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Ryan T. Pozzi

@ryantpozzi.bsky.social

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Ryan T. Pozzi @ryantpozzi.bsky.social · 15h

Life on the Midlist lands in Inboxes later today. I try to sort out why traditional publishing persists when the benefits look murky: advances as risk transfer, prestige as access, and infrastructure indie still can't fully replace, but is it enough? Subscribe: ryantpozzi.com/midlist

Life on the Midlist | Discover Realities of Traditional Publishing — Ryan T. Pozzi

Explore authentic stories from a midlist author about publishing, querying, and the truths behind making it in the book industry, delivered every Tuesday.

ryantpozzi.com

Ryan T. Pozzi @ryantpozzi.bsky.social · 3h

On This Day in History: October 14, 1986
Elie Wiesel, author of 57 books, including Night, which is based on his experiences in concentration camps, received the Nobel Peace Prize for bearing witness to the Holocaust and pressing the world to resist indifference.

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Ryan T. Pozzi @ryantpozzi.bsky.social · 4h

Attention. Can I have your attention, please?

I want to be more like Cookie Monster in my everyday life.

That is all. #goals

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Ryan T. Pozzi @ryantpozzi.bsky.social · 6h

On This Day in History: October 14, 1926
A. A. Milne released Winnie-the-Pooh, with E. H. Shepard’s drawings, gathering the Hundred Acre Wood and its friendships into a single volume. A gentle book about loyalty and play that proves the everlasting value of small kindnesses.

1st edition cover for Winnie-the-Pooh (book)

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Reposted by Ryan T. Pozzi

A lone ghost 👻 @a-lone-ghost.bsky.social · 15h

#newcomic
Did you mean exercise
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#ALoneGhost #ComicSky #GhostComic #HalloweenVibes #SpookySeason #IndieArt
#AutumnAesthetic #GhostVibes #SoftHorror #FallComics #Ghostie

Two panel comic
Panel 1: ghost floating down a hall. “Time to…”
Panel 2: ghost looking super scary in a glowing circle surrounded by candles and a water tumbler while holding a dumbbell. “Exorcise!”

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Ryan T. Pozzi @ryantpozzi.bsky.social · 13h

On This Day in History: October 14, 1892
Arthur Conan Doyle published The Adventures of Sherlock Holmes, twelve Strand stories gathered in one volume with Sidney Paget’s illustrations. The book cemented Holmes and Watson in the culture and set the template for the modern detective.

Holmes (right) and Watson in a Sidney Paget illustration for "The Adventure of Silver Blaze"

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Ryan T. Pozzi @ryantpozzi.bsky.social · 15h

Life on the Midlist | Discover Realities of Traditional Publishing — Ryan T. Pozzi

Explore authentic stories from a midlist author about publishing, querying, and the truths behind making it in the book industry, delivered every Tuesday.

ryantpozzi.com

Ryan T. Pozzi @ryantpozzi.bsky.social · 1d

On This Day in History: Today
Today marks the 233rd celebration of Columbus Day and the 33rd celebration of Indigenous Peoples' Day.

If, like the US President, you're still on the wrong side here, congrats! You've chosen to celebrate a man who ordered amputations, forced labor, and sexual assault.

Indigenous Peoples' Day celebration in Berkeley, California, 2012

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Ryan T. Pozzi @ryantpozzi.bsky.social · 1d

Mutual Monday
Meet @philipardagh.bsky.social, award-winning children’s author behind the Eddie Dickens adventures and Grubtown Tales. His Stinking Rich and Just Plain Stinky won the Roald Dahl Funny Prize, and he co-wrote High in the Clouds with Paul McCartney so his resume > our collective resumes.

Ryan T. Pozzi @ryantpozzi.bsky.social · 1d

TIL that on the day of my wedding, eight years ago today, 83 bears on Sakhalin Island, Eastern Russia mobbed and killed two fishermen.

I swear these events are not related.

Also, the bears were starving on the island due to overfishing of nearby waters, so I ain't mad that they got two back.

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Ryan T. Pozzi @ryantpozzi.bsky.social · 2d

You're right. That's apparently the biggest of the three groups. Can't believe I forgot them.

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Ryan T. Pozzi @ryantpozzi.bsky.social · 2d

So this shutdown is the rich people who won't be affected and want to keep the broken private insurance system as-is vs the rich people who won't be affected and want to make the broken private insurance system do less and cost more. Have I got that about right?

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Ryan T. Pozzi @ryantpozzi.bsky.social · 2d

Damn. I was hoping it wasn't a typo bc you were distantly related.

Ryan T. Pozzi @ryantpozzi.bsky.social · 2d

On This Day in History: October 12, 2024
Researchers reveal DNA findings that cast Columbus as Spanish, likely from Valencia, with Sephardic Jewish ancestry, not Italian from Genoa as he long claimed. I'm not a fan, and given how fiercely some cling to the Italian-hero myth, the irony writes itself.

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Ryan T. Pozzi @ryantpozzi.bsky.social · 2d

On This Day in History: October 12, 1859
Joshua Abraham Norton, a San Francisco businessman turned folk monarch, declared himself Emperor Norton I and issued an edict abolishing the U.S. Congress. Satire, sure, but maybe he was onto something?

Emperor Norton in full dress uniform and military regalia, his hand on the hilt of a ceremonial sabre, c. 1875

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Ryan T. Pozzi @ryantpozzi.bsky.social · 2d

✉︎ Postcards from the Mess ✉︎
Goya is not décor. He's a witness you have to meet on his terms. Look. Really look. Stand there until the image stops being art and starts being evidence.

The Third of May 1808, 1814. Oil on canvas, 266 cm × 345 cm (105 in × 136 in). Museo del Prado, Madrid

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Ryan T. Pozzi @ryantpozzi.bsky.social · 3d

On This Day in History: October 11, 1987
Two hundred thousand marched in Washington for lesbian and gay civil rights. The AIDS Memorial Quilt was displayed on the National Mall for the first time, and the day helped seed National Coming Out Day.

Picture of the AIDS quilt in front of the Washington Monument

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Ryan T. Pozzi @ryantpozzi.bsky.social · 3d

On This Day in History: October 11, 1981
Then unknown, Prince opened for the Rolling Stones at the Los Angeles Memorial Coliseum and faced a hostile crowd that booed and pelted him. He left the bill soon after.

Humiliation that weekend; “1999” and “Purple Rain” not long after.

Prince performing at the Los Angeles Memorial Coliseum

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Ryan T. Pozzi @ryantpozzi.bsky.social · 3d

On This Day in History: October 11, 1975
NBC premiered Saturday Night Live, created by Lorne Michaels, with George Carlin hosting and Janis Ian and Billy Preston as musical guests. The Not Ready for Prime Time Players, Chase, Belushi, Aykroyd, Radner, Curtin, Morris, and Newman, set the tone.

The original 1975 cast, from left to right: Laraine Newman, John Belushi, Jane Curtin, Gilda Radner, Dan Aykroyd, Garrett Morris, and Chevy Chase

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Ryan T. Pozzi @ryantpozzi.bsky.social · 3d

On This Day in History: October 11, 1967
Yoko Ono opened her Half-a-Wind show, known as Yoko Plus Me, at London’s Lisson Gallery, with Half-A-Room, everyday objects cut in half and painted white. John Lennon quietly backed the show. We are definitely a Yoko house.

Ryan T. Pozzi @ryantpozzi.bsky.social · 3d

On This Day in History: October 11, 1924
Paris opened the Bureau of Surrealist Research at 15 Rue de Grenelle, with Antonin Artaud as director. A walk-in lab for the irrational, it invited the public to bring dreams and strange encounters, days before Breton’s first Surrealist Manifesto.

The original Bureau of Surrealist Research, photo courtesy of Grace Mvg DM

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Ryan T. Pozzi @ryantpozzi.bsky.social · 3d

Genius is Complicated: Francisco Goya

Court favorite and witness in the same body. He painted saints and butchers with the same eye, royalty and prisoners under the same light. He served a king he despised. Genius here isn't charm, it's stamina for truth, and that bill always comes due.

The Sleep of Reason Produces Monsters, c. 1797, 21.5 cm × 15 cm (8+1⁄2 in × 5+7⁄8 in)

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Ryan T. Pozzi @ryantpozzi.bsky.social · 4d

On This Day in History: October 10, 2014
Malala Yousafzai, 17, won the Nobel Peace Prize, the youngest laureate in history, sharing it with Kailash Satyarthi for defending the right to education. Shot at 15 for going to school, she challenged every government to treat girls’ learning as vital.

Malala Yousafzai at the 2023 Nelson Mandela Annual Lecture

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Ryan T. Pozzi @ryantpozzi.bsky.social · 4d

On This Day in History: October 10
Birthdays: 1917 Thelonious Monk, pianist and composer of “Round Midnight”; 1930 Harold Pinter, Nobel-winning playwright of The Homecoming and Betrayal. A wild pairing of syncopation and silence that rewired the century.

Ryan T. Pozzi @ryantpozzi.bsky.social · 4d

Quote from the Francisco Goya chapter of The Mess That Made Them by Ryan T. Pozzi

Ryan T. Pozzi @ryantpozzi.bsky.social · 5d

I didn't assume anybody DIDN'T know that. I could just foresee folks coming for me for promoting this as a sales technique instead of as a chatty conversation I was having with my wife.

I find that sometimes preemptive clarification saves me some angry messages. I too sensitive for angry messages.