S. A. Chant 🏳️‍⚧️ is writing sword & sorcery
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essaychant.bsky.social
S. A. Chant 🏳️‍⚧️ is writing sword & sorcery
@essaychant.bsky.social
2.5K followers 400 following 970 posts
Author & transsexual menace. He/they.

Find my books on my website: https://austinchant.com/
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essaychant.bsky.social
Found a Borders receipt from 1999 in this book 🫡 remember the fallen
A copy of In Cold Blood by Truman Capote with a Borders receipt, dated May 1999, sitting on top
November 7, 2025 at 5:26 PM
essaychant.bsky.social
First book I've finished in a long time and MY GOD was it hard. I've had to drag myself out of years of perfectionism and depression hell to get back to a real writing practice but I can feel it taking shape again and it feels really good.
A word document cropped so just the words "The End" are visible.
November 2, 2025 at 8:34 PM
essaychant.bsky.social
I'm reading through the Morgaine Cycle books and really enjoying them - lovely, indulgent prose, a tragic but overwhelmingly cool heroine, and weird, fucked up worldbuilding. And look at this gorgeous Whelan cover!
A copy of Well of Shiuan by C. J. Cherryh, the cover featuring a woman on horseback wielding a cool sword
November 2, 2025 at 4:07 PM
essaychant.bsky.social
stormy day at rialto beach
A shot of the ocean off the Washington coast with James Island in the background. A seagull is flying overhead. The waves are tall, and the water is so foamy it's almost pure white. Seafoam flying from a pile of logs as they get slammed by a big wave
October 20, 2025 at 7:03 PM
essaychant.bsky.social
visited the hall of mosses in the hoh rainforest this weekend
A gigantic moss-covered tree surrounded by evergreen and autumn foliage Close-up on a weird knotted log covered in moss A tree with branches draped in giant manes of moss Close up on some cute fuzzy moss
October 20, 2025 at 6:59 PM
essaychant.bsky.social
omg I just got a surprise KJ arc in the mail, today is ✨blessed✨

(the book is already out, you should go get it)
An advance reader's copy of All of Us Murderers by KJ Charles
October 9, 2025 at 5:35 PM
essaychant.bsky.social
A VERY VERY happy book birthday to my best bud @keezyyoung.bsky.social and Hello Sunshine!! I'm overjoyed to finally have this gorgeous book in my hands and can't wait for it to make me cry FOR THE UMPTEENTH TIME. Read it. It will knock your socks off.
A paperback copy of Hello Sunshine by Keezy Young
September 23, 2025 at 9:57 PM
essaychant.bsky.social
anyway castle rat is incredible and you should go see them live if you have the chance. all hail the rat queen
A blurry photo of the Rat Queen from Castle Rat performing onstage, a sword in one hand and a magic book in the other.
September 17, 2025 at 6:48 PM
essaychant.bsky.social
FYI: the Rainbow Crate edition of Peter Darling is available in their shop now as an individual book 🏴‍☠️
rainbowcratebookbox.com/products/pet...
The cover of the Rainbow Crate special edition of Peter Darling by S. A. Chant
September 9, 2025 at 6:44 PM
essaychant.bsky.social
I DID IT: got a blackout on SPL reading bingo for the first time ✊
A completed bingo card for the Seattle Public Library's 2025 Summer Reading Program.
September 1, 2025 at 5:39 PM
essaychant.bsky.social
Having an extremely weird problem with Word where as I'm typing, the text will suddenly turn to gobbledygook like this. If I copy and paste it elsewhere, the text shows up normally, but it usually won't go back to normal within the document. Is my computer possessed?
A bunch of weird random characters where a normal paragraph should be in Word
August 29, 2025 at 8:15 PM
essaychant.bsky.social
who wants to see pics of the FANCY ILLUSTRATED EDITION OF PETER DARLING by @rainbowcrate.bsky.social !!

Dust jacket + edges by @olyfrogg.bsky.social
Endpapers by @mspencerdraws.bsky.social
Hardcase by @nong247.bsky.social
The special edition cover of Peter Darling by S. A. Chant, featuring a moment of homoerotic swordplay between Peter and Hook. Peter's dagger is under Hook's chin and Hook's claw is held up to Peter's face and they are smiling at each other. The endpaper illustration for the special edition of Peter Darling, a colorful watercolor spread. It shows Peter sitting on a mossy tree with a knife and Tinker Bell by his side, looking out over a beautiful vista of Neverland while Hook, in his cabin, smokes and plays piano with his luscious chest hair out. The special edition hardcase, which is white with a black ink illustration with gold foil accents of a tallship being ripped apart by the tendrils of a kraken. The back of the hardcase, showing the quote "Dreamers are always welcome here, whatever their reasons." in an elaborate gilt frame.
August 25, 2025 at 6:43 PM
essaychant.bsky.social
citation needed because it was also, historically, Leslie Feinberg's Transgender Warriors and Transgender Liberation, both of which specifically align transgender identity with class solidarity and working class queer politics
Quote from the article Reject Transgender Liberalism by Jules Gill-Peterson: "The transgender position was, historically, invented by people who deliberately declined to transition so that they could conserve their jobs, marriages, private wealth, and social status."
July 22, 2025 at 3:01 PM
essaychant.bsky.social
learned to bedazzle so I could bedazzle a life-size anatomical heart in her favorite colors
A purple and white bedazzled heart The bottom of the heart, showing off the details of the veins, which are bedazzled in silver
July 11, 2025 at 2:36 AM
essaychant.bsky.social
a contract is a fucking contract!! if you put in a contract that you owe somebody royalties on a quarterly basis, nobody cares if it's your "passion project"!! you are still legally bound by the terms you agreed to! god!!
A quote from the linked article, from Avi Ehrlich: "“A lot of the earlier contracts said that royalties would be quarterly. And the truth is that I started this out as a passion project in my bedroom and kitchen, and I never dreamed that it would grow to there being over a hundred releases. ... And as things grew and as I kept on spending a lot of money out of pocket and time and energy to make these better systems, it just got to be a tremendous amount of labor.""
July 1, 2025 at 6:16 PM
essaychant.bsky.social
dude why are indie publishers like this
A quote from the linked article: "Traditionally, a royalty refers to a percentage paid to an author based on the retail or wholesale price of a book. The Silver Sprocket contracts in question do not entail royalties of this kind, but rather what might be called a profit-share model in which profits, usually defined as the amount of money left after expenses such as printing are recouped, are split between the author and publisher. Ehrlich, however, says that they did not know the term was used differently from the way they employed it. "I was not aware of the word 'royalty' having the very specific meaning you're describing," they said. "You could be right, this is the first I'm hearing of it. Substituting the word 'royalty' for 'artist payment' or 'artist commission' doesn't change what these payments are.""
July 1, 2025 at 6:10 PM
essaychant.bsky.social
incredible passage from Conan the Conqueror
A page from "Conan the Conqueror" (1935) in which Conan's advisor tells him that only he can unite the barons of his kingdom, with the following passage highlighted: "You were the cord that held the fagots together. When the cord was cut, the fagots fell apart."
June 27, 2025 at 10:04 PM
essaychant.bsky.social
The guilt-tripping I am receiving rn
My fluffy white cat Mercy, sitting inside my halfway-packed suitcase and looking sadly at the camera as she begs me to take her with me
June 13, 2025 at 8:35 PM
essaychant.bsky.social
BLESSED AGAIN AT THE USED BOOK STORE
1960s editions! Look at those sprayed edges!!!!
A stack of five 1960s Conan the Barbarian books. On top of the stack is Conan the Usurper, featuring a shirtless Conan chained to the ground in front of a giant serpent. The same stack of Conan books, rotated to show that they all have vibrantly purple sprayed edges
June 12, 2025 at 9:48 PM
essaychant.bsky.social
For my sword and sorcery folks: I found a TREASURE at the used book store today
A 1960s copy of Jirel of Joiry by C. L. Moore, featuring the titular heroine with flowing crimson locks and very cool but very impractical plate armor, surrounded by a herd of spooky white horses.
June 9, 2025 at 11:46 PM
essaychant.bsky.social
This is one of my first linocuts and I'm still so pleased with it. Doing some fresh prints for a market next weekend :>
Linocut prints of a black hole surrounded by an accretion disk in the middle of slurping up a star
May 31, 2025 at 4:20 PM
essaychant.bsky.social
Workin' on a little guy with a message
A linoleum block with a colored sketch of a pigeon with a tiny love letter in its beak and some carving notes scribbled on it
May 30, 2025 at 10:38 PM
essaychant.bsky.social
little buddy snackin'
A bumblebee drinking sugar water on a leaf
May 21, 2025 at 6:09 PM
essaychant.bsky.social
please admire this unhinged 90s copy of Hexwood I had to buy immediately
A 1996 Penguin edition of Hexwood by Diana Wynne Jones featuring a cgi-looking... head? growing from a stump? with a fire-breathing dragon coiled around it
May 21, 2025 at 3:09 PM
essaychant.bsky.social
Take the fictional characters quiz and post the first four you know: openpsychometrics.org/tests/charac...

dare I say this is a transmasculine mood
Wash from Firefly Remy the rat from Ratatouille Jack from Titanic Lumiere the gay candlestick from Beauty and the Beast
May 17, 2025 at 9:26 PM