Erotica, fantasy, and horror writer.
Knickerbockers, tam o’ shanters, farthingales, liripipes… who wears these things anymore? But even if we don’t, we remember them because of their odd and lyrical names. Here’s a list of more you probably haven’t heard of (because I randomgenned them up) but will remember once you hear them. So will readers and campaigners. Use at …
A piece of street art in Brazil. You dig?
I saw her at the edge of the cliff, dancing with her arms extended, fingers grasped, to form a perfect ring. “What are you doing?” I said. “I’m dancing with my husband before I join him on the bottom.”
Contrary to what you may have heard, the Tarot was not created for telling fortunes. It was instead a cousin of the regular playing card deck used throughout the Western world. Tarot cards date from 15th century Europe and are still used in the present day to play games such as the Italian Tarocchini. Note …
Modern witches design their huts differently to attract small children.
In my art classes I was taught that the way to create a good caricature, whether for a political cartoon or MAD magazine parody, was to exaggerate the two or three most distinctive features of a subject’s face, because that is what the human eye takes in first. Such a depiction is grotesque, yet instantly …
Were they being created, or destroyed? Punished, or enhanced? Monitored, or forgotten? They look caught in motion, yet perhaps the liquid medium just holds them in stasis. Don’t ask the worker at the lower right. He’s just doing his job.
Every Heart a Doorway by Seanan McGuire Tor Books, 2016 Every Heart a Doorway is a book that spans genres. It’s part YA, part horror, part old-timey Portal fantasy, and part magical boarding school fantasy, with a dollop of LGBTQ. It’s disturbing, in ways both unintentional and obvious. It won a Nebula award, yet could …
The Absolutely True Diary of a Part-Time Indian by Sherman Alexie Little, Brown & Co., 2017 (10th Anniversary Edition) [Challenge # 5: A book by a local author.] The Absolutely True Diary of a Part-Time Indian is a semi-mythic coming of age story of a Native American boy’s freshman year. Arnold Spirit Jr. lives on …
It’s Halloween. And what better way to celebrate than by visiting a spooky old mansion? Old castles, manses, and abbeys are a mainstay of Gothic literature. Manderlay, in Daphne du Maurier’s Rebecca, is practically its own character, along with its housekeeper. And who can forget “The Great House of Collinwood” mentioned at the beginning …