Words-ish Katamari
@cyballard.bsky.social
CY Ballard. Speculative fiction author. Find my work through www.cyballard.com. Collector of cosmic mysteries over at www.cosmicmystery.club (Also video games, weaving, and things I find on the ground)
Listen to me and many others talk about their Readercon experience!
Matthew Kressel@matthewkressel.net · 2w agoWhat's this?! A new NERD COUNT PODCAST episode!? Mercurio and I come to you live from (and on the way to!) the Readercon convention in Burlington, MA, where we interview these ten amazing people about their past and present Readercon experiences and more! Podcast link in thread.
Digital chapbooks of the work produced by the Reimagining Public Goods workshop are now up on the ASU CSI website: csi.asu.edu/public-goods... (Including my vignette on food) (Lovely illustrations by Donovan Beeson)
I rewatched (almost) all of True Detective so I could write this article for you about Horror/Mystery mashups on @darkertimes.bsky.social. Many more examples inside, complete with dorky categorization. www.darkertimes.com/spooky-proce...
Spooky Procedurals: A Taxonomy
The horror-mystery mashup will never be defeated.
darkertimes.com
And at home at the Cosmic Mystery Club, a little about Star Trek, curiosity, and cosmic horror: www.cosmicmystery.club/p/death-and-...
Death and Curiosity Aboard the USS Enterprise
"...our existence is part of a reality beyond what we understand now as reality."
cosmicmystery.club
This month I wrote about gardens and community in the video game Mutazione over at Imaginary Papers: mailchi.mp/asu.edu/imag...
Imaginary Papers, Issue 26
A quarterly newsletter about science fiction worldbuilding, futures thinking, and the imagination. In this issue: gardens after catastrophe in the game "Mutazione," pondering Isaac Asimov's Three Laws...
mailchi.mp
Swim, sea pig, swim! @echinoblog.bsky.social says this smooth swimmer, fr #ArgentinianDeepSeeps (2864m) belongs to family Elpidiidae, genus Peniagone. The urchin is an Echinothurioid, aka pancake urchin, w/cute "booties" on their spines around the bottom fringe for "walking" on soft sediments.
I wrote a little about my mysterious faves from Steam Next Fest: Burden Street Station, HYPNOS, Nocturne for Cyl-Hestia, and Woodrot (plus Titanium Court)
Oops! All Minute Mysteries (Steam Next Fest Edition)
Memories and dreams in Burden Street Station, HYPNOS, Nocturne for Cyl-Hestia, and Woodrot
cosmicmystery.club
Paranormasight: The Mermaid's Curse screencaps that resonate with me, pt 1 / ?
This is somehow the most haunting bit of in-game lore I have ever read.
Jacob Geller@jacobgeller.com · 5mo agoHere is a little bit of @duncanfyfe.net's afterword for "How Can We Bear to Throw Anything Away?"
Thinking about this quote from Persepolis creator Marjane Satrapi again.
This month I wrote a little about cult fave tv show Lodge 49 and how it resonated with my own search for weird mysteries: www.cosmicmystery.club/p/a-cosmic-m...
A Cosmic Mystery About Seeking Cosmic Mysteries
How to find a cosmic mystery, Lodge 49, and what to do with unresolved endings
cosmicmystery.club
I’m sorry but that dog is a Cassette Beast, it should be at the train station fighting cosmic horrors with the power of friendship and impeccable jams
Serebii.net@serebii.bsky.social · 5mo agoSerebii Update: The new starter Pokémon have been revealedL Browt Pombon and Gecqua serebii.net
writing an intro is a duel between two urges. one tells me I have a very narrow window of opportunity to hook a reader and so I should be compact, punchy, and informative. the other urge I lovingly call "my bullshit"
In anticipation of part 2 I went back and checked out some of the paths untaken and I’m good actually thanks
Words-ish Katamari@cyballard.bsky.social · 6mo agoIt’s so hard for me to think about anything besides @blacktabbygames.com's Scarlet Hollow right now. I've been playing a benign haunted weirdo from the start and thank you Chapter 5 part 1 for rewarding my terrible decisions. Pretty sure it's going to end so badly for me I'm so ready
It’s so hard for me to think about anything besides @blacktabbygames.com's Scarlet Hollow right now. I've been playing a benign haunted weirdo from the start and thank you Chapter 5 part 1 for rewarding my terrible decisions. Pretty sure it's going to end so badly for me I'm so ready
The overwhelming urge to set aside my Story About The Fascism to rewrite ‘At the Mountains of Madness’ and set it in the snowed-in Bass Pro Shop Pyramid
Nature valentines. This comic is now available as a set of 6 Valentines cards: topatoco.com/collections/...
Reminder for everyone operating at situationally-diminished capacity.
This green flower dress (the most often re-used dress in #StarTrek history) was originally created for Alsia, played by K Callan in #StarTrekDS9's "Rivals". Look how much fun she has wearing it! 😊 I'm going to list all the re-uses of this dress here, including weird appearances and bloopers.🧵 1/11
The survey is open to non-members (I am not one) and to readers (who here is not &c.) so I encourage you to share your feelings on the matter. Don't assume that everyone already understands that AI is bad or why! I mean, people *should*, but you could say that about a lot of things.
Science Fiction and Fantasy Writers Association@sfwa.bsky.social · 8mo agoSFWA members and general SFF community: In this press release, our Board of Directors apologizes for recent events. Feedback from writers is strongly welcomed in the survey. SFWA Members: Write to office@sfwa.org to support our Emerging Tech Committee. www.sfwa.org/2025/12/22/p...
This week I wrote a little about how Paradise Killer’s art direction puts players in the mind of the sleuth in Kaizen Game Works’ 2020 murder mystery game. Featuring hard questions from fish ghosts, getting lost in paradise, and various Knives: www.cosmicmystery.club/p/love-dies-...
Love Dies in Empty Paradise
"The day starts with a warm sun enveloping our lives in hope before bleaching the world clean under its scorching gaze."
cosmicmystery.club
FATHER JUD will return in CONCLAVE: THE NEXT GENERATION
I've seen some people saying that the new SFWA rule on "AI" in the Nebulas will prevent people from being transparent about their LLM use. Newsflash: They wouldn't have been anyway. It would cost them readers. It would cost them votes. It would potentially cost them opportunities with publishers.
