iiinova — where your digital self keeps evolving

Alexander Chee @alexanderchee.bsky.social · 04/10/2026

Zoe asked me to collaborate with her on imagining a part of Lee’s story implied by the classic American novel but not described by it. An assignment unlike any other. It was a thrill to see Hoon Lee bring it to life.

A screen still of Hoon Lee as Lee, the cook, in Eaat of Eden.

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Alexander Chee @alexanderchee.bsky.social · 04/10/2026

This was wild to see. My first time writing for the screen. My thanks to Zoe Kazan for inviting me on this journey back in 2023, and my agent Jason Richman and everyone at @unitedtalentagency.bsky.social for their work on my behalf.

“Written for Television by ZOE KAZAN & ALEXANDER CHEE” in white letters against the black tv screen.

A tv still of Mike Faist, Christopher Abbott and Florence Pugh. White text in a San serif font reads “This East of Eden, adapted primarily by Zoe Kazan-Alexander Chee co-wrote a key midseason episode-with Garth Davis directing, is rich, morally complex and packed with memorable performances."
Daniel Fienberg
The Hollywood Reporter

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Alexander Chee @alexanderchee.bsky.social · 28/09/2026

Stupid, craven, evil. www.nytimes.com/2026/09/27/u...

President Trump has asked Xi Jinping, the leader of China, whether he would like to buy American weapons, David Perdue, the American ambassador to China, said in a television interview on Sunday.
"President Trump continues to say,
'Hey, we sell arms to other people around the world, " Mr. Perdue said on "Fox News Sunday" while discussing the state visit by Mr. Xi to Washington last week. "He actually asked President Xi would he like to buy some at one point."

Mr. Trump has been withholding a $14 billion sale of weapons to Taiwan, even though the U.S. government has been required by law since 1979 to send arms of a defensive nature to the island. The latest arms package was put together by State Department officials and was approved by congressional leaders early this year, but has since languished at the department, The New York Times reported.

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Alexander Chee @alexanderchee.bsky.social · 26/09/2026

Rangeley, Maine, about 10 years ago.

A swirl of clouds at sunset over a lake, looking like a bird near the water and the trees at the photo’s bottom edge.

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Alexander Chee @alexanderchee.bsky.social · 25/09/2026

Last night at Hawthornden Castle near Edinburgh. I revised 335 pages of my new novel here this month. I’m so grateful to the Hawthornden Foundation for this time and support.

A castle courtyard. The yard is dominated by a stone well; lined with benches and roses. A stone gate house is in the distance, topped with a jaunty flag.

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Alexander Chee @alexanderchee.bsky.social · 23/09/2026

Another moon walk, by which I mean we walk out of the forest where I’m staying in Scotland so we can see the moon.

A triangle of clouds at night surrounds the waxing moon above a meadow and a town past the meadow. A faint rainbow moondog surrounds the moon.

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Alexander Chee @alexanderchee.bsky.social · 22/09/2026

Moongazing in a field in Scotland at night. Hello from Roswell, near Edinburgh.

A waxing moon peeking out from under a blanket of clouds, framed by trees and some lights from the town in the distance.

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Alexander Chee @alexanderchee.bsky.social · 17/09/2026

He didn’t think we’d live to be 59, couldn’t imagine gay marriage or that we’d have a husband, and was often told he couldn’t be an out gay writer. He‘d be a little sad about our hair. But I live the life he fought for.

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Alexander Chee @alexanderchee.bsky.social · 17/09/2026

An old friend who rarely recommends books to me texted me, urging me to read this, so here we go.

Taiwan
Travelogue
Yáng Shuang-zi
1 "Hold on. What's going on here?" " I couldn't help but voice the thought out loud. 1 For, in that moment. I seemed to have been transported back into the midst of Shokyokusai Tenkatsu's Magic Troupe. 1
Translated by Lin King Winner of the 2026 International
Booker Prize

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Alexander Chee @alexanderchee.bsky.social · 17/09/2026

Photo with alt text this time, a screenshot of the Harvard Wikipedia entry:

Academic staff
~2,400 faculty members (and
>10,400 academic appointments in affiliated teaching hospitals) 18]
Students
21,189 (fall 2024)191
Undergraduates
7,038 (fall 2024)[9]
Postgraduates
14,151 (fall 2024) 9]
Location
Cambridge, Massachusetts, US 42°22'28"N
71°07'01"W
CITATION
[9] "Common Data Set 2024-2025" tr
(PDF).
Office of Institutional Research. Harvard University. Archived from the original• (PDF) on July 18, 2025. Retrieved July 18, 2025.

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Alexander Chee @alexanderchee.bsky.social · 17/09/2026

So, max budget of about 85 million a month? I’m going back to bed.

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Alexander Chee @alexanderchee.bsky.social · 09/09/2026

This was one of the novels I was struggling to recall yesterday. Charlie Porter’s Nova Scotia House. He wrote about it here: i-d.co/article/char...

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Alexander Chee @alexanderchee.bsky.social · 06/09/2026

At Hawthornden Castle for the month for a residency and found this on the shelves: the 1957 20th printing cover of the movie promo edition of Lucky Jim.

A black and white cinema still of a young white woman with long black hair embracing a white man with dark side parted hair and glasses looking agonizingly at the camera adorns the 1957 20th printing cover of the movie promo edition of Lucky Jim. The cover is yellow with red letters. The text reads
Lucky Jim
Amis’s famous novel! Now a hilarious film!

Spine of this edition reads Lucky Jim * Kingsley Amis VG Gollancz

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Alexander Chee @alexanderchee.bsky.social · 05/09/2026

Ramzi is raising money still to feed his family, which is good in a way because it means they’re still alive in Gaza. Please join me in helping them if you can. chuffed.org/project/1319...

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Alexander Chee @alexanderchee.bsky.social · 05/09/2026

I’m celebrating the 25th anniversary of my debut novel Edinburgh this fall with a new Mariner Classics edition (intro by @garthgreenwell.bsky.social) on Oct. 13th at the Center for Fiction with Brandon Taylor, @mirajacob.bsky.social and @rokwon.bsky.social. centerforfiction.org/event/edinbu...

A dark green book jacket with a wooden fox head at the center. Text is in white and reads: "ONE
OF THE
GREAT QUEER NOVELS •
- BRANDON TAYLOR, GQ
0 F
OUR
TIME."
EDINBURGH
25TH ANNIVERSARY EDITION
ALEXANDER CHEE
BESTSELLING AUTHOR OF THE QUEEN OF THE NIGHT

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Alexander Chee @alexanderchee.bsky.social · 04/09/2026

They got me, I am indeed from Maine. Interesting to see Northern California was my second place, even though I lived there just for two years. mydialect.us/quiz-standar...

Your dialect map

Redder areas talk more like you, blue areas least. You talk most like someone from Maine – about 51% of your answers match a typical resident.

My dialect – standard

Save map as PNG
Cities most & least like you
Interpolated from the nearest survey responses.
MOST SIMILAR
LEAST SIMILAR
1. Portland, ME (50%)
1. Oklahoma City, OK
2. Boston, MA (49%)
(45%)
3. San Francisco, CA
2. Dallas, TX (45%)
(49%)
3. New Orleans, LA (45%)

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Alexander Chee @alexanderchee.bsky.social · 29/08/2026

Ramzi is raising money to feed his family in Gaza, they need 145€ more to make it work this week. chuffed.org/project/1319...

Ramzi and his mother, father and brother, standing in their tent.

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Alexander Chee @alexanderchee.bsky.social · 11/08/2026

A former student just abruptly said as she appeared next to me on the side walk, “I loved Clam Down! Best thing I read that year! Thank you!” So let me recommend it again now to all of you.

A pale green book cover of a woman engulfed by a red clam shell, her arms and legs sticking out of it. Text reads "An exploration of the clam state of mind, and the benefits and great costs of shutting oneself off from others." —The New York Times Book Review
CLAM DOWN
A METAMORPHOSIS
ANELISE CHEN

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Alexander Chee @alexanderchee.bsky.social · 10/08/2026

Was reading the new @vqr.bsky.social and fell for this story “Western,” by Owen Park. Seems to be his debut. I’m excited for whatever he writes next. www.vqronline.org/spring-2026/...

Thinking about him now, I realize Juho spent most of his time trying to tell me something. Our communication tended to fail us in important ways. It was mainly my fault.
We were forever running into these little word-to-word problems. We had one in our first conversation after he got out of jail, when I visited his new apartment and he explained to me the latest method he'd discovered for making money.

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Alexander Chee @alexanderchee.bsky.social · 06/08/2026

My mother’s wedding portrait, her in the dress she made. The Home Economics Teacher Ultimate Challenge.

My mother’s portrait. She is blond white woman in a white wedding dress with a veil, lace sleeves, and a bouquet of white roses.

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Alexander Chee @alexanderchee.bsky.social · 05/08/2026

My sister’s cat and I have a deal that every so often when I visit she sits there in the sink and I turn on the tap just a trickle. She does not otherwise address me.

A long hair Maine coon cat sits in a steel sink as a trickle of water falls from the tap.

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Alexander Chee @alexanderchee.bsky.social · 05/08/2026

Ramzi is unwell now and needs funds for medical attention there in Gaza if you can help. chuffed.org/project/1319...

Two little boys blowing kisses beside a young man with a mustache and goatee holding his fingers in a peace sign.

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Alexander Chee @alexanderchee.bsky.social · 30/07/2026

While helping my mom move I found this photo of me and it might be the best photo of me to exist, ever. Husband calls this The Brown Ensemble.

A six year old me, mixed Korean, looking like I’m the most excited gay child of all time. I’m wearing a brown turtleneck cardigan with a cream collar and brown buttons straight up the front, brown and white patterned pants. Someone has done my hair wrong but I don’t know it yet. I’m just really happy.

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Alexander Chee @alexanderchee.bsky.social · 27/07/2026

Ramzi with two of his nephews that he is raising money to feed there in Gaza. chuffed.org/project/1319...

Ramzi, a young man with brown hair and a goatee, holds up his fingers in a peace symbol. His two nephews beside him blow kisses though in the screenshot they look to be covering their mouths.

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Alexander Chee @alexanderchee.bsky.social · 25/07/2026

Found the lead D&D figurines my brother and I used to paint back in the 1980s.

Shoebox full of D&D characters in a turmoil.

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Alexander Chee @alexanderchee.bsky.social · 22/07/2026

But I was told this was alarmist thinking based on over exaggerated math.

Somewhere in Henrico County, Virginia, a teacher is being asked to shut down a computer at night so the county can shave a few bucks off its electric bill. Meanwhile, 37 data centers hum along across roughly 2700 acres of county land, each one drinking power at a scale that makes your home energy use look like a nightlife — a demand surge accelerated by projects like the Stargate project. On June 26, county manager John Vithoulkas emailed thousands of employees, including staff—with the news: electricity rates jump 25% on July 1, adding 5 million in annual costs. His fix? “Collectively make small adjustments.”
The math nobody did out loud
Data
Centers now drive the majority of electricity price increases in your region and your bill reflects it.

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Alexander Chee @alexanderchee.bsky.social · 16/07/2026

In Ptown and Melissa Febos gave me this, for my fan dancing bear era—my biggest fan to date. And yes, I can snap it.

Me, a man in his 50s, short dark hair and a salt and pepper beard, wearing a red t-shirt and holding a black fan wider than me with white letters that spells DADDY.

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Alexander Chee @alexanderchee.bsky.social · 07/07/2026

“Cliff Jensen, a business agent for the Steamfitters Local 638 Union” and a real poet, too.

Cliff Jensen, a business agent for the Steamfitters Local 638 Union, said fitters were evacuated after the beams started to bend.
"The north side of that building is crumbling" he said.
"I-beams are
bending like cigarettes in there." The developers and authorities did not say what had caused the damage, and Mr. Jensen's claim could not be immediately confirmed.

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Alexander Chee @alexanderchee.bsky.social · 07/07/2026

My sister in law sent us this present today, which seems to be a card illustration from a David Bowie Tarot deck. Please let me know if you recognize it.

A painted tin Tarot card of The Star, with a young man who looks like Bowie in knee high boots and a striped shirt. He holds a bucket or cauldron, upside down, water is pouring from it as if it is the dregs. A yellow star shines brightly behind him.

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Alexander Chee @alexanderchee.bsky.social · 05/07/2026

Have you read Deborah Eisenberg’s first short story, “Days”? An excerpt from the beginning:

THE COLLECTED STORIES OF DE...

Days

I had never known what I was like until I stopped smoking, by which time there was hell to pay for it. When the haze cleared over the charred landscape, the person I had always assumed to be behind the smoke was revealed to be a tinny weights-and-balances apparatus, rapidly disassembling on contact with oxygen.

The First Two Weeks
I lie on the floor and howl with grief. A friend tells me, "During the third week it will occur to you that you're insane, and you'll think, Well, now I'm insane.

What difference does it make whether I smoke or not? This is a trick to get you to smoke."

The Third Week

I am insane, but I am determined to wait it out.

Today I bump into someone crossing the street. I begin an apology, but when he tells me to watch where I am going in a tone I consider unnecessarily con-demning, I seize him by the lapels. For an instant we look at each other. Then I release him back into the surge of pedestrians and continue on, stiff with fear.

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Alexander Chee @alexanderchee.bsky.social · 02/07/2026

My favorite roses to visit in Provincetown, going on decades now, over by the FAWC. I feel certain this was once Mark Doty’s garden.

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Alexander Chee @alexanderchee.bsky.social · 28/06/2026

Herring Cove an hour earlier. Same spot.

Herring Cove, Provincetown. Many footprints dot the sandy beach in the foreground. Near the edge of the water, two people are headed in. Behind them the water shines like metal, and the clouds along the horizon drift up in small white pieces like they are transformed and departing for who knows where, who knows what heaven is for a cloud.

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Alexander Chee @alexanderchee.bsky.social · 28/06/2026

The sky at sunset tonight from Herring Cove in Provincetown.

An enormous cloud at sunset along Herring Cove beach in Provincetown, a faint orange smear by the horizon, a golden streak heading to the right.

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Alexander Chee @alexanderchee.bsky.social · 23/06/2026

Parker Posey, Dina Martina, and two other performers I can’t remember on the new Sesame Street style set for Showgirls in Ptown tonight. Pure pleasure.

Parker Posey, Dina Martina wearing a trash can hat like Oscar, and two other drag performers from Show Girls in Ptown on the new Sesame Street style set. Sign at the center reads Trash Only in green letters on a yellow background.

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Alexander Chee @alexanderchee.bsky.social · 17/06/2026

One of Epstein’s pet theories, too.

At one session at Harvard, Mr. Epstein criticized efforts to reduce starvation and provide health care to the poor because doing so increased the risk of overpopulation, said Mr. Pinker, who was there. Mr. Pinker said he had rebutted the argument, citing research showing that high rates of infant mortality simply caused people to have more children.
Mr. Epstein seemed annoyed, and a Harvard colleague later told Mr. Pinker that he had been "voted off the island" and was no longer welcome at Mr. Epstein's gatherings.

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Alexander Chee @alexanderchee.bsky.social · 08/06/2026

This seems like a useful screenshot.

Lobo from the DC Comics adaptation of Supergirl as played by Jason Momoa whirling a chain overhead with a brawny tattooed arm mid-battle.

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Alexander Chee @alexanderchee.bsky.social · 04/06/2026

Satrapi’s obituary mentioned this Instagram tribute to her late husband, and as I couldn’t imagine it I went to look. And it broke my heart.

An Instagram grid tribute by Marjane Satrapi to her late husband, Mattias Ripa, composed of photos of them and of him, separated by the words For I Lost The Love Of My Life.

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Alexander Chee @alexanderchee.bsky.social · 02/06/2026

Leif Garrett. I was… in the 7th grade?

Teen idol of the 70s and 80s, Leif Garrett. A white young man with long wavy blond hair and big blue eyes, standing arms akimbo in a blue shirt with a red background behind him. His shirt is open five buttons down, collar is popped, sleeves are rolled up.

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Alexander Chee @alexanderchee.bsky.social · 31/05/2026

Happy birthday! Here’s a double rainbow I saw a few days ago.

A double rainbow above a forest at the end of a field by a mostly empty parking lot.

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Alexander Chee @alexanderchee.bsky.social · 24/05/2026

Gin martini straight up and I don’t fear vermouth.

A gin martini straight up balanced on rows of empty champagne flutes at the end of table.

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Alexander Chee @alexanderchee.bsky.social · 22/05/2026

Benedetta Craveri’s biography of the Contessa di Castiglione, one of my favorite historical characters (see my second novel for proof) now translated by Alex Andriesse, on sale 9/26 from @nyrb-imprints.bsky.social.

A book cover with a black and white photo of a striking white woman, her dark hair streaked with white at her brow, holding a photo frame up to her eye, peering through it playfully.
Across the top: BENEDETTA CRAVERI
THE CONTESSA
ADVANCE UNCORRECTED PROOFS - NOT FOR SALEat the bottoms in red banner

Screenshot of the first page:

Preface

"IO SON IO!" "Moi c'est moi?” At twenty as at forty, Virginia Verasis di Castiglione demanded, in both her languages of choice, the right to be herself—-the right to live a life compatible with her social position, her needs, and her intellectual gifts. But these demands were ahead of their time.

As a teenager she was blessed with a beauty that her parents considered a "serious business," and she'd barely come of age when she became one of the glories of the past. A former queen of Parisian society pages and Napoleon III's ex-lover, she wasn't even permitted to choose the role of seductress for herself; she played it on behalf of third parties, in the interests of Italian independence. Used as political bait by Cavour and Victor Emmanuel II (both of whom, once the French-Savoyard alliance was signed, left her to her fate); separated from a husband she'd humiliated and driven to ruin; and beleaguered by hosts of lovers, Virginia swore a solemn oath never to have a master again. She wanted to be free because freedom was for her, as it is for cats, an irrepressible instinct. And she would adhere to this freedom unswervingly, staying loyal solely to the volatile standard of her ego, under a banner stitched with the motto I THINK FOR MYSELF.
She was a forerunner of the tabloid celebrity. In Paris, in London, in Baden-Baden, she played every role in the repertoire to perfection,

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