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Rebecca Baumann

@arkhamlibrarian.bsky.social
4.5K followers 2.2K following 5.1K posts

rare book librarian, book junkie, devotee of the weird, angry queer, friend to all monsters, nonbinary freak. Free Substack on queer pulps: nympholibrarian.substack.com

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Reposted by Rebecca Baumann
Sandy Ernest Allen @sandyernestallen.bsky.social · 16h
FIRSTLY as the piece alludes: Loren Rex Cameron’s also-trans and arguably more famous older sister, Cameron, was a I believe fully stealth working model and actress (a la plot of Pose) in the 80s and 90s mostly … I rewatched like I dunno, dozens of TNG episodes, where she appeared as Ensign Kellogg:
A stunning redhead woman in a Star Trek TNG uniform
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Sarah Pyke @sarahpyke.bsky.social · 16h
Extremely excited to share the CFP for the ✨fifth✨ annual #QueerBibliography conference! bit.ly/QB2027CfP When? 2-4 September 2027 Where? Manchester, UK & online Theme: TAKING STOCK Deadline for abstracts: 29 January 2027 Decisions: by 12 March 2027 Submit here: forms.gle/WGjXKA1d6gWm...
Queer Bibliography
Taking Stock
Manchester, UK and online
2-4 September 2027

Call for Proposals

Since the inaugural 2023 conference, queer bibliography has grown from an interesting concept to a burgeoning field. Our 2027 theme, Taking Stock, marks the fifth annual conference and is a chance to pause and reflect on genealogies of the field, the present state of queer bibliographical enquiry, and our senses of the future. How might we trace queer histories of queer bibliography? How can we imagine critical futures for bibliographical enquiry within and beyond its traditional academic locations? Where do we find ourselves and our work? 

Stock also has meaning in bibliography. While “stock” originally referred to a tree trunk or plant stem, and figuratively to the source of a line of descent or even a human torso, it later began to connote an aggregate of goods—in the context of bookmaking, one might own a stock of paper or pasteboard. Towards the mid-nineteenth century, “paper stock” began to connote the raw material of paper itself. “Stock” might refer to the inventories of booksellers, the process of beginning and curating an institutional or personal collection, and the supply and material characteristics of paper. From the raw materials of books to the origins and shapes of personal, commercial, and institutional collections, how does "stock" participate in the production, articulation, and study of queer textuality and textual communities? What is queer about materiality, the ecology of books, and the processes of making and engaging with (collections of) physical textual objects?

We invite participants to engage in stock-taking or reflect on
bibliographical stock, broadly defined. We welcome meta, theoretical, and historiographical work that takes stock of queer bibliography, and we
welcome proposals that relate to “stock” in bibliography, book history, and reception studies.This three-day hybrid conference will be hosted at the John Rylands
Library, part of the University of Manchester, and online on 2–4 September 2027. The conference will feature two days of panels, conversation, and discussion on 2 and 3 September and will be followed by an optional workshop on 4 September. Conference programming may also include evening receptions, tours of Manchester libraries (including Chetham’s Library, the oldest public library in England), and collection viewings at the Rylands.

The conference welcomes participants from a diverse range of fields and
career stages, including: book arts practitioners, activists, postgraduates,
early career researchers, independent scholars, librarians, archivists, and
booksellers, both in person and via video conference. As in past years, the goal of the broadly articulated theme of “taking stock” is to bring people in and to shape conversation, not to exclude or limit. All submissions that engage with the intertwined relationship between queerness and bibliography are encouraged.

Participants will be invited to submit a 2000-word pre-circulated paper,
before presenting in panels of 10-minute papers. We also welcome
alternative contributions, such as workshops, roundtables, or self-organised seminars and creative presentations, with a pre-circulated submission that provides a grounding for the conference contribution.

Contributors should submit an abstract of 200–300 words, along with a
short bio, by 29 January 2027:

https:/ /forms.gle/WGjXKA1d6gWmtfjZ8

Prospective speakers will be informed of the outcome by 12th March. Pre-circulated papers will be collected and shared in mid-July. 

Any questions should be directed to: queerbibliography@gmail.com

http://queerbibliography.org
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Rebecca Baumann @arkhamlibrarian.bsky.social · 12h
I’ve been thinking a lot lately about my favorite Arthurian character: Nimue, the sorceress who put her beloved master Merlin in a tree. Finding out my preferred name for her is probably a printer’s error just makes me love her more. levgrossman.substack.com/p/on-the-enc...
levgrossman.substack.com
On the Enchantress Nimue
She's hugely overpowered, and she basically doesn't make sense as a character. But that is why we will always love her
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Rebecca Baumann @arkhamlibrarian.bsky.social · 30/09/2026
Just an Agatha update
Gray and white kitten Gray and white kitten Grey and white kitten and adult black cat resting on bed together Gray and white kitten rolling around and harassing two adult black cats
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Rebecca Baumann @arkhamlibrarian.bsky.social · 30/09/2026
Just a donkey in my campus parking lot.
Donkey!Donkey
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Rebecca Baumann @arkhamlibrarian.bsky.social · 26/09/2026
I 🖤 Riverside
Statue of Eliza Tibbets, one of the founders of Riverside, an activist, abolitionist, Spiritualist medium and horticulturalist Ramen shop with banner of black cat eating ramenDetail of Cesar Chavez statue showing a fierce woman with a hoe Mural of a buffalo reading a book that says “all things grow all things go”
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Rebecca Baumann @arkhamlibrarian.bsky.social · 26/09/2026
Thurston, mountains, moon. My evening view is beautiful.
View of roofs, palm trees and mountains with black cat on windowsill Black cat in window with rising full moon visible in pink sky
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Rebecca Baumann @arkhamlibrarian.bsky.social · 25/09/2026
I had to honk at them. This is now a rare book and donkey account.
Donkeys crossing a road, mountains in the background
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Rebecca Baumann @arkhamlibrarian.bsky.social · 24/09/2026
I have not yet introduced Bluesky to Agatha. We found her abandoned by our house about two weeks before we left Indiana. She’s traveled 2000 miles to become a California cat and is absolutely ruling over our new household like a tiny hellion.
Grey and white fluffy kitten Grey and white fluffy kitten on blanket Grey and white fluffy kitten with mouth openGrey and white fluffy kitten batting at camera
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Rare Book School @rarebookschool.bsky.social · 23/09/2026
RBS is currently accepting applications for the following funding opportunities: —𝗔𝗹𝗹 𝗥𝗕𝗦-𝗮𝘄𝗮𝗿𝗱𝗲𝗱 𝘀𝗰𝗵𝗼𝗹𝗮𝗿𝘀𝗵𝗶𝗽𝘀 —𝗧𝗵𝗲 𝗠. 𝗖. 𝗟𝗮𝗻𝗴 𝗙𝗲𝗹𝗹𝗼𝘄𝘀𝗵𝗶𝗽 𝗶𝗻 𝗕𝗼𝗼𝗸 𝗛𝗶𝘀𝘁𝗼𝗿𝘆, 𝗕𝗶𝗯𝗹𝗶𝗼𝗴𝗿𝗮𝗽𝗵𝘆, 𝗮𝗻𝗱 𝗛𝘂𝗺𝗮𝗻𝗶𝘁𝗶𝗲𝘀 𝗧𝗲𝗮𝗰𝗵𝗶𝗻𝗴 𝘄𝗶𝘁𝗵 𝗛𝗶𝘀𝘁𝗼𝗿𝗶𝗰𝗮𝗹 𝗦𝗼𝘂𝗿𝗰𝗲𝘀 Details at: rarebookschool.org/scholarships-fellowships #BookSky #RareBooks
A graphic topped by a horizontal black bar features a photo of a group of people standing amongst library stacks full of books bound in bright reds, oranges, yellows, and blues. In the upper right corner is the RBS logo. The man in the foreground holds a large book with a gilded leather binding in his hands. Text reads, “Applications are now open for the following RBS scholarships & fellowships: All RBS-awarded scholarships for both first-time and returning RBS students. Applications due by Sunday, 1 November 2026. The M. C. Lang Fellowship in Book History, Bibliography, and Humanities Teaching with Historical Sources, a two-year fellowship for faculty, librarians, and curators at U.S. liberal arts colleges and small universities. Applications due by Sunday, 6 December 2026. Learn more about these and other RBS funding opportunities at rarebookschool.org/scholarships-fellowships.”
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Rebecca Baumann @arkhamlibrarian.bsky.social · 24/09/2026
My first Riverside donkey sighting!!! (I won’t say that I took this job just because there are wild donkeys here but I won’t say it wasn’t a consideration). Having an amazing first week and loving UCR and the the Inland Empire.
Donkeys grazing on a hillside
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Rebecca Baumann @arkhamlibrarian.bsky.social · 22/09/2026
I brought 2 humans, a Great Pyrenees, 2 cats, and a tiny sassy kitten 2,000 miles across the country to start a new life. You can’t tell me shit. I can do ANYTHING.
Rebecca & her spouse Ryder with an alien, somewhere on Route 66 in Oklahoma Fire Walk With Me on a hotel TV. Turning on the hotel TV to this was AN INSANE SIGN FROM OUR GOD OF THE INLAND EMPIRE DAVID LYNCHOur beloved dog Hazel With a dinosaur statue in New MexicoGraffiti saying Be Somebody at Cadillac Ranch in Amarillo
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Rebecca Baumann @arkhamlibrarian.bsky.social · 16/09/2026
Scenes of departure. The best thing about moving is that you get to decide what to take with you and what to leave behind.
A restaurant booth covered in sharpie notes.
A burning Hand of GloryAn open suitcase with two black cats in itA praying mantis on a light
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Rebecca Baumann @arkhamlibrarian.bsky.social · 10/09/2026
I cannot figure out how to pack a skeleton. My fantasy that I would be a very clever murderer is swiftly dissolving.
Skeleton model upside down in a large box. It does not fit. Skeleton leg sticking out of a box.
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Rebecca Baumann @arkhamlibrarian.bsky.social · 08/09/2026
🖤🖤🖤🖤
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Steven Sheil @scsheil.bsky.social · 04/09/2026
@arkhamlibrarian.bsky.social I know you enjoy a good stepback - have you come across this one before?
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Rebecca Baumann @arkhamlibrarian.bsky.social · 17/08/2026
I accidentally did the meanest thing possible and took these guys to the vet on National Black Cat Appreciation Day. I don’t know if I will be forgiven. 🐈‍⬛🐈‍⬛
Two black cats in a vet office.
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Rebecca Baumann @arkhamlibrarian.bsky.social · 14/08/2026
Me in Hay-on-Wye in 1999. Good to know the same things will always make me happy 📚🚀🦄
Woman in her early 20s with brown hair and glasses standing by a shelf of books labeled Science Fiction
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Rebecca Baumann @arkhamlibrarian.bsky.social · 12/08/2026
Am I done packing my pulps? Nope, but I don’t have time to post more covers. Enjoy this crazy thread if you haven’t yet and look forward to much more pulp lore when I get settled in my new home!
Shelves crammed with pulp novels, most of them smutty.
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Inspirational Skeletor @skeletorinspires.bsky.social · 10/08/2026
I will be okay. Not because everything is fine, but because I am surprisingly difficult to destroy. Says Skeletor who notices being hard to destroy sure doesn’t mean a bunch of asshoes don’t keep trying.
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Rebecca Baumann @arkhamlibrarian.bsky.social · 03/08/2026
I was at Sam’s (aka Enemy Territory) yesterday and noticed a boomer-aged white man giving me a weird side eye. He finally sidled up to me and said very softly, “I like your shirt.” Absolutely made my day—thank you random man! This was the shirt:
Blue t-shirt with picture of pornographer and first amendment advocate Larry Flynt. Red letters say “Larry Flynt for President”
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Mike Westphal @mfwestphal.bsky.social · 03/08/2026
Cool!! Fun fact about WALK TO THE END OF THE WORLD: that’s the artist, Gene Szafran, glaring at you. Szafran mostly centered women on his book covers, but when he centered a (recognizable) man, it was more often than not a self-portrait.
An image of four paperback books on a gridded bedsheet. THE DU MAURIERS, by Daphne du Maurier, Avon edition, showing a man who looks like the artist Gene Szafran, holding a palette and painting a nude woman; WASP, by Eric Frank Russell, Bantam, showing a man who looks like Gene Szafran in some kind of space suit and what looks like a fighting stance in front of a circular, abstract design and a field of blue flowers characteristic of Szafran; THE DAY OF THE DRONES, by A.M. Lightner, Bantam, depicting an African woman in traditional garb, a bunch of bees, some flowers, the Big Ben clock tower, and a guy with an unbuttoned shirt who looks a lot like Gene Szafran; and THE MIND MASTERS # 3: THE DOOR by John F. Rossman, Signet, showing the head of a sultry man resembling Gene Szafran, a medical oscilloscope readout, a computer, Stonehenge, and a naked women being attacked by someone wielding a knife, all on a pink background.A sepia photograph of the book illustrator Gene Szafran wearing a paisley shirt. He is a young white man with a full head of blonde or red hair and sideburns. His posing in front of a relief.
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Michael @selmerguy.bsky.social · 01/08/2026
@arkhamlibrarian.bsky.social The thrills and Detection are all well and good, but a peek inside the Vaults of the Bodleian are why I’d buy this book.
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Rebecca Baumann @arkhamlibrarian.bsky.social · 31/07/2026
This just gets more batshit as the thread progresses! Fascinating pulp history!
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Anna Holmes @annabookwriter.bsky.social · 30/07/2026
Let’s be clear: what these bastards are doing to these books isn’t digitizing. Digitizing is about preservation and access to the original material. They’re gutting and destroying to make Soylent Green. Don’t let them get away with pretending to do this for humanitarian reasons.
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John Bull @garius.bsky.social · 30/07/2026
People still think of Sweden as this sexually liberated place, but the reality is you're not even allowed to fuck inside the giant taxidermied Blue Whale anymore. Place has really changed.
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Discontinued Foods! @discontinuedfoods.bsky.social · 23/01/2024
That shadowy place way out there? That is beyond our borders. You must never go there. That is the Big Boy graveyard.
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Sitcom People @sitcompeople.bsky.social · 25/07/2026
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Night of the Living Red Durkin @daedsider.bsky.social · 05/01/2025
"expanding consciousness" meme: 1. Frankenstein created a monster 2. Frankenstein was the real monster 3. Frankenstein and his creation are *both* tragically flawed 4. Captain Walton made the whole thing up because he couldn't admit to his sister that he failed to find the Northwest Passage
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brendan mordheim @brendanmcleod.dev · 24/07/2026
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Anne Billson @annebillson.bsky.social · 24/07/2026
Dutch homework.
Covers of "adult" comics "Bloederige Verhalen" (Gory Stories) showing 1) a scythe-wielding Death on horseback, a semi-naked woman in distress and a large cross. Subheading: "A witch for the archbishop" 2) a sword-wielding wildman on horseback, a semi-naked woman in distress and the subheading "The god of death and the mass murderer" 3) A man inflicting some sort of horrible sexual violence on a woman, a semi-naked woman who may or may not be in distress, hard to tell, a guillotine and the subheading "Sex and fury" and 4) A skull-faced figure standing in a garveyard in front of a gothic church monster next to a semi-naked woman with a knife in her chest. Not in distress, but definitely dead, with the subheading "Emmaus and the amulet of the dead".
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Rebecca Baumann @arkhamlibrarian.bsky.social · 24/07/2026
I’m packing my pulps to move to California. This is a daunting task. To keep myself moderately entertained I am going to post 4 random covers from each shelf I finish packing until I’m done.
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Rebecca Baumann @arkhamlibrarian.bsky.social · 23/07/2026
I’m on a self-imposed break from book collecting while I move because god knows I don’t need any more books to pack. But how could I resist?
Lesbian roulette by Tony Trelos. “She gave her body to a Shawty agent until she thought she had it made; then she was made by a lesbian big shot and got everything but what she wanted most…” illustration of two women’s faces in purple with a roulette wheel
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Gavin, Small Beer (closed due to long covid), &c. @gavingrant.bsky.social · 20/07/2026
25 years ago Kelly & I published our first season's titles — all 2 of them: first collections from Kelly (Stranger Things Happen; art: Shelley Jackson) & Ray Vukcevich (Meet Me in the Moon Room; art Rafał Olbinski). Buy either this month, we'll send you both: smallbeerpress.com/not-a-journa...
Screenshot of the first two books we published:
 
Stranger Things Happen
Kelly Link

“A set of stories that are by turns dazzling, funny, scary, and sexy, but only when they’re not all of these at once. Kelly Link has strangeness, charm and spin to spare. Writers better than this don’t happen.”
— Karen Joy Fowler

Meet Me in the Moon Room
Ray Vukcevich

“One of my all-time favorite collections.”
— Laird Barron, author of Blood Standard

“Uniquely, splendidly, brilliantly original, a surprise in each and every one, and brimming with wit and laugh-out-loud humor. A stunning collection.”
— Kate Wilhelm, author of Desperate Measures
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Rebecca Baumann @arkhamlibrarian.bsky.social · 17/07/2026
I am more determined than ever to collect and share queer pulp. Our literature and our lives are actively being erased.
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Rebecca Baumann @arkhamlibrarian.bsky.social · 17/07/2026
You (a naïf, a rube): What should we do? Me (a perimenopausal crone, a relic from the before-times): My child, we must consult the sacred texts. The texts:
Are you there God it’s me Margaret by Judy BloomRamona, forever by Beverly Cleary and Ramona Quimby age 8, by Beverly ClearyBlubber by Judy Bloom and just as long as we are together by Judy Bloom
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Benjamin Dreyer @bcdreyer.social · 13/07/2026
Tomorrow is Sidney Blackmer's birthday, and I always get a thrill out of Sidney Blackmer's birthday.
Sidney Blackmer as Roman Castevet in Rosemary's Baby.
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Rebecca Baumann @arkhamlibrarian.bsky.social · 04/07/2026
Donald Sutherland in Invasion of the Body Snatchers, looking utterly horrified and pointing. An Uncle Sam hat and American flag have been added to the image. From the SubGenius community on Reddit.
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Rebecca Baumann @arkhamlibrarian.bsky.social · 03/07/2026
jimfieldingfieldnotes.beehiiv.com/p/leaving-an... IU Board of Trustees member Jim Fielding’s statement on why he is stepping down from a leadership role at the University resonates with many of the reasons I am leaving IU (1/2)
jimfieldingfieldnotes.beehiiv.com
Leaving An Important Room
What I have learned in closing a challenging chapter of a 40+ year story
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Rebecca Baumann @arkhamlibrarian.bsky.social · 29/06/2026
I’ve held off reading this for years because I was afraid of how much I would love it and I was not wrong. The best novel with a librarian protagonist is also about bear fucking. Have to put it on the shelf next to Rachel Ingall’s Mrs. Caliban.
Bear by Marion Engel. Drawing of a human arm holding the back of a bear.
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Kate Watson @loreandordure.com · 29/06/2026
The next thing I want to do in bookbinding / repair is definitely a book concealment!
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BOO! k HistoriAAAH 🎃 @book-historia.bsky.social · 28/06/2026
I was looking for things to send to the CABS charity auction, and this 1852 travelogue of Egypt is the gift that keeps on giving 🙃
A lock of hair tucked into a book
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Rebecca Baumann @arkhamlibrarian.bsky.social · 27/06/2026
I wouldn’t spend $4000 on a purse even if I could but damn it’s beautiful. One of my favorite standby book history lessons is “why is Dracula yellow?”
Dior handbag designed to look like the first edition of Dracula, yellow with red text.
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Derf Backderf @derfbackderf.bsky.social · 24/06/2026
One of today's political prisoners. Cartoonist & zine maker Daniel Rolando Sanchez Estrada wasn't even at the ICE protest. He was accused of "moving" a box of anti-Trump zines THE NEXT DAY. A rightwing judge sentenced him to 30 years! Just for possessing zines. The darkness is descending.
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Ryan Estrada @ryanestrada.com · 25/06/2026
Here are links to zines about the people who were arrested as terrorists for making, possessing, and sharing zines.
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Ken Klippenstein @kenklippenstein.bsky.social · 25/06/2026
An American just got sentenced to 30 years in federal prison for moving “Antifa” zines and there’s about 1000x as much media coverage of Trump’s reflecting pool 👍
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Benjamin Dreyer @bcdreyer.social · 27/06/2026
"The number of people who expected Mrs. Hutchinson to win a Bendix washer at the end would amaze you." —Shirley Jackson
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Benjamin Dreyer @bcdreyer.social · 27/06/2026
Happy Lottery Day!
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Rebecca Baumann @arkhamlibrarian.bsky.social · 13/06/2026
When you’re reading and you have to get up and grab a pencil because you have so much to annotate, so much to talk to the text about—I love that feeling
Sleazoid Express by Bill Landis and Michelle Clifford
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