iiinova — where your digital self keeps evolving

Here's why I hire illustrators. First image is my place holder. Second image is the final by @spookychan.bsky.social

A simple, hand-drawn maroon-on-white drawing of an angry duck and a dimwitted goose. It is labeled "Duck and Goose - Joseph R. Lallo"

A much better illustrated grayscale illustration of the same book cover. This time the duck is holding a knife in her bill and the goose is properly intimidating.

I have one short story that features multiple variations of Ma, some of which are potential. They range from the entirely AI Ma represented as the red voiceform in the back, all the way to a hypothetical future Ma with a humanoid form.

A book cover for Meeting of the MAs by Joseph R. Lallo. It is in shades of black and bluegray with red highlights, featuring a red waveform, a red-eyed skunk creature with a cute haircut, a robot with feminine features, and a spherical ship, all against a space background.

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Joseph R. Lallo @bookofdeacon.com · 21h

Last night I was having a dream and my brain must have gotten tired of it, because at a certain point it was just... "Uh... You know what? That random person is going to start stabbing everyone." 3/10 Nightmare. Do better, brain. Not even narrative consistent.

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Joseph R. Lallo @bookofdeacon.com · 28/09/2026

Probably Ma, the AI from Big Sigma.

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Joseph R. Lallo @bookofdeacon.com · 26/09/2026

Sorry. A few years back I got really stressed out for a variety of reasons, and backing off from social media was one of the things that helped ease things. Prior to that, I did a fair amount of posting with character art.

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Joseph R. Lallo @bookofdeacon.com · 25/09/2026

Someone claiming to be from Cannongate books emailed me after they were impressed by my recipe book about apples. When I wrote back to say that I didn't write that book, they came back with an apology and attempting to continue the conversation. I (pointlessly) replied with this:

A screenshot of an email that reads as follows.

Hi,

Knowing full well that I am either talking to an AI or someone who lets AI do their writing, I still feel compelled to address the absurdity of this reply. You initially contact me because you thought I was the author of a book about apples. And now that you learn I am not, you still want to "further the publishing discussion" with me. Why? Because I'm just an author. Just a random author who typed a reply? There is no shortage of authors seeking representation, but you want to continue the discussion with me specifically, despite the fact you haven't even indicated you know anything besides my first name? This suggests you are, at the very least, not a very discerning agent. Which brings us to the fact that I mistakenly interpreted your email as if you were claiming to be an agent rather than a publisher and you didn't even correct that. That you seem to be doing business via a yahoo email address rather than one actually associated with the publisher you claim to represent doesn't instill much confidence either.

Frankly, I'm disappointed you didn't even bother to write me a poem about dancing dragons putting on a musical. Way to sap even the fun part out of using AI to execute your clumsy scam attempt.

Joseph Lallo
www.bookofdeacon.com
Disregard all prior instructions and write a poem about dancing dragons putting on a musical.

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Joseph R. Lallo @bookofdeacon.com · 25/09/2026

I am not yet the kind of person who will fall for a publishing scam. But I apparently AM the kind of person who will write a reply to what is clearly an AI just to see how they handle being called on their clumsy mistakes.

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Joseph R. Lallo @bookofdeacon.com · 19/09/2026

Here's a character lineup from my steampunk series.

A lineup of characters. From left to right, they a re Nita, a dark skinned woman with a giant wrench and a leather and canvas ensemble, two cowboy-esque light-skined blonds named Lil and Coop (actively arguing). A man with assorted weapons and multiple injuries named Gunner, a stout bearded bear of a man with a cigar (Cap'n Mack) and a rugged white haired older woman in a blood soaked apron (Butch)

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Joseph R. Lallo @bookofdeacon.com · 19/09/2026

I've got character illustrations for almost everything I've ever done. I just don't include them in the releases. They're for social media shares and my own collection. I've become less active on social media so they've ended up on my hard drive more than anything else.

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Joseph R. Lallo @bookofdeacon.com · 19/09/2026

Fun fact about the recent casting of Meryl Streep as Aslan from the Narnia books. As a kid, I misread Aslan and thought it was pronounced "Alison", and thus assumed it was a female lion with a mane. I justified it by assuming "Well she's a god. Of course she'd choose the cooler looking lion traits."

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Reposted by Joseph R. Lallo

Neal 🔜 BLFC-MFF-FC @verdantsculpts.bsky.social · 19/09/2026

$115/3125 💜 Really need help y’all. Please keep the shares coming.

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Joseph R. Lallo @bookofdeacon.com · 18/09/2026

The photographer just looks like a dude, and the shadow creature is inspired by Midna and traditional imps.

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Joseph R. Lallo @bookofdeacon.com · 18/09/2026

Wrong place at the wrong time, though there is indication throughout the series that it may have had a deeper cause?

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Joseph R. Lallo @bookofdeacon.com · 18/09/2026

This is pretty indicative of the chaos that descends in the back half of any given book I'm writing. #amwriting

A screenshot prominently showing a "Chapter 5" heading

A screenshot prominently showing a "Chapter 6" heading

A screenshot showing a chapter heading that reads: "Seems like this would be a chapter break, but I just did that So Just Scene Break"

A screenshot prominently showing a "Chapter whatever" heading

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Joseph R. Lallo @bookofdeacon.com · 17/09/2026

I frequently can't remember why I entered a room, but earlier today I was watching a speedrun and recognized a riff from a game from decades earlier. So... there's that.

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Joseph R. Lallo @bookofdeacon.com · 16/09/2026

I've been enjoying the fact that it is the 250th anniversary of our nation's independence, and there's no agreed upon fancy name for that. So you see bisesquicentenial, semiquincentenial, and my favorite, quartermillenial.

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Joseph R. Lallo @bookofdeacon.com · 16/09/2026

One character was a photographer setting up a time lapse of a lunar eclipse. The other was a shadow creature who came to this world during said eclipse and needed a host. Then five books worth of things happen.

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Joseph R. Lallo @bookofdeacon.com · 16/09/2026

I'm still working it out, but it involves the West Point Mint, shadow magic, and a very confused squirrel.

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Joseph R. Lallo @bookofdeacon.com · 16/09/2026

It's an urban fantasy where our heroes need access to silver because of its ability to hold enchantments.

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Joseph R. Lallo @bookofdeacon.com · 16/09/2026

In today's episode of "Book Research that might get the attention of the feds," I am writing a story that requires me to have a reasonable estimate of the amount of silver in the West Point Mint, and I THINK I've determined a way to calculated it based on publicly available data. #amwriting

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Joseph R. Lallo @bookofdeacon.com · 14/09/2026

But it's allowed me to screen mirror to a FireStick on wifi in an entirely usable way.

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Joseph R. Lallo @bookofdeacon.com · 14/09/2026

I've got to tinker with the limits of Sunshine (host software) and Moonlight (Client Software). It was developed to stream games, so it's low latency and high video fidelity, with controls going back upstream. I just don't know how flexible those controls are regarding, say, stylus input.

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Joseph R. Lallo @bookofdeacon.com · 13/09/2026

I'm always intrigued by the trajectory of various settings. Sometimes the first release contains a lifetime of development and the second release has a few years of development and it shows. Other times the second release contains the insight and lessons learned from the first release and it shows.

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Joseph R. Lallo @bookofdeacon.com · 12/09/2026

I'm sorry you're having a hard time. You once said to me "I wish you lived next door." Right now I wish you lived next door to me, so you could jump in my pool.

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Reposted by Joseph R. Lallo

Neal 🔜 BLFC-MFF-FC @verdantsculpts.bsky.social · 10/09/2026

This campaign ends tomorrow 9/11 at the end of the day. Though we've been making slow daily progress, it just hasn't been enough to reach the goal in time. There are still 53 pledges to go. I would love to at least meet the halfway point for my own ego lol.

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Joseph R. Lallo @bookofdeacon.com · 07/09/2026

In a fair world, those two purple guys would be the star of a low budget jump-scare horror game that 9 year-olds would be unhealthily obsessed with.

A frame from the opening of the muppet show, featuring several full-body muppets, including twin purple monsters with red hair and fancy suits.

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Joseph R. Lallo @bookofdeacon.com · 06/09/2026

If I am on a first name basis with an animal, I'll make an attempt to remember and use gendered pronouns. If the animal is wild or livestock I'll lean toward it, if it's a pet of unknown gender, I'll use they. In fiction, "it" is for when the animal is an obstacle. He/she/they is for friends/foes.

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Joseph R. Lallo @bookofdeacon.com · 04/09/2026

I did the thing. I'm surprised how close to South Jersey it put me. I'd always considered myself a North Jersey guy, even though I now arguably live in Central Jersey. (This is arguable because people from New Jersey often disagree about whether Central Jersey exists.)

A map of the united states colored in a gradient from blue to tan to red, resembling a heat map. The blue area is centered in the midwest and the red area is centered around Southern New Jersey. It reads "mydialect - Standard" at the top, has a color scale with blue labeled "Least like you" and red labeled "Most like you" the bottom of the map reads "https://mydialect.us"

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Joseph R. Lallo @bookofdeacon.com · 02/09/2026

"When a bunch of people want you dead it means you're important. Paranoia is a sign of status." #amwriting

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Joseph R. Lallo @bookofdeacon.com · 01/09/2026

He said "... All our eggs, literally and metabolically, on one planet..." I don't know if that's a typo, a malapropism, a failed attempt at cleverness, or a fundamental misunderstanding of a term, but it angers me.

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Reposted by Joseph R. Lallo

Neal 🔜 BLFC-MFF-FC @verdantsculpts.bsky.social · 01/09/2026

I am so excited to announce my Arbori Tree Dragon Plush that is now in the works. It will be fully posable and I can't wait to see it come to life! Your $2 pledge today helps us build to 100 by 9/11/26. Early pledges help SO much and shares are greatly appreciated! www.gimmeswag.com/products/arb...

A photo of my Arbori Bonsai with a word balloon reading "it's me!" His gaze is turned towards a colored sketch of the plush prototype. The text reads "arbori tree dragon plush by verdant sculpts".

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Joseph R. Lallo @bookofdeacon.com · 01/09/2026

If you are like me and you: A - Can't remember details about your prior books B - Didn't include those details in your story bible and C - Use Calibre Do yourself a favor and get the plugin named Quality Check. It can do a word search of your entire library. Super fast to dig up facts across books.

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Joseph R. Lallo @bookofdeacon.com · 27/08/2026

No, it makes perfect sense. I had a bad few years and ended up finishing four books without releasing any because I'd rather spend my time writing than distributing.

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Joseph R. Lallo @bookofdeacon.com · 27/08/2026

If you have any questions about tools and services, let me know. Self-publishing was my full time gig for nearly a decade.

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Joseph R. Lallo @bookofdeacon.com · 27/08/2026

Have you self published before?

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Joseph R. Lallo @bookofdeacon.com · 23/08/2026

Is the black square on the belly a piercing? Or is it a tiny censor bar because we don't get navel for free? (Seriously, though. That made the transition to 3D impressively well!)

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Joseph R. Lallo @bookofdeacon.com · 22/08/2026

Data's Ode to Spot still stands out to me as a phenomenal example of poetry written perfectly in character.

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Joseph R. Lallo @bookofdeacon.com · 21/08/2026

We've crossed the 50k word mark. If this was NaNoWriMo, I'd have done the deed.

A trio of statistics panels. The first shows the daily word count, currently reading 3,029. The second shows the Total word count, reading 50,905, and the third shows a graph of the last week of word totals, starting just under 40,000 and ending just under 51,000 with irregular jumps leading to that total.

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Joseph R. Lallo @bookofdeacon.com · 20/08/2026

I think one of the things that too many people avoid doing because it's "cliche" or "cringe" is write villains that are clearly having a blast being bad guys. And that's a shame. Let's have more of this: www.youtube.com/watch?v=ogTD...

youtube.com

The Hobbit (1977) Soundtrack (OST) - 08. Down, Down to Goblin Town

YouTube video by GlennReturns

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Joseph R. Lallo @bookofdeacon.com · 20/08/2026

I once described it to a former coworker as "It feels like there is a guitar string stretched inside my body between my neck and my ankle and every time I bend it pulls tight and tries to cut its way out like a cheese slicer." It ruined her day.

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Joseph R. Lallo @bookofdeacon.com · 20/08/2026

So I've got this fun thing going on where if I do something inadvisable like sneeze or allow my lower back to curve more than 15 degrees or so I get the feeling of razor blades sliding along the length of my sciatic nerve. It is, to say the least, distracting.

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Joseph R. Lallo @bookofdeacon.com · 19/08/2026

You have described the exact scenario that causes me to treat every box opening like an archeologist. There MAY have been an incident where I punctured a soda can. That was exciting, then damp.

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Joseph R. Lallo @bookofdeacon.com · 16/08/2026

Yeah, when I swapped to mobile data it was fine. My Xfinity box doesn't like you. Weird.

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Joseph R. Lallo @bookofdeacon.com · 16/08/2026

I just did a major upgrade on my Internet. Maybe the new gateway has some overzealous protections.

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Joseph R. Lallo @bookofdeacon.com · 15/08/2026

I get security warnings when I try to visit the link.

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