iiinova — where your digital self keeps evolving

JasMinmo @jasminmo.bsky.social · 20/08/2026

Come, open wide, dark king, your ghastly brazen doors! Come forth, whom earth and heaven abhors! Come forth, O monstrous craven lord, and fight with thine own hand and sword, thou wielder of hosts of banded thralls, thou tyrant leaguered with strong walls… (Leithan 12:12-18)

“The fall of the High King” by Manuel Castañón, in which Fingolfin, High King of the Noldor in Exile, faces down Morgoth - black-armoured, towering, iron-crowned.

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JasMinmo @jasminmo.bsky.social · 20/08/2026

I was going to make a little post about how I understand why the last stretch goal essay to MDC was going to be the intensely practical downtime one instead of one on Themology (and how much I appreciate that joke), but then I got distracted by the voice of Bilbo Baggins in my ear.

I am the one hundred and eleventh backer for Merryshire Detective Club, a tabletop roleplaying game of hobbits and murder tha you can back too!

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JasMinmo @jasminmo.bsky.social · 09/08/2026

I personally think “Realms of the Three Rings” is the most beautiful book in the line so far.

A double-page spread. In the foreground, two adventurers stand in silhouette; in the distance, elves dance and make merry.

A double-page spread. On the left, a ruin sprawls over a misty island; on the right, only grey sea and the silhouettes of birds on the mist.

A double-page spread; animals come flocking to an elven harper. There is a beautiful fox standing on its hind legs, and a bear stands peacefully next to deer.

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JasMinmo @jasminmo.bsky.social · 23/04/2026

Pick up the nearest book, turn to p. 42, and post the second sentence: “It is if you get on the right bus.” - Kate Beaton’s aching memoir of working in the Alberta oil sands, “Ducks.” The following page below.

An illustration of an oil refinery in the early morning, grey smoke and white lights against a black foreground and a black sky.

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JasMinmo @jasminmo.bsky.social · 31/03/2025

A defiant TDoV to all. 頑張りましょう.

JasMinmo, standing out in nature, wearing a denim jacket with an Ernalda pin and a “good luck” Hello Kitty shirt.

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JasMinmo @jasminmo.bsky.social · 09/03/2025

“Before the gods that made the gods / had seen their sunrise pass, / the White Horse of the White Horse Vale / was cut out of the grass.”

The eye of the Uffington White Horse on Whitehorse Hill, the oldest horse on the hills of Britain, made of chalk ground into trenches. I took this picture.

The body of the Uffington White Horse stretching out across the hillside, as seen from the head. Beyond, a visiting family; beyond, English fields.

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JasMinmo @jasminmo.bsky.social · 09/03/2025

For my money, the best thing Chesterton ever wrote. It makes me cry, it moves me, it lodges in my thoughts, it overcomes its propagandistic subtext completely. “I tell you naught for your comfort / yea, naught for your desire / save that the sky grows darker yet / and the sea rises higher.”

G.K. Chesterton’s poem “The Ballad of the White Horse,” printed on demand - which is why there’s just a random white horse in front of the sea on the cover.

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JasMinmo @jasminmo.bsky.social · 09/03/2025

Seven copies of this print run (which had a faux-stucco background for @katrindirim.bsky.social’s gorgeous Lunar art, removed in the current print-on-demand version) were sold. Which means I get to brag about having a signed copy from a set of seven. Praise the Red Goddess!

“The Zero Wane: Early Lunar Art from Blessed Torang,” containing Gloranthan art by the peerless Katrin Dirim depicting the life of Teelo Estara/Teelo Imara before her ascension, when she danced the Red Moon into the sky. The cover portrays the Battle of Four Arrows of Light, where the Lunars decisively defeated the Carmanian Empire. Teelo Imara, on the far left, is haloed in power offered to her by her worshippers. Above the battle, Kana Poor, Scribe of Time and Wielder of Age, drives back the Carmanian deities; the Carmanian war god Humakt bears down on Lunar General Yanafal Tarnils, Ram and Warrior; and Irrippi Ontor, Master of Secrets, bedazzles and defeats Carmanian spirits. Below, the Char-un horse nomads and Lunar foot troops clash with Carmanian cataphracts.

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JasMinmo @jasminmo.bsky.social · 09/03/2025

While reading this for the first time, I realized I was reminded of Arthur Machen’s “The White People,” and I set the book aside to reread Machen on a whim. I would like it on the record that I did this BEFORE the characters read that story together to discuss its relevance to their horror.

That’s right, I have the fancy printing of “The Twisted Ones,” written by Ursula Vernon under the pen name T. Kingfisher. The deer skull (not upside down) is in the center, surrounded by leaves and stones with faces carved on them, and I made faces like the faces on the rocks, and I twisted myself about like the twisted ones, and I lay down flat on the ground like the dead ones, and I made faces like the faces on the rocks, and I twisted myself about like the twisted ones, and I lay down flat on the ground like the dead ones, and I made faces like the faces on the rocks, and I twisted myself about like the twisted ones, and I lay down flat on the ground like the dead ones—

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JasMinmo @jasminmo.bsky.social · 09/03/2025

Nobody does fantasy quite like Moers, and Rumo was my first introduction to his work. It’s like a surreal dream, if literally everything in the dream was building upon itself for narrative payoff. I need to do a reread soon.

“Rumo and his Miraculous Adventures,” a surrealist fantasy novel by German author Walter Moers. In the title, a baby Rumo clutches the talking knife Dandelion; two dinosaurs, a Clockwork Killer and a wolpertinger are at the bottom.

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JasMinmo @jasminmo.bsky.social · 07/03/2025

I was introduced to Phyllis Ann Karr with “When the Wolf Pirates Came to the City of Wonders,” and stumbled across Idylls in my FLGS-used-bookstore-and-records-shop. It’s an excellent distillation of her Arthurian short fiction into a murder mystery dripping with dramatic irony and Orkney pain.

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JasMinmo @jasminmo.bsky.social · 07/03/2025

Got another like on this while I’m out, so I am grabbing the last book I photographed. The world of SPIRE and HEART unfolded while I was overseas, and my favorite setting element is still the Vermissian, a failed transit system now flooded with magic, where space-time is shattered - and exploitable.

A copy of the supplement “Vermissian Black Ops” for the tabletop roleplaying game “HEART: THE CITY BENEATH.” Three dissident dark elves are in the abandoned subway tunnels of the Vermissian. The one in front brandishes a rifle, the one behind (wearing a diving helmet) waves a mace, and a third in a gas mask seems to have noticed a growing light in the tunnel behind…

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JasMinmo @jasminmo.bsky.social · 28/01/2025

I’d seen the Rankin/Bass adaptation on the cusp of teenagerhood, but I wasn’t prepared for the beauty and mastery of language, of brilliant turns of phrase, that is on display on every page. This copy’s signed, but, alas, to an old name no longer in use.

A copy of Peter S. Beagle’s “The Lasy Unicorn,” with a unicorn as the focal point of the cover.

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JasMinmo @jasminmo.bsky.social · 28/01/2025

The book I didn’t know that I wished I’d written until I read it. @catvalente.bsky.social weaves stories into stories like thread on a scarf, telling stories of women, monsters, and monsters who are women. It might be the book I’ve recommended to others the most.

A copy of “In the Night Garden,” the first part of the Orphan’s Tales duology by Catherynne Valente. Characters from its many interlocking stories are depicted.

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JasMinmo @jasminmo.bsky.social · 24/11/2024

12, but I believe I am rolling with a masterwork mat.

A green d20 displaying 12 on its face, lying on a leather dice mat depicting Thorin’s map from “The Hobbit.”

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JasMinmo @jasminmo.bsky.social · 24/11/2024

Here’s my own context for the temple. Photos really don’t do the Buddha justice; he truly is a massive bronzework.

A view of the Temple, taken from the edge of the inner courtyard.

Floral decorations in front of the great bronze Buddha.

A side view of the Buddha. Behind him, a halo with other sages surround his head.

A commemorative coin purchased at the Temple. It reads “JASMINE - 2023 - 04 - 04.” On its face is “NARA,” and an image of one of the famous Nara deer.

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JasMinmo @jasminmo.bsky.social · 20/11/2024

When I returned to the US in 2023, I only owned roughly seventeen of these books physically, despite having a large digital library. But Kickstarters have delivered, and the used book market (and ChaosiumCon ‘24, and some POD from DTRPG) has been good to me.

A shelf full of books for the world of Glorantha. (The brown leather cover is protecting “Kingdom of Heroes.”)

A motley assortment of particularly beloved books. (Fourth from the left is an obscure third-party D&D 3.5 adventure, here because my aunt did art for it and then gave it to me as my entry into the hobby.)

Books from both editions of “The One Ring,” along with primary texts and maps. “The Atlas of Middle-Earth” was a beloved companion since I was six years old - though not this specific copy of it!

The bottom shelf, with still more books. I’ll need to figure out an overflow bookshelf soon.

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JasMinmo @jasminmo.bsky.social · 14/11/2024

A selection of some favorites currently in my library. Both The Last Unicorn and The Way of Kings are signed by the authors— but to my deadname, alas.

A stack of books, including from top to bottom: Basil Johnston’s “The Manitous,” Catherynne Valente’s “In the Night Garden,” Ted Hughes’ “Selected Poems 1957-1994,” Lord Dunsany’s “The King of Elfland’s Daughter,” T. Kingfisher’s “The Twisted Ones,” Peter S. Beagle’s “The Last Unicorn,” Catherynne Valente’s “The Girl Who Circumnavigated Fairyland in a Ship of Her Own Making,” Phyllis Ann Karr’s “The Idylls of the Queen,” Brandon Sanderson’s “The Way of Kings,” and J.R.R. Tolkien’s “The Hobbit.”

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