iiinova — where your digital self keeps evolving

Mark Brandon @markbrandon.bsky.social · 16/11/2025

Just started this and it’s absolutely brilliant. Mind-bending in all the right ways. Kudos, @qntm.org !!

Mark Brandon @markbrandon.bsky.social · 06/10/2025

My favourite book-related podcast, with some spooky tales for the Witching Season, including a morsel from yours truly! 👻 🎃 😈

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Mark Brandon @markbrandon.bsky.social · 19/08/2025

For those in the know, the final round of a truly insane mono white attrition… major respect to my valiant opponent (many GGs…) #magicthegathering #mtgarena

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Mark Brandon @markbrandon.bsky.social · 11/05/2025

No such sky wonders this time but a fabulous weekend nonetheless!

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Joanne Harris @joannechocolat.bsky.social · 15/04/2025

Unsolicited writing advice no. 13: No artist needs artificial intelligence if they have the real thing.

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Joanne Harris @joannechocolat.bsky.social · 29/03/2025

Unsolicited writing advice, no. 940000: The senses are a way of connecting with your readership. Use them all. Don't forget scent, touch and taste as well as just sight and sound. Describing something ordinary via an unexpected sense can suddenly make it fresher and more interesting.

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Adrian Tchaikovsky @aptshadow.bsky.social · 28/03/2025

I know this was the cover format back in the day but I’m imagining a modern reader seeing this and thinking ‘Do not remember the scene with the penguins in 1984.’

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Mark Brandon @markbrandon.bsky.social · 29/03/2025

Clearly I’m in a simulation. I recently wrote (and have out on submission) an SF story where Miles Davis plays a pivotal role! lol

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Mark Brandon @markbrandon.bsky.social · 29/03/2025

A balcony, wrapped around one corner of a red brick former warehouse built when dreadnoughts ruled the waves. Metal railings, walled with decaying raffia. Pretty pots of dead plants. Worn decking, black with lichen, slick to the touch. A door, the pane above the handle broken.

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Rod Duncan @rodduncan.bsky.social · 27/03/2025

I am delighted to have an article in this issue of Pulse.

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Mark Brandon @markbrandon.bsky.social · 28/03/2025

An old factory on the shoreline, slowly rusting into the lake. Two chimneys reach defiantly into a lead white sky. Chill air laced with a chemical tang. A patched road leads to a loading dock. A badge on a faded blue lanyard. Name blurred. Face still recognisable.

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Mark Brandon @markbrandon.bsky.social · 27/03/2025

The palace stood at the very centre of the frozen lake. Walls of ice so old, so compressed they were blue. Ramparts like broken teeth. A single entrance, just a crack, pulled apart by time and weight. A dark blue nub the size of a child’s hand: a bell. But to summon whom? Or what?

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Chuck Wendig @chuckwendig.bsky.social · 26/03/2025

I finished five novels before BLACKBIRDS was ever published — none good and all necessary to write. That doesn’t include the many more novels I began and never finished. I still think of myself as a failed novelist — my failures outweigh my successes and I am glad for that. Failure teaches.

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Mark Brandon @markbrandon.bsky.social · 26/03/2025

Currently in exactly this mode. Stop worrying about word length, Mark, just write everything down!

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Mark Brandon @markbrandon.bsky.social · 26/03/2025

Thanks! It was my response to the exercise set by @rodduncan.bsky.social at his Worldbuilding talk at States of Independence on Saturday. I’m seeing if I can do a few a week for my own amusement 🙂

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Mark Brandon @markbrandon.bsky.social · 26/03/2025

Heartily agree with this advice! Reading aloud is one of the essentials in my writing process.

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Mark Brandon @markbrandon.bsky.social · 25/03/2025

The cottage had once been part of a castle. Stonework dusty with pale green lichen. Three deep-silled windows, dark as eyes. The smell of earth and rotting wood. A glint by the doorstep, a half-buried brooch, revealed by rain.

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Chuck Wendig @chuckwendig.bsky.social · 24/03/2025

current news vibes: - White House introduces new "if you don't buy a Tesla you go to a Tesla Reeducation Camp in El Salvador" initiative - Trump threatens to scour the Shire - SEVERANCE season 3 canceled by DOGE - Democrats institute new plan of "wait for it all to be over" - the gyre widens

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Mark Brandon @markbrandon.bsky.social · 24/03/2025

My partner described lo-fi jazz (which I listen to sometimes) as “like being on an elevator to Hell”. I retaliated, calling BBC Radio6 Music (his fave) as “like being on a rollercoaster made out of custard and razor blades”. He called me a “typical Aquarian”. Music War continues!

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Mark Brandon @markbrandon.bsky.social · 24/03/2025

Thought-provoking. I like the way you write. Kudos.

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Mark Brandon @markbrandon.bsky.social · 23/03/2025

We were both working until the idea of crumpets and a movie occurred, and now it seems work is done…

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Mark Brandon @markbrandon.bsky.social · 23/03/2025

Who are some of the writers who made you? Iain M Banks Robert Silverberg H P Lovecraft Philip K Dick Richard Morgan William Gibson Tolkien Julian May Bruce Sterling Jane Austen Anthony Doerr

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Rod Duncan @rodduncan.bsky.social · 21/03/2025

Looking forward to seeing people at States of Independence tomorrow at DMU. It's a free festival. So if you are near Leicester, do come along and enjoy the many events, stalls and lovely people.

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Mark Brandon @markbrandon.bsky.social · 21/03/2025

The only one I had before was for the Rolls-Royce armoured car!

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Mark Brandon @markbrandon.bsky.social · 21/03/2025

Awesome book haul this morning - three Haynes manuals courtesy of fantastic sale at the Tank Museum - love those guys!

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Joanne Harris @joannechocolat.bsky.social · 19/03/2025

Unsolicited writing advice, no. #16140: Don't assume that your desk is where all your writing happens. 90% of the process of creation happens elsewhere. Use whatever time you have. Thinking time; dreaming time; observing time; analyzing time. All this time can be part of your work. Don't waste it.

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Mark Brandon @markbrandon.bsky.social · 16/03/2025

Spending the evening calculating travel times in my second world fantasy novel is most illuminating! (And will require some tweaking of the WIP!)

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Mark Brandon @markbrandon.bsky.social · 16/03/2025

That’s a much more interesting song! 🤣🤣

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Mark Brandon @markbrandon.bsky.social · 16/03/2025

I always understood torchon to be a smaller cloth (tea towel, dishcloth, duster) and it’s ‘amour’ not armour. Kinda works!

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Barba Papa 🏳️‍🌈 The Bear Did Lady @thebeardidlady.bsky.social · 16/03/2025

🎼🎵 Her body hair is gold Her hips will make you sigh Her hands could shovel coal She got Polyphemus' eye 🎼🎵 She will tease you Maybe squeeze you Then without a warning, eat you She's a cyclops and she knows just How to BBQ some man chops All the crew think they're gonna die She got Polyphemus' eye

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Mark Brandon @markbrandon.bsky.social · 14/03/2025

Writing a chapter I thought was two before the midpoint only to realise “wait - this is the midpoint!” How exciting… #WIP #epicfantasy

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Mark Brandon @markbrandon.bsky.social · 13/03/2025

Started reading a sample of a bestselling novel today. Perfectly well written, but I find first person present tense impossible in long-form fiction. Tiring to read beyond 20 pages or so. So that’s another DNF…

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Clarkesworld @clarkesworldmagazine.com · 10/03/2025

In 18 years, the best day (by far) we've had for new subscriptions was triggered by a reader who posted two sentences and a link on Reddit. Never underestimate word-of-mouth. Thank you to everyone that has done that for us over the years. It all adds up and continues to make a difference.

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chmmagazine.bsky.social @chmmagazine.bsky.social · 10/03/2025

CHM's new magazine Goblins & Galaxies will be opening for submissions on May 7! Check out the guidelines below. goblinsandgalaxies.com/submissions/

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Mark Brandon @markbrandon.bsky.social · 09/03/2025

Heremin, theremin, everywhereaminmin Old Macdonald had an electronic instrument, Etherphone, etherphone Oh…

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Mark Brandon @markbrandon.bsky.social · 08/03/2025

Ok, so if my characters start explaining the plot to one another, talking in exposition and always ending their little speeches in aphorisms, you can shoot me and save the world from more of this utter dreck.

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Mark Brandon @markbrandon.bsky.social · 08/03/2025

I’ve discovered my Kill Switch. The moment I’d give up writing forever: “Didn’t like that last story of yours, Mark. It reminded me of Reacher season three.” S3 is so aggressively bad it’s difficult to look away.

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Rod Duncan @rodduncan.bsky.social · 07/03/2025

Stories are built from moments of change. If you understand what changes in a scene, you'll be able to sculpt that change from the start to the end. That's the key to keeping readers turning the pages. #WritingTips #WritersLife #Thriller

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Mark Brandon @markbrandon.bsky.social · 07/03/2025

🙀 my secret is out!!! 🤣🤣

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Joanne Harris @joannechocolat.bsky.social · 07/03/2025

And this morning the Shed is a murmuration of birds, briefly held in the shape of a shed against the mellow morning sky.

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Mark Brandon @markbrandon.bsky.social · 07/03/2025

When I write, I quickly get into Flow state, where time collapses. It’s wonderful, except that I’m doing a lot of writing right now and it feels like my life is speeding along… 🤪

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