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🌈Sarah Pauling

@sarahpauling.bsky.social
271 followers 171 following 278 posts

Neon SFF and gaudy boots. Pub'd in Clarkesworld, Strange Horizons, Escape Pod, &etc. Lead writer on a TTRPG forthcoming from Gameswell. #vp23; James White Award finalist. She/her. stories @ sarahpauling.com

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🌈Sarah Pauling @sarahpauling.bsky.social · 1h
I know none of you care about barbershop music (for shame) but I need someone to see this tag we found
Four lines of music in four-part harmony. The song is called “We are not Gay!” and contains lyrics such as “We give hugs and dance with each other / But we’re still straight ‘cause we’re in choir”
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🌈Sarah Pauling @sarahpauling.bsky.social · 03/10/2026
this is barbershop harmony. at least I think so
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🌈Sarah Pauling @sarahpauling.bsky.social · 01/10/2026
I am in Boise for a barbershop harmony convention so please pass along Boise recs if you’ve got ‘em. I liked the art museum
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🌈Sarah Pauling @sarahpauling.bsky.social · 01/10/2026
“At Generic State, it’s normal for crowds…to chant, scream, cry, and occasionally bleed while exploited youths risk their bodies and minds in ritual violence to sate the bloodlust of their watchers. Surely this must be Dark Academia somehow.” www.mcsweeneys.net/articles/gen...
mcsweeneys.net
Generic State University Pivots to Dark Academia
“Generic State University has been proudly upholding its mission to provide opportunities and build character in all students since its founding. Now, we tur...
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OTHERSIDE @othersidespec.bsky.social · 28/09/2026
We are opening submissions for our fourth and final issue of the year in October! SOON! Issue 4 has a theme: EXPLORATION 🪐🗡️ Early opening for trans, BIPOC, and/or disabled authors: October 1-7 General submissions: October 8-21 Guidelines: othersidespec.com/guidelines/
othersidespec.com
Submission Guidelines - OTHERSIDE
Submission guidelines for fiction and poetry submissions to OTHERSIDE, including opening dates and how to submit.
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𝕾𝖙𝖗𝖆𝖓𝖌𝖊 𝕳𝖔𝖚𝖘𝖊 @strangehouse.bsky.social · 24/09/2026
Cover art I made for the Italian edition of Between Two Fires. Available to pre-order from Mercurio Books
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Merc Fenn Wolfmoor @mercwolfmoor.bsky.social · 27/09/2026
We are REAL CLOSE... come back #OpportunityWindow, get some awesome #timeloop stories!! www.backerkit.com/c/projects/m...
screenshot from the backerkit website showing OPPORTUNITY WINDOW is at 1567/2000 with 96 backers and 4 days left to go
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mattie lubchansky @mattielubchansky.com · 28/09/2026
Recent Events have me once again considering: the cube
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🌈Sarah Pauling @sarahpauling.bsky.social · 27/09/2026
everyone in a given writer’s circle has an important social role. my role is “doesn’t shut up about tiptree”
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🌈Sarah Pauling @sarahpauling.bsky.social · 27/09/2026
for blood on the clocktower last night i couldn’t decide if I should go for “literal witch casting spells” or “why on earth would I have killed my husband, officer?” So I split the difference
Writer in a black dress with roses and a capeWriter in a black dress; the bottom has lace with pentagram patterns
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🌈Sarah Pauling @sarahpauling.bsky.social · 27/09/2026
they both fit. they promise
Two cats cuddling on a desk cat bed
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David J Prokopetz @prokopetz.bsky.social · 16/08/2026
I'm not saying it doesn't HAPPEN, but "all weird indie TTRPGs are a kink thing" is reductive. There is also "designing RPGs to publish your worldbuilding bible", "designing RPGs because you invented a neat dice trick", "designing RPGs to win an argument", and "designing RPGs as an act of self harm".
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🌈Sarah Pauling @sarahpauling.bsky.social · 23/09/2026
god dc comics are stupid (she said, lovingly). i should get back into reading dc again
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Max the comics guy who does comics about comics @waitingforthetrade.bsky.social · 19/09/2026
Bruce Wayne: I met a woman. Her name is Evilla Von Facestabber. I think I might love her.
Tim Drake: Slow down, boss. I think she might be that new villain, The Face Stabber? The one who keeps stabbing people in the face?
Bruce: Don't make me throw you in the hole again, Tim.
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70s Sci-Fi Art @70sscifiart.bsky.social · 20/09/2026
Last day to sign up for my art blog newsletter before the next issue's out! 70s-sci-fi-art.ghost.io This one gets weird: We're looking at the coolest cover art on corporate annual reports from across the 1970s.
A big oil rig in the ocean is surrounded by a supply ship and helicopter.Abstracted colorful graphic depicting machinery.Colorful collage of a face, circuit boards, a keyboard, and a microchip.Montage of industries, transportation, and agriculture depicted as branches of a large tree.
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meagan kane @spocksbrain.bsky.social · 11/04/2026
Remember Me in the Meat, @sarahpauling.bsky.social in @clarkesworldmagazine.com - This one had me from the title and did not let go. Lobemeat! Cults! Girlbosses! Memory! I found the twist here particularly effective, in that stomach-dropping kind of way. clarkesworldmagazine.com/pauling_02_26/
clarkesworldmagazine.com
Clarkesworld Magazine - Science Fiction & Fantasy
Clarkesworld Science Fiction and Fantasy Magazine and Podcast. This page: Remember Me in the Meat by Sarah Pauling
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Adria Bailton @adriabailton.com · 31/08/2026
Have you read? Mother Mansrot in the Glass Mountain by Sarah Pauling at Otherside How could she sit in an icy room with nothing in it but a four-poster bed and pace, and pace, and let the filth of the world watch her, and not want to smash through the glass with her own two hands?
othersidespec.com
Mother Mansrot in the Glass Mountain - OTHERSIDE
There were walls within the glass mountain, just as clear as its sheer cliffsides. There were floors within the glass mountain—and ceilings, too—but they left just as little to the imagination. A…
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Tom Ewing @tomewing.bsky.social · 19/09/2026
Narnia books as Isekai Manga
1. My Sweet Tooth Made Me The Villainess’ Slave
2. In Another World, The Dwarves Picked Me To Lead The Revolution
3. All At Sea With My Level 0 Sailing Skills
4. On A Mission In Another World And I Can’t Remember The Cheat Codes
5. That Time I Got Reincarnated As A Horse
6. Help! My Uncle’s In Love With The Demon Queen!
7. Reincarnated In Another World Just As The Game’s Ending
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Max the comics guy who does comics about comics @waitingforthetrade.bsky.social · 19/09/2026
Bruce Wayne: Aunt Kathy, why didn't you take me in after my parents died?
Kathy Kane: I'm going to be honest with you, Bruce. It seemed like a giant hassle mixed with a massive bummer.
Kathy Kane: But hey, now that you're old enough to drink, we can hang out as much as you want!
Bruce Wayne:
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🌈Sarah Pauling @sarahpauling.bsky.social · 21/09/2026
dental hygienist looked in my mouth and said “oh yeah I remember now” am I cooked?
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🌈Sarah Pauling @sarahpauling.bsky.social · 20/09/2026
best (worst?) thing abt conventions is how quickly my "to read/watch" bookmarks multiply
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🌈Sarah Pauling @sarahpauling.bsky.social · 19/09/2026
SOON the mystery rpgs talk is at 11pm EDT which means i am here to support the australians. australians, assemble
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Memento Morlys 🍉 @aardwyrm.bsky.social · 15/09/2026
high fantasy has an elevation of at least 2000' above sea level and has a cooler, windier climate than low fantasy, which is less seasonal and lacks joshua trees
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🌈Sarah Pauling @sarahpauling.bsky.social · 19/09/2026
cheating bc i already talked about this like a month ago but i read THE GONE WORLD by tom sweterlitsch and lost my goddamn mind. good and idiosyncratic prose, strong characterization, complicated emotional valence, "time travel as cosmic horror"
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🌈Sarah Pauling @sarahpauling.bsky.social · 19/09/2026
this was real real good and now i want to play girl frame even MORE
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Amanda Helms - Preorder THE UPPER TENTACLE @amandaghelms.bsky.social · 18/09/2026
It's September 18, which means that in exactly one month, my special call for @diabolicalplots.com, Diabolical Rot, will be opening for submissions! Check out the full details here: www.diabolicalplots.com/dp-general-s...
diabolicalplots.com
DP General Submission Window and “Diabolical Rot” Themed Window – Diabolical Plots
If you are thinking about starting a short fiction publication and would like to discuss with someone experienced how to get started, please do contact us!
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🌈Sarah Pauling @sarahpauling.bsky.social · 17/09/2026
the mystery rpg ted talk is in part an excuse to give recs recentish games whose handling of mystery stories i will enthuse about include Psychic Trash Detectives by @brigittewinter.bsky.social, Alice is Missing by @spenserstarke.bsky.social, and of course The Between by @jasoncordova.bsky.social!!
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Small Wonders @smallwondersmag.com · 16/09/2026
Co-editors Stephen and Cislyn will be at @flightsoffoundry.bsky.social this weekend! FoF is a mutli-disciplinary virtual online convention running round the clock during the 60 hours of the event. There's lots of casual fun stuff in addition to presentations, panels, and workshops. Check it out!
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🌈Sarah Pauling @sarahpauling.bsky.social · 13/09/2026
i am going to Talk About Things at @flightsoffoundry.bsky.social! 1) I love slush reading at @diabolicalplots.com and @smallwondersmag.com AND 2) I am neck-deep in mystery ttrpgs and ready to make that everybody else's problem
Graphic showing author's schedule at Flights of Foundry: one panel on Friday evening on indie TTRPGs, one Saturday afternoon on the view from the slush pile, and one Saturday evening on mystery TTRPGs.
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🌈Sarah Pauling @sarahpauling.bsky.social · 14/09/2026
i've been so deep in the tabletop mines in the first place because i’m lead writer for wyrd mist, a ttrpg with deck building elements forthcoming from gameswell! i've been pitching it as "nancy drew twin peaks." the playtest packet is available online: gameswell.shop/pages/wyrd-m...
A pencil illustration of a campsite with the text: Wyrd Mist: Coming soon to Kickstarter: A deck-buliding TTRPG for standard playing cards. You live in a small Pacific Northwest town: an out-of-the-way place with a quaint Main Street, neighbors who know where you went for coffee last Tuesday, and the all-important local Rutabaga Produce Festival. And beneath it all, there's something else. Something wyrd is waking up. Your adventure unfolds with a standard deck of cards and six-sided die for each player.A pencil sketch of a pie with a slice eaten. The text is part of a "how to play" guide with character creation instructions: players choose between small-town professions and indicate why they've volunteered for the Rutabaga Festival planning committee this year, a significant time commitment.
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ash vs the evil dead @ashvalewrites.bsky.social · 15/09/2026
Vampires! Eldritch whales! Pathetic lesbians! Weird science! Vengeful trees! Sadness! As always, this issue has everything you crave
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Julie Annihilator @kastor.sh · 23/07/2026
It’s finally out
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Sid Jain @sid--j.bsky.social · 14/09/2026
This weekend!! Still spots left to sign up. Come learn some techniques and journaling prompts to generate infinite ideas from observations and obsessions, then how to connect them together into a single story seed. metrowestwriters.myshopify.com/products/sin...
metrowestwriters.myshopify.com
Single-Session: Sid Jain teaches The Charged Field: How Writers Build
Just in time for our busy drafting season, this class is perfect for the writer looking for new ways to cultivate story ideas! Every story starts with an idea, and accumulates new ideas with every sen...
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Rainbow Space Magic @spacemagiccon.bsky.social · 14/09/2026
Your last chance to apply for Opening Pages Consults! Deadline is today (Monday September 14th)! Want feedback from a professional editor on the opening pages of your #QueerSFF novel? Submit your novel's opening pages to apply for a one-to-one session. ​ docs.google.com/forms/d/e/1F...
A graphic for the Opening Pages Consults at the Rainbow Space Magic Convention. It includes the con dates, October 3 to 4, the URL RainbowSpaceMagic.org, and headshots of the participating editors, Brenna Bailey-Davies, Genevieve Clovis, Alex Crawley, and Tanya Gold.
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🌈Sarah Pauling @sarahpauling.bsky.social · 14/09/2026
i've been so deep in the tabletop mines in the first place because i’m lead writer for wyrd mist, a ttrpg with deck building elements forthcoming from gameswell! i've been pitching it as "nancy drew twin peaks." the playtest packet is available online: gameswell.shop/pages/wyrd-m...
A pencil illustration of a campsite with the text: Wyrd Mist: Coming soon to Kickstarter: A deck-buliding TTRPG for standard playing cards. You live in a small Pacific Northwest town: an out-of-the-way place with a quaint Main Street, neighbors who know where you went for coffee last Tuesday, and the all-important local Rutabaga Produce Festival. And beneath it all, there's something else. Something wyrd is waking up. Your adventure unfolds with a standard deck of cards and six-sided die for each player.A pencil sketch of a pie with a slice eaten. The text is part of a "how to play" guide with character creation instructions: players choose between small-town professions and indicate why they've volunteered for the Rutabaga Festival planning committee this year, a significant time commitment.
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Devan Barlow @devanbarlow.bsky.social · 14/09/2026
🍂👻Starting your autumn reading? HONEY AND HARM IS full of scary fairy tale moments, magical food, and complicated family relationships!
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🌈Sarah Pauling @sarahpauling.bsky.social · 13/09/2026
i am going to Talk About Things at @flightsoffoundry.bsky.social! 1) I love slush reading at @diabolicalplots.com and @smallwondersmag.com AND 2) I am neck-deep in mystery ttrpgs and ready to make that everybody else's problem
Graphic showing author's schedule at Flights of Foundry: one panel on Friday evening on indie TTRPGs, one Saturday afternoon on the view from the slush pile, and one Saturday evening on mystery TTRPGs.
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🌈Sarah Pauling @sarahpauling.bsky.social · 13/09/2026
if i can't find a good canva template for a single-axis left/right scale can i just draw on the futch scale
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Ed Morland @edmorland.bsky.social · 13/09/2026
As we're getting into the back half of 2026 do think about whether there's any works you'd recommend for the Otherwise Award for SFF "that expands or explores our understanding of gender". The jury can't consider works they aren't aware of so do give them a heads up of stuff they shouldn't miss.
otherwiseaward.org
2026 Otherwise Awards Recommendations « Otherwise Award
Recommend works here for the Otherwise Awards jurors to consider!
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St. Simeon the Holy Fool @simeonthefool.bsky.social · 29/09/2025
This movie is back from the unhinged days of Sesame Street, where you think it’s going to be about looking at paintings with your friends but then Big Bird befriends the ghost of a 4000-year-old ancient Egyptian boy and faces down the god Osiris to let him into the afterlife
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val - V.M. Ayala 🏳️‍🌈 @spacevalkyries.bsky.social · 10/09/2026
hi yes I'm SO excited that my trans giant robot flash fic is out now at @lightspeedmagazine.com. please enjoy "The Chrysalis of Moth One" 💜 this one is a bit Pacific Rim drift compatibility but make it angry and defiantly trans. I'm so proud of this one ✨ www.lightspeedmagazine.com/fiction/the-...
lightspeedmagazine.com
The Chrysalis of Moth One - Lightspeed Magazine
They didn’t want either of us to live this long. Sucks for them—we’re good at living in spite. We’re good at surviving, at fighting, at never stopping. Today is the last day we exist in spite of Comma...
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🌈Sarah Pauling @sarahpauling.bsky.social · 10/09/2026
Spent half of my voice lesson just quizzing the guy on music theory. i wish i had fifteen degrees
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Mike X. Nichols @mikexnichols.bsky.social · 08/09/2026
Thinking about this exchange today
A YouTube video for the Water Temple in The Legend of Zelda: Ocarina of Time. The comments section has an exchange as detailed below. “@TheMrdangles16 • 11y ago: 
i hate the water temple... too confusing :(“ “@KeithHalsell • 2y ago: 
it's been 9 years, i hope you are doing great in life now.” “@TheMrdangles16 • 2y ago: it couldn't be going worse Keith.”
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Thomas Cardwell @gameswell.shop · 08/09/2026
PAX West 2026 is in the books! Thanks to some lovely friends for keeping Kelly and me rolling at the show. Rayne, Andrew, Davi and Sarah—y’all are the best. (Bonus points to Sarah taking pics at the booth)
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Guan Un @thisisguan.bsky.social · 07/09/2026
I am teaching a class on Sunday at ConSyderation on "Short Story Essentials". Writers, what are some of the things you wished you'd known when you started out writing short stories?
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🌈Sarah Pauling @sarahpauling.bsky.social · 07/09/2026
Yooo the booth looks so good
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🌈Sarah Pauling @sarahpauling.bsky.social · 07/09/2026
I’m at PAX today with @gameswell.shop!! Say hi. Learn abt our PNW ttrpg (I have lovingly referred to it as “Nancy Drew Twin Peaks”)
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Alasdair Beckett-King @misterabk.bsky.social · 07/09/2026
The king's adviser is actually a nice guy:
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Rick Hollon @mimulus.bsky.social · 01/09/2026
My very upstate poem “Natty Bumppo Bums a Smoke Outside the Stewart’s Shop” is in this issue!
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