iiinova — where your digital self keeps evolving

Reposted by Emma Devlin

Zachary Gillan @megapolisomancy.bsky.social · 04/10/2026

For October let’s remind ourselves what really matters: weird fiction

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Emma Devlin @theactualemma.bsky.social · 13h

Matthew got over his cold in like a day while I still suffer 😭

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Emma Devlin @theactualemma.bsky.social · 03/10/2026

my dad waking me up at 7am for school after i'd only gone to bed at 5am

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Emma Devlin @theactualemma.bsky.social · 02/10/2026

V proud of Matthew, whose artwork will be included in the upcoming issue of The Apiary. It's his artistic debut and I'm so proud ❤️

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Emma Devlin @theactualemma.bsky.social · 02/10/2026

Our new place is so bloody awkwardly shaped and sized. I miss the old place so much 😭

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Emma Devlin @theactualemma.bsky.social · 01/10/2026

This is my absolute favourite time of year 🍁🍂

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Emma Devlin @theactualemma.bsky.social · 30/09/2026

I'm getting sick and I blame literally everyone I've spoken to in the past couple of days.

Woman in a doorway yelling at her kids: well it was fucking one of yas

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Emma Devlin @theactualemma.bsky.social · 30/09/2026

Lol lads I was trying to show some students how to use the self-issue machines in the library and now they all know about the massive fine on my account 🫠

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Emma Devlin @theactualemma.bsky.social · 28/09/2026

how do i know i haven't just been writing complete crap? what if i've just utterly taken leave of my senses and everything i've written so far is just bad? what then??

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Emma Devlin @theactualemma.bsky.social · 25/09/2026

I just spent a good ten seconds looking for my headphones before realising I was wearing them. Lads, I need a nap.

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Emma Devlin @theactualemma.bsky.social · 25/09/2026

We have such an amazing line-up for Undertow and we couldn't be more excited. It's part of the Doors Into the Dark event, which you'll find more about here: www.qub.ac.uk/events/whats...

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Emma Devlin @theactualemma.bsky.social · 24/09/2026

I keep reading this as "extra spicy"

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Reposted by Emma Devlin

Tal Lavin @swordsjew.bsky.social · 20/08/2026

parents in ancient mesopotamia 🤝parents in contemporary america "damn these kids playing with their tablets"

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Emma Devlin @theactualemma.bsky.social · 20/09/2026

I am going to take a cue from Ashurbanipal and start writing my CV like this. (From Selena Wisnom's The Library of Ancient Mesopotamia and the Making of History.)

I learned the craft of the sage Adapa, the secret and hidden lore of all the scribal arts. I am able to recognise celestial and terrestrial omens and can discuss them in an assembly of scholars. I am capable of arguing with expert diviners about the series called 'If the liver is a mirror image of the heavens'. I can
resolve complex mathematical divisions and multiplications that do not have an easy solution. I have read cunningly written texts in obscure Sumerian and Akkadian that are difficult to interpret. I have carefully examined inscriptions on stone from before the Deluge that are sealed, stopped up, and confused.

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Emma Devlin @theactualemma.bsky.social · 19/09/2026

Voluntarily sang karaoke this evening. I am evolving.

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Emma Devlin @theactualemma.bsky.social · 19/09/2026

Finally unpacking the rest of my books and, well, we have a bit of a situation.

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Emma Devlin @theactualemma.bsky.social · 18/09/2026

Cuneiform rules, dude. When I was 11 made up a bunch of fake writing systems and one of them was kind of modelled after the look of cuneiform (no, I had basically no knowledge of how it actually worked).

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Emma Devlin @theactualemma.bsky.social · 18/09/2026

My memory is so bad lol. I wish I was the sort of person who could recall quotes from books but all I can do is dredge up this soggy approximation of what they maybe said, while also forgetting their title and the name of the author.

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Emma Devlin @theactualemma.bsky.social · 17/09/2026

I'm going to start signing off my emails with "complete the instruction!"

The king wrote letters to far-fung scholars to request copies of tablets in their collections so he could add them to his own.'Write out all the scribal learning
in the property of Nabû and send it to me. Complete the instruction!' read one letter to some scholars based in the city of Borsippa, over 300 miles to the south of his capital.
Ashurbanipal's royal CV was not just about power and might...

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Emma Devlin @theactualemma.bsky.social · 17/09/2026

Learning about ancient Sumerian proverbs about dogs.

Extract: Dogs were an important part of life in ancient Mesopotamia, where they guarded homes and cities, they helped people hunt, and they may have helped them heal alongside Gula, the goddess of medicine. As they so often do today, they accompanied soldiers into battle,which gets depicted in art alongside chariots and horses, and recorded
in administrative texts that describe their provisions. Sumerian proverbs give sweet glimpses into the way people interacted with and relied on their canine companions, such as 'The dog understands,"Take it!" It does not understand, "Put it down!"'; and 'A dog which is played with turns into a puppy' Or a personal favourite,'Fate is a dog, walking always behind a man'. My own ten-year-old black Labrador follows me around like a shadow, lying quietly at my feet when I sit
at the dining table or panting cheerfully at my side when we go for short runs. He is, unequivocally, the best dog in the world (as is every other dog in the world). I cannot think of a more beautiful - and less stressful- way to understand the inescapability of fate than as a doting dog at my heels.

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Emma Devlin @theactualemma.bsky.social · 16/09/2026

In another life I would have studied ancient history instead of English, and I sometimes wonder where it would have taken me. Furiously writing short stories about neo-babylonian priestesses, presumably.

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Emma Devlin @theactualemma.bsky.social · 14/09/2026

I acquired a great many books while in London and, uh, I may be in a spot of trouble re. luggage allowance.

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Emma Devlin @theactualemma.bsky.social · 14/09/2026

About 5 mins away from the Bayeux Tapestry ☄️

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Emma Devlin @theactualemma.bsky.social · 13/09/2026

My sister and her boyfriend have dragged me into a board game based on Jaws, little knowing that it is my favourite film of all time.

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Emma Devlin @theactualemma.bsky.social · 11/09/2026

For some reason my father thought Celine Dion died. The RELIEF he experienced when I googled it and told him that she is, indeed, alive.

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Reposted by Emma Devlin

Rachel Handley 🏳️‍🌈 @rachelahandley.com · 08/09/2026

I'll be reading a short story as part of the Doors Into The Dark event dedicated to weird & wonderful fiction on 26th September at The Seamus Heaney Centre (Queen's University Belfast). Organised by @theactualemma.bsky.social and Niall McKenna. Tickets: www.seamusheaneycentre.com/Events/Doors...

A green poster with an illustration of a crow which reads "The Seamus Heaney Centre, Doors Onto The Dark: A Day of Weird Fiction, Saturday 26th September 2026".

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Reposted by Emma Devlin

David Hayden @seventydys.bsky.social · 08/09/2026

Doors Into the Dark is a fascinating day of weird fiction at the Seamus Heaney Centre 26/9 @qubelfastofficial.bsky.social that ends with an evening of new strange & speculative writing, hosted by @theactualemma.bsky.social & Niall McKenna inc a new story of mine. www.eventbrite.co.uk/e/doors-into...

eventbrite.co.uk

Doors Into the Dark: A Day of Weird Fiction

Join us to explore Science-Fiction, Speculative Fiction, Horror, Myth and the Weird with the makers of fiction, film, comics and games.

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Emma Devlin @theactualemma.bsky.social · 07/09/2026

I'm watching an old Marco Pierre White interview where he's cutting onions and it's literally the most important thing on Earth.

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Emma Devlin @theactualemma.bsky.social · 05/09/2026

Going to see the Bayeux Tapestry later this month ☄️

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Emma Devlin @theactualemma.bsky.social · 04/09/2026

My sister and I are making Dolly Parton's cake recipe from Steel Magnolias, but we're making it in the terrible oven our landlord provided. More as it comes.

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Emma Devlin @theactualemma.bsky.social · 03/09/2026

I have learned that the legendary Keats and Chapman bookshop is closing down. I am BEREFT.

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Emma Devlin @theactualemma.bsky.social · 01/09/2026

I've been watching a lot of old Gordon Ramsay shows and every time I sit down with my lunch I see this in my mind's eye

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Emma Devlin @theactualemma.bsky.social · 01/09/2026

Well I certainly hope they fix Outlook. I would really hate to go to work tomorrow and find out that I can't receive any emails. It would just do me right in so it would.

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Emma Devlin @theactualemma.bsky.social · 31/08/2026

help i have once again ended up with fewer words than I started with 😭

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Reposted by Emma Devlin

Emma Devlin @theactualemma.bsky.social · 27/08/2026

You'll see my big face at a few events at Doors Into the Dark. A day of weird fiction. A delight.

qub.ac.uk

Doors Into the Dark: A Day of Weird Fiction

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Emma Devlin @theactualemma.bsky.social · 28/08/2026

Dolly Parton's appearance at Glastonbury, and especially Lay Your Hands on Me, was so good. Now if only I can find a version where the sound isn't completely banjaxed.

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Reposted by Emma Devlin

Emma Devlin @theactualemma.bsky.social · 28/08/2026

Deadline is TODAY at 5pm!

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Emma Devlin @theactualemma.bsky.social · 27/08/2026

You'll see my big face at a few events at Doors Into the Dark. A day of weird fiction. A delight.

qub.ac.uk

Doors Into the Dark: A Day of Weird Fiction

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Emma Devlin @theactualemma.bsky.social · 26/08/2026

People spend their whole lives trying to feel as rich as I do when I'm standing in front of a well-stocked bookcase.

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Emma Devlin @theactualemma.bsky.social · 26/08/2026

Last few days before the submission window closes and work is coming in thick and fast! If you're on the fence, now is a good time to send something through!

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Emma Devlin @theactualemma.bsky.social · 25/08/2026

The Move has created some kind of void into which every book I was in the middle of reading appears to have fallen 😭

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