Joely Black

Bone Moth

The Bone Moth: Episode 3

"There's no way you're going to put me on a dragon, not even a large one." I lean on Naraik in the elevator back down. My slate has messages from Ajaë and the Head Curator. They're both curious, but for different reasons.

Bone Moth

The Bone Moth: Episode 2

🔮You can find all episodes on Wattpad here. I'm going to develop some subscriber bonuses, such as maps and extra chapters, as soon as I can. Ishril 25, 4633 AIA I straighten up. "Stolen? What d'you mean stolen?" "I mean stolen." The

Lore 2024

You don't just have to fight: a curator's story

🔮This is an excerpt I've been working on this week, a diary except from another Amnari, SDAC Tabishka. I'll be continuing to work on it over the next few months, as much as I have time. It's very much a first draft, but I

Amnar

TTRPGs in Amnar: An interview with SDM Dolja on the importance of storytelling.

Last Monday, we talked about growing up in Amnar. I mentioned that one of the biggest and most important activities is the Bala–Dura. We'll discuss the Bala portion later, but today, we're going to talk to Dolja about the Dura, what it is, and the

Amnar

What it's like to grow up in Amnar.

🔮This is a long-read for the Lore 2024 Challenge. If you enjoy, you can sign up below for more. Welcome to a different world. Aside from a few basics, growing up in one of the Amnari Exclusion Zones is very different to anywhere else. For a start, here you are

Storytelling

From penguins to subpostmasters to magical procedures: the power of storytelling.

Marking. It's the worst bit of teaching. No, actually, "worst" is the wrong word. It's hardest, because it requires so many skills all at once. I have to sit and read essays, each of which will present me with something unique. A student'

Amnar Featured

This is what I'm going to do next. Yes, I'm terrified.

OK, hello there, 2024. New year, same old me. Or maybe not so much. I wasn't planning to write another newsletter the week after I finished the 52 weeks thing, but I'm incorrigible that way. I think I do need to follow up on what I

52 Weeks of Editing

52 Weeks of Writing: Week 52—The end is the beginning.

Here we are. Week 52. In the first week of January this year (2023), I set out to edit and re-develop the original Amnar manuscripts so they could be published. Maybe I'd do a series on Tuesday Serial. Maybe I'd try to get them published traditionally.

52 Weeks of Editing

52 Weeks of Writing: Week 51—The inevitable rambling on Christmas Eve.

Here we are, at last. Not quite the end (that's next week), but this is the date I started writing the original Amnar books, twenty years ago. Last year, I picked up the manuscripts from their dust-gathering shelves, and decided to spend a year editing them to see

52 Weeks of Editing

52 Weeks of Writing: The missing week 40 and the Facebook livestream idea

💡(I couldn't understand why I seemed to have an extra week left over... I didn't do a week 40. So this is week 40. Honest.) This is not what I planned for this week's post. Not that I ever plan these posts in any

52 Weeks of Editing

52 Weeks of Writing: Week 50—I had a meltdown and the psychologist threatened to call the police.

I'm not sure how to start this week. Last week's episode of "What the F happened to me between 2009 and 2014 (or, to be fair, 2017)" was a rough cut. I wanted to write the only thing I really know about the first

52 Weeks of Editing

52 Weeks of Writing: Week 49—Stare into the abyss long enough and it'll send you more paperwork.

I wake up and it’s dark but it’s also not. Two rooms overlap with distinctly different hues; one is my bedroom in the flat, with its exposed brickwork and plain off-white walls. The light cuts through the gaps between the blinds. It’s never entirely dark because the

52 Weeks of Editing

52 Weeks of Writing: Week 48—The eviction hearing and other waiting rooms.

OK, where were we? Over the last two weeks, I've been starting to pick over the bones of the last fourteen years—oh god, has it really been that long?—in an effort to explain how I got here. How I ended up doing two PhDs, how my

52 Weeks of Editing

52 Weeks of Writing: Week 47—I got the eviction notice on my birthday.

I got the eviction notice on my thirty-first birthday. I remember sitting at my table, a ridiculously big and stupid table I'd had since Lancaster days, and hearing the car engine down below. I remember that my windows overlooked the postboxes to the building, and I remember how,

52 Weeks of Editing

52 Weeks of Writing: Week 46—How do I tell the story of how I got here?

I have a story to tell you. It's a story I've been meaning to tell for a long time. No, wait. That's not how it goes. This is a story I never wanted to tell and I never planned to tell. It was a

52 Weeks of Editing

52 Weeks of Writing: Week 45—A mug fell on my head.

This is not going according to plan. Not that I had a plan, but still. I say under duress because if I hadn't said I'd write every week for a year, I wouldn't write at all this week. It's Sunday evening, and

Members only

52 Weeks of Editing

52 Weeks of Writing: Week 44—Burnout

52 Weeks of Editing

52 Weeks of Writing: Week 43—The coming few weeks will be a little bit different.

I am digging myself up out of the burnout grave this week with a bit of an odd post. Not penguins again, but more like an introduction to the odd posts that are going to pop up in the next couple of weeks. I might have set myself an utterly

52 Weeks of Editing

52 Weeks of Writing: Week 42—The answer to life, the universe, and everything is maybe this.

I've always thought the number 42 was special because I'm a Hitch-Hiker's Guide to the Galaxy fan. I wanted my forty-second birthday to be more special than my fortieth for that reason. If I'd made any plans to set up the forty-second

52 Weeks of Editing

52 Weeks of Writing: Week 41—Lessons from Writing a Series of Prompt Challenges

Well, you may have noticed a bit of a change this week. It's Spooky Season, it's the last month before Nanowrimo, and it's my first week of teaching. I feel like I've been running very fast and still not keeping up with

Amnar

WA Spooktober 2023.3: "Helpless"

Today's World Anvil Spooktober prompt word: "Helpless" Today required quite a bit of work. I spent all morning on campus teaching, which slowed me up. I had no idea what to do with the word "Helpless". It's a great word—it conveys

Amnar

WA Spooktober 2023.2: "Spectre"

Today I have another post for you from the World Anvil Spooktober Prompts. I'm going through them as they show up, and I'm going to apologise straight up and say this is very scrappy indeed. Today was my biggest teaching day of the week so far,

WA Spooktober 2023

WA Spooktober 2023.1: "Crow"

It's Spooktober. I had a whole set of plans for this month because Ancient Magic probably has a lot of crossovers with this month. However, all my intentions to write smart academic-style blogs have fallen by the wayside as I am struggling with medical issues as one of

52 Weeks of Editing

52 Weeks of Writing: Week 39—From another world

Hello. I'm reporting in from the stern of a narrowboat somewhere in the East Midlands of the UK. This is my first long, proper holiday since 2019, when I flew out to Rome with T and friends. After that, there was a pandemic, and although we went away

52 Weeks of Editing

52 Weeks of Writing: Week 38: Shadow work for developing characters and plot

For the last week, I've been digging into the idea of shadow characters and shadow work. If you haven't encountered this aspect of storytelling before, the basic concept is that characters (or even groups of characters) around the main character, represent dark features of the protagonist&