Filipino & Finnish mythology & folklore in my recent work

To celebrate crossing the midpoint in my science-fantasy novella, I'm sharing the Filipino & Finnish mythology & folklore I've incorporated in my work so far. This includes The Quiet is Loud, Seeker of the Lost Song, and Seeker's sequel as well as the novella. Folklore/mythology from the Philippines:⁠ ✦ Nuno…

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The inevitability of Peter Gabriel: creative inspiration

Today is Peter Gabriel’s 74th birthday, and it's good timing. Lately I’ve been thinking about the way his Genesis years influenced my writing. It might not be obvious mainly because he’s a musician and I’m a writer. Of course, though, in Genesis he did write most of the lyrics he…

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Historical inspiration for my fantasy novel: Pre-colonial Philippines

Seeker of the Lost Song is a historically-inspired fantasy novel merging medieval Finnish & pre-colonial Filipino elements, and I wanted to share two elements of Filipino history I included. Dulang, a low table One of my favourite tidbits from my research is that pre-colonial Filipinos ate at a low table,…

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Why I left Substack

  • Post category:Misc.Writing

You may have heard that Substack recently came under scrutiny (to say the least) for its position on platforming/making money off Nazis - namely, they don’t see a problem with it. So I want to get out of the Nazi bar. I’ve spent the past few days trying out alternatives…

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Essay in All Lit Up about older protagonists in speculative fiction

  • Post category:NewsWriting

Why do we need older protagonists in fantasy, sci-fi, and other forms of speculative fiction? I recently wrote an essay for All Lit Up about the value of north-of-25 protagonists in speculative fiction (and beyond). An excerpt: I do enjoy books where the protagonist saves the day at the age…

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