Kyle Winkler Profile Banner
Kyle Winkler Profile
Kyle Winkler

@bleakhousing

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Horror | Books: GRASSHANDS (JournalStone) | TONE-BONE (Castaigne/9.13.24)| ENTER THE PEERLESS (From Beyond/6.10.25) | @LeftHandLeGuin | @ashlandmfa

Ohio
Joined December 2016
Don't wanna be here? Send us removal request.
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@bleakhousing
Kyle Winkler
2 months
As promised, the complete cover for TONE-BONE, from @CastaignePub , out on 9.13.24. Some hidden references in here to TNTI, so get ready to scour. (Blank sq. is for the ISBN...) Art: @DeeplyDapper
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@bleakhousing
Kyle Winkler
2 years
No joke, my 5 year old will have a book contract before me. Bet on it. The first line is: “A boy had a family but the family was dead.”
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@bleakhousing
Kyle Winkler
2 years
I know this means diddly-squat to most ppl, but my wife and I have spent the past 2 yrs w/ our 2 small kids every day w/o any breaks whatsoever. No dates. No vacays. No grandparent relief system. No nearby relatives, close friends, or trusted neighbors. Lots of ppl are like us.
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@bleakhousing
Kyle Winkler
6 months
Ppl were not joking abt this book. We need to empirically study it for its allure.
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@bleakhousing
Kyle Winkler
4 months
Buried in the NYTimes article. A quotation from Ithaca’s police chief:
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@bleakhousing
Kyle Winkler
4 months
2024, folks.
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@bleakhousing
Kyle Winkler
2 years
UPDATE: showed him how this took off here and now he wants me to help write the book with him! 🥹😭
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@bleakhousing
Kyle Winkler
2 years
I’m not boohooing. I’m just saying: if you see a family struggling, it might e because they have zero in the way of material resources. Hilarious to think my dentist asked where I was going for the summer. “You have to have money for vacations,” I said. Or time.
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@bleakhousing
Kyle Winkler
2 years
@NatatiaLynn The boy encounters a bag of wishes that talks. It tells him he has to go and find a person who makes wind swords, and he has to travel there by hot air balloon a 1,000 miles. And my son said that the bag of wishes is a liar. So...
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@bleakhousing
Kyle Winkler
11 months
How did this book go from published to not published to self-published, all while being amazing? Who has the story on this journey? @Buehlmeister ? In any case, the writing is sharp, sad, funny. Enjoying this immensely.
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@bleakhousing
Kyle Winkler
3 years
Just got notified that a story I wrote 7 yrs ago was accepted for publication in May. I'm telling you--persistence is everything in writing. That's it, and that's all.
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@bleakhousing
Kyle Winkler
3 years
I worry that my kids will look at my cell phone usage the same way I looked at my parents’ smoking.
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@bleakhousing
Kyle Winkler
3 years
💀COVER REVEAL⚡️ Who's up for weird short fiction this November? OH PAIN: stories by Kyle Winkler (Nov. 15)
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@bleakhousing
Kyle Winkler
3 years
You know who comes out swell at the end of MACBETH? Witches.
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@bleakhousing
Kyle Winkler
9 months
I’m gonna need readers to get more onboard with multiple POVs in a novel. I keep reading that publishers dislike these because readers don’t cotton to them. But I mean, like, GoT has tons of switches and is super popular? So wtf?
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@bleakhousing
Kyle Winkler
6 months
Which writers are almost like philosophers to you in the way that they write their stories/novels? IE, writers that have acute and brilliant observations that wouldn’t be misplaced in a philosophical discourse…
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@bleakhousing
Kyle Winkler
4 months
That’s the problem with colleges: they’re trying to be businesses.
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@bleakhousing
Kyle Winkler
5 years
@craigcalcaterra She is my new hero on three fronts: cartography, fiction, and confidence.
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@bleakhousing
Kyle Winkler
2 years
Quit overthinking. Finish yr fucking book. Seriously: you’re putting too much pressure on yrself. Just blab it out. Start. Right now. Go. One paragraph. I dare you.
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@bleakhousing
Kyle Winkler
1 year
I'm willing to take the hit on this one: I don't enjoy most contemporary Big Five publishing cover art. It just feels like souped-up hotel art most of the time w/ one of six different fonts.
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@bleakhousing
Kyle Winkler
7 months
My book launch had book cookies—bookies!
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@bleakhousing
Kyle Winkler
2 years
@baumanis_j Same! Being a parent has made me more progressive than anything prior.
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@bleakhousing
Kyle Winkler
1 year
Found out I got tenure today. Promotion will likely be on its heels. So that's nice.
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@bleakhousing
Kyle Winkler
2 years
Found this classic in a Free Little Library for my 6yo.
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@bleakhousing
Kyle Winkler
2 years
Hearing a lot more from my students that a writer (student or otherwise) is "good" when they are "relatable." I think this is horrible. If a baseline for aesthetics is a recognition of self, then we are in odd fucking territory. But wait, there's more!--
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@bleakhousing
Kyle Winkler
3 years
COVER REVEAL: I am impulsive and could not wait. This is the kickass cover for my cosmic horror novella THE NOTHING THAT IS. I'm aiming for a May 11 release. If people are interested in reviewing it, let me know, I'll send an digital ARC in the next few weeks! xoxo
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@bleakhousing
Kyle Winkler
2 years
COVER REVEAL. Ebook pre-order available tomorrow. Paperback release in the next week!
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@bleakhousing
Kyle Winkler
5 months
Does anyone just sit down at the end of the day and just weep?
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@bleakhousing
Kyle Winkler
9 months
Found the title of my next novel.
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@bleakhousing
Kyle Winkler
4 years
I just sold my first story. And it was the first acceptance after a nine year drought. Story's called "Smudge the Head" and it's quiet horror. It'll be out in the Scare Street anthology, likely coming in the next half year! Don't worry. I'll remind you all!
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@bleakhousing
Kyle Winkler
3 years
Anything you unconsciously include in your writing all the time? Mine seems to be Ball jars.
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@bleakhousing
Kyle Winkler
2 years
Looking for an illustrator for the cover of a horror novel! Suggestions welcome in the comments. Can be 2D media or digital. No preference.
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@bleakhousing
Kyle Winkler
3 years
Gonna open a horror themed bakery and call it Breaditary.
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@bleakhousing
Kyle Winkler
4 months
Like, give me a break.
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@bleakhousing
Kyle Winkler
5 months
you know that scene in Hereditary when Toni Collette turns off the light and sees that outline of her mother in the dark and even the viewer isn't sure but then they are and Toni is and then the light comes on and nothing's there? That's the genre of book I'm working on now.
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@bleakhousing
Kyle Winkler
1 year
Resolving vaguetweet: I'm publishing my novel GRASSHANDS w/ JournalStone. Release date Jan. 19, 2024. Ty to @scarlettralgee for reading, liking, making the offer. Will share more (cover/blurbs) w/ folks as it comes. See 👇 for 🧵 abt the book from last month.
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@bleakhousing
Kyle Winkler
2 years
@sarafmradio I’ve gone from writer to manager. I’ll have to ask him how he comes up with this stuff.
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@bleakhousing
Kyle Winkler
8 months
2 quick updates. 1. Our daughter was born and is wonderful. Mom and baby are doing well! 2. Confirmed that I’ll be at the Scarelastic Book Fair for the second year in a row. If you’re near Indy, come out and meet a murderer’s row of authors.
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@bleakhousing
Kyle Winkler
2 years
I realize I have a lot of new followers b/c of my son’s kickass fantasy’s story. Wow. So real quickly: hi. I’m a writer of mostly speculative stuff—(hmm, wonder why my kid writes it?)—and an English professor. I tweet a lot abt language/writing/books. Often vulgar. Sorry!
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@bleakhousing
Kyle Winkler
7 months
FRIENDS & NEIGHBORS: Today GRASSHANDS is born among the frosty muck of late January. I will post intermittently thru the day abt the book. Plz consider ordering a copy and indulging in library horror, body horror, & sweet metaphysical sadness! Available everywhere.
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@bleakhousing
Kyle Winkler
2 years
I've probably said this before, but when my parents died 3 yrs ago (113 days apart), I felt like a very small door behind me closed, the seams of which I couldn't even trace if you gave me an infinite amount of time. & I didn't even know it existed until it closed. I'm fine btw.
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@bleakhousing
Kyle Winkler
8 months
We are going to the hospital tomorrow to have our third (and last) baby. And our first girl! But please stop telling me girls are harder to raise than boys. People are hard to raise, period. Raising another human is a fucking endeavor. Anyway, I may be offline for a while. XO.
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@bleakhousing
Kyle Winkler
3 years
Just wrote a horror scene that takes place in a RadioShack in 1982. I mentioned batteries once. I regret nothing.
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@bleakhousing
Kyle Winkler
1 year
Printed out. Ready for a few trusted readers, i.e. my wife. But I hope you all can read it soon.
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@bleakhousing
Kyle Winkler
8 years
@Ssnyder1835 @GregCapullo You've become a goal for my son's crawling/tummy time.
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@bleakhousing
Kyle Winkler
3 years
I don’t believe in heaven. But if it existed, it would be the Scholastic Book Fair. And every book you wanted from that flimsy onion skin paper handout you could get. I see you, late 30s/early 40s people.
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@bleakhousing
Kyle Winkler
3 years
Kealan Patrick Burke said THE NOTHING THAT IS "reads like Anthony Bourdain riffing on Lovecraft." How does a blurb get better than that?
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@bleakhousing
Kyle Winkler
3 years
I think most men can stop describing breasts in their writing, yes? Good god, guys.
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@bleakhousing
Kyle Winkler
3 years
Did I mention I’ll have a collection of weird fiction coming out in mid-November? It’s called OH PAIN. Twelve fucked up stories sprinkled with body horror, comedy, and lots of mothers. Cover reveal coming soon…👀
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@bleakhousing
Kyle Winkler
6 months
A fan made me a grasshand cookie! Amazing.
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@bleakhousing
Kyle Winkler
5 years
@timmaughan How is this not the beginning of UBIK?
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@bleakhousing
Kyle Winkler
8 months
Might as well do this now! Here's the cover to GRASSHANDS and a preorder link for the ebook. Pbk should populate everywhere soonish! Cover by @FrankNobleArt I'll retweet this w/ some choice quotes from writer friends.
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@bleakhousing
Kyle Winkler
2 years
Got the first proof of my novel BORIS SAYS THE WORDS. Can’t believe I didn’t fuck this up. 306 pp. of lunacy.
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@bleakhousing
Kyle Winkler
2 years
Not doing it.
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@bleakhousing
Kyle Winkler
3 years
Proud that my current finished novel draft only has 11 "fucks" in it, whereas the previous one had, like, 88 or something, and my agent kindly asked me to, yanno, maybe cut it down a tad. Which I, of course, fucking did.
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@bleakhousing
Kyle Winkler
2 years
So I live directly 49 miles west of East Palestine. Ppl talk about but no one seems bothered. Not even kidding that I wrote about shit like this in my novel & hoped it wouldn't come to pass. I do not expect the town to be livable, tho they'll pretend it is.
@heckmanatee
Manatee of La Mancha
2 years
Chernobyl Lite™️ is happening in Ohio right now but we’re not gonna know the extent of the disaster for another 10 years or so, huh
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@bleakhousing
Kyle Winkler
3 years
Stop fetishizing long sentences. Hit me with a solid two word sentence, and I’ll love you forever.
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@bleakhousing
Kyle Winkler
3 years
I want to write a story where a person tries to unclog a toilet but starts pulling up pieces of a Lovecraftian elder god that’s embedded itself into the ground under their house. This story would have no resolution.
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@bleakhousing
Kyle Winkler
1 year
You know what to do.
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@bleakhousing
Kyle Winkler
3 years
Do any writers believe that your ambitions can outpace your capabilities? Like, how do you know you're capabilities are shit or if you're just not working hard enough? Also: what does it mean if you can come up with a story that you're not then able to fulfill/write?
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@bleakhousing
Kyle Winkler
3 years
I sort of decided to take weekends off from writing and just read. Does anyone else do this? Also: writing short scenes on Notes app. instead. Less treating it like a job, but more of a way to release the pressure to get words down every goddamn day. Also, um, excuse me? Reading?
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@bleakhousing
Kyle Winkler
2 years
@ChristianaSalah e x a c t l y. Thank you for saying that. It's circumstance, as I've said. Social conditions in areas you move into don't snap into our fantasy versions of life. We have to live w/ what they are. And we are a country that's increasingly atomized/isolated. Add the pandemic. Phew.
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@bleakhousing
Kyle Winkler
2 years
Book News: I signed a contract w/ @Lever_Press to publish a weird, academic, & stylish book called ADJUST YOURSELF TO MIDNIGHT: POSSIBILITY AND PLAY IN RHETORIC. Now I am going to go into a hole and finish writing it. (thank you Emily Dickinson for the title 🖤)
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@bleakhousing
Kyle Winkler
3 years
This novella is very real and in the world. My hope is for preorder links for the paperback will be up tomorrow.
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@bleakhousing
Kyle Winkler
3 years
Real talk. Got a novel we sub'd almost 2 years back before COVID. Literary horror. Fun shit. No bites. Too lit for horror, too horror for lit, etc. Who does 71K word weird creepy novel w/ crazy badass women MCs? Should I try Inkshares? Kickstarter? Other small press? Thoughts?
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@bleakhousing
Kyle Winkler
11 months
FOR THOSE WHO'VE FORGOTTEN/DIDN'T KNOW: I have a new novel coming out on Jan. 19, 2024. It's horror. It's called GRASSHANDS. JournalStone is the publisher. @horrorsong said this about it (🖤🖤):
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@bleakhousing
Kyle Winkler
1 year
The most lyrical genre novel?
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@bleakhousing
Kyle Winkler
6 months
41 today. Whee. Nothing special. However, if you're into that kind of celebration, plz consider buying one of my books. Or send cinnamon rolls. Both are appreciated. Last night, did a book event w/ Dan Chaon for GRASSHANDS & it was a fucking blast. Best bday gift ever. xoxo
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@bleakhousing
Kyle Winkler
3 years
Be the genre you wish to see in the world.
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@bleakhousing
Kyle Winkler
8 months
“Madonna with Child” (2024)
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@bleakhousing
Kyle Winkler
1 year
Book/Design Twitter: help me w/ an investigation. Who are the ppl behind these early 90s Signet pbk Stephen Kings? They hold a special place in my memory. Would love to put a name(s) to the covers. And any stories behind them. Thank you.
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@bleakhousing
Kyle Winkler
1 year
This book is a fucking banger and I will never not promote it for free. That’s how you sell books. Word. Of. Mouth.
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@bleakhousing
Kyle Winkler
3 years
I love @SGJ72 , like, a lot, but $42 for PEOPLE LIGHTS is nutty. (Sorry, brother.) Who is going to buy this man's back catalogue and reprint all of it? WE NEED MORE AFFORDABLE COPIES OF STEPHEN'S OLDER BOOKS! Thank you for coming to my lecture.* *go buy my heart is a chainsaw
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@bleakhousing
Kyle Winkler
3 years
Favorite cosmic horror novels. Cannot be Lovecraft or his associated ilk or use his mythos. Go.
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@bleakhousing
Kyle Winkler
2 years
@stephstephking I can't get into it with ppl who say "Well you chose to have kids, so you should shut up." Hmm. OK. Does that mean that parents are meant to suffer more than non-parents? It makes no sense.
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@bleakhousing
Kyle Winkler
2 years
1. Go to the bookstore. 2. Hold a bunch of stuff. 3. Feel guilty about unread books at home. 4. Drop books. 5. Mope out of bookstore. 6. Repeat following week.
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@bleakhousing
Kyle Winkler
7 months
My oldest son took GRASSHANDS to school & showed his first grade class the book. And my bio pic. Some other 1st grdr was quite impressed. The teacher asked if she could have a copy as she'd like to read it. I will be hiring my son as my publicist.
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@bleakhousing
Kyle Winkler
1 year
Also keep thinking about how much SF writers in 60s/70s shoved into 150 pp. that in today's aesthetics would maybe take up more like 150K words/500 pp. Shorter, weirder, harder, blastoid, vroom, gulp.
@bleakhousing
Kyle Winkler
1 year
Have cut almost 40K words from 3rd draft to 4th. In many ways, it's like a wholly different novel. In others, it's not. But I do wonder how others who've written large books feel about their much smaller ancestors thru the revision process? I am pleased.
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@bleakhousing
Kyle Winkler
3 years
KOKO by Peter Straub. Yea? Nay? General thoughts? Seems like an interesting premise. And before ppl. are all, "It's slow" and whatnot, I've read the premise and complaints, and I'm cool with slow burn.
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@bleakhousing
Kyle Winkler
6 months
I feel it’s solid to announce: @frombeyondpress will publish my 3rd novel, ENTER THE PEERLESS. I’m lucky to consistently work w/ publishers who get me & want to put my books in the best light. Thrilled to do this w/ a talent like @frombeyondmike . Aiming for Summer ‘25 pub date!
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@bleakhousing
Kyle Winkler
7 months
I would like to say that I think having lots of small presses and ppl wanting to take on the task of publishing weird books is a good thing. None of us can live on the proceeds, but that may not be the point. Onward.
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@bleakhousing
Kyle Winkler
8 months
A 🧵on book publishing. So I'm 2 days away from a book coming out (GRASSHANDS/JournalStone) a "traditionally published" one. & I'm here for a self-assessment. Join me, won't you? 1. How has the actuality of a trad pub'd book turned out in the face of what I envisioned...?
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@bleakhousing
Kyle Winkler
3 years
Feel like we don't talk enough about how, in MACBETH, after Duncan is killed, his horses ate each other. (2.4.23) Umm, wtf? I will now write a story/novella on this moment alone. *vanishes up into smoke*
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@bleakhousing
Kyle Winkler
6 months
At the Scarelastic Book Fair!
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@bleakhousing
Kyle Winkler
2 years
I don’t push my own junk enough. These copies just came in cuz @the_bookeyman requested new ones since he gave his away to a curious reader. Love that generosity. Check ‘em out. You may love them.
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@bleakhousing
Kyle Winkler
3 years
In the next year, I’d like to meet a lot of you somehow. Let’s have pie and coffee. Let’s read books out loud. Yes, this is a convention, but I hate entry fees. And I love pie.
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@bleakhousing
Kyle Winkler
2 years
I gotta New Book coming yr way in May, folx. BORIS SAYS THE WORDS is a full-on speculative/horror-adjacent/weird/SF-ish novel Cover reveal in April, I hope. Meanwhile, here's a taster. Opening graf of the book...DM me if interested in review ARC! xoxo
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@bleakhousing
Kyle Winkler
9 months
Revision is "harder" than writing.
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@bleakhousing
Kyle Winkler
2 years
My son just used “toilet skeleton” as an insult. 🚽☠️
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@bleakhousing
Kyle Winkler
5 months
This is the first month since I’ve been publishing that my novel BORIS SAYS THE WORDS is selling better than any other title I have. My mutated baby is finally finding its audience!
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@bleakhousing
Kyle Winkler
5 months
From, THE MÖEBIUS STRIP CLUB OF GRIEF, Bianca Stone
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@bleakhousing
Kyle Winkler
2 years
Paperback is now available! Read all about the sadness! I hope you dig it. If you read, plz leave a review, even if short. They always help. 🖤☢️ Boris Says the Words
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@bleakhousing
Kyle Winkler
2 years
More novels should be written in 2 weeks. I like the crazy that comes out in the end. We could call it the PKD Challenge.
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@bleakhousing
Kyle Winkler
2 years
I feel like the numbers are warranted: if you dig weird fiction, consider checking out my books. Appreciated. The Nothing That Is
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@bleakhousing
Kyle Winkler
3 years
Cosmic horror the way it was meant to ruin you. THE NOTHING THAT IS. You’ll laugh. You’ll cry. You’ll puke. The Nothing That Is
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@bleakhousing
Kyle Winkler
3 months
Found one of my books in a thrift store a few cities over. Hah.
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@bleakhousing
Kyle Winkler
7 months
Part of writing a novel now is telling ppl about writing it on social media. I don't know if you know that. But it's true.
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@bleakhousing
Kyle Winkler
10 months
The new hotness is 50 to 55K horror novels that just burn hot rubber from word one to the gory end. Let's make it happen. Publishers wanna publish shorter, fine. But we're going to write the most fuckyou crazy waking nightmare images you can shake a haunted stick at.
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@bleakhousing
Kyle Winkler
2 years
Kathryn was my teacher for 3 yrs. I learned more abt writing from her by drinking coffee & talking abt Isak Dinesin or Eudora Welty than any other person/book. The art of transition was a topic I remember her discussing. Much of who I am as a writer can be traced to her work.
@AEAkinwumi
Akin Akinwumi
2 years
“There are points in your life when you think you’re about to become whatever’s next.” The opening words of Kathryn Davis’s new memoir Aurelia, Aurélia, which I read today. Cerebral, erudite, digressive, and strangely hypnotic, this one will stay with me for a long time.
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@bleakhousing
Kyle Winkler
4 years
Okay, who's writing @gabehudson 's novel for him this weekend?
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