j.m. avants
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jmavants.bsky.social
j.m. avants
@jmavants.bsky.social
670 followers 360 following 320 posts
Writer, lit and specfic | Words in Snowflake Magazine
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HOWL’S MOVING CASTLE x FREIREN

When her father disappears, Sav must navigate the aftermath: her village’s abandonment, her mother's blame, and her own depression. Entering a magical tourney to win audience with a powerful mage might restore her people’s faith…or break her own. #GhostPit #A #F #W
Hey, you, American voter from New York. Didja know Mamdani’s wife secretly supported him in private?? 🤔🤔 Communists, amirite???
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I let you in on a Nordic secret. Denmark conditions children to assemble toys coming in a flatpack following illustrated instructions. Then after they've become adults Sweden sells furniture to them coming in a flatpack following illustrated instructions. This is our silent path to World Domination.
Some light editing (oops) of chapter 1 while the kids played in the other room today. Tomorrow morning we begin, chapterrrr 2! Which will be a fun write. Much busier than the prologue and 1st chapter. My mc will show what her real day job is to the reader. Things go well for her, until they don’t. 👻
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It’s either a cryptofash occupied government with zero empathy, discernment, nuance, and basic reading comprehension or a liberal arts major, pick your poison
hahahaha this is the funniest headline I have ever seen. Go get em today Mamdani
[the NY Post scrambling to make a last-ditch scandal:]

"umm, uhhh, his aloof wife Rama Duwaji secretly ran the campaign"
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Being a fantasy writer is typing "they extended an olive branch" and then going "shit, do they even have olives in this world?"
The mc of my adult fantasy WIP, Sav, facing down all the crap in her way toward saving her father, her village, and herself:
Damn, that’s an underrated post.
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What did you think would happen when you pulled the sword from your heart? Were you not prepared to bleed?
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VOTE tomorrow. ✔
Local level elections matter very much to you and your neighbors, and can send a message to the national parties.
Because my wife woke up, saw me writing, and offered me the rest of the morning free to keep at it. In exchange I get the kids all afternoon, sure. Deal!
Chapter 1 rewrite complete. 2k words, a little lighter than I anticipated, but I don’t think it is missing anything other than descriptive fluff. Chapter 2 will have more characters, a much busier scene, and a lot more world building. Will tackle it later this morning!
Why not. A page from my fantasy WIP rewrite. Sav has just secretly performed a blood rite on herself and has lost a fair amount of blood. She can’t let anyone else know. The village priest discovers her struggling to get to the inn without collapsing. Using *vibes* for nice: kind old man. #WIPSnips
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New website is up.
My ranking of lit mags is available at: brechtdepoortere.com
700+ more words down, deep into chapter 1 rewrite, one more scene and likely done. Already this rewrite has introduced moderate changes that I feel much improve the overall draft.
I use one by KM Weiland!
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I started working on Path fresh out of undergrad a quarter of a century ago. 🤯
Why did I stick with it? Why go back and rewrite it every time I finished a newer series? The characters. Some of the best characters I've ever created: I needed to tell their story

🌈📚🪐
books2read.com/PathofEndles...
Teckle? How odd my autocorrect didn’t highlight that typo. No edit feature yet in Bluesky either. Oh well 🤗
It feels easier to nudge my characters along in the right directions. It feels simple enough to compose at my current skill level. And I’m confident I’ll be able to write it out more beautifully in the edit.
Maybe my brain needed a 2 year break from writing, and feeling bad about it is useless anyway. It’s not that my prose is suddenly better (nope). But my plotting is? Like an extended disengagement helped me refocus and teckle my weakness as a writer. Because I really love this wip’s plot.
So fucking true, but like, that’s how I ensure these characters are alive. They have my blood in them.
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If I’m not tearing my soul to bits bringing this story to life, I’m clearly not doing it right
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What is it about writing books that they all turn into unexpected deep dives into my own issues filtered through a character's quite different experience yet somehow they manage to hit me to the quick
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Zohran Mamdani campaigned a lot and appears not to hate the voters whose support he's seeking. Here's what other Democrats can learn from his unorthodox strategy.