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Ryan Consell

@stealingfromwizards.com

760 followers 180 following 1.5K posts

Discount Canadian store brand Green brother, fantasy author, lapsed bicycle scientist, Muppet biologist, waistcoat enthusiast, cosplayer, cat haver, he/him. I contain multitudes, sometimes they leak out. Books: https://stealingfromwizards.com

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Ryan Consell @stealingfromwizards.com · 5d

Stealing from Wizards Volume 4 is coming November 4th.

Canadian misfits learning about life, love, and larceny at wizard school.

📚🪐

Preorder on amazon and Kobo now:
www.amazon.com/Stealing-Wiz...

www.kobo.com/us/en/ebook/...

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Reposted by Ryan Consell

Charlie Jane "Lessons in Magic and Disaster" Anders 🏳️‍⚧ @charliejane.bsky.social · 3h

Today is National Coming Out Day!

It's also Freedom to Read Day, aka the last day of Banned Books Week.

This feels right — because the main reason they try to ban books is to keep people from dreaming they could ever come out.

My latest newsletter: buttondown.com/charliejane/...

They Want To Ban Books To Keep Us From Coming Out

Quick housekeeping! I’m doing a flurry of events once again: Tuesday I’ll be in the Koret Auditorium at the SF Public Library talking about banned books for...

buttondown.com

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Ryan Consell @stealingfromwizards.com · 7h

My most frequent issue is to occasionally forget that periods exist. I have, more than once this morning, run out of breath before sentence.

Ryan Consell @stealingfromwizards.com · 9h

I'm on the final edit of Arson, which is the "read the whole thing out loud" edit.

Mostly that's just a minor tweak to a sentence here and there, but every few chapters it involves screaming "who wrote this unreadable nonsense" and rewriting a whole paragraph.

#writing

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Ryan Consell @stealingfromwizards.com · 11h

My brain woke me up at 6:00 am this morning, working on edits for Arson.

Not real edits, dream edits, which are just as taxing but not nearly as useful as real ones.

Ryan Consell @stealingfromwizards.com · 1d

Awww, thank you! That's incredibly kind.

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Ryan Consell @stealingfromwizards.com · 1d

"Write what you know" means the platonic ideal of a writer — a young man alone in a tiny apartment with a typewriter whose only friends are coffee and cigarettes — is a myth. To write well you need to experience life and meet people.

Arson is out Nov 4.

#booksky

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Ryan Consell @stealingfromwizards.com · 2d

Due to the actions of *other authors*, it is again necessary to reiterate that Stealing from Wizards is trans-inclusively queer friendly.

Shouldn't have to say it, but apparently we do.

Man standing in front of brick wall wearing a black t-shirt with the words "you will have to go through me" in trans pride colours.

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Ryan Consell @stealingfromwizards.com · 2d

Promotional matchbooks is a genius idea for arson with the somewhat limiting factor that my audience is majority
A: non-smokers and
B: fourteen

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Ryan Consell @stealingfromwizards.com · 3d

Toronto.

Locally it has only one T and up to one O.

Reposted by Ryan Consell

Ness 🎃🇨🇦 @vriccithode.bsky.social · 4d

heck, you can get *all* my books (slightly discounted even!) through bookshop for anti-prime day WITH FREE SHIPPING, including my nebula award-winning spooky queer kids book! #booksky #kidlit 🌈📚
bookshop.org/p/books/the-...

The Young Necromancer's Guide to Ghosts

Check out The Young Necromancer's Guide to Ghosts - Lusi is a perfectly normal 12-year-old wizard except for the part where she can talk to ghosts. But everyone knows ghosts aren't real, so at best...

bookshop.org

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Reposted by Ryan Consell

Ness 🎃🇨🇦 @vriccithode.bsky.social · 4d

heck yeah you can get my queer ace romantasy, the dragon next door, through bookshop for anti-prime day. 🌈📚
bookshop.org/p/books/the-...

The Dragon Next Door

Check out The Dragon Next Door - Tollar's got a stolen dragon egg, and that's the least of her problems.Tollar is a hero for hire who just wants to deliver a stolen dragon egg to its ...

bookshop.org

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Ryan Consell @stealingfromwizards.com · 3d

NB: Masterlocks are great for beginner practice. Less so for actually securing things.

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Ryan Consell @stealingfromwizards.com · 3d

I was told to "write what you know." I took that to mean I need to know more things if I want to write about them.

So I learned how to pick locks in order to write Stealing from Wizards better.

Which is why, officer, I have all these lockpicks.

Arson comes out Nov 4. 📚🪐

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Ryan Consell @stealingfromwizards.com · 4d

I mostly get it through insta. Particularly if you ever use writerly hashtags there.

Ryan Consell @stealingfromwizards.com · 4d

That's a real gamble. Most of mine talk about being "moved" or my "engaging characters."

Clearly you attract less risk averse spam artists.

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Ryan Consell @stealingfromwizards.com · 4d

Also, @charliejane.bsky.social is a fancy and notable author, so she gets personalized spam which knows her name and book title.

Most of mine read. "I loved your book. It's so clever and original. Send a message to this unrelated account to talk about how we can buzzword your technobable."

Ryan Consell @stealingfromwizards.com · 4d

For non-authors, we get at least one of these a week. Usually obvious scams, sometimes convincing.

Charlie Jane "Lessons in Magic and Disaster" Anders 🏳️‍⚧ @charliejane.bsky.social · 4d

Dear [Author],

Your book [Title] is wonderful. I had painful urination and blood in my urine for years, until I read [Title] and now there is a clear golden stream.

[Title] deserves a wider readership. My team of 5,000 cyber-turtles can post honest reviews and raise your Zoob ranking, for a modest

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Ryan Consell @stealingfromwizards.com · 4d

Eight years later, I'm wrapping up the series, and it feels necessary. We all need some stories with some hope and optimism among the fire and flames right now.

Also stories about magic raccoons and pies. We need more pies.

Ryan Consell @stealingfromwizards.com · 4d

I wanted stories where little weirdos could find themselves and each other, and where villains could be defeated by a well-meaning misfit.

I wanted stories about the lonely and lost finding community.

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Ryan Consell @stealingfromwizards.com · 4d

I started writing Stealing from Wizards in 2017. In some ways it was my rebellion against the grimdark which had taken hold of YA.

I wanted a story young me would have liked, with humor and whimsy, more light than dark, where the heroes were kind rather than confident, clever instead of violent.

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Ryan Consell @stealingfromwizards.com · 4d

Just going out on a limb here, but maybe my publisher rejected the request due to it coming from a personal email with no details as to your affiliations, credentials, or reason for wanting it.

Folks, if you want to read an ARC, look less like you're just pirating it before release.

#booksky

Screenshot of DM. Text reads: "Message: Will you send me an e-copy of #IV (Arson) as an ARC, as your publishers declined my request via netgalley."

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Ryan Consell @stealingfromwizards.com · 5d

Among my many concerns with the overinvestment in AI, the technology is not mature.
Building these data-centers is like building superhighways as the model T first rolled off the line. We don't know what the future of this tech looks like.
The infrastructure could be obsolete before its built.

Sam Altman’s AI empire will devour as much power as New York City and San Diego combined. Experts say it’s ‘scary’ | Fortune

Andrew Chien told Fortune he’s been a computer scientist for 40 years but we’re close to “some seminal moments for how we think about AI and its impact on society.”

fortune.com

Ryan Consell @stealingfromwizards.com · 5d

Having young fans is kind of the greatest. I had two show up to my book event yesterday. They dealt with their interaction with
"celebrity" in entirely opposite ways: One couldn't speak, the other could not stop.

Absolutely incredible.

#writersky #authorsky

Ryan Consell @stealingfromwizards.com · 5d

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Ryan Consell @stealingfromwizards.com · 5d

That seems like the greatest of possible days.

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