I used to think that the Order as a society was broken, but watching you navigate it, knowing what they’ve done to you because of it, being away from it myself, showed me that it’s not broken. It’s working exactly as designed. A wheel, drenched in hate and control, churning.

Reader, I nearly fled. Cold iron holds no power over my kind, but we are quite repulsed by dull people.

Your records show exceptional intelligence and mediocre results. It’s a comfortable place, mediocrity. Never pushing oneself to the limits to see what you can take. Never staring down your fears, never reaching into yourself to find that last bit of courage.

Whatever he says, whatever he does, you need to remember that you are a brilliant, amazing person. You bend over backwards to please that man, and if he doesn't appreciate you, if he doesn't realize how special you are, then you just have to do whatever you need to do to protect your heart.

She came to us as any apocalypse does: slowly at first, and then all at once.

“Pain isn’t a competition,” I assure him. “There’s always enough to go around.”

And what was a home but somewhere you wouldn’t have to feel quite so alone.

ts voice was like the wind, but also like a thousand trees thinking the same thought.

Perhaps being too powerful, too unopposed, is a curse in and of itself, leading to boredom and dissipation, and the invention of imaginary enemies whose powers to torment were less limited than those of flesh and blood.

2024 was full of ups and downs, but still read 120 books. Check out all the stats from reading this year and see the best books I read in 2024.

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Animals began telling stories of Silver Nose’s nightly journeys and his signal fires. It did not take long for others to start calling him Flame Fox. A being who was black as night during the day and who set fires on fells as the rest of the world was fast asleep.

Among the tales of sorrow and of ruin that came down to us from the darkness of those days there are yet some in which amid weeping there is joy and under the shadow of death light that endures. And of these histories most fair still in the ears of the Elves is the tale of Beren and Lúthien.

If more of us valued food and cheer and song above hoarded gold, it would be a merrier world.

And that, to me, embraces the very soul of the most important commandment you’ll find anywhere in your Principles of Successful Termination: ‘Do in others as you would have others do you in.’

“How in hell is anybody supposed to help you if you won’t ask?” Because asking is dangerous, I could tell her. Because to ask is to hope that someone answers, and it hurts so bad when nobody does.

Never trust a writer who doesn’t have too many books to read. Or a reader, for that matter.

Live long enough, you realize some folks can be handed a problem and some tools, and they’ll sort it out. And I never think twice about hiring that sort of fellow.

An anthology of short stories by Black authors redefining the horror genre.