#WritersCoffeeClub #WCC 2026.04.12 —How does being a writer influence your life outside of the work?

For most people, it is irrelevant what they do for work, but I'm an author. Word choice matters. How to communicate through words, meaning, and symbology is the core of my profession.

How does being an author influence the rest of my life? I am profoundly aware of all the meanings of words (the meanings I've learned, anyway), and when I learn a new one I almost want to dance—which means the imprecise use of language always draws my attention. It likely doesn't help that I'm #actuallyAutistic. When I don't understand, my first inclination is to see meaning where there isn't any (or fixate on a more archaic meaning), and the second is to see people's attempts to spin, obfuscate, equivocate, or prevaricate. Political news makes me wonder if there is an epidemic of stupidity, or whether people simply pick and choose words and meanings that best suit their beliefs or the agenda they are pushing, and are willing to lie to do so. (Okay, not wondering, really.) On good days, I can figure out what people are saying to the point that I seem fluent and neurotypical. I can even participate in wordplay to work the meanings they've given me. On a bad day, I fixate on the wrong meaning and suffer misunderstandings. Still, words bring me joy. I love to listen to a great conversation, or watch a great screenplay.

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#ScribesAndMakers ∆ 2026.04.12 — Create a poll with three words that appear in your WIP and one that doesn't. Ask people to guess the one that doesn't.

The following words occur in the SF novel Reluctant Courier (for the Mob). All except one! Choose which one does not occur.

Please boost to improve sample size! Thanks.

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#WordWeavers 2026.04.12 —Your MC has 2 1/2 days of spare time, time to...

The facts of Bolt's life are that she finds a blue envelope, or is given an item, and she delivers it to the addressee. She has no regular work hours or workplace. She finds coins somewhere in her path when she's done her job. She works for the mob, and when they tell her to do something like shadow someone through the city? She. Does. It.

If she were told she had 2 1/2 days of spare time, she'd likely freak out, worried she'd done something bad and that the boss about to torture her.

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When a news article reports an event or something someone important said, then immediately segues to

People didn't hold back from sharing their thoughts on social media,

it's annoying, maybe even malpractice.

Why should anyone care about random cherry-picked pithy or funny opinions of people who nobody knows, aren't knowledgeable, likely inexperienced, certainly not expert in what happened, probably ignorant of the history of the matter, and are nothing verifiable other than a fast thumbtyper able to react quickly enough to be noticed by a lazy journalist?

Look up "trusted sources" and "fact checking." Do your social media sources fit the bill?

Seriously, folks, especially if you call yourself a journalist: don't care what the Internet thinks! You might even be quoting bots. The Internet is partly responsible for getting us in the mess we're in today, to boot. Stop it. Just stop it. Delete your X-Twitter. Turn off your phone. Quote Wikipedia; you'll at least sound intelligent.

#BoostingIsSharing so please boost.

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#PennedPossibilities 983 — MC POV: If you had been able to choose, would you rather have been an only child or part of a very large family?

[Bolt, a day angel woman:] If I'd had a big sister, maybe my mother wouldn't have been so controlling. Had I had a good relationship, maybe I'd not have done the bad things I did. Any girl with a conscience would want more brothers to help care for her children†, but now, unable to return home or even to send word of my fate, I feel bad for my baby brother: Young men are so sure in their teens that they understand their freedom that they almost always say they're so happy if they haven't a sister; when they're my age, they get sappy about other guy's nieces and nephews. Since I'm unable to ever return home (don't want family involved with the mob like me) it feels selfish to think of that I might have wished for a large family. Most women are happy with one healthy child††. I can't imagine wishing to be an only child!

=~=~=
†Brothers take care of their sisters' children in Bolt's world. More brothers mean more help divided amongst more hands.
††Humans are significantly infertile in this era, and with an extremely hot climate that drives up child mortality, the population is consistently declining. That Bolt has a sibling who's not a twin beats the odds.

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#WritersCoffeeClub #WCC 2026.04.11 —What's your most effective method for connecting with readers?

There is a literal and a literary sense to this question. Literally, at this point in my second career, it's through Mastodon. Here I connect with other writers, readers, and other interesting folk, sharing ideas, advice, and solving problems. One day I'll do this also via a website. In previous incarnations, I connected with readers of posted stories through comment boxes and replying to forum posts. Literarily, I'm hoping to build up a base of readers of my short-short fiction that might consider my longer works when I publish them.

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#WordWeavers 2026.04.11 —What would be the most unappreciated social event a character of yours could be invited to?

Bolt is not shy. Ask the many boys she went to high school with. A bit of a wild daredevil. Shy? No. So why would she not appreciate being invited to any social event?

Bolt works as a courier for the mob. Blackmailed, so it's involuntary. She would not even considering hanging out with the punks. Not happening! Nor would they invite her, the punks. As for the lieutenants or the boss? Really? You need ask?

However, thanks to being discovered as a talented street photographer, she's made friends that she likes but for which she knows that associating with her is dangerous. She can't tell them the truth. She finds it hard to refuse her new friends, she's been so lonely the last dozen years, so she really dreads when they get friendly as she'd feel terrible if they got hurt.

Spoiler: They do.

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#PennedPossibilities 982 — For characters with a significant other, what is their happiest shared memory?

Thorn Rose and Streak Carryingaton are childhood friends become lovers with a strength of bond we find fairly common in our world, but doesn't exist so much in theirs. Different institutions. This pair go through quite a lot, like becoming astronauts and traveling to the moon together. She's a daemon and he's a day angel; though those words don't mean the same thing as they would in our world, they do represent social, class, and cultural chasms they must traverse. My attempts to pin them down is more like a list of incidents and adventures, many of which are not so happy remembered in detail. What I'm settling on is the time they spent attending university together. Nothing was easy about that school, but they both remember that time fondly, much of it together, in her dorm room, studying and feeling connected with the one person that mattered most.

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#ScribesAndMakers ∆ 2026.04.10 — Our next featured creator writes Science Fiction. What's a feature of Science Fiction that you find interesting?

SF is too big a genre these days for me to pigeonhole easily. Distilled down, I think what attracts me is the sense that the world, any world, could be rational at some level—its people, its institutions, how to navigate its difficulties—all rational, somehow. To this add sense of hope and wonder, that things can be different, that opportunity to be one's self do exist, and anyone can find their way

Wow, I think that describes your work, @orionkidder! Best as I've read it described.

So, first #TTMD question:

How do you describe your work in its most basic outlook? What do you find interesting about it?

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#WordWeavers 2026.04.10 —Did your MC ever have a melody/tune stuck in their head?

Worse, actually. Something contagious.

Tripudioetcanticumania (TPCC) is a transient compulsive disorder that's endemic to the fantasy world I was writing in. I invented a psychological term for it in Latin. It translates to "a dancing and singing euphoria." Those affected find themselves suddenly singing a song that reveals their raw emotions or fears, uncontrollably dancing to the melody in their head. They can't control themselves and can easily become a danger to themselves or others. They will dance and sing even if tied down and gagged, and may hurt themselves in their struggles. As I stated, it's also contagious if the melody or display connects emotionally with a listener.

Bouts didn't last as long as they did historically in our world. The link is to something historic and more dangerous: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dancing_mania

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