Matthew Claxton's avatar

Matthew Claxton

@matthewclaxton.bsky.social

404 followers 304 following 4254 posts

Reporter, hack sci-fi and fantasy writer, dinosaur enthusiast. Deeply confused most of the time. He/him

Matthew Claxton's avatar Matthew Claxton @matthewclaxton.bsky.social
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Had to have something custom-made, picked it up today, and it's a purely practical item, and I emphasized that I didn't care how it looked, but damn if the craftsman who put it together didn't make something gorgeous.

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Matthew Claxton's avatar Matthew Claxton @matthewclaxton.bsky.social
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NEW IGUANODONTIAN JUST DROPPED, GUYS!

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Matthew Claxton's avatar Matthew Claxton @matthewclaxton.bsky.social
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Retvrn to the '90s when men's pants were as wide as the sky…

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J.R. 's avatar J.R. @jrbolt.bsky.social
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One of my favourite Art Deco pieces, over the door of the Fulton County Dept. of Health and Wellness. Swole spirit of medicine fights off the grim spectre of death, reminding you that medicine is Cool

31 replies 171 reposts 911 likes

Reposted by Matthew Claxton

Matthew Claxton's avatar Matthew Claxton @matthewclaxton.bsky.social
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Local Fraser Valley guy co-edited Longlegs, a movie whose trailer, frankly, gave me the heebie jeebies. Good for him!

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Matthew Claxton's avatar Matthew Claxton @matthewclaxton.bsky.social
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I'm here until I crumble into dust, or the paper does.

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Matthew Claxton's avatar Matthew Claxton @matthewclaxton.bsky.social
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So I went home, wrote it up, and sat on it. By the time the ban was lifted and the accomplices had pleaded out, I'd been laid off. Wound up selling it as a freelance piece, which kept me going for a while until I got another proper job. 2/2

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Matthew Claxton's avatar Matthew Claxton @matthewclaxton.bsky.social
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I was once the only reporter in court the day a killer decided to suddenly plead guilty to a shotgun murder, and the lawyers detailed the bizarre story for the judge. Who then slammed a publication ban down on the whole thing because his co-accused were set for a jury trial. 1/

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Matthew Claxton's avatar Matthew Claxton @matthewclaxton.bsky.social
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One of the great thing about living/working as a reporter in the same town for a long time is you remember all the times fire and arson destroyed significant public buildings. This is more useful than you'd think!

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Matthew Claxton's avatar Matthew Claxton @matthewclaxton.bsky.social
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Okay, anyone want to read a book where the villain is a sentient financial instrument that bought a human so it could move around/run its software on the human's permanently dreaming brain?

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Reposted by Matthew Claxton

Premee Mohamed's avatar Premee Mohamed @premeemohamed.com
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BookRiot has named THE BUTCHER OF THE FOREST one of the best books of 2024 so far, in some stellar company! (Thank you Patricia!) Also for some reason "terrifying and demented and never to be trusted" struck me as funny because... the fae, amirite??

1 replies 12 reposts 70 likes

Reposted by Matthew Claxton

David Bowman's avatar David Bowman @dlbowman76.com
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"I say, Jeeves!" "Sir?" "This void-thingy...rather big, isn't it?" "Indeed, sir." "Shouldn't we turn a light on, have a look?" "I shouldn't advise that sir." "Why not, Jeeves?" "Too many...imponderables, sir." -The Big Spot of Bother Over Innsmouth.

1 replies 9 reposts 29 likes

Reposted by Matthew Claxton

Reposted by Matthew Claxton

Matthew Claxton's avatar Matthew Claxton @matthewclaxton.bsky.social
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My god, a reviewer at Tangent Online understood the point of one of my short stories. They missed the fact that it's set in Vancouver, and they didn't actually say if they liked it or not, but still, points for effort.

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Matthew Claxton's avatar Matthew Claxton @matthewclaxton.bsky.social
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Sorry, Big Cutworm got their hooks into me. The money was just too good!

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Matthew Claxton's avatar Matthew Claxton @matthewclaxton.bsky.social
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The journalistic equivalent of someone papering your tombstone with strip club flyers.

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Matthew Claxton's avatar Matthew Claxton @matthewclaxton.bsky.social
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Cutworm borer infestations can be really serious, mind you! Gotta protect the delicate root systems of your vegetable crops! HAVE YOU CONSIDERED USING WORM-A-WAY BRAND CUTWORM BLASTOR?!?

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Matthew Claxton's avatar Matthew Claxton @matthewclaxton.bsky.social
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"Are you seeking high-quality, durable identification solutions for your aeronautic and naval equipment?" No, alarmingly specific spam email. But good try!

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Reposted by Matthew Claxton

Reposted by Matthew Claxton

Dia Lacina's avatar Dia Lacina @dialacina.bsky.social
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YOU GUYS WE HAVE TO STOP GLOBAL WARMING SO THE ECHIDNAS CAN DREAM

10 replies 468 reposts 1060 likes

Matthew Claxton's avatar Matthew Claxton @matthewclaxton.bsky.social
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Took my bike down to the LBC the other day because it's in bad shape, and the guy asked me if I wanted a different wheelset, because the pro-racers are using a different wheel size now. And my internal voice was like "What do I, a potato that learned to ride a bicycle, care for such things?"

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Reposted by Matthew Claxton

Reposted by Matthew Claxton

Matthew Claxton's avatar Matthew Claxton @matthewclaxton.bsky.social
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From an interview in 1991 with Sterling & Gibson re: The Difference Engine: Veronica Hollinger: Have there been a lot of people who haven't got it? Bruce Sterling: Legions. William Gibson: Hardly anyone gets it entirely.

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Matthew Claxton's avatar Matthew Claxton @matthewclaxton.bsky.social
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Just found out I have a co-worker who has seen and enjoyed Macross Plus. We're going to have to start some kind of in-firm club, and have T-shirts made.

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Reposted by Matthew Claxton

M. R. Robinson's avatar M. R. Robinson @mruthrobinson.bsky.social
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That’s my name! On a magazine cover! 🥹 My first-ever short story will be online on the 11th, but why wait? You can read it now! Come for the incredible Emily C. Skaftun story, stay for mine!

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Chris Bissette 🔪🐻's avatar Chris Bissette 🔪🐻 @loottheroom.bsky.social
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Still working my way through Analog and just read Matthew Claxton's TERMINAL CITY DOGS, which is easily one of my favourite short stories I've read this year

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Reposted by Matthew Claxton

Natania Barron's avatar Natania Barron @natania.bsky.social
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AI novel writing seems like the perfect fit for that guy who inevitably approaches writers at an event and says, "Listen, I'll give you a great idea, you write it, and we can split the profits 50/50."

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Matthew Claxton's avatar Matthew Claxton @matthewclaxton.bsky.social
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Also: You should be reading Ian McDonald's Luna novels. The middle book has a character discourse about low-gravity cake-baking techniques for four pages while he's running for his life across the lunar surface and low on oxygen. It's great!

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Matthew Claxton's avatar Matthew Claxton @matthewclaxton.bsky.social
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Is anyone writing near-future-ish space-based SFF that's in any way similar to Ian McDonald's Luna series right now? (I am familiar with The Expanse.)

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Justin Mikulka's avatar Justin Mikulka @justinmikulka.bsky.social
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This will be an interesting day to reflect on in the future. "Battery cells at $50/kWh means the technology to decarbonize most of road transport globally is already here, as opposed to in some future scenario." EVs are cheaper than ICE now. Today.

17 replies 172 reposts 430 likes

Reposted by Matthew Claxton

Steve White's avatar Steve White @sharkbitesteve.bsky.social
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Following a Late Triassic mega-monsoon, a Fasolasuchus scavenges the corpse of a Shastasaurid ichthyosaur washed ashore. A trio of Zupaysaurs await their turn at the carcass. A herd of dicynodonts pass along the storm-lashed shoreline. A3 piece for the new book.

2 replies 9 reposts 30 likes

Matthew Claxton's avatar Matthew Claxton @matthewclaxton.bsky.social
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The fact that these warehouses exists also just irked the hell out of me. "So we have this valuable metal, that we dug out of the ground with massive machines, and it's both useful and valuable, who will get it?" "No one, it goes in a box to facilitate financialization!"

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Matthew Claxton's avatar Matthew Claxton @matthewclaxton.bsky.social
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Still obsessed with this story from last year, when it turned out that a bunch of nickel stored in warehouses, to serve as the "real" assets for nickel futures trades, turned out instead to be bags of rocks.

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Reposted by Matthew Claxton

Reposted by Matthew Claxton

Matthew Claxton's avatar Matthew Claxton @matthewclaxton.bsky.social
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Going to have to re-read Sterling & Gibson's The Difference Engine again, but this time it's for RESEARCH. Also, may have to read a lengthy and turgid Victorian novel as well.

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Marissa van Uden 's avatar Marissa van Uden @marissavu.bsky.social
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One of my fav things about this KS: rather than solicit big-name authors, we are doing something different. If we reach our funding goal + 400 backers, there will be a special issue of Apex dedicated solely to UNPUBLISHED AUTHORS! ❤️❤️❤️❤️

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Matthew Claxton's avatar Matthew Claxton @matthewclaxton.bsky.social
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One piece of advice: read news. Read more news than you read columns and op-eds and editorials and hot takes and "analysis" and whatever else they're calling it now. Even half-assed actual news writing is better than chewed-over opinion, any day.

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Matthew Claxton's avatar Matthew Claxton @matthewclaxton.bsky.social
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There's a huge amount of punditry and commentary and BS right now balanced on an increasingly narrow base of actual fucking news, and that's not a good thing. This is not the inverted pyramid they taught us about back in J-school.

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Cooper Lund's avatar Cooper Lund @cooperlund.bsky.social
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The rise of Substack has given us a lot of pundits who think they're journalists, while we're seeing portions of legacy media shift to punditry that reads like journalism and it stinks from both sides!

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Matthew Claxton's avatar Matthew Claxton @matthewclaxton.bsky.social
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Writer I respect just contacted me to say "Hey, I read that essay you wrote!" and the conflicting forces generated between pride and my desire to sink down through the floor to disappear into the earth forever could have powered a dam turbine, I tell you.

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Indrapramit Das's avatar Indrapramit Das @indrapramitdas.bsky.social
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Yes, so delighted to hear that this marvellous and strange novel will be reaching more readers outside South Asia! Tashan puts one in mind of a desi Calvino or Borges or Susanna Clarke but is very much her own writer.

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Reposted by Matthew Claxton

Stephen Gallagher's avatar Stephen Gallagher @brooligan.bsky.social
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Now *that's* a seaside town

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