Hot off the virtual press, it's Issue 28 of the Writers & Robots newsletter! Will Shannon survive a week of writing in the rainforest? What new blog posts have arrived for the thirsty GM? What is Shannon Reading? Find out now!
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#amwritingfantasy #blogging #booksky
This looks awesome!
I made a Loot the Body table with some fun stuff on it, like toenails and a magic Fedora.
puzzledungeon.com/loot-the-body/
And your cover is FANTASTIC!
This looks super fun!
Thanks. It's a bit of a hook for readers as that bit of info doesn't come up again for a couple of chapters. The bit immediately after this is dialogue as the protagonist (Varick) and his erstwhile partner (Anias), who he is planning to betray, begin to explore the ruin.
Hope you roll a crit!
Happy birthday, @daleivan.bsky.social! Hope you can shut out the noise of the world for a day and just have some fun. Cheers!
Over on my tabletop gaming feed, I shared a new blog I wrote about using project management skills as a game master. Using project management for creative writing is similar, but the one person you're wrangling is yourself!
#blogger #ttrpgr #gmadvice
Add me please
Thanks! It's out on sub with my agent so hopefully will be able to share the full work soon.
I wrote 14k words last week on my current WIP, "The Lost," a dungeon-lit fantasy adventure and I'm super jazzed about where this book is going (spoiler... into a dungeon).
Thanks to #rainforestwritersvillage and @patrickswenson.bsky.social for hosting!
#amwritingfantasy #booksky #WIP #amwriting
Text reading: I returned my attention to the gap in the floor, sliding forward until my feet dangled in darkness. I strained to see anything below but couldn’t make out much more than the cables and a wall. At last, I held my breath and lowered myself off the lip, shimmying down the rope into the gloom below. My piton held, and I dropped the last meter to floor below. In the deep gloom, I could make out little. There was a long hallway extending into darkness in both directions. The floor was free of dust and dirt except where the panel above had opened. That meant that this part of the ruin was unspoiled, sealed for who knew how many centuries. Along the wall, at chin-height, ran a string of geometric figures, characters from the dead language of the Skylords. It was too dark to make out much detail, but I recognized the design; I had seen them in my father’s papers.
This is a fun excerpt from an early chapter in my novel "Gods of Sky and Dust," where the MC crosses the threshold into the unknown.
#writesky #writingcommunity #booksky #wipsnips #sciencefantasy
Illustration of a mountain town with the words The Company, Shannon Rampe Descriptive text: A human woman with a sword and a dream, A half-gnome thiefwho can’t resist opening every door, And an elf sorcererss who knows more than both of them combined On an old-school dungeon-crawling adventure!
Inspirations Images of Dungeon Crawler Carl by Matt Dinniman, Dungeons & Dragons red box edition, Delicious in Dungeon by Ryoko Kui, and Legends and Lattes by Travis Baldree Themes and Tropes Found family, cozy, adventure, dungeon-lit, dungeon crawling, unexpected romance, weird magic
Synopsis: Dariel dreams of becoming an adventurer but quickly learns it's far more dangerous--and expensive—than she'd ever imagined. With help from her friends Quintus and Jase and funding from the questionable Shadow Dwarf Cabal, Dariel braves the megadungeon Mythbarrow, where she discovers wonderous treasures, surprising allies, and an unexpected romance. But dungeon delving doesn't come without risks—slime wizards, drug-addled hobgoblins, and mysterious fairies to name just a few—and to make it out alive with her friends, she'll need every bit of skill and bravery she can muster.
Excerpt: Dariel peered through each open doorway, trying to guess which way she should go and more than a little worried about stumbling into another trap. The opening the first dwarf had gone through led into a chamber filled with stacked pots, most of which looked like they’d been smashed open. The center doorway led down a short hallway that opened into another chamber, this one holding what looked like stone plinths. The third one was another hallway that sloped down further underground. She was about to try the center doorway when she heard a scream and shouting from down the sloped hallway. She yanked her sword out of its scabbard—the loose hilt rattling a little in her grip—and charged down the hall. As she rounded the corner, it occurred to her that most sensible people would have turned and run the other way. Well, no one had ever called her sensible before. There was no reason she should start being sensible now.
THE COMPANY
A dungeon-lit cozy fantasy adventure in the old school style!
#WSPit #Ag #NA #A #F #R
learn more: www.shannonrampe.com
Inspirations: cover images of Dune by Frank Herbert, Fragile by Yes, Final Fantasy, The Mandalorian
Themes: techno-powered demigods, machine spirits, found family, epic quest, secret histories, first-person POV
Text on a desert background: Gods of Sky and Dust Shannon Rampe An amnesiac robot A psychic scoundrel A scholar out to change her world
GODS of SKY and DUST
Now on submission!
A jaded treasure-hunter is offered a chance at personal redemption when he and a scholar-friend discover an ancient, sentient robot that may be key to unlocking the secrets of an ancient civilization.
#WSPit #OS #A #SF #F
Learn more: www.shannonrampe.com
Help us celebrate nonfiction writers from 2025! In our first-ever Planetside Reader Survey, which runs until Feb 28 at 11:59 PM PST, we are asking readers to highlight the articles they most loved.
Thank you to all the volunteers who make this teaching tool for professionalizing writers possible!
So many great rec's in this thread! Not sure if it counts as midlist or not, but @travisbaldree.bsky.social's latest, Brigands and Breadknives, came out recently and caps off a really fun trilogy.
WWWAAATTT???? OMG YOU ARE NOW THE COOLEST PERSON I KNOW!!! CONGRATULATIONS!!
Myth’s Landing – A City ’26 Project
This blogpost originally appeared on The Novel Game Master. I'm excited to participate in City '26. This is the 2026 TTRPG/worldbuilding project, inspired by prior years' projects like Dungeon 23. This one was kicked off by Garblag Games and is loosely…
Over on my TTRPG blog, I've started a #City26 project detailing the districts of Myth's Landing, the setting for my dungeon-lit fantasy novel THE COMPANY.
Diane's Top 10 Reads of 2025: The Silo Saga Omnibus by Hugh Howey The Book That Held Her Heart by Mark Lawrence The Walled City by L.L. Stephens The Staircase in the Woods by Chuck Wendig Protocol of Valor by Timothy Wolff Born of an Iron Storm by Anthony Ryan Queen of Thorns by Joel C. Flanagan-Grannemann Daughter of the Otherworld by Shauna Lawless Turns of Fate by Anne Bishop King Sorrow by Joe Hill
List of daily post prompts for indie fantasy authors for December. Today's is: Favorite reads of 2025 Hosts: @chesneyinfalt.bsky.social and @lvrussell.bsky.social
Day 30 of #FantasyIndiesDecember
My top 10 reads of 2025 are pretty diverse, and a good mix of indie and trad. I could have chosen more - it was really tough - but these were definitely the best of the best for me.
#WritingCommunity
My 2025 Wrap-Up newsletter is now live! Includes recommendations for my three favorite brain-melting books I read in 2025.
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Lots of new stuff coming from me in 2026. Stay up on the latest and greatest by joining my newsletter - sign up at shannonrampe.com and I'll send you a free ebook. We got stuff about writing, TTRPGs, recommendations, and more goodness. Free from AI slop and no spamming.
Rather than doing an ordinary end-of-year best of post, I put together 9 things I've learned running 9 different RPG systems in the past year(ish). What have you learned?
www.thenovelgamemaster.com/2025/12/9-th...
#osr #dnd #mothership #shadowdark #gmtips
The bloggies are coming, the bloggies are coming!
Over on my TTRPG blog, I wrote about my latest novel-in-progress, which is an OSR-inspired fantasy adventure!
www.thenovelgamemaster.com/2025/12/writ...
Final chapter on revisions of my novel WHITE BONE SPIRIT - I'm so excited to be finished with this project so I can move on to something new! It's great to be writing regularly again though. The last few months have been crazy!
They are both excellent. Very different from the Radch trilogy, but if you enjoy Leckie's writing and worldbuilding, you will definitely enjoy them. More introspective and character focused with still plenty of fascinating worldbuilding and politics and still maintaining a compelling plot and pace.
