Reading Report: May 2026
A very untidy library, foodie flashfiction, and how to make writing less hard.
May was a month with a lot of rain here in NYC. Prime reading and writing weather and lots of it. I leaned into the cozy with the links for this reading report. I hope you'll share it with a friend who could use a little break. Or share with eachother what you have been up to this month in the comments. Happy writing. ~EM
Year of Joy
- I've been playing Librarian: Tidy up the Arcane Library and what starts out as an utter horror is actually a cozy delight. The titles of the books are hilarious and the music is a real treat. If you feel like you need a good chillout game this is highly recommended.
- Librarian made me think of one of my all time favorite cozy books recently Wooing the Witch Queen, by Stephanie Burgis, in which a prince takes a job as the librarian to an "evil" sorceress. Hijinks ensue.
- And speaking of Stephanie Burgis, she had a delight of a short story called Mail Order Magic out in Podcastle last week. Tiny griffins and finding new balance.
Accountability
I'm bumping this section up to report on my StoryADay May experience. Friends, things did not go to plan. They never do. However, I have 8-ish new short story drafts(!) and another chapter revised. I also have a nifty updated revision checklist due to some serious procastination (more on that later). And there are still an abundance of story prompts for the rest of the year. Worth it? Absolutely. All of the prompts are online if you are feeling like a challenge. Start today!
Foodie Flash Fiction
Feeling hungry for some flash fiction? I was this month.
- Electric Literature - The Flamingo Cafe - Laurie Lathem
- Flash Fiction Online - The Screaming Garden - Em Starr
- Free Flash Fiction - Lemon Tea and Lost Biscuits - Dr Goutam Bhattacharyya
- Shadow and Sorcery - Blood Tower - Sean Hill
Writing Bits & Bobs
- NY Times - “All or something mindset” - I don't normally link to the Times but I really like this phrase. It's mentioned in the context of exercise but I think it applies to writing too. Should be a gift link, for what that's worth.
- Oliver Burkeman - How to Make Writing Less Hard - Some good strategies for making writing less of a chore from the author of Four Thousand Weeks
- Transfer Orbit - Table of Contents - If you are trying to write short stories, the best way to know what's selling is to read a few. Transfer Orbit lists what's being published by month, with links to the stories available online.
Longread
- Longreads - Swan Late - What does it mean to learn ballet when you know you will never be good at it? A strong argument for learning a hobby you will always be bad at. Will also maybe make you rethink ballet as an artform.
Books I'm Reading
- Platform Decay - Martha Wells - Yes, this is a new Murderbot Novella. Yes, you should read it immediately. All I'm gonna say is AppleTV is gonna need a bigger cgi budget for this one.
- Magic and Bullets - Larry Correia - Second in his Academy of Outcasts series, this is marketed as LitRPG, but those elements are not obvious. And nobody writes a fight scene like Correia.
- Spirit Blade - Glynn Stewart - Hot Guy saves Cat. Starts slowish, but that's just giving Stewart a bigger runway to build to his typical epic finale.
- Eye of the Bedlam Bride (Dungeon Crawler Carl 6) - Matt Diniman - Took me a while to get into this one, but now it's ticking along and the plots are getting thicker, the game more complex, and Carl and Doughnut face some serious choices.
- How to Take Smart Notes - Sönke Ahrens - Still working my way through this one because I'm interested in the Zettlekasten method and thought I'd go straight to the source. Makes me wish I'd read it in grad school because it sounds very useful for academic research.
