Happy Friday. I thought it was Thursday. It’s been a somewhat restful break for me so far, in that I got to take a nap yesterday in that nice lull when the kids were putting together some new Legos. It’s also been a productive break: on the Malarkey front I spent a lot of time catching up on orders and stapling copies of King Ludd’s Rag. I’ve got to staple more of the new one, actually, but earlier this week I printed and stapled two copies of every single issue we’ve published because a couple people had ordered The Compleat Luddite. Note to self: need to buy a new stapler. And at home I got to crawl under the house to run some wire so we could finally have an outlet in the front room. Now we can listen to records. Before I head back to school I have to defeat the cluster flies that invade any time the weather is nice, correct a mistake in an ebook file, edit two books, set up two new ebook files, put in the rest of the outlets, plan upcoming units on Macbeth and Animal Farm, remember to exercise, and calculate 2025 royalties. Among other to-dos. Last year we started the new semester with four snow days and I’m secretly hoping for a repeat.

We might not get the snow I want, but Malarkey needs to finish the year with a nice flurry. Through December 31 everything we’ve got is 15% off with code MALARKEY at checkout. This includes:

2026 Book Club

Book club for 2026 will come with four books, three issues of King Ludd’s Rag, a copy of our Halloween zine, Hellarkey, and four zines/micro-chaps of poetry. Joining the book club is one of the best things you can do, both for yourself (a year of book mail!) and a small press always battling to break even. It’s a great way to introduce yourself to new writers that you probably wouldn’t have read otherwise.

Preorders

• The Walls Are Closing In On Us, a novel by Joshua Trent Brown

• Terrestrial, a novella by Suzy Eynon

• Submarines, a novel by Mike Andrelczyk

Returns

Currently we have bookstore returns of Kill Radio and Still Alive available for just $13. They’re all in great shape; bookstores just over-ordered.

Bundles

• Two Books + a t-shirt

• Zines Club

• Compleat Luddite

Books

Including . . .

• Boxcutters by John Chrostek (15 first run copies remaining)

• My Ardent Love for the Pencil by Vi Khi Nao (12 signed first run copies remaining)

• The Barre Incidents by Lauren Bolger (16 first run copies remaining)

• Hair Shirt by Adrian Sobol (23 first run copies remaining)

• First Aid for Choking Victims by Matthew Zanoni Müller

• Sleep Decades by Israel A. Bonilla

• Your Favorite Poet by Leigh Chadwick

• Faith by Itoro Bassey

• Music Is Over by Ben Arzate (Ben has copies on hand that he will sign and send your way)

• Gloria Patri by Austin Ross

The discount code is also good for zines and ebooks.

Malarkey is a time-consuming, un-lucrative project, and sometimes I wonder why I keep it going. We’re not changing the world. We’re not saving the publishing industry, and unfortunately I don’t believe that small presses and indies are going to be able to offset whatever horrors the bigger publishers are likely to embrace in the coming years. Why then? It’s not inertia and it’s not money and it’s not even a feeling of obligation. I think it’s just that I love it and it matters to enough people to make it worthwhile. If it matters to you as well, even something as small as dropping $5 on Malarkey Forever, a digital sampler featuring writing by 16 of our authors, helps the press out big time.

This is a beautiful world, regardless of how many people try to ruin it (they will always fail), and we’re grateful to be here with you.