Rue Sparks (They/Them)
@ruesparks
Author, artist, advocate, aficionado of alliteration. Also see: antagonist (allegedly) Just a queer, disabled, neurospicy punk trying to survive the dumpster fire. 📚 🚀💫🌈🏳️⚧️ 🚫 Generative AI
Anyone have strange writing idiosyncrasies? One of my weird habits is I will often write the stripped down dialogue for conversations first, then go back through and add in the narration and interiority. I’m a chaos gremlin when I write apparently 📚💙
No one: Me: Ever think about how we always have our noses in our line of sight but our brains are so used to it being there it just blocks it out unless we think about it? Also me: Oh it’s 8pm and all I’ve had today was tea. (Yup. I’m definitely perceptive and aware of my body at all times…)
Cover process for my #zine with the #spokenWord piece I’m performing tomorrow night with added #illustrations The piece is about the inside jokes and tall tales we make between us and the people we love during hard times, and how we carry these jokes with us long after they’re gone.
It’s Pride time yall, but with #books! 🌈📚 Time to read all the queer scifi, fantasy, romance, contemporary, IDEK but it is gay AF so we dig it . My SFF #shortstory collection The Stars Will Guide Us Back is in the Pride Hard With A Vengeance bundle with 36 others 👀 itch.io/b/3676/pride...
My fellow #chronicIllness peeps you ever break out into Victorian era purple prose to describe the mercurial waltz that is your every waking moment in a body that decomposes as you speak? Asking for a friend.
‼️ART COMMISSION OPEN‼️ I’m trying to make it through a bad couple of months financially after a bunch of crisis, so I’m opening up for single color #illustrations with a quick turnaround. This could be personal or for #bookinteriors or #bookcovers. Single color only 📚🎨
...I spoke too soon. Me: I'm almost done with these drawings! Also me: I'M GOING TO DRAW HUNDREDS OF PINE NEEDLES ONE BY ONE SEE YOU NEVEEEEEEEER 🌲
Finishing up the spot illustrations for the New Fires, Old Seeds #zine! All the #illustrations include pull quotes from the #shortStory. A husband & wife embody the clash of the philosophical against the cold reality of the end of the world. One saves seeds, the other builds fires. 📚🚀
Noice! I’ll have to check them out. I have a bunch of handmade watercolor sets and I adore them!! My favorite is this neon set.
Say hello to Salvador Dali. He decided the window seat was his, despite the record player that had claimed it first. Just moved it off the shelf so it is officially his roost.
#HearingAid core?? I didn’t plan on looking like a confidential informant for the Peaky Blinders in 2026 but here we are. It’s wild to me how unobtrusive hearings aids can look now 🤯You can’t even tell.
I was mad at myself that I didn't have a ton of usable prose written for Eclipse. I've mostly been worldbuilding/plotting/working on visual & formatting components. Then I realized my Obsidian hadn't synced and there was a ton of half-written scenes I'd forgotten about 😅 Ah, the writing life.
-The zine includes illustrations throughout, printed with a Kraft cardstock cover with hand painted accents and bound by hand. I’ll be bringing some to upcoming events and it will soon be available in my store.
I’m almost done with the hand bound zine for my story “New Fires, Old Seeds.” This short story follows a mother and child traveling north along the Great Lakes, now a brackish uninhabitable wreck after pollution, abuse of natural resources, and climate change. (Cont)-
It’s #PortfolioDay so uh… *insert not so awkward hello* I’m an illustrator, designer, and author whose been making things professionally for 15+ years (that hurts to type) Lately I’ve been working with independent publishers and authors on covers and characters, and on my own books.
If anyone is I’m the Hastings Michigan area April 11th I’m running a free workshop at Wild Wood Books taking about different avenues for publishing. Come to learn, discuss, and get a list of resources!
Finally finished the first two Hubris illustrations, Icarus and Atlas. They’re technically for a later book in the Archetype series I’m working on, but they stand alone too. Sisyphus next. Or Prometheus? Greek punishment myths are WILD. I’m just realizing I neeeeed to do the Norse myths someday…
Was going to work on developing this character design more but got distracted drawing Oscar Isaacs in Dune with my new Procreate brushes on my iPad. As one does.
The world is a dumpster fire so sometimes you just gotta make shite for yourself. I can’t afford more cool earrings so I thought “I’ll make some” and now I’ve been sucked down the shrink plastic rabbit hole…
Proof to #writers that not everyone is your audience—in plain numbers. I submitted a story for an anthology with the option for feedback. I won't show comments for privacy, but here's the ratings: 3, 5, 9, 10, 10 I haven't seen a clearer demonstration of who my demographic is and isn't.
I’m playing. I have more confidence. I’m even animating again. It took looking at those early files to really comprehend how far I’ve come. We can get too absorbed in the drudgery to see. Sometimes what we really need is to look back behind us to remind ourselves we’re not standing still. (3/3)
-My first 20 files or so were unfinished and clumsy. I’d been creating digital art for a long time, but the transition from computer to tablet compounded with chronic illness stifled me. It was really hard to push through and I still struggle many days. But I’m feeling less uncertain. (2/3)
Progress is hard to see when you stand too close. I was looking at my iPad drawing library and came to the realization that I’ve evolved a lot in less than 2 years. (1st image: first files on iPad 2nd image: last finished piece) (1/3)
-as such I’m only using grayscale and gold coloring -I’m going to be using visual parallels between Odysseus and Scylla back stories, with Scylla a much more fleshed out and relatable character than the original song So much with to do buuuuuut hold me accountable y’all
-that iteration - She was originally a woman who was cursed. Poison was added to her water when she was bathing which made her transform. - Gods and immortals are sometimes described as having ichor for blood, that is iridescent/gold/etc and toxic to mortals-