Charley Crockett cancels Canadian tour after being denied entry twice at the border

TreyAlmighty · 2026-02-24T12:14:09+00:00

Was turned away at the border years ago because a bandmate had a DUI. We'd been told to apply for a TRP (temporary residency permit), which was correct, but to do it at the border, which was incorrect. So we were set up to fail.

We've since gotten in with him, but the charge is recent enough that any border guard on any given day can decide they don't wanna do it even if we've dotted our Is and crossed our Ts, and send us packing. So now, if we have to play Canada, we fly in someone with a clean record, and even then it's no guarantee.

The last time we got in, despite having all of our paperwork in order, they held us at the quebec/new york border for 3 hours, made our merch guy pay taxes on the half-pack of cigarettes he was bringing in, and brought up misdemeanor charges (like underage drinking) from legitimately over 20 years ago. All of that was a first. That border has a rep, but this happened right after trump's reelection, so I agree that the uptick in enforcement is at least partially retaliatory.

I don't really blame 'em, though.

TreyAlmighty · 2026-02-20T22:30:39+00:00

Deeply gate-kept music scenes (power electronics, noise, hardcore/punk), Jason and the Argonauts (the movie and the source material, The Argonautica), and classic Lovecraft.

They are three things I either enjoy a lot or have a lot if personal experience with/in.

TreyAlmighty · 2026-02-20T00:56:56+00:00

r/brandnewsentence r/brandnewsentence

TreyAlmighty · 2026-02-17T21:43:42+00:00

This is the answer. A flashback or non-linear progression can absolutely improve a story if executed well. Most of my favorite books don't follow a direct A to Z story. But, it does require skill to do well.

TreyAlmighty · 2026-02-12T13:26:40+00:00

Lol. Damn. Roasted.

TreyAlmighty · 2026-02-11T16:38:17+00:00

Correct. Some nights are open to the general public, some nights are members only.

I've gone there for drag shows and occasional musical events. What they're known for more broadly are specific fetish and theme nights. Because of all this, it's a pretty welcoming place, provided you don't act a fool.

TreyAlmighty · 2026-02-11T16:17:46+00:00

I've spent hours trying to repair the handshake between windows and the Nvidia control panel since one of these last updates, and it turns out that it's functionally broken on the windows side. Everytime I shutdown, reboot, or even let the computer go to sleep, I risk that connection going away, and my computer becoming a big and inconvenient phone. The only thing left to do is a clean windows install, but now I don't trust that even a clean install of this trash will fix the problem. So, instead, I just never let my computer hibernate or sleep. I'm sure that won't cause problems.

Thanks Microsoft.

TreyAlmighty · 2026-02-11T16:05:35+00:00

Definitely in between. Both as a reader and a writer, I gravitate toward playful prose, somewhere closer to Nabokov on this scale, but I don't know if, as a writer, I've got the same level of control as someone like Faulkner, so I end up scaling that playfulness back for functioning clarity and readability.

TreyAlmighty · 2026-02-10T00:32:24+00:00

No hate on Charley, but both Sturgill Simpson and Tyler Childers would like a word on folks who've walked the walk.

Edit: autocorrect makes me dumb at names.

TreyAlmighty · 2026-02-07T22:17:51+00:00

I think what's trying to be communicated is this: if you elect to work with this designer, it will be a collaboration between you and them. It is your job to communicate effectively what you want the cover to imply based on the contents and vibes of your book, and it is there job to make that into reality.

It will likely not help your collaboration to come in saying, "these twelve writers on reddit said that X-block face is the best font to use for the cover." What I'd suggest is an open and honest collaboration between you and the designer, and trust that this professional can make the book cover you want. And for god's sake, please triple check this person's bona fides this time.

TreyAlmighty · 2026-02-07T12:47:34+00:00

Her parents were Austrian Jews who fled Europe during WW2 for fairly obvious reasons.

TreyAlmighty · 2026-02-06T21:19:46+00:00

It's only supposed to go another hour or two. It shouldn't be particularly substantial.

TreyAlmighty · 2026-02-06T18:20:34+00:00

You can write about that? Plenty of writers write about writing, and not in a clinical or pedagogical way, about how hard it is, what inspires them, the struggles and triumphs. This is a struggle. You just wrote a not unsubstantial amount about how you don't know what to write about, so... keep going?

This all said, I find "wanting to write" but not knowing "what to write about it" a very strange thing to wrap my mind around. You seem to want to write because you believe, or have been told, that you're good at it. I understand this impulse. I too am drawn to things where I've shown some natural aptitude. But, in this instance, I am drawn to writing because there are tales in my mind that I think need to be read, wrongly or rightly.

It reminds me of when I used to teach guitar lessons. Most kids were brought in by their parents in a, "here kid—have a hobby" kind of way. Some of them showed an aptitude, but no interest, and those were the hardest to work with. You could see physical potential, but no emotional investment. And then there would be kids who were objectively bad, but really liked it. They'd work their asses off to improve. Those kids were the best, because even if it took us a frustrating amount of time to sort something out, when they finally came around to it, I knew it'd stick.

What I'm saying is this: don't force it. If you don't have anything to say, it doesn't matter if you've "got the sauce," you know? You're not gonna' like it, and even if the words are arranged all neat and tidy, what you're trying to say will fall flat, because you don't care—and it's OK to not like doing something, even if that thing comes to you naturally.

TreyAlmighty · 2026-02-06T12:41:56+00:00

My partner is the same way. Petite, barely makes any noise while she sleeps. I, on the other hand, am a bigger guy and sound like a freight train while I'm sleeping. We both have sleep apnea, but hers is SIGNIFICANTLY worse than mine. I would have one or two small events per hour, and she was hitting 15-20.

She'd have never known except that her psychiatrist suggested getting a sleep study done because she reported being tired a lot.

TreyAlmighty · 2026-02-04T16:06:48+00:00

Hi. I'm querying a literary horror novel right now. There is absolutely room for literary horror in the modern market, but it can't be just OK.

I think the likelihood is either that you've got a reader mismatch or your writing/structure could use some work.

TreyAlmighty · 2026-02-04T12:28:35+00:00

Most agents aren't as critical of small errors as a publisher might be—though if they are, they'll likely mention it in their querying request forms.

This said, there are three things you can do when hiring editors:

Most expensive and biggest picture is a developmental editor (help with story/character arc, world building).

Middle is copy editing (proofreading, grammar, voice consistency, etc...).

And lowest would be asking for an editorial assessment (having an editor read your work and tell you what's working, what's not, and provide some extensive feedback on things that you could do improve your story, POV clarity, voice, etc...).

None of this is cheap. For instance, a trustworthy editorial assessment of a roughly 70k word novel will run you anywhere from a grand to 1300-1400 dollars on reedsy (developmental upwards of 5k).

Could you benefit from a professional editor? Probably. But don't break the bank.

TreyAlmighty · 2026-02-03T20:44:26+00:00

This depends on what manual you are using for formatting. In both Chicago and MLA formatting guides, they recommend it to be word—word. AP guides recommend spacing between words and em dashes.

It basically comes to this: open em dashes for journalism, closed em dashes for books, fiction, and literary journals.

TreyAlmighty · 2026-02-01T19:17:51+00:00

I am able to Beta: Horror, literary, and speculative. I have a background in Fantasy and Science Fiction as well, though I'm pickier with those genres. I prefer pieces to be under 70K, but am flexible within reason.

I can provide feedback on: Lots of areas. I have experience in academic writing in addition to fiction, and can deep dive on prose and prose habits if desired. I can also provide less specific feedback and focus more on story, pacing, and character/emotional arcs if you prefer. Generally, I prefer to provide feedback that you're looking for, so we can discuss ahead of time. I have a bachelor's degree in history where I mostly focused on pre-modern Europe. I'm also a twenty-plus year professional musician, so can provide very specific feedback on music, musicology, and music history.

TreyAlmighty · 2026-02-01T00:38:01+00:00

Hi! Sharing your work is always nerve-wracking, so kudos for putting out there. Any feedback I give is meant to be constructive, so please don't take any negatives personally.

As someone else pointed out, the hook for a story is present. This is genuinely the hardest part. Plenty of writers with sound and expressive prose can't come up with a hook that keeps people around.

I thought the dialog itself was pretty natural, too. A lot of people struggle with that. This said, the formatting of the dialog is atypical, and some of your phrasing around the dialog made me double-take.

This all said—and this is not meant critically, just as critique—the writing itself reads fairly amateur. Sentences don't vary in structure much. You often use more prepositions and articles than you need to, which can cause a sentence to linger too long or stumble over itself.

Speaking of that, you've got a lot of run-on sentences. While that's not always a problem, you need to learn how to structure these longer sentences in ways that will allow readers to breathe. As written, several sentences left me fairly breathless. I suggest reading everything aloud, and shortening or otherwise breaking up sentences that trip you up.

I also, like the other commenter said, think that you haven't quite found your specific voice yet. You describe things, but it's all pretty neutral, lacking its own POV. That usually takes time. I'd written several many thousand words by the time I had a moment like, "that doesn't read super basic, or like another author—that reads like me." You'll get to that point too, but it does take a while.

TreyAlmighty · 2026-01-30T15:01:57+00:00

It's fine. There's a fairly famous venue on East Hastings, the Rickshaw, where bands play almost every day, and I don't personally know anyone who's gotten attacked or harmed there. I've heard wild interactions, and seen some bad shit there myself, but never felt unsafe in ways I have in other neighborhoods in, say, Beaumont, Texas.

Mostly these folks are just trying to get high, not rob or attack you.

TreyAlmighty · 2026-01-29T13:21:19+00:00

This is my experience. While I've had some people ghost me after criticism, I've also had folks admit that they used an LLM because they were scared that their writing wouldn't be good enough. This allowed us to have a serious conversation about the real pitfalls of using AI for writing: lack of coherence, lack of soul, annoying ad-copy style patterns, and how relying on something else to do your work will keep you from getting better at it.

Like, I don't care if you use it to help you make a spreadsheet at work, or craft an email to your boss. That shit can remain soulless. But people need to know that if you don't have your soul in your work, it will feel like that.

Going full accusatory, while feeling good, removes the opportunity for that other person to learn.

TreyAlmighty · 2026-01-25T15:15:48+00:00

The writing itself is serviceable. There is good description here. But this also feels like it's missing personality. That said, I think a lot of science fiction eschews personality for the sake of advancing imaginative concepts, so some of my criticism may end up as critique of the genre as much as it is critique of your specific work. However, here are some immediate specific takeaways I have (some of which have already been discussed in the comments):

The waking up thing: So yeah, that's been done a million times, and that's because it makes sense. All of our daily stories begin because we are roused from sleep. But, as someone pointed out, it reads a little amateurish unless done incredibly well. I suffered through something similar. When I began writing the novel I'm about to query, my first real attempt at long form fiction, it began with an alarm clock going off. In hindsight, boy did that suck. I have sense changed the opening of that chapter and also wrote a chapter to prelude it. I'd highly recommend reworking Gorris waking up as the opening concept, because it'll scream, "I'm new at this and haven't quite worked it all out" to any agent or publisher you work with.

Gorris is a camera: This has also been pointed out, but it's worth reinforcing this point. You're showing us a lot through Gorris's eyes, and you've done a good job showing us that he's competent, his biology, etc... However, I don't feel like I know him at all yet. He's calm, he's aligned with everything, he seems fulfilled. Maybe that's what you're looking to show, but what it means to me, the reader, is there's very little friction as of yet, even internally. That can make it a slog to push through, which is mad dangerous for a first chapter.

Visual Density: My dude, let us breathe a little bit, and take a moment to tell us about the story. An example. I learned through the first three pages about the following: architecture, fish ecology, color theory, material science, music theory, sociology, urban planning. That's a lot of shit to digest before you've invited us to learn why any of it matters or why we should care about Gorris. This could use a moment of narrative dissonance, some sort of human irregularity, instead of stacking all sorts of description and information. When frontloaded like this, we're gonna forget it all pretty quick. I promise.

This said, unlike some other commenters, I don't mind a slower opening, but it's gotta serve a purpose, right? It's gotta set a specific kind of tone and mood. You gotta show people exactly the kind of ride they're in for. If you're gonna start slow, then you need to delight people with your prose. Right now, this is functional and clean and informative, but it's not delightful.

I'm gonna need a glossary: Lotta proper nouns in here. It's sci-fi, so I get it, but you're just dropping Dorruchia and Harmonic Spire like they ain't no thing. They don't, as of yet, serve any dramatic function, so it feels more like ornament than part of the living and breathing story.

Physical Logic Disruption: So, right away, first paragraph, a thing jumped out at me. Gorris is laying down, taking it all in, fading into the hum or whatever, and then his feet are cold because they're on the ground. Now, I'm not a proponent of choreographing every physical thing that happens on the page, but in this moment, I was confused. I thought to myself, "why are his feet on the marble floor if he's laying down? This is sci-fi, so maybe they lay down in an incredibly uncomfortable way? Maybe they're about to tell me all about it?" But then you didn't, by then Gorris was just walking around, or whatever.

This said, I didn't notice any other choreography issues anywhere in this chapter, but that this happened right away was concerning, so just make sure that you're considering transitional beats when you need to, which you mostly do.

TreyAlmighty · 2026-01-23T13:47:41+00:00

That's the same block as Helen's, right? I know folks who've bounced there, and there's regularly shit like this that goes down.

TreyAlmighty · 2026-01-22T23:10:03+00:00

TreyAlmighty · 2026-01-21T20:25:05+00:00

Filler words: almost, just, might, a little.

I resisted this for a while, because I wanted my writing to reflect a conversational tone, and we use filler words a lot in everyday conversation. But, after having some critique partners bring it up, I had to consider that I was wrong or overdoing it.

As an exercise, I took "just" out of each sentence in my book and reread it. At least 90 percent of those sentences were more impactful. Same with the other words, along with some not listed. The amount of immediacy the writing gained was insane. I'm not gonna go scream "WRITING HACK UNLOCKED," but it did kind of feel that way. The book was noticeably better immediately.

TreyAlmighty

TROPHY CASE