Spencer D.W. - The Nightingale Ambassadors

Are you ready to get to know our next Ambassador in line?

If you're not up to date, click below to read the previous one:

And now, let’s get going:

Introducing Spencer D.W.

Our fourth ambassador is the one and only Spencer, who you might recognize from his visceral cosmic and body horror short stories or his ongoing poetry project Sugar of Lead, where he builds upon the altar of other authors’ corpus. When it comes to choosing a representative of an author-first press, who better than someone who takes the time to dive deep into the cloying essence of other writers’ demons and comes crawling out holding jewels in his hands?

Review

To introduce him better, let’s have a look at his story Dernière Volonté, a short and sickly sweet work of 1100 words.

Beware, the following link is going to take you off-site, over to substack, as the story is only available

there for now:

I couldn't feel the rocks under my back, the slight gust that rippled the standing water forming in craters. I couldn't feel the rain across my skin.

Spencer’s style is raw and gritty. His ideas flow like river rapids, fast and splashing unbothered over boulders, coursing as naturally as blood through veins. There is no pretense or beautifying sheen of grandeur, because Spencer’s horror comes naturally, albeit from a well beyond human comprehension.

Still, his imagery can be delicate and beautiful, reflecting the glimmers of beauty in darkness in the same way feathers dipped in motor oil might. One of the best examples of both worlds colliding is Dernière Volonté.

In Dernière Volonté, a mechanical, once-human soldier lays on the battlefield, grievously wounded and calmly analyzing his own bodily condition.

It was just what was left of my real ears straining to hear through my war sarcophagus.

As he catalogues his wounds, the turmoil surrounding him finds itself unmatched by his inner world. He is at peace with himself, albeit yearning for the humanity he was forced to abandon. And yet… he wishes he could feel connected to his long-foregone humanity once more.

The clouds swam into one another in great grey and black waves. Churning, the nest of our doom. […] I wanted to feel the rain one more time.

Because what is humanity, but the soul within the vessel? In a world so dependent on technology like ours, there is perhaps no question more important to know the answer to.

If you like what you’ve read here, we’ve linked some more of Spencer’s work below.

Look forward to getting to know our—for now still secret—last Ambassador in a couple days!

Spencer’s Work

You can read more of Spencer's stories on his profile: Spencer D. W.

Or over on his substack: Spencer's Cult of Forbidden Horrors