hi, I’m Lj,
I help writers to create artworks as singular, rich, and indelible as fairy tales.
My practice, Ceremony Studio, is a feast to be savoured with a silver fork or devoured from berry-stained fingers.
Ceremony
Ceremony helps writers to create fiction, memoir, poetry, and nonfiction that are as luxurious as cocktails of molten gold.
Through my writing, teaching, and mentoring, I help writers to distill the atmosphere of their projects.
Distilling the atmosphere makes writing and reading feel like a ceremony, a celebration, and a feast.
I invite you to feast with me on rich, mouthwatering morsels of red velvet cake, scallion pancakes, sour noodles, and caramelised garlic.
To savour every bite and to share your abundance with your readers.
To devour my intensive programme, Slow Practice.
To drink psychedelic potions in my community, Atmospheres.
To sharpen your appetite on my newsletter.
Or to read more about my clients’ books here, and hear interviews with many of them on the Ceremony podcast.
books
“A frightening fairytale, surreal, not the story you think you know. A book that reads like a spell, meant to be read slowly. It unfolds like a strange dream, and a nightmare. A book I still think about years after reading it.” Kirin Khan
On Christmas night, a small girl is crowned at a pageant, before stumbling into the snowy darkness, alone, to meet her greatest fan. Set in Rosewood’s forest, the “creeping liquefaction” of the dead produces a fungal harvest that casts a spell on the town. In the endless dark of winter, feral creatures thrive, and psychedelic spores infect the air. The Museum of Atheism, deep below ground, is full of hallucinatory terrors.
“A fierce and deadly little fantasia that bites its way deep into your brain.” Brian Evenson
THE LUMINOL REELS takes its imagery from pornography, Catholicism, and crime scene investigation to interrogate the violence done to women. It considers the ongoing brutality of the femicides in Ciudad Juarez and the institutional misogyny of the Catholic Church. Violence is intrinsically linked to location, and the shrines, quinceañera parties, holy communions, and seances of this book are all stained luminescent blue.
“This book will forever change how you read about violence.” Nicola Maye Goldberg
When human blood reacts with luminol, it lights up a ghostly blue. This reaction, most commonly used to detect whether violence has taken place at suspected crime scenes, combines the human and the chemical, it invokes violence but also transformation.
interviews and discussions
Playlist at Largehearted Boy
Research Notes at Necessary Fiction
‘Scorpio Rising: Gothic Hybridity and the Occult: a Discussion with James Pate’ at 3AM Magazine
‘Rituals for Creative Writing + Unearthing Our Deepest Stories’ at Living Open Podcast
‘Talking about Tarot, Creativity, and Writing’ at The Life of Tarot Podcast.