alex manley
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alexicon.bsky.social
alex manley
@alexicon.bsky.social
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non-binary writer/editor. author of The New Masculinity (2023), translator of Made-Up (2021), working on Post-Man (2025), editor at AskMen. it's giving nominative determinism. alexmanley.com
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alexicon.bsky.social
montrealers! come to the launch of POST-MAN tomorrow at de stiil books! i’ll be in conversation with the brilliant domenica martinello, & laura mota-juang will read some poems to kick off the evening!
screenshot of 2010s-style emoji-heavy chain text message adapted to promote my book launch. it reads: “what's UP! all you ICE QUEENS & SNOW CLONES it's almost the 13th of NOVEMBER which means it's ALEX MANLEY's book launch tomorrow night 7 p.m. at De Stiil Books on Duluth Ave. just in time for the PARTY the Service de Transport de la Communauté Urbaine de Montréal (ST. CUM) announced it's SUS-pending its STRIKE ACTION - meaning METR-HOE and BUSSY services are BACK ON the MENU boys!!! come on out & enjoy an evening of FLOWetry, lyrical essays & engaging literary conversation. attendance is FREE but touching will cost ya. send this to 10 FRIENDS & SITUATIONSHIPS you think would enjoy a book about gender & mental health.”
November 12, 2025 at 7:29 PM
alexicon.bsky.social
more details here :)
event poster for my ottawa launch at perfect books tuesday november 4th: OTTAWA, ON Alex Manley launches Post-Man In conversation with Dessa Bayrock POST-MAN essays on being a neuro divergent non-binary person ALEX MANLEY Tues, November 4, 2025 7:00 P.M. Perfect Books 258A ELGIN ST, OTTAWA, ON Join Alex as they read from their new book of essays on contemporary masculinity and neurodivergence from a non-binary perspective. MORE INFO: perfectbooks.ca ARSENAL PULP PRESS PERFECT BOOKS event poster for my ottawa launch at perfect books thursday november 6th: Another Story Bookshop and Arsenal Pulp Press present Post-Man: Essays on Being a Neurodivergent Non-Binary Person by Alex Manley in conversation with EJ Kneifel with guest readers Sennah Yee and Jake Byrne RSVP at post-man.eventbrite.ca Thursday, November 6 / 7pm In Store, 315 Roncesvalles Ave. ARSENAL PULP PRESS BOOKSHOP ROST-MAN essays on being a neurodivergent non-binary person ALEX MANLEY
November 3, 2025 at 9:22 PM
alexicon.bsky.social
made some pullquote graphics for the book, like all the Cool Authors do
A quote from my forthcoming book, Post-Man (my name and the title are bottom left). At the top, dark text on turquoise-ish background: "As a child, my faith led, before long, to philosophical inquiry. I remember grappling with the idea that it was impossible not to sin, probably around the age of ten or eleven. What if I was really, really dedicated, though?" In white below it to the right, the name of the essay: EGO SVM LVX MVNDI with a portion of the cover design featuring a bobby pin, bottom right A quote from my forthcoming book, Post-Man (my name and the title are bottom left). At the top, dark text on turquoise-ish background: "I felt like a bad gay. How bound up in shame and otherness I was, that Pride itself felt alienating. And yet Halloween, in many ways its vibe apogee, I was equally repelled by, a spinning magnet caught between two forms of queerness I could not manage to hack." In white below it to the right, the name of the essay: Hallowed Out, with a portion of the cover design featuring a bobby pin, bottom right A quote from my forthcoming book, Post-Man (my name and the title are bottom left). At the top, dark text on turquoise-ish background: "To have a body, to be alive, is to be subject to capitalism. It touches us before we even come out, a probing finger, a bias that shapes an argument, a framework that demarcates what is and isn’t possible. Casualties of the conditions in which their mothers lived." In white below it to the right, the name of the essay: The Lead Essay, with a portion of the cover design featuring a bobby pin, bottom right A quote from my forthcoming book, Post-Man (my name and the title are bottom left). At the top, dark text on turquoise-ish background: "The truth is, there has always been homoerotic desire in hockey, the way there is any time enough men gather together, like a sort of queer holy spirit. Whenever two or more gather in my name, I am there. It may not have been spoken aloud, acted on, or acknowledged, but it was there, the way queerness has always been, uninvited yet irrepressible.." In white below it to the right, the name of the essay: Behind the Masc, with a portion of the cover design featuring a bobby pin, bottom right
September 26, 2025 at 12:56 PM
alexicon.bsky.social
accidentally did that thing where a new poem meant for someone else downloaded itself into my brain & now it’s been published. please enjoy my pronoun poem:
literary magazine being held open by hand with extended forefinger, which has polish on the nail. text of the poem: My pronouns are he/him My pronouns are wait/what My pronouns are My pronouns are he/they My pronouns are they/them My pronouns are gay/femme My pronouns are j'ai/jaime My pronouns are pink/hair My pronouns are twink/stare My pronouns are yes/chef My pronouns are yes/daddy My pronouns are daddy/issues My pronouns are just/kidding My pronouns and I have a great relationship I mean my father and I are he/they My pronouns are gender/free My pronouns are marketing/ploy My pronouns are spring/summer My pronouns are limited/edition My pronouns are photo/shoot My pronouns are trans/agenda My pronouns are Twitter/joke- That's just how an Italian person says transgender My pronouns are clocked/at the hardware store Just kidding, that's Clocked! at the Hardware Store My pronouns are a suc/cess My pronouns are a suck/sesh My pronouns are Sock/says You're weaponizing your neurotypical privilege by asking My pronouns are they/them to do the dishes My pronouns are ironic/mullet My pronouns are dis/course My pronouns are intro/course My pronouns are in/bio My pronouns are Go/Fund/Me My pronouns are they/them/theirs My pronouns are them/thar/hills My pronouns are Sock/Ray/Blue My pronouns are he/l mean/they My pronouns are clocked/by the watchmaker My pronouns are clocked/by the passing of time My pronouns are not in the Bible Just kidding, they're He/Him My pronouns are neopronouns My pronouns are Trinity pronouns My pronouns are against/the couple form My pronouns are masc/femme My pronouns are masc/off My pronouns are masquerade My pronouns are top/shortage My pronouns are bottoms/up My pronouns are down/for whatever My pronouns are going/amateur My pronouns are zie/zir My pronouns are see/saw My pronouns were easier according to speech-to-text software My pronouns are clocked/by the postman My pronouns are post/man My pronouns are blank/space My pronouns aren't
September 7, 2025 at 4:55 PM
alexicon.bsky.social
wake up babe they sold the space between the scrabble tiles
screenshot of the upper portion of the board of a scrabble game in progress where an ad is visible above the game and also descending below the top of the board so that it’s visible in the spaces between the tiles screenshot of the upper portion of the board of a scrabble game in progress where an ad is visible above the game and also descending below the top of the board so that it’s visible in the spaces between the tiles. this time words are visible on the board
September 1, 2025 at 2:12 PM
alexicon.bsky.social
seems wild but it’s true: the books arm of canada’s national broadcaster has seen fit to alert its readers to the existence of my forthcoming memoir in essays
screenshot of the lead image + headline for a cbc books article. text includes: CBC Books, FALL BOOK PREVIEW, 45 Canadian nonfiction books to read this fall, Our nonfiction roundup includes new memoirs, essay collections, biographies, sports books and more. screenshot of my book’s entry on the list, showing the book cover in teal/turquoise and a photo of me. text includes: Post-Man by Alex Manley. essays on being a neurodivergent non-binary person. In Post-Man, neurodivergent non-binary author Alex Manley shares their lifelong feelings of being apart, alone and othered. The memoir explores their experience of navigating masculinity, from growing up steeped in hockey culture, to working for a men's website, to coming to terms with going bald as a non-binary person. screenshot of the remains of the entry for my book on the list. text includes: When you can read it: Sept. 30. Manley is a non-binary writer, editor, translator, and poet based in Montreal. They are the author of We Are All Just Animals & Plants and The New Masculinity, and the translator of Made-Up by Daphné B., Manley was a reader for the 2024 CBC Nonfiction Prize.
August 28, 2025 at 2:11 PM
alexicon.bsky.social
them: you better not be recreating your book cover out of sea glass when i get there

me:
overhead close-up of the cover of my forthcoming memoir in essays, POST-MAN, constructed out of white, brown and green sea glass on a white picnic table background less close overhead shot of the cover of my forthcoming memoir in essays, POST-MAN, constructed out of white, brown and green sea glass on a white picnic table background, with a bucket of sea glass, a ruler, my actual book and a cloth towel visible around the edge of the frame
August 13, 2025 at 5:59 PM
alexicon.bsky.social
guy who has only worked as a playwright, considering human existence: Getting a lot of
theatre vibes from this...
"All the world's a stage, and all the men and women merely players." - William Shakespeare
August 10, 2025 at 3:10 PM
alexicon.bsky.social
admin reveal
selfie, this time with my smiling face visible, holding a shrink-wrapped brick of six copies of my book POST-MAN
August 2, 2025 at 5:18 PM
alexicon.bsky.social
seems insane but my book is real ??
selfie but i’m holding two copies of my book, POST-MAN, in front of my face (cover is mainly turquoise)
August 1, 2025 at 5:42 PM
alexicon.bsky.social
there’s a boilerplate one at the beginning too but i wanted one where i got to yap a little
cropped pic of a portion of the copyright page of my book Post-Man. text in the centre reads “No Al was used in the making of this text.”
July 12, 2025 at 11:30 PM
alexicon.bsky.social
i asked my editor if i could include an anti-AI author’s note at the end of the book:
picture of a passage on a page at the end of my forthcoming book, Post-Man: Though this book comprises a number of essays written between 2014 and 2023, much of the writing and the bulk of its editing were done in 2024 and 2025, a period in which the use of large language models and generative Al was rampant. As someone politically, philosophically, spiritually, and emotionally opposed to Al, particularly in creative contexts, it was important to me not only not to use any Al in the writing of the book, but also to make the book a text that could not have been written by Al. Some of the project of this book was finding ways to create text that an AI would not.
July 12, 2025 at 12:09 PM
alexicon.bsky.social
last night as i was falling asleep a thought came to me. which was: "what if there was a sufjan stevens 50 states album, but for quebec." so this morning...
photoshop of an imagined album art for a fictional album by a musician named stéphane st. jean called "je me souviens de LA BELLE PROVINCE," with a tracklisting made up of imagined songs shouting out various details about quebec sort of in the mode of sufjan's song titles on michigan and illinois. i'm reproducing it here but just know that i know that this is stupid: 1. St. Louis du Ha! Ha! 2. Alouette (Tu m’aimerais plus) 3. Un P’tit gars d’chez nous 4. Abitibi 5. Chiac/Joual 6. La Guerre civile, première partie (Nous autres contres les hexagones) 7. Le Mononc et le Manic-5 8. Envergure/Verglas 9. Mon Osti 10. Les deux Vladimir 11. La Sainte Flanelle 12. Ouate de phoque 13. La Guerre civile, deuxième partie (ROC Edition) 14. Un Weekend au chalet, tu me manques 15. Si j’etais FLQiste, je te kidnapperais ben (mais je ne te tuerais pas) 16. Colombe 17. La Guerre civile, troisième partie (La Fl(u)oride) 18. Bin oui Ginette, on redescend bientôt
June 24, 2025 at 1:46 PM
alexicon.bsky.social
seems insane to be publishing a book this year but thank god it’s a celebration of being outside the bounds, a giant fuck you to the worst kinds of people
photo of an advance reading copy of my book, POST-MAN: essays on being a (neurodivergent) (non-binary) person, placed on a wooden surface (kitchen island) with assorted daily debris around the edges. the ARC notes publication date 9/30/25 and that the copy is not for resale, as well as names and contact info for PR people covering american and canadian press. screenshot of back cover design of my book, white and sometimes black text on turquoise background. barely visible flower pattern under the text. the copy reads: “In this divisive moment in the history of gender politics, Alex Manley navigates life as a neurodivergent non-binary person and explores their dislocations from the norm. Post-Man delves into the ways Manley has always felt apart, alone, and othered-how they always felt there was something wrong with them. In adulthood they came to recognize that in addition to having depression, anxiety, ADHD, and possibly more, they existed outside the neat binary of gender that modern society imposes on us. With this understanding of themselves, Manley takes readers through the stultifying machismo of hockey culture, the improbable job of working for a men's website, the strange unpleasantness of going bald as a non-binary person, and more. Heart-wrenching and profound, Post-Man is a book that will make you reconsider your own perceptions of masculinity and manhood.” below are three blurbs: "Post-Man is a work of striking honesty and irresistible curiosity. Manley's analysis of gender dynamics balances forensic attention with tactile sensitivity. A thrilling detective story of -and a beautiful homecoming to - the self." - Tajja Isen "Post-Man is an unapologetic jaywalk through ideas so potent, they bleed into one another: the tenderness of becoming, the unlit edges of desire, chance encounters that change us forever, and being misunderstood through it all." - Daniel Allen Cox "In those essays-steeped in internet lore and shimmering with a poet's sensibility-Manley explores crushes, late-stage capitalism, and the shifting. searching, febrile landscape of gender." - Larissa Pham
June 17, 2025 at 5:57 PM
alexicon.bsky.social
my sister asked me who i thought was going to win when it was 3-3 and i said it was either going to finish 4-3, 5-3, 6-3, or 5-4, for “one of the two teams”
text message exchange that reads: me: well i was right. it's gonna be 5-4 in overtime. for one of the two teams my sister: Yeah l'd be surprised if it was for a third team!! Lolol text message exchange that reads: me: crying at this me: the surprise winners.... the minnesota wild! they snuck into the building, changed into their gear in the bathrooms, assembled in the stands, jumped onto the ice and scored the first goal of overtime while the panthers and oilers looked on in shock! me: we've never seen this happen before but they only had 5 skaters on the ice so it's technically legal
June 13, 2025 at 12:54 PM
alexicon.bsky.social
ahem hem
screenshot of article on yahoo.com from the hockey news. headline reads: Canadiens: Hutson Finished Ninth In James Norris Trophy Voting
June 12, 2025 at 12:14 AM
alexicon.bsky.social
if digital media hadn't totally collapsed in the past decade i would try pitching a weird, funky essay about the rise of the laugh react emoji on facebook as a tool of social control & cruelty. every time i go on there the second- or third-most used react on popular trans posts is laughing at them
screenshot of the reactions on a facebook post — 4.6K total, featuring like, heart and laughing react. the post is an earnest pro-trans post featuring a picture of elliot page
May 30, 2025 at 3:20 PM
alexicon.bsky.social
every day we stray further from god’s liiiiiiiight
screenshot of buzzfeed article appearing on yahoo entitled “these are 25 of the funniest pet tweets on the internet this week” and below it there’s a little AI box that offers one the ability to “generate key takeaways” from the article
April 11, 2025 at 5:55 PM
alexicon.bsky.social
feeling so, so blessed to share some blurbs for POST-MAN with you all — blurbs written so thoughtfully and generously by three of my favourite writers of beautiful, smart, deeply personal essays. screaming, crying, throwing up!!!
a book blurb! it's black text on a mostly turquoise background (a portion of my book cover). text reads: "Post-Man is a work of striking honest and irresistible curiosity. Page after page, Manley's analysis of gender dynamics balances forensic attention with tactile sensitivity. A thrilling detective story of — and a beautiful homecoming to — the self." - Tajja Isen, author of Some of My Best Friends a book blurb! it's black text on a mostly turquoise background (a portion of my book cover), with a black looping line intruding from the left side. text reads: "Post-Man is an unapologetic jaywalk through ideas so potent, they bleed into one another: the tenderness of becoming, the unlit edges of desire, chance encounters that change us forever, and being misunderstood through it all. In these razor-tipped essays, Alex Manley is both vulnerable and unrelentingly curious, a perpetual work-in-progress. You can't read this book and not feel something, everything." -Daniel Allen Cox, author of I Felt the End Before It Came a book blurb! it's black text on a mostly turquoise background (a portion of my book cover). text reads: "In these essays—steeped in internet lore and shimmering with a poet's sensibility—Alex Manley explores crushes, late-stage capitalism, and the shifting, searching, febrile landscape of gender. Throughout, Manley's prose is unwaveringly honest; Post-Man is an ode to language as its own way of figuring things out." - Larissa Pham, author of Pop Song: Adventures in Art and Intimacy
April 5, 2025 at 10:05 PM
alexicon.bsky.social
an ARC of my new book has made it to australia???
advance review copy of my book - text visible says Post-Man essays on being a person Alex Manley in front of some scattered rocks on a beach
March 1, 2025 at 2:27 AM
alexicon.bsky.social
every time i text myself it’s either groceries or notes for the book
screenshot do text message exchange with myself. first text: “chili spice coconut yogurt frozen beyond beef 1-3 x frozen berries 2 beers” second text: “and yet a trace of the false self exists in the true self”
February 20, 2025 at 2:46 PM
alexicon.bsky.social
early reviews are coming in… emphasis on Early
screenshot of instagram DMs exchange between me and another person. other person says: “It's really good, Alex” i respond “40 minutes after i sent it?? speed reader over here” they reply “Lol. Just getting going. Maybe it starts to suck a third of the way in. I'll let you know.” finally i say “it would be helpful as i work on the edits :)”
February 12, 2025 at 10:05 PM
alexicon.bsky.social
*movie trailer guy voice* in a world… where being non-binary was illegal… one person… sought to write really thoughtful & poetic personal essays about it. coming september 30th from arsenal pulp press
photo of my new book’s cover, it’s turquoise and features the text: Post-Man: essays on being a neurodivergent non-binary person and my name, Alex Manley. there’s a large black bobby pin diagonally across the centre and very faint flower motif barely visible in the background. the cover is placed atop a photo of my kitchen island with some wilted oxalis flowers peeking through off to the side
February 8, 2025 at 2:53 PM
alexicon.bsky.social
it’s february ???

but honestly, fair at this point
photo of a plastic skeleton sitting on a front porch. there’s snow on the ground and no leaves on the bushes
February 7, 2025 at 9:13 PM
alexicon.bsky.social
wanted to see, if an email was short enough, whether google Wouldn’t offer to summarize it for me. guess not
screenshot of gmail email to me from myself. subject is “(no subject),” entire body of email text is “dandelions don't wear clothes — have you ever thought of that?” google gemini button offers to “summarize this email”
February 6, 2025 at 9:27 PM