Noel Cober
LightNews LightNews
banner
noelcober.bsky.social
Noel Cober
@noelcober.bsky.social
10 followers 13 following 78 posts
Researcher and academic of disability and the Bible, teacher of religious studies and English, and in my spare time I write books about weird gay people solving and/or committing crimes! They/him
Posts Replies Media Videos
noelcober.bsky.social
He wants food but he hates my nail polish.
A grey and white cat begging for food. The same cat fleeing a smell he doesn't like in a blur.
October 29, 2025 at 10:30 PM
noelcober.bsky.social
#SFFChat
There are many such scenes in my horror WIP Apocrypha, many of them involving bugs being in places they're not supposed to be. Here's one that shows what happens when you lie to (and for) a god!

TW: vomiting up bugs
I nod, surprised he can talk. I try to say something, but my throat hurts a lot and he’s already walking away. He shuts the door behind him this time. I fall to my knees, hands on my chest. The scratching my throat is a crawling now, and there’s something big and thick there, and it’s not the time for a sexual euphemism so I’ll just out and say it’s not a dick like usual. I can’t breathe, and whatever’s in my throat is crawling, crawling, up and up and I throw up, barfing it onto the floor. It’s a beetle bigger than my hand, the black kind that gets stuck upside down and then can’t do anything. It’s stuck upside down. I almost throw up again seeing it, but the nausea passes because looking at it is weirdly calming. It’s not going to hurt me, this little guy. It just wants to get home. I reach out and tip it over, helping it gets back onto its feet.
October 2, 2025 at 11:17 PM
noelcober.bsky.social
30. Every single one of my books takes place in the winter 😂But here's a peek at my favourite passion project where the summer will happen in the future (in a sequel [the sequel takes place in spring]). #SFFChat

Thanks so much @sffchat.bsky.social for hosting this all month, it was really fun. :)
Kitaya nodded. “We’re the luckiest parents. Which is hardly fair to everyone else, since I also managed to be the luckiest man and convince you to marry me.” Niana laughed. She felt the same way about Kitaya. “Well, some people just get all the blessings. We’ll just have to go on living with everyone else’s jealousy.” Kitaya smiled a moment longer, but it faded eventually into something more serious. “I’m trying to keep a bit of a closer eye on him lately. He’s…not going to be a little boy for much longer.” Niana nodded. “I know. It’ll be fine—we’ll handle it.” Kitaya’s concern wasn’t, Niana didn’t need to be told, motivated by worry about when Fyn’s voice would start to drop. Though that in itself was somewhat alarming. Niana didn’t feel old enough to have son who would be turning ten in the summer. In more ways than one, she wasn’t ready for her boy to start growing up. But there wasn’t much she could do about that, now was there?
July 1, 2025 at 2:14 AM
noelcober.bsky.social
28. Surprisingly Enzo, who despite not being that good at anything, really wants to help. #SFFChat
Enzo was shaking, tears on his face and some blood in his hair. “No,” he said. “Veronica’s right. We can help. Even I can help. Just having another person there will help, even if all I can do is help you lift something or…” he shook his head. “No. I’m going with you.”
June 29, 2025 at 12:00 AM
noelcober.bsky.social
23. For Envy, Enzo manages to make admiring how hot a woman is extremely gay. #SFFChat
Carlotte sighed, which made the artificial light shine on her hair. She turned around and looked at him, which made Enzo wish he were as well dressed as her. Maybe he should start wearing a uniform or something, to make him look more put together. But then, the scout uniform he’d briefly worn as a child had just made him look like he couldn’t dress himself, so maybe not. “No wonder Floyd likes you,” she said to him. Enzo blinked, taken off-balance by that almost literally. He spilled some of his water. “Floyd likes me?”
June 24, 2025 at 2:15 AM
noelcober.bsky.social
20. Lust! Everyone in all my (adult) books is horny all the time so I'm spoiled for choice. Here's my favourite moment of Castor being horny in Apocrypha. #SFFChat

Bonus excerpt from my gay demon BDSM erotica novella Asher's Collar, which is available on Amazon 🐈‍⬛
www.amazon.ca/Ashers-Colla...
7. GGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGg I had most of a chapter written about my supper with Athra, but fucking Diablo buzzed down and landed on the laptop and erased everything and I don’t want to re-write it, so I’m just going to skip to the part where we fuck. “We’re not permitted to use our magic without the Master’s explicit permission,” Asher told Quentin. Tremblay was one of those humans who believed that if his familiars used their magic on their own, it would drain them for in case he needed them. It had been seventeen dull years since the last time Asher had been allowed to use his powers. “Your bath is ready, sir.” “Good.” Quentin dipped a hand in the tub and let his smile come out into his face. “Perfect. I like it to turn me nice and red.” “I’m glad it’s to your liking, sir,” Asher said, eyes on the ceiling as Quentin started to undress. He dropped his sweater on the bed, exposing pale skin, though he wasn’t as skinny as he looked. Asher really was trying not to look, but he was definitely watching as Quentin sat down to take his heeled boots off, and then undid his pants. Asher half-expected him not to be wearing underwear, but he was, a bright red pair of low-cut briefs that made it impossible not to want to look. Asher managed, barely, until Quentin stood up, still in his briefs, and came over to fill his vision and peer at him up close. “Is something wrong, Asher?” “No, sir.” Aside from the fact that Asher 's stomach was close to cramping as he summoned all the control he didn’t have to avoid getting hard, of course. “It’s just that you’ve been watching me all day, and suddenly you don’t seem to want to look at me.” “I was ordered to be respectful of you, sir.”
June 21, 2025 at 2:29 AM
noelcober.bsky.social
16. Gluttony...honestly food and eating are huge weaknesses of mine because I place basically no value on food and don't understand the appeal of food culture, so, uh, here's Floyd having no taste. #SFFChat
Floyd was sweating a little with how hot the curry was and trying not to drink water like a camel, which he was pretty sure was a strange extinct fish from Earth. “You must love having to answer questions about it every time her name comes up, though,” he offered, because rescuing people was the right thing to do. “So much,” said Jolene with a nod that Floyd thought was meant to be grateful. “It’s my absolute favourite topic of conversation.” “Our apologies,” said Samuel Sunstealer, one of the only people who hadn’t actually talked about it. “This curry is delicious, Shannon. You did very well.” “I’m just glad to have some people to test things out on besides Floyd,” Shannon teased. “He doesn’t like anything.” “Hey, I like everything,” Floyd protested, wondering where this was coming from. One hour with her old friends and suddenly she was throwing Floyd under some heavy means of public transit. “You have no taste whatsoever, dear,” Shannon told him. “You eat everything, it’s not the same thing.”
June 17, 2025 at 2:13 AM
noelcober.bsky.social
13. For Friday the 13th I've gone into my adult horror novel Apocrypha, starring a scary little god who breaks into your apartment, feeds your cat, and threatens to murder your friends and family if you don't get him a long list of weird things very quickly. #SFFChat
“By whom?” asks the boy. He’s now sitting on my lumpy sofa, and he picks up my e-reader, thumbing through my library of classy world literature that I’ve never read and biker erotica that I’ve also never read. “You’re out of cat food.” “No, I’m not,” I say, going into the kitchen to look under the cupboard. I’m out of cat food. “You weren’t, but then I fed Diablo and now you are. You’ll need to buy more. While you’re at the store, can you get me a bag of chicken hearts? I’d prefer if they weren’t frozen.” I frown, go back into the living room. I sit on the couch next to the boy. “Get your own chicken hearts.” “They’re hard to come by these days,” says the boy, not looking up from Taken By the Iron Guild Gang. “You guys bioengineer all your chickens to only have the body parts that most people want to eat, and most people don’t want to eat the hearts. Here.” He hands out a slip of paper—actual paper, not the plastic stuff they started making to save trees back in the thirties. I take it. Thirty chicken hearts, it reads. One living dog (large breed), one pound of salt, a bar of gold, two human sacrifices (still living, babies acceptable but not preferred), six pints of virgin blood, ceremonial robe (blue, extra small), one empty terrarium, a jar of sunlight. “What’s this?” “The list of things I want from you.”
June 14, 2025 at 12:23 AM
noelcober.bsky.social
9. Snippet Share: Sloth

Think about how many people can feasibly turn into or be turned into cats in one book before it becomes ridiculous. Wizards in Space has more incidences of people being turned into cats than that.

The cats people turn into are my old cats Theo and Leon ❤️
Dr. Iphigenia Xerxes nodded and headed for the other bed, passing in front of Enzo. “I’m obligated by Alliance law and fleet policy to tell you that I’m no longer a veterinarian after the incident on Delta Centauri, so I can’t claim to be an expert in cats.” “Duly noted,” said Floyd, who had done her background check when she’d been hired onto the Humboldt’s medical staff last year. He was pretty sure that the thing with the inverted giraffes had not been her fault. “In your inexpert opinion, then.” “He’s sleeping.” “Just…sleeping?” Floyd looked at the two cats, who were indeed sleeping. “What about his cognitive activity? Is it the same as with the others?” “No,” said Iphigenia Xerxes. “He’s sleeping. He’s a cat. Well, two cats. They’re fucking lazy.” “But…it’s been a whole day.” “Yeah, they’re cats. I’m not worried about it. He’ll wake up eventually for food.” “You’re not…worried about it.” This didn’t seem like a situation to be not worried about. “Yes. Trust me, I’m a brain surgeon.” A photo of Leon, a white and grey cat, wrapped in a blanket. A photo of Theo, a black cat, sitting on top of the book "Thinking Kink" by Catherine Scott.
June 10, 2025 at 1:10 AM
noelcober.bsky.social
6. Looking for a Wrath snippet has told me that hardly anyone ever gets angry in my work, somehow, which seems...unlikely.

Anyway, Milo is too old for silly nightmares about his absolute 🦴 best 🦴 friend 🦴 ever being weird and scary. #SFFChat
Milo backed away, pressing against the cave wall. “You’re not real,” Milo told him, crying. “You’re just a voice.” “Are you sure about that?” the Bone Boy asked. And Milo felt the wall give out behind him. And he fell, and fell, into an unending darkness. But he could still see the face of the Bone Boy, looking down at him. “Bye-bye, Milo.” Milo hit the floor with a thud and struggled not to shout. “Are you okay?” the Bone Boy asked, sounding close to Milo. “You were moving around a lot in your sleep.” “I’m fine,” Milo said, angry. He was angry because he was still scared even though it had obviously just been a dream. “I was just…I’m fine.” “Were you having a nightmare?” Milo got back up into bed, shaking. It was still dark outside. He sat for a minute, waiting until he calmed down. “I guess.” He felt silly having nightmares at his age. He was nine years old, he should have grown out of that by now. “Do you want to talk about it?” the Bone Boy asked. He sounded exactly like he had in Milo’s dream, without the buzzing.
June 7, 2025 at 2:28 AM
noelcober.bsky.social
2. Pride snippet, from Wizards in Space, which will be coming out, uh. Soon ish! #SFFChat
“I was wondering why there were no windows onboard the ship,” Veronica Tabernacle said, smiling slightly. She seemed only to do things slightly. She had also changed clothes. “But now that you’ve said that I suppose it would be rather dangerous.” “Terrifying, too,” said Jessie Bains from their station opposite where Floyd would still be sitting if there weren’t wizards on the bridge eating into his workday. “Movies are full of shit, if you were wondering. You don’t see a glorious field of stars, pride-themed nebulae and the occasional gas giant gianting around. Space is too big for that shit—you mostly just see the endless black expanse that reminds you of both the inevitability of entropy and your own relative tininess in the face of the utterly uncaring cosmos. It’s a bit of a downer.”
June 2, 2025 at 3:55 PM