<![CDATA[Stray Lungs' Latest]]>https://blog.straylungs.comhttps://substackcdn.com/image/fetch/$s_!_5HJ!,w_256,c_limit,f_auto,q_auto:good,fl_progressive:steep/https%3A%2F%2Fsubstack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com%2Fpublic%2Fimages%2F601cf5e7-07ab-4732-9a4a-07057e90f80f_261x261.pngStray Lungs' Latesthttps://blog.straylungs.comSubstackFri, 01 May 2026 20:28:53 GMT<![CDATA[Springing into Bandcamp Friday!]]>https://blog.straylungs.com/p/springing-into-bandcamp-fridayhttps://blog.straylungs.com/p/springing-into-bandcamp-fridayFri, 01 May 2026 04:01:01 GMTHappy May Day! What a good day to celebrate the workers who make our world go round and to remember the labor movements stilling fighting for justice and dignity for us all.

Which is to also say, it’s Bandcamp Friday! Bandcamp is still one of the best platforms for working artists to be fairly compensated for their labor, and today, Bandcamp waives their cut of revenue so that all proceeds go directly to us, the artists.

To celebrate, I’ve dropped a brand new bonus track in the Hearthbound Original Soundtrack! You see, earlier this year, Amber Devereux remixed “Friend of Mind,” featured on Episode 1: Telemachus, live on Twitch. The result is a dreamy, luminescent spark of a track, “Everything’s Gonna Be Alright (Tin Can Audio Remix),” now available along with all the songs and instrumentals from the show.

Buy the Album Now

Or, scroll back up to watch the official animatic, masterfully drawn by Anatola Howard.

Want to support more artists? Here are some friends of Stray Lungs you can check out on Bandcamp as well:

In other news…

The branching script for My Darling Monk is coming along! I’ve hit 25,000 words, including 8 premature endings (yes you can get eaten a LOT). Have a peek at what the script looks like in Twine:

so many branches you can call me General Sherman

This story has been a blast to write, not the least because I get to watch the 1986 Journey to the West series for research.

https://64.media.tumblr.com/07cf2e70c01bf44b0939883be660c76a/16df8c1199e54810-63/s400x600/fbf760bf2aed85186ffa54894971cbaa3f457896.pnj
our darling monk, kidnapped, again

It will be a minute before I have shinier than my virtual ink-stained fingers to show you. When I finish the script, I’ll be accounting for all the art assets the game will need, and our illustrators will begin their work. Hopefully, we can do a little show and tell by the end of the year, starting with character designs for our core five (that accounts for the horse)!

In case you missed it…

  • Hearthbound won Best LGBTQ Audio Fiction and Best Score in a Podcast at the Baltimore Next Media Web Festival.

  • We were also nominated for Best Fiction Podcast at the NYC Podcast Awards, as well as Best Script, Best Sound Design, and Best Ensemble Cast at the LA Webfest Awards.

  • If you’re local to NYC, catch Spreading the Gay Agenda, written by Joey Odom (Antony), as part of SoHo Playhouse’s Lighthouse Series this weekend.

  • Otherwise, Liba Vaynberg (Medea) joins the writer’s room for the first season of Star City, which you can watch when it premieres May 29 on Apple TV.

Anyway, that’s all for now, and more to come! Onwards!

-Jo

]]><![CDATA[Introducing Stray Lungs]]>https://blog.straylungs.com/p/introducing-stray-lungshttps://blog.straylungs.com/p/introducing-stray-lungsWed, 31 Dec 2025 21:41:51 GMTHi! Jo here.

Another revolution around the sun, another revolution (slow but certain) in service of what José Esteban Muñoz calls “other ways of being in the world, and ultimately new worlds” (that’s from Cruising Utopia, 2009). This year, we created a new world in Hearthbound. A world of other ways of being in the aftertimes. Of song and soil.

And today, I’d like to bring the work we’ve done and the work we are about to do under one roof. It’s a bit rough-shod, leaking probably, and marked by giant, wobbly, alien-hailing letters.

WELCOME TO STRAY LUNGS.

Here be a touch of the speculative, a solemn vow to continue bastardizing the canon, and a curiosity for how contrary forces collide to create something new in the expanses beyond them.

And for our next trick… indie game development.

Exhibit A:

Caption: I think they call this “expectation setting”.

Sorry, I mean, EXHIBIT A:

My Darling Monk: A Journey to the West Visual Novel

Caption: My Darling Monk, a Journey to the West Visual Novel

Here’s what to expect:

  • Art direction from the crackerjack illustrator and grandmaster of Creatures With Weird Little Hands, Anya Boz.

  • A loving and light-hearted approach to the irreverent Ming Dynasty classic.

  • And a treat for all the monsterf***ers out there (and the true “hear me out” girlies).

You can watch this space for occasional updates on the writing process, mechanics design, and character work for My Darling Monk. That is, if I can stop replaying Slay the Princess (for research).

So now that expectations are set, I want to leave you with some words I’ve all but carved and calcified upon my own vagrant, breathing organ—words from the great prophet of Muñoz’s ultimate worlds, Ursula K. Le Guin:

“Lest there be no more telling of stories at all, some of us out here in the wild oats, amid the alien corn, think we'd better start telling another one, which maybe people can go on with when the old one's finished. [...] Hence it is with a certain feeling of urgency that I seek the nature, subject, words of the other story, the untold one, the life story.”
- The Carrier Bag Theory of Fiction, 1986

Happy New Year, and here’s to telling the life story.

-Jo

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