Why I Love Strands of Starlight

I picked up Strands of Starlight by Gael Baudino almost entirely because of the cover art -- the rest of the motivation I needed involved the description including the Inquisition and Elves. I've never been shy about my feelings in regard to the usual wisdom that one shouldn't "judge a book by its cover" -- that wisdom applies better to people than to books. Cover art is no less art and their visual design and appeal are important. Thomas Canty's work brought me to a lot of good fiction - particularly the Year's Best Fantasy & Horror collections put together by Ellen Datlow & Terri Windling. The more important part here was that I picked it up at all, and that I was a teenager.

It's no big secret that I was sexually abused as a child. In spite of that -- or perhaps because of it -- I found my peace in school and learning, in roleplaying games and speculative fiction of all sorts (fantasy, science fiction, horror). I had more adult friends than peers my own age. Though I was assigned a therapist by the state, I didn't find him helpful. What 16 year old would?

It's been nearly 20 years since I was an angry teenager in a therapist's office, arguing with him over what he thought he knew about me and what I knew about myself. I still think he was wrong; I didn't blame myself and didn't need to move through the step of admitting that I blamed myself so that I could realize it wasn't my fault. I already knew that, I already knew people could be "sick in the head" since my father was an alcoholic and abused my mother. I wasn't burdened with guilt from thinking I had caused my own abused and maybe that's really what saved me.

Still, as I've gotten older, as I've learned to reflect more on my experience of being human and what I've learned about the human experience through stories, I sometimes have epiphanous moments where I better understand myself and the things I've loved.

I have loved Strands of Starlight from the moment I started reading it. I have loved it for more than 20 years, though I never could quite put my finger on why, beyond the facts that:
1) the cover was beautiful
2) Baudino's storytelling voice flowed well for me
3) it mixed real world bits with high fantasy bits -- I hadn't experienced magical realism yet, though I feel a strong connection to the stories that seed our reality with magical possibility.

I heard three words today: Redemption through Transformation. And I suddenly knew what I'd been trying to figure out for so long, what I'd been so close to figuring out on more than one occasion when I found myself looking at this book -- holding a copy I'd found in a used bookstore in my hands, or dusting off my second copy (I lost the first), or preparing to send a friend a copy because it was like giving them a piece of my soul even if they didn't know it.

As part of the story, Miriam, the protagonist -- like so many protagonists -- can only achieve redemption (and revenge) through transformation, and it occurs on a very literal, physical level for her. As a teenager, I was essentially powerless. As an adult, it isn't a whole lot better. But I needed to believe in the possibility of setting things right, of gaining some modicum of control over things happening to me in my life.

As a teenager, I lost control of a lot of things, including my body. When I manifested Hashimoto's and my thyroid ceased regular function, I put on a lot of weight in a very short amount of time. This loss of bodily control was just as hurtful to me as my abuse, maybe more so since there wasn't someone doing this to me... my body was doing it to itself.

I saw this in Miriam, too. I related strongly, even if I didn't realize it, to the figure of a girl who had done nothing wrong but was treated by a dominant system as though she were guilty of some crime. For Miriam, it was her power of healing which didn't fit the church's paradigm. For me, it was being asked what I did to provoke my abuser - a man of nearly 40, when I was 6. It was being accused of lying and stealing by a foster mother who was more accustomed to younger children. It was having my escapes taken away from me by a religion-sponsored children's home. And Miriam did the thing I wanted to do -- she escaped to a world where people valued her and didn't care about her past. And she changed. She took power for herself. Without spoiling the story -- because of course I hope you'll read it -- she did the things I wanted, needed to do, even if I hadn't consciously realized it.

Maybe this is also why I like "unlikeable" characters, like Miriam or Meche. But that's a whole other can of worms...

It seems silly and oversimplified, put like this. Stark black letters on the white (digital) page.  But it's powerful and it was a story I needed as a teenager, and to an extent still need today. We all need stories like that; stories that tell us that we are not defeated, that someone like us can, has, will find a way through the pain and suffering and will find beautiful things.

Is it always happy endings and rainbows? No. I would argue it isn't even often happy endings and rainbows, but that's not what hope is for or about.

Reviewish: No Lasting Burial (The Zombie Bible)

Reviews of the arts are always going to be a very personal thing. What makes the difference (as I've mentioned many times in my real life, but maybe not here) is if a person has the self-awareness and analytical wherewithal to be able to adequately and accurately describe the WHY of their assertions. (Technical reviews of function tend to be a little less subjective - did a thing do the job it was supposed to do in the method in which it was supposed to do so?) I hope I can hold up to my own standards.

I start off with this sort-of disclaimer because I recently finished reading a book that I consider to be a great read because of its impact on me on that personal level.

No Lasting Burial, by Stant Litore (The Kindle edition is on sale for $2 - if you don't have a Kindle, you can still read it through the PC Cloud Reader or through the Kindle App on other devices - and the paperback is just under $9. I recently won a hard copy in a contest and it is really a well-printed book.)

I'm going to endeavor to avoid spoilers.

I'll try to start with the more technical aspects:

The writing is lovely. While the bulk of textual entertainment can be referred to as "prose", I tend to save this word for particularly well-wrought and beautiful language. This is not experimental or high-brow stunting; Litore's prose is direct and 'simple' (but not simplistic) while also being complex and, at times, layering in more meaning.

The story is engaging and moves along at a very steady clip. I was surprised at the size of the print-copy of the text. (I read the Kindle version.) It is a hefty book! Originally released in episodes on Amazon, it does have pacing that allows you to step away at the end of each episode, but I found that I didn't really want to. Still, it was convenient when I needed to. In total, I finished reading the book in less than 6 hours total. (Despite its 360+ page length - in electronic and in print format.)

Good word use, great story crafting - there's not much more I can ask for in a text.

Here's where things get tricky, though - at least, as I've encountered in talking to people who've never heard of this book. This is part of a series called "The Zombie Bible". I know that for most people, this immediately summons up ideas of zombie-insertion fiction and a certain level of cheese, camp, and/or gore. While there is some gore (none I found gratuitous - and I have used that word to apply to blood/violence in a Tarantino film, for some context of my use of the word), this book was not cheesy or campy. The zombies, though, are not just zombies. These are The Dead; they are/were people and they have something to say to the reader, just as much as any of the other characters.

Then there's the matter of this being a story about Christ and his invitation to Shimon (Peter) (and others) to follow him. My relationship with religion and faith have always been fairly distant, if not strained or estranged. I came up through churches with a lot of conflicting views, a tendency to take all the wrong things literally, and a drive to snuff out questions. These experiences did not cultivate a lot of faith or trust in me. However, this portrayal of a figure I've known since childhood was (to continue to overuse a word) beautiful.

If you are of a particular mindset, this book will probably challenge you in some ways. I hope, if you choose to read this, you'll be open to that challenge to think and examine what you think and why. I did not, however, find anything about the rendering of this story to conflict with the broader message I've since extracted about Christianity (love one another, be excellent to each other, God will take care of the sorting - not my job).

I tried, just now, while talking to a friend and trying to figure out how to "sell" someone on the idea of a text that is called "The Zombie Bible", to read a passage to him and explain just why and how it moved me. I couldn't read it out loud. As soon as I tried, I started to sob.

 "My mother ... she told me once that our father did not promise a life without pain. ... Not without pain. Only that he would weep with us. Only that his heart would break. Only that he would take each moment of suffering, each death, each, and hold it in his hands, and ... and bring from it something, something even more beautiful than what was lost."

This book was a really personal experience for me and that's all manner of odd to admit "out loud" when you're talking about a book that includes zombies. But they aren't just zombies, and no other threat (packs of wild dogs, Romans, or tribbles) could replace them. The Dead are so much more than that. They are a symbol and a metaphor. They are a binding and a sundering. And Litore's treatment of Christ did not threaten or scare or offend me. (I'm not very easy to offend.) If anything, it brought a little spark of faith and hope back to my life. It brought some humanity to a figure that so much of my experience has painted as pretty flat. If THIS were the Jesus I experienced in my youth, if THESE were the words given to me from that pulpit-of-authority when I needed them? I think things would've been different. Maybe I'd be different. Those words, that quote, are something that could've soothed some hurts when I was younger. Far better than any attempts at therapy or self-medication to sort through hurt and anger.

I cannot and will not apologize for works that touch me.

I am not, however, trying to convince anyone else to read this book for that experience. What books touch us is a unique experience for every individual. We all have our own special texts that impact, brand, mark us for life.

What I am saying, though, is that this is an honestly good read if one can set aside assumptions and take it in on its own terms; a 'second world' retelling of a familiar tale, with some hungry Dead.

If you're even a little curious, I encourage you to give it a read. And, at $2 (at the time of this posting), what can it hurt?

Reviewish: The Hobbit: Desolation of Smaug

If you're worried about spoilers, just leave now.

I want to talk about The Hobbit: Desolation of Smaug, but at the same time, I don't know how to talk about it. Perhaps the easiest way is to talk about the characters a little, as groups or individuals, and their interwoven stories. This is not about comparing the book to the movie (though there are times that is unavoidable), it is about weighing a film on its own merits.

Would I recommend seeing it? Yes, absolutely yes. But don't expect the text verbatim. Book:Film doesn't work that way.

It was a beautifully rendered movie. It was a beautifully acted movie. The writing, in places, was brilliant and not so much in others.

Gandalf, as far as I am concerned, is the face-to-watch for the bits of the movie in which he appears. Sir Ian McKellen tells a lot of Gandalf's backstory with his eyes. Pay attention. If you think you see a soul burdened with thousands of years of stuff, you're right. He's seen things, man.

The dwarves were dwarfy. (I would like a Barrel Bombur action-figure please.) And since this is THEIR story (Bilbo's too), it could always use more dwarf.

Bilbo. He could've gotten a little more development time. I'm a little annoyed that there was no conversation about the Ring with Gandalf. It would've tied in so nicely to the stuff going down in Dol Guldur (which Jackson did NOT make up, by the way - that stuff is stuff Tolkien wrote).

Mirkwood:  Spiders - ew! Yay! but ew!  Elves. Yay! Elves. Sigh.

I accepted the changes that went down in regards to Azog & Bolg. I accepted that there would be an invented elf added to the story. I accepted that Legolas would be more than a cameo. I accepted a lot of things would be different from the texts; it is simply the way film works.

What I have difficulty accepting is poorly executed changes, whatever their intent. What I speak out against is poor storytelling.

Tauriel. Nevermind the lore-issues that could be discussed (red-headed elf).

What I won't excuse is the shoe-horning in of a female character who is used entirely as a plot device and an object (moreover, for a romantic subplot that was entirely unnecessary and in many places ruined the pacing of the story). Thanks for the gesture, but ultimately I found it to be a condescending and/or patronizing one.

You can tell me all day what a badass she is, you can tell me "But she's Captain of the Guard!"  So what? What elf with a name isn't a badass? And why does it matter if she's Captain of the Guard? It is pitched to me like that is some kind of achievement for a girl. And that is what makes it worse. "You should be happy there's an empowered female in the movie!" No, not really. Not when she's a walking cliche machine.

She comes off as a token female, and for me, that's worse than no female at all. (I'd actually have been fine with no female 'main character' because this is the story of the dwarves & their hobbit bro. Their story. There were plenty of opportunities to people the land with individuals - the whole "strong woman" issue is a whole other can o' worms not for this post...)


Ultimately I have two gripes and they don't take away from the movie overall, for me.

1 - The romantic subplot was:
unnecessary
poorly written
poorly developed
poorly executed


2 - This is really a result of the poor writing/execution of the unnecessary and poorly developed romantic subplot; the misuse/abuse of Morgul Blades. This is probably the closest I get to having an issue about divergence from the texts. Morgul Blades were Very Important in the Fellowship. In Desolation, they are this footnote, throwaway plot device to put Kili in danger and motivate the Love Interest to come save him.

If you know what a Morgul Blade is, then you know a random orc is NOT running around with arrows tipped with the stuff. It's just not happening. So, bad storytelling begets sloppy storytelling.

The End Again: National Novel Writing Month

Last year I participated in NaNoWriMo (National Novel Writing Month) and I was a bit cynical. As I struggled through the process, I learned a lot about MY process and a lot about the gaps in my writing toolbox. I only achieved half the goal for the month, but I like to think that what I learned (and the sheer amount of outlining and brainstorming that happened) made up a little bit for the lack of words on the page.

The truth is, nothing can make up for words that don't make it onto the page. Every word written is better than a word unwritten, and last year, I barely cleared 25,000 words. (And of those words, most of them were backstory for the world in which I thought I was writing. They weren't even ABOUT my main character, though they had some historical significance.)

This year, I decided to try a different approach and it seems to have worked out for me, though it didn't work as planned. (It never goes as-planned.)

I decided I wanted to write some specific types of short stories and based on average length estimates, I projected I could churn out 5-7 stories during the month of November.

I just can't seem to follow the rules though. (Incidentally, I have similar trouble when game-mastering and trying to use a module. I just can't do it.)

I started out working on a story about half of a set of twins and a graduation party. I finished that piece on the fourth day. At that juncture, I wasn't sure where to go, so I fell back on a character that'd been wandering around in my brain for a while. I started writing about her encounters. I thought it might be good for a couple of the projected stories. Then it got away from me and I just kept writing. So, the first 8956 words were on one project, but the rest were on this one character and her world of experience.

There are still a LOT of things unwritten and the majority of them are purely the happenings in her personal life. While that may be compelling (or not), I feel like I need to observe her character arc and give her a story arc with which to interact. Or maybe not. I know for now I will keep writing. My "master document" tells me I have over 83k words, which includes a lot of notes and some outlining, while my solid word count - which does not include those outlines/notes - comes in at 55,372 words as of today. (Today was a small day, 522 words on an incomplete scene.)

Did you participate? Did you "win" (I still hate the win/lose dichotomy - if you learned something, if you produced something, you are winning at writing)?

Feel free to share your thoughts, your victories, your defeats. Or ask me questions about mine. I'm not a professional writer (using the definition of 'being published, making money at it'), but if I've learned anything from my time talking to writers, observing writers, and writing... it's that we are all on a journey together. It's not a destination, it is ALWAYS a journey... and everyone has something they can teach and learn.

Wells of Words: The Books We Come Back To

Recently, Stant Litore (The Zombie Bible) conceived of the notion to collect a library of sorts for his daughters River & Inara. I won't try to over-explain it, he does a fine job of saying just what it is over on his blog. (I encourage everyone to read through the contributions; it is beautiful.)

As I considered what quotes and what books I'd share in this particular light, I started to notice a trend in the sorts of books I quote.

First and foremost, whenever I am asked to offer a quote from a beloved book (we might take a moment to remember that I love books of all sorts) I come back to two particular texts without fail:

The Velveteen Rabbit, by Margery Williams

and

The Last Unicorn, by Peter S. Beagle

With The Velveteen Rabbit, it is always the same excerpt:

“What is REAL?” asked the Rabbit one day, when they were lying side by side near the nursery fender, before Nana came to tidy the room. “Does it mean having things that buzz inside you and a stick-out handle?”

“Real isn’t how you are made,” said the Skin Horse. “It’s a thing that happens to you. When a child loves you for a long, long time, not just to play with, but REALLY loves you, then you become Real.”

“Does it hurt?” asked the Rabbit.

“Sometimes,” said the Skin Horse, for he was always truthful. “When you are Real you don’t mind being hurt.”

“Does it happen all at once, like being wound up,” he asked, “or bit by bit?”

“It doesn’t happen all at once,” said the Skin Horse. “You become. It takes a long time. That’s why it doesn’t happen often to people who break easily, or have sharp edges, or who have to be carefully kept. Generally, by the time you are Real, most of your hair has been loved off, and your eyes drop out and you get loose in the joints and very shabby. But these things don’t matter at all, because once you are Real you can’t be ugly, except to people who don’t understand.”

...once you are Real you can't be ugly, except to people who don't understand. This sentiment is the reason songs like Iris (by the Goo Goo Dolls) speak so strongly to people. We are so afraid of being flawed, ugly, broken in the sight of the people around us that we forget we are always beautiful in the sight of those who love us - and that those who love us are the ones who matter most in this life.

On the other hand, with The Last Unicorn, I tend to pick and choose (there are SO MANY quotable bits in that book (many are maintained in the film)) to suit the audience doing the asking. In the case of Stant's Library, I offered the excerpt about heroes knowing the order of things - it is a testament to the Hero's Journey and the cyclic nature of our personal narratives, not just those of fictional personae. But in truth, it is Molly Grue when she meets the Unicorn... this is the true quote that lives carved into the inner walls of my heart:

“Where have you been?" she cried. "Damn you, where have you been?" She took a few steps toward Schmendrick, but she was looking beyond him, at the unicorn.

When she tried to get by, the magician stood in her way. "You don't talk like that," he told her, still uncertain that Molly had recognized the unicorn. "Don't you know how to behave, woman? You don't curtsy, either."

But Molly pushed him aside and went up to the unicorn, scolding her as though she were a strayed milk cow. "Where have you been?" Before the whiteness and the shining horn, Molly shrank to a shrilling beetle, but this time it was the unicorn's old dark eyes that looked down.

"I am here now," she said at last.

Molly laughed with her lips flat. "And what good is it to me that you're here now? Where where you twenty years ago, ten years ago? How dare you, how dare you come to me now, when I am this?" With a flap of her hand she summed herself up: barren face, desert eyes, and yellowing heart. "I wish you had never come. Why did you come now?" The tears began to slide down the sides of her nose.

The unicorn made no reply, and Schmendrick said, "She is the last. She is the last unicorn in the world."

"She would be." Molly sniffed. "It would be the last unicorn in the world to come to Molly Grue." She reached up then to lay her hand on the unicorn's cheek; but both of them flinched a little, and the touch came to rest on on the swift, shivering place under the jaw. Molly said, "It's all right. I forgive you.”

And really, of all of that, the only parts I needed to know were Molly's words, "Where have you been? ... How dare you, how dare you come to me now, when I am this?" All the weight of her life is in that simple four-letter word - this. I didn't need Mr. Beagle to explain what she meant (though he helpfully does for those who may not know/understand); at sixteen years old, wrung out from a childhood of particular abuses, strained family relationships, few friends, several upheavals, foster care, an orphanage, a new home or two every year, I already knew what Molly meant - and this is why her words are the true quote for me from all of that wonderful tome.

All of this really brings me around to this question: What words, what books have etched their words into your heart and/or mind? When you're asked to offer up a favorite quote, from what well do you draw your bucket?

Narrative Responsibility: Women in Fiction (A Link)

I can't begin to tackle the (very) large idea of narrative responsibility, but today I read a post that resonated and managed to lay out one aspect of the narrative responsibility of storytellers that I feel compelled to share.

More and more we see writers or memes about writers telling us that the way they write strong female characters is by simply writing strong people, by viewing women as people, gender not impacting the equation of creating them as whole beings. 

Neil Gaiman says, "remember that the most important thing to do is to write people who feel like people and that women are people."

Joss Whedon had a lot of things to say at his 2006 Equality Now speech regarding the fact that he's constantly asked about his strong women characters, and he raises a good question. "Why aren't you asking a hundred other guys why they don’t write strong women characters?"

Even George R. R. Martin has been turned into an image that seems to have started on reddit from an interview with George Stroumboulopoulos when he answers the question of how he writes women so well:  "I've always considered women to be people."  (The question comes around 18:37 in the interview link.)

All of that leads up to me wanting to share THIS post with everyone. I encourage you to follow the link and read the whole thing. There is nothing I found there with which I disagree. We all know about subtext and how our stories say more than what they say just in words, and we should be aware of those things. 


"'We Have Always Fought': Challenging the 'Women, Cattle and Slaves' Narrative" by Kameron Hurley.

Stories tell us who we are. What we’re capable of. When we go out looking for stories we are, I think, in many ways going in search of ourselves, trying to find understanding of our lives, and the people around us.  Stories, and language tell us what’s important.

If women are “bitches” and “cunts” and “whores” and the people we’re killing are “gooks” and “japs” and “rag heads” then they aren’t really people, are they?  It makes them easier to erase. Easier to kill. To disregard. To un-see.

But the moment we re-imagine the world as a buzzing hive of individuals with a variety of genders and complicated sexes and unique, passionate narratives that have yet to be told – it makes them harder to ignore. They are no longer, “women and cattle and slaves” but active players in their own stories.

And ours.

Valentine's Day

Credit: TARDIS Coloring Page by VioletSuccubus on DeviantArt - For time travel use only.

I have nothing insightful or particularly profound to offer up on this Saint Valentine's Day, but I thought I'd try to bring together all my passing knowledge of the holiday. I have decided to work backward, as I could not quite come up with a way to work from a point of origin to the present day... so, let's take a ride backward through time, linearly.

There was more than one Saint Valentine. I think there were seven, or eleven (open 24 hours a day?). Of course, this holiday is said to be named for a particular Saint, martyred for performing forbidden marriages. Notably, marriages for Roman Soldiers who were not allowed to wed while engaged with their soldiering duty. I don't recollect that I ever knew a time frame for this story.

What I do know is that it became associated with Courtly Love. This is no ordinary love, but a distant and chivalrous courting affair. ...Courtly love is a little weird and, I think, largely misunderstood by people who romanticize the notion.

To take us further back in time; the Valentine for whom the holiday appears to be named lived during the rule of the Roman Emperor Claudius. The Christian church was fledgling, and Claudius was not a Christian. (I've never been happier to be a humanities student who studied 3 years of Latin. I can finally tie all this together. Of course, I have a lot more information to which all this is tied that I couldn't hope to dump into a post - nor would I torture you in that fashion, my gentle reader.)

Overall, most people are at least passingly aware that many of our modern holidays, particularly tied to the Christian faith (or inspired by its influence), were created and placed in such a way as to overwrite older, pagan celebrations. Valentine's Day seems to be no exception. Mind you, this was not a uniquely Christian practice. Within pantheons, one deity's festivals could be subsumed by the rise of another, similar deity's worship...

Lupercalia was a festival held from February 13th-15th and while it probably had a lot of nuances I am forgetting, it was a kind of 'rebirth' festival. It's difficult to think of expecting spring while it's snowing outside where I am... and I'm pretty sure even Rome is at the same or a very similar latitude... but, it is what it is. Daffodils and some other plants bloom this early, despite the cold... so who am I to say nay to the ancients that wanted to party in the name of Spring as soon as possible?

At the same time, but temporally earlier in history than Lupercalia, was the "Februa" festival. This was a festival of cleansing and/or purification. "Spring Cleaning," if you will. (Februa. Roman month Februarius... February. (That word gets weirder the more you type it.).) It was celebrated on the same days during which Lupercalia was celebrated.

These sorts of events have always interested me. Somewhere in there came the chocolates and the love letters and then the candy hearts and witty cards. Somewhere in there, it became highly commercialized, to the point that flower commercials sound more like invitations for men to compete with one another through showings of status and public gift-giving (there's been a commercial locally for a flower delivery company that shows snippets of interviews with women talking about how their husbands/boyfriends made all the other women jealous and put all the other men to shame by purchasing superior arrangements). Then came the bitterness and a little spite. And somewhere in that, we've lost the cleansing festivals, the celebrations of spring-to-come, and even the notions of distant, courtly, transcendent love. I want to take it a touch further than that.

As frustrated as I may be with humanity, as curmudgeonly as I tend to feel toward my fellow people...

I love you all. I can't (and won't) give you flowers or chocolates or jewelry, but I can give you my respect and consideration and courtesy. Sometimes, I can give you the fruits of my brain. This is low-hanging fruit, and for that, I apologize. (I keep trying to give you British s's ("apologise") but spell-check doesn't like them.) Those are things you have until you lose them, and sometimes you can gain them back. It may not seem as nice as flowers, but I hope it is all esteemed a little higher. Just a little?

Plus, I give you random information that you can probably fact-check against Wikipedia and tell me
where I screwed up if you need to feel better today.


Happy Love Day.

The End: National Novel Writing Month

National Novel Writing Month. This year, I finally decided I would participate. I signed up on the website, I outlined a little bit, I pondered it over in the week leading up to it... then I started two days late because I found myself with an outline but no real direction.

At the end of the month, I have accumulated just over 25,000 words on a single project. Sort of. Some of the pieces feel like they belong to distinctly different stories though in my mind they are all part of the same world. Some of it was world-building, as opposed to the story arc of my main protagonist(s) (never even met the secondary protagonist).

My NaNoWriMo Graph

Do I think I "failed"? Absolutely not. I may not have churned out the 50,000+ words of other writers, I may not have "WON" the event that NaNoWriMo is celebrated to be... but I wrote 25,000 words related to ONE project. That's a lot, given that I'm much more comfortable in shorter, smaller territories. I did fail though, in one important regard - and it's the one thing I believe kept me from generating the 1,667 words per day.

I failed to KNOW my characters very well. I didn't know my characters, so it was very difficult to invest in their story. Certainly, I find their story interesting, or I'd have thrown it to the wayside immediately.

The pieces that got me to and beyond my daily word goal? Those were about characters I adapted from other half-formed stories in my mind, characters that I've played with and known in some regard or another (some of them for several years). These were easy. I knew their internal landscape. I could put them in situations of varying types and I'd know how they'd react, respond, what they'd get out of those situations, how they might change and develop... I knew them.

Kyern, though? The first of my two main protagonists? I don't know him. What I do know of him, he doesn't know yet. I know he's young, a little confused, and pretty much 'lost' in the world. He lives his day to day life and that's all there is. At the beginning of this story, he doesn't yet know ANY of the things that might make him more interesting. He's pretty much just a regular kid (young adult, but... kid) who has a very irregular destiny ahead of him. I found exploring his life, his daily routine, to be rather boring - but I needed to explore it to get to know THIS much about him. (I did discover an old man who is pretty interesting though). Novel-story progression is slower... maybe not as slow as my mind has painted it, but slower than a short story's nonetheless. I learned a lot from it and about it.

I have to say that I did not get very much use out of the NNWM community. I don't need the pep talks, and I don't like the socialization aspects of it. I also don't like the competitive nature it evokes when it declares those who reached the 50,000 words "winners" - that means that everyone who didn't (even if they didn't give up) are losers... and that's incorrect. (If there are "winners", there are "losers" - that's how the dichotomy works.) Maybe I'm being overly semantic. Maybe I think that the people who really won are the people who will keep writing, who didn't stop writing even when they knew they weren't going to reach 50,000 words...

In any case! I participated, I did not reach 50,000 words in 30 days, and in the future I will not be participating within the "official" capacity again.

I wrote.
I outlined a novel (or series!) length story, which is something I've never done before.
This story is interesting.
I don't need a 30 day "writing competition" to tell me that I'm worthy, that I am a writer.

Maybe what really bugs me is that I don't think the word "won" even has a place in this process. I think there's did and did not.

I did:
A lot of things I'd never done before, including writing (almost) every day on a singular project.

I did not:
Reach the 50,000 word goal within one month.

When compared to one another? One of those things has significantly more weight than the other.

The end result is that NaNoWriMo isn't a fit for me. I'm very, extremely happy for those people who find it to be a useful motivator and tool, but now I know it doesn't serve the same purpose in my personal space.

My Books Multiply Like Rabbits

Last weekend (10/19 - 10/21), I attended MileHiCon, in Denver, Colorado. I'd love to sum it up in a single word, but that would require me being some kind of word magician like Lewis Carroll and creating a nonsense word that meant what I wanted it to mean due to other words not quite cutting the mustard. (That's a long sentence!)

There's a lot to tell! I cannot communicate to you how excited I am, or how - a whole week - I am still riding the high of being surrounded by authors of all gradients and immense talent. They are also full of splendiferous ideas and gracious hearts and humility and wonderful things of every sort. I've no doubt they are "just human" as well, which makes all the rest that much more sparkling.

I'm going to take a risk here. Let me explain:

Typically, I like the approach of "if I'm going to list/link some, I should do my best to list/link all" - but let's be honest here. That would be a MAMMOTH undertaking. What I will do, instead, is try to mention all of the authors to whom I listened on panels when I talk about their specific panels. For today, I wanted to talk about the big pile of books I bought.

I had the opportunity to meet and talk with each of the Guests of Honor (I even got to hang out with a couple of them, and engage a couple in earnest, if brief discussions). I'll admit it, even talking about it here, I am squee'ing inside. It's difficult to pick a place to start, so I'll go with... books!

I bought MANY books this weekend. And some of them have stories behind them.

Cherie Priest

I finally got to meet Cherie! A long time ago (about 12 years now), I had a LiveJournal (I still have it, I just don't use it so much), and through that LJ I met many wonderful people. Among them are more than a couple of ladies who have since become published and successful authors. (I feel there IS a difference between published and successful, I can talk more about that later if someone is curious.) Cherie is one of those ladies, and I've been so happy seeing her get her due from the publishing and reading world. As a result of meeting her, of being so excited to realize that she is as much of a genuine person in "real life" as she seems through her site & blogging, I purchased almost all of her books that I could find in print. Yeah. Major hetero-girl-crushing.

Books I bought and why:

Boneshaker
Ganymede
Dreadnought

These are the books that broke Cherie into the limelight. I'm pretty sure it's about time that I gave them a read.

Fathom

Cherie's first Publisher's Weekly starred reviewed book. Seems like it didn't get its due, and I've been excited to read it for many years now.

Bloodshot
Hellbent

Well, what can I say. She calls them her "Trashy Vampire Novels" but that's not what drew my attention. During a panel, she talked about the old vampire folklore that discussed one of the ways to escape the undead abomination was to throw grain or rice or sand or pebbles on the ground in front of the monster. It would then be forced to stop and count the discarded objects. All of this links to the notion of OCD, and Cherie said that her protagonist was "a vampire with OCD" - I was hooked. I've read the first chapter of the first book and am enjoying it.

CJ Henderson

What can I say? I've never been happier to be surprised. I went to the convention MAINLY to get a chance to meet Cherie and to HOPEFULLY sit in on some great panels. I didn't intend to have as great of a time as I did. In the course of things, I went to a panel that consisted of all of the Guests of Honor. At that panel, I had the opportunity to 'meet' CJ Henderson for the first time. His charisma and his no-bullshit attitude won me over in a heartbeat.

I am a living example of his belief that an author earns their fans one at a time. I didn't even really know who he was (I figured out later that I had done a lot of reading about his character Lai Wan), but after that... I had to read something of his. I browsed a local bookstore in the dealer room and found:

What You Pay For

Now, here's where things get even more amazing. Daring to dare, I went to the Autograph Alley and approached Mr. Henderson to get him to sign the book. Meek creature that I can be, I explained (apologetically) that I had not really known who he was, but he made such an impression, I had to pick up something of his from the store. I pulled "What You Pay For" out of my bag. He laughed - a short and surprised and utterly delighted sound. Turns out, the main character in this collection of stories... one of his first, and one of his favorites. Immediately, he flipped into the book and started reading to me, in Jack Hagee's voice. It was amazing; a lil mini reading just for me.

I've read a few pages (this seems to be a trend), and love it. I've always liked detective fiction (not mystery/crime, which I feel are SLIGHTLY different), and I think Jack Hagee and I are going to get along quite well.

Molly Tanzer

A Pretty Mouth

I saw Molly on a panel back at Denver Comic Con and immediately loved her hair. At MileHiCon, I got to meet her and even hang out a little bit (under the influences of some alcoholic beverage(s)). So very glad I did! As a result, I picked up her newly released book as well. I even got her to sign it! ...because why not? I've read a couple pages and am looking forward devouring the rest.

Eventually, my hope is to read and write at least a little review on all of this - as well as delve more into each of these authors' bodies of work. You know, and perhaps one day sit on a panel with them.

Memory Eternal: Harry Harrison

It's been a week now, since Harry Harrison's passing and I feel like I've been remiss in not talking about it. While I've never written any real Science Fiction (my Flash-Challenge piece about Icarus is the closest I've gotten and has me learning a lot about Quantum stuff), it's always held a special place in my heart as a reader. I'm afraid I don't have any heavy insights to add to the masses offered all over the internet in the wake of his passing, but...

While catching up on some blog reading, I came across this post by Neil Gaiman where he shared scans of an article he wrote for Knave in 1984 (if you don't know, Knave appears to be the British cousin of Penthouse), where he interviewed Mr. Harrison. The scans are hell on the eyes to read, so I took the time to transcribe the article as I absorbed it. It is certainly worth sharing.

Reviewish: The Amazing Spider-Man

This isn't where I was thinking I would start my blog, but it seems as good of a place as any.

I realize that I may be a terrible "film critic" - a title I've never claimed for myself. Although Roger Ebert's review reflects my feelings about the new Spider-Man reboot, I keep seeing largely negative reviews from people who have issues with the soundtrack, or the deviations from the comic books, or just because "didn't they do this 10 years ago?"

I went into The Amazing Spider-Man with no expectations, except that it should be somehow "better" than the first. Let me rephrase that; I did not have an expectation that the movie should repeat, re-represent, or retell any particular aspects of the comics (keeping in mind that Marvel has had several different iterations of reality/multiverses and multiple retellings of Spider-Man's origin story) or the Raimi films.

What did I expect?

I expected a good Story; a story that showed me the development of a teenage boy who gains superpowers from a spider bite, on top of dealing with all the regular problems that come with being a teenager. Not only a teenager, Peter Parker is also a kid whose parents have left him (abandoned, even) with relatives, is a bit nerdy and awkward, and has to process very important ethical and moral questions above and beyond what at typical person must face. I expected the story to progress logically, to keep me engaged, and to resolve in a way that made sense without a feeling of deus ex machina (in a world with superheroes & supervillains, there's a lot more leeway on what acts as deus ex machina, but you can still sense a cheapness when it happens, and it usually requires an even BIGGER power to pull supers out of the fire).

The Amazing Spider-Man met and exceeded all of these expectations. Andrew Garfield was extremely comfortable in the skin of Peter Parker; his love of the character showed in his excellent portrayl of it. Peter's reactions to events in his life were believable and realistic. There were no forced-angsty moments, and when the right amount of teenage emotional conflict reared its head, the character was not forced to stay in a scene or on camera for longer than any teenager would remain in that particular situation. The movie, overall, was extremely satisfying for me, given my expectations.

Some of the nitpicks I've encountered:

Soundtrack - from my single viewing, I remember seeing 3 or 4 songs listed in the credits. Songs, not score. Of these songs, I remember ONE during the course of the movie, after an adorable but awkward encounter between Peter and Gwen. The score, however, was wonderful in the theater. It wasn't distracting, and in the quiet scenes where it became noticable, it was as fitting as the scenery.

The Suit - The suit doesn't get a lot of time in the story. There is the way in which Peter learns he should probably cover up his face if he's going to go around looking for the guy that killed Uncle Ben (spoiler alert?), there is a little research, and a very short construction scene. Some people pick at how suddenly Peter becomes an excellent sewer due to his powers. Sewing, by hand, is NOT a difficult skill to pick up.  In any case, the suit is not a focal point of the story and I had no problem with it being glossed over. It didn't NEED super detail. There was no time for it.

Gwen Didn't Know - For those unfamiliar with the comics, the general canon for Gwen is that she had no idea that Peter was Spider-Man. This has been altered in the film, as have some of the events that happened in relation to Gwen, her father, and Spider-Man - and their interesting interpersonal relationships. These changes did not bother me because they made sense in the context of the film. Given the number of reboots/retellings/alternate universes that have happened in the Marvel universe, I'm surprised at how much criticism this gets. In at least one iteration, I felt the comic dragged the reveal out too long - but that is also the nature of the medium, which brings me to my next point of minor contention.

Film is a completely different medium through which to tell a story. A comic, done weekly or monthly, is set up to build up tension that will carry over to the next week, the next installment. You receive a rather small snippet of story with a lot of repetition or filler, with a major arc lasting months or even years. A movie has roughly 2 hours to give you a complete and satisfying arc. While this film could've given more time to a few moments (I personally would have liked to see more development between Peter & Dr. Connors, as well as a little more between Peter & Gwen after the climax), I didn't feel cheated.

All in all, everyone MUST make their own decision as to what they like and what they don't; my criteria makes it a lot easier for me to enjoy a good story, regardless of any source material.