Marie Brennan's Blog, page 218
November 19, 2011
Thanksgiving Advent, Day Eighteen: Central Heating
I grew up in Dallas, lived there for eighteen years. I don't care that my ancestry is largely Scandinavian and Swiss German; I don't like the cold. I am a creature of sunlight and warmth.
At this time of year, and for the next five months or so, you can be damn certain I am thankful for central heating, which for is the difference between living, and living in hell.
. . . now if you'll excuse me, I have to go create a conflict between a previous object of gratitude and this one, by standing in the cold for three hours or so.
At this time of year, and for the next five months or so, you can be damn certain I am thankful for central heating, which for is the difference between living, and living in hell.
. . . now if you'll excuse me, I have to go create a conflict between a previous object of gratitude and this one, by standing in the cold for three hours or so.
November 18, 2011
Signal Boost: Trust and Treachery
You know how we keep having these discussions about anthologies that take the best stories, regardless of who writes them . . . and somehow those stories end up all being by white men? (Totally by chance, you understand, and the editors can't be blamed if that's what was sent to them.)
It's nice to be able to talk for once about somebody doing it right. I've been contacted by the editors of an upcoming anthology, Trust & Treachery , who are actively reaching out to get more quality submissions from women. To quote:
This? Is good, pro-active editing. It's realizing that imbalances aren't automatically a reflection of the fiction that's out there -- only the fiction that's being sent in. And that's something that can be changed, with a little effort.
So I'm happy to give them a signal boost. Description of the theme is here, and submissions guidelines are here. And props to Day Al-Mohamed and Meriah Crawford for their hard work.
It's nice to be able to talk for once about somebody doing it right. I've been contacted by the editors of an upcoming anthology, Trust & Treachery , who are actively reaching out to get more quality submissions from women. To quote:
One of the items that we made specific mention of in our original call for submissions was that we're looking for works representing the entire range of experience -- including all races, ethnicities, genders, ages, religions, sexual orientations, abilities and views on life. The world of fiction and its characters, especially genre fiction and speculative fiction, can be diverse places with a richness and depth in both culture and community. As editors, we made both a personal and professional commitment to have that same richness represented in this anthology. But we need to you help us do it.
This? Is good, pro-active editing. It's realizing that imbalances aren't automatically a reflection of the fiction that's out there -- only the fiction that's being sent in. And that's something that can be changed, with a little effort.
So I'm happy to give them a signal boost. Description of the theme is here, and submissions guidelines are here. And props to Day Al-Mohamed and Meriah Crawford for their hard work.
Thanksgiving Advent, Day Seventeen: Dishwashers etc.
I lived for about five years in places without a dishwasher. (Well, longer than that -- but the four years in college don't count, since all I had to do was dump my tray at the appropriate spot in the dining hall.)
I am so very, very thankful to have one again.
Dishes fall into that deeply annoying category of "didn't I just do this chore?" No sooner have you cleaned them up than, oh look, there's another dirty plate. Laundry is the same way, and words cannot express how glad I am that I've never had to do that by hand. The one time I ever tried was with a pair of trousers when I was at a field station in the middle of the rainforest in Costa Rica; I got about a minute in, very feebly, before a pair of hands appeared in my field of vision and took the soap and trousers away. I watched the very nice Costa Rican lady do what my fourteen-year-old self could not, and marveled as if she were turning water in to wine. Combine that with my reading about what it used to take to do laundry in the pre-washing-machine past . . . yeah. There are entire months of my life that have been saved by me not having to do laundry by hand.
Dishwashers. Laundry machines. Vacuum cleaners. Hell, showers -- even bathing used to be a bigger undertaking, back when you had to heat the water and fill the tub and so on. Be thankful, people. Be very, very thankful.
I am so very, very thankful to have one again.
Dishes fall into that deeply annoying category of "didn't I just do this chore?" No sooner have you cleaned them up than, oh look, there's another dirty plate. Laundry is the same way, and words cannot express how glad I am that I've never had to do that by hand. The one time I ever tried was with a pair of trousers when I was at a field station in the middle of the rainforest in Costa Rica; I got about a minute in, very feebly, before a pair of hands appeared in my field of vision and took the soap and trousers away. I watched the very nice Costa Rican lady do what my fourteen-year-old self could not, and marveled as if she were turning water in to wine. Combine that with my reading about what it used to take to do laundry in the pre-washing-machine past . . . yeah. There are entire months of my life that have been saved by me not having to do laundry by hand.
Dishwashers. Laundry machines. Vacuum cleaners. Hell, showers -- even bathing used to be a bigger undertaking, back when you had to heat the water and fill the tub and so on. Be thankful, people. Be very, very thankful.
November 17, 2011
Thanksgiving Advent, Day Sixteen: Hair Screws
Tonight, I am thankful for these things:
[image error]
I first encountered them years ago at my ballet studio. Bought some for myself, lost them over the years, and then my mother made herself a hero of the revolution by tracking down more. These days, Goody makes their own version, which are a bit longer (though not as nicely coated) as the kind she found for me.
What are they? They are magic. I know they can be put to other hair-related uses, but to me, they are the things that hold my bun up. For those who haven't seen me: my hair is down to my hips, and is relatively thick. When I put it in a bun (for ballet then; for karate now), I end up with a mass of hair more than half again as big as my fist. This is a lot of hair to bun, y'all, and it takes a vast number of hairpins to hold it, not very securely, in place.
I can hold my braid up with two of those, messily. Four makes it tidy. Six makes it secure enough to stay in place through two hours of karate and kobudo.
They are freaking magic.
We call them "hair screws;" I don't remember what Goody calls them. If they might be of any use to you, go out and buy some, stat: I want Goody believing there's enough of a market to go on manufacturing them. Otherwise, I will be back to buns falling down, and I will be sad.
[image error]
I first encountered them years ago at my ballet studio. Bought some for myself, lost them over the years, and then my mother made herself a hero of the revolution by tracking down more. These days, Goody makes their own version, which are a bit longer (though not as nicely coated) as the kind she found for me.
What are they? They are magic. I know they can be put to other hair-related uses, but to me, they are the things that hold my bun up. For those who haven't seen me: my hair is down to my hips, and is relatively thick. When I put it in a bun (for ballet then; for karate now), I end up with a mass of hair more than half again as big as my fist. This is a lot of hair to bun, y'all, and it takes a vast number of hairpins to hold it, not very securely, in place.
I can hold my braid up with two of those, messily. Four makes it tidy. Six makes it secure enough to stay in place through two hours of karate and kobudo.
They are freaking magic.
We call them "hair screws;" I don't remember what Goody calls them. If they might be of any use to you, go out and buy some, stat: I want Goody believing there's enough of a market to go on manufacturing them. Otherwise, I will be back to buns falling down, and I will be sad.
Dear Yuletide Writer
Yuletide signups are open, and will run until 8 p.m. EST on Monday, if you were thinking of joining us for some holiday fun.
Hello, Yulegoat! I know you haven't written a word yet, but I already want to thank you. Last year was my first time doing Yuletide, and I had a blast, which means this year I'm already happy because I know how awesome it is to have somebody write a fic for me. This year, that's you, and I want you to know I appreciate it.
The optional details below are optional; they are also, ummm, long. Please do not be intimidated. The length comes from me talking about what I like about the sources, and offering a variety of suggestions as to what kinds of stories would interest me; you're welcome to use any of them, or to springboard off of them into something else you think I'd like. Basically, I'm just trying to feed the plotbunnies. (There are also more general notes about my tastes at the bottom.)
***
Fandom: Gabriel Knight
Characters: Gabriel Knight, Grace Nakimura
What I love about the source: The balance of humour and darkness, the way the stories made use of real-world history and folklore, and the sense that Gabriel was a flawed but still basically good man.
What I'd love to get: All right, I admit it -- I'm still sore we never got a fourth game. :-) That's the problem with having a game series with actual character development arcs; when those get cut off short, it leaves me unsatisfied!
Which is by way of saying: what I would really love here is a story giving closure of some generally upbeat kind to the relationship between Gabe and Grace. They slept together in Blood of the Sacred, Blood of the Damned, then never really talked about it, and then Grace bailed out and we didn't even get to read her note and auuuuuuuggggggggggggggh.
The closure could take whatever form you like (and be from whichever point of view you like, or both). Grace, presumably, was going to talk to that guy in India she'd been e-mailing, about fighting supernatural evil in her own right. Maybe Gabe goes after her. Maybe he doesn't, and she shows up again a few years later, after becoming some kind of full-blown Schattenjager equivalent herself. Maybe they run into each other without warning when they both go after the same supernatural beastie. I'd love to see Grace treated as Gabe's professional equal (I think she's always been his equal in personal terms), rather than a sidekick, and for him to accept her as such -- which is not to say he should have a personality transplant and suddenly be without flaws or blind spots, but I feel like he's been struggling with a lot of issues there, and it would nice to see him continue to grow.
As I said, I'd like there to be a happy ending eventually -- get your mind out of the gutter! I mean happy emotions! -- but I don't mind angst along the way. (Where "happy endings" are concerned, wink wink nudge nudge -- eh, I really care more about the emotional resolution. They can sleep together or not, as you like, but I'm not looking for smut.) If you have the time and energy, I would ADORE something plotty, with a supernatural threat they have to take care of. (Flavor of threat is entirely up to you. Rumour had it the fourth game would have taken place in Scotland and dealt with ghosts; run with that if you want, or grab any cool bit of folklore and history that you know and want to play with.)
If, on the other hand, you detest that entire relationship, then I could also be fine with a story that is just about Grace doing something cool, post-canon. You don't have to be a Ritter and the Schattenjager to fight supernatural evil, after all.
***
Fandom: Repo! The Genetic Opera
Characters: Magdalene Defoe (Blind Mag), the GraveRobber
What I love about the source: The weird dystopian aspects (which didn't get explored enough for my taste), the grit vs. glamour, and the GraveRobber, whose voice is goddamn hot. :-)
What I'd love to get: Last year I requested a crossover, and lucked out in that my writer wanted to do it; I figure I might as well try asking for another one this year. But if you don't know the other source or don't want to write anything related to it, stay tuned -- I have some optional details for a stand-alone, too, which would also make me very happy!
The crossover idea is based on the fact that Blind Mag is played by Sarah Brightman . . . who also originated the role of Christine Daae in Phantom of the Opera. And, y'know, both characters are singers. So the idea is some kind of story wherein Blind Mag is Christine Daae. How and why this happened, not to mention how she's around instead of being dead and gone a century past, is up to you; I'd like it to involve the GraveRobber (maybe he dug up Christine's grave, and for some reason she wasn't dead/came back to life?), but whatever idea fires your imagination, go for it.
If you don't want to do the crossover, then Blind Mag is optional; I'd be interested in a story about her (especially the eyes -- those are really cool; what kinds of things have they recorded?), but really, let's face it, I am shallow, and the Graverobber is hot. :-) Anything focusing on his work would be cool, and if you write about both of them, maybe they're friends for some reason? My GK request above notwithstanding, I'm a sucker for good platonic friendships between men and women.
***
Fandom: Sky High
Characters: Warren Peace
What I love about the source: I firmly believe the best parodies are written out of deep love for the material, rather than actual mockery. Sky High is a fine example. I'm also a sucker for treating these kinds of things "realistically" -- in this case, by imagining what it's like to be the kids of superheroes (or supervillains), in a world where such things are commonplace.
What I'd love to get: I limited my request to Warren because I'd like the story to focus on him -- let's face it; pyrokinetic bad boys are hot, kind of by definition :-) -- but feel free to include anybody else from the film, nominated or not, that suits your plot. I'd prefer not to see him shipped with Layla (which I know is common), mostly because I'd rather respect the childhood-sweetheart thing she has going on in canon; you can put him with the frost-power girl we see at the end, if you have nifty ideas for that, or an original character, or nobody at all -- the story doesn't have to be shippy in the first place. (I'm actually a hard sell on romance, especially in something this short, so let me translate that to: if romance is what you usually write, don't feel constrained to avoid it, but otherwise it's totally optional.)
Story-wise, I could go for pretty much anything that is The Continuing Adventures of Superhero High School. I liked the ensemble from the movie, particularly the sidekick group, and would like to see something that delivers on the line from the end of the movie, about how "my girlfriend became my arch-enemy, my arch-enemy became my best friend, and my best friend became my girlfriend." You could explore a clever idea for something else like Power Placement or Save the Citizen, or the ways that superpowers tie into various adolescent tropes. More specifically to Warren, there's the backstory note about his mom's a superhero and his dad's a supervillain; it would be neat to see something arising out of that. I wouldn't mind seeing it get a bit angsty if you go that route, but I do love the touches of humour that get slid in all over the place, so it shouldn't get too dark.
***
Fandom: Elfquest
Characters: none
What I love about the source: Oh god, where do I start? This was, for many years, the only comic book I had ever read. It's still one of the deep foundational stories in my mind. I love how well-realized the characters are, and the capacity for the narrative to be about the ensemble and subsets thereof, rather than just Cutter's story, with everybody else playing bit parts. I love the way conflict is handled, never being casually dismissed, or treated as if violence is a get-out-of-jail-free card for everything. I love the consequences, and the fact that the characters experience both real losses and real victories.
What I'd love to get: This request is stupidly open-ended, and I admit it. If that's a problem, feel free to contact![[info]](https://i.gr-assets.com/images/S/compressed.photo.goodreads.com/hostedimages/1380924027i/3298574.gif)
teleidoplex
and she'll serve as a go-between for questions -- but really, there are so many things I could be happy with, you should be safe.
I left the characters off from this one because this is a fandom where really, I just want MOAR ELFQUEST DAMMIT. I've read possibly everything there is -- certainly I've read most of it, including the far-future Jink stuff -- though nothing after Kings of the Broken Wheel quite scratched the itch, as the world started being farmed out to other writers. It doesn't have to be canon for the known characters, though. While I do have favorites (Clearbrook and Strongbow lead the list, but really, I like pretty much all of them), there aren't any specific stories I want to see told with those people. (About the only thing I'm not keen on seeing is The Further Adventures of How Winnowill Is the Problem That Keeps on Giving.)
I'd love to see, well, anything else exploring the world. History for any of the original four canon tribes (life under a past Wolfrider chief, the founding or development of the Sun Village, Go-Backs vs. trolls, the Gilders in their glory days), or a different story about the contact between the elves and humans after the end of Kings of the Broken Wheel (i.e. an AU to take the place of the Shards storyline, which I confess I wasn't too wild about), or something about a totally new tribe (your own sea elves, or jungle elves, or any other environment that strikes your fancy). Basically, pretend the Pinis came to you and said: we've decided to hire you on to expand the Elfquest universe! Do whatever you like! You don't even have to draw the pictures!
(Though wow -- if you're an artist and decide you want to make a comic for Yuletide, do NOT let me stand in your way. I will rec you to the skies, just for being that psychotically hard-core.)
***
More generally: I love stuff with actual plot in, but since I know that can be a lot of work, I would also be very happy with something that really examines the characters (or world, for those requests that aren't character-focused). I prefer stories that stay close to the characters as written, respecting canon relationships, working with flaws rather than sweeping them under the rug, etc. Even in the most cracky of my requests -- the Phantom/Repo! crossover -- I'd rather it be presented as "this could be the secret unknown backstory" rather than something that blatantly alters the existing narrative. Go ahead and include any canon characters I've not listed that might be useful to you, or invent OCs to serve your narrative needs.
I adore drama; I also like humour, especially when it's of the "witty" variety rather than physical comedy or gross-out excess, but I love it best when it's used as leavening for the more serious stuff, or as the jab to set up the dramatic roundhouse that follows. (The kind of thing Joss Whedon excels at, if you want an example.) I don't like humiliation, or characters being flat-out stupid -- which is not the same thing as their flaws getting in the way of good decisions. :-) Not really looking for smut. I don't mind violence, as long as it doesn't cross the line into splatterpunk gore, but I don't like torture. Especially against women: by all means let them fight, but please don't victimize them, or refrigerator them, or push canonical women to the sidelines of the story.
I haven't written much fanfic -- and most of what I've done was for last year's Yuletide -- but you can see my meagre output here. If you check the fanfiction tag, you can see other posts I've made on the subject, which might give you additional clues, or you can check out my original work.
Thank you again, and please, above all: have fun!
Hello, Yulegoat! I know you haven't written a word yet, but I already want to thank you. Last year was my first time doing Yuletide, and I had a blast, which means this year I'm already happy because I know how awesome it is to have somebody write a fic for me. This year, that's you, and I want you to know I appreciate it.
The optional details below are optional; they are also, ummm, long. Please do not be intimidated. The length comes from me talking about what I like about the sources, and offering a variety of suggestions as to what kinds of stories would interest me; you're welcome to use any of them, or to springboard off of them into something else you think I'd like. Basically, I'm just trying to feed the plotbunnies. (There are also more general notes about my tastes at the bottom.)
***
Fandom: Gabriel Knight
Characters: Gabriel Knight, Grace Nakimura
What I love about the source: The balance of humour and darkness, the way the stories made use of real-world history and folklore, and the sense that Gabriel was a flawed but still basically good man.
What I'd love to get: All right, I admit it -- I'm still sore we never got a fourth game. :-) That's the problem with having a game series with actual character development arcs; when those get cut off short, it leaves me unsatisfied!
Which is by way of saying: what I would really love here is a story giving closure of some generally upbeat kind to the relationship between Gabe and Grace. They slept together in Blood of the Sacred, Blood of the Damned, then never really talked about it, and then Grace bailed out and we didn't even get to read her note and auuuuuuuggggggggggggggh.
The closure could take whatever form you like (and be from whichever point of view you like, or both). Grace, presumably, was going to talk to that guy in India she'd been e-mailing, about fighting supernatural evil in her own right. Maybe Gabe goes after her. Maybe he doesn't, and she shows up again a few years later, after becoming some kind of full-blown Schattenjager equivalent herself. Maybe they run into each other without warning when they both go after the same supernatural beastie. I'd love to see Grace treated as Gabe's professional equal (I think she's always been his equal in personal terms), rather than a sidekick, and for him to accept her as such -- which is not to say he should have a personality transplant and suddenly be without flaws or blind spots, but I feel like he's been struggling with a lot of issues there, and it would nice to see him continue to grow.
As I said, I'd like there to be a happy ending eventually -- get your mind out of the gutter! I mean happy emotions! -- but I don't mind angst along the way. (Where "happy endings" are concerned, wink wink nudge nudge -- eh, I really care more about the emotional resolution. They can sleep together or not, as you like, but I'm not looking for smut.) If you have the time and energy, I would ADORE something plotty, with a supernatural threat they have to take care of. (Flavor of threat is entirely up to you. Rumour had it the fourth game would have taken place in Scotland and dealt with ghosts; run with that if you want, or grab any cool bit of folklore and history that you know and want to play with.)
If, on the other hand, you detest that entire relationship, then I could also be fine with a story that is just about Grace doing something cool, post-canon. You don't have to be a Ritter and the Schattenjager to fight supernatural evil, after all.
***
Fandom: Repo! The Genetic Opera
Characters: Magdalene Defoe (Blind Mag), the GraveRobber
What I love about the source: The weird dystopian aspects (which didn't get explored enough for my taste), the grit vs. glamour, and the GraveRobber, whose voice is goddamn hot. :-)
What I'd love to get: Last year I requested a crossover, and lucked out in that my writer wanted to do it; I figure I might as well try asking for another one this year. But if you don't know the other source or don't want to write anything related to it, stay tuned -- I have some optional details for a stand-alone, too, which would also make me very happy!
The crossover idea is based on the fact that Blind Mag is played by Sarah Brightman . . . who also originated the role of Christine Daae in Phantom of the Opera. And, y'know, both characters are singers. So the idea is some kind of story wherein Blind Mag is Christine Daae. How and why this happened, not to mention how she's around instead of being dead and gone a century past, is up to you; I'd like it to involve the GraveRobber (maybe he dug up Christine's grave, and for some reason she wasn't dead/came back to life?), but whatever idea fires your imagination, go for it.
If you don't want to do the crossover, then Blind Mag is optional; I'd be interested in a story about her (especially the eyes -- those are really cool; what kinds of things have they recorded?), but really, let's face it, I am shallow, and the Graverobber is hot. :-) Anything focusing on his work would be cool, and if you write about both of them, maybe they're friends for some reason? My GK request above notwithstanding, I'm a sucker for good platonic friendships between men and women.
***
Fandom: Sky High
Characters: Warren Peace
What I love about the source: I firmly believe the best parodies are written out of deep love for the material, rather than actual mockery. Sky High is a fine example. I'm also a sucker for treating these kinds of things "realistically" -- in this case, by imagining what it's like to be the kids of superheroes (or supervillains), in a world where such things are commonplace.
What I'd love to get: I limited my request to Warren because I'd like the story to focus on him -- let's face it; pyrokinetic bad boys are hot, kind of by definition :-) -- but feel free to include anybody else from the film, nominated or not, that suits your plot. I'd prefer not to see him shipped with Layla (which I know is common), mostly because I'd rather respect the childhood-sweetheart thing she has going on in canon; you can put him with the frost-power girl we see at the end, if you have nifty ideas for that, or an original character, or nobody at all -- the story doesn't have to be shippy in the first place. (I'm actually a hard sell on romance, especially in something this short, so let me translate that to: if romance is what you usually write, don't feel constrained to avoid it, but otherwise it's totally optional.)
Story-wise, I could go for pretty much anything that is The Continuing Adventures of Superhero High School. I liked the ensemble from the movie, particularly the sidekick group, and would like to see something that delivers on the line from the end of the movie, about how "my girlfriend became my arch-enemy, my arch-enemy became my best friend, and my best friend became my girlfriend." You could explore a clever idea for something else like Power Placement or Save the Citizen, or the ways that superpowers tie into various adolescent tropes. More specifically to Warren, there's the backstory note about his mom's a superhero and his dad's a supervillain; it would be neat to see something arising out of that. I wouldn't mind seeing it get a bit angsty if you go that route, but I do love the touches of humour that get slid in all over the place, so it shouldn't get too dark.
***
Fandom: Elfquest
Characters: none
What I love about the source: Oh god, where do I start? This was, for many years, the only comic book I had ever read. It's still one of the deep foundational stories in my mind. I love how well-realized the characters are, and the capacity for the narrative to be about the ensemble and subsets thereof, rather than just Cutter's story, with everybody else playing bit parts. I love the way conflict is handled, never being casually dismissed, or treated as if violence is a get-out-of-jail-free card for everything. I love the consequences, and the fact that the characters experience both real losses and real victories.
What I'd love to get: This request is stupidly open-ended, and I admit it. If that's a problem, feel free to contact
teleidoplex
and she'll serve as a go-between for questions -- but really, there are so many things I could be happy with, you should be safe.I left the characters off from this one because this is a fandom where really, I just want MOAR ELFQUEST DAMMIT. I've read possibly everything there is -- certainly I've read most of it, including the far-future Jink stuff -- though nothing after Kings of the Broken Wheel quite scratched the itch, as the world started being farmed out to other writers. It doesn't have to be canon for the known characters, though. While I do have favorites (Clearbrook and Strongbow lead the list, but really, I like pretty much all of them), there aren't any specific stories I want to see told with those people. (About the only thing I'm not keen on seeing is The Further Adventures of How Winnowill Is the Problem That Keeps on Giving.)
I'd love to see, well, anything else exploring the world. History for any of the original four canon tribes (life under a past Wolfrider chief, the founding or development of the Sun Village, Go-Backs vs. trolls, the Gilders in their glory days), or a different story about the contact between the elves and humans after the end of Kings of the Broken Wheel (i.e. an AU to take the place of the Shards storyline, which I confess I wasn't too wild about), or something about a totally new tribe (your own sea elves, or jungle elves, or any other environment that strikes your fancy). Basically, pretend the Pinis came to you and said: we've decided to hire you on to expand the Elfquest universe! Do whatever you like! You don't even have to draw the pictures!
(Though wow -- if you're an artist and decide you want to make a comic for Yuletide, do NOT let me stand in your way. I will rec you to the skies, just for being that psychotically hard-core.)
***
More generally: I love stuff with actual plot in, but since I know that can be a lot of work, I would also be very happy with something that really examines the characters (or world, for those requests that aren't character-focused). I prefer stories that stay close to the characters as written, respecting canon relationships, working with flaws rather than sweeping them under the rug, etc. Even in the most cracky of my requests -- the Phantom/Repo! crossover -- I'd rather it be presented as "this could be the secret unknown backstory" rather than something that blatantly alters the existing narrative. Go ahead and include any canon characters I've not listed that might be useful to you, or invent OCs to serve your narrative needs.
I adore drama; I also like humour, especially when it's of the "witty" variety rather than physical comedy or gross-out excess, but I love it best when it's used as leavening for the more serious stuff, or as the jab to set up the dramatic roundhouse that follows. (The kind of thing Joss Whedon excels at, if you want an example.) I don't like humiliation, or characters being flat-out stupid -- which is not the same thing as their flaws getting in the way of good decisions. :-) Not really looking for smut. I don't mind violence, as long as it doesn't cross the line into splatterpunk gore, but I don't like torture. Especially against women: by all means let them fight, but please don't victimize them, or refrigerator them, or push canonical women to the sidelines of the story.
I haven't written much fanfic -- and most of what I've done was for last year's Yuletide -- but you can see my meagre output here. If you check the fanfiction tag, you can see other posts I've made on the subject, which might give you additional clues, or you can check out my original work.
Thank you again, and please, above all: have fun!
November 16, 2011
Almost missed it!
Gah. The sixteenth not only sneaked up on me this month; it almost sneaked past. But I ran over to SF Novelists and dashed off the next (and probably final) post in my "Research for Writers" series: Get Help.
Comment over there; no login needed, but if you're a first-time commenter give me a little while to fish your comment out of the moderation queue.
Comment over there; no login needed, but if you're a first-time commenter give me a little while to fish your comment out of the moderation queue.
Thanksgiving Advent, Day Fifteen: Occupy Wall Street
I could ramble on for a long time -- not in a "thankfulness" way --with a lot of only vaguely-connected thoughts regarding Occupy Wall Street, corporate accountability, the current state of U.S. politics, media imbalance, economic inequality, police brutality, and a bunch of other things way too big to fit into a blog post. But since I can't begin to sort those into anything like a coherent enough order to inflict on other people, I'll excerpt out one tiny slice that does fit into this series:
I'm thankful for the Occupy Wall Street protest, and its cousins all around the country.
Why am I thankful? Because I'd started to believe, in a fatalistic, "fuck it, I might as well just give up" kind of way, that the political left in this country had lost its will to fight. Let them pass draconian anti-immigration laws, state constitutional amendments against gay marriage, tax cuts for the people who don't need them, cuts to benefits for the people who do, religious initiatives and attacks on women's rights and wars that never end -- we'll just sigh and turn on the Xbox for some mindless entertainment.
No. We'll protest. And not just through meaningless online petitions that only require a few clicks of the mouse: through physical action, through civil disobedience, through a movement that persists until the media can't ignore it anymore. And this isn't Tea Party-style activism, either, where the big corporate interests barely even try to hide their hand inside the puppet: it's grass-roots instead of astroturf. It's real.
Which isn't the same thing as perfect. The movement is more a thousand-voiced scream of frustration and rage than a single message; there are so many things that need fixing, so many of them intertwined, that it isn't as simple as (say) an anti-war protest, whose win condition is clear. OWS supporters want lots of things, and don't necessarily agree on how any of them should be achieved.
But it's my end of the political spectrum finally speaking up. Finally fighting. And doing it with enough force and persistence that people are paying attention. The United States is a big ship; she's slow to turn, and we may not (probably won't) get her on exactly the heading I'd like to see. Still: every degree of turn is a victory. I'm glad to see so many people do, in fact, have the will to grab the tiller and pull.
I'm thankful for the Occupy Wall Street protest, and its cousins all around the country.
Why am I thankful? Because I'd started to believe, in a fatalistic, "fuck it, I might as well just give up" kind of way, that the political left in this country had lost its will to fight. Let them pass draconian anti-immigration laws, state constitutional amendments against gay marriage, tax cuts for the people who don't need them, cuts to benefits for the people who do, religious initiatives and attacks on women's rights and wars that never end -- we'll just sigh and turn on the Xbox for some mindless entertainment.
No. We'll protest. And not just through meaningless online petitions that only require a few clicks of the mouse: through physical action, through civil disobedience, through a movement that persists until the media can't ignore it anymore. And this isn't Tea Party-style activism, either, where the big corporate interests barely even try to hide their hand inside the puppet: it's grass-roots instead of astroturf. It's real.
Which isn't the same thing as perfect. The movement is more a thousand-voiced scream of frustration and rage than a single message; there are so many things that need fixing, so many of them intertwined, that it isn't as simple as (say) an anti-war protest, whose win condition is clear. OWS supporters want lots of things, and don't necessarily agree on how any of them should be achieved.
But it's my end of the political spectrum finally speaking up. Finally fighting. And doing it with enough force and persistence that people are paying attention. The United States is a big ship; she's slow to turn, and we may not (probably won't) get her on exactly the heading I'd like to see. Still: every degree of turn is a victory. I'm glad to see so many people do, in fact, have the will to grab the tiller and pull.
November 15, 2011
Thanksgiving Advent, Day Fourteen: Modern Health
When
la_marquise_de_
and I were doing the podcast thing at World Fantasy, one of the things that came up was the sheer physical discomfort people used to live with as a matter of course.
Now, I know that there are many people ven now -- possibly some of you reading this -- who likewise live with chronic pain, disease, injury, disability, or other such conditions. I have no desire to trivialize those things. But taking the long perspective . . . my god. Things have improved so much in the last century or so, I can barely even conceive of it.
I'm talking about everything from the major achievements (smallpox used to kill or disfigure vast numbers of people; now it's been eradicated) down to the minor ones (most of us still have all our teeth, and they're probably pretty straight, too). Thanks to vaccinations -- but no thanks to the anti-vax movement, which I won't rant about here because this is supposed to be about thankfulness -- we no longer have to run the gauntlet of measles and mumps and rubella and whooping cough and everything else that used to drop children like flies. We have antibiotics: no more "and by the way he spent the last three years of life with a supperating ulcer in his thigh" for us! We can repair torn ligaments, use hearing aids to combat deafness, replace freaking hip joints, man. If I didn't have astigmatism, or U.S. had approved toric ICLs already, I could get a lens permanently implanted in my eye to correct my vision.
Dude, Beck Weathers lost his nose to frostbite, and they grew a new one for him on his forehead.
So while I extend my heartfelt sympathies to everyone who suffers from ill-health of one kind or another -- my GOD am I thankful for modern health. If you threw me into the European past, I would not want to be treated by any doctor from before maybe 1940 or so. (I don't know enough about the history of medicine in other parts of the world to make judgment calls there, except to say that Europe was late to the smallpox-vaccination party.) I'm sure any number of things we do today will be considered barbaric and dumb by the people of the future, but from where I'm standing, we've made amazing progress.
la_marquise_de_
and I were doing the podcast thing at World Fantasy, one of the things that came up was the sheer physical discomfort people used to live with as a matter of course.Now, I know that there are many people ven now -- possibly some of you reading this -- who likewise live with chronic pain, disease, injury, disability, or other such conditions. I have no desire to trivialize those things. But taking the long perspective . . . my god. Things have improved so much in the last century or so, I can barely even conceive of it.
I'm talking about everything from the major achievements (smallpox used to kill or disfigure vast numbers of people; now it's been eradicated) down to the minor ones (most of us still have all our teeth, and they're probably pretty straight, too). Thanks to vaccinations -- but no thanks to the anti-vax movement, which I won't rant about here because this is supposed to be about thankfulness -- we no longer have to run the gauntlet of measles and mumps and rubella and whooping cough and everything else that used to drop children like flies. We have antibiotics: no more "and by the way he spent the last three years of life with a supperating ulcer in his thigh" for us! We can repair torn ligaments, use hearing aids to combat deafness, replace freaking hip joints, man. If I didn't have astigmatism, or U.S. had approved toric ICLs already, I could get a lens permanently implanted in my eye to correct my vision.
Dude, Beck Weathers lost his nose to frostbite, and they grew a new one for him on his forehead.
So while I extend my heartfelt sympathies to everyone who suffers from ill-health of one kind or another -- my GOD am I thankful for modern health. If you threw me into the European past, I would not want to be treated by any doctor from before maybe 1940 or so. (I don't know enough about the history of medicine in other parts of the world to make judgment calls there, except to say that Europe was late to the smallpox-vaccination party.) I'm sure any number of things we do today will be considered barbaric and dumb by the people of the future, but from where I'm standing, we've made amazing progress.
November 14, 2011
Thanksgiving Advent, Day Thirteen: The (Forgiveness of the) Internets
'Cause I, well, forgot to post yesterday. I remembered at one point during the afternoon, but I hadn't yet picked a thing to post about, and then next thing I know it's, well, now. (And I already did the meta "get out of jail free" thing with being thankful for days off. Clearly, weekends are hard.)
So I'm thankful that you all forgive me for missing a day. You do forgive me, right? Right???
To avoid totally copping out on this post, though, I'm going to be thankful for the internet more generally. I was talking with
kniedzw
the other night about signal to noise ratios in our current society, and he complained about internet searches: fifteen years ago he could go to Altavista or whatever and type in [some kind of techie query; I can't remember what his example was] and turn up a useful tutorial on how to do that thing. Now he has to wade past various auto-generated SEO traps to get to the actual info. I conceded this may be true . . . but on the other hand, fifteen years ago I doubt Altavista could have pointed me at an online account of the exact route taken by Elizabeth I's coronation procession. The Internet back then was a paradise for techie topics, maybe, but not so much for everything else.
These days, I may indeed have to wade past random crap -- but the information is out there, so often it simply boggles me. I can, without leaving my office, look at a topographical map of the area around Dover Castle, or read back issues of the London Times, or get instructions on embroidery stitches. The sheer amount of info contained in Wikipedia alone is astronomical. When I try to imagine writing the Onyx Court series without the 2007-2010 Internet to help me out . . . well, actually, I try not to imagine that, since it leads to me curling up under my desk and wibbling. (I dunno. Maybe it would have been great, because I wouldn't have had so much red meat to feed my obsessive tendencies.)
So I'm thankful for the Internet, and all its wonders.
You do forgive me, right?
So I'm thankful that you all forgive me for missing a day. You do forgive me, right? Right???
To avoid totally copping out on this post, though, I'm going to be thankful for the internet more generally. I was talking with
kniedzw
the other night about signal to noise ratios in our current society, and he complained about internet searches: fifteen years ago he could go to Altavista or whatever and type in [some kind of techie query; I can't remember what his example was] and turn up a useful tutorial on how to do that thing. Now he has to wade past various auto-generated SEO traps to get to the actual info. I conceded this may be true . . . but on the other hand, fifteen years ago I doubt Altavista could have pointed me at an online account of the exact route taken by Elizabeth I's coronation procession. The Internet back then was a paradise for techie topics, maybe, but not so much for everything else.These days, I may indeed have to wade past random crap -- but the information is out there, so often it simply boggles me. I can, without leaving my office, look at a topographical map of the area around Dover Castle, or read back issues of the London Times, or get instructions on embroidery stitches. The sheer amount of info contained in Wikipedia alone is astronomical. When I try to imagine writing the Onyx Court series without the 2007-2010 Internet to help me out . . . well, actually, I try not to imagine that, since it leads to me curling up under my desk and wibbling. (I dunno. Maybe it would have been great, because I wouldn't have had so much red meat to feed my obsessive tendencies.)
So I'm thankful for the Internet, and all its wonders.
You do forgive me, right?
November 13, 2011
The DWJ Project: House of Many Ways
Charmain Baker gets sent, against her will, to look after the house of her Great-Uncle William, who is also the Royal Wizard of Norland, while he's away being cured of illness. The house turns out to have all kinds of dimensions not immediately obvious to the naked eye, but there are problems from rebellious kobolds and a dangerous lubbock, as well as difficulties for the Kingdom of Norland, which is very nearly bankrupt.
(Random aside: can I just say how distracting the lubbock was to me? So far as I can determine, that's not anything from folklore. And I associate the name with a rather dreary city in Texas, known to me mostly because a) it's where we stopped for lunch on road trips to Arizona, and b) it's the home of Texas Tech University, from whence came the various correspondence courses I did in high school. So yeah, that's what I kept thinking about.)
Like Castle in the Air , this is less a direct sequel, more a related book. Howl, Sophie, and Calcifer appear (and their influence is more apparent than in Castle), but mostly they're there to facilitate someone else's story -- in this case, Charmain's.
Alas -- moving into spoiler territory, now -- I don't find Charmain half so engaging as either Abdullah or Sophie before. The problem is that Charmain doesn't want anything, really. Her primary wish is to be left alone to read a book. While I can sympathize with this -- it's a fairly apt description of my own feelings at her age -- it's essentially a passive desire, a wish not to engage with the plot. As a result, stuff happens largely because of random chance, or other characters' actions. Charmain neither has nor contributes much in the way of forward momentum.
That lack of desire means she's largely disconnected from most of the story's content, even when I the reader am interested in it. Whyyyyy does she not want to explore the house?!!! I'm a big reader, but dude, that's enough to distract me from a book. And she fiddles with magic -- despite being raised to think it's disreputable -- but pretty much drops it after one use. Even if you grow up surrounded by that kind of thing, I find it hard to swallow that you'd show that little interest. The only thing Charmain shows any interest in (besides her own comfort and convenience) is helping out in the King's library, but that falls short for two reasons: first, she achieves it without much effort, and second, her passion for that is more stated than felt.
Which is not to say there aren't elements I enjoy. The house itself is cool, even if it doesn't feature as centrally as the title makes me wish, and I like the practicality of the royals of Norland. I also enjoy what we see of the series characters, especially Calcifer's faceoff with the lubbock. Heck, I even enjoy Howl here, though I sympathize with Sophie's desire to brain him with something heavy for the whole "Twinkle" thing. Filter out the lisp, and I like watching him be competent while also managing to entertain himself hugely. :-)
In the end, though, the pieces don't quite hang together as a strong whole, largely because Charmain's not a very effective center of gravity. (I think I actually would have preferred Peter as a protagonist.) It's a bit of a shame; I would have liked more.
Derkholm series next!
(Random aside: can I just say how distracting the lubbock was to me? So far as I can determine, that's not anything from folklore. And I associate the name with a rather dreary city in Texas, known to me mostly because a) it's where we stopped for lunch on road trips to Arizona, and b) it's the home of Texas Tech University, from whence came the various correspondence courses I did in high school. So yeah, that's what I kept thinking about.)
Like Castle in the Air , this is less a direct sequel, more a related book. Howl, Sophie, and Calcifer appear (and their influence is more apparent than in Castle), but mostly they're there to facilitate someone else's story -- in this case, Charmain's.
Alas -- moving into spoiler territory, now -- I don't find Charmain half so engaging as either Abdullah or Sophie before. The problem is that Charmain doesn't want anything, really. Her primary wish is to be left alone to read a book. While I can sympathize with this -- it's a fairly apt description of my own feelings at her age -- it's essentially a passive desire, a wish not to engage with the plot. As a result, stuff happens largely because of random chance, or other characters' actions. Charmain neither has nor contributes much in the way of forward momentum.
That lack of desire means she's largely disconnected from most of the story's content, even when I the reader am interested in it. Whyyyyy does she not want to explore the house?!!! I'm a big reader, but dude, that's enough to distract me from a book. And she fiddles with magic -- despite being raised to think it's disreputable -- but pretty much drops it after one use. Even if you grow up surrounded by that kind of thing, I find it hard to swallow that you'd show that little interest. The only thing Charmain shows any interest in (besides her own comfort and convenience) is helping out in the King's library, but that falls short for two reasons: first, she achieves it without much effort, and second, her passion for that is more stated than felt.
Which is not to say there aren't elements I enjoy. The house itself is cool, even if it doesn't feature as centrally as the title makes me wish, and I like the practicality of the royals of Norland. I also enjoy what we see of the series characters, especially Calcifer's faceoff with the lubbock. Heck, I even enjoy Howl here, though I sympathize with Sophie's desire to brain him with something heavy for the whole "Twinkle" thing. Filter out the lisp, and I like watching him be competent while also managing to entertain himself hugely. :-)
In the end, though, the pieces don't quite hang together as a strong whole, largely because Charmain's not a very effective center of gravity. (I think I actually would have preferred Peter as a protagonist.) It's a bit of a shame; I would have liked more.
Derkholm series next!
