Kristin Cashore's Blog, page 56

Nobody Understands Me

Me at the local yummy vegetarian foodie place (Life Alive. Stupid name, delicious food. Also, no, I am not a vegetarian): I'd like the Romantic Wrap. Please add eggs and greens.
The guy: The Romantic Wrap, add eggs and beets?
Me: Eggs and greens.
The guy: I'm afraid we don't have any beans.
Me: GREENS!  I WANT GREENS!

***
My sister, codename: Apocalyptica the Flimflammer, on the phone in the wind: I just got to Harvard Square! I'm sorry I'm late! I'm on my way!
Me: Oh, don't worry, I'm just doing crap.
Apocalyptica: Crafts?
Me: Crap.
Apocalyptica: Crack?
Me: Crap! I'm doing crap! I'm paying bills and filing paperwork!
Apocalyptica: So you're not doing crack?

***
So, travel puts a lot into me, but it also takes a lot out of me, and lately I've been using what I've got for stuff other than blogging. My expectation is that this will result in you someday soon having more fiction by me to read. Fair deal?

On Wednesday I leave for Rome and environs, where I'll be doing some research into small medieval towns. A friend doing research into small medieval towns talked me into joining her. It's nice to have friends with common objectives :-)

Unrelatedly, here are some beautiful photos of ranchers out West (in Colorado), taken by Michael Crouser. Make them nice and big on your screen.

Finally, my lack of blog brain makes me grateful to Brian Ibbot of Coverville for providing me something awesome to repost: this video of the band Walk off the Earth (link automatically plays music) covering Gotye's "Somebody That I Used to Know," all five of them on a single guitar. Funny that around 2:55, the guy on the far right is making the guitar sound like a piano (IMO) -- reminding me, of course, that a piano is a string instrument.

Home Again, YEE-HAW

You know it's a good trip when you don't pine for home even once. And you know you love your home when you get back and find yourself practically skipping from room to room because you're so happy to be there. Three weeks is a long time to be away from home! All of my plants utterly thrived while I was gone, which is a sign that (1) as I suspected, I have been overwatering them this winter (they *loved* not been watered for three weeks); and (2) re: my orchids, which would *not* have loved not being watered for three weeks, I have an excellent steward. :o)

The sight that welcomed me home.
I'm soaking in as much home as I can right now, because I leave on another trip in ten-ish days.

Loved the recent cover feature in Boston Magazine called "Single by Choice," by Janelle Nanos. "When it comes to getting hitched, more Americans than ever before are saying 'I don't.' Singles now make up nearly half the adult population in this country, and new research suggests they're happier, more social, and more active in the community than many of their wedded counterparts. Now if only their friends and family (and oh, while we're at it, coworkers, benefits providers, and the federal government) would get off their back." (H/t JD!)

BTW -- HEY EVERYBODY, IN CASE YOU DIDN'T NOTICE, DOWNTON ABBEY IS BACK.

Resolutions

I just stumbled across a list of books about body image, health, and dieting and had the urge to list them here on my blog, now, at the New Year, when the societal pressure toward weight loss rises to a fever pitch. In case it is helpful for anyone to know that books like this exist:

Andersen, Arnold, Leigh Cohn, and Thomas Holbrook. Making Weight: Healing Men's Conflicts with Food, Weight, Shape & Appearance. Carlsbad, CA: Gurze Books, 2000.

Campos, Paul. The Obesity Myth: Why America's Obsession with Weight Is Hazardous to Your Health. New York: Gotham Books, 2004.

Cash, Thomas. Body Image Workbook: An 8 Step Program for Learning to Like Your Looks. Oakland, CA: New Harbinger, 1997.

Dixon, Monica. Love the Body You Were Born With: A 10 Step Workbook for Women. New York, NY: Berkley Pub Group, 1996.

Doty, William G. Myths of Masculinity. New York: Crossroads, 1993.

Erdman, Cheri. Live Large! Ideas, Affirmations, and Actions for Sane Living in a Larger Body. San Francisco, CA: HarperCollins, 1997.

Johnson, Carol. Self-Esteem Comes in All Sizes: How to Be Happy and Healthy at Your Natural Weight. Carlsbad, CA: Gurze Books, 2001.

LoBue, Andrea and Marcus Marsea. The Don't Diet, Live-It! Workbook: Healing Food, Weight and Body Issues. Carlsbad, CA: Gurze Books, 1999.

Maine, Margo. Body Wars: Making Peace with Women's Bodies. Carlsbad, CA: Gurze Books, 2000.

Pope, Harrison G., Katharine A. Phillips, and Roberto Olivardia. The Adonis Complex: The Secret Crisis of Male Body Obsession. New York: Free Press, 2000.

Wolf, Naomi. The Beauty Myth. New York: William Morrow and Company, 1991.

Please note that I haven't read any of these books. Please bring your open mind and your critical mind to them, as I expect you always do.

******

My New Year's resolution is special this year, because 2012 is set to be a pretty crazy year for me, what with Bitterblue entering the world. It's also pretty broad: I resolve to try to remember what matters.

Happy New year, everyone! Be kind to yourself :o)

Baking Bread in Time for the New Year

I kept all my New Year's resolutions!

I baked this bread (with my mother, in her kitchen) in honor of Bitterblue.
(When you read Bitterblue, you'll understand.)
Happy New Year, everyone!

Conversations from the First Leg of My Trip

(Background: My nieces, codenames: Phoenix and Isis, are approaching 2 ½ years old.)
Someone discovers an enormous quantity of water inside one of the low kitchen cabinets where the girls have just been playing together.
Me: Isis, did you pour the water from your cup into the cabinet?Isis: Yes.Me: Phoenix, did you pour the water from your cup into the cabinet?Phoenix: No.Me: You didn't?Phoenix: No, but I poured my water into Isis's cup.
Sometimes it's difficult to maintain the appropriate stern expression.
***
Isis, Phoenix, and I are lying on the floor together, hanging out, talking. Each girl is holding a bottle she found in the kitchen.
Isis (holding out her bottle to me): Will you read it and tell me what they is?Me (reading the labels): Yes. This one is coconut oil and the other one is balsamic vinegar.Isis: No, they are peepee and poopy!
This joke rocks Phoenix's world. She tries to repeat it, the way one does when one enjoys a joke, but she's laughing so hard that she can't even get the words out. "They are peepee and poopy," she finally manages, bright red and gasping, then collapses into giggles again.
***
Phoenix: Daddy, do Santa bring presents to bad girls too?Codename: Joe: Yes, Santa is very nice. He brings something to everyone, even bad girls.Phoenix: But Santa can be bad too.Joe: What do you mean, Santa can be bad?Phoenix: Santa run over Grandmommy with his reindeer.Joe (understanding): Did you hear that in a song?Phoenix: Yes.Joe: But Phoenix, that song isn't real. That song is only a joke.Phoenix (actually sounding quite relieved): Oh! That song is a JOKE! (giggles)
***
Codename: Cordelia and I are driving with the girls to a festival called the Winter Wonderland. We hear giggling in the backseat and listen in.
Isis: It's the Winter Peepeeland!Phoenix: It's the Winter Poopyland!
***
Isis (very upset): NO! IT'S GLOOT!  IT'S GLOOT!Phoenix (very upset): NO! IT'S FLOOP!  IT'S FLOOP!
(This is an argument over the pronunciation of the word "flute.")
***
Cordelia and Joe are whispering to each other about what a good job the girls did sharing that morning. They're whispering in the girls' hearing on purpose, so that the girls will overhear the praise. Isis indicates to me that she has a secret to tell me, too.
I lean toward her.
Isis (whispering): Poopy!
(Were you expecting something else?)

Things I Thought I Knew about Writing, But Had to Learn Again in New Ways from Bitterblue

Even if you go into a book knowing your plot and your plot never changes from your plan, you still don't know what you're getting into. Making messes isn't just okay, it's necessary. For most of the process, nothing but faith, fueled by your own stubbornness, will be pulling you along. The work that you've done on the book so far won't be much comfort, because so much of it will be insufferable crap, until the very last moment, when you figure out how to fix it and everything comes together. Everything will come together, as long as you don't lose hold of what the soul of your book is, work as hard as you can, and don't give up. When it does come together -- that moment is the best feeling a person can have. The next part, where the book stops being just yours and becomes other people's, will be thrilling to your spirit, but there are aspects of it that will possibly be too strange and surreal for your quotidian little soul to process. You may be overwhelmed, scared, or hurt on occasion. That's okay; you'll get your solid footing back. Just let it happen, observe, try to grow, and be grateful.

Waiting to Be Rescued by My Bunter in Shining Bowler Hat

I'm going to be away from home for 31 of the next 40 days, which is always lovely once I'm on the road but COMPLETELY BONKERS before I go... especially this time, because I need to bring so much stuff and so many books. I mentioned my e-book reader in a previous post... I much prefer reading physical books -- there's no contest -- I should write a post sometime about all the things I find frustrating about e-books -- but I do have an e-book reader, pretty much solely for travel, and I can't overstate how much easier it makes life. I'm in research mode for the next three weeks and will probably be reading as many as 15 to 20 books, not to mention a few manuscripts, and all of it weighs less than a pound and takes up practically no space at all, since it's on the e-book reader. As it is, I'm still going to be lugging a lot of books and paper, but at least I won't be a walking bookcase.

Anyway, as I write this, I'm in travel prep mode, so I'm not at my best. I just want to take a nap, not spend every waking moment being organized about getting tasks done. Also, I have strong words for whoever invented 7 AM flights. HELP HELP 

Once Upon a Time (um, vague spoilers ahead?) may have done something unforgivable; they may have lost me; yes, a mere seven episodes into the show, I may have to stop watching, UNLESS THEY DO SOMETHING EXCEEDINGLY SPECTACULAR TO MAKE UP FOR GOUGING OUT MY HEART WITH EPISODE 7. If they're going to make me that sad and OUTRAGED, then they also need to make me that fascinated and delighted. IMMEDIATELY. Or it's all over. Here's a suggestion: UNDO WHAT THEY DID.

*hrmph*

There is probably other news, but I'm working with about a 10-second memory span at the moment and can't remember it. If I have bloggy time and things to blog while I'm traveling, I will. I need some tea. Where is my tea? Oh, wait, I remember: I wanted to link you all to Tui's fabulous holiday book-buying post in which she tells you what book to buy for whom on your list! She also mentions some favorite charitable organizations, and I'd like to share my own at some point, too, maybe while I'm traveling.

Why hasn't Bunter brought me my tea?

It always strikes me as funny that the time of year which involves quiet contemplation and reflection for me (New Year's) is always preceded by the time of the year involving the most frenzy (December). I used to hate it. Now I kind of feel like the process of fighting for calmness and centeredness in the middle of frenzy is an important step.

I guess I'd better go get that tea by myself, and pack, and make arrangements, seeing as I'm not an English lord in the 1930s and Bunter does not seem to be materializing...

The World's Smallest Reading/Writing Lesson

Look look!  Hebrew cover from Kinneret-Zmora! ----->

So, a gazillion years ago, I wrote a post about Megan Whalen Turner's A Conspiracy of Kings, which included a picture of my own copy of the ARC. Afterwards, people kept asking me what was up with all the post-it flags, and I got all inspired and enthusiastic about writing a big long post about How to Read Books like a Writer. I was going to tell you all the things I'd flagged in A Conspiracy of Kings, then tell you why I'd flagged them. Unfortunately, Bitterblue yada yada, in other words, I never got the time, in addition to which, now that I look around, I can't find my copy of A Conspiracy of Kings anywhere. *directs suspicious glances at my sisters and other ne'er-do-wells*

So instead of that big grand post, I'm going to give you a teeny crappy post. :D? I'm going to share one tiny example of something I just flagged in the excellent book I'm currently reading, The Likeness, by Tana French:

When I was sure they were gone, I shut the door and stood still in the hallway, listening to the empty house. I could feel it settling, a long whisper like shifting sand, to see what I would do now. (p 124 of the 2008 Viking edition)

Here's the thing: when I read a book and find myself loving or admiring the writing, I'm always trying to learn from it. How is the writer making me feel this way? How is the writer being so evocative? How is the writer making it so damn easy for me to read this book?

So I flagged that line about the house, to remind myself that one small way to breathe life into a book is to breathe life into the book's important spaces. Almost everything I write has some sort of important domicile. Now that I've read this line by French, I want to remind myself to think about the spaces in my books, the buildings, and ask myself, what is my building like when my protagonist is alone? What does it feel like, what does it sound like, what kind of personality does it have? The next book I write will probably have moments where I try to do something with this. I also flagged this line:

The house felt huge and unwelcoming, the way a house sometimes does when you come back downstairs after you've closed up for the night: alien, withdrawn, focused on its own private business. (329)

Yet another reminder to try to think of new ways, when I'm writing, to breathe life into my settings.

Sometimes I'll read a book and flag nothing, or only one thing, because nothing much has sparked my writing brain; sometimes there aren't enough flags in the world for the book I'm reading. Sometimes a book is creating explosions in my mind with every single line and I don't flag anything because the whole damn book is a big waving, flapping flag.

I started doing this flagging thing when I started getting serious about writing. Once you find yourself trying to breathe life into people, places, dialogue, once you realize how hard and frustrating it is, it becomes impossible not to start deconstructing how other people do it.

And that's why I post-it flag the books I read. And to answer a frequently asked question, no, they're not color-coded. I will sometimes color-code the flags I use in my own manuscripts, in order to follow a single revision thread or a single character or WHATEVER all the way through, but I'm not that organized with the books I read.

Holiday Randutiae and a Couple FAQs

Dear Santa, I would like a teleporter for Christmas.

Though I have to admit that air travel has gotten less onerous for me recently. Not because anything has changed for the better at the airports or on the airlines; quite the opposite. Things seem to be getting worse. Rather, because I've come to realize that unless I want to be miserable all the time, there are certain things I just need to let go. Like my expectation of being treated with any dignity, for example. :D?  Sigh...

I just took a look at last year's resolutions. I've happy to say that I've kept them all, except for one: I still haven't baked any bread. I was too busy making Bitterblue. HOWEVER, there is still time, and I bet I can convince one of the many people I'll be traveling to in the next few weeks to make bread with me before the New Year.

A couple random FAQs: 

Should I read/reread Graceling and Fire before I read Bitterblue?
You don't need to. It wouldn't hurt, and I suppose it might help, but only do it if you feel like it; don't worry about it if you don't.

Why do you use swear words on your blog, but never the F word?
Because I'm saving the F word for the day when I write a blog post about the for-profit health insurance industry and the way its CEOs become wealthy by not only preying on, but exacerbating, other people's personal tragedies.

*ahem*

Happy Monday, everyone :o)

Bad Days, Voice Recognition Software, SNoQ, and Benedict Cumberbatch

Wednesday was one of those days where you wake up and it's so dark outside that you feel like there must've been some mix-up with the sun. And it never gets any brighter, and also your hands hurt, but you have to do a lot of computer work anyway, and because your hands hurt, you're clumsy, and because you're clumsy, you keep spilling crumbs and splattering liquids everywhere on account of a person must eat, and it sucks to have to clean everything all up, because your hands hurt.

I depend on my dictation software for my e-mail communications and the transcription of my work. I'm inexpressibly grateful for its existence. BUT that doesn't mean that it doesn't make me livid with anger, even bring me close to tears, from time to time. There are just some days where nothing works; no matter where you put the microphone, no matter how distinctly you speak, it won't get any of your words right, and nothing works, and you have to use your hands. On Wednesday, in the middle of an e-mail to my sister, codename: Apocalyptica the Flimflammer, I finally gave up. "I'm not correcting what my software just wrote," I dictated. "You can figure out what words I actually said, right?"

She wrote back, "Of course, and I'd much rather do some sleuth-work than have you typing."

A minute later, she wrote back with another e-mail: "Sleuth-work! Benedict Cumberbatch!"

What a splendid world it is when we can run into Benedict Cumberbatch around every corner.

Which reminds me of an excellent game of Sufficient Number of Questions (SNoQ) Apocalyptica and I recently played. (SNoQ, as I have explained before, is a game much like 20 Questions -- 20 Questions being the game where Person X thinks of a physical entity and Person Y guesses what the entity is by asking no more than 20 Yes/No questions. Here's the difference: With SNoQ, there are no limits to what the entity can be. It can be an abstract concept, a nonentity. It can be a made-up invention. It can be an existing thing that you might not in ordinary circumstances consider to be an existing thing. There are also no limits to the number of Yes/No questions Person Y is allowed to ask. S/he always asks whatever number is sufficient.)

It only took Apocalyptica about 25 minutes to guess this concept: Apocalyptica herself, rescuing Benedict Cumberbatch when he deposits a quarter into the world's largest gumball machine and the machine goes haywire, burying him in gumballs! She is a SNoQ pro! (Especially in matters concerning Benedict Cumberbatch. Which is why I made sure this matter did. Concern him, I mean.)

It took me significantly longer to guess "an apple blasting off." (I don't have it in me to explain the context for that, but if you're curious, it's quite delightful and has to do with the scientists who recently won the Nobel Prize in physics for discovering that the universe is expanding, and you can read about it here.)

Incidentally, my TOS keeps me from being able to type, but two things I can do without pain are: (1) drawing; and (2) procrastinating.

 Apocalyptica rescues Mr. Cumberbatch
 from a gumball calamity