Maya Kaathryn Bohnhoff's Blog: #42 Pencil: A Writer's Life, the Universe, and Everything, page 118

Best of the Blog: Would You Please Fucking Stop

Editor’s note: The Book View Cafe blog has been around since 2008 and we’ve run at least 1,500 entries. Today we’re starting a weekly series reprinting some of our favorites. Up first: Ursula K. Le Guin and our all time most-popular blog post.

By Ursula K. Le Guin

I keep reading books and seeing movies where nobody can fucking say anything except fuck, unless they say shit. I mean they don’t seem to have any adjective to describe fucking except fucking even when they’re fucking fucking. And sh...

Truth and Lies

I am not a liar.

I’m not talking about daily life lies here. I can admire an ugly haircut with the best of them. Nor am I protesting that I’m too moral to lie in circumstances where the truth would get me into real trouble. I’m sure I’ve done that more often than I’d like to admit, despite being incompetent at it. (I have to plan lies very carefully, which is probably a dead giveaway.)

What I mean is, I’m not lying when I write fiction. I don’t subscribe to the common wisdom that fiction writer...

BVC Announces JAMES FAIRFAX by Jane Austen and Adam Campan

James Fairfax

by Jane Austen and Adam Campan

Foreword

by Adam Campan

Jane Austen

It’s been two centuries since Jane Austen’s Emma appeared. Austen’s popularity has experienced a tidal ebb and resurgence ever since, resulting in a world-wide recognition unmatched by any other writer of her period.

Some claim that Austen’s current popularity owes itself to the films. The true Janeite will maintain that the film versions, though varying in eye appeal—culminating, many claim, in Colin Firth’s famous di...

WWW Wednesday 6-12-2013

It’s WWW Wednesday. This meme is from shouldbereading.

hi. it’s me and i’m pooks and i spilled iced tea on my macBook Air yesterday and one shift key isn’t working right now. since this is a very bizzy day, i’m not going to fight it. So let’s turn this into a game.

Which shift key isn’t working/

okay, i didn’t say it was a hard game. or even a fun game. So, sue me.

Anyway, here’s the thing. i feel like a very unloyal fangirl. i discovered a new writer who writes urban fantasy set in london, and d...

All Creatures Real and Otherwise: Going to the Dogs

On the principle that everyone can use a weekly cute critter break, we’re starting a new series of posts featuring the animal companions of Book View Cafe members along with other creatures we have seen in the wild and not so wild.

Although the Internet is powered by cats, we are beginning with dogs.

BVC’s newest member, Doranna Durgin (so new she doesn’t have an author page yet), has a literate dog. She says: “ConneryBeagle chooses his next good read with care. Must be a BVC book!”

Apparently h...

BVC Announces Azkhantian Tales by Deborah J. Ross

From the world of The Seven-Petaled Shield.

Across the Azkhantian steppe, warrior women ride to battle against foes both human and supernatural. From the world of The Seven-Petaled Shield come four fantasy tales, originally published in Marion Zimmer Bradley’s Sword & Sorceress.

Prophecy links a mother and daughter in an unbreakable bond.

A young woman defies tradition to become a shaman.

When twins are magically divided, the survivor searches for the other half of her soul.

A warrior woman discov...

BVC Announces the Jane Madison Series, by Mindy Klasky

Jane Madison is a librarian who finds out that she’s a witch. Girl’s Guide to Witchcraft begins the series, introducing Jane to her magical abilities – as well as to her warder and her familiar. The story continues in Sorcery and the Single Girl, when Jane is invited to join her exclusive local Coven. Jane’s story concludes in Magic and the Modern Girl, when she discovers the consequences of letting her powers lie fallow for just a little too long. In addition, this edition includes bonus rec...

Marginalized =/= Magic

I grumbled about children in fiction (particularly in, but not limited to, media fiction: TV, movies, etc.) some months ago. When I re-read the post I metaphorically smacked myself on the forehead, remembering that what initially got me thinking about all this was a TV show in which an autistic kid (and his family) were menaced by a serial killer. In this show, the boy exercised agency and saved the day. Exercising agency=good, certainly. But I wondered why, given the shape of the plot, the w...

Writing Nowadays–Scripted Romance

Elizabeth Browning wrote, “How do I love thee? Let me count the ways,” and people take that as a metaphor.

But seriously–count them. Please!

I’m coming off yet another poorly-written romance novel simultaneously catching up on the TV show ONCE UPON A TIME, and I recently re-watched BROKEBACK MOUNTAIN. All of them are supposed to twang with heart-rendering romance, yet they all fall flat. What the heck is going on? Let’s take a look so we can all avoid the same problem.

In all three cases–novel,...

Author Interview: Jennifer Stevenson

Jennifer Stevenson

Interviewed by Katharine Eliska Kimbriel

Rereleased at Book View Cafe this Spring are King of Hearts and Fools Paradise, by Jennifer Stevenson, two romantic comedies set in the blue collar world of union stagehands and all the rest of the folk who get live productions up and running.

Jen will release five books in her Hinky Chicago series on Book View Cafe this year, including The Hinky Brass Bed, The Hinky Velvet Chair , The Hinky Bearskin Rug, The Hinky Genie Lamp, and A Hin...