P.C. Hodgell's Blog, page 12

Torisen

Eek.  I've been trying to figure out if/how Jame knows that Ganth tried to blood-bind Tori.  Tori sort of knows, but he's repressing the memory.  Sometimes these things really get complicated.

I've also been thinking about Tori.  Readers don't like that he keeps undercutting his sister, which is understandable.  He's basically a decent, intelligent,  caring person.  I hate dumping on him.  But the plot requires that he sink before he rises.  I'm thinking that he's already shown the Matriarch Trishien that his father Ganth can possess him via the shard of Ganth's soul left in Tori's soul-image.   And Ganth in turn was periodically blood-bound by his nasty brother Greshan.  That suggests that if Jame or anyone really pushes Tori/Ganth/Greshan's buttons, Tori may not be able to keep control, especially if said event plays on one of his key insecurities.  Something like that happens at the end of Sea of Time, with consequences.

Thoughts?

I drove up to Door County last Saturday with a roll of my father's prints for a gallery. Thirteen years dead and he still has fans, as is only right:  his work keeps its relevance over time.  It's wonderful stuff.  A friend came with me,.  We took the ferry out to Washington Island over Death's Door and got lost walking on the  8 acres that I own up there.  I hadn't seen it in maybe a decade and was lucky to find it at all.  It was pretty -- a forest of maple and paper birch with little undergrowth except for ferns and a high canopy of leaves.  Very airless and still, though.  No wind, birds, or crickets.  We came across strange circular piles of rocks and what looked like the skeleton of an unlikely tepee.  I started to think of the Blair Witch Project, also of the Anarchies in Rathillien, about which I first wrote soon after my initial experience with this land.   (That dead sapling that traps Jame's foot and nearly falls on her?  It happened to me.)  When we turned back, my sense of direction went haywire.  Thunder sounded in the distance, out over Lake Michigan.  My friend spooked because we were walking on damp ground under many trees.  I didn't know that she had a phobia about getting lost in the woods and made the mistake of following her too far to the east.   Finally we came across a road of sorts and followed it westward back to the car.  It was a long, strange day.

Update

It's now nine weeks after the riding accident.  After I got home, my boss from MOW came every day to wash and re-bandage my arm, bless her. This is the third time she's come to the rescue (the other two for breakage due to slip-and-falls, a shoulder and a wrist).  At first I was more inconvenienced by a limp due to my cracked pelvis, but that's worn off.  The elbow is growing new bone over the break and (I think) over the dozen or so screws that currently hold the whole mess together. That's kind of a strange idea,  the opposite of the Bradbury story about the man who wanted his skeleton removed.   I'm under strict orders not to lift anything heavy with my right hand for fear that I'll tear lose all that hardware.  My fingers tingle and my whole right arm vibrates like a bell.  I hope that will eventually go away.  Still, on the whole, I'm very lucky that it wasn't worse.

Meanwhile, the hunt begins for a new horse.  I'm currently looking at Morgans and Morgan crosses.  One ad was for a Morgan/Percheron mare who sounded perfect, but the owners didn't answer repeated phone calls.  We'll see what else is out there.  My trainer is helping me look. If we find something, he will take over Countess, which is very good of him as I can't afford to support two horses.   I've watched Countess give lessons to other riders.  She doesn't really wake up for the inexperienced, making her a safe if dull ride.  Then something clicks in her head and she's a racehorse again, as she was when she threw me.

No worldcon this year, alas, even though someone reports having seen me there.  I hope to make London in '14 and Spokane in '15.

I'm still struggling to write a summary of the next novel for Toni.  It seems to me that there are two more books in the series, so this one has to set up the next and last.  For the longest time, I couldn't face ending this story, not, at least, until I figured out what would happen to the characters afterwards.  Now that's in place, if I feel the need for further short stories.  At the moment, I just want to end while I'm capable of giving it my best.  Watching my mother's descent into dementia and my father's sudden death has make me very aware of mortality.  Falling off horses doesn't help.

Cover Art II

I spoke too soon.  Baen has given me a new cover artist, Eric Williams.  You can see samples of his work at http://www.ewillustration.com.    He does interesting things with color and faces.  What he wants from me is the description of an animal in Sea of Time.  Will need to think about that.

Yesterday I went out to the stable for the first time since the accident and talked to Marc about Countess.  The plan is to find her a new home and me a new horse, one I can trust.  I'm looking at Morgans currently.  That breed has always sounded attractive.  Finding one i can afford may be another matter.

Cover Art

<Sigh>  I was wandering the web last night and came across the following.  Although Toni at Baen promised me a different artist, it's Clyde again.  Truth to tell, this is a lot better than his last one.  For the first time, they asked me for suggestions, and this was one of them,

Sea of Time



©2012 Clyde Caldwell All Rights Reserved

Size: 16 ½" x 26"
Medium: Oils
Date: 2012
Publication: Cover for the Baen book by P.C. Hodgell

To purchase this original painting click here.


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Opps

It's been awhile since I last posted. When I finished the last novel, I sort of crawled into a hole and waited for the shock waves to subside. 2.5 years of concentrated effort takes it out of one.

More recently, though, I'm just back from the hospital trauma unit after plowing into the arena sand at 25-30 mph. Countess took off, as she sometimes does especially when I use my jingling travel saddle. I lost a stirrup, she started to buck, and I came crashing down elbow first. Of all the times I've been thrown, this was by far the worst. Besides shattering my elbow, I broke several ribs, punctured a lung, and cracked my pelvis. No damage to head, neck, or spine. The ambulance hauled me into Neenah, siren blaring and attendants shouting questions about presidents while they cut me out of my clothes (damn: I'd finally gotten a pair of riding britches I liked). I don't remember much about that first night except for getting tangled up in blankets and tubes. I could hear the nurses talking at their station, but they apparently couldn't hear me shouting with increasing desperation for help. When one finally turned up, she told me, crossly, that I should have rung for her. I don't remember them putting my elbow back together, which is probably a good thing. I was surprised afterward that the fingers still had sensation and strength. Four days followed with me flat on my back. I slept a lot, when permitted, read a collection of stories selected by Alfred Hitchock, and listened to sounds out in the hall. I couldn't make out the words, but one nurse murmured incessantly with the cadence of prayer. Others whispered outside my door, went away, and came back. The door opened. No one was there. By the fourth day, the wall paper began to crawl with an oily sheen of pink and aqua dots. "It's the pain-killers," a nurse told me. She had apparently never heard of Gilman's "Yellow Wall Paper."

So now I'm home again, more inconvenienced by a pulled leg muscle than by anything else. I have to decide what I'm going to do about Canada. Also, I need to seriously consider my future riding career. True, this is the first really bad accident in 13 years, but at my age, how many can I afford?

Yow

I haven't written about Countess for quite awhile because she's been behaving and really does have a sweet temper. Not so yesterday. I knew there was going to be a problem when she danced on my toes in the stall. When we got out into the arena, she tossed her head, tried to bolt, went backwards, and reared. I wasn't so much scared as at a loss what to do and, yes, worried about what she would do next. Marc got on her three times, trying to calm her down, with limited success. In the stall afterward, he put her on shortened cross ties and swore to leave her there all night if necessary. I wasn't to feel sorry for her. He would put a bullet in her head, he said, before he saw her break my neck. I left her trying to kick down her water bucket.

Mind you, none of this behavior was malicious. Rather, she seemed to be intolerably irritated by something. Nothing seemed to be wrong with her bridle, bit, or saddle. She may have been in season, but that's never made her act up so much before. We'll see what she's like on Monday.

Meanwhile, my agent tells me that Baen has already sent in the ms. delivery payment. That was fast. I doubt if Toni has had time to read it yet and may yet have revision suggestions, but apparently she trusts me to have turned in an acceptable story. Now my agent wants an outline for the next one. Eek. I know how it all ends, but not everything that happens before then.

And I may be making a six day road trip in the Canadian Rockies in August. It would be so nice to get away for awhile after the stain of finishing the novel. Too bad it isn't sooner.

Sea of Time Turned in to Baen

Hurray, it's done! I sent off the ms. to Baen this morning, all 120,000 words of it. Toni tells me that it's scheduled for release summer '14. She also says that she will assign it to a different cover artist.

Meanwhile, a question: does anyone know who took the photo of me that appears on wikipedia (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/P._C._Hodgell)? I'm going to appear at a book festival in Waukesha, WI in September, and we would like to use said photo in publicity if we can get permission.

Martian Brains and Other Things

I forget who put me onto this knitting pattern, but here's what came out of it:

"Martian," because the aliens in Mars Attacks! have blue tinted, bulging brains. This hat is for the Harvy Milk silent auction. I also knit a pair of fingerless gloves to go along with it.

Meanwhile, I'm on the last chapter of the new novel, with a deadline of May 1. Since I revise as I go, I'm a bit worried that the end won't be as polished as the beginning. I suppose my editor will tell me if that's the case, though. On the other hand, it may be weeks until she gets to it, so I can keep tinkering.

I've been thinking about the initiation/hazing thread. Lots of your ideas are good, probably better than what I came up with which is more a threat than anything else. The following is about a challenge that's been issued to Jame's ten to ride out on wide patrol to the foothills. The peculiar mares are called "thorns" -- As Harn tells Jame later, "Introduce a mare in season to a rathorn stallion and, if he doesn’t kill her, eleven months later you get the blackest, meanest little filly you can imagine. All they lack is their sire’s armor."


Brier and the rest of the ten command had gotten perhaps ten miles away from Kothifir by the time that Jame caught up with them, having slowed Bel alternately to a trot and a walk so as not to over-tire her. Jame rode up beside Brier Iron-thorn on her tall chestnut gelding. Bel’s head barely came up to his shoulder. Neither spoke for the next mile. The others tactfully fell back to give them privacy.
“You should have told me,” Jame said at last, nudging the Whinno-hir into a brief trot to catch up with the chestnut’s longer stride. Trinity, no wonder people used saddles; her tailbone throbbed with every bounce.
Brier shrugged. “You had other things to do. Besides, why should you waste a day with the rest of us?”
“Because I’m your ten-commander, idiot. I assume that precious note of yours included me.”
“It did. Specifically. In none too polite terms.”
“Which made you all the more determined to leave me out.”
Brier shrugged again. “It was a stupid order, and presumptuous, given who sent it, to demand that the Knorth Lordan do anything. To involve you in such nonsense demeans us all.”
Jame sighed. “If it had only been addressed to me, I might have torn it up the way Gorbel did with his challenge. Rue had it right: this little expedition proves nothing unless we run into a raid. But I am your commander and therefore responsible for you. In the future, we aren’t going to like many of the commands given to us, but we will still have to obey them. Do you have any spare water, by the way?”
Brier unhooked a goatskin pouch from her saddle and handed it down to her. Jame drank, then leaned forward to offer Bel a cupped handful of water. The mare’s pink tongue rasped her fingers dry, once, twice, and again.
“All right,” she said, straightening, a bit defensive. “I’m here without travel rations, tack, or even a weapon, discounting the knife in my boot. When I saw you heading out without me, well, I didn’t stop to think.”
She paused, flicked by her sixth sense. Death’s-head was nearby, but so was something else.
“Horses,” she said. “Strange ones.”
They were finally in the foothills of the Apollynes, their view restricted by rolling hills, shrubs, and giant rocks. Their mounts stirred uneasily as hoof-beats approached both ahead of them and behind. Could it be another Gemman raid like the one that had cost the young seeker her life?
The rathorn Death’s-head roared around a boulder lower down and surged up the incline toward them, his white mane roached up all down his spine and his tail flying like a battle standard.
Simultaneously, black mares erupted from the surrounding rocks with riders also in black, cheches concealing all but hard, bright eyes set in sun-dark faces.
“Karnids,” Brier snapped. “Circle up.”
The cadets backed rump to rump with Bel squeezed in the middle, in danger of being kicked by anyone of them. Jame slipped off and dodged between the surrounding horses. Death’s-head swerved toward her, as usual nearly running her over but allowing her to grab his mane and swing onto his back as he surged past. The rathorn pivoted to face the mares, then paused, snorting. Some of them were in season. Their scent drew off his attention as others dashed in.
Jame found herself in the center of a swirling storm of horseflesh. Sleek black heads with red eyes snaked past. White fangs snapped at her. Hands grabbed. She drew her knife and hacked at them, all the time clinging to the rathorn’s mane, forced to ride high by the roached spine. Brier’s shout seemed distant. They were running away with her, the rathorn stumbling over rocky ground, striking almost at random.
Come. You know where you belong.
The image formed in her mind of a tall, black-robed figure lifting his arms to receive her. He wore a single, silver glove.
I hacked off that hand when it reached out between scarlet ribbons to claim me …
Death’s-head snorted and steadied.
Not my lady.
Then he stumbled again and threw Jame over his head. She fell among rocks and lay there, dazed. All around her iron hooves struck spark from stone. A hand grabbed her arm and jerked her up across a saddle, knocking the breath out of her. The dimming sky whirled overhead. Then it went black.

Woman with a Box

Here's a question for you.

I'm reading Agatha Christie's The Pale Horse and in passing she mentions "the Woman with a Box" as if it were a common folklore concept. (Pandora?) I'm curious because the new novel also features such a character, a crone with a box containing death as a dark aspect of the Earth Wife. It always freaks me out when I re-invent something. I swear to you, I came up with the Three Faced God long before I encountered him/her/it in Indian mythology.

To screen or not to screen?

I've noticed that a number of recent comments have been screened, and to answer them I have to un-screen them. Is that a problem to the original poster? I don't want to embarress anyone, but I don't know how else to respond.