Lyda Morehouse's Blog, page 22
January 18, 2015
A Bloody End
Mason and I have the worst luck sometimes.
I went out today to get some groceries and noticed that it was, in point of fact, a f*cking GORGEOUS day. So, when I came home I talked Mason into heading out to "the slopes," as we call the the St. Paul Country Club's Golf Course hill. We piled into the car with a couple of sleds... and it was AWESOME. I bet we went up and down that hill twenty times, screaming all the way down, and hiking our way back up happy (if exhausted.) Right at the very end, we decided to go down together on the toboggan. We'd done this before, mind. The second time was spectacular (the first time I was so scared I clung to Mason and said words an 11 year old should probably not hear from their mother.) So, it seemed a safe bet. Except, of course, somewhere right at the foot, when we were nearly free and clear, something happened. I think an edge of my butt slipped off the sled and we flipped.
And Mason face-surfed his way down.
To add insult to injury, I think rolled over him, like an alligator going into a death roll...
But, despite this mayhem, the most we suffered was some road rash and bruises. No trips to the hospital required. It was just... a painful end to a previously PERFECT day sledding.
The good news is that we got in a solid two hours of fun before disaster hit. I tell you though, something was gunning for some kind of pain, because we watched at least one kid hit a tree (they're all padded, but that's still a jolt), and two others go so fast in their plastic sled that they not only cleared the ridge (a natural up slope that usually stops most sled) but launched themselves over the steps (only barely missing the metal hand-holds) and crashed into the fence. It's not easy to describe the distance they went, but it was INSANE. Moreover, if either of them had been about two inches taller they'd have had some serious head injuries--because they went THROUGH the stair railing. THROUGH it. They were both wearing helmets (which neither Mason and I ever do, though we probably should, given our track record.)
Insane.
But, I don't Mason and I regret going. It was so much fun.
In other news, I finally saw "Edge of Tomorrow." Wow! I'd heard it was a good science fiction film, but I'd no idea. Very well done. If you haven't seen it and you're into SF, I recommend it hands down. No question. Say what you will about Tom Cruise, but he picks really good SF films to be in. Shawn and I both really liked "Oblivion" too.
I'd gush more about it, but I don't want to spoil any of it for people who haven't seen it yet.
When I was at work on Saturday, I learned how to do an inter-library loan because I wanted to continue my hunt to read all the Philip K. Dick award nominees this year. I've got THE BULLET CATCHER'S DAUGHTER by Rod Duncan. The Ramsey County library system had MEMORY OF WATER by Emmi Itäranta, so I'm having that pulled for me, and we managed to inter-library loan ELYSIUM by Jennifer Marie Brissett. So I'll probably have two books waiting for me next Saturday. Which is a little dangerous given how slow I read, but I'll read the ILL book first since those can't be renewed.
Did I tell you about MAPLECROFT: The Borden Dispatches? I ended up mostly really enjoying that. I only add the "mostly" because I was a little unhappy with the ending. I suspect that, in a quest to be historically accurate, Cherie Priest went a certain way, which was a shame because it short-circuited some character growth. I ended up not much caring for one of the main characters thanks to that. But, I'd still recommend it, though I find trying to tell people about it very difficult because it usually goes like this, "So, okay, the main character is Lizzy Borden, yeah, yeah, that one, with the axe! Right, so she's using her axe to hunt, erm, these freaky sea creatures or maybe aliens or something Chthulu-like..." and by this point most people are backing away VERY SLOWLY.
Even while I'm saying, "No, seriously, it's GOOD!"
It actually got under my skin so much when I was reading it that I had a dream about water running in our house (which is an image Priest uses a lot.) Plus, let's be honest, with my dyslexia, the fact that I got all the way to the end is a huge testimony to the strength of this book.
Okay, I'm going to go nurse my sore knuckles and maybe settle in with some Bullet Catcher.
I went out today to get some groceries and noticed that it was, in point of fact, a f*cking GORGEOUS day. So, when I came home I talked Mason into heading out to "the slopes," as we call the the St. Paul Country Club's Golf Course hill. We piled into the car with a couple of sleds... and it was AWESOME. I bet we went up and down that hill twenty times, screaming all the way down, and hiking our way back up happy (if exhausted.) Right at the very end, we decided to go down together on the toboggan. We'd done this before, mind. The second time was spectacular (the first time I was so scared I clung to Mason and said words an 11 year old should probably not hear from their mother.) So, it seemed a safe bet. Except, of course, somewhere right at the foot, when we were nearly free and clear, something happened. I think an edge of my butt slipped off the sled and we flipped.
And Mason face-surfed his way down.
To add insult to injury, I think rolled over him, like an alligator going into a death roll...
But, despite this mayhem, the most we suffered was some road rash and bruises. No trips to the hospital required. It was just... a painful end to a previously PERFECT day sledding.
The good news is that we got in a solid two hours of fun before disaster hit. I tell you though, something was gunning for some kind of pain, because we watched at least one kid hit a tree (they're all padded, but that's still a jolt), and two others go so fast in their plastic sled that they not only cleared the ridge (a natural up slope that usually stops most sled) but launched themselves over the steps (only barely missing the metal hand-holds) and crashed into the fence. It's not easy to describe the distance they went, but it was INSANE. Moreover, if either of them had been about two inches taller they'd have had some serious head injuries--because they went THROUGH the stair railing. THROUGH it. They were both wearing helmets (which neither Mason and I ever do, though we probably should, given our track record.)
Insane.
But, I don't Mason and I regret going. It was so much fun.
In other news, I finally saw "Edge of Tomorrow." Wow! I'd heard it was a good science fiction film, but I'd no idea. Very well done. If you haven't seen it and you're into SF, I recommend it hands down. No question. Say what you will about Tom Cruise, but he picks really good SF films to be in. Shawn and I both really liked "Oblivion" too.
I'd gush more about it, but I don't want to spoil any of it for people who haven't seen it yet.
When I was at work on Saturday, I learned how to do an inter-library loan because I wanted to continue my hunt to read all the Philip K. Dick award nominees this year. I've got THE BULLET CATCHER'S DAUGHTER by Rod Duncan. The Ramsey County library system had MEMORY OF WATER by Emmi Itäranta, so I'm having that pulled for me, and we managed to inter-library loan ELYSIUM by Jennifer Marie Brissett. So I'll probably have two books waiting for me next Saturday. Which is a little dangerous given how slow I read, but I'll read the ILL book first since those can't be renewed.
Did I tell you about MAPLECROFT: The Borden Dispatches? I ended up mostly really enjoying that. I only add the "mostly" because I was a little unhappy with the ending. I suspect that, in a quest to be historically accurate, Cherie Priest went a certain way, which was a shame because it short-circuited some character growth. I ended up not much caring for one of the main characters thanks to that. But, I'd still recommend it, though I find trying to tell people about it very difficult because it usually goes like this, "So, okay, the main character is Lizzy Borden, yeah, yeah, that one, with the axe! Right, so she's using her axe to hunt, erm, these freaky sea creatures or maybe aliens or something Chthulu-like..." and by this point most people are backing away VERY SLOWLY.
Even while I'm saying, "No, seriously, it's GOOD!"
It actually got under my skin so much when I was reading it that I had a dream about water running in our house (which is an image Priest uses a lot.) Plus, let's be honest, with my dyslexia, the fact that I got all the way to the end is a huge testimony to the strength of this book.
Okay, I'm going to go nurse my sore knuckles and maybe settle in with some Bullet Catcher.
January 16, 2015
Secret to Life: Show Up (for your court date)
One of the things I did this week that I haven't had a chance to blog about is that I got to stand up and be a witness at a legal name change.
We showed up at the Ramsey County Courthouse at nine am and got shuffled into one of the minor courts. You remember the TV show Night Court? It had that kind of feel. Like, it was all very legal with a witness stand and such, but sort of... low scale. Not a lot of pomp and circumstance or marble trim, if you know what I mean. Similarly, it was serious, but not super-formal. I'm not even sure the judge wore robes, though we did have to stand when she entered.
What I didn't know, but should have expected, is that while you're expected to be there at 9 am sharp, pretty much you get called the order of first come first serve and your case is one of probably twenty or more. We were number 12. And justice is actually fairly swift. We were out of there by 10:30 am or so, which considering that the judge oversaw a number of things besides legal name change petitions, I was actually impressed.
One of my friend's other witnesses sat beside me on the bench seat in the audience and surfed the internet while we waited; I sat on the edge of my seat UTTERLY FASCINATED by how it all worked.
The majority of the cases were name changes. They were, for the most part, the sorts of thing you might expect. Petitions on behalf of minors who were now part of a melded family and everyone wanted to share the same surname. One guy was changing his middle name because, somehow during the process of naturalization, he heeded up with just "C" instead of his full family name on his legal documents.
But I'm also here to tell you that at least one district judge in the state of Minnesota GOT THE MEMO about how to be decent to trans* people. The case right before ours was that of a young man who was changing his name from his birth name (something clearly feminine) to something more appropriate. The judge never, EVER used a pronoun with this young man until someone else did. She (the judge) said things like "are you the plaintiff" and when it came to the witnesses "What is your relationship to the plaintiff?" As soon as that person said, "I'm his friend," the judge embraced that and started saying "And do you feel this change is a good fit for him?" etc. When the friend said, "I do," the judge said, "And I do too. Very much." (TBF she said that about almost every name change, which actually made it more awesome.)
Some of the other cases were fascinating too. A couple insurance settlements. And then the most important takeaway of all? Show up. There were two? Maybe three? Cases where the plaintiff didn't show up at all and as a consequence their life got shittier. In one case a whole lot shittier because an arrest warrant was issued on the spot.
So that adage? Showing up is half the battle?
SUPER ACCURATE.
And, just to bow on it, my friends' new name got accepted and changed. Whoohoo!
We showed up at the Ramsey County Courthouse at nine am and got shuffled into one of the minor courts. You remember the TV show Night Court? It had that kind of feel. Like, it was all very legal with a witness stand and such, but sort of... low scale. Not a lot of pomp and circumstance or marble trim, if you know what I mean. Similarly, it was serious, but not super-formal. I'm not even sure the judge wore robes, though we did have to stand when she entered.
What I didn't know, but should have expected, is that while you're expected to be there at 9 am sharp, pretty much you get called the order of first come first serve and your case is one of probably twenty or more. We were number 12. And justice is actually fairly swift. We were out of there by 10:30 am or so, which considering that the judge oversaw a number of things besides legal name change petitions, I was actually impressed.
One of my friend's other witnesses sat beside me on the bench seat in the audience and surfed the internet while we waited; I sat on the edge of my seat UTTERLY FASCINATED by how it all worked.
The majority of the cases were name changes. They were, for the most part, the sorts of thing you might expect. Petitions on behalf of minors who were now part of a melded family and everyone wanted to share the same surname. One guy was changing his middle name because, somehow during the process of naturalization, he heeded up with just "C" instead of his full family name on his legal documents.
But I'm also here to tell you that at least one district judge in the state of Minnesota GOT THE MEMO about how to be decent to trans* people. The case right before ours was that of a young man who was changing his name from his birth name (something clearly feminine) to something more appropriate. The judge never, EVER used a pronoun with this young man until someone else did. She (the judge) said things like "are you the plaintiff" and when it came to the witnesses "What is your relationship to the plaintiff?" As soon as that person said, "I'm his friend," the judge embraced that and started saying "And do you feel this change is a good fit for him?" etc. When the friend said, "I do," the judge said, "And I do too. Very much." (TBF she said that about almost every name change, which actually made it more awesome.)
Some of the other cases were fascinating too. A couple insurance settlements. And then the most important takeaway of all? Show up. There were two? Maybe three? Cases where the plaintiff didn't show up at all and as a consequence their life got shittier. In one case a whole lot shittier because an arrest warrant was issued on the spot.
So that adage? Showing up is half the battle?
SUPER ACCURATE.
And, just to bow on it, my friends' new name got accepted and changed. Whoohoo!
January 15, 2015
Step One: Stand Up
As you know, Bob, I'm attempting to get myself back on track this year.
The reason you haven't heard from me in the last few days is because I've been revising (maybe even, one could say "reshaping") the web serial that Rachel Gold/Calish and I wrote called "School for Wayward Demons" into book form. We're planning on having it available for MarsCON 2015, where I will be a guest of honor. If I dare say so? After all that work (and knowing that it's not even done yet, that Rachel will be going over it again), I think it's pretty damn good.
I'm little nervous about next steps. We're talking about doing a Kickstarter for this series--something I've thought about a lot, but never dared. We're only just sitting down to figure out how we might do that, because... well, because it's a big undertaking. Do we ask people to fund the production of this book in its print form? Do we ask people to fund the next book(s) and use this one as a premium? Both? Something else entirely?
If any of you out there have Kickstarter/Indigogo experience, advice, or even just strident opinions, please let me know. You can comment here, or email me (lyda.morehouse@gmail.com). Rachel and I are meeting tomorrow, but we'll be gathering information for a little while, for sure.
I'll frank, too, the nervous part has to do with how much I worry that Kickstarters and Indigogo things are popularity contests to some extent, and the nerd in me fears that the only award I'd get in such a contest would be "least likely to succeed." This fear of mine is currently being feed by the fact that I failed to reach critical mass for my Loft Fan Fiction class. Now I have theories about why that class didn't go and at least one of them falls squarely on Rachel and my shoulders. The title and the description were a little bland, not very snappy. We were trying to figure out how to appeal to the type of Loft student who can afford in-house classes and, in doing that, I think we went a little broad. If we were to offer this in the future, I think we shouldn't bother with that imaginary student and just try to hook the friendly neighborhood geek. We pushed the class as kind of the: so you want to do that 50 Shades of Gray thing and turn your fic into pro work, eh? angle.
The only problem with just embracing the geek is that I think the Loft's prices are a big stumbling block for a lot of people. (They would be for me. Frankly, I just signed up for 8 weeks Japanese Intermediate at Community Ed. and I nearly baulked at the 60 bucks. The Loft charges $300 or more for 6 weeks.)
So maybe the lesson here (and for the Kickstarter?) might be: scale costs to your audience.
We'll have to see. I'm a big proponent of the impulse buy, which is why I talked my editor/publisher at Wizard's Tower Press into such low costs for my e-books. In my case (and which will be the case with School for Wayward Demons) a lot of people already owned my books. With School... a lot of content is on-line and free. The book is significantly deeper and, in a few cases, different, but we're going to have to be sure to keep that in mind when we think about how we're going about this.
I don't know.
It's going to be interesting, if nothing else.
Meanwhile, did I say I signed up for Intermediate Japanese? I'm so psyched! It's going to be a blast (I hope.) Same teacher: Tetsuya-sensei, whom I really grew to love, so that will be good. I've been supplementing in the meantime by listening to JapanPod101.com. All that really means is that I now remember how to introduce myself to someone for the first time! (The most basic thing ever. Still. I am practicing, which is IMPORTANT.)
Also, I should do a blog post tomorrow about all my reading. I finished MAPLECROFT: The Borden Dispatches by Cherie Priest. I also got tapped to read and blurb a book by a new author who seems to be writing New Adult SF Dystopia--though I can't really say for sure, because so far, I only opened up the document long enough to make sure it came through all right. I'm going to try to read through that this weekend, and then start up on the second of the Philip K. Dick award nominees, BULLET CATCHER'S DAUGHTER by Rod Duncan.
At the library on Tuesday night, I noticed that Arden Hills had the third Hawkeye collection: HAWKEYE: L.A. WOMAN (Fraction/Wu, Pulido). This one seems to follow Kate Bishop (aka Hawkeye--yes, folks, there are two) when she gets fed up with Clint and goes to Los Angeles. She apparently takes the Dog, who is, BY FAR, the fan favorite if fic requests during Yuletide are any indication.
So that's me. You?
Also, Wyrdsmiths has a new member, Theo Lorenz.
The reason you haven't heard from me in the last few days is because I've been revising (maybe even, one could say "reshaping") the web serial that Rachel Gold/Calish and I wrote called "School for Wayward Demons" into book form. We're planning on having it available for MarsCON 2015, where I will be a guest of honor. If I dare say so? After all that work (and knowing that it's not even done yet, that Rachel will be going over it again), I think it's pretty damn good.
I'm little nervous about next steps. We're talking about doing a Kickstarter for this series--something I've thought about a lot, but never dared. We're only just sitting down to figure out how we might do that, because... well, because it's a big undertaking. Do we ask people to fund the production of this book in its print form? Do we ask people to fund the next book(s) and use this one as a premium? Both? Something else entirely?
If any of you out there have Kickstarter/Indigogo experience, advice, or even just strident opinions, please let me know. You can comment here, or email me (lyda.morehouse@gmail.com). Rachel and I are meeting tomorrow, but we'll be gathering information for a little while, for sure.
I'll frank, too, the nervous part has to do with how much I worry that Kickstarters and Indigogo things are popularity contests to some extent, and the nerd in me fears that the only award I'd get in such a contest would be "least likely to succeed." This fear of mine is currently being feed by the fact that I failed to reach critical mass for my Loft Fan Fiction class. Now I have theories about why that class didn't go and at least one of them falls squarely on Rachel and my shoulders. The title and the description were a little bland, not very snappy. We were trying to figure out how to appeal to the type of Loft student who can afford in-house classes and, in doing that, I think we went a little broad. If we were to offer this in the future, I think we shouldn't bother with that imaginary student and just try to hook the friendly neighborhood geek. We pushed the class as kind of the: so you want to do that 50 Shades of Gray thing and turn your fic into pro work, eh? angle.
The only problem with just embracing the geek is that I think the Loft's prices are a big stumbling block for a lot of people. (They would be for me. Frankly, I just signed up for 8 weeks Japanese Intermediate at Community Ed. and I nearly baulked at the 60 bucks. The Loft charges $300 or more for 6 weeks.)
So maybe the lesson here (and for the Kickstarter?) might be: scale costs to your audience.
We'll have to see. I'm a big proponent of the impulse buy, which is why I talked my editor/publisher at Wizard's Tower Press into such low costs for my e-books. In my case (and which will be the case with School for Wayward Demons) a lot of people already owned my books. With School... a lot of content is on-line and free. The book is significantly deeper and, in a few cases, different, but we're going to have to be sure to keep that in mind when we think about how we're going about this.
I don't know.
It's going to be interesting, if nothing else.
Meanwhile, did I say I signed up for Intermediate Japanese? I'm so psyched! It's going to be a blast (I hope.) Same teacher: Tetsuya-sensei, whom I really grew to love, so that will be good. I've been supplementing in the meantime by listening to JapanPod101.com. All that really means is that I now remember how to introduce myself to someone for the first time! (The most basic thing ever. Still. I am practicing, which is IMPORTANT.)
Also, I should do a blog post tomorrow about all my reading. I finished MAPLECROFT: The Borden Dispatches by Cherie Priest. I also got tapped to read and blurb a book by a new author who seems to be writing New Adult SF Dystopia--though I can't really say for sure, because so far, I only opened up the document long enough to make sure it came through all right. I'm going to try to read through that this weekend, and then start up on the second of the Philip K. Dick award nominees, BULLET CATCHER'S DAUGHTER by Rod Duncan.
At the library on Tuesday night, I noticed that Arden Hills had the third Hawkeye collection: HAWKEYE: L.A. WOMAN (Fraction/Wu, Pulido). This one seems to follow Kate Bishop (aka Hawkeye--yes, folks, there are two) when she gets fed up with Clint and goes to Los Angeles. She apparently takes the Dog, who is, BY FAR, the fan favorite if fic requests during Yuletide are any indication.
So that's me. You?
Also, Wyrdsmiths has a new member, Theo Lorenz.
January 8, 2015
No More Mourning the Rug
Today, I feel fairly accomplished (at least so far), despite not doing that much writing. I did work on a number of writing-related things, however.
First of all, I wrote the acknowledgements and a new bio for a short story in the AngeLINK universe that Cheryl Morgan at Wizard's Tower Press will be publishing. It's a story that was first published in, of all places, South Africa, in 2003, in a magazine called Simulacrum: The Magazine of Speculative Transformation. The short story is going to get cover art for the first time EVER, which I bought from the lovely and talented Theo Lorenz, who happens to be the author of the successful coloring book Unicorns Are Jerks (and others.)
What do you think? I know it doesn't match Bruce Jensen's amazing cover art for the AngeLINK universe or even the cover of Resurrection Code, but... I don't know, maybe short stories are friendlier? (Also, I didn't ask Bruce, because I'm sure I can't afford him.)
At any rate, I'm pretty excited to have this story come out and have a wider distribution. Wizard's Tower Press has been very awesome to me. I will let you know when this will be available for public consumption. I believe that it's first going to be part of a giveaway for the Accessing the Future Anthology's successful fundraiser. But, I suspect once they have the contributors have their copies, Wizard's Tower will make it available to the public. And, yes, of course, as soon as I have those details, I'll post them here (and probably everywhere. :-)
And, since we're talking writing, there are two new chapters up at the Enter The Unseen/School for Wayward Demons website, "The Cavalry Arrives with Donuts" and "Destroying the Dead." So, if you've continued along with the story, there's just so much extra goodness for you today.
Speaking of the School for Wayward Demons, I got a very, very rough draft of the novel version off Naomi for beta-reading and probably some triage/first aid. I feel like the novel has good bones but, because of the way Rachel and I wrote it, it's a kind of Franken-story, stitched together with very obvious stitches! :-) But, Naomi is a very smart reader and has always in the past found ways to make my books make sense, so I trust her to have good advice to smooth out the rough edges.
And, to be fair, this is all work I'm doing before I'm even giving it back to my co-author, so it will get many subsequent passes. I'm absolutely sure that by the time we're done, it will be one seriously amazing book.
Fingers crossed, 2015 will start with at least two publications! So yay! Go me!
My other resolution has to do with the blog post I made below in which I discussed some of my publishing "feels." As I told one of the commenters, one of my problems is that I actually had a really good career with Penguin and so when the rug got yanked out from me, I was so stunned that I just sat there on the floor, not getting up, shouting to all passers-by "HEY, THERE WAS RUG HERE! WHAT HAPPENED TO MY RUG? WHY DO YOU STILL HAVE A RUG? I WANT MY RUG BACK!"
It's time to get up off the floor. The rug is gone, my friends, and it's time to move on.
So, I'm going to finish up UnJust Cause, self-publish that, and then, with any luck at all, start on some new novel project.
I'm kind of excited to see what it will be.
First of all, I wrote the acknowledgements and a new bio for a short story in the AngeLINK universe that Cheryl Morgan at Wizard's Tower Press will be publishing. It's a story that was first published in, of all places, South Africa, in 2003, in a magazine called Simulacrum: The Magazine of Speculative Transformation. The short story is going to get cover art for the first time EVER, which I bought from the lovely and talented Theo Lorenz, who happens to be the author of the successful coloring book Unicorns Are Jerks (and others.)
What do you think? I know it doesn't match Bruce Jensen's amazing cover art for the AngeLINK universe or even the cover of Resurrection Code, but... I don't know, maybe short stories are friendlier? (Also, I didn't ask Bruce, because I'm sure I can't afford him.)
At any rate, I'm pretty excited to have this story come out and have a wider distribution. Wizard's Tower Press has been very awesome to me. I will let you know when this will be available for public consumption. I believe that it's first going to be part of a giveaway for the Accessing the Future Anthology's successful fundraiser. But, I suspect once they have the contributors have their copies, Wizard's Tower will make it available to the public. And, yes, of course, as soon as I have those details, I'll post them here (and probably everywhere. :-)
And, since we're talking writing, there are two new chapters up at the Enter The Unseen/School for Wayward Demons website, "The Cavalry Arrives with Donuts" and "Destroying the Dead." So, if you've continued along with the story, there's just so much extra goodness for you today.
Speaking of the School for Wayward Demons, I got a very, very rough draft of the novel version off Naomi for beta-reading and probably some triage/first aid. I feel like the novel has good bones but, because of the way Rachel and I wrote it, it's a kind of Franken-story, stitched together with very obvious stitches! :-) But, Naomi is a very smart reader and has always in the past found ways to make my books make sense, so I trust her to have good advice to smooth out the rough edges.
And, to be fair, this is all work I'm doing before I'm even giving it back to my co-author, so it will get many subsequent passes. I'm absolutely sure that by the time we're done, it will be one seriously amazing book.
Fingers crossed, 2015 will start with at least two publications! So yay! Go me!
My other resolution has to do with the blog post I made below in which I discussed some of my publishing "feels." As I told one of the commenters, one of my problems is that I actually had a really good career with Penguin and so when the rug got yanked out from me, I was so stunned that I just sat there on the floor, not getting up, shouting to all passers-by "HEY, THERE WAS RUG HERE! WHAT HAPPENED TO MY RUG? WHY DO YOU STILL HAVE A RUG? I WANT MY RUG BACK!"
It's time to get up off the floor. The rug is gone, my friends, and it's time to move on.
So, I'm going to finish up UnJust Cause, self-publish that, and then, with any luck at all, start on some new novel project.
I'm kind of excited to see what it will be.
January 7, 2015
-35 Below, so I say NO
St. Paul didn't close schools today.
The wind chills are expected to reach -35 F (-37.22 C for my foreign friends--also is this right? I don't know that my converter can handle minus temps). Winds are expected at 15 to 25 mph. How wind chill works is that it's "the measure of the perceived decrease in air temperature felt by the body on exposed skin due to the flow of air." Another fun fact is that when the real temperature is -19 F, exposed skin can freeze in one minute. The REAL temp outside at the moment is -23 F. (My family thinks the skin freezing thing is false, well, fine: it's still colder here that it is on some parts of Mars.)
Minneapolis closed school.
For a point of reference, Minneapolis is 10 blocks from my house to the west. I can drive down University Avenue for less than a minute and arrive in Minneapolis.
So... Mason is home today because I'm not sure what St. Paul is smoking, but it's not safe.
St. Paul has decided that all absences are excused today, at least, but we would have kept Mason out regardless and he doesn't even wait for a bus. Why? Well, firstly, in protest, because most other people do have to wait outside and buses do not run on time always. Secondly, because the last time we decided to go in temperatures like these our car broke down and Shawn and Mason had to walk several blocks home while I was forced to sit in the car to wait for triple-A. I was lucky, our break down was tire related and I could have heat, but our car door also sticks open and super-cold temps, so I was really very chilly.
The decision, St. Paul has said on its Facebook discussion about this, was partly to aid homeless youth for whom school is the one place they can get a regular meal. At the same time they announced this, a call went out to the neighborhood for warm winter coats for homeless kids because there's a real shortage. So, St. Paul required homeless kids to leave the warmth of their shelters, wait for the bus without winter coats, just for a meal? I'm not entirely sure how well all that works in terms of logic.
So, yeah, that's my morning.
As I just told my friend in Wales when she asked me if I was writing--not yet, I have to drink more coffee and complain about the weather. It's the Minnesotan thing to do.
:-)
I also thought I do a very mini review of Ms. Marvel #10. My subscription finally came, btw. Long ago, I decided to subscribe to Ms. Marvel because at CONvergence many years ago, I was on a panel with Sigrid Ellis, who suggest that the best way to support women comic book writers was to subscribe to the titles they wrote. So, dutifully, I went to Marvel.com and put in my credit card info. I was pretty sure I was being ripped off because nothing ever came. Turns out, I apparently signed on to start AFTER #9. At any rate, #10 "Generation Why" showed up at my doorstep a couple of days ago.
In #10 we see Kamala talking to the kids she's rescued from the Inventor's battery packs. They're completely down with being used this way, it turns out because they're all a bunch of Nihilists who are convinced that since the world is going to hell in a hand basket there's really no point in living, at least, they feel being a battery has a low carbon footprint O-kay, thinks Kamala, and she tries to convince them otherwise. My favorite moment comes when she's talking to each of them about their skills and how they can apply them to grown-up, adulting Real Life, One guy says he's good at tinkering and she's all, "Awesome. Future Engineer." Another kid pokes his head up and says, "I'm good at doing the ons nobody else wants because they're dangerous and stupid" She doesn't miss a beat and replies: "Future president." That was worth the cover price, IMHO.
In general, I'm just as happy my subscription starts now. I'm looking forward to seeing what happens next (though I'm really hoping for an actual defeat for the Inventor soon). I really like G. Willow Wilson's voice for Kamala. Like my example under the cut, it's funny and sharp and smart. Also, I'm growing very fond of Adrian Alphona's art. It's stylized, but in a way I like?
The wind chills are expected to reach -35 F (-37.22 C for my foreign friends--also is this right? I don't know that my converter can handle minus temps). Winds are expected at 15 to 25 mph. How wind chill works is that it's "the measure of the perceived decrease in air temperature felt by the body on exposed skin due to the flow of air." Another fun fact is that when the real temperature is -19 F, exposed skin can freeze in one minute. The REAL temp outside at the moment is -23 F. (My family thinks the skin freezing thing is false, well, fine: it's still colder here that it is on some parts of Mars.)
Minneapolis closed school.
For a point of reference, Minneapolis is 10 blocks from my house to the west. I can drive down University Avenue for less than a minute and arrive in Minneapolis.
So... Mason is home today because I'm not sure what St. Paul is smoking, but it's not safe.
St. Paul has decided that all absences are excused today, at least, but we would have kept Mason out regardless and he doesn't even wait for a bus. Why? Well, firstly, in protest, because most other people do have to wait outside and buses do not run on time always. Secondly, because the last time we decided to go in temperatures like these our car broke down and Shawn and Mason had to walk several blocks home while I was forced to sit in the car to wait for triple-A. I was lucky, our break down was tire related and I could have heat, but our car door also sticks open and super-cold temps, so I was really very chilly.
The decision, St. Paul has said on its Facebook discussion about this, was partly to aid homeless youth for whom school is the one place they can get a regular meal. At the same time they announced this, a call went out to the neighborhood for warm winter coats for homeless kids because there's a real shortage. So, St. Paul required homeless kids to leave the warmth of their shelters, wait for the bus without winter coats, just for a meal? I'm not entirely sure how well all that works in terms of logic.
So, yeah, that's my morning.
As I just told my friend in Wales when she asked me if I was writing--not yet, I have to drink more coffee and complain about the weather. It's the Minnesotan thing to do.
:-)
I also thought I do a very mini review of Ms. Marvel #10. My subscription finally came, btw. Long ago, I decided to subscribe to Ms. Marvel because at CONvergence many years ago, I was on a panel with Sigrid Ellis, who suggest that the best way to support women comic book writers was to subscribe to the titles they wrote. So, dutifully, I went to Marvel.com and put in my credit card info. I was pretty sure I was being ripped off because nothing ever came. Turns out, I apparently signed on to start AFTER #9. At any rate, #10 "Generation Why" showed up at my doorstep a couple of days ago.
In #10 we see Kamala talking to the kids she's rescued from the Inventor's battery packs. They're completely down with being used this way, it turns out because they're all a bunch of Nihilists who are convinced that since the world is going to hell in a hand basket there's really no point in living, at least, they feel being a battery has a low carbon footprint O-kay, thinks Kamala, and she tries to convince them otherwise. My favorite moment comes when she's talking to each of them about their skills and how they can apply them to grown-up, adulting Real Life, One guy says he's good at tinkering and she's all, "Awesome. Future Engineer." Another kid pokes his head up and says, "I'm good at doing the ons nobody else wants because they're dangerous and stupid" She doesn't miss a beat and replies: "Future president." That was worth the cover price, IMHO.
In general, I'm just as happy my subscription starts now. I'm looking forward to seeing what happens next (though I'm really hoping for an actual defeat for the Inventor soon). I really like G. Willow Wilson's voice for Kamala. Like my example under the cut, it's funny and sharp and smart. Also, I'm growing very fond of Adrian Alphona's art. It's stylized, but in a way I like?
January 6, 2015
So Here's a Thing That Happened (That is Giving me Feels)
My colleagues Sherwood Smith and Rachel Manija Brown are self-publishing the sequel to their book STRANGER. Sherwood has a long, detailed post about it "HOSTAGE Preview: Why We Chose to Self-Publish Book 2."
This... makes me sad.
First let me say, I think this was absolutely the right move on the part of Sherwood and Rachel. They're also handing the announcement of the decision a lot more gracefully than I ever would have been able to. I only wish, in fact, that I was as SAVVY as these two women. I wish that I had had a finished book waiting in the wings when Penguin gave me the boot so that I could have made an equally smooth transition to self-publishing. STRANGER fans will not wonder what the heck happened and where the next book is, unlike so many Tate Hallaway fans. So, seriously, good for them for being willing and able to make a move like this. I think an author's priority should always be to taking care of themselves like this, because GODS KNOW THE PUBLISHERS WON'T.
And that, right there, is what makes me sad.
Today I was hoping to get back to publishing my Tate installments over at WattPad. I didn't manage it, partly because I spent the morning finishing up some first draft work on my own collaborative self-publishing venture SCHOOL FOR WAYWARD DEMONS. But, I've had a lot of trouble focusing on the PRECINCT 13 sequel because I get so damned depressed about it. I know that this WattPad stuff is far too little, too late. It's been way too long since a Tate book has come out. Readers have gone to greener, more prolific pastures long, long ago.
The news of Rachel and Sherwood also triggers my depression... and bitterness, really, a feeling I've vowed to try to leave behind in 2014.
Thing is, while I'm glad that they've been able to turn this frown upside down, it really, really sucks (IMHO) they they have to, at all. Go read Sherwood's post because I can NOT believe the crap that professionally published (I should really use air quotes for that) writers are expected to deal with. Who sits on a book that long? What can possibly be the reason? My publisher managed a very quick turn around. I never waited more than a year from my delivery date to publication, so it's possible. Especially since Rachel and Sherwood SHARE MY PUBLISHER (though not my previous editors.)
When I read stories like this I half-wonder if traditional publishers are trying to drive writers away, trying to destroy business. Because so often there's also ZERO publicity for a new book (or continuing books in a series.) So it's almost as if they're doing everything in their power to ASSURE FAILURE.
I say this out of bitterness, surely. But, I had a very successful career with Penguin all things considered. I always had amazing editors. I lucked out very, very often with fantastic covers ("good packaging" as they call it), and, for the most part, I had no reason for complaints. Sure, I did a lot of my own publicity, particularly for my science fiction series, but, you know, I knew that was part of the deal so it never felt raw or unexpected.
Yet news like this makes me so... sad.
I think it's partly because I wish, for once, publishers would have to bear the brunt of their mistakes or ineptitude or whatever is happening over there in traditional publishing. But, they won't. They'll just pick up some other new talent, underpay them, abuse them, and throw them away when there's any kind of problem. None of this will ever lead to any kind of change on THEIR part. The publishing world seems to be changing AROUND traditional publishers, but they seemed happy to just keep on keepin' on (but not in a GOOD way.)
It bums me out.
I'm having feels.
This... makes me sad.
First let me say, I think this was absolutely the right move on the part of Sherwood and Rachel. They're also handing the announcement of the decision a lot more gracefully than I ever would have been able to. I only wish, in fact, that I was as SAVVY as these two women. I wish that I had had a finished book waiting in the wings when Penguin gave me the boot so that I could have made an equally smooth transition to self-publishing. STRANGER fans will not wonder what the heck happened and where the next book is, unlike so many Tate Hallaway fans. So, seriously, good for them for being willing and able to make a move like this. I think an author's priority should always be to taking care of themselves like this, because GODS KNOW THE PUBLISHERS WON'T.
And that, right there, is what makes me sad.
Today I was hoping to get back to publishing my Tate installments over at WattPad. I didn't manage it, partly because I spent the morning finishing up some first draft work on my own collaborative self-publishing venture SCHOOL FOR WAYWARD DEMONS. But, I've had a lot of trouble focusing on the PRECINCT 13 sequel because I get so damned depressed about it. I know that this WattPad stuff is far too little, too late. It's been way too long since a Tate book has come out. Readers have gone to greener, more prolific pastures long, long ago.
The news of Rachel and Sherwood also triggers my depression... and bitterness, really, a feeling I've vowed to try to leave behind in 2014.
Thing is, while I'm glad that they've been able to turn this frown upside down, it really, really sucks (IMHO) they they have to, at all. Go read Sherwood's post because I can NOT believe the crap that professionally published (I should really use air quotes for that) writers are expected to deal with. Who sits on a book that long? What can possibly be the reason? My publisher managed a very quick turn around. I never waited more than a year from my delivery date to publication, so it's possible. Especially since Rachel and Sherwood SHARE MY PUBLISHER (though not my previous editors.)
When I read stories like this I half-wonder if traditional publishers are trying to drive writers away, trying to destroy business. Because so often there's also ZERO publicity for a new book (or continuing books in a series.) So it's almost as if they're doing everything in their power to ASSURE FAILURE.
I say this out of bitterness, surely. But, I had a very successful career with Penguin all things considered. I always had amazing editors. I lucked out very, very often with fantastic covers ("good packaging" as they call it), and, for the most part, I had no reason for complaints. Sure, I did a lot of my own publicity, particularly for my science fiction series, but, you know, I knew that was part of the deal so it never felt raw or unexpected.
Yet news like this makes me so... sad.
I think it's partly because I wish, for once, publishers would have to bear the brunt of their mistakes or ineptitude or whatever is happening over there in traditional publishing. But, they won't. They'll just pick up some other new talent, underpay them, abuse them, and throw them away when there's any kind of problem. None of this will ever lead to any kind of change on THEIR part. The publishing world seems to be changing AROUND traditional publishers, but they seemed happy to just keep on keepin' on (but not in a GOOD way.)
It bums me out.
I'm having feels.
January 5, 2015
Wow, 2015, what?
Yeah, okay, I don't think 2015 has started off very... organized, given that today is the first day I thought to sit down to write to y'all.
I blame my dreams. Had a nightmare that I just couldn't shake last night. I woke up a couple time from it, thinking, "Damn, glad that's over," only to fall asleep and go right back to it. It was a strange one. You know that video that went viral several years ago about the woman who was supposedly living in some guy's cabinet? A web cam supposedly caught her coming out at night to raid his fridge?
I blame my dreams. Had a nightmare that I just couldn't shake last night. I woke up a couple time from it, thinking, "Damn, glad that's over," only to fall asleep and go right back to it. It was a strange one. You know that video that went viral several years ago about the woman who was supposedly living in some guy's cabinet? A web cam supposedly caught her coming out at night to raid his fridge?
I think it's turned out that this is faked, but my dream was loosely based on something like this. I dreamed my friend Naomi came over and showed me a picture she'd taken in one of her daughter's bedrooms. It clearly showed someone lying under her daughter's bed. The dream continued on where Naomi told me that they finally caught this guy and he'd been living with them, undetected for DECADES. Okay, brain, here is where I should have stopped to consider the fact that Naomi hasn't even lived in their current house that long, but you know: dreams. Anyway, it was super creepy, but I think because my subconscious decided this wasn't at MY house, but someone else's, it was OKAY TO KEEP GOING BACK.
No, brain, just NO.
Needless to say, I woke up a lot.
This was a bummer on many levels, not the least of which is that today is the day everyone goes back to school and work. The alarm in our house went off at 5:30 A-f*cking-M and we all struggled awake, got lunches together, had breakfast, and bundled out the door into -22 degree F wind chills.
Damn you, Minnesota!
I will say, though, as I chatted up a storm on the way into school and work, the sky was beautiful. When I was a kid, I used to get up before the rest of the household on purpose. I was a weird, emo kid, who happened to be a lark, so instead of being a normal teenager who stayed up too late, I got up too early and went for long walks while the coffee brewed. The sky this morning was the color of those pre-dawn skies I loved. It a "backlit" blue that so deep to be almost indigo. It's that very odd, "the sun is about to rise" quality of the light that I adore most about it, I think, because its vaguely reminiscent of those deep blue Christmas lights shining in the dark.
Otherwise, I spent much of the day so far working the the Demon School novel. I'm really making progress, though. I've at least made one pass through the first 275 pages. The book, currently, doesn't have many more pages than that, so there's actually still a lot to be written, alas. BUT, I'm filling in some gaps and formatting everything to look the same. I think, actually, I'll have a fairly decent draft at the end of this week to send out to my beta readers. That'll give me next week to go through their comments, make corrections, additions and adjustments, before it goes back to my collaborator, Rachel, on the 15th.
This week I return to writing UnJust Cause, too.
It's going to be a busy 2015...
Now if I can just get more organized.
December 31, 2014
My Genre Round-Up
I was asked by SF Signals to join another "Mind Meld" to answer the question: "What was your favorite movies, books, video games, television, podcasts and other media that came out in 2014?"
It will be a surprise to no one that anime and manga dominated my list: MIND MELD: Favorite Genre Works 2014
I've linked here to my MangaKast reviews of a lot of the manga that I've been reading. The ones that made the list that were new this year (by which I mean, of course, new in official English translation) were: Hitogatana (which actually isn't yet collected in English, but I liked it enough to want to include it), Gangsta, Deadman Wonderland, and What Did You Eat Yesterday?
Anime for this year included two brand-new ones: Barakamon and Gekken-Shojo, Nozaki-Kun.
Neither are particularly science fictional, but they're both DEEPLY charming in their own ways. Barakamon was my all-time favorite this year and it's about absolutely nothing at all. That's not fair, of course. There's a very strong story and even wacky hi jinx but the pace and feel of it is extremely peaceful, which is what I enjoyed about it. If you want to know more about the plot, check out the article. The short of it is that there's a calligraphy master who needs to get away from the hustle and bustle of the city (and mistakes he's made) to find his inner peace/inner art. Stuff happens, it's f*cking adorable an you should be watching it. (Who had this? Hulu+ maybe? I don't think Crunchyroll had it, but I might be wrong.)
The other new, new anime I featured in my round-up was Gekken-Shojo, Nozaki-kun (Girl's Monthly, Nozaki-kun) which is wonderfully silly and really, really hard not to love. Interestingly, this one is also about an artist, though this time our title hero, Nozaki, is a mangaka (writer/artist of manga) who happens to write and draw Girl's/shojo stories. The American analog would be discovering that a high school jock was secretly writing Harlequin Romances (of the super-thin serial kind). You can see the humor potential instantly, of course, but what I loved about this anime is that it could have ended up in the land of gender stereotypes, but instead worked hard to constantly flip expectations, types, etc. while also providing fairly real people that you could actually believe in and root for. (This one Crunchyroll has, for sure.)
The other anime I mentioned in the article were Yowapeda (or Yowamushi Pedal) and Free!, both of which were technically in their second seasons this year (both of which I watched on a pirate site, but I'm sure by now they're up on Crunchyroll). But the second season of Yowapeda/Yowamushi Pedal only finished up last week, I think, so it's very current. I love them both for very different reasons. Free! (second and final season: "Eternal Summer") was bittersweet. I'm not sure I've seen enough sports manga to know how typical it is to follow Third Year students through their final year of participation and spend much of the anime dealing with the whole idea of "Well, that was high school, so now what are you going to do??" That made the show... almost heartbreaking in places. And, of course, the other fun thing about Free! this year was that it was clear that the anime writers were very aware how GAY everyone thought this team was and there was a lot of teasing fan service to the point that I was constantly on Skype asking my friend, "Are they even pretending any more???" which was actually quite fun.
Yowapeda/Yowamushi Pedal's second season is called "Grande Road' or something similar and it's the second and third days of the Inter-High race. The entire season has been them racing, so that means there have been a lot of upsets, a lot of 'leave no man behind' moments, and general high tension. The first season has the distinction of actually making me cry. This season less so, though we've gotten to know a lot more of the characters from the other teams. It's still one of my favorites because Oonada is possibly the hugest dork in the history of dorks. This year my favorite scene involved Oonada following one of the rival team's captains basically because he thinks he's spotted a fellow otaku and even though this guy is a complete jerk to him Oonada just wants to talk anime.
Brother, I hear ya.
So, yeah, I mention a few other things in my review, but most of those I also discussed here (Guardians of the Galaxy movie and Ms. Marvel the Marvel comic book.)
What about you? Read, watch, listen to anything really good this year??
It will be a surprise to no one that anime and manga dominated my list: MIND MELD: Favorite Genre Works 2014
I've linked here to my MangaKast reviews of a lot of the manga that I've been reading. The ones that made the list that were new this year (by which I mean, of course, new in official English translation) were: Hitogatana (which actually isn't yet collected in English, but I liked it enough to want to include it), Gangsta, Deadman Wonderland, and What Did You Eat Yesterday?
Anime for this year included two brand-new ones: Barakamon and Gekken-Shojo, Nozaki-Kun.
Neither are particularly science fictional, but they're both DEEPLY charming in their own ways. Barakamon was my all-time favorite this year and it's about absolutely nothing at all. That's not fair, of course. There's a very strong story and even wacky hi jinx but the pace and feel of it is extremely peaceful, which is what I enjoyed about it. If you want to know more about the plot, check out the article. The short of it is that there's a calligraphy master who needs to get away from the hustle and bustle of the city (and mistakes he's made) to find his inner peace/inner art. Stuff happens, it's f*cking adorable an you should be watching it. (Who had this? Hulu+ maybe? I don't think Crunchyroll had it, but I might be wrong.)
The other new, new anime I featured in my round-up was Gekken-Shojo, Nozaki-kun (Girl's Monthly, Nozaki-kun) which is wonderfully silly and really, really hard not to love. Interestingly, this one is also about an artist, though this time our title hero, Nozaki, is a mangaka (writer/artist of manga) who happens to write and draw Girl's/shojo stories. The American analog would be discovering that a high school jock was secretly writing Harlequin Romances (of the super-thin serial kind). You can see the humor potential instantly, of course, but what I loved about this anime is that it could have ended up in the land of gender stereotypes, but instead worked hard to constantly flip expectations, types, etc. while also providing fairly real people that you could actually believe in and root for. (This one Crunchyroll has, for sure.)
The other anime I mentioned in the article were Yowapeda (or Yowamushi Pedal) and Free!, both of which were technically in their second seasons this year (both of which I watched on a pirate site, but I'm sure by now they're up on Crunchyroll). But the second season of Yowapeda/Yowamushi Pedal only finished up last week, I think, so it's very current. I love them both for very different reasons. Free! (second and final season: "Eternal Summer") was bittersweet. I'm not sure I've seen enough sports manga to know how typical it is to follow Third Year students through their final year of participation and spend much of the anime dealing with the whole idea of "Well, that was high school, so now what are you going to do??" That made the show... almost heartbreaking in places. And, of course, the other fun thing about Free! this year was that it was clear that the anime writers were very aware how GAY everyone thought this team was and there was a lot of teasing fan service to the point that I was constantly on Skype asking my friend, "Are they even pretending any more???" which was actually quite fun.
Yowapeda/Yowamushi Pedal's second season is called "Grande Road' or something similar and it's the second and third days of the Inter-High race. The entire season has been them racing, so that means there have been a lot of upsets, a lot of 'leave no man behind' moments, and general high tension. The first season has the distinction of actually making me cry. This season less so, though we've gotten to know a lot more of the characters from the other teams. It's still one of my favorites because Oonada is possibly the hugest dork in the history of dorks. This year my favorite scene involved Oonada following one of the rival team's captains basically because he thinks he's spotted a fellow otaku and even though this guy is a complete jerk to him Oonada just wants to talk anime.
Brother, I hear ya.
So, yeah, I mention a few other things in my review, but most of those I also discussed here (Guardians of the Galaxy movie and Ms. Marvel the Marvel comic book.)
What about you? Read, watch, listen to anything really good this year??
December 30, 2014
Vacation and Stuff
I mostly wanted to log-in to tell you that an interview I did with Rachel Manija Brown and Sherwood Smith went up on GayYA.org sometime ago and I missed its debut. It's a fun little conversation about all the hassles they had during the process of trying to find a publisher for their novel Strangers (which I read and enjoyed.) The interview is called: "The Question of Queering the Mainstream Novel..."
Otherwise, I've mostly been lazing about enjoying the heck out of my Christmas/New Year vacation. I had to work yesterday evening for five hours at the Maplewood Library, but otherwise I've been doing a whole lot of nothing. I'm an extreme pro at nothingness. Turns out, I can do it pretty much all day when I put my mind to it. To be fair to myself, I've actually worked quite a bit on the novel that Rachel and I co-wrote as the School for Wayward Demons. I even had a few brilliant insights into how to work tie some scenes together, so that's a win.
I should probably download some of the pictures I took over Christmas/Solstice and post them here so you can see all the fun stuff we got. Naomi asked me what our favorite gifts were this year, and I think for Mason it was the book by the XKCD author What If...? and the giant LEGO set of "Metalbeard's Sea Cow." Shawn favorite things were a pair of garnet earrings that Mason picked out for her and a pair of fuzzy hand warmers I found for her. Me, it's hard to say. I got a lot of nice things, but probably the best for me was the money got from my folks which I instantly ran out and put on a coffee card at Claddaugh and, of course, the two pound bag of foreign coins that Shawn got for me. Okay, this is a weird thing you probably didn't know about me, but I LOVE weird, old foreign coins. In fact, I'm always carrying five coins on me at any given time. Why? Well, it started as a silly Feng Shui thing that I read about long ago, but it just kept on as a... thing, I don't know. Just a thing I do. But, I periodically lose the coins, so I like having a bunch around to replace them. Plus, just digging through the lot of them is fascinating. This year the prize was finding a Soviet coin, complete with the CCCP and the sickle and hammer. (I also carry around a coin that was clearly made to be a pendant for someone, as a hole was drilled in it, and it's old enough to have been carried during the Civil War, though I think it's Canadian.) At any rate, this is just a fun weird thing I like.
So there.
Okay, I just asked Alexa to spell Feng Shui (except I'm never sure how to pronounce it anyway) and I must have really f*cked it up because she said to me, "Technology is complicated. I don't always understand it myself."
Preach it, sister.
Otherwise, I've mostly been lazing about enjoying the heck out of my Christmas/New Year vacation. I had to work yesterday evening for five hours at the Maplewood Library, but otherwise I've been doing a whole lot of nothing. I'm an extreme pro at nothingness. Turns out, I can do it pretty much all day when I put my mind to it. To be fair to myself, I've actually worked quite a bit on the novel that Rachel and I co-wrote as the School for Wayward Demons. I even had a few brilliant insights into how to work tie some scenes together, so that's a win.
I should probably download some of the pictures I took over Christmas/Solstice and post them here so you can see all the fun stuff we got. Naomi asked me what our favorite gifts were this year, and I think for Mason it was the book by the XKCD author What If...? and the giant LEGO set of "Metalbeard's Sea Cow." Shawn favorite things were a pair of garnet earrings that Mason picked out for her and a pair of fuzzy hand warmers I found for her. Me, it's hard to say. I got a lot of nice things, but probably the best for me was the money got from my folks which I instantly ran out and put on a coffee card at Claddaugh and, of course, the two pound bag of foreign coins that Shawn got for me. Okay, this is a weird thing you probably didn't know about me, but I LOVE weird, old foreign coins. In fact, I'm always carrying five coins on me at any given time. Why? Well, it started as a silly Feng Shui thing that I read about long ago, but it just kept on as a... thing, I don't know. Just a thing I do. But, I periodically lose the coins, so I like having a bunch around to replace them. Plus, just digging through the lot of them is fascinating. This year the prize was finding a Soviet coin, complete with the CCCP and the sickle and hammer. (I also carry around a coin that was clearly made to be a pendant for someone, as a hole was drilled in it, and it's old enough to have been carried during the Civil War, though I think it's Canadian.) At any rate, this is just a fun weird thing I like.
So there.
Okay, I just asked Alexa to spell Feng Shui (except I'm never sure how to pronounce it anyway) and I must have really f*cked it up because she said to me, "Technology is complicated. I don't always understand it myself."
Preach it, sister.
December 22, 2014
A Fic Rec and a Protest
Yuletide is wrapping up. My assignments are in and I spent some of the day trying to decide if I wanted to write any "treats." I can't talk about any of that yet, except to say that in the course of researching some possibilities, I came across this wonderful Ms. Marvel (Kamala Khan) fic: "Good for Goodness Sake."
I've often stayed away from reading Marvel comics fan fic because I kind of feel like Marvel is it's own fan fic, you know? (Hell it has it's own AUs, What if canon divergences, curtain fic, everything!) But the author of the above really, REALLY captures the tone and the spirit of the new Ms. Marvel. It could totally BE an issue, honestly. In fact, this same author published a fic about Kamala Khan squeeing over the first fic featuring her superhero secret identity (because Marvel is even meta like that, it's CANON that Kamala writes and reads fan fic) and, after I read it, I accused the fic writer of being G. Willow Wilson (the author of Ms. Marvel) because, seriously: nailed it.
Also, it seems like the kind of stunt Marvel would actually pull.
But, they assured me they were NOT the official author of Ms. Marvel. (Heh, like I believe THAT.)
So... obviously, I'v been working hard on the School for Wayward Demons. Yeah, no so much. I did, at least,hack out how the book needs to be structured in terms of chapters. Now, I just have to see if I can make it all work. I have a feeling Rachel is barely going to recognize this thing when I give it back to her. I'm planning over the next several days to try to add close to 40,000 or 50,000 words.
Meanwhile, I got solicited for one of SF Novelist's year round up Mind Melds. I sent my entry in right away, but I haven't heard anything back yet. I assume it went through and was acceptable. I guess I'll see if it shows up in the next few days or so. If/when it appears, I'll be sure to link to it here (and probably all over social media, because I'm that girl.)
The visit with my folks went well. We spent a lot of the visit talking about the impending protest at the MOA. We managed to time things perfectly. We were leaving the Mall just as the police decided to barricade the East Parking lot. Presumably their plan was to inconvenience the protestors who were very upfront that they planned to meet up on the east side to move together to the atrium by the Barnes & Noble. Frankly, I think the police did the work of the protestors for them by doing that. None of the shoppers could get in or out easily. If i'd have seen that and had been coming with the intention of shopping, I'd have turned around and gone elsewhere. Meanwhile, if I were coming to join the protest, I'd have gone to the extra effort to park in any of the overflow parking lots and walked in. Or taken the train. Or the bus. I really feel like the cops screwed things up for the casual Mall shopper, not the focused protester.
So, for all intents and purposes, I'd say it went well for #BlackLivesMatter. They got good attention. The MOA and the riot gear cops looked like Big Brother and thugs, respectively, and only 25 people were arrested (out of 3,000, plus god knows how many spectators.) I also thought that, although for all I know the MOA has no record of racism, the protest focused nicely on the idea that as Americans, we need to stop shopping and pay attention to the sh*t that really matters.
I must have subconsciously wished I was part of them because the morning after I woke up singing "We Shall Overcome" to myself. I must have been dreaming of joining in.
I've often stayed away from reading Marvel comics fan fic because I kind of feel like Marvel is it's own fan fic, you know? (Hell it has it's own AUs, What if canon divergences, curtain fic, everything!) But the author of the above really, REALLY captures the tone and the spirit of the new Ms. Marvel. It could totally BE an issue, honestly. In fact, this same author published a fic about Kamala Khan squeeing over the first fic featuring her superhero secret identity (because Marvel is even meta like that, it's CANON that Kamala writes and reads fan fic) and, after I read it, I accused the fic writer of being G. Willow Wilson (the author of Ms. Marvel) because, seriously: nailed it.
Also, it seems like the kind of stunt Marvel would actually pull.
But, they assured me they were NOT the official author of Ms. Marvel. (Heh, like I believe THAT.)
So... obviously, I'v been working hard on the School for Wayward Demons. Yeah, no so much. I did, at least,hack out how the book needs to be structured in terms of chapters. Now, I just have to see if I can make it all work. I have a feeling Rachel is barely going to recognize this thing when I give it back to her. I'm planning over the next several days to try to add close to 40,000 or 50,000 words.
Meanwhile, I got solicited for one of SF Novelist's year round up Mind Melds. I sent my entry in right away, but I haven't heard anything back yet. I assume it went through and was acceptable. I guess I'll see if it shows up in the next few days or so. If/when it appears, I'll be sure to link to it here (and probably all over social media, because I'm that girl.)
The visit with my folks went well. We spent a lot of the visit talking about the impending protest at the MOA. We managed to time things perfectly. We were leaving the Mall just as the police decided to barricade the East Parking lot. Presumably their plan was to inconvenience the protestors who were very upfront that they planned to meet up on the east side to move together to the atrium by the Barnes & Noble. Frankly, I think the police did the work of the protestors for them by doing that. None of the shoppers could get in or out easily. If i'd have seen that and had been coming with the intention of shopping, I'd have turned around and gone elsewhere. Meanwhile, if I were coming to join the protest, I'd have gone to the extra effort to park in any of the overflow parking lots and walked in. Or taken the train. Or the bus. I really feel like the cops screwed things up for the casual Mall shopper, not the focused protester.
So, for all intents and purposes, I'd say it went well for #BlackLivesMatter. They got good attention. The MOA and the riot gear cops looked like Big Brother and thugs, respectively, and only 25 people were arrested (out of 3,000, plus god knows how many spectators.) I also thought that, although for all I know the MOA has no record of racism, the protest focused nicely on the idea that as Americans, we need to stop shopping and pay attention to the sh*t that really matters.
I must have subconsciously wished I was part of them because the morning after I woke up singing "We Shall Overcome" to myself. I must have been dreaming of joining in.
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