Bryce Moore's Blog, page 196

In Defense of Stupid Movies

Dan Wells and I are having a Twitter argument. That’s fine in my book. Half the fun of being friends with a guy like Dan Wells is being able to get into enjoyable arguments. (The other half of the fun is finding out who’s right by board game duel.) Today’s topic? Basically whether or not Jurassic Park is a good movie, although I think it goes beyond that. Here’s a rundown of the relevant Tweets:

Dan Wells ‏@TheDanWells 

I want everyone who sees movies, or tells stories in any medium, to hang this on their wall: Movies Should Be Good http://birthmoviesdeath.com/2015/06/25/movies-should-be-good …

Bryce Moore ‏@bmoorebooks

@TheDanWells I disagree. There are different values of “good” for stories. Jurassic World is NOT going for this kind of good.

@TheDanWells Jurassic World is going for “explodey stupid action” good, and it does it very well. Doesn’t matter if some dislike that genre.

Dan Wells ‏@TheDanWells 

@bmoorebooks I disagree vehemently that explodey action has to be stupid. There are plenty of action movies with viable stories.


Bryce Moore ‏@bmoorebooks 

@TheDanWells True. But that’s a different genre. There’s “explodey stupid action” and “explodey action.” I happen to like both.

Bryce Moore ‏@bmoorebooks 

@TheDanWells Half the fun of stupid action is laughing at how stupid the characters are.

We went on from there, and I for one was entertained by the thought exchange, even if Dan did end up saying I had poor taste in movies and I wasn’t his favorite librarian. (We’ll just see if *any* of his interlibrary loan items every show up at his library ever again.) But after the dust all settled, I think it came down to basically one topic (or at least, as I reflect on what started the whole thing it does): what redeeming quality do stupid movies have? And does it matter if they’re stupid on purpose or just by accident?

See, I don’t think Jurassic World is trying to be a stupid action movie, and I think that’s one of the reasons it succeeds so well at it. What is a stupid action movie? It’s hard for me to define, but I know one when I see it. The first GI Joe movie definitely qualifies. The A-Team movie. Fast and Furious films (though I didn’t like them nearly as much as the first two examples.)

The more I think about it, the more I begin to wonder if this isn’t a personal taste issue: a proclivity I have for movies that try to be one thing but do it with such big holes that I stop holding them to the standard of the genre they’re trying to be.

That sentence made sense to me, even if it didn’t to you.

Let me try and break it down some more. Action movies have standards. What you can get away with, and what you can’t. Go too far with your physics-defying stunts, and you lose me. But there’s this interesting path I can sometimes take when watching a movie, and I think it typically has to do with the plot, not the action. Have the characters do enough stupid things with a straight face, and my mind starts to play a game: laugh at the stupid. It’s how I came up with the VENGIL scale for movies like this. (The key components for GI Joe’s success was Violence, Explosives, Ninjas, and Girls in Leather. VENGIL.)

The VENGIL scale gets tweaked a bit for me from film to film. Obviously Jurassic World had no ninjas (though wouldn’t it have been awesome if it had?), and Bryce Dallas Howard isn’t in leather (though again, wouldn’t it have been . . . I’ll stop there), so it would be more of a VADGIS scale: Violence, Attacking Dinosaurs, Girls in Skirts. (One Bryce Dallas Howard in a cute outfit goes an awfully long way to making a movie successful on the VADGIS scale.)

But once my internal critic senses this shift in a movie, I stop caring as much about the plot and the characterization, and I start just enjoying the ride. (Is this how normal people consume movies?)

See, I can understand Dan’s point about Jurassic World. If I wanted a seriously awesome movie, I would have been upset by many of the decisions the film made. The plot has gaping holes, and the characters make massively huge mistakes multiple times throughout the film. But somehow, I stopped caring about any of that and just enjoyed the ride.

The great thing about consuming media is that you get to do it on your own terms, and that everyone can have a unique experience. What works for one person might bomb with another. Was Jurassic World supposed to be taken as an idiotic romp through the Cretaceous Period? I tend to doubt it, and likely the film maker would be sad that that’s how I was able to enjoy it.

But at least I still enjoyed it.

I don’t know. What started as a simple Twitter-off has made me all introspectivey. I’d love to hear some other takes on this subject, because I think my Friday mind has about reached its limits for now. Please chime in!

Fury: Just How Realistic Do War Movies Have to Get?

I watched Fury the other day. Just me for this one, as I’d heard it was a pretty brutal tank movie. Guess what? They were right. It was also a very solid movie in its own right. Brad Pitt stars as a tank commander in the last days of WWII as he and his crew carve through the German countryside in an effort to bring a final end to the war. Shia LaBeouf and his mustache costar.

Make no mistake about it: this movie is bloody. That’s part of the point: to depict just how awful and terrible war can be. How bloody? When they start showing pieces of faces scattered around the inside of the tank, then you know you’re getting pretty graphic. That’s about the most extreme as far as actual depictions go, but the film also shows that simple blood isn’t the most disturbing thing about war.

It’s a character piece in many ways, too. A new recruit is plopped into the middle of this crew. He’s idealistic. He wants to do the right thing, and he’s totally unprepared for the terrors that await.

Did I like the movie? Yes, I did. Was it historically accurate? Not completely. From what I’ve read online, it took a variety of stories from throughout the war and had them all happen to a single crew, and some of those stories may or may not have been true. A bigger question I had after watching it was “How accurate was its bloody depiction of war?”

I’ve never been to war, and I’m in no rush to go. That said, this depiction did seem very authentic to me in the same way that Saving Private Ryan seemed authentic. And yet I know that often just because something seems authentic to someone who knows nothing about the subject doesn’t mean it’s actually authentic. (There’s a confusing sentence for you!) One way or another, however, it helped me to understand just what some of those soldiers might have been facing in the war.

Did it have to be that bloody? I’m not sure, honestly. But as I think about it, I think I begin to side with saying “Yes,” even if it wasn’t accurate in its depiction. This was one of the few war movies I’ve watched that helped me understand soldiers better, or at least feel like I understand them better. I’ve seen plenty of great war movies, but they typically begin to paint things in a softer light. They glorify heroes or overlook the actual process of dying and killing that goes on during war. Don’t get me wrong–Fury also glorifies fighting to an extent (the climax of the film is hard to believe, for one thing, even if it’s thrilling to watch).

But it also has its characters be a mixed bag. Germans aren’t the only evil ones, and Americans aren’t the only good ones. At times, the Americans are much scarier than the Germans, without giving away any spoilers.

So it was an action movie that made me think, which doesn’t always happen. Can I recommend it? Not unless you have a strong stomach. But if you do, I believe the film is worth your time. I’m glad I watched it. 9/10

Pick Your Own YA Fantasy: Part 12

[Welcome to part twelve of my continuing blog series. I write the book, you pick the plot. For earlier parts, see part 1, part 2, part 3, part 4, part 5, part 6, part 7, part 8, part 9, part 10, and part 11.]

John looked at the Tome of Ra, looked at Liese, checked the electrified door one more time, then said, “You know what? I think we should get out of here.”

Liese blinked, startled. “What?”

“I don’t know what I’m doing,” he explained. “I went to bed last night just having a normal life. I woke up in the middle of a dram by the sounds of a djinn raiding my fridge, and the next thing I knew, I was trying to get this stupid book into some dumb library. Why am I even doing this? What’s the big deal if the book doesn’t make it there?”

Liese folded her arms across her chest. “You can’t just give up.”

“Why not?”

She sputtered as she tried to find a reason. “There’s no way out, that’s why not.”

John shrugged. “We don’t know that. All I’m saying is that I want to try giving up before I try that doorknob, because you can’t tell me anyone who touches that isn’t going to turn a little Kentucky Fried Chicken. Electrified doorknobs? That’s like textbook ‘don’t touch’ territory. I don’t think anyone really cares if this tome makes it back to its library or not. I certainly don’t. It seemed important at first, but now that I’m looking at it, I could really go with a nice game of Monopoly right now, instead. Or maybe slamming my fingers in the door. That sounds better than this too.”

Liese checked the door as well, then nodded. “When you put it that way . . .”

The two of them turned to leave the room, then jumped in surprise when they saw the Sphinx had come to stand behind them. For a thing that massive, it was pretty light on its toes.

“Seriously?” it said in its low, booming voice.

“What?” John asked.

The Sphinx shook its head. “I stand guard here for thousands of years, and you two are the first two humans to waltz down here in like nine centuries, and you’re not even going to try to go through the door?”

It didn’t sound nearly as somber and majestic as it had before. In fact, it sounded more than a little put out. “We just–” John began.

The Sphinx interrupted him. “I mean, I even worked on some new riddles for this. I worked hard, dang it. When the knight came through nine hundred years ago, he didn’t even let me finish my riddle. So I worked and worked on that thing, and then the two of you got it without blinking. Not only that, but you figured out my other riddle, so you didn’t end up getting devoured by the mummy crocodile. Do you know how disappointing that is to Harvey?”

“Harvey?” Liese asked.

A rotting crocodile poked its head through the Sphinx’s front paws. “Hey guys,” it said, sounding more than a little disappointed. A bit of its nose dropped to the floor to accentuate the effect.

“Not now, Harv,” the Sphinx said. “I’m yelling at them. Where was I?”

“Harvey?” This time John was the one to ask.

“Right,” the Sphinx said. “Harvey. He’d been looking forward to a good devouring ever since the wicked priests put him down here with me. He missed out on the last one.”

“I can only run so fast,” the crocodile explained. “I’ve got bunions.”

“Bunions?” John asked. “Crocodiles don’t get bunions.”

“Tell that to my feet,” Harvey said.

“Stop!” Liese yelled out, holding her arms up for extra emphasis. “Hold on a minute. What’s going on?”

Everyone took a moment to think things through, staring at everyone else as if to make sure this was really happening. “I think,” Harvey said after a moment, “that the two of you are either going through that door right there right now, or . . . ”

“Or you’re volunteering to let Harvey devour you,” the Sphinx finished. “He might be slow, but I’ll hold you down so he can catch you.”

And when you’re faced with a decision like that, what other option do you have, really? John took a look at Harvey’s rotting mouth and wicked smile. The thought of having that thing chomp down on his head was enough to make him sick to his stomach. “Fine,” he said. “We’ll go with the door.”

Liese nodded in agreement.

Harvey sniffled a few times, clearly saddened by this choice. “It’s okay, Harv,” the Sphinx said. “I think they might have left the door to up above open. Maybe we could sneak a tourist or two, just like in the old days.”

“Really, Marvin?” the crocodile asked.

“No one would notice,” the Sphinx continued. “There are so many of them these days, and–”

“Stop!” Now it was John’s turn to hold his hands in the air dramatically. “Wait a minute.”

Everyone looked at him. He stared at the Sphinx. “Your name is Marvin?”

The crocodile and Sphinx both growled in response, and John lowered his arms. It’s important to know when you have to stop talking and starting going through electrified doors, after all. “Fine,” John said. “We’re going.”

He and Liese stepped up to the door and paused in front of it. This close, he could feel the hairs on his skin standing on end, and the air practically hummed with energy. The doorknob had hints of purple lightning just under the surface. Touching it was going to be one of the worst choices John had ever made. In fact, if it weren’t for the fact that only other option (getting devoured by mummy crocodile) was standing right behind him with an impatient look in its eye and blocking the only way out of the chamber, he might have still made a break for it and hoped for the best.

As it was? He took a deep breath, reached out his hand, and turned the door knob.

Make a Suggestion

Have any ideas for what happens next? Feel free to discuss amongst yourselves and reach a consensus. Otherwise you end up with whatever comes to me. Thanks for playing!

How to Cultivate a Sensitive BS Meter

If there’s one thing that social media has taught me since I’ve been using it, it’s that many of my friends have a hard time telling the difference between reality and fiction. Not *you*, of course, You’re very good at it. It’s everyone else that’s really bad, right?

Right.

I’d like to think people are getting better at it, but that runs counter to my experience. The amount of information out there in the world is only growing, and judging by the new stories that appear in my feeds, our ability to sift through it is staying stagnant. Case in point? My kids saw this video online about resurrecting dead, mushy bananas using nothing more than a hairdryer and a bag of rice.

They were convinced (convinced!) it was true. All it took me to disprove them was a tiny bit of internet searching (when simply saying, “I’m your dad, trust me” wasn’t enough to convince them). The result? This nice take down by Snopes (the go-to source for all stupidity busting online). I don’t blame my kids for thinking the video was true. They’re 11 and 7 for crying out loud.

The rest of the people online who are sharing the video as gospel truth? Them I blame, though in their defense, it seems like something happens to people when they go online. They lose about half their IQ score in certain situations. How else do you explain all these people who somehow think Onion articles are real? (Warning–some bad language at that site.)

It doesn’t need to be like this. There are some basic steps people can take to make sure they appear smart and educated to all their friends. In public, this is hard to pull off. You need to have facts ready off the top of your head, ready to back you up at a moment’s notice. Online? You have the luxury of time. If you play your cards right, you should be able to never appear idiotic online. Well, maybe that’s a bit of a strong statement (it hasn’t worked for me, at least), but you can at least be twice as smart online as you are in person, and who doesn’t want that?

So here are the guidelines to follow:

Think before you post something. Especially something that you’re enraged about or upset about or amused by or are in awe of. If it seems too good to be true, it probably is, just like in real life. Everyone needs a brake that kicks in before they hit share. A pause button where they can reflect for a moment. If you saw this on a site you’re familiar with and trust, that’s one thing. If you saw it shared by a friend or acquaintance? Be careful.
Google things you’re not familiar with. Seriously. All it takes is five seconds to put most of these posts to rest, permanently. Google the main topic, and throw in “snopes” as a term if you’re feeling particularly lazy. That should usually fill you in if you’re about to do something silly, though Snopes isn’t infallible. Still, if people would do that and nothing more, then that would cut down on a lot of these silly reposts.
Think about the information you’re posting. There are some basic librarian questions to ask about it. Questions like
Who wrote it or created it? Does that person have an axe to grind about something? Are they looking for page views? It’s amazing what people will do online to get eyeballs.
When was it written? I’ve seen some zombie posts wandering the social networks, passed on from person to person from year to year as they wend their way through the interwebs. If it’s really old information, don’t present it as brand new.
Why was it written? Check the other stories/information on the page. That will usually give you some good hints about the story. Better yet, if you’re really suspicious, google the page itself. Not sure if it’s a fake news site or not? The answer is a few keyboard clicks away!
Is the news corroborated anywhere else? Can you back it up with some other reliable sources?

Basically, people just need to be a bit more suspicious of information these days. I know this is sounding a lot like research, and that’s because it is. The same principles I teach incoming freshman apply to much more than just research papers. All of us research things every day (or we should). All I’m asking for is for people to extend that skill to the stuff the repost online.

Because friends don’t let friends look foolish. Except for some of the time, when friends want to make fun of friends . . .

Nightcrawler: A Movie I Chose Not to Finish

I give up on books quite regularly. The amount of time it can take me to finish a book can range anywhere to a few hours to up to 10 or so of solid reading time, depending on the book. So if I’m not having a great time reading, it just makes sense to put the book down and move on to the next one. I never review those books, and I almost never even mention that i’m reading them to anyone.

TV shows are another medium a regularly abandon. If something doesn’t catch me early on, I’ll move on to something that does. I don’t feel guilty about it. It’s a simple matter of time management.

Movies are typically a different beast, however. They only take a couple of hours to finish, so by the time I’ve decided I don’t really care for a film, I’m usually only an hour or so away from being done with it, so why not just finish the thing?

Nightcrawler provides an excellent case study.

It’s supposed to be a solid film. A disturbing look into a disturbed individual. I’d read about it when it was in theaters, and then I saw it pop up on Netflix, so I started watching it last week while I exercised. I got 50 minutes into it or so, and I decided today not to return to it.

Why not?

The film seems to be well put together. Good acting. Good directing. I can see why critics like it. The big flaw for me is that it’s a subject matter I really don’t care to explore any further. It made me uncomfortable. That’s often not a good reason for me to give up on a movie. I can stand a bit of discomfort in my life, but in this case . . .

I don’t know. It was different. It made me feel like I needed to wash my hands. Maybe that means it was doing too good of a job for me. I’m not sure. But I do know that with all the other movies out there, hanging out with one that just made me feel icky isn’t an experience I’d like to prolong.

So there you have it. Yes, I self-select which movies I will and won’t watch, but even after I go through that process, it turns out there are movies that I still just don’t want to finish. I suppose you learn something new about yourself all the time.

Any movies out there that you started but turned off? Which ones, and why? (For the purposes of this question, I’d like to restrict it to movies that you knew what you were getting into before you started watching. No fair saying, “I started Silence of the Lambs but turned it off because it was way bloodier than the movies I like to watch.” On the other hand, if you typically will watch movies of that nature, but had to turn off Silence because of a scene or the specific way it dealt with something, then that’s fair game.

And anyone out there finish Nightcrawler? What did you think of it? Any ideas why I responded this way?

Jurassic World: The Movie Review

I’m not sure why I’m even writing this review, as it appears that the entire globe saw this movie before I did, but at the same time, I’m often entertained by reading reviews of movies I’ve already seen, to see if I agree with the review or not. So here goes.

Over 20 years ago, I went to see the original Jurassic Park in the theaters with my two great friends, Becky and Nikki. I still remember the experience quite vividly. Becky watched most of it with her hands over her eyes, and Nikki progressively chewed all the heads off the gummy bears she’d bought as a snack. It was scary, thrilling, and fantastic.

I haven’t watched it since.

So when I went to see Jurassic World, I was sort of in that same frame of mind. I wanted to be entertained on an epic level. To be scared and enthralled. I had to see it in 3D of course. This is the sort of movie 3D was made for. I didn’t really care about being moved by the movie. I didn’t care overly much about plot, either. It’s a movie about people who decide ti build an amusement park around ginormous predators that have been extinct for forever. Any movie with this premise doesn’t have to worry about things like “solid character building.” Give me some explosive dino vs. dino action, peppered liberally with some dino chomping on human scenes, and we’re good to go.

Houston, we have lift off!

Make no mistake about it: this isn’t a highbrow film. It’s predictable from a mile off. Characters in the movie consistently make the dumbest choices possible. Every. Time. And the movie seemed to make a game out of seeing how many articles of clothing it could persuade Bryce Dallas Howard to remove before the credits. (Spoiler alert: let’s just say that if she were playing strip poker, she didn’t come close to actually going bankrupt, but she was only a few articles shy by the end.)

But the movie had everything I wanted out of it. Giant dinos fighting giant dinos. Spectacle. This movie is the modern day equivalent of the Coliseum. ARE WE NOT ENTERTAINED?

I gave the movie an 8/10, and that’s about the limit a movie like this can expect to get. That’s okay. It was worth the price of admission, and worth seeing sprawled across the big screen. It was worth seeing with other people, because something like this demands to be shared. My only real regret? That Nikki and Becky couldn’t be there to watch it with me. Then again, Becky sort of gave up on my movie recommendations once I forced her to watch Tim Curry in It, and Nikki is all the way in Denver, so such a reunion was probably too much to ask.

I saw this one solo. I’m looking forward to my kids being a smidge older. In a year or two, TRC will be able to watch the kids, and I can take Denisa to movies like this. As long as she doesn’t talk to Nikki or Becky first. They might try and persuade her out of it . . .

Mass Shootings: Everyone Else’s Problem

Sigh. How can you not be depressed when you read the stories about yet another mass shooting in America? And feel even more depressed when it fails to make as big of an impact on you for the simple reason that it happens so often?

I’ve been at a bit of a loss for how to write about today’s shootings, mainly because I really would like an answer. A solution to this problem. But part of the problem is that there are no simple solutions. That there’s so much blame to go around that everyone who has a share of that blame can simply stand back and point the finger at someone else.

The NRA can point to mental health issues, mental health issues can point to violent movies, violent movies can point to violent video games, violent video games can point to news media glorifying shooters, the news media can point to the NRA, and on and on it goes, and nothing gets changed except the running total of casualties to gun violence in America. I’ve written about this before. My thoughts today haven’t changed too much from those earlier comments, but they have evolved a bit.

The biggest problem I see? People like to view this as someone else’s problem. If you personally love guns, then it’s too easy to defend your passion and blame the other factors. The same holds true for video games, mental health issues, news media, Hollywood depictions–you name it.

Typically in these blog posts, I like to talk about my thoughts around an issue and reach some sort of conclusion. Some answer that brings everything into focus. But when there are so many different lenses involved in an issue, how can you hope to find any clarity?

I believe that for mass shootings in America to finally begin to dwindle, we all need to step up and admit we’re part of the problem, and then do as much as we can to stop it. I was once a pretty big fan of first person shooters. I don’t play them anymore, and I certainly don’t let my kids play them if they contain realistic portrayals of violence. Why not? Because I believe if you watch too much of that stuff (particularly at a young age), you become normalized to it. It bothers me that so many children end up playing games rated M. Games which supposedly are intended only for those who are 17 years or older, just as it disturbs me when I see children in a screening of Mad Max.

But I can’t just blame other people for this, and I can’t single out any one “reason” that’s The Cause of It All.

Americans live in a cultural that idolizes violence. That presents it as good and proper and noble. Whether it’s Captain America beating up the bad guys or the audiences who flock to the latest torture porn movie. It starts young and continues throughout our lives. I don’t know what can be done to stop it.

I’m not trying to say we need to stop going to superhero movies or that all guns should be banned. It’s a complex problem, clearly. But it’s going to take everyone looking at their lives and deciding what they can do to help curb the problem.

Because as long as we just keep pointing fingers at everyone else, we’re only contributing to the problem.

What can I do personally? I can vote for politicians who will make solutions a priority. I can withhold my money from movies that present a skewed vision of reality. I can take a look at the role violence plays in the novels I write, and make sure I’m handling the material responsibly. I can speak out online when people try to dodge the blame or pin it on others.

It’s not just someone else’s problem. It’s our problem. And anyone who doesn’t admit that is only proving my point.

Sigh. Some days . . .

Pick Your Own YA Fantasy Part 11

[Welcome to part eleven of my continuing blog series. I write the book, you pick the plot. For earlier parts, see part 1, part 2, part 3, part 4, part 5, part 6, part 7, part 8, part 9, and part 10.]

“The sphinx speaks in riddles,” John said. “There’s no way the answer is to just go down the passage on the right for 210 steps and then turn. It’s too simple.”

“But what else could he be meaning?” Liese said. “There are four seasons. There are seven days in a week. I don’t see any other way to interpret them.”

“But what if the Sphinx was talking about a different calendar?” John asked, then slapped the wall in frustration. “If we had an internet connection, we could just zip online quickly and check it out. I’m sure it’s on Wikipedia or some other website.

Liese shrugged and unslung her conveniently not mentioned until now backpack. “I’ve got my history book on Egypt,” she said. “Do you think that will cover it?”

John blinked, then narrowed his eyes at Liese. “You don’t happen to have a wheelbarrow and a holocaust cloak in there too, do you?”

She gave him a blank stare. “Is this some sort of American humor?”

“Never mind. Check the book.”

John would have peered over her shoulder to get a glimpse of the answer sooner, but the entire thing was written in German, so he had to content himself with watching Liese as she skimmed through the pages. “It’s only general things,” she said. “I don’t know if they . . . Wait! Here it is! Ancient Egyptians had a calendar that was separated out into 3 seasons, and their weeks had ten days.”

“Strange,” John said. He could understand wanting to cut out summer. That was a beastly season. But who in the world would want ten day weeks? That would mean 8 days of school with only two days off for the weekend. It was like some teacher’s dream schedule. But he barreled through that thought and did some quick calculations. “So we need to go down the passage behind us for 300 steps, and then turn and take that fork. That should take us to the library entrance, right?”

Liese checked the math and nodded. “That should do it. Do you think we missed anything else? It would be a shame for the two of us to meet some grisly fate just because we were too quick with the riddle.”

John couldn’t agree more, but he also didn’t have the luxury of having the riddle written down in front of him. Was it possible the sphinx’d had some other tricks in there? Yes. But this was the best he could come up with for an answer for now. And that was assuming the sphinx had been trying to trick them. It was always possible the sphinx had kept up to date with current calendaring methods, and that by studying this problem so thoroughly, he and Liese were making it far harder than it was supposed to be. “It’s going to have to do,” John said at last. “Let’s go.”

So the two of them set off down the passage, the light of their cellphone illuminating the path in front of them. Have you ever tried to count to 300 as if your life depended on it? It gets more difficult the higher you go, especially when one of you is counting in German. Were you on 160 now, or already at 170? Did you skip the 220′s entirely? There was a branch to the right at 275, and then a branch to the left at 302.

That was when John and Liese both realized that using any measuring system that relied on something as arbitrary as steps was really about as foolish of an idea as you can come up with. “How tall were ancient Egyptians?” Liese asked.

John shrugged. “You’re the one with the book. What does it matter?”

“If they were really short, then maybe their steps wouldn’t be as big either.”

“But what if the sphinx was talking about its steps, and not our steps?” John asked.

The two of them exchanged a long glance, then shrugged. “We could keep debating this for ever,” Liese said. “I don’t think we’ll come up with a clean answer. I say we go down this passage here. The one it took us 302 steps to reach. If we’re wrong, we’re wrong.”

John was about to give up hope as well and just go with the easiest path, but then he remembered he had the Tome of Ra to consult. He took out the book, stared at the cover, and asked, “Which passage do we go down?”

The Tome gave an exaggerated eye roll, then stared unblinking down the passage they were standing next to right now. “It’s this one!” John yelled, his voice echoing down the corridors. “We were right!”

With a smile and a much lighter feeling in their steps, John and Liese rushed down the passage as fast as they could, looking forward to being free of this interminable maze at last. Labyrinths were much cooler when you were thinking about them than when you were actually stuck in one.

The passage led down and then down some more, going on for longer than John expected. As the approached the bottom, it appeared some sort of light was emanating from something ahead of them. They slowed down and shut off their cell phone flashlight, then approached their destination with caution. Now wasn’t the time to lose their heads, after all.

The passageway led to a large chamber, at least fifty feet square and twenty feet tall. In the middle of the chamber stood a single stone door frame, unattached to any walls or ceilings. Lightning arced around the stone in a continual arc, making the whole thing look like it was being permanently electrocuted. It gave off a furious crackling noise, like a bonfire on a lonely night.

“We’re supposed to go through there?” Liese asked.

John shrugged. “If we’re going to get into the Library of Alexandria, I think we are.”

“Great,” she said. “But how?”

That was the question of the hour, certainly.

Make a Suggestion

How will they try to get in, and what do you think will happen when they do? Feel free to discuss amongst yourselves and reach a consensus. Otherwise, I’ll take the suggestion I like the most and run with it next week. Thanks for playing!

NEW (Old) Book Deal Alert: THE MEMORY THIEF is Back in Business!

Phew! It’s been a crazy road to get here (recognizing that “here” hasn’t officially arrived and won’t until I see a printed copy in my hands), but THE MEMORY THIEF has found a home with a publisher once more. I’m ecstatic, to say the least. And more than a little relieved. First it was getting published in Fall 2016, and then all of a sudden it wasn’t anymore. That was back in January, if you’ll recall. My intrepid agent started sending the book out again right away, but it was more than a little demoralizing to be back at square one with the book, especially under such trying circumstances.

Meanwhile, my original editor had gone on to be hired at Adaptive Studios, a publisher that had been focused mainly on working with existing content. I was happy for her, but it looked like she wouldn’t be in a position to take another look at MEMORY THIEF. Such is life.

Except then it turned out she’d been given the green light to purchase new books, and she was still very much interested in MEMORY THIEF.

In the meantime, I’d been able to read a couple of Adaptive books (Silence of Six and Coin Heist) and I really enjoyed them. I was impressed that the company seemed to be dedicating some serious marketing efforts to these titles, and I felt like they came up with some solid end products.

And so I’m really excited to have them publishing my next book.

What’s this done to my publishing schedule, however? After all, I was originally supposed to see my book in print in September 2016 or so. That was back when the deal had been completed in October 2014. This is 8 months later, and we all know the glacial speed publishing can go at. May 2017 wouldn’t be surprising.

So imagine my surprise when I found out Adaptive is shooting for spring 2016! You read that right. In less than a year from now, MEMORY THIEF should be in your greedy little hands. By having my contract canceled and then having to resell the book, I managed to have it get published four months early?

I’ll take it.

In any case, I look forward to having more exciting news to share with you as we move forward in the publication process. It’s been so long since I looked at this book, but I’m already rereading it now as I get ready for editorial notes to arrive early next month. It’s a fun book, and one I’ve been waiting to share with you all for quite some time.

Yay for good news!

Boxtrolls: Should Movies be Pretty?

There’s a lot to be said for being the first. Everybody remembers Toy Story, because it broke cinematic ground. Same thing goes for Snow White. These days, I have to admit that all of the movies I watch start to blur together after a while. There’s been a slew of animated movies that all sort of blend in with one another. They’re funny enough, and amusing in their own way, but a year or two after you’ve watched them, good luck on actually remembering what they were about. (The Ice Age movies are an excellent example of this. Or all the Shrek sequels. Does anyone other than the creators really remember what happened in Ice Age 3?)

So it starts to take more and more effort for something to stand out from the crowd. I’d argue that The Boxtrolls does a pretty good job of this, though it does it at a price. I saw it pop up on Netflix a few weeks ago, and I added it to my list as a potential family movie. We watched it over the weekend, and we all enjoyed it.

But boy are the people in it funky looking. I applaud the willingness to explore different body shapes and heroic types, but the general style of this movie is not a particularly pleasant one to watch, which brings an interesting question with it: how many of Hollywood’s popular movies would be as popular if they were filled with (how to put it?) ugly people?

Don’t get me wrong. I really enjoyed the style of this movie, but I doubt anyone would argue that the characters in it are the most pleasing to the eye. They’re filled with warts and skinny limbs and huge noses and rotting teeth. It all works and is consistent with itself, but somehow it’s easier to be forgiving of a movie when there’s things happening that are at least pleasant to look at. Take that away, and it becomes easier for me to be critical.

Maybe I really am that shallow.

The thing is, there’s really a lot to like about this movie. The plot is fun, it’s filled with interesting, unexpected twists and turns, the characters are plucky, the villain is truly monstrous. And the claymation is really spectacular. It really impressed me. It also deals with some pretty great ideas and debates. Just check out this after credits scene:

But when I wonder why It didn’t do better, I can’t help but think it’s because of the style itself. It brought in just a bit over $50 million on a $60 million budget. (Of course, when you add international, that goes up to $108 million, but still. I think the movie was better than that total reflects.) Honestly, I gave it a 9/10, and while I feel bad about it, I can’t help but think it could have been a 10 if the characters were a smidge easier on the eyes. Then again, I also recognize the movie is an adaptation of Here Be Monsters, an illustrated book that already had its own unique style.

I suppose the question becomes how much you want your art to get in the way of commercial success. I’m not saying one choice is better than another. It’s something each creator has to think about and come to terms with. I do think there’s a middle ground to be explored. Most of the people I see and interact with each day are regular. Normal. They’re not drop dead gorgeous, but they’re far from hideous (how’s that for an endorsement?) I would love art that celebrates that normalcy. I’ve always thought foreign media does a better job with this than American media does.

The interesting thing is that I don’t feel like I can discuss this without seeming really petty and judgmental. That wasn’t the intent, but the more I type, the more I’m beginning to doubt I can adequately pin this down. So I’m going to step away now and see if anyone has anything more to add. Did you see the film? What did you think? What do you think of the idea in general?