Bryce Moore's Blog, page 265

Watery Villain: Vodnik Chapter Nineteen

(For those of you who haven't been following these commentaries, just be aware that they're all about me discussing how I wrote my book, and they're chock full of spoilers. Just giving all y'all fair warning and all that. Okay? Okay.)



So. We finally get to the Vodnik in full-on Vodnik mode. Only eighteen other chapters to get here. (This probably makes it clear why it was so important to introduce hints of the character earlier--even going so far as to write him "in disguise" in some spots. When the main villain doesn't really do much until the book's half over (as was the case in the original draft of Vodnik), you've got yourself a problem, author-ally speaking.)



One other issue I had to deal with was a main villain who . . . isn't exactly all there. His well doesn't quite meet the water table, if you know what I mean. In the first draft of the book, the Vodnik was much more evil. Sinister. More like Count Dracula.



He didn't work at all for this book.



One of my writing teachers back in the day (Dave Wolverton/David Farland) would have us do an exercise when we were working on creating characters. We'd write out a pretend casting call sequence, where you put out a call for people to come fill the role, and different actors show up. He'd challenge us to find and select actors you wouldn't normally think of us being "perfect" for that role. I loved the exercise, and I still use it sometimes. It helps you avoid getting stereotypes for characters, and you can really end up with some cool results.



I did this when I was trying to recast the Vodnik.



Woody Allen showed up to the casting call.



Not exactly Woody Allen, of course. But someone who had a very rambling way of talking, was neurotic, non-threatening (in a threatening sort of way)--he was perfect, and he was a breeze to write. (In fact, the biggest problem I'd have with him was that whenever he was in scene, he never wanted to shut up. He would just talk and talk and overexplain himself until I had to force him out somehow, then go back and trim down all his speeches.)



Then again, he also made things problematic from a plot standpoint. He'd do things that didn't make a lot of sense at the time. He was wishy-washy, unwilling to commit to any one plan for a significant length of time. I liked this about him--not all people are great planners, after all, and it reflected Tomas's own uncertainties very nicely.



So you have a main villain who occasionally decides to just throw caution to the wind and do his best to kill Tomas right away, and at other times, thinks it might be better to wait and kill him in a more organized fashion. The problem the Vodnik was having was that he wasn't sure Tomas would be able to do what he wanted him to (fix Lesana) if Tomas was stored in a tea cup. But Tomas was creating enough problems for him, that at times it seemed like everything would be better if Tomas were nicely put away on a shelf.



In any case, despite the difficulties he brought with him, I'm very pleased with how the Vodnik turned out, and he's by far one of my favorite characters that I've written. (So much so that I've thought now and then about writing a short story about what happens to the Vodnik once he makes it to the after life. Someday . . . )



Thanks for reading!

Movie Review: Lady for a Day (Netflix Instant)

Frank Capra. The man's a genius. It's a Wonderful Life, Mr. Smith Goes to Washington, You Can't Take It with You, It Happened One Night--he just had a style that was all his own. A master of feel good movies.



Lady for a Day is no exception.



It's one of his lesser known movies, certainly. (And by that, I mean that I'd never heard of it, and I watched it mainly because of who the director was. I see Frank Capra's name, and I'm going to watch the movie.) The story of a apple seller who's been pretending to be an upperclass socialite when she writes letters to her daughter, who's living in Europe and dating a Duke's son. Her daughter decides to surprise her by coming to America for a week, and the woman (Apple Annie) has to scramble to try and make her lifestyle temporarily match what she'd been describing.



The movie's very well done. If you're ever feeling cynical about the human race, just watch some Frank Capra, and all will be right with the world. (Maybe we need to force all politicians to sit down for a Capra Movie Fest in the next week or two. Might that make a difference?)



Does the movie have some holes? Yes. The plot isn't much concerned with where Annie's been, or where she's going after the closing credits. All that matters is what happens in the present, and I couldn't help but wonder what would become of her. The sound balance of the copy I saw on Netflix had some issues, too. At times, the characters could be hard to understand. But that's quibbling, and a fault of the time the movie was made, not the movie itself.



The acting is fun. There's a whole subplot of a group of gangsters who help Annie out, and it's got such strong similarities to Guys and Dolls that I have to think they're related, story-wise. (Capra remade the film as a Pocketful of Miracles, his last movie.) It was nominated for Best Actress, Director, Picture, and Writing. losing all of them to Cavalcade (which I have yet to see. Must get around to that.)



Three and a half stars for this one. You shouldn't miss it.



And as a side note, anytime people complain to me that there's nothing to watch on Netflix Instant, I just can't relate. Between all the television series they have on there and the excellent back catalog, there's always something great to watch. Sometimes it might take a bit of effort, and you need to poke around a bit to make sure you're getting something good and not a dud, but that's what their rating system is there for. It might not be the best place for brand new movies, but that's not what it's really trying to do. If you need a recommendation ever, just ask me. I'm happy to oblige. :-)

Denisa's Teaching Again

(Mega Super Points to you if you manage to link the pic for this post to the topic--without needing to Google it.)



If you've been following my Twitter or Facebook feeds, you might have noticed me mentioning that Denisa's heading back into the teaching force. She has a Masters in Teaching English as a Second Language, and when she got it, we figured it would come in handy pretty much anywhere we moved. We didn't count on moving to a place like Western Maine, where the ESL population is just about zilch. (At least that's how it feels sometimes).



But then earlier this year, the university reached out to her to see if she'd be interested in teaching a writing class to international students who are struggling with writing. Go figure--on a campus with only 2,000 students, there are students from Cambodia, Chad, Japan, Sweden--all sorts of places. (One of these times, I think it would be really interesting to hear the stories about how all of these different students ended up going to Western Maine for school. I think it would be fascinating, but I'm strange like that.)



It's been five years or so since Denisa taught, and yesterday was her first day back. (Also DC's first day of Pre-K). This means that yesterday, it was the first day all four family members were away from the house at work or school. TRC even noticed it, and wondered if our house would be lonely. (If I were a house, I'd be relieved, most likely.) DC was beyond excited for her Pre-K experience. It's an all-day Pre-K, and she rides the bus in along with TRC. She looked as grown up as she no-doubt felt, and she loved talking all about her experience when she got home. (A second child gets even more excited for things, I think--because she's seen what the first child has gotten to do, and has had time to look forward to it.)



But back to Denisa. Her day went very well, it sounds like. Teaching was a success, and she was still able to get the laundry done, make seven or eight buckets of dough, get around 20 loaves ready, and watch a movie with me. This is in addition to getting up to get DC's hair done for school, make the kids lunches, finish lesson planning, and come with the rest of us to the school's open house in the evening.



She's going to be a busy woman this semester, and we've both known that for quite some time.



Hopefully not *too* busy. We'll see how it all goes. In any case, I'm very proud of her and all she's managing to get done, and I think teaching will be great for her. It's something she always loved doing, and I felt bad when we moved here and she had to essentially give it up. No idea if this class will lead to more classes in the future, but it's important to focus on--and enjoy--the present.



Go Denisa!

WorldCon: All Your Base Are Belong to Us Edition

Yes, I'm back from WorldCon, and I'm here to tell all about it. But first off--the important bit. The jawdroppingly stunning fact: I got home 2 hours before I was supposed to! I know. Somehow, somewhere, the travel powers that be decided to smile down upon me. I got on an earlier flight that landed early, so I caught an even earlier bus. Traffic on Labor Day was light.



Hell has frozen over, my friends. And all it took was a trip to WorldCon.



Okay. Now that that's out of my system, I'm here to tell you all about my wining and dining with the good folks out in Chicago. It was a fantastic trip, helped in no small part by the fact that I had an awesome roommate: Myke Cole. Myke is in many ways my polar opposite. He's outgoing, fearless, confident and chatty, while I'm only somewhat good at pretending to be all of the above. Myke filled the role of "Get Bryce to go out and do stuff" admirably, as well as "Force Bryce to talk to strangers." He really needs to look in to renting himself out for parties. :-)



I met too many people to name all of them, but I shall try to pick out some highlights. (Of course, every time I do this, I obsess that I forgot someone I really wanted to mention. But I'm going to do it anyway, and if I forgot *you*, know that it wasn't intentional.)




I met with various awesome people including but not limited to: Lissa Price (author of Starters), Chuck Wendig (author of Blackbirds), Joshua Bilmes (my agent), Eddie Schneider (my other agent), Brady McReynolds (my other other agent), John Berlyne (my sort of other other other agent, with a British flair, because when it comes to agents, I'm of the Pokemon persuasion), Nancy Fulda (short story writer extraordinaire), Myke Cole (of course), Doug Hulick (author and swordsman), Paul Genesse (author of The Secret Empire), Brian McClellan (old WorldCon buddy and upcoming author of The Powder Mage Trilogy), Joshua Palmatier (author), John Moore (author), John Hemry (author), Joe Zieja (upcoming author and fellow New Jersey-ian) and--this is starting to go on a little too long, so I'm going to stop name dropping. It was all awesome.
I was on three panels--

Acquiring an Agent--About sixty people in attendance, give or take. The panel went really well. It was well-moderated, and Joshua Bilmes was there, with tons of great advice. I think I had a few "breakthrough" moments of insight while on the panel, but I'll save those for a later date to write them up separately.
Trends in YA--I moderated this one, and it was packed. Tons of people in a smaller room. Leigh Bardugo and Gwenda Bond were on the panel, as were Aurora Celeste and Emily Jiang. Everyone knew their topic well, no one monopolized the conversation, and it all went swimmingly. Very impressed with this panel, and the audience in attendance. WorldCon isn't known for being very YA heavy, but hopefully this is slowly changing.
SF in Libraries--This was a bit trickier, since most of the audience were librarians, but only 2 of the 5 panelists were. I was also moderating, and it was much more difficult to involve everyone adequately. Librarians know the field well, and it's not always easy to ask non-librarians library specific questions and get the sort of responses that will be helpful to librarians. (Much like if I were invited to a panel on car repair. I may drive a car, but good luck getting me to give you insight on how to repair one.) Despite this, I feel like it went well, and everyone seemed to leave happy.

Chicago Cubs game--I got to go to a game with Myke, Brady, and John Berlyne, and we had a great time at Wrigley Field. Historic place, great plays, tasty Cracker Jack. Great weather. Who could ask for anything more? Too many times at cons, I'm in a hotel the whole time. This was a great change of pace. As was
3.3 mile walk through Chicago at night--Joshua loves to walk, and he took all interested (me and John Berlyne) on a walk back from dinner at 10:30 at night. The city was shrouded in fog (reminded me of Mistborn), and the weather was comfortable. We chatted the whole time, and it was another highlight of my trip. Amazing how sometimes the things you think will just be side shows end up being the main event.
Hugos--I attended the awards presentation. Essentially the Oscars of fantasy writing. What did I think? Very well done, all good awards, not as long as it could have been (yay!). But there were way too few seats. the room was hot, and it could have been even shorter. (I have a bad back. When there are no arms on chairs, my back gets angry. You don't want to see my back angry.) Still, I was sitting next to Myke and Joshua, and that made the time go faster.
Parties--I went to them. They're really out of my comfort zone, but I went. Everyone was drinking. They were crowded. I couldn't hear a thing. But I was seen, and I talked to some lovely people, so I suppose that's a plus.
BYU/Washington State Game--I did NOT go to the first night of parties, because it was opening day, and I had to watch me some BYU football. And we won! Great way to start off the trip. :-)
Internet was lousy. Just terrible. I still feel behind on the world. Also, I might be kind of addicted to the internet.
Food was great. Japanese, Indian, deep dish pizza, and all the peanut butter Nutella sandwiches I could cram down my mouth. (All this, and I only put on two pounds? Nice!)


And . . . I'm out of time. All told, 'twas an epic trip, and definitely worth the money and time. I just wish I didn't have so much to do to catch up with everything now. Still, if you're interested in fantasy and fandom, WorldCon is an experience you really need to try out sometime. It's in San Antonio next year, and I'm already eyeing the date . . . 
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Movie Review: In Time

I plan on writing up a full WorldCon post, but I'm swamped with Getting Caught Up, so it'll have to wait for now. In the meantime . . . I watched In Time last night, and I thought I might pass my thoughts on to all of you lovely people.



If you don't know, the movie's based on the idea that people live in a future where time is currency. Everyone stops aging at 25, and then they get one year of life. Once that life runs out, they die--but they can earn life by working. Of course, it also costs time to pay the rent, buy food. You name it.



So--high concept stuff.



Justin Timberlake plays a guy living in the slums who suddenly gets a gift of 100 years (a lot of time, for the slums). He decides he wants to break down the system, because, hey--inequality. The rich get to be immortal, the poor get to die fast.



The premise is all pretty good. The problems start cropping up in the execution. First of all, there's no real definition of what Timberlake wants to do. I mean, he wants to stick it to the Man, but we don't know which Man, and we don't know how he can stick, and what he can stick with, if that makes sense. There are no clear goals.



Secondly, too much of the plot depends on coincidence. Coincidence happens. I get it. But when a ton of the plot is basically, "And then, the main character happens to _______ just as ________," you've got a problem. Some of the solutions of the movie happen this way (Deus ex Machina), but complications come the same way (Deus ex Wrench).



It's all very tense, and serious, and Oh No! But in the end, it's also not very believable. The biggest problem is that we're told The Man is using time to do awful things, but we don't know what, and we don't know how. When the main conflict of the movie is so nebulous, it's hard to feel very engaged in the solution.



In the end, I found it diverting, but I wish more attention had been paid to crafting a more precise plot and creating a more complete world.



2.5 stars.[image error]

WorldCon!

As I posted about a few weeks ago, I'm in WorldCon in Chicago right now. No real time to post or update the blog. I left my laptop at home, and posting on the iPad just isn't as much fun. I hope you have a wonderful weekend, and I'll see you all on Tuesday! (Unless you're here in Chicago, in which case, why not come by and say hello? My schedule's in that earlier post I just linked to.)

Movie Reviews: Sherlock Holmes and Barefoot in the Park

Two very different movies up for review today, and I honestly was crazy about either of them. First, the one most of you probably know and many of you have likely seen: Sherlock Holmes: A Game of Shadows. I saw and really enjoyed the first one of these. I found the fresh take on Holmes to be fun (though nowhere nearly as good as the current BBC production of modern-day Holmes). So I had high hopes for this movie.



Hopes were not met.



It was still fun. Downey, Jr. keeps the character . . . sporadic. There are funny parts, and parts that are certainly unexpected now and then, but as far as the main plot goes, the only way it kept it unpredictable was by withholding information. When a key part of the climax rests on obscure information that we never had a clue existed . . . that's a bad thing. (And it makes me think that somewhere on a cutting room floor, there's a three hour version of this movie that might make more sense. But I really don't think this movie warrants three hours, which then makes me think that somebody should have revised the plot a fair bit before pressing the "Go" button on this one.)



I'll try to avoid spoilers, but I also really didn't appreciate the fact that they dispatched a certain character without so much as a "How do you do?" Of course, we see no body, so my bets are on the fact that the character could return for a sequel, but still . . . it was quite a blow of disrespect. Better to leave the character out entirely.



The last critique I'll give it is that somehow, by having a protagonist who's always one step ahead of the bad guys, and a villain who's always one step ahead of the good guys, you end up with a plot that's pretty much like the old hand game--the one where you put your right hand on top of the other person's hand, they top it with their other hand, you top it with your left hand, they top by slipping out their first hand, and you do the same with your right hand--on and on and on. Is Sherlock losing, or letting Moriarty think he's winning? And vice versa, ad infinitum. It didn't have the feel of cat and mouse so much as cat and cat, and not in a good way. Characters need flaws and limitations, and neither of these guys really had them in any meaningful way. Two and a half stars, but diverting at least.



Barefoot in the Park . . . I had high hopes for again. I'd heard of the movie. Robert Redford, Jane Fonda, based on a Neil Simon play. Should be great, right? But it was a movie that really failed to come together for me. It's about a newlywed couple who are just beginning to learn how to really live with each other. Fonda is an absolute spaz. Does every little thing that comes into her head. Redford is a stuffy young lawyer. And you really wonder what in the world these two people saw in each other to begin with. I think that's where the movie starts to come unglued for me. We're told by other characters how in love Fonda and Redford are, but I don't really see anything there to make me believe it. They lust after each other, sure. That makes sense. But more than that? You got me.



And Fonda is so much of a spaz. Her character drove me crazy the entire movie. She overreacts to everything, doesn't think at all of consequences, and is pretty much focused on herself the whole time. Yes, she gives lip service to wanting to make her husband happy, but she takes no real note of him or what he wants. Redford . . . looks like he has no clue how he got saddled with this woman, and I'm inclined to agree.



The plot is rambly, the music failed to impress me--and yet there are pieces of the movie that work extremely well. There's a run-on gag about how high up their apartment is that I really enjoyed. There are some lines that are just flat out great. But they're too few and far between, and it all fails to come together in the end. Two stars.

Third Grade--and Pre-K

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It's that time of year again. The time when your Facebook feeds get crammed with the requisite "First Day of School" pictures. And who am I to scoff in the face of tradition? TRC headed off to third grade this morning, and DC is going to be going to full day Pre-K starting next week (twice per week).



DC is especially excited. She sat TRC off this morning, and she'll be riding a "real bus" and everything.



I talked to TRC some, asking him what he thought about third grade, and if he was worried at all about it, or bummed that summer vacation was over. "You don't get it, Dad," he said. "I actually kind of like school."



I get it more than he realizes--I remember feeling the same way.



Another cute aside--at my reading on Monday evening, TRC's favorite part was seeing his school librarian there in the audience. He also confided in me that "When you were talking this time, it was actually fun to listen to you. Even better than playing with Transformers."



High praise, indeed.



Anyway--life goes back to normal. Summer's over. For some reason, I always have an easier time going to work when my kids are going to school. Life seems much more fair. :-)



Here's another couple of pics of the kids, for good measure:

Library Visit Report--and Another Vodnik Giveaway!

[image error] (Sorry for the pic. Sometimes I just feel a bit like I'm shilling my book a little too heavily. I hope that's not the case.)



I went to the New Vineyard Public Library last night, and I was blown away by what an awesome crowd they had. Realize this is a town of about 600 people or so. The public library isn't exactly NYPL proportions. But I'm all for supporting the local libraries, and I was excited for the visit, no matter how many people showed up.



I got there and the parking lot was full, and so was the room. Standing room only, pretty much. (Unless you wanted to get really snug with your neighbor.) It was a great group. with ages ranging from teens to . . . much older. (I didn't ask for ages.) Tons of questions after I read the first chapter of Vodnik, and I'd brought a box of books (thinking it never hurts to be prepared, but not realistically believing I'd actually sell any) and came home with only three (books, not boxes). Really, it was just a fantastic experience, and I'm very grateful to the library for having me out.



(And remember--if you'd like me to visit or "visit" (via Skype) your library or school, let me know!)


In other news, Readnowsleeplater is running a giveaway, courtesy of Goodreads. So if you're interested in winning a free copy of Vodnik, head on over and enter. (You can also enter via the link in the widget on the right side of my blog.) It closes on September 15th. Tell all your friends! It's open to people in the US, Canada, Great Britain, and Australia. Shiny!

When Memory Deceives: Vodnik Chapter Eighteen

This was a chapter that I wrote fairly early on in the first draft. I can't remember exactly why now. Typically when I write, I do so chronologically. I start at the beginning and then keep writing until I'm at the end. For some reason (maybe I was stuck at an earlier plot point), I jumped ahead to get this scene down. It might be that I just thought it would be an easy scene to write. Tomas going down the well.



I'd found out that they cleaned out the well regularly from my brother-in-law, and as soon as I heard that, I knew it would be a logical place for Tomas to go looking for vodniks. (The other main part of the chapter--the last water vision of Lesana--was also a bit of tee-ball, creatively speaking. It's a real legend from Trencin. (At least . . . I thought it was. I had a website from Trencin where I came across it, but that website has disappeared on me, now that I tried to link to it. Bother. Anyway. I made changes to what I'd read about, in any case.)



So I summoned up everything I remembered about the Well of Love and wrote the chapter. Here's a pic of the well, for reference.






I had pics of the well, I'd been there numerous times--it was all straightforward. I was very happy with how the chapter turned out. The tension that builds as Tomas gets closer and closer to going down the well, the actual experience of descending, and then seeing the Vodnik at the bottom.




Then I went to Slovakia in the final drafting stages of the book, and I discovered . . . the well isn't round. Not inside, at any rate. It's square. (And it's not nearly as wet and slimy around the side as I'd remembered.) This made no sense at all. I remembered the well being round inside. Not like it was a huge pain to fix, but it was a shocking experience to me. (Sort of like being sure there was a web page that listed the legend of Lesana, then going to that web page and finding no mention of it.)




This was something that happened quite a few times on that trip, actually. I found fountains had moved in my memory. Memorials had shifted. Scenery had changed. Bridges had gotten taller. Drives had gotten shorter (or longer). Not that they really had, of course--but my iron-clad memory of all of these things turned out to be cardboard-clad.




Which makes sense, in a way. Through all the drafts for this book, I've now spent much more time in Trencin in my imagination than I've spent there in person. By the time you're on your fifth or sixth draft of a scene, that scene is pretty set in your mind. Most other fantasy authors don't have the chance to then visit the site of that scene in person and discover how much has changed from what you'd imagined. (I read this article in Wired the other month, about how fragile our memories really are. Absolutely fascinating read, which explains what happened to me perfectly, and will make you doubt your memory more than ever. Mind. Blown.)




That said, it's still a lot of fun to be able to go to Trencin and see all the places I'd written about. In many ways, the memories I have of being there are about the same as the experiences I had Tomas undergo in the book, in my mind. I can look at the town square and "remember" Tomas and his father waiting there until it was dusk, so they could break into the electronics store, just as much as I can remember being there with my son while he scared pigeons.




This is all just to say that memory is a strange beast. But then again, I suppose we all knew that anyway.