Kyell Gold's Blog, page 9

Side Story Collection Now Available For Sale!

I wrote twelve side stories with characters from my previous novels last year for supporters of my Patreon, and now you can see all those stories, many with illustrations by Rukis! It’s for sale on baddogbooks.com right now: http://baddogbooks.com/?product=twelv...

In a month or so I’ll put it up on the big retail stores, but because of issues I’ve had over image content, probably I will take the explicit images out of it before I do that. So if you want all the illustrations, this is the best place to get it.

The characters are:

Coach Samuelson, from Out of Position

Henri, from Green Fairy

Nick Hedley, from Waterways

Penny Smith, from Out of Position (Colin’s wife)

Duke Avery, from Volle

Kesh, from “Bookstore Back Door”

Pom and Dom, from Love Match

Bret, from Winter Games

Cristal, from Dude, Where’s My Fox?

Maxon, from Shadow of the Father

Vaxy, from Science Friction

(and there’s one original story in there too)

 

Zootopia and Subtlety

I’m thinking about Zootopia a lot lately, so that’s what you get a post on. I’m going to preface this by saying that there are a lot of reviews that praise its subtlety; I’m not picking this topic because it’s a trend in commentary or anything. I’ve just seen this kind of comment more than once and I wanted to respond to it, and also to tell you guys about some of the neat things I and others have noticed in the film, because it just makes me happy as a storyteller and casual film buff to see artful screenwriting like this.

[WARNING: SPOILERS COMING]

People have had varying reactions to the concepts of prejudice in Zootopia. One of the early reviews I read (which I can’t find anymore or I’d link to it) said “It’s not as subtle as Pixar’s best work,” which I found a little head-scratching. Not as subtle as the mountains of garbage and corpulent people on floating beds in WALL-E? Not as subtle as Syndrome saying, “When everyone’s super…no-one will be.”? The tone that I get from the people complaining that it’s not subtle are the ones who think that Judy’s “A rabbit can call another rabbit cute, but when other animals do it…” is hitting the nail too squarely on the head, that Nick’s, “You can only be what you are” is too starkly presented as a straw man to be knocked down.*

(* And also, if we’re comparing movies that are subtle about prejudice and racism or even just big social issues, let’s not confine ourselves to Disney/Pixar. Zootopia comes off well in comparison to racism-themed Oscar winner Crash, which had all the subtlety of a brick wrapped in a sledgehammer and even at the time felt about twenty years out of date. I may still be bitter about Brokeback Mountain not winning best pic that year.)

Here’s the thing: those statements are pretty stark, yeah. But they set up interactions and scenes later in the movie. They’re necessary to establish the context in which the rest of the movie takes place (let’s not forget that this movie needs to be accessible to kids). And that’s where the subtlety comes in. Judy establishes that being called “cute” is offensive to rabbits, and then Nick’s remark to her that “a toy store is missing its stuffed animal” becomes not just rude, but a microaggression, something deliberately calculated to be hurtful based on her species. But she doesn’t break the flow of the conversation to point this out again. After his third ‘cute’ comment (he calls her a “cute meter maid” at their first meeting), she does say, “Don’t call me ‘cute’,” as they’re about to set off on their investigation, but it’s sharp and matter-of-fact, delivered with just the right amount of “I’m about fed up with this.”

Judy’s Fox Repellent, similarly, is kind of right up front–but it also sneakily doubles as a symbol, the kind of thing that very smart non-animated movies also do. It’s not just a convenient thing to signal to Nick that she’s not really over her prejudices. It’s a stand-in for prejudice itself. We most often get our prejudices from our parents and though we might think they’re stupid, we still carry them around with us. We might forget about them because they’re so small, but they’re often obvious to other people (Nick: “Don’t think I didn’t notice that the first time we met.”). And in a stressful situation, we find ourselves unconsciously reaching for them.

What I think is beautiful and subtle about Zootopia is the way it has so many moments and points that it just lets happen without calling attention to them. The biggest is in the climactic scene, when we’re so caught up in our heroes foiling the plot that it’s easy to miss that Judy has just let Nick put his teeth on her throat. There’s no acknowledgment of that moment, of the trust that now exists between them and the giant step she’s taken–it’s masked by the callback to the beginning of the film and the triumph of our heroes. Similarly, not long after Nick explains to Judy his philosophy of “Never let them see that they get to you,” he breaks down in the press conference scene, visibly affected by her betrayal. That moment gains a lot of depth when you think about how much she must have reached him just before.

(The film’s structure is a little unconventional, but from a character standpoint the first half–up to that point–is really Nick’s story. His arc completes when he fills out the application Judy gives him, when he trusts someone enough to try to be part of something again. Judy’s character arc takes place in the second half, although most of the change is signaled in the scene under the bridge with Nick and the second half is more devoted to the two of them solving the case than to any character development.)

Zootopia is unsubtle in some areas, sure. But it’s as subtle as it can be, and that is largely why it works so well for adults as well as kids. Many of the points above I didn’t notice on a first viewing; several of them were pointed out by other people in discussions about the movie (and we can talk endlessly about the movie). The second and third time (and fourth and fifth) you go back to see it, you notice new things: about the story, about the characters, about the world building. Picking up later on things you didn’t notice the first time, or having other people notice things you missed–that’s subtle. I’ve watched a number of Pixar and Disney movies multiple times, and I don’t think there’s another one that’s had so rich a world behind it or such complexity in two main characters.

Over Time, iTunes, and Allowable Content

Hey, if you’re waiting for Over Time to show up on iTunes, there’s good and bad news. The good news is it should hopefully be up soon. The bad news is it will be up minus one of the images, which iTunes determined it does not want to allow for sale on its site.

The image in question is in the first chapter and is a pretty explicit picture of Dev and Lee having sex. Penetration is visible and I think that’s the first time that’s happened in any of the books (and indeed, in almost any of my books). Even though iTunes’ content guidelines draw a distinction between drawn and photographed content and only prohibit photographed penetration, even though they force the book’s primary category to be Erotica and include a checkbox for whether the book has Explicit Content, the reviewers decided that this image was not appropriate for iTunes.

I will put a warning in the description and on the page where the image would be notifying people that the image was removed at iTunes’ request, so it might take a couple more days, but I’m about to do that.

If you feel moved to complain to iTunes about this, I don’t recommend you point out any one of my other books that might contain a similar image, as they might just pull that one. If you have other books (non-furry) that contain drawn images, it might be worth mentioning those, but I pointed out to them a yaoi manga that has a guy getting a blow job on the cover and that didn’t make a difference (you can’t see the actual genitals in that one so that’s probably the distinction).

The iTunes rep with whom I was in contact directed me to send you to https://www.apple.com/support/itunes/contact/ > Contact Store Support > Other iTunes Store Topics > iBooks and iBooks Store > Email to complain. I’ve included a sample letter below that is how *I* would go about complaining; feel free to modify as you like (I’ll talk to Ket and Rukis about maybe posting the offending image, but trust me, it’s on the tame side of stuff that shows up on FA). As long as the people screaming for prudish standards are louder, the big companies will continue to listen to them. At some point we have to let them know that there are a lot of us who might not want to see all the things people want to put in their books, but we don’t mind other people seeing them as long as there’s warnings (the Explicit Content label works quite well for that).

For the record, iTunes’ current content guidelines are pretty much fine with me. The problem with photographed explicit images is that there is no way to determine whether the subjects are being exploited; the other things they list are incitements to illegal behavior. All those things are up front prohibited and that is fine. But a drawn picture of two guys loving each other–it’s hard to see where that falls into the same category.

I should also point out that you can get the book with all its images from baddogbooks.com, Rabbit Valley, and Jaffa Books (all furry-owned). The ePub imports very nicely into iBooks. I have a book coming up with a bunch of images that will likely be problematic with the non-furry sites so I think I will just offer one version through the furry sites and one without so many images through the mainstream ones. I would like to think that the market is moving toward a place where this is no longer necessary, but for the moment you should get used to it.

 

Sample letter to iTunes:

Dear iTunes,

I’m writing to complain about the requested removal of an image from the book “Over Time” (ISBN 9780997279405). Having seen the image elsewhere, I feel it is perfectly suitable to be included in a book labeled as including explicit content (which this book is), since it does not violate any of the published content guidelines for iTunes. In addition, none of the other major e-book retailers have requested the removal of this image. I hope that hearing from me will help you better understand your customers and serve their needs in the future.

Sincerely,

 

 

Over Time Audiobook on sale!

Hey, I tweeted earlier, but… the audiobook of “Over Time” is on sale now on Audible. It’ll be on Amazon and iTunes soon.

(The e-book is still working its way onto iTunes.)

Signed books from Furplanet–last day!

Hey, if you want to get a book from FurPlanet signed by me, you should get those orders in today! Also you can pre-order Black Angel and pick it up at TFF (we shouldn’t run out, but best to be sure, right?). If you’ve been waiting to get Cupcakes like Bridges, Losing My Religion, or Dude, Where’s My Fox? (among others) with your very own Kyell Gold signature, this is your chance…

Here’s the skinny: http://furplanet.livejournal.com/28951.html

So…Zootopia. (My thoughts)

[This post will contain some stuff about the buildup to Zootopia and then some minor spoilers about the film itself, mostly in the way it handles certain themes and things but also with reference to a couple specific non-plot relevant scenes. Still, if you want to avoid hearing ANYTHING about the movie, as I did for the week or two before it, best to stop at the spoiler warning. Also, duh, the following are my own opinions only, and all images herein are copyright The Walt Disney Company 2016.]

So…Zootopia.

We’ve been looking forward to this for a year and a half, I think, maybe more. Since the first concept art came out, it looked like a project that would align with the interests of a lot of furries. And the more we saw, the more positive it looked. The trailer had a fun sensibility–all the characters had personality from the get-go even without dialogue.

The more we saw, the more we hoped. The sloths in the DMV included some great humor and animation gags; further trailers and art and the official poster looked promising. Disney pushed this movie hard in unexpected ways–like advertising heavily on ESPN and tweeting on “big game” sports days with the “JUST ZOO IT” ad.

The night we went to see it–Thursday night of release, a 9:40 pm show–I was talking to one of my friends and saying that I was trying not to be too excited about it. You know, when you get to a certain age, you get let down a lot. And the stakes were high for this: a movie basically right in the wheelhouse of our fandom by the biggest name in animation. It almost felt like a test of our fandom: if even Disney can’t pull off a good furry movie, then we won’t ever be able to convince people outside the fandom that it’s worthwhile. Which is flawed thinking, of course. It’s worthwhile to us, and Disney has misfired enough times that you shouldn’t blame the source material.

And yet at the same time I wanted to let myself be excited for it. I think the last time I was this excited for a movie was for the first Harry Potter film, and even that wasn’t quite the same. This was…like “The Force Awakens” for Star Wars fans, “Fury Road” for that Mad Max fandom, only it was completely new.

And yes. One of the main characters is a fox, and he’s well done and super cute, and so that was another reason for me to be excited.

We’d seen enough to buy tickets to two shows, the Thursday night one and another down in L.A. “If it’s bad,” we said, hoping we were joking, “we’ll just put in headphones and watch the cute animals.”

You guys all know by now that it wasn’t bad.

We came out of the theater all giddy, gushing about it. For the next three days, online and in person, people would say out of nowhere, “Another thing I liked about Zootopia…” It’s got a terrific story. The script is great. The voice acting is tremendous, from the two leads all the way on down (and they have career voice actors doing some parts, names I recognize from cartoons over twenty years ago). The worldbuilding is good enough to withstand a fair bit of scrutiny. And on top of all that, it’s not just a fun story with cute animal people; it’s a story with a message that is perfectly relevant to our time, delivered with care and thought, accessible to kids but not dumbed down for them.

[HERE COME THE MINOR SPOILERY BITS]

For years, furry writers have been talking about furry fiction as an excellent vehicle to discuss issues of prejudice and discrimination. Zootopia does this in all the right ways. At its best, this kind of allegorical story doesn’t just substitute in species for races or religions; it creates a set of cultural beliefs held about each species and examines the ways in which those beliefs get in the way of us knowing the real people we meet. During one funny sequence, a yak constantly praises an elephant’s memory in between reminding her of all the things she doesn’t remember, ending with, “I wish I had a memory like hers.” It’s played for laughs, but even this low-key scene reinforces that everyone in Zootopia has preconceptions and prejudices, even if they don’t recognize them or see them as harmful.

And the film doesn’t wrap everything up neatly. To take on that weighty message and then have everyone resolve their issues and be happy together would be a cheat, what people call a “Disney ending” in an unflattering way. Zootopia doesn’t take that easy way out. There’s a charge that is spoken to the people of Zootopia, but also to everyone in the audience, that life is messy, but we all have to get along. It’s a great speech that leaves you with a sense of hope about the world (that is one of my weaknesses, another reason I love this story).

The story structure is well done, too, harkening back to two of Disney/Pixar’s recent films, Wreck-It Ralph and Monsters University. There are no spots where the story drags, and the character journey feels more complex and authentic than I can remember since (and maybe including) those two movies in the Disney canon. It feels a little non-traditional, but it’s actually Nick’s story nested inside Judy’s story (from a character standpoint). Nick has the character movement in the first part while Judy is the agent of change; he then serves as the agent of her change in the second part (foxes are faster than bunnies sometimes).

And the animation…my goodness. The train ride to Zootopia is breathtaking, showing off not just the animation but the thought put into the world. We’ll be watching the crowd scenes and the fly-bys of the various towns for the minute details the animators have put in there. One article I read claims that every character who appears has a name and a story; I’m not sure if this applies to the crowd scenes, but they all look distinct enough that it’s possible. Disney used a new technology here called Keep Alive that keeps the background items in motion to make them seem more real. Look at the trees in the background: the leaves are in constant motion, like real trees. It’s a small effect but adds so much to the realism of the film.

Not only the background, but the foreground: the expressions on the characters are well done throughout. It’s a joy to watch characters who aren’t interacting because they’re still engaged in the scene. In the famous sloth scene in the DMV (which was funny in the trailer but is also surprisingly character-revealing), it is great fun to watch Nick and Judy react to the sloth and each other.

There are lots more things to love about the movie–the well-meaning parents saying terrible things–but I only have so much time. So one last thing: Zootopia’s hero is a female bunny. Her drill sergeant and at least one of her fellow police officers are female, as is the deputy mayor. Judy’s place in the police department is never questioned because of her gender–in fact, it’s never even so much as mentioned. And Judy is proudly front and center on all the merch for the movie. Somewhere Rey and Black Widow are thinking, “Why not me?”

[END OF SPOILERY BITS]

The furry fans I’ve talked to have all loved Zootopia. With the worlds and concepts we have loved for years, Disney has made something on a scale that many of us dream of but can’t possibly afford–and something really good. Of course they didn’t make this for our fandom. But it feels like it was made by people who love this kind of story and aesthetic as much as we do. We’re all excited by its success, not just because selfishly we want to see more stories in Zootopia, but because it means other people are appreciating what we love, and what fan doesn’t want to feel that?

It’s been a while since I got that feeling of wanting to go live in someone else’s made-up world. I make up enough of my own these days. But I’d love to go live in Zootopia, for all its problems. And I can’t thank the good people who made it enough for that feeling, for justifying all of our excitement and anticipation. We were at Disneyland recently and attended the World of Color show, which ended with the song, “Forever Young,” and more than anything in the parks, this movie gave me that feeling. But it didn’t just deliver childlike wonder; it also evoked a great appreciation for the craft of the movie and the intent, for people trying to make the world better through story.

Also: The fox was great. But I loved the bunny, too.

Furry Fandom Essay in Uncanny Magazine

The good folks over at Uncanny Magazine asked me to write an essay about how awesome the furry fandom is. So I did.

(You should also check out their fiction while you’re there. It’s terrific stuff.)

Furry Fiesta Panel Schedule

In just over a week I’ll be heading down to Furry Fiesta in Dallas! We’ll be doing the release of the final book in the Dangerous Spirits series, Black Angel, and I’ll be on a number of panels. When I’m not on panels, you can find me in the dealer’s room between FurPlanet’s and Rukis’s tables, and when the dealer’s room is closed I’ll likely be hanging out with people in the lobby or the bar.

Here are the panels I’ll be doing:

Thursday, March 10

9 pm: Black Angel book release. I’ll be doing a reading, and maybe–we have to verify with FurPlanet–you’ll be able to pick up your pre-orders there. We’ll have a Q & A and I’ll hang out, and hopefully Rukis will be there too, as will Fuzzwolf and/or Teiran from FurPlanet. It’ll be fun! You should come!

Friday, March 11

5:30 pm: Building a Cast of Characters. Rukis and I will sit down and talk about how to make the supporting cast of your stories as real as the main characters.

Saturday, March 12

10 am: Write Now! A Short Story Workshop. If you’re working on a short story (like for the short story competition they’re going to be running at TFF), this workshop will help you get started. You’ll have time to actually write, so bring your writing medium of choice.

4:30 pm: Keep on Writing: Staying Motivated. I’ll be sitting with Sasuke and talking about how we keep ourselves motivated to finish our stories.

9:30 pm: Adult Furry Literature. Again with Sasuke, I’ll talk about adult furry literature–why we write it, how we write it, and so on. We’ll answer any other questions you might have as well!

10:30 pm: Knotsheathed. Famous Podcaster Fuzzwolf and I will sit down and talk about whatever comes to mind. Come and see us and suggest topics!

Sunday, March 13

11:30 am: RAWR: Furry Writing Workshop, Year One. Workshop Administrator Chandra and I will talk about the first furry residential writing workshop: how the first year went and what our plans our for the future.

Oscar Best Pics

The Oscars are about to start, and I still didn’t get my review of the Best Picture nominees up. Mostly that’s because we just saw the last one, Room, last night. But I thought this was an interesting year because the eight films pair up nicely–well, in at least six cases, and you can kind of squint for the last two. So I’m going to go through my impressions of them and hopefully get this up before they announce the winner…

Category 1: How the hell did this happen?

Both The Big Short and Spotlight examine huge breakdowns in our society, the first being the mortgage crises that led to the crash of 2008, the second being the Catholic Church’s cover-up of child abuse by Catholic priests over decades. In both, it’s the people outside the system who are the only ones able to find and uncover the horrific breakdowns happening: The Big Short features a group of people whose common denominators are an understanding of the financial systems of our country and a lack of understanding of how to get along with other people in regular society. Their outsider status is emphasized throughout the film as nobody listens to their predictions of doom; eventually they decide to profit off the apocalypse they see coming. In Spotlight, it’s journalists who sniff a story and aren’t beholden to the church who root out the story of decades of abuse and cover-ups.

Both are very good films, and I don’t know if I can rank one above the other. Spotlight dances a very fine line between sensationalizing the abuse and downplaying it to focus on the dilemmas of the journalists. The world of Spotlight feels very real and well-developed. The Big Short, by contrast, is loud and brash, and deliberately focuses on its protagonists until it comes to the end, employing a lot of very fresh and effective writing techniques to make a terrific experience out of a tragic, depressing subject. Both were good; neither is my favorite nor the expected winner of this crop. But you should see both of them to understand what was going on at the time.

 

Category 2: The world is trying to kill me.

Both Matt Damon in The Martian and Leonardo DiCaprio in The Revenant should be dead about twenty minutes into the movie. Both survive, but continue to struggle through a hostile world more or less on their own until they reach a place where their survival is more assured.

In both, the world itself is featured as a character in the movie. The cinematography in both is wonderful, but in The Revenant it is breathtaking. The northwoods are beautiful, but every shot is also meaningful and thematic. The wounds are shown realistically and so effectively, and DiCaprio’s acting is so effective that we were tense even when there was no action going on because we could feel how painful every motion was for him. The world was not only hostile, but aggressively so. The world in the Martian is portrayed more as aloof and uncaring. Matt Damon works to tame it, but in very few scenes did we feel tense for him.

The problem with both of these movies is that in neither one does the main character change much, if at all. This is far less of a problem in The Revenant because the main character is struggling every moment, his motivation emotional and relatable. He also has a backstory that ties him in to several of the people in the world and give us a human context to place him into. In The Martian, the main character’s motivation is also relatable, but the danger is far less immediate. More attention is paid to his character, and so the lack of change in it becomes more obvious.

The Revenant was one of the best movies of the year, and I think it will win Best Picture, along with a Best Actor award for Leo. The Martian is good, but I didn’t feel it was in the same class as many of the others.

 

Category 3: Where is home?

This is one of my favorite themes to write and read about, and that might be why Room and Brooklyn are my two personal favorite films in this year’s crop. Room is the story of Joy Newsome (Brie Larson), taken captive at seventeen and held in a garden shed for years, and her son Jack, who grows up knowing no other world than the shed, which they call “Room.” Brooklyn tells the story of Eilis, an Irish immigrant who travels to Brooklyn to seek her fortune and gradually comes to regard it as her home.

Both movies feature amazing writing and acting. The child actor who plays Jack in Room was flat-out robbed; he should have been nominated for an award. Leave out Eddie Redmayne; he’s already won one. Jack and his mother’s emotions are heartbreaking throughout the film, their journeys gripping. Saoirse Ronan is amazing in Brooklyn and anyone who’s left their home can immediately relate to her homesickness and the way in which the people around her make her part of this new world. Both movies feature a terrific supporting cast who are all fully realized characters, a beautifully rendered world, and a compelling journey with those characters through that world.

I would sooner rewatch Brooklyn, but I think Room is a little better as a movie. Both of them are absolutely deserving of the nomination, and I think Room has a shot to take a directing award. Brie Larson should win Best Actress.

 

Category 4, sort of: Believe in yourself.

And here rest Mad Max: Fury Road, my personal favorite of the movies overall, and Bridge of Spies, my least favorite. You guys probably all saw Mad Max, so I won’t say too much about it except to say that for imagination, character stories, plot, engagement, filmmaking, sound, and cinematography, it was amazing across the board. There were at least three realized character arcs in the movie: Furiosa, Max, and War Boy. The structure was broken all to pieces and it worked. The consistency and imagination on display in the world was near-perfect.

Bridge of Spies, by contrast, was a good 110-minute movie stretched out to 140 minutes. The Coen brothers’ names are on the screenwriting credit, but their hands aren’t visible through most of the movie. Spielberg’s is, in the part that I hated because it undercut the theme of the whole movie: the last two scenes. Tom Hanks is great; he always is. Mark Rylance is also wonderful and deserves his nomination for sure. And there are some great moments; overall the movie is a well-done story. But you guys know how I feel about endings. You have to stick the ending. Bridge of Spies‘ ending is the worst part of the movie, and that’s my last impression of it. So I feel like Carol, or Steve Jobs maybe, could have taken that last spot and I’d have been much happier. But it’s hard to compete with Spielberg and Hanks, let’s be honest.

I don’t think Mad Max will win Best Picture; it’s not quite the Oscars’ speed for that category. But it should.

Black Angel Pre-Orders Open

FurPlanet has begun accepting pre-orders for Black Angel. If you order any of my other books along with it, like any of the Cupcake line, I’ll sign those as well to be included when FurPlanet makes up the order. And if you’re attending TFF, you can select a special option to pick up your books there.

Please read FurPlanet’s announcement for all the info!