Kate Elliott's Blog, page 45
December 8, 2010
Cold Fire (Spiritwalker, book two)
I have sent a solid draft of COLD FIRE to my editors at Orbit Books.
Publication date: Sept 2011
I should note that the book is done but not finished. That is, I expect editorial comments from my editors as well as comments from beta readers and I will be doing some additional research to incorporate together with my own revisions as I get a little distance from it. But the main thing is that the book is done, and scheduled.
Publication date: Sept 2011
I should note that the book is done but not finished. That is, I expect editorial comments from my editors as well as comments from beta readers and I will be doing some additional research to incorporate together with my own revisions as I get a little distance from it. But the main thing is that the book is done, and scheduled.
December 7, 2010
Jewish SFF, win a copy of Cold Magic, Egyptian temples, and printmaking
I have a guest post over at SFFChat as part of their Hannukah 8-day week of guest posts for writers of sff who are also Jewish.
Check it out, if you're interested in a very little bit about world building (and the name Barahal), and also check it out because you can enter to win a copy of Cold Magic.
All the posts in this miniseries are interesting. I particularly enjoyed this one by fantasy writer Ari Marmell, who writes mostly secondary world fantasy, especially since it appeared the day after David Brin wrote about "the preference of Jewish SF&F authors for science fiction over fantasy... and their near complete absence from heroic or "elfish" genres". I hope Ari is glad to know that he (and so many others) is part of a near complete absence.
In other links:
My spawn has a new blog about printmaking and art and the ruminations of her exceedingly peculiar mind (although I say that with the greatest affection and pride).
Finally, 2,300 year old temple discovered at Thmuis (Delta region, Egypt), built by Ptolomy II Philadelphius. One of the co-directors at this dig is my spouse.
Check it out, if you're interested in a very little bit about world building (and the name Barahal), and also check it out because you can enter to win a copy of Cold Magic.
All the posts in this miniseries are interesting. I particularly enjoyed this one by fantasy writer Ari Marmell, who writes mostly secondary world fantasy, especially since it appeared the day after David Brin wrote about "the preference of Jewish SF&F authors for science fiction over fantasy... and their near complete absence from heroic or "elfish" genres". I hope Ari is glad to know that he (and so many others) is part of a near complete absence.
In other links:
My spawn has a new blog about printmaking and art and the ruminations of her exceedingly peculiar mind (although I say that with the greatest affection and pride).
Finally, 2,300 year old temple discovered at Thmuis (Delta region, Egypt), built by Ptolomy II Philadelphius. One of the co-directors at this dig is my spouse.
December 5, 2010
Today in Hawaii
Of the weather we will not speak.
I have written a post for SFFChat, for their Hannukah week, but I'm waiting to get feedback from two beta readers before I send it on.
I have Draft Two finished except for two things:
1) I need to go back through chapters 25 and 26 and do some significant trimming as well as pointing and layering (by which I mean building a series of conversations dramatically). I have bit too much emotional investment in chapter 25 in particular, and it can be difficult in such cases to see them clearly enough to do a good revision job. But fortunately![[info]](https://i.gr-assets.com/images/S/compressed.photo.goodreads.com/hostedimages/1380442897i/1319734.gif)
sartorias
has a fine pair of beta reading goggles that in their steampunkish manner have illuminated the issues I was IGNORING (or could not quite see).
2) I really have to write the last chapter. This is where I got stuck last time (on Draft One), and I have about half of it written in clunky, awkward first draft form, but now I really Must. Go. Do. It.
Other than that SMALL DETAIL, the book is done *in this draft* (there will be more drafts, but this is the one that will go, at long last, to my editor).
But, oh, wait! There is banana cream pie in the refrigerator.
No one really wants to read Cold Fire anyway, right? The pie, she calls.
I have written a post for SFFChat, for their Hannukah week, but I'm waiting to get feedback from two beta readers before I send it on.
I have Draft Two finished except for two things:
1) I need to go back through chapters 25 and 26 and do some significant trimming as well as pointing and layering (by which I mean building a series of conversations dramatically). I have bit too much emotional investment in chapter 25 in particular, and it can be difficult in such cases to see them clearly enough to do a good revision job. But fortunately
sartorias
has a fine pair of beta reading goggles that in their steampunkish manner have illuminated the issues I was IGNORING (or could not quite see).2) I really have to write the last chapter. This is where I got stuck last time (on Draft One), and I have about half of it written in clunky, awkward first draft form, but now I really Must. Go. Do. It.
Other than that SMALL DETAIL, the book is done *in this draft* (there will be more drafts, but this is the one that will go, at long last, to my editor).
But, oh, wait! There is banana cream pie in the refrigerator.
No one really wants to read Cold Fire anyway, right? The pie, she calls.
November 30, 2010
Writing Explicitly: Guest Post by Victoria Janssen
I asked Victoria Janssen, author of several steamy erotic novels, how she does it.
By it, of course, I mean writing explicit sex. I can't. All of my books/series include prominent love stories and/or sexual encounters because those are so much a part of human life (and because I can be a bit of a romantic) but I do not write explicit sex (more like PG rated with perhaps an occasional R rating tossed in) not because I don't like it or object to it but because, I suppose, I feel too self conscious to manage it (something she addresses in her post).
What follows is her guest post, on the occasion of the release of her new novel, The Duke and the Pirate Queen.
Writing Explicitly
by Victoria Janssen
I think there are several keys to writing good explicit sex scenes. The first is to give up any pretense of hiding yourself. You can't hide from the reader, and you most especially can't hide from yourself.
By the way, it doesn't matter if you've never done the thing you're writing about and never intend to do it. What matters is what you think and feel about the action you're depicting. Writing, in some ways, works on the brain directly. Your feelings, through the medium of your style and voice, are being transmitted towards the reader. If your feelings aren't essentially honest, it's a lot harder for the reader to connect emotionally with what she's reading.
A way to honesty is finding empathy for what you're writing. A few times, I've written a sex scene about something I've never experienced and did not find appealing. So I asked someone who DID like the activity what it was she liked about it, and why. Given an additional point of view to work from, I was then able to consider what my characters might like, and not like, from the inside, and thus find a place of emotional honesty to work from.
Another key to writing sex scenes is the same as in writing any other type of scene; you have to pay attention to your prose. I also think you have to pay EXTRA attention, since some readers read sex scenes more closely and often than others! The attention-paying doesn't have to happen in your first draft. Some writers, including me, sometimes find it easier to write out the first draft in a state of semi-trance, as another route to access emotional honesty.
In revisions, though, I think it's more important in sex scenes than any others to pay attention to details. Simple things like repeating the same word over and over can throw a reader out of the scene. You can't let a sex scene drag, and you can't let it be predictable. After the initial draft, you might have to go back and add in a few more unexpected twists, of plot or characterization or dialogue. I always refine and polish the vocabulary I use, to make sure it's not only evocative but appropriate to the characters, the story's mood, and any thematic ideas I might have. Originality is always good, to one degree or another (it depends on your aims). And I make sure to look for unintentional double entendres. Those come up (heh) more often than you would think!
I feel the editing process is essential to avoid going over the top with a sex scene. It's especially good if you can wait a while, then read again what you've written.
Finally, I think you have to know your characters. Sometimes I know before I start the scene how that character would act in a sexual situation; sometimes I figure it out as I go along, from a mingling of intuition about the character and the needs of the story. The important thing to remember is that this scene isn't about you. It's about your characters. Weirdly, I think your own emotional honesty is required to know your characters properly.
Demonstrating women's sexuality through writing erotica, to a public audience, verifies the existence of female sexuality (woman as actor rather than than object) and helps bring female sexuality into public discourse. My emotional honesty thus not only validates women in general, it validates me as well.
###
General blub:
The Duke and the Pirate Queen is set in the same world as The Duchess, Her Maid, The Groom & Their Lover and features characters who appeared in that novel, Duke Maxime and Captain Imena Leung. Captain Leung is forced to abduct Duke Maxime, who is her employer, to thwart an assassination plot against him. He wants her. She wants him. Unfortunately, issues of birth, rank, and their own pasts are in conflict with their desires. And then there are the pirates, the storm, the hostile islanders…not to mention the sharks.
Excerpt:
Imena slid into one of the smaller pools, across from Maxime. The stone bench beneath the water was slippery, and she had to brace herself with her toes. A moment later, she realized she'd braced herself against Maxime's leg.
"I am sorry!" she said, splashing as she hitched herself higher on the bench.
Maxime laughed. He reached out and snagged her arm, drawing her to sit next to him. "If you sit here, you can see the new sculptures."
Imena eyed him and tried not to grin. "Your Grace, are you trying to seduce me?"
"Only a little," he said, and slung his arm over her shoulders. "Have pity," he said. "I've had a difficult day, too." He leered in a patently false way, and she laughed. Perhaps it would be all right. She could indulge, just a little, and harm nothing.
"Just this once, I will sit with you," she said, and settled back against him. A velvety thrill chased over her skin as their bodies met. She shifted so their shoulders overlapped. His muscular bulk was as solid and comforting as it looked; the hair on his chest was softer than she'd expected. She wanted to rub herself against him, all over, just for the sensual pleasure of it, a reaction she didn't even have to Sanji, who'd been her lover for many months.
Such a pity Maxime was a duke, a pity for her and for him. She, at least, could flee the men her parents had chosen for her. She didn't think Maxime would elude his king's choices for very long. His arm tightened around her shoulders. It was more difficult to fight her body's desire when she was this close to him. She slid lower in the water and rested her cheek on his firm pectoral, her nose tantalizingly close to his nipple. He smelled of cedar-scented soap. She could lick him with no effort at all, if she wanted.
Maxime said, "You're not dozing off, are you? You haven't admired the sculptures. Over there, in the grotto."
Imena looked. The grotto had been hollowed out of the bathing chamber's far corner to reveal stalactites; they'd been embedded with crystals that glowed softly in the lamp light. The new sculptures were small glass octopuses in every color of the rainbow, attached in different positions as if they swam among a forest of stone.
"It's lovely," she said.
"I'm glad you like it," he said. He rubbed his hand over her upper arm. "Captain Leung, what if you married me?"
Imena laughed. "That's the worst possible solution to both our problems. I would be a terrible liability to you."
"Not necessarily," Maxime said. He leaned a fraction to the side and kissed her ear, then the bare sensitive skin above it; the touch resonated down to her toes. Imena shivered and thought about edging away, but her body didn't want to move. His nearness sang along her nerves. He said, "You have many valuable qualities. I also have many admirable traits that I would like you to consider."
"Such as?"
###
By it, of course, I mean writing explicit sex. I can't. All of my books/series include prominent love stories and/or sexual encounters because those are so much a part of human life (and because I can be a bit of a romantic) but I do not write explicit sex (more like PG rated with perhaps an occasional R rating tossed in) not because I don't like it or object to it but because, I suppose, I feel too self conscious to manage it (something she addresses in her post).
What follows is her guest post, on the occasion of the release of her new novel, The Duke and the Pirate Queen.
Writing Explicitly
by Victoria Janssen
I think there are several keys to writing good explicit sex scenes. The first is to give up any pretense of hiding yourself. You can't hide from the reader, and you most especially can't hide from yourself.
By the way, it doesn't matter if you've never done the thing you're writing about and never intend to do it. What matters is what you think and feel about the action you're depicting. Writing, in some ways, works on the brain directly. Your feelings, through the medium of your style and voice, are being transmitted towards the reader. If your feelings aren't essentially honest, it's a lot harder for the reader to connect emotionally with what she's reading.
A way to honesty is finding empathy for what you're writing. A few times, I've written a sex scene about something I've never experienced and did not find appealing. So I asked someone who DID like the activity what it was she liked about it, and why. Given an additional point of view to work from, I was then able to consider what my characters might like, and not like, from the inside, and thus find a place of emotional honesty to work from.
Another key to writing sex scenes is the same as in writing any other type of scene; you have to pay attention to your prose. I also think you have to pay EXTRA attention, since some readers read sex scenes more closely and often than others! The attention-paying doesn't have to happen in your first draft. Some writers, including me, sometimes find it easier to write out the first draft in a state of semi-trance, as another route to access emotional honesty.
In revisions, though, I think it's more important in sex scenes than any others to pay attention to details. Simple things like repeating the same word over and over can throw a reader out of the scene. You can't let a sex scene drag, and you can't let it be predictable. After the initial draft, you might have to go back and add in a few more unexpected twists, of plot or characterization or dialogue. I always refine and polish the vocabulary I use, to make sure it's not only evocative but appropriate to the characters, the story's mood, and any thematic ideas I might have. Originality is always good, to one degree or another (it depends on your aims). And I make sure to look for unintentional double entendres. Those come up (heh) more often than you would think!
I feel the editing process is essential to avoid going over the top with a sex scene. It's especially good if you can wait a while, then read again what you've written.
Finally, I think you have to know your characters. Sometimes I know before I start the scene how that character would act in a sexual situation; sometimes I figure it out as I go along, from a mingling of intuition about the character and the needs of the story. The important thing to remember is that this scene isn't about you. It's about your characters. Weirdly, I think your own emotional honesty is required to know your characters properly.
Demonstrating women's sexuality through writing erotica, to a public audience, verifies the existence of female sexuality (woman as actor rather than than object) and helps bring female sexuality into public discourse. My emotional honesty thus not only validates women in general, it validates me as well.
###
General blub:
The Duke and the Pirate Queen is set in the same world as The Duchess, Her Maid, The Groom & Their Lover and features characters who appeared in that novel, Duke Maxime and Captain Imena Leung. Captain Leung is forced to abduct Duke Maxime, who is her employer, to thwart an assassination plot against him. He wants her. She wants him. Unfortunately, issues of birth, rank, and their own pasts are in conflict with their desires. And then there are the pirates, the storm, the hostile islanders…not to mention the sharks.
Excerpt:
Imena slid into one of the smaller pools, across from Maxime. The stone bench beneath the water was slippery, and she had to brace herself with her toes. A moment later, she realized she'd braced herself against Maxime's leg.
"I am sorry!" she said, splashing as she hitched herself higher on the bench.
Maxime laughed. He reached out and snagged her arm, drawing her to sit next to him. "If you sit here, you can see the new sculptures."
Imena eyed him and tried not to grin. "Your Grace, are you trying to seduce me?"
"Only a little," he said, and slung his arm over her shoulders. "Have pity," he said. "I've had a difficult day, too." He leered in a patently false way, and she laughed. Perhaps it would be all right. She could indulge, just a little, and harm nothing.
"Just this once, I will sit with you," she said, and settled back against him. A velvety thrill chased over her skin as their bodies met. She shifted so their shoulders overlapped. His muscular bulk was as solid and comforting as it looked; the hair on his chest was softer than she'd expected. She wanted to rub herself against him, all over, just for the sensual pleasure of it, a reaction she didn't even have to Sanji, who'd been her lover for many months.
Such a pity Maxime was a duke, a pity for her and for him. She, at least, could flee the men her parents had chosen for her. She didn't think Maxime would elude his king's choices for very long. His arm tightened around her shoulders. It was more difficult to fight her body's desire when she was this close to him. She slid lower in the water and rested her cheek on his firm pectoral, her nose tantalizingly close to his nipple. He smelled of cedar-scented soap. She could lick him with no effort at all, if she wanted.
Maxime said, "You're not dozing off, are you? You haven't admired the sculptures. Over there, in the grotto."
Imena looked. The grotto had been hollowed out of the bathing chamber's far corner to reveal stalactites; they'd been embedded with crystals that glowed softly in the lamp light. The new sculptures were small glass octopuses in every color of the rainbow, attached in different positions as if they swam among a forest of stone.
"It's lovely," she said.
"I'm glad you like it," he said. He rubbed his hand over her upper arm. "Captain Leung, what if you married me?"
Imena laughed. "That's the worst possible solution to both our problems. I would be a terrible liability to you."
"Not necessarily," Maxime said. He leaned a fraction to the side and kissed her ear, then the bare sensitive skin above it; the touch resonated down to her toes. Imena shivered and thought about edging away, but her body didn't want to move. His nearness sang along her nerves. He said, "You have many valuable qualities. I also have many admirable traits that I would like you to consider."
"Such as?"
###
November 29, 2010
Crossroads review + the perils of translation
Hungarian SFMag features a review of the Crossroads Trilogy.
It appears to be a positive review of the trilogy, as far as I can determine from running the page through Google Translate. Which is a translation feature that only goes so far, as you may imagine.
Because Google Translate (Hungarian to English) also includes puzzling lines like: Bones are found only in a white shroud screws and The Commissioner had a stroke (which as a sentence makes sense but does not make sense in the context of the story).
Still, I'm quite thrilled to get a review in Hungarian.
And I'm pretty impressed that Google Translate even exists, however inaccurate and amusing it may be.
It appears to be a positive review of the trilogy, as far as I can determine from running the page through Google Translate. Which is a translation feature that only goes so far, as you may imagine.
Because Google Translate (Hungarian to English) also includes puzzling lines like: Bones are found only in a white shroud screws and The Commissioner had a stroke (which as a sentence makes sense but does not make sense in the context of the story).
Still, I'm quite thrilled to get a review in Hungarian.
And I'm pretty impressed that Google Translate even exists, however inaccurate and amusing it may be.
November 28, 2010
Reading Recommendation: THE BROKEN KINGDOMS by N.K. Jemison
I have been thoroughly enmeshed in writing COLD FIRE, and now in revising COLD FIRE, and as some among you know, in full-bore writing ANGST of the most tiresome kind, which naturally tires me out. I have not done a lot of reading recently, and the reading I have done has been mostly non fiction for research. I did go through a brief spurt of reading historical romances, but then I burned out on those. And I haven't been able to read secondary world fantasies for some months because I was writing so immersively, although at the moment I think I am ready to go back to reading secondary world fantasy but at the moment I simply do not have time until I finish Draft Two of CF.
In the interval, I have decided I need to do a better job mentioning books and films/tv I have enjoyed.
Today: N.K. Jemisin's THE BROKEN KINGDOMS.
I gave a quote to Jemisin's debut, THE HUNDRED THOUSAND KINGDOMS, because I was so excited by this first novel (I hadn't read any of Jemisin's short stories because by and large I don't read short stories). As much as I enjoyed 100K, though, I totally adored TBS with utter squee. The novel has all the strengths of the first one: a strong narrative first person voice (and I am a tough sell on first person), a complex world that has no easy answers or pat solutions, plenty of action and intrigue and plot. However, while I respected and was gripped by Yeine's story in 100K, I cannot say I loved Yeine. Not so with Oree, the protagonist of TBS. I really identified with her, and not just because I've worn glasses and been terribly near sighted since I was 5, but because I found her terrifically sympathetic. Also, frankly, the story features one of my little secret fondnesses (or perhaps we should say weaknesses or narrative kinks): the arrogant dude who learns his lesson the hard way.
Highly recommended.
In the interval, I have decided I need to do a better job mentioning books and films/tv I have enjoyed.
Today: N.K. Jemisin's THE BROKEN KINGDOMS.
I gave a quote to Jemisin's debut, THE HUNDRED THOUSAND KINGDOMS, because I was so excited by this first novel (I hadn't read any of Jemisin's short stories because by and large I don't read short stories). As much as I enjoyed 100K, though, I totally adored TBS with utter squee. The novel has all the strengths of the first one: a strong narrative first person voice (and I am a tough sell on first person), a complex world that has no easy answers or pat solutions, plenty of action and intrigue and plot. However, while I respected and was gripped by Yeine's story in 100K, I cannot say I loved Yeine. Not so with Oree, the protagonist of TBS. I really identified with her, and not just because I've worn glasses and been terribly near sighted since I was 5, but because I found her terrifically sympathetic. Also, frankly, the story features one of my little secret fondnesses (or perhaps we should say weaknesses or narrative kinks): the arrogant dude who learns his lesson the hard way.
Highly recommended.
November 27, 2010
Converting print books to e-books: Linda Nagata
Writer Linda Nagata has posted a series of blog entries on the steps she used to convert four of her (now out of print) novels into e-books.
Linda has written six truly excellent sf novels (my particular favorites are THE BOHR MAKER and LIMIT OF VISION). She won the Nebula for Best Novella in 2000.
Not only are four of her excellent novels now available in ebook editions (with more to come), but she also provides a useful step by step breakdown of how she went about the conversion for those who are interested in the ebook revolution.
Linda has written six truly excellent sf novels (my particular favorites are THE BOHR MAKER and LIMIT OF VISION). She won the Nebula for Best Novella in 2000.
Not only are four of her excellent novels now available in ebook editions (with more to come), but she also provides a useful step by step breakdown of how she went about the conversion for those who are interested in the ebook revolution.
November 26, 2010
Reviews & Critique
As I said in my previous post, I don't write reviews and I definitely don't write criticism. I'm not adept at either of these forms.
I do sometimes, when I have time (often I don't but occasionally I do), critique manuscripts, and I find that I am okay at that in the sense that I sometimes can ask questions or try to describe my reaction in a way that is, I hope, helpful to the author as they consider what revisions they are going to make. As a beta reader, I'm pretty good on structural issues, and all right on characterization.
While critiquing in this way can be a delicate process or even political insofar as the personal is political, I usually enjoy it.
So how is the process of critiquing a mnanuscript as a beta reader and trying to analyze what elements worked and which did not work different from the process of writing a review (or piece of literary criticism)?
Is the only--or the main--difference that with beta reading you are tangling with an incomplete piece, and with a review you are analyzing something complete? Will that change the nature of how you approach your comments? Or are the processes the same?
I do sometimes, when I have time (often I don't but occasionally I do), critique manuscripts, and I find that I am okay at that in the sense that I sometimes can ask questions or try to describe my reaction in a way that is, I hope, helpful to the author as they consider what revisions they are going to make. As a beta reader, I'm pretty good on structural issues, and all right on characterization.
While critiquing in this way can be a delicate process or even political insofar as the personal is political, I usually enjoy it.
So how is the process of critiquing a mnanuscript as a beta reader and trying to analyze what elements worked and which did not work different from the process of writing a review (or piece of literary criticism)?
Is the only--or the main--difference that with beta reading you are tangling with an incomplete piece, and with a review you are analyzing something complete? Will that change the nature of how you approach your comments? Or are the processes the same?
November 24, 2010
"I'm sorry I'm so old" (DwtS) + a foreign sale!
I don't watch Dancing with the Stars, only because I don't watch tv that much although if Twin B and Adorable Girlfriend came over on Sunday nights when Amazing Race is on I would probably follow that (I rarely watch tv alone as it was very much a social occasion in the house I grew up in). But I have watched DwtS in occasional clips, mostly because I think it's a cute idea, something most anyone who has ever had a thought of dancing a bit would love to try.
So I was really pleased to read this morning that 50 year old Jennifer Gray (most famous for her role as "Baby" opposite Patrick Swayze in DIRTY DANCING) won this year. She could paddle on my Senior Masters crew (and why wouldn't anyone want to, since my crew-mates are JUST THAT MUCH FUN)!
At one point in one of those "training montage" clips, when it is obvious she is hurting and they have to take a break because she is in pain, she apologizes to her (young, fit, congenial, and supportive) dance partner, saying, "I'm sorry I'm so old." How I loved her then! That's why I'm glad she won. She's lovely, of course, and very fit, and has dance training anyway, but she clearly feels every one of those 50 years and she competes because that is the kind of person she is.
+++
In other news, COLD MAGIC has apparently sold to Dutch publisher Luitingh-Sijthoff, who are also, I believe, Katharine Kerr's Dutch publishers.
I haven't had any novels published in the Netherlands* yet, so this is exciting, adding another language to the ones I've been translated into so far: German, Polish, Russian, French, and Spanish (Crown of Stars), and Hebrew (The Golden Key, which also has a Russian and German translation). It also marks the first translation sale of COLD MAGIC.
*ETA: fixed as per comment below
So I was really pleased to read this morning that 50 year old Jennifer Gray (most famous for her role as "Baby" opposite Patrick Swayze in DIRTY DANCING) won this year. She could paddle on my Senior Masters crew (and why wouldn't anyone want to, since my crew-mates are JUST THAT MUCH FUN)!
At one point in one of those "training montage" clips, when it is obvious she is hurting and they have to take a break because she is in pain, she apologizes to her (young, fit, congenial, and supportive) dance partner, saying, "I'm sorry I'm so old." How I loved her then! That's why I'm glad she won. She's lovely, of course, and very fit, and has dance training anyway, but she clearly feels every one of those 50 years and she competes because that is the kind of person she is.
+++
In other news, COLD MAGIC has apparently sold to Dutch publisher Luitingh-Sijthoff, who are also, I believe, Katharine Kerr's Dutch publishers.
I haven't had any novels published in the Netherlands* yet, so this is exciting, adding another language to the ones I've been translated into so far: German, Polish, Russian, French, and Spanish (Crown of Stars), and Hebrew (The Golden Key, which also has a Russian and German translation). It also marks the first translation sale of COLD MAGIC.
*ETA: fixed as per comment below
November 23, 2010
I recommend "Glitter Rose" by Marianne de Pierres, and discuss why I don't review books
I have been wanting to tell you all about Marianne de Pierres' short collection GLITTER ROSE for over two months now, ever since I returned from my short trip to Australia and AussieCon4. While there, I met a number of fabulously wonderful Australian writers, and I also discovered that books in Australia are really expensive. Shockingly so, compared to our prices and even UK prices.
BUT. There is also a small press scene with intriguing authors and material that is not seen in the USA (or presumably the UK either).
With commercial houses, de Pierres has written the Parris Plessis series (NYLON ANGEL is the first), and the Sentients of Orion series, and has a YA novel, BURN BRIGHT, coming in March 2011.
GLITTER ROSE is a quartet of four spec-fic stories whose setting--an offshore island community--is as much a part of the psychology and emotion of the tales as the characters are. The collection has lovely writing, first of all, and a nuanced and mature sense of characterization, by which I mean that people have mixed and ambivalent motives and aren't all one thing or another, and the journey the narrator makes through the four stories is complex and felt, to me, true to the human condition. It also has a strong sense of place, and I am picky about sense of place. It is clear to me that the author knows and understands her landscape and how landscape flows through and changes people.
I rarely read short stories (they're not my thing). These stories made a strong impression on me; I can still call up actions and impressions from the stories in my mind's eye. Definitely worth reading and highly recommended.
In addition, Twelfth Planet Press has produced a simply excellent book as a physical object. It's nice to hold and nice to look at and nice to read as pure physical considerations. This is something small presses can do very well indeed, and TPP has done it.
So why did it take me two months to write the above?
Because I do not write reviews. I don't really have the temperament or knack or desire--or something which I can't put my finger on--to write reviews. The best I can do is write a recommendation and tell you what I liked (it is very unlikely you will see me post a negative piece on a book in the sff field, but that's a different issue).
I note this because of a recent discussion over at Torque Control about "Why I Write Reviews." It's an interesting discussion but one I didn't join in because (see above) I don't write reviews. What I do do is read reviews, sometimes, and I admire a writer who can review or critique (these have two different goals, I think) in an incisive or illuminating way. Not all reviews I read strike me as useful; ymmv with regard to the same review and two different readers of that review. In addition, some pieces called reviews seem more "reactions," which to me is also a valid piece of writing, but it's not a review per se.
I know how the joke goes: those who can't write, teach; those who can't teach, become critics. But you know, it's not true (well, okay, there may be cases where it is true, but that doesn't make it true). The best teachers I know teach because teaching is their goal and vocation. A good review or a well written piece of criticism is another form of writing expression, just as fiction or other non fiction is. I like to explore what I read, but I'll most likely do it verbally among friends and not in writing in public.
So, after you have trotted over here to check out the webpage for GLITTER ROSE, come back and tell me your thoughts about reviewing. Do you review? What are your thoughts on the differences between reviews, reactions, recommendations, and criticism?
I just wish I had posted my recommendation for GLITTER ROSE sooner
BUT. There is also a small press scene with intriguing authors and material that is not seen in the USA (or presumably the UK either).
With commercial houses, de Pierres has written the Parris Plessis series (NYLON ANGEL is the first), and the Sentients of Orion series, and has a YA novel, BURN BRIGHT, coming in March 2011.
GLITTER ROSE is a quartet of four spec-fic stories whose setting--an offshore island community--is as much a part of the psychology and emotion of the tales as the characters are. The collection has lovely writing, first of all, and a nuanced and mature sense of characterization, by which I mean that people have mixed and ambivalent motives and aren't all one thing or another, and the journey the narrator makes through the four stories is complex and felt, to me, true to the human condition. It also has a strong sense of place, and I am picky about sense of place. It is clear to me that the author knows and understands her landscape and how landscape flows through and changes people.
I rarely read short stories (they're not my thing). These stories made a strong impression on me; I can still call up actions and impressions from the stories in my mind's eye. Definitely worth reading and highly recommended.
In addition, Twelfth Planet Press has produced a simply excellent book as a physical object. It's nice to hold and nice to look at and nice to read as pure physical considerations. This is something small presses can do very well indeed, and TPP has done it.
So why did it take me two months to write the above?
Because I do not write reviews. I don't really have the temperament or knack or desire--or something which I can't put my finger on--to write reviews. The best I can do is write a recommendation and tell you what I liked (it is very unlikely you will see me post a negative piece on a book in the sff field, but that's a different issue).
I note this because of a recent discussion over at Torque Control about "Why I Write Reviews." It's an interesting discussion but one I didn't join in because (see above) I don't write reviews. What I do do is read reviews, sometimes, and I admire a writer who can review or critique (these have two different goals, I think) in an incisive or illuminating way. Not all reviews I read strike me as useful; ymmv with regard to the same review and two different readers of that review. In addition, some pieces called reviews seem more "reactions," which to me is also a valid piece of writing, but it's not a review per se.
I know how the joke goes: those who can't write, teach; those who can't teach, become critics. But you know, it's not true (well, okay, there may be cases where it is true, but that doesn't make it true). The best teachers I know teach because teaching is their goal and vocation. A good review or a well written piece of criticism is another form of writing expression, just as fiction or other non fiction is. I like to explore what I read, but I'll most likely do it verbally among friends and not in writing in public.
So, after you have trotted over here to check out the webpage for GLITTER ROSE, come back and tell me your thoughts about reviewing. Do you review? What are your thoughts on the differences between reviews, reactions, recommendations, and criticism?
I just wish I had posted my recommendation for GLITTER ROSE sooner
