C.E. Murphy's Blog, page 72

Picoreview: A Little Chaos

Picoreview: A Little Chaos: Entirely fictional, but charming.

I mean, entirely fictional: Kate Winslet’s character is an invention, no one like her existed at all, and…I wish they wouldn’t do that. It’s like Disney’s Pocahontas: why drop a couple of historical names on top of characters who live lives completely unlike the real story?

The answer, obviously, is because people recognise names like Pocahontas and Versailles and King Louis, which establishes the story, but…look, Belle was not an...

Five years old. :)

And very excited about it too. Very clear on YESTERDAY he was not yet five, even if we had a birthday party yesterday. (“My birthday celebrated!”) Definitely not five last week when I, being old, started saying he was five. “NOT YET. NOT FOR TWO WEEKS.” (We’re still a little unclear on time. :))

But today, oh my. Today the first words out of his mouth were, “NOW I’m five years old!”

And indeed he is. :)

The post Five years old. :) appeared first on The Essential Kit.

Bewitching Benedict!

Okay, the decision is official: the straight-up Regency romance (no fantasy elements involved!) that I’ve written will be coming your way soon! In July or August, if all goes well!

BEWITCHING BENEDICT is (potentially!) the first of a new 7 book series about the Lovelorn Lads. Think 7 Brides for 7 Brothers meets PG Wodehouse: seven friends (not actually brothers, except in spirit!) attempt to navigate the Regency marriage market, while an interfering valet helps them avoid bad relationships an...

Picoreview: Age of Ultron

Picoreview: Age of Ultron: We saw it twice in a row.

We were going to ANYWAY, I mean that was our plan, we had tickets for the 10:15am 3D IMAX showing, which was as early as we could see it without going to last night’s midnight showing, and then tickets for a 3:30pm 2D showing, so basically we had time enough to go get lunch and come back to the theatre. And that’s what we were going to do ANYWAY.

But we were also glad we did. :)

First and most importantly, you actually *don’t* need to stay...

Writing Wednesdays: Synopses

My latest question from the peanut gallery was about how I write synopses. Or at least, I think that’s what it was about: the entirety of the question, actually, was, “Synopsis?” :)

I’ve talked about writing synopses before at least once, in depth, as part of the Great Plot Synopsis Project (warning: that contains the entirety of the (2 page) synopsis for URBAN SHAMAN, and is therefore spoilery). However, that was written in early 2008, and I have Changed My Process since then.

Specifically,...

aw man elfquest stuff :)

The Pinis are having an Elfquest collectibles sale, as they’re apparently trying to clear stuff out. They intend to run it over several weeks, adding stuff as they go.

I do not need any of their stuff to become my stuff, I said with grim determination. I don’t I don’t I don’t. Unless they come up with the red leather-bound compilation of all four of the Starblaze Donning GNs, which I saw as a teen in Bosco’s Comic Shop in Anchorage Alaska and did not, of course, have $125 for and never really...

Kitsnacks: Easy Tikka Masala

I have semi-invented an easy tikka masala recipe, which is what happens when I have a recipe I’ve made before but discover I’m missing many of the actually-called-for ingredients. This one ends up having what I trust most people have in their pantries, which is why it’s ideal. :)

Easy Tikka Masala
1-2 oz butter or vegetable oil
1 tbsp garlic powder
2 tsp ground cumin
2 tsp paprika
1/2-1 tsp chili powder
1/2 tsp salt
pepper to taste

1 can chopped tomatoes
1 can chickpeas
1 fresh tomato, rough...

Picoreview: Fast & Furious 7

Picoreview: Fast & Furious 7: broke my heart.

I knew it was going to; the goddamn trailers were making me tear up even as I recognized that they were specifically choreographed to. I had no attachment at all to Paul Walker–I think the only thing I’ve seen him in is the F&F movies–but I was shocked by his death because, well. It was shocking. And so messed up, that he’s best known for these fast car movies and then died in a horrific car wreck. So FF7 was always going to break my heart.

And it...

Kitsnaps: Zoo Day

Yesterday it was a glorious morning and on the way to preschool Young Indiana said to me, “We should go to the zoo after school on this beautiful day!”

That seemed like a very sensible thing to do, so after school I collected him and we hopped on the bus to, er, actually, to go downtown and then get on the bus to the zoo, because that was by far the easiest way to get there, but, y’know, details details. To go to the zoo. :)

It was in fact a perfectly marvelous day, and I learned something ve...

viral!

I’ve had something go viral! I think ~160K reblogs qualifies as viral by anybody’s standards. #beams

Look, I’m dorktastic, I knew that already, but it’s kinda cool to see something get so many hits. My previous-ever best was several hundred retweets when I bitched about being able to read faster than any news video so please always just GIVE ME A TRANSCRIPT. So this is neat.

Also it makes me wish I posted more original content on Tumblr but I don’t so oh well. :)

The post viral! appeared fir...