a moment of burnt hat

Interviews and Profiles

• The Bulletin interviews Hiromi Goto.
• John Scalzi's The Big Idea: Catherine Lundoff.
• io9 on Movie Science That Fails (video).
• Locus interviews Nick Mamatas.
• Anthology Builder interviews Alethea Kontis.
• Decompose interviews Nancy Fulda.

Advice/Articles

• Book View Cafe (Sherwood Smith) on The Time Machine question.
• Book Life Now (Matt Forbeck) on 12 for ’12: Writing a Dozen Books a Year.
• Book Life Now (John Klima) on Debunking the Myth of a Strong Opening.
• Inkpunks (Sandra Wickham) on High Fiber Serials.
• Matt Forbeck on Why Do Ebooks Sometimes Cost More?
• BBC Future on ‘Barcode everyone at birth’.

News

• Launch Pad Attendees 2012.
• Editor GoH at World Horror Con 2013: John Joseph Adams.

Bread and Circuses by Felicity Dowker

If you’ve been reading these posts for the last week, you know that my intention was to write two posts. The first, about help, I did write. The second, I still haven’t written. This is very much in keeping with the way I write anything. I have a general idea. I put the words on the screen. And then other words arise out of interaction, and, well.

We, as parents, all want our children to be happy. I take that as a given. We do not always make our children happy - but at base, we want our children to lead happy, long lives.

Given the way life works, life is not predictable. We are adults, our children are not. We know the things that caused us pain - and we want to help our own children avoid that pain, and avoid bearing those scars.

( But... )

And now, I am running out of the house because it’s our 23rd anniversary :)

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...but one way and another, we ended up with one.

It's been a while. I've been reading and posting elsewhere on lj, but the blogging Muse has been persistently AWOL (probably on the beach with Aruba where my fiction Muse has been known to hole up when it's work time)(the pina colada bill for those two is off the charts).

We have had a very nice, almost-ten-day Camp. There have been Adventures with Family in Hospitals (OK now, and should continue OK, we hope). But! Pooka finally got his needles, and is finally doing better. And the rose population is exploding.

( See! Evidence! )

Focus on small orange blob in top right window. He was watching Miss P right to her door. Wary or besotted? She, of course, never gave him a glance. Probably a good thing.

Posted via LiveJournal app for iPhone.

Posted via LiveJournal app for iPhone.

Posted via LiveJournal app for iPhone.

For the first one, I've got a recently colored version of my first half-naked Renji (with bankai Zabimaru). Both of these represent my attempts to break from drawing directly from the Manga. The colored picture is a pose from the Manga, but I took Renji's clothes off (nice of me, right?)


This one is a funny combination of the St. Paul firefighter calendar and Manga, but completely original.

The week before last we headed on up to Newcastle so that I could attend & speak at the University Science & Technology Librarian's Group Meeting. I try to go to USTLG meeting when possible as they're really useful and a great, professionally supportive bunch.

We went via Stoke on Trent in order to find my parents and their canal boat in order to drop Loki off... he was very pleased to see them. Not a recommended route from Leicester to Newcastle! Though it did take us via the highest bit of motorway in England, in strong winds...yay?


Tyne Bridge, we know you well...

We finally arrived in Newcastle at teatime, after waving hello to the Angel of the North, at which point Jay's phone lost GPS and we went back and forth over the Tyne Bridge several times (this happened again later in the week). After driving around the same roundabout several times we finally found the Quayside Travelodge.

We checked in and became contestants in the krypton factor (or that's what it felt like) when trying to find our room, which involved about three sets of doors, following a corridor with forty odd rooms on, before finding a secret lift that only took you to the LG floor where our room was located.


Quayside: Millennium Bridge & Baltic


Sage

Monday saw me off to the conference, which was very good (I'll be blogging it for work) and Jay spending the day in the room in pain from a recent filling and a virus (rather than writing as planned), not so good. The day finished with a splendid evening talking comics with several of the Paperjammers, including Terry Wiley, Paul Thompson & Brittany Coxon at Lady Greys. Alas the pub stopped serving food before we got there so we did end up in a pizza & chips place at 11.30pm... though we didn't try the Nutella Pizza!


Heads at Newcastle University (where the conference was held).

The next few days saw us moving between pubs & cafes to meet up with lots of friends. Tuesday was lunch at the Northern Stage with ex-colleague Suzie, a trip to Travelling Man who kindly took a couple of copies of The Girly Comic Book 1 and finished with a lovely dinner at The Forth with old friends Baz & Katie.

Wednesday saw us descend on Tynemouth for afternoon tea with Criminology lecturer & knitter extraordinaire Charlotte Bilby (she's knitting a TARDIS cape). We met Charlotte at Crusoe's Cafe, which our phone app told us we'd found despite it not being in sight... it turned out to be at the bottom of the cliff, on the beach and did fab cakes.


Crusoe's Cafe

We stayed in Tynemouth for fish & chips at Marshalls and then to met up with some more Paperjammers (and some of the same ones again) for more drinking and comics talk.

Overall a lovely trip marred by Jay feeling pretty ill for most of it and which resulted in him seeing the Doctor (advised to rest) and having emergency dental surgery when we arrived home! He is feeling much better now.

This Wednesday saw me travelling down to the big smoke for another work conference, this time about the issues surrounding Open Access scholarly publishing. It proved to be more interesting than I thought it would and was in the interesting surroundings of the Institute of Materials, Minerals & Mining (IoM3). Though I suspect the women's toilets were a later addition to the building (they were in the basement), much like our engineering building at work, which had to have female toilets added later as who could predict there would be women engineers one day!


IoM3

This week was rounded off by the Comic(s) Bodies event in Nottingham, which I'll blog about later.

The brief but glorious summer continues. I read part of a book on the not-so-busy north strand and swam when the tide was high on the crowded harbour beach. Waves too high and wild to properly swim, but the water warmer (to perception) even than yesterday, almost temperate. Some Polish lads were peeling pink, and some black lads teased me in a friendly manner about going for a dip, and dozens of skinny Irish children screamed in the shallows and jumped into breaking surf.

But soon the summer will disappear, and we will wonder, "Was it all a dream?" "Does the sun even exist?" "Perhaps it was a hallucination brought on by chemicals in the rain." But by the Peeling Tomato shade of healing sunburn, we shall know it was true, and that once, once, the sun appeared in glory.

And the memory of light will endure behind the clouds of another year. *strikes a grand and tragic pose*

Therefore let us continue on towards suppertime. And have cake and grapes, because it is summer.

This entry was originally posted at http://hawkwing-lb.dreamwidth.org/479831.html. There are comments there. Comment where you like.

I haven't been near reliable internet for the last week, hence the silence. In that silence came a really lovely interview with cathschaffstump about writing process. Belated thanks, Catherine, for inviting me and lovely to trade hugs at WisCon!

As is tradition with voyaging to Wisconsin, there was the maternal clan visit, which consisted of much pot roast, far too much pie, and a marathon of horse-racing movies that required Kleenex and recitation of every racing bloodline from Man O'War to Sunday Silence.

Next WisCon. It's been a while. The Concourse has so many sense memories for me. It's strange to remember coming here with my first-ever novel to workshop and to think this time I came here on the verge of publishing my seventh. This year, I only took on one reading and I'm still in awe at my compatriots--ellen_kushner, Caroline Stevermer, and Franny Billingsley. They were SMASHING. If time had permitted, I'm quite certain I could have stayed up all night talking to deliasherman. I had a lovely lunch with glvalentine and a great conversation with Chris Barzak which I hope to continue at some later date. I met the most sparkly Nancy Werlin, also hoping to talk to her again some day. Sad I couldn't spend more time with Annalee Newitz and Charlie Jane Anders, who are also made of awesome.

And there were so many people I missed--Stephanie Burgis & Patrick Samphire, Gwenda Bond, Ysabeau Wilce (who sent me chocolate via courier since she couldn't be here herself!!)...the list goes on and on.

I can remember early years of feeling like I was on the outside looking in, nose pressed to glass, so anxious about being on the outside that I could barely speak. This year, I was with people I most admire whom I'm so proud to also now call friends. There was no anxiety at all (perhaps there should have been--I went over on my reading time! Oops!). We talked about Things that Matter to all of us as writers, as women, as people. I have oft likened it to being in Fairyland, and this year was no exception.

I was very sorry I had to cut it short this year. Maybe next year will be less frantic. (Who am I kidding?)

And now, I must write like the wind before June 15th swallows me whole. I fear things will be again sparse and dark for a bit until I come up for air, but I hope you're having a lovely weekend, whatever you may be up to.

YA author Karen Healey gives her feelings on teen fiction, swearing, and the latest round of censorship pleas. Seriously? The "let's protect all the kiddies by coating the planet in sanitized rubber" movement makes me crazy. I suppose censorship is easier than thinking or actual parenting for that matter.

There's a great interview over at SFSignal on Some Thoughts on Post Colonialism and Politics in SF. And well, here's a link from NPR on baby-naming and political affiliations. (Statistically, it doesn't work out the way you'd think it would.) I thought this article on Why Some Nations Become Wealthy While Others Remain Stuck in Poverty was pretty facinating. Take-away point: "Countries that have what they call “inclusive” political governments — those extending political and property rights as broadly as possible, while enforcing laws and providing some public infrastructure — experience the greatest growth over the long run. By contrast, Acemoglu and Robinson assert, countries with “extractive” political systems — in which power is wielded by a small elite — either fail to grow broadly or wither away after short bursts of economic expansion." I've long felt that extreme conservatism and well as Libertarianism both think short term. "American" corporations certainly do these days.

On a lighter note... and now... McSweeney's "Ultimate Guide to Writing."

Spent entire day yesterday dressed in my jammies, eating aspirin and hanging out on the couch. Watched mostly brainless films* until the very last -- Casino Royal (2006)** -- which told me my brain was finally getting back to normal. Just couldn't bring myself to think. It hurt too much. Am feeling so much better today. Dane says I'm my self again. Which is good. I've two days of slack to make up for today. So much writing to do. Am looking forward to it.
----------------------------------
* Underworld and Days of Thunder. I couldn't watch Underworld all the way through. I usually can't. Days of Thunder was awful, but it featured growly engines. So, I made it all the way through.
** That film was so well written. Daniel Craig is my favorite Bond and always will be, I suspect. And Eva Green hits that sweet spot of smart, tough, competent, feminine, and a little bit vulnerable. Come to think of it, Craig's Bond has that vulnerable quality too. I think I prefer characters (either male or female) who are a touch vulnerable. It makes them more realistic and sympathetic.

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http://whatever.scalzi.com/2012/05/27/graduation-song/

http://whatever.scalzi.com/?p=18708

Away from the Internets for most of the day because my niece Cecilia is having her high school graduation ceremony. See you all tomorrow. In the meantime, here’s “The Paper Chase,” one of my favorite graduation-themed songs, from the (now defunct) The Academy Is… (the ellipsis is part of their name).

I wrote about Fast Times at Barrington High, the album this song is on, here.

Have a good Sunday.

I’ve picked up a number of new albums over the past few months, all of them welcome additions.  Some of them will mainly just flesh out my randomizing library, but two in particular have entered heavy rotation.

First of these is Skeleton Key, a great, under-appreciated band that combines funk grooves, grungy guitars, and inventive auxiliary percussion into a distinctive and infectious alternative pop sound.  This band’s catchy riffs and melodies are tightly arranged, propelled by an undercurrent of rattletrap machinery, as pots and pans and scrap metal punctuate the beats — imagine Fat Albert’s Junkyard Band repurposed as a heavy alternative group, with Tom Waits occasionally producing, and you’ve got the general idea.  Gravity is the Enemy (2012) is their first full-length studio album in ten years, and it’s aptly named.  Frontman Erik Sanko’s voice is rawer, and the rhythm section’s usual clockwork precision has a heavier weight than usual, as if the band is valiantly resisting entropy.  While a few numbers don’t quite know when to quit, for the most part I’m finding it highly listenable and addictive stuff.  My favorite tracks:  “Museum Glass,” “Human Pin Cushion,” “Little Monster,” “Everybody’s Crutch,” “Every Hero.”

The second comes from Darth Vegas, a band I had high hopes for when I special ordered their debut album nine years ago.  This Australian postmodern ensemble found its way onto my radar when I read them described as a Mr. Bungle descendant that models itself on the Star Wars cantina band.  That first album was fun, but then I lost track of them.  Now, not only is that debut album finally available on iTunes, they’ve got a new one that’s even better (by a longshot), Brainwashing for Dirty Minds (2012).  This album is an endlessly inventive kitchen sink of instruments and influences, borrowing liberally from jazz, metal, ska, lounge, and…well, just about every other genre.  This is deeply weird music with a perverse and playful sense of humor, from its opening spookhouse jazz-metal number “Gritos Dulces,” to the demented 70s gameshow Latin of “Music for a Haitian Voodoo Priestess,” to its utterly silly album-ending Nintendo 64 medley of themes from every track.  This band will annoy the shit out of some people, but I love it…and is that the best band name ever, or what?  Favorite tracks:  “Gritos Dulces,” “Prokletsvo Gummina Kokoshke,” “Music for a Haitian Voodoo Priestess,” “Kopf Verloren,” “Waltz of the Pumpkins,” “Swami Salami,” “Things That Go Bump in the Night.”

As for other recent album pick-ups, I found the new Meshuggah album, Koloss (2012), an inessential extension of their cacophonic math-metal repertoire — some good tracks, but nothing all that groundbreaking compared to some of their mindblowing earlier releases.  After a while, this stuff just starts to sound like the same thing over again.  Similarly — in a really different way — the full-length Dumpstaphunk release Everybody Want Some (2010) fleshes out their presence in my iTunes nicely, but probably won’t work its way into heavy rotation.  I think I prefer funk as a flavor, rather than a focus, and a full album sometimes feels like too much of a good thing.  Happy to hear their tunes kick up now and then, though.

That’s probably why my second Tribal Tech grab, Thick (1999), is more welcome.  There’s plenty of funk flavor here, mixed in with jazz fusion and accomplished instrumental improv — but not so much of any one element to get stale.  Probably not as impressive as Rocket Science for me, but still good stuff.  And the same can be said for Tribal Tech bass player Gary Willis’ solo album Actual Fiction (2007), an impressive showcase for his chops, more jazz-funk fusion with some interesting sampling and mixing giving it a unique spin.  Stand-out track for me is easily “Eye Candy.”  Good albums, all, with the Darth Vegas definitely standing out as an early favorite.

Related Posts:

• Album: Vehicle by miRthkon
• 15 Albums Meme
• No Such Thing as Too Many Notes
• Six New Albums
• Film: Message from Space

Originally published at CHRISTOPHER EAST. You can comment here or there.

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Now the OU children's literature course is over and my job has come to an end,^[*] I can actually think about writing fiction again. In my Not the New Year Resolutions post, I mentioned setting myself a number of challenges. (Divided into physical, intellectual and creative challenges.)

Two of the creative challenges were finishing the first drafts of a couple of novels that are about three-quarters written. Getting stuck projects moving again is not the easiest thing to do, but wldhrsjen3's post about knowing what a character really wants has got a few ideas moving.

With the novel that started as a NaNo project a couple of years ago, I know what the POV character wanted, but that ambition was destroyed before the story actually starts, so to provide a satisfactory ending, I need to know what underlying need that ambition represented. I think that when I have that clear and when I have decided what an acceptable substitute for her original ambition is, then I'll be able to make progress again.

---

^[*]I have some ideas for self-employment, but won't be doing anything serious in that direction until the end of the summer.

[Cross-posted from Dreamwidth by way of a backup http://heleninwales.dreamwidth.org/44559.html. If you want to leave a comment, please use whichever site you find most convenient. Comments so far: .]

This is one of those weekends where everyone is off at a con having fun without us. I did see Men in Black III and enjoyed it a bunch. It was a huge lot of fun. It made a nice antidote for The Woman in Black which we rented and watched Friday night, and which was a very well-made, gorgeously filmed movie which I disliked so intensely it upset my stomach.

Question answers:

Brennan Griffin asked
Gate of Gods trilogy
Do you have any plans to re-visit the Ile-Rien world? You may have addressed this somewhere else, but I thought that Gate of Gods did not get nearly the shelf-space it deserved, and I'd definitely like to see more.

Not to say that I'm not enjoying your Cloud Roads sequence! And I quite liked the Wheel of the Infinite as well.

Thank you! The third book in the trilogy, The Gate of Gods, definitely did not show up in most bookstores and I've talked to many people who read the first two books (The Wizard Hunters and The Ships of Air) and never saw the third. The first two books didn't sell as well as the publisher wanted, so they didn't put much effort into getting the third out there. Technically, they are all three still in print, but you have to order them online. They are available as ebooks, too.

I did originally start a prequel novel about Giliead and Ilias, but the publisher wasn't interested in it, so I just turned it into a series of short stories which were eventually published by Black Gate Magazine. (Three of them are on my web site now: Holy Places, Houses of the Dead, and Reflections. There's one more that hasn't been published yet.) At this point, it's been so long I kind of doubt whether I would ever go back to that world. I haven't completely ruled it out, though.


desertport asked I have been wondering this for a little while: What is the ultimate fate of the Ravenna? Does she end up a museum or sink fantastically? Something else?

I always imagined her becoming a floating museum, kind of like the Queen Mary, but more honored and better maintained.


If anyone has anymore questions (about my books or about writing or publishing in general or about what I'm doing today (hint: it's boring)) go ahead and ask.

Hullo all!

Submissions Guidelines for Issue Three of Cabinet des Fees's Demeter's Spicebox are now up!

We have chosen the Aarne-​​Thompson type 2031C, The Mouse Who Was To Marry The Sun for Issue Three, do refer to the guidelines for the additional prompts!


Reading Period: 5 APRIL 2012 onwards (until we get the perfect two stories for the next issue).

Do bear in mind that you will need to read the stories from Issue One and Issue Two, as this is a storytelling project and the prompts reflect this. DS runs in Volumes of four issues each, and each Volume will start with a fresh set of prompts.

If you have any questions or doubts, feel free to email us at demeterspice (gmail) in April!

Best,

Nin Harris