Sickness and Health

Posted by Unrepentant Escapist

August 3, 2011 -- 12:33 p.m.

Ugh. It's amazing how the end of writing a book can leave you so frustrated, tired and depressed. It's like reaching the end of a marathon without the runner's high. There's the brief moment of joy and then...thud.

I can't bear to begin revising it at the moment. I'm bursting with creative energy though, even if I'm lethargic. Maybe I'll churn out another short story.

What I really want to do is start working on an epic fantasy about a city made entirely of mist but I probably ought to go back to the one I was working on during Brandon Sanderson's class, since it's already partially finished. New shiny ideas always seem to win out over dull old ones in terms of distraction.

It's also interesting how illness can strike two similar people in different ways. Monday, I woke up so dizzy I was barely able to stand up, so I spent the day napping and felt better after the sea-sickness passed. I wanted to nail the room down and say YOU! SIT! STAY!

But a family member of mine who works at a law firm felt fine...until he passed out in the middle of a deposition, banging his head a face times on the way down. The red scabs on his face looks like he got in a bloody beer brawl instead of a brawl with a table. He felt fine, afterward. Refused to let them take him to the hospital. I joked that he was the beginning of a House episode.

I figure we had the same illness and it just manifested in two different ways. Perhaps another symptom is me not particularly feeling like writing about the rest of my Hugo votes, though I did get them in on time. Oh well, maybe later.

In the meantime, in honor of all the Doctor Who nominees, here's the 1960s classic, 'I'm Gonna Spend My Christmas with a Dalek...'



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One Hundred Thousand Kingdoms Review (Hugo Reading)

Posted by Unrepentant Escapist


July 21, 2011 -- 1:35 p.m.

I just got cool news. I signed up for the writing workshops at Worldcon and one of my workshop leaders is going to be N.K. Nemisin, which makes the timing of this review fun. It will be interesting to see what she has to say about my work, because while she's an awesome author, from what little I've read of her work, our styles will be completely, entirely different. It made me wish I'd submitted something a little more surreal/descriptive than Skin Farm, which is fun but very...well, plain-spoken. Purposefully so, since the main character is illiterate.

The other writer working with our group is Louise Marley, who I've never heard of before, but her body of work looks interesting. I'll have to pick on up before I go.

Anyway, onto The Hundred Thousand Kingdoms: (shouldn't be any spoilers)

HTK came out with more hype for any debut fantasy novel I've seen than Name of the Wind. Because of all the news swirling around it (and because the name made me expect Hundred Thousand Kingdoms = hundred thousand potential novels...), I was expecting some new sword and sorcery along the release of a new NoTW or a new Scott R. Bakker series sort of thing.

What I got was entirely different.

From the get-go, there's conflict. A child whose own mother even never wanted her born. A dangerous new world floating above the crowds, full of people who titter behind their hands at the protagonist, Yeine, who seems to have been brought only to serve as a sacrificial lamb on a chain. A lamb who might not even survive the day, for as night falls, she's being chased by a ravenous half-man, half-beast through glowing corridors, some of which will respond to her very thoughts.

In the back of the book, Nemisin lists her influences. Octivia Butler is among them, which doesn't surprise me, because this book reminds me of Butler's Patternist series in terms of style. The plot also strikes me as Butler-ian. Black girl from 'barbaric' (ironic air quotes applied) matriarchal backwater gets invited to rich white people's court by her maternal grandfather after her mother (who fled the court to marry the protagonist's mother) is murdered.

I point it out the race because it's there, but it's subtle. It's more about the characters than race/class politics.

I like how Nemisin manages to blend a lot of elements into one, not-too-big book. There's a mystery (who killed the protag's mom and why?) politics (need to manipulate one faction against the other) and religion. That last is especially intriguing, and builds the backbone of the work. If John Milton's Lucifer and a few of his angels were kicked out of heaven, confined inside mortal bodies and given to one hierarchical family to be used as weapons, it would be a bit like this book.

Since family conflict and religious conflict are two of what I love to see most in fantasy literature, this one hits most of my sweet spots. My only quibble was that I'd like to see more try-fail from the protagonist, who has gods at her beck and call. It seems like, with all that power, she could try to do something more. I understood that she was a) in a new place, b) limited by the fact everyone else around her also could command the gods and c) that none of her scurrilous family could be fatally harmed by said god-weapons, but still, I would have liked to see her try more, even if it meant failing. One scene in particular would have resonated more if the villain had caught a god-weapon spying on her instead of just singling him out because she wanted to hurt someone.

That passivity reminded me a little of Butler as well. In books like Dawn, she'd put the characters in situations where they were completely helpless (or only had the illusion of free will) and make her readers squirm. I loved that style when I first read it, but am a little less enamored of it now, maybe because I feel far too helpless sometimes in my own life and I read (like the blog says) for escape. For the belief/illusion that one person can be powerful and potent. And the protagonist in this book is powerful--but not because of her choices, but because of what others made her.

The obligatory romance also wasn't my cup of tea. Since being sexually assaulted, I don't have much truck with women falling in love with men who could violently hurt them even if, theoretically, the men 'didn't mean to.' But I understand that my taste is not everyone's. Also, I wished I could have seen a little more of the female gods.

That said, this book was tremendously awesome. I enjoyed the book a lot and thought it was beautifully written. The setting was fantastic fun. From the first pages, I was hurtling through, hungry for more. I almost started reading it again from the beginning as soon as I put it down.

The style is definitely on the literary side, which I love to see in fantasy, because as much as my own style is pretty simple, I like to see variation in a genre. One of the interesting things Nemisin does is, instead of a straight narrative, the character is constantly engaging in asides--sometimes from her present self, sometimes from her future self looking back--very complicated, but it never lost me as a reader even though Nemisin's juggling so many balls.

I especially enjoyed the conversations the protagonists had with 'herself.' You'll understand what I mean if you read the book.

For a sample of her style, take this excerpt from one of my favorite scenes (Minor spoiler, naturally. Well, kind of, since it's out of context):

[I]n that sliver of time, I felt the power around me coalesce, malice-hard and sharp as crystal.
* * *
That this analogy occurred to me should have been a warning.
* * *
Rish swung. I held still, tense for the blow. Three inches from my face Rish’s fist seemed to glance off something no one could see—and when it did, there was a high hard clacking sound, like stone striking stone.

Rish drew his hand away, startled and perhaps puzzled by his failure to put me in my place. He looked at his fist, on which a patch of shining, faceted black had appeared about the knuckles. I was close enough to see the flesh around this patch blistering, beading with moisture like meat cooked over a flame. Except it was not burning, but freezing; I could feel the waft of cold air from where I stood. The effect was the same, however, and as the flesh withered and crisped away as if it had been charred, what appeared underneath was not raw flesh, but stone.

If that bit made you want to read more, go pick up Hundred Thousand Kingdoms. I don't think you'll be disappointed.

I can tell already that choosing Hugos is going to be like picking teeth out of my spine. I also watched Doctor Who's version of the Christmas Carol, nominated as a short, and loved it, even though the science was complete bunk. (Proper frequency, my foot...) I thought it was a new twist on an old classic, and who doesn't like seeing Dumbledore as Scrooge? Or a shark pulling a sleigh? This is must-see Christmas watching, along with Futurama's X-mas episode and the Grinch Who Stole Christmas (the cartoon, not the Jim Carrey version).

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Hugo Reading!

Posted by Unrepentant Escapist

June 18, 2011 -- 4:28 p.m.

So I've finally had time to begin my Hugo reading.

I haven't actually read any of the previous books by this year's Hugo nominees, so it's exciting and kind of disorienting for those books that plop me down mid-series. From discussion boards, Ian McDonald seems to be the inside favorite, but Connie Willis won the Nebula, so I wouldn't count her out yet.

Though seeing a WWII travel book made me feel like writing a story where a history professor comments: "You know, why do time travelers never seem to end up in Africa? Isn't that a little weird?" And then having it turn out there's some sort of time-nexus that will automatically draw all time travelers to WWII where they will be given the opportunity to kill Hitler only to a) have something go terribly wrong or b) alter their own futures in a horrible way. And the time travel nexus was created by aliens who wanted to mock us.

Well, what else could explain how the time travelers ALWAYS end up there, except when they're going to assist with the assassination of J.F.K. instead...

As a postscript, apparently China banned shows about Time Travel. Odd.

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Me Want...

Posted by Unrepentant Escapist

April 21, 2010 -- 7:30 a.m.

I so would wear this.

My younger brothers fail to appreciate the awesomeness of Spiderpig. I think they just don't understand how epic it is.

Maybe they fail to understand the epicness of the Simpsons in general. For me, even though some more recent cartoons have surpassed them in humor (only to go down into their own abyss of repetition *cough* Family Guy), they all owe a huge debt to Homer, Marge, Bart, Lisa and Maggie. And unlike the more recent adult cartoons, the Simpsons had heart. It was about people who, more often than not, were trying to do their best only to have things go horribly wrong. The best Simpsons episodes weren't focussed around guest stars and gimics, but around the relationships of a family that wasn't too different from our own.

That's while I'll always be a Simpsons fan, even if some episodes/entire seasons make me wince and reach for the shark repellent...

In other animation news, I finally went to see Avatar. I was pleased by the animation and all the little touches that went into the story. The technology was wonderful, the scenary breathtaking. While nothing new on the story front--white man goes and becomes truest member of native culture--there were enough little twists to keep this interesting. Like the evil corporate dude was reluctant to commit a massacre and the main character started things in a wheelchair. I don't think Avatar will become the classic Star Wars is, just because there wasn't enough groundbreaking, either in terms of idea or plot. But for what it is, it's the best. Enough little flourishes and details that I could tell everything came out of love, and I'd put it at the very top of the "nature-worship" genre, which in general bugs me because it because it's so didatic. Nature = good. Technology = bad.

There is some irony, of course, given the high involvement of technology in this film.

Speaking of Spiderman, there's also supposedly a Spiderman Broadway muscial in the works. From comics to movies to Broadway. Weird.

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NBC = Lose

Posted by Unrepentant Escapist

February 25, 2010 -- 11:03 p.m.

"To quote Mary Carillo’s former mixed-doubles partner, John McEnroe…”You cannot be serious!” NBC isn’t showing the second group of skaters because it needs to broadcast a feature about Carillo spending time with lumberjacks in Canada. And it didn’t break any ground, seeming like another excuse to put Carillo in a goofy outfit. Sorry skating fans, NBC thinks logs make better programming right now than skaters."

 --From the NYT Liveblog of skating.

Wow. NBC did such a poor job of covering figure skating tonight, I'm not sure I'm ever going to watch their Olympic coverage again. That was ridiculous. Only showing the final group? Lara Lapisto must have had the skate of her life to make the jump from 10th to the top 6, given Rachel Flatt's clean program. Her free program score beat out Miki Ando and Mirai Nagosu. It's especially impressive because the NYT blog says she had technical difficulties. Akiko Suzuki managed to move up from 11th to 8th. They both must have had great programs. And what do we get? LOGGING. A few nights ago, they spent their opening ten minutes on a random plane flight. Because that's what we all tuned in to see, jokes about peanut packages.

WHAT WAS NBC THINKING????

Oh, and the people who've done the skating packages--those little clip films--need to be slapped. The riculous font ice dancing stuff was bad enough, but the whole "five days-three days-right now" thing was just dumb. Let's show a minute of people getting their pictures taken! Ooh! Exciting!

In the past, I've like the segments because they actually introduced us to people, but this year, they're just trying to get us all revved up with dramatic imagery and lame music. I don't know why NBC thinks it needs to turn figure skating into the superbowl.

And it's not as if NBC doesn't have multiple networks. Couldn't they pick one to show all the skating? They must not want to split the sponsors by dividing it between multiple networks. But since women's figure skating is like THE defining event of the winter games, the jewel of the advertiser's crown, why not show more of it? Showing so few skaters is just putrid. I mean, NBC just got smacked down by the Ol' Gray Lady, for goodness sake. And they deserved it.

Bottom line, I don't think I can wade through three hours of coverage about stuff I don't care about for figure skating anymore. I just can't. And I can't seem to download the software NBC tells me I need to watch the videos on their website, either, so they lose in multiple ways. I try to download it and it takes me to a blank page. Stupid, stupid, stupid.

The only worse moment in NBC's coverage during this games that I can think of is the time they spent staying with a ski race when it was snowing. The entire time, the announcers said. "Well, fresh snow is death to the course, so none of these guys have a chance of medalling. Oh, there goes another guy, but he has no chance of medalling, either." And this went on for an hour...

Though of course, the lowest point EVER must have been when NBC barely covered the Hamm medal debacle in 2004. So I wasn't exactly enamored with their coverage in the first place. Too jingoistic.

It makes it worse because of the choice of skaters they showed. I get, they wanted to show it live for east coast viewers...but they chose to show the pre-recorded skate of Cheltzie Lee, who ended up in 20th, instead of the skater who was on the ice at the time: Kwak Min-Jung of South Korea, who scored almost 20 points better and ended up with the 12th best free program score. Perhaps because Lee's mother is American? One wonders why they bothered to show her score instead of another skater or...another logging segment.

This was the last straw. From one outraged figure skating fan to you, NBC: I hope the loggers paid you a lot for that little p.r. stunt, because you just lost any respect I had for you. And I didn't have much in the first place. Not even my beloved Scott Hamilton may be able to fix this wound...

ESPN is making a bid for the next Olympics. They say if they win, they'll show everything live regardless of what time it goes. Well, they've got my vote. Even if having the games in Sochi would put figure skating in the mid-afternoon, at least we'd get to see more of it. Bet they'd handle the online stuff better, too.

On the skating itself: The skates we did see went well. Kim Yu-Na rocked the house. I thought Rachel Flatt was underscored. If she'd been able to skate the whole program with the energy she showed at the end, it would have been even greater.

I wonder how long Kim Yu-Na will dominate? She's so young, and it doesn't seem like there are many skaters who can take her place. They talk about Mirai Negasu as a rising star...but when the 'risen star' is only a few years older, it's hard to take such talk seriously. Kim Yu-Na could probably take back to back golds, if she wants too.

I wonder what she does with all her money? That's the thing about getting by on $20,000 a year. The idea of getting $8 million a year just leaves me a little bemused. What would you do when you're too old to skate and have so much money sitting around? Would you work? Found a bunch of charities? Play golf all day?

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Ladies' Night

Posted by Unrepentant Escapist

February 24, 2010 -- 8:03 p.m.

Glad to see such stellar performances from the women last night. Of course, the ladies' competition is almost boring because the favorite is so strong, its' unlikely anyone will give her any kind of run for her money.

I love Yu-Na Kim's short program. I was happy Mao Asada skated so well, since she's had problems this year. I don't know what they were talking about when they said Yu-Na's draw order was bad. As a competitor, nothing drowns out the nerves like seeing your arch-rival excel. It lifts you up, gives you something to concentrate on the fact that a whole bunch of people are staring at you and do you have parsley stuck between your teeth?

Or maybe that's just me.

Speaking of draw order--what the heck was up with the ice dancing finals? It takes all the tension out of it when you have the leaders go before the end. I don't know why they aren't just doing it in reverse-rank order.

Anyway, one skater I wished would do better is Akiko Suzuki. She's actually my favorite Japanese woman on the ice. She skates with such beauty and musicality. I was sad to see her not do as good as I know she can.

My heart broke for Joannie Rochette. I can't imagine how hard that must be to have all the media attention on you at the same time you lose your mother. She handles it with grace. She is such a sentimental favorite, I hope she medals. The U.S. girls probably won't be able to crack the top three, but I can hardly blame them with such strong competition. At least, hopefully, they'll be able to claim high spots so next year we can send more girls. Only have two present is annoying.

I was confused by the fact the network didn't show Russian skater Anna Leonova last night, who has an adorable spunk and a great short program. She landed in 8th.

I'm also mystified to hear the announcers call things "controversies" that really aren't. Like the U.S. silver medalist not taking first at the U.S. championship. That wasn't a controversy. Protesting a bobsledder's helmet ridges as illegal is a controversy. Protesting an offensive aboriginal dance is a controversy. Pluschenko's website labelling one of his metals a "platiunum metal" is a controversy. A judging decision that seemed surprising is not a controversy, unless it involves bribery. It's merely a surprise. Anyway, I've heard the announcer use mis-word the word two or three times. Every time she does, I want to whack her with a dictionary.

Speaking of mystifying, a skater from Israel qualified for the olympics but her country didn't allow her to skate. Why? Because she didn't place in the top 14 at Europeans. Apparently, Israel only wants to send athletes to the olympics who have a shot at the top.

One wonders how they're supposed to climb to the top if they don't get all the international experience they can get, if they don't get the olympic exposure that might allow them to pick up more sponsors, and might draw new Israeli skaters to the sport because little kids look up at the tv and say 'I want to do that.'...

Here's the NYT article about Israel's choice. There is just a missing piece here that I don't understand. I feel sorry for her...all that work, that sacrifice, and your own government kicks you in the head.

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Writing Prompt #12: Beast and Beauties

Posted by Unrepentant Escapist

February 22, 2010 -- 4:17 p.m.

Well, looks like I got the top three pairs in the ice dancing right, if not the order. Davis and White's long program is good, but not quite good enough to beat Virtue and Moir. I'm okay with that, the Canadians skated well.

I thought the Russians' original skate was overrated. The nice thing about all the other skates was it caught the flavor of the folk dances they were doing, like Davis and White stepping right out of Bollywood, down to the delicate hand motions. On the other hand, the Russian's aboriginal dance looked like people who had never actually seen an aboriginal dance doing what they thought it might look like. At least they toned down the skin-color thing.

Meanwhile, I saw a PBS Nature Special on Beauties and Beasties, talking about various ugly and beauty creatures and why their appearances had evolved the way they did, and how the ugliness sometimes gave creatures functional advantages.

One of the species covered was the Viperfish, which has got to me about the ugliest, most terrifying-looking things in existence. Even though they're not human predators, waking up face-to-face with one of these would seriously freak me out.

WRITING PROMPT #12

Title: Beasts and Beauties
Genre: Any
Type: Description

Try to write descriptions of the Viperfish. They can be twisted into any context--maybe your land is being overrun by monsters with Viperfish faces. Try to isolate what makes them so ugly and terrifying. The thin yellow teeth? The large black eyes staring at you with their beastial hunger?

Use these pictures to inspire yourself to write a description that would make Stephan King shudder. Remember that human beings have evolved to find certain things instinctively frightening. Remember that, when it comes to creating creatures that can inspire your characters to greater heights of fear, and use your descriptions to terrify the readers as well.

Now in contrast, write a description from a Viperfish's point of view. When a Viperfish looks at an attractive Viperfish, what does he notice? The shimmer of her scales? The delicate ridges in her chin? Can you find the beauty in the ugliness? Can you convince your reader that this is the most fearful thing he or she has every seen, but also the most lovely?

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Lysacek Wins Gold!

Posted by Unrepentant Escapist

February 10, 2010 -- 10:53 a.m.

LYSACEK WINS GOLD!!!!!!!!

Yes, I got all teary-eyed. I thought Johnny Weir did far better than his scores merited (I was hoping his performance would propel him up to fourth). Takahashi also did well, but not as well as I would have wished. I felt bad for Oda--only thirty seconds left and the lace breaks. His Charlie Chaplain routine wasn't as energetic as usual. Patrick Chan did better than I expected. Good for him. I have no clue how he managed to beat Weir, though. Cause Weir's skate was incredible, best of his whole career. And one fall-out on a spin wouldn't outweigh the other mistakes, you'd think. I liked his new fir-free costume too. Looking at the breakdown, he did eight triples, all of them clean, compared to six from Chan. His technical score was 6.19 points higher than Takahashi's (only .3 higher than Chan, who got a lot of grade of execution bonuses)...so Weir lost it all on the performance mark. He got a 77.1 while Chan got an 82. Which puts him .8 behind to the performance marks compared to Lysacek and Pluschenko. Takahasi got a 84.5 in performance (he did do well--although it was his short program that did it for him. He was 5th in the free skate).

Really? And Johnny got a 77.1. REALLY?

Turns out the mistake on the spin only cost him half a point, by the by. Well, it still would have taken Johnny an awful lot of ground to make up to get in medal position, I do think he should have gotten a better second mark. I just don't get it. I don't get how Patrick Chan's mark was so high, comparitively. Though I could really see the potential in him--I liked last night's skate better than anything I've seen from him in the last little while. But not that much.

Bottom line--there must be something about this system that I don't get. (I'm not the only one--ask Pluschenko and his coach...)

I was surprised Lysacek and Pluschenko got the same performance marks, because I thought Lysacek had far more involved choreography, and Pluschenko definitely had the better jumps. Lambiel did fabulously...only .5 away from the bronze, so that's really good for another returned retiree. Pluschenko and his coach are upset, throwing fits at the judges, and some people are saying that the new system turns figure skating into ballet.

Elvis Stojko, for example. Though you could call him biased, since he was definitely always better on the jumps than the artistry. (He thought Daisuke should have been second, Lysacek third, too. Which is right out.)

I think they do have a point. The quad is undervalued, so it discourages skaters from taking the risk. However, that's the way the system does it. Don't blame Lysacek, blame a scoring system that rewards people who act conservatively. Then again, if Pluschenko would have put even one more of those fabulous jumps at the end of the program, he probably could have clinched it. I was so sure Pluschenko was going to win. But his front-loaded program really does annoy me. I feel like it's almost flipping off the judges--("yeah, all I need is my jumps so I'll just give a token salute to the artistry in the second half, and it's going to be sloppy").

Ice dancing starts tonight, and if there's any justice, the gold will also go to an American team (hopefully it'll go 1-2). However, I've seen a couple of news posts saying that the new scoring sytstem hasn't reformed ice dancing because it's still so subjective. So it's quite possible it'll go to the Russian world champions. Or the Russians because they're good, no seniority/favoritism involved. I wasn't all that impressed with them at Europeans. There's something that strikes me as wrong when you can come in at the end of a season yet score better than Belbin/Augusto (though of course, B&A weren't there, so it may have just been a happy-go-lucky judging panel).

Anyway, if you look at scores alone, it'll be the Canadians who'll win. They posted an incredible 204.38 at their own national tournament. Which...I'll put down to it being the national tournament. My picks would be: #1 Davis/White, #2 Belbin/Augusto, #3 Moir/Virtue. Though of course, this won't actually happen because having no Russian pairs on the platform will make the whole skating world faint. So the Russians will probably end in second, and Belbin/Augusto probably fourth, just because giving two medals to the Americans in ice dancing isn't allowed.

Okay, so I'm cynical when it comes to judging. How can I not be after Weir last night? Sue me. That boy skated his heart out.

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Skating!

Posted by Unrepentant Escapist

February 17, 2010 - 9:13 a.m.

Ooh, I've been waiting for the men's figure skating competition all year! And it was worth the wait. Last night was in-flippin-credible. I was on the edge of my seat the whole time. I don't think there's ever been a field this deep and this strong. And oh, the pain. Joubert. Abbott. Ugh, you knew the instant the kid stepped out on the ice, his face looked terrified. I wanted to reach through the screen and hug them all.

One oddity: watch how many skaters have dark eyes. For a minute, it felt like walking into Randland. Beautiful dark eyes, and of course expected from many of the ethnicities, but I was just startled and wondered if they reflected the figure skating population statistically.

I always change favorites from year-to-year. Last year, I loved Lysacek and Contesti for their long programs. I hoped they would ditch this year's long programs and go back to what I think of as "classic hollywood" and "spaghetti western" because this year's just aren't as strong for me.

But this year, after the Grand Prix, I think I was turning Japanese. Daisuke Takahasi wrapped my heart around his little finger, even if he didn't win. He's such a beautiful, passionate skater. And Oda's long program is fantastic.

And I still like Lysacek. It kind of frustrates me that he's so underrated. He's World Champion (I never get sick of the clip where he's fist-pumping coming out of his sit spin--victory in his home town must have felt incredible) and Grand Prix Champion. He posted the second highest total score for a program all year--beaten only by Pluschenko at Russian nationals (and everyone knows the scores at national championships are inflated.) Yet he doesn't get any of the sponsorship or love that some of the other figure skaters get. Maybe he has a nasty personality, or maybe he just doesn't get the respect he deserves, I don't know. Maybe no one wants to be represented by a guy with puffy sleeves and feathers on his wrists. When I saw his short program last night, I almost jumped out of my seat and cheered.

In contrast, I've always thought Patrick Chan is overrated. He seems like a nice kid, but there's room to grow, and I never bought into him being a favorite to win, despite the Canadian media's swoons. He just...didn't do very well this season. I hope he grows from it and that his country will lay off on the expectations. You can't expect someone who's struggled all season to win games against juggernauts like Pluschenko.

At any rate, however good my three favorites are (who ended up 2, 3 and 4), I doubt they have a realistic shot at Pluschenko. The man is just too good a jumper. I admire his take-no-prisoners on the ice attitude and got amused by NBC's package showing him as a villain, but he lacks so many of the things I love in a figure skater--the footwork, the spins--that I can't help hoping for an upset. Even if it's an unrealistic hope. Pluschenko is just too great in terms of consistancy--though he looked surprisingly vulnerable last night, didn't have his usual verve.

I suspect he'll come back with a vengeance Thursday. Hopefully my favs will still be able to walk home with silver and bronze.

One figure skating program that you won't get to see Thursday, but that I love, is from0 Ryan Bradley, the alternate for the U.S. men. He's not as good as Abbott, Weir, or Lysacek, but he's still a sentimental favorite of mine anyway for his long program. The skaters who can use humor in their programs are always golden in my books.

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Phlegm-tastic!

Posted by Unrepentant Escapist

December 10, 2009 -- 3:41 a.m.

Golly gee, I'm sick again. Which is amazing since I've been a hermit this past week. Germs somehow invaded my fortress of solitude.

Good thing Legend of the Seeker is here to entertain me. Richard Rahl/Cypher actor Craig Horner has grown a beard. But had he grown THE BEARD?

When I see him, I have the urge to shout "GET A HAIRCUT, YOU HIPPEE!!!"

While I'll grant that Legend of the Seeker has its quality issues, there's so much quality camp ("Or you'll feel the wrath of my sword!") that how can you NOT love it? (Speaking of camp, hulu also has some MST3K up and the Inspector Gadget Saves Christmas. Because is there anything extendable legs can't solve? No? I thought so). I'm happy to see they're keeping around the main villain from season one, because despite a general aura of villanous stupidity, he does entertain me. I wish he'd camp it up more. At least he hasn't worn his "wizard's wifebeater" this season.

I haven't read anything of Goodkind's but the Wizard's First Rule, mostly because--I don't like Ayn Rand. The ironic thing is, the whole premise of Legend of the Seeker, which is about going around and saving weak and helpless people seems somewhat contradictory to the Ayn Rand's ideas... But I'm not an expect.

But Legend of the Seeker is not only a philosophical masterpiece (teehee), it is also an educational tool. So, without further ado...

EVERYTHING I'VE LEARNED FROM LEGEND OF THE SEEKER

25) Any problem can be solved with a sufficiently big magic sword.
24) Dharken Rahl looks pretty good naked.
23) Skirts are absolutely no hindrance in a battle.
22) Wizards can cut holes in walls when it comes to letting prisoners escape, but they can't cut their way into evil fortresses.
21) You cannot be slightly evil. You have to either be a) misunderstood b) an axe-wielding maniac or c) a lovable thief.
20) Swords are for slashing, never stabbing. And enemies will always fall down with dramatic death cries, even though there are no visible wounds.
19) Always wear your corset laced up as tightly as possible, even while sleeping.
18) All farmer/ranger types can instantly pick up swordplay and then go on to beat any trained, armored swordsman.
17) A white dress will never get dirty, even if you're beaten and thrown in prison.
16) Your power is directly proportional to the power the plot requires. (IE, the Power-ups and abilities you gained last episode will never be useful again. And the guy who beat you at the beginning of the episode will not be able to manage to do so at the end of the episode...even though no change has been made except for the hero learning a moral.)
15) Real men never use hand gestures.
14) Hair will mysteriously get longer if you braid it and pile it on top of your head.
13) An explosion must always be accompanied by a hero leaping away and screaming.
12) All magical keys, potions, puzzles, etc. will be designed to be ridiculously difficult and often require trips to several different villages, no matter what the end result actually is.
11) If you have important information that the hero must know, write it down, because chances are, when you try to tell it to them you'll be killed mid-sentence.
10) Hot peasant women will always have access to great tailors. And their massive cleavage will never get in the way of their farming, ie, pop out while they're hoeing potatoes.
9) There are two sides in any argument, of which one of them will always be wrong. Unless they're both wrong. 'Gray area' is another word for 'pussy.'
8) When in doubt, get on something high and leap off screaming. This always works.
7) Even if someone's made a HUGE, TERRIBLE mistake, their spouse and friends will always forgive them completely within an hour-long span of time.
6) Good guys important to the plot never die. If they do, a woman dressed in the tight red leather will climb on top of them and give them mouth to mouth. Which is, of course, an enticement to suicide.
5) Cheaters never prosper. Unless they're lovable side characters who actually have hearts of gold. (Sorry blond dude, but you're no Bruce Campbell)
4) Hell is actually a naked gay orgy.
3) Don't ignore prophecy because it will come back and bite you in the ass.
2) Peasants are always happy unless they're currently being molested by tyrants or monsters.
1) Yes, the slit in Kahlan's skirt CAN go higher.

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TV Goodness (Or not)

Posted by Unrepentant Escapist


November 3, 2009 -- 3:22 p.m.

Modern Marvels did an episode on "Barbarian Battle Tech." Though even the show seems to acknowledge that "Barbarians" to cover everything from the Celts to the Huns is perhaps not the best word, the info about the weapons will be interesting to any fantasy enthusiast. I had no clue that the Celts had chariots, though I wonder if they really did use them in the way described. It seems--un-Celtic. It also says that there is a surprising advantage to fighting naked except for blue paint--though mail is still a more effective protector.

Anyway, you can watch it here.

Tonight, ABC is premiering their latest hyped series--"V," which is apparently a remake of an earlier science fiction series with the same name. The first eight minutes of the show are available for free online.

Although I wouldn't waste your time on it, honestly. Unless you want to learn how not to tell a story.

It's just too formulaic. I can picture executives sitting around in a studio, ticking off demographic groups--there's the rebellious teen. The hard-worked single mother. The religious guy. The person being overlooked at work. And the black man.

It's obvious that the show is trying to invoke Lost--which I finally got around to watching--even the title minus theme music fade dramatically into the foreground. The show does try to hang a lampshade on it by joking that the movie Independence Day "is merely derivative of its other science fiction predecessors." But as far as I can tell, this series isn't going to be anything new.

The commercial where the alien asks the news reader "not to ask any questions that might portray them in a negative light" is amusing, not because of the obvious, overplayed menace in the question, but because the television news guy is all "what?" It's humorous because obviously, the writers haven't been involved in journalism, to act as if this stipulation is unusual or even unthinkable. Anyone who's worked with established politicians knows that in some cases, there are limits to the questions you can ask--which often have to be submitted in advance, no less. So how this request should surprise him...

Though, of course, the wisest politicians will field any question, because chances are, they know more about it than the reporter does. I was often pleasantly surprised as a newspaper editor at how intelligent the politicians were. They are not all spotlight seekers with good hair, strangely.

Anyway, "V" starts too slowly. It has none of Lost's in-your-face slashes of temporal displacement, a brilliant type of storytelling that should have obsoleted the "info-dump" in V's intro. Also, V's focus on so many characters dilutes any chance of me empathizing with one. You just can't flash cliches on the screen and expect me to identify with them. Either sink your teeth into the characters, or get to the special effects, else you leave me yawning.

Anyway, perhaps I'll be pleasantly surprised by the rest of the episode. There was a series, I think it was on sci-fi in the late 90s, that played with the same premise. But instead of this show, where the aliens were obviously bad guys, you never quite knew whether the visitors were good or bad. They offered human beings all this advanced technology, but the humans were still suspicious, and there were alien hate groups and all sorts of interesting, advanced themes. Too advanced, perhaps, for viewers. It was V's premise done right.

Looked up the show I liked: It was called "Earth: Final Conflict." I don't think I watched all five seasons, though. Either I quit watching after they killed off all the people I liked or they quit broadcasting in my area.

Anyway, speaking of Lost...

I was watching an episode with Rousseau and I suddenly realized, "That's Ambassador Delenn!" I was surprised it took me so long to notice--must be the lack of a bone plate. So I had to wikipedia it to make sure I was right, and it turns out that not only does Mira Furlan play both characters, she's also Croatian. Which means something to me because I did my college thesis on Yugoslavia. The ethnic cleansing there inspired the racial aspects of the novel I'm working on--as well as providing some of the motifs. Furlan is a Croatian who married a Serbian, and who fled Zagreb after she was harassed for attending an International Theater Festival in Serbia, making her, supposedly, a national traitor. She had agreed to do the performance before the war broke out.

It's a hard situation. On the one hand, you have this chance to remind the Serbians that their enemies are human, too -- something many soldiers obviously forgot during the war. Dialog between the two very similar cultures who had been living in peace together since WWII could have been a bridge to solve the genocidal rampages. Art should continue despite war.

However, at the same time, by participating in an event, no matter how international, in Belgrade, capital of your worst enemies, you are bringing legitimacy and helping, at least economically, the people who are massacreing you. Art may be beyond borders, but it can also be twisted. Politicized.

It must have been a tough decision. I cannot even begin to speculate what was the "moral" action was or what I would have done in Furlan's place. I wasn't in her situation, I haven't heard both sides of the story, etc. I strongly suspect I would have been out with the Croatian nationalist army, wielding whatever primitive weapon I could have against the superior armed Serbs, because if someone hurt the people I love, I couldn't not fight back. Whatever the rightness of her decision, Furlan's goodbye to Yugoslavia--written in response to the death threats she received when she got home, shows a woman of intellect and courage. And should be required reading for any writer whose characters are about to make "The Speech."

It's here in full, but an excerpt:

"It seems that I've been chosen for some reason to be the filthy rag everyone uses to wipe the mud off their shoes. I am far too desperate to embark on a series of public polemics in the papers. I do, however, feel that I owe myself and my city at least a few words. Like at the end of some clumsy, painful love story, when you keep wanting, wrongly, to explain something more, even through you know at the bottom of your heart that words are wasted; there is no one left to hear them. It is over...

"I know that it may seem out of place to swear t0 pacifism, to swear to love and brotherhood of all peoples while people are dying, while children are dying, while young men are returning home crippled and mangled forever...But I have no other way of thinking. I cannot accept war as the only solution, I cannot force myself to hate, I cannot believe that weapons, killing, revenge, hatred, that such an accumulation of evil will ever solve anything. Each individual who personally accepts the war is in fact an accessory to the crime; must he not then take a part of the guilt for the war, a part of the responsibility?

In any case, I think, I know and I feel that it is my duty, the duty of our profession, to build bridges. To never give up on cooperation and community. Not the national community. The Professional community. The human community. And even when things are at their very worst, as they are now, we must insist to out last breath on building and sustaining bound between people. This is how we pledge to the future. And one day it will come...

It is terribly sad when one is forced to justification without having done anything wrong. There is nothing but despair, nausea and horror. I no longer have any decision to make. Others have decided for me. They have decided I must shut up, give up, vanish; they have abolished my right to come home...

Can the horror of war be used as a justification for every single nasty bit of filth we commit against our fellow man? Are we allowed to remain silent in the face of the injustice done to a friend or colleague and justify our silence by the importance of the great bright national objective?...

To whom am I addressing this letter? Who will read it? Who will even care to read it? Everyone is so caught up with great cause, that small personal fates are not important any more. How many friends do you have to betray to keep from committing he only socially acknowledged betrayal, the betrayal of the nation? How many petty treacheries, how many pathetic little dirty tricks must one do to remain "clean in the eyes of the nation"?

I am sorry, my system of values is different. For me there have always existed, and always will exist, only human beings, individual people, and those human beings (God, how few of them there are!) will always be excepted from generalization of any kind, regardless of events, however, catastrophic. I, unfortunately, shall never be able to "hate all Serbs", nor even understand what that really means. I shall always, perhaps until the moment the kind threats on the phone are finally carried out, hold my hand out to an anonymous person on the "other side", a person who is as desperate and lost as I am, who is as sad, bewildered and frightened...

I reject, I refuse to accept such a crippling of myself and my own life. I played those last performances in Belgrade for those anguished people who were not "Serb" but human beings, human beings like me, human beings who recoil before this monstrous Grand Guignol farce in which dead are flying. It is to these people, both here and there, that I am addressing my words. Perhaps someone will hear me...

I am sending this letter into a void, into darkness, without an inkling of who will read it and how, or in how many different ways it will be misused or abused. Chances are it will serve as food for the eternally hungry propaganda beast. Perhaps someone with a pure heart will read it after all.

I will be grateful to that someone."

(Mira is apparently currently working on a film with Oscar winning director Danis Tanovic of "No Man's Land" called "Cirkus Kolumbia" which is tentatively slated for release in 2011. Not much info on it yet, but it looks interesting. Filming just started, so I wish her the best of luck!)

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Cast List!

Posted by Unrepentant Escapist

October 19, 2009 -- 2:10 p.m

The cast list for a pilot of George R.R. Martin's: A Crown of Fire and Ice series is up. Arya Stark is EXACTLY how I pictured her--kind of like the girl from the 'To Kill a Mockingbird' movie. Anyway, they all look good. We'll see if they can act good. (Yes, writers can use bad grammar too when we feel like it.)

I started re-watching the Lord of the Rings trilogy while I was sick (now I'm coughing up phlegm, though I don't have the flu anymore, which is good, though now I feel like Nicole Kidman from Moulin Rouge, without the blood) and I'd forgotten how awesome it is. I remember when the Fellowship of the Rings movie came out, my reception was lukewarm. I loved the beginning in the Shire but as Aragorn got introduced and went all Bruce Li on the Nazgul, I got a little discouraged, because swordfights are cool and all, but I was worried the real story--of a ordinary people who struggled with impossible temptation--would get buried under Conan-like tactics.

That's right, I am probably the only person ever who wanted to shout "Less swordfighting! More hobbits dancing!"

Admit it. The fireworks were so freaking cool.

I also hated Liv Tyler as Arwen. For some reason, it just rubbed me the wrong way. Watching it again, I still hate every scene that she was in.

I think it was her acting. While there's some really good acting (can you imagine playing Saruman and trying to say "We must join with Him, Gandalf." or " I gave you the chance of aiding me willingly, but you have elected the way of pain!" with a straight face? The writing's fine, its just that Tolkein has been ripped off so often that the lines feel like they belong in a B-movie, even if the wizard fight scenes were very well done.) in the movies, something about Liv Tyler just felt off. Like it was too over the top, nothing understated about it. I do give her mad props for learning Elf though.

I could be I just resented the intrusion of romance in a story that was low-key on romance. I recognize that sex sells and maybe the romantic storyline drew some more interest, but I hate love stories. Usually, I resent them because they take away from a book's plot. I'm like, "step away from the woman and get back to the villain-bashing." And so many romances just have drama that, while may be like real-life, doesn't build any tension for me because you know it's going to work out. Especially the authors who the characters are completely hating each other because of a MISUNDERSTANDING. They'll talk it out eventually, you know they will, so why bother. I prefer books that keep the romance angle really minimal, or, alternatively, bring it along really slowly and gradually. Or there's some real stakes involved. I'm thinking Daenarys storyline in the Fire and Ice series, where her relationship with Khal Drogo made a big difference to the plot. As was Kahlan and Richard's relationship in the Wizard's First Rule. If we don't keep our hormones down, the hero goes braindead? Now that's a real barrier.

I would probably enjoy romance more in books if they weren't usually such a throw-away thing. It feels like the editor says, "oh, you have to put a kiss scene in chapter 11" and so, even though the characters have barely noticed each other before, they suddenly realize they are passionately in love with each other and start making out. Alternatively, there's the unrealistic romances. When you see and boy hating a girl, you know they're going to fall in love by the end of the book and live happily ever after. How many times is the hate caused by the girl behaving irrationally and then coming to her senses, warming up and letting her frigid shell melt? My least favorite cliche ever. How many times do people who hate each other in real life fall in love?

Oddly, I don't mind the romance so much in the female-centric vampire romances. I suppose because the focus on the romance allows it to develop a little more naturally. Or something. Or maybe I have lower expectations when I approach the genre. Fantasy can educate and force us to think, "what if?" But mostly, vampire romances tend to be episodic, no one learns anything, and character development is limited. There's escapism and escapism. And I enjoy it, I just don't expect great things of it. I think we should call the vampire romance genre "Trash with Teeth."

But maybe every ostracized group needs its own subclass to look down on. (Brandon Sanderson has an amusing essay on it and nerdom here). Which is why it's good to see essays like this one on the Gemmell awards. Though it leaves me scratching my head--are there any hard sci-fi only fans anymore? I thought the Lord of the Rings movies would have got everyone admitting that fantasy can be awesome.

Anyway, having meandered from my main point--while I was worried the sword and sorcery aspects and somewhat anvilicious environmental message overwhelming what I loved, now with the movies safely concluded, I can watch the first movie with joy. While I was right about the main thread being overwhelmed in some ways (COUGH Two Towers COUGH), Gollum was such a scene stealer that, if there was a war with swords and orcs going on in the aisles of the theater, I would still be watching him muttering "my precious."

I'll watch the movies, love the movies, and hum with my hands in my ears during the Liv Tyler scenes.

PS: Random sidelines: What WAS the Nobel Prize committee thinking? They get an EPIC FAIL. And isn't the Soviet Version of Winne the Pooh the cutest thing ever? If you remember the Disney movies, you don't need subtitles. I wish I had Vinni Puh on a T-shirt saying something about destroying the capitalist system. That would be so awesome.

And it doesn't look like I'm going to get my revision done in time. I realized suddenly that I do some serious mantel-rearranging, which entailed writing an entirely new chapter that's basically nothing but explanation and doing some other stuff. So I'm about halfway done now, I think. And every revision seems to add another layer of words, so it looks like we'll finish up somewhere in the neighborhood of 150,000 words. I'll just cross my fingers and hope that won't be too long for publishers to stomach from a new author.

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Blarg

Posted by Unrepentant Escapist

August 27, 2009 -- 1:37 a.m.

I finally figured out what had my subsconscious up in arms. The moon, of all things!

I wrote a scene so that the moon was still full nine days apart. Okay, yeah, that was an error, but couldn't my subconscious have just pointed that out to me rather than let me writhe for days in agony, wondering what was wrong? That was the unsolvable error? That was the reaosn for my writer's block? The freaking moon?

Today was a good day. Until my computer shredded everything I had worked on. I finally hammered the emotional scene into a shape I liked but...BAM! It's gone. And I can't remember a bloody thing I did. I heard a strange whirring sound and tried to save but it died a moment before the little blue bar crossed the screen. Curse you, little blue bar!

I don't know why auto-save failed. But I'm almost ready to chuck this laptop out of my window. It's impossible for me to remember to save things myself when I'm drowning so deeply in Rachell's world.

I'm trying to look at it as an opportunity to create a new and better revision, but it's hard not to be discouraged. I worked so hard.

Writing Prompt (no number, because it's not an official one): Write a flash-fiction (or longer, whatever) horror story involving a frustrated writer and a supposedly "innocent" computer.

Oh well. Time to relax and cuddle up with some episodes of House. I've been having the most delicious dreams about Hugh Laurie.

(Though sometimes I wish Cuddy would just kick him in the groin, just for the sake of strong women everywhere.)

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More Revision

Posted by Unrepentant Escapist

June 18, 2009 -- 2:37 p.m.

I like Lee Ann's term for revising to plant clues and things. "Rearranging the mantle." That's a good one.

Anyway, the next step of revision I do is I retype just about everything. I open a new document side-by-side with my old one, or in another window, read a few pages, and then type up what happened. Often, I use the same words, but often I discover there's something even better.

The blessings of computers over typewriters is that we can go back and change things. While that's all well and good for minor changes, for major changes, I need to get my juices going and re-typing a draft helps me do that.

Right now, I'm remembering why it took so long for me to write the book in the first place. This prologue is the most difficult thing I've ever written. I was urged to slow it down and take all the time I need, but is anyone really going to put up with a 23 page prologue in the first book of a series? That's like 6,000 words before you get to the opening! There was a reason I shoved most of the scenes to flashbacks instead of trotting them out in real time.

That's the other thing about doing multiple drafts and saving them in multiple documents. If I don't like it, I can always go back to the version I had before. I probably will. Just because this prologue's better doesn't mean it's more salable.

On the plus side, I'm not going to hand a prologue in as my first set of pages/chapters to any agents/publishers anyway. So it really doesn't matter, right? If my editor wants me to slash it down, I give her the old version. Bulk it up? New.

If you haven't watched the Empires series, produced by PBS, it's up on hulu and I think it's well worth watching for any fantasy writers. I just finished watching the series on the Medici. Not only was it wonderfully produced (though I wished from time to time, that it would give more detail) but you can find a lot of political intrigue and conflict that can be fertile inspiration for your stories. For example, who'd have known that the works of Boticelli, Leornardo, Michaelangelo, etc. had so much political importance. I would like to write a story like Colleen McCullough's masters of Rome series set in the Italian Renassaince. However, I wonder, again, if it'd be salable? Especially since a lot of the main characters would, in this day and age, be registerred sex offenders for cavorting with their NAMBLA-age apprentices...

Michaelangelo in particular fascinates me. He was one of those crazy, difficult to work with geniuses who I empathize with myself since I too fall a little short in the social skills catagory from time to time.

And there's something about Renassaince paintings that I haven't seen matched. Compared to them, most other paintings look like they were formed out of cheap, colored plastic. I just love the art, the politics and the power of the mind unleashed in that age. So many interesting moments, from Da Vinci and Michaelangelo's fight over the block of marble that would become the statue of David to the birth of the Inquisition. I will write the story one day, I think, even if it molders in a basement closet. It's too powerful an age to ignore.

It makes you really understand Mussolini. Italy had the Roman Empire, the Renaissance, and yet it is nowhere near as prominent. You can understand where a mad dream to return to power could really take hold when your history so outshines your present. Nothing against present Italy, of course! I plan to visit there as soon as I scrape up the money. But it's hard to compete with such a fervent, powerful history.

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Ugly Betty

Posted by Unrepentant Escapist

May 21, 2009 -- 12:09 a.m.

You know what I hate about the show Ugly Betty?

SHE'S NOT UGLY. You can put a pretty person in glasses, braces and a silly wig and she'll still have a nice complexion, good eyes and a nice enough set of legs. Instead of, let's see, actually having a realistic person, why do we need yet another pretty girl pretending she's not actually pretty? Does anyone really believe Jennifer Anniston would actually end up with Ross in real life?

Well, one can only expect so much from the magic box, I suppose.

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