W100M – 74 – Silence of the Lambs — 73 – Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid
Christiana and Mike continue their discussion with the next two movies from the AFI Top 100 Films List
73 – Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid
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Yesterday’s News – Fan Fiction
We interrupt this scheduled reading of “A Dance with Dragons” by George R.R. Martin for… this blog post… which will be short… then more DwD. More. MOOOOORRRRREEEE!!!!
So I had an interesting thought at my local board game night tonight, when the subject of fan fiction came up.
I have nothing against fan fiction at all. I’ve read some, and like any type of amateur (or professional) fiction, some of it is bad, some of it is good, some of it is REALLY good. I have friends who are actively involved in fan fiction communities.
But it has never really been something I’ve found myself inspired to write. Though I have no rational objections to it in principle, the idea of slipping into someone else’s setting or especially, someone else’s characters, has always felt a bit like sneaking into their house and trying on their clothes. You may go to great lengths to take good care of their clothes, and take care to put everything back where you found it, but it’s still weird.
Note: I don’t mean to imply any moral judgement there, just a personal ooky feeling. Even that is not really all that severe. I have no doubt that I could get over it if motivated to do so. However, I’ve not so far had the motivation, because usually the stories I write just come to me without me having to pursue them. (Getting them on paper is a separate question.) And so far, no fan fiction stories have come to me.
The closest I’ve come are things like parodies or shared universe-type sketches, and those were frequently not full-fledged stories anyway. Then, there is my story: “Death Traps”, which features Dr. Mercury, a character created by JR Blackwell. I wouldn’t call that story “Fan Fiction” exactly, though there is no question that the line is a little blurry there.
But the discussion tonight just got me thinking about writing exercises and challenges and such, wherein you actively set out to do something different from your normal routine. In that context, perhaps I ought to, just for fun, try my hand at a little bit of fan fiction. Who knows, it might even help my original projects. After all, the addition of Dr. Mercury took a bare-bones story idea I had and turned it into one of my favorite things I’ve ever written.
How to start though? What fandom do I choose from? I could easily rattle off a dozen different universes that I feel like I know well enough to get started.
And do I want to write something faithful to the original? Something subversive? Cross-over?
Any of you write both original and fan fiction? Any pointers?
Yesterday’s News – True Blood
So as I write this, I am watching the latest episode of HBO’s True Blood.
Why do I love this show so much?
I have not read the novels by Charlaine Harris, so it certainly isn’t that. I am not especially a fan of vampires or werewolves or supernatural romance. I don’t find the characters to be intelligent or deep or even sympathetic.
And yet, somehow, I look forward to every new episode.
I enjoy it in ways very different than most television I watch. I think it is pretty much the epitome of a guilty pleasure.
What I like about it is that, because there is essentially no depth or nuance, the story is freed from the burdens of traditional characterization and narrative structure, allowing them to abandon entire plot lines the instant they get boring, and dwell on the characters that are fun and interesting, rather than keeping the focus on traditional protagonists.
I like it because it is unpredictable. It’s not always good. It frequently makes very little sense. But it keeps me entertained.
Yesterday’s News – The Metablades
Hey there, I missed posting yesterday so today there will be two to make up for it.
For THIS post, I thought I’d share the bit of flash fiction that I wrote at this year’s Balticon during the “Iron Writer” competition. Basically, each writer was given a randomized premise generated by this website. I had the great honor of participating alongside Mur Lafferty, Scott Sigler, and Paolo Bacigalupi. (Incidentally, I just read Paolo’s book “The Windup Girl” recently, and it was very good. I may do a longer review at some point.)
Here was my prompt:
“Title: The Metablades
In a shrill Outer Rim world, a young collector of oddities stumbles across an otherworldly portal which spurs him into conflict with forces that encourage conformity, with the help of a leather-clad female in shades and her and her condescending tone, culminating in the land restored to health.”
And here was my story:
The Metablades
The wind was worse than usual today, whistling through the canyon with unusual ferocity. Evan pulled the collar of his jacket up to protect his face against the stinging alkali sand. Despite his discomfort, sandstorms were the best day for artifact hunting. The wind could uncover the ancient ruins that otherwise remained buried beneath the desert sands. With the Traveling Dunes of this colony planet, the human settlements were forced to be nomadic, lest they be buried beneath the desert like the alien cities of another age. The wind though, sometimes revealed trinkets, sometimes treasures, so Evan spent his downtime hunting for them. He slowed his speeder to a crawl. His scanner had detected something, not only metal, but with a power signature. Could he have found something still functional? He dared not hope, but went to investigate. He found the tip of the artifact that had triggered his sensors, and was shocked to discover that with only a little bit of sand cleared away, a noticeable glow began to shine through the remaining sand. He dug into his pack for the compressed air gun to blow the remaining obstructions. After a few minutes, he had uncovered what looked like a doorway, but with a glowing blue field where the door would be. He started toward the device, but before he could take more than a single step, a man emerged from the field. The man wore strange clothing, alost all in black, but with a white under layer, and a long thin of dark fabric around his neck, tied in a complex knot. His hair was neatly combed, and he wore a serene expression. "Who- who are you?" asked Evan. The man didn't answer right away, instead, simply looking him up and down with a concerned expression. Finally the man spoke. "No. No, this will not do at all. Your hair is mussed, your clothing is entirely too individualized. You are too short, and your teeth need straightening. I am afraid that we will have to issue you a citation." "A what?" "This is a citation for failure to adopt mandatory aesthetic standards." The man handed him a piece of paper. "You must pay the sum below within the next seven cycles or be subjected to summary judgment and death by badgers." "What are you talking about?" "My guess is that you are not the only one failing to conform. Where are the rest of your cellmates? I must issue their citations as well. I do have a quota to reach, and I'm only..." His voice trailed off, and Evan noticed a trickle of blood from the side of the man's mouth. Then he collapsed to the ground. A blade that seemed oddly unreal and representative of knife-making more than actual knives stuck out of his back. A woman wearing dark leather riding gear and dark sunglasses passed through the portal as well, and said. "No problem, kid. I'm sure you had it under control, but just thought I'd save your world for you. Don't sweat it, you can get the next one." Then she dragged the man's body back through the portal. The End.
Yesterday’s News – 08Jul11
So today, the very last mission of the space shuttle was launched.
I know several people who can speak about all the technical aspects more knowledgeably than I can, so here are some of them.
Dr. Phil Plait, the Bad Astronomer
Dr. Pamela Gay, host of The Astronomy Cast
Anyway, I’m not especially qualified to educate anyone on the shuttle program, but I can say that it’s always been something that meant a lot to me. When I was a kid, we would often go down and visit my grandfather and uncle in Florida, and that’s why I was there when the Challenger blew up. I wasn’t there at Kennedy Space Center or anything, but Titusville, FL, where my grandfather lived, is not far away, and it was close enough to see the launch trail in the sky. Now, I was only seven years old at the time, and we weren’t close enough to really tell what had happened except for a sort of “That doesn’t look right” feeling.
Still though, the incident has always left me feeling like I have a personal connection to the program, if only a very small one.
The last shuttle mission is beautiful, but still sad.
It’s not that I think we should keep the shuttle going. Any space vehicle should have an expected operational lifetime, and unless we wanted to build NEW shuttles, it just makes good sense that the existing shuttles should be retired at some point. The sad part, of course, is that we don’t have some other program to replace it.
It’s great that several private companies are working hard to develop orbital launch vehicles, and I think that ultimately, this is probably the direction it all needs to go, if we are ever to move into space in a serious way. However, even though there are some really exciting developments coming out of companies like Space X, they are still a long ways out from having even an equivalent to the space shuttle, much less something that could take us to the moon, or to Mars.
It’s not fair to really blame the government or NASA for this, because it’s really the American people who have not collectively demanded further space exploration. Many argue that the money could be better spent here at home, rather than going “Out there”.
It’s definitely true that there is a lot of value in robotic rovers and probes and all that, but I think that manned exploration is a necessity. Some may argue that there is no practical benefit, but even if there isn’t, I think that human beings need something that raises our eyes from the every-day. We live our lives, work at our jobs, and focusing, as we should, on our immediate concerns. But without having anything else, something that elevates us as a species, we can start wondering what’s the point.
When we went to the moon, that is a task that rivals the mythical tasks of Hercules. We, as a people, decided to perform a great work, and then we followed through. Humanity needs great works in order to be great. Exploration is not something that can just be put on the back burner, or else we lose the drive. I don’t want that to happen.
Going to space is hard. But we can do it if we want it bad enough.
Yesterday’s News – 07Jul11
Woo-hoo! Two days in a row!
*ahem*
Today, I thought I’d talk a little bit about some good graphic novels that I picked up recently. I’ve not been in the habit of heading to the comic book shop very often, but twice in the last month or so, I’ve been to Chapel Hill Comics for book launches from friends. Those friends being Mur Lafferty and Angie Shearstone.
I was there to buy Heaven and Blood Dreams on each day, but while I was there, I picked up several other things as well. These are but a few of them.
This is an autobiographical graphic novel about an Iranian woman who grew up during the Islamic Revolution which occurred in that country. I had heard good things about the animated film based on the book , but had not seen it. The book is really wonderful. The story is told in an episodic fashion with a very simple but effective art style. It is at times very funny, at other times sad, sometimes scary, but always fascinating. Here in the US, if we think of Iran at all, it is usually in the context of wondering if we’re going to have to do something about how THEY don’t like us. But the truth, of course, is that many different kinds of people live there, and have hopes and dreams and feelings. However, the various anecdotes about roving “morality” squads, checkpoints, disappearances and war also serve as good reminders of how important our freedoms can be. I really enjoyed it, and have purchased the follow-up book as well, though I’ve not read that one yet.
This is a supernatural horror/mystery series by Joe Hill and Gabriel Rodriguez. I’ve now read the first three collected volumes and it is truly great stuff. When the father of a family is murdered under strange circumstances, his wife and three children move back to his childhood home in “Lovecraft, MA”. There’s something unusual about this house. (I know, right?) Its many doors and keys have all sorts of powers: Powers of transformation, powers of healing, and let’s just say: “Powers of NOT-healing.” What could be a fairly ordinary premise is really made compelling by interesting characters, beautiful art, and a nicely twisted story, full of things that really only work in a graphic novel. There are things you will see on these pages which just wouldn’t work in any other medium. Really looking forward to volume 4.
I’ve now read the first two collections of this graphic novel. It stars Gus, a young man with antlers. He’s never known anything but his simple cabin in the woods, and never known anyone but his father. His father has told him that a horrible plague came to the world, to purge it of all sinners and to take the virtuous up to heaven. It also, apparently, caused many children to be born as human-animal hybrids. All of that remains the mysterious unknown, however, until his father finally succumbs to illness, and Gus decides to do what his father told him to never do: Leave the forest. What follows is an interesting take on the now-common post-apocalyptic survival genre. Gus himself is endearingly sweet, and pretty smart, despite his lack of education and knowledge of the outside world. I enjoyed this one, but don’t feel especially compelled to continue. I might pick up the next volume if I see it, but probably won’t seek it out.
So that’s all for this time, though I have a few more that I may review soon. Have any of you read any good graphic novels lately?
Yesterday’s News
I sometimes have a tendency to be non-social.
I don’t mean anti-social, because that has a proactive connotation that isn’t really accurate. When I say non-social, I am suggesting a simple loss of momentum that can happen for all manner of reasons that aren’t really all that interesting. (At least not to me, but then, that may be because they lack any aspect of voyeuristic novelty.)
Anyway, what happens when I get into one of those phases is that I don’t make much effort to reach out or communicate with people, and this includes friends, family and of course, my fans.
And yet, my love of hearing my own voice, and my strong feeling that my opinions are compelling and fascinating to any who might hear them does not go away.
This causes, as you might expect, a certain cognitive dissonance that is not fun for me, nor does it particularly benefit anyone else. Plus, even Luna, my Welsh Corgi, gets bored of my stories when she’s the only one I have to talk to.
But! This blog post is not about my unique and fascinating collection of neuroses, it is about how I’m going to try doing a daily blog post!
What will it be about?
Basically, whatever I feel like. Sometimes I’ll talk about what I’ve been reading, movies I’ve seen, games I’ve played, etc. Sometimes it’ll be about what I’m working on creatively or even little snippets of fiction that don’t really belong anywhere else. Sometimes it’ll just be observations on the world or whatever I’m thinking about, sometimes serious, sometimes more in the vein of Christiana’s Shallow Thoughts.
I’m not going to over-think it.
At least, not tonight.
Anyway, the reason for the title is that I will almost certainly get in the habit of writing these blog posts in the evening, so for most readers, they will be seeing it on the day after the day that I’m writing about. Thus: “Yesterday’s News”.
I did a quick google search and the biggest hits for the name were for a brand of cat litter, which amused me enough that the name stuck.
Anyway, I’m out of practice, and I don’t want to overdo it with this first post, so I’ll leave it there for now.
Anyone have thoughts? Things you’d like to see me write about? Mocking comments at the huge cliche of setting a resolution to blog more? Go ahead and leave a comment! I’ll be back tomorrow.
Escape Pod 299 – Plus or Minus
By James Patrick Kelly
Read by: Christiana Ellis
Originally appearing in Asimov’s
Discuss on our forums.
All stories by James Patrick Kelly
All stories read by Christiana Ellis
Nominated for the Hugo Award for Novelette, 2011
Rated appropriate for older teens and up for sexual situations and violence.
Plus Or Minus
By James Patrick Kelly
Everything changed once Beep found out that Mariska’s mother was the famous Natalya Volochkova. Mariska’s life aboard the Shining Legend went immediately from bad to awful. Even before he singled her out, she had decided that there was no way she’d be spending the rest of her teen years crewing on an asteroid bucket. Once Beep started persecuting her, she began counting down the remaining days of the run as if she were a prisoner. She tried explaining that she had no use for Natalya Volochkova, who had never been much of a mother to her, but Beep wouldn’t hear it. He didn’t care that Mariska had only signed on to the Shining Legend to get back at her mother for ruining her life.
Somehow that hadn’t worked out quite the way she had planned.
For example, there was crud duty. With a twisting push Mariska sailed into the command module, caught herself on a handrail, and launched toward the starboard wall. The racks of instrument screens chirped and beeped and buzzed; command was one of the loudest mods on the ship. She stuck her landing in front of navigation rack and her slippers caught on the deck burrs, anchoring her in the ship’s .0006 gravity. Sure enough, she could see new smears of mold growing from the crack where the nav screen fit into the wall. This was Beep’s fault, although he would never admit it. He kept the humidity jacked up in Command, said that dry air gave him nosebleeds. Richard FiveFord claimed they came from all the drugs Beep sniffed but Mariska didn’t want to believe that. Also Beep liked to sip his coffee from a cup instead sucking it out of a bag, even though he slopped all the time. Fungi loved the sugary spatters. She sniffed one particularly vile looking smear of mold. It smelled faintly like the worms she used to grow back home on the Moon. She wiped her nose with the sleeve of her jersey and reached to the holster on her belt for her sponge. As she scrubbed, the bitter vinegar tang of disinfectant gel filled the mod. Not for the first time, she told herself that this job stunk.
She felt the tingle of Richard FiveFord offering a mindfeed and opened her head. =What?=
His feed made a pleasant fizz behind her eyes, distracting her. =You done any time soon?= Distraction was Richard’s specialty
=No.=
=Didit is making a dream for us.=
W100M – 76 – Forrest Gump – 75 – In the Heat of the Night
Christiana and Mike discuss the next two movies on the AFI’s Top 100 Movies with…
76 – Forrest Gump
