Alas, there is just too much spam coming through LJ these days. Check me out at facebook or on twitter @crackpothall.

Cheerio!

Is the October full moon the Harvest Moon or the Hunter's Moon?

I can't remember.

Either way, the moon is full and big. It drifts over the desert like an albino pumpkin. That image sounds cooler in my mind than it does on paper. Screen. Whatever.

Yr. obt. svt.,

Y.S. Wilce

"People often ask great storytellers, "Where do you get your ideas?" but the real question is "How do you make sense of your ideas?" Delany believed that good writers read so much that they "internalize" certain "literary models" and thereby acquire an instinctual feel for a story's proper shape. As they build on that evocative first image or scene, while they are still venturing further out into the unknown, an unconscious part of their creative intelligence is figuring out how to knit it all back together again. Writers who never develop that instinct tend to keep dragging new gunmen into the room until the story stalls out, which is why a decent ending is so much harder to write than an enticing beginning. The ability to pull it off is one thing that separates the Neil Gaimans of this world from the rest of us saps."

From Cloudsourcing Coraline by Laura Miller, published on SALON.

Yr. obt. svt.,

Y.S. Wilce

As we all know, the motto of Florian Abenfarax, Warlord of Califa, is "Never Trust a Fish." (His Latin is a bit rusty.)

The Jollyship the Whizbang completely agrees:






Yr. obt. svt.,

Y.S. Wilce

Also from this week's NY Times book review section:

"To the Editor:

Thank you for not comparing any children’s fantasy novel in the children’s books issue (Nov. 8) to the Harry Potter series. More than three-quarters of the paperbacks I own have quotes on the back cover from The Times or some other respected literary source comparing the book to Harry Potter. None of these books have anything to do with Harry Potter. It seems that the only fantasy novel critics have read is Harry Potter and that they assume that all fantasy will be like Harry Potter. Children’s fantasy should be reviewed by children or adults who actually read fantasy.

REBECCA LANDAU
Berkeley, Calif.
The writer is 13 years old and a student at Martin Luther King Middle School."

Yr. obt. svt.,

Y.S. Wilce

"...a good editor should improve the writer's work by doing a number of useful things: posing questions the writer should have answered and didn't, suggesting places where thematic concerns can be reinforced to make a more pleasing whole and pointing out (gently) infelicities of language. What an editor should never do is superimpose his or her own beliefs about style and story upon the author's work. An editor should be an expert midwife, not a surrogate parent."

--Stephen King, latest New York Times book section.

One could argue that this also describes a good critique-er, as well.

Yr. obt. svt.,

Y.S. Wilce

Went to see The Boondock Saints 2: Electric Saint-a-loo yesterday. Ayah, so probably this is one of the stupidest movies ever, but I enjoyed it a lot. I got no Irish in me (as far as I know) but the MacManus brothers are pretty lovable psychopaths. Of course the movie wasn't as good as the first one (no Willem Dafoe) but it was still pretty darn good in a stupid campy way.

One of the amusing aspects of the series is that the movies are so campy, and yet I can't figure out if the director knows he's being campy or just thinks he's being awesome. Of course Ed Wood didn't think he was being campy, either, and yet...so clearly self-knowledge is not required to produce camp--in fact, it may well be that obliviousness is the key.

Anyway, as far as crazy wild operatic mish-mashy totally implausible gratuitous shoot-em-ups go, I'd give The Boondock Saints 2: Boondockier a solid eight and a half. A la Joe Bob Briggs: salami-fu; Christian Louboutin fu; panic room fu; swearing fu (the most awesome swearing fu ever!); tattoo fu; and of course, hot Irish twins fu.

Yr. obt. svt.,

Y.S. Wilce

Oh yeah, and I have recently finished these most excellent and highly recommended books:

The Children's Book by A.S. Byatt. Sometimes Byatt does it for me, sometimes she don't. This is her best (and most accessible) book since Possession. It's brutal and grim and lovely and haunting and horrible and eerie and wonderful.

Lavinia by Ursula K. LeGuin. A sorta-retelling of the Aeneid (Aeneas fleeing the wreckage of Troy and eventually founding Rome) from a woman's point of view. Often classics redone from female POV books are silly or pointless or full of powerlessness pretending to be empowered. This book really does evoke the distant past and bring a fresh perspective, and a deep sadness, to a very old story.

Johannes Cabal Necromancer by Jonathan Howard. Clever and inventive story of a scientist who sells his soul to the devil and then decides he wants it back. Satan is willing to do a return--if the scientist will trade him 100 souls. What's the best way to gather 100 souls? With a carnival, of course. Author said he was inspired by Bradbury's Dark Carnival and it shows--in a very good way.

The Girl Who Played With Fire by Steig Larson. I liked this one better than the Girl With the Dragon Tattoo. More Lisbeth and less journalistic twaddle. Lisbeth Salander is definitely a heroine for the ages, a Nini Mo for the 21th century.

Yr. obt. svt.,

Y.S. Wilce

Still drafting away, this time on the final. I've been doing a ton of research and reconsidering, so plot is getting juicier by the minute and so are the characters! I've been so absorbed that I haven't been able to spare any energy for blogging--and my apologies to those who commented and then probably gave up long ago on ever getting a response from me. Mea culpa, particularly since I am painfully pleased to hear from readers--FLORA'S DARE has long since vanished without a trace from bookstores, and I was beginning to think that no one but me and my grandmother had actually read it. How lovely to hear the contrary!

I've been doing research on bears. (The reason behind this will be clear later.)

Here's a very cool video I found of a bear getting a swimming lesson.

I particularly like the way in which he gets into the pool just as a human would.

Yr obt svt.

Y.S. Wilce

Just returned from Califa (and Elsewhere) to find a few new pieces re: moi on the internet.

My interview for the Nebula Awards has posted on the Nebula website. Read me expound upon questions both metaphysical and trivial!

And over at SF Signal, I put in my two cents as to the Best Bad Guys in Genre...As I pondered my answer to that question, I realized that IMHO there really are no truly well-done bad guys in traditional fantasy. It's all unspeakable evil (Lovecraft) or unknowable evil (Sauron) or petty evil (your average dark lord). To really get good evil guys you have to go horror (paging Randall Flagg/Bob Gray/The Overlook Hotel) or to what the hoity-toitys call literary fiction (Humbert? Humbert?). In fact, as I pondered this question is occurred to me that while many many traditional fantasies are all about the battle for good and evil, oft-times the good is boring and the bad banal. Of course, I guess I'm thinking of the word-cube fantasies here, or maybe just Tolkien-y wannabes.

In other parts of my life, I am really enjoying parts of this season of TRUE BLOOD. It's a silly show, and has a tendency to really blow as far as the genre elements go (perhaps the writers figure since they are making up the supernatural crap it doesn't matter if there's no logic to it?) but some of the dialogue is great, and I am totally adoring Jason Stackhouse, who has to be one of the most appealing morons to ever be presented on the tiny screen. He is dumber than a sack of hair, but his heart is so good...I tried to read the books and couldn't get by the awful prose, but the tv show is good clean dirty fun, and I recommend it for a pop-corn entertainment.

In yet other parts of my world, I finally finished the rough draft of FLORA'S FURY. Whew. Glad that is over. It was a challenge wrapping up stuff, but not too tightly, and as I got closer and closer to the end, I started thinking....hmmm...I hate to leave Flora here, I wonder if there might be another book. Maybe. But first things first, getting this one off my plate. I think it turned out well, if rough. After two books, it's hard to come up with new stuff, but I think I did, and def. moved Flora out of her comfort zone. Plus, if you think Flora screwed up before...well...wait till you hear what bone-headed trouble she gets into this time...

Saw PONYO last week. It was cute. Not his best, but entertaining none-the-less. Also saw the preview for WHERE THE WILD THINGS ARE, which may actually be the greatest kids movie since I dunno, WIZARD OF OZ, maybe, but the preview had been edited to make it look totally stupid.

Oh, I am reading WICKED GENTLEMEN by Ginn Hale. It's a little slashy, which I didn't expect, but don't mind, and I think the world building--a kind of weird Neo-19th century city with demons and really hot military inquisitors, like if the Salvation Army was actually trying to salvate you--is quite good. I'm enjoying it, and frankly, I don't enjoy much fantasy anymore. There is a same of a sameness to so much out there--and not just genre either--tons of good stuff, but just good stuff. Very little that seems to me to be really outstanding. So these days I mostly just read the Financial Times. I am captivated by the adventures of  Tyler Brule, his mother and his boyfriend, as they jet from one part of the world to another, spreading style and heaping scorn on British Airways and other legacy air carriers.

That's all I got. Between the book and my delicious teacup human master, there's not much room for anything else.

Yr. obt. svt.,

Y.S. Wilce

p.s. Is anyone going to World Fantasy? We'll be on the West Coast and probably will pop in one day, to show off Teacup Human and see friends...if you wish to be one of those friends, please let me know so we can coordinate!