on the road of rue & wormwood

compulsively readable

Sun, 22 Nov 2009 15:45:44 GMT

Since my Google alerts seemed to have been failing me by picking up everything that is unimportant and absolutely nothing interesting lately, I double-checked with some ego-googling--and picked up three or four more reviews of my fiction that I hadn't seen before in the first round alone. Of course, the reviews led me to think about something else entirely, and I stopped ego-googling, and came over here to say this.

One of the reviews says something like "the story was strangely compelling and the structure was interesting enough to keep me reading, which made the experience of reading it more pleasurable than it had any right to be with such a depressing message." (You know, after typing all that out, I should probably go look for the actual review again, but that would probably distract me so much that I would never get this entry written.)

Anyway, I love that review. The story itself forced them to keep reading. I suspect it had less to do with my structure and more to do with voice, though I know that the structure is still part of it. (It's "An Almanac for the Alien Invaders" and the structure was the only way I could parse a nearly untellable story.) But the point is, I managed to make something compulsively readable. Which is excellent. That, seriously, is like the number one goal I have as a writer, no matter what the length I'm writing to.

Now. Just to figure out how to do that compulsively readable thing every time, eh?

*sigh*

Sat, 21 Nov 2009 18:12:14 GMT

_earthshine_ did this meme thing. Here's how it goes:

Leave me a comment saying you want to play.

* I'll respond by asking you five questions so I can satisfy my curiosity.
* Update your journal with the answers to the questions.
* Include this explanation in the post and offer to ask other people questions.

Earthy then asked me the following questions.

1) You've been invited to screenwrite an entire season of any TV series you've ever seen, and it will go into production. What show do you pick? (Optional: any story arcs, ep plots, or "must have" scenes you've already got in mind?)

In the days before Castle, I would have picked Firefly--and maybe I still would if it were contractually obligated that Fillion would continue playing Castle afterwards. I think I would be allowed to collaborate with the original folks, right? Because I don't really want to write Firefly entirely alone, and without Whedon's notes. But I could totally do that, for the fans of course, and it would be totally awesome, I promise. I even know how I'd bring Wash back.

Otherwise, How I Met Your Mother, or, seriously, Quantum Leap (revival!). For How I Met Your Mother, I would be doing the Barney/Robin relationship right, and I dunno, I have always had a special, special place in my heart for QL.

2) OK, highly contrived question, but here it is: You stumble upon and trigger an ancient glyph in an old book. The spell will transport you into a stationary observational bubble located anyplace in the physical universe, sustain you there in comfort and safety for as long as you wish, and then transport you back. ... but it will also bring along the last person you talked to, who of course is splash_the_cat. It being well-known that cellular phone activity dangerously disrupts the quickening of ancient glyphs, you have to decide on your own. Where do you go?

Hm. I'm selfish enough not to take into account who comes with me on this, and know that splash_the_cat is adventurous enough to be up for wherever we go. Since this is a stationary observational bubble, that makes interactive adventures out of the question... Let's go see the nearest alien civilization! Yeah! Civilization being the operative word. I don't want to go observe the nearest alien life forms--algae on Mars can bite me. Because. Then we'd know. (I think Splash would be up for that.)

3) Same question, but this time the last person you talked to was dannimal. :)

Same answer.

4) Unbeknownst to all of us, in addition to everything you already do in your life, you're also a superhero (or supervillain)! What are your alias, your power(s) (aside from keeping everyone in the dark about your double life, apparently), and your weakness(es)?

Dude, I'm totally the Time Mage. You didn't know this? I'm always mucking around in the time stream. I LOVE going back a couple of days and proving that "You never told me that!"--though of course, that's an abuse of my power. I go back and fix things periodically--but it has to be little things, because the TimeCops are always watching Hitler and stuff like that. In fact, my inability to elude the TimeCops for very long is easily my biggest weakness. Overall, my identity is still me: mild-mannered library worker by day. Time Mage by night. I tend to be pretty useful in a fight, because if it looks like the good guys are getting their asses kicked, I go back and make sure the bad guys get a nasty head cold or break an arm or whatever.

5) If you could create a sports team in any major nationally-recognized sports league, what sport would you pick? More importantly, what would you name your team, and what would their colors be?

Well, I'd probably make a baseball team, so Dann could manage it. (I'm assuming that powers of creation include greater degrees of control after the fact.) And I'm assuming I can take some other team's colors, since most of the good ones have been taken? Yeah. I'm totally taking blue and gold. Those just look good together. As for a name, I dunno. Most of the good animals are taken. The Detroit Echidnas?

A little less ouch

Wed, 18 Nov 2009 02:58:33 GMT

Knowing what's wrong with my foot is weird. My interaction with the pain is different. I'm afraid to push through and tromp endlessly now, because I fear I might do more damage that way. I pay more attention to the sharper, more localized pain because I know that's the actual cause, whereas before, I ignored the sharper, more localized pain because at least my whole foot/leg/knee didn't hurt. (I had a LOT of pain from the compensation in my walking, I've decided, because now that I'm not wearing shoes, and compensating, as much, I have almost no other pain. My right heel hurts occasionally, as one might expect with a big ol' bone spur in it; but without constant shoe pressure at work, it's much better, and without needing to compensate, the aches in my right knee and in both of my feet are virtually gone.)

My daily routine now includes an icing and an aspirin. I pretty much haven't worn shoes except outside, and in the bathroom, lunchroom and mailroom at work. I'm shod approximately two hours a day now, and pretty intermittently. Forty-eight hours after hearing my diagnosis, and I'm relatively pain-free. Down to an occasional 2-3 during walking, a 1 while sitting, on the 10-point pain scale, instead of a 3-4 (always) when sitting with shoes on, and a 5-6 or even 7 when walking. I should take my flip-flops in to work for bathroom trips.

I knew that my shoes hurt my feet, which is why I kept looking for new shoes. I threw out a lot of shoes in the last six months, because they all made me limp. Many of them did actually need to go--I'd worn them down pretty badly, and I've been underpronating like crazy to compensate for the pain, so they were pretty lopsided--but I probably gave up a few pairs before their time. It never occurred to me to stop wearing shoes in general, though. I just... thought I was buying bad shoes. Often. Or that shoes weren't as good as they used to be. Or something.

In any case, I think I'll make it through to my referral appointments just fine. And I don't need to continue the quest for the Perfect Shoe anymore.

It was... inNebulatable.

Tue, 17 Nov 2009 20:15:59 GMT

Right, so the politics of this are beyond me, I confess. Shouldn't I just let people nominate stories at they are moved by them? But I guess this year's Nebula nominating period is different because of rules changes and stuff? I also confess that I don't really know how it's all different, because I wasn't a member of SFWA last year. And I also confess that I don't know that I'll ever do this self-pimpery thing again. But anyway. My list of eligible stories is as follows:

Short stories:

"Sun's East, Moon's West." Electric Velocipede (I will go post it on the SFWA forums tonight, or email me and I'll whip you a copy.)

"The Girl-Prince. Coyote Wild.

Novelette:

"The Wedding Dress Tea Parties of 2443." Quantum Kiss.

Now you know.

Ah. That's why that hurts, then.

Mon, 16 Nov 2009 15:12:03 GMT

I've had some difficulty walking of late. I mean, I've been kinda forcing myself to just march on through it, because the first time I complained about it to my doctor a year ago, he said, "Sometimes we get these aches in our body, but they're really a reaction to stress and other problems, and maybe we internalize them" and blah, blah, blah, and "Pay attention to what's going on in your life to see if there's a root cause there." (I don't think I have to explain how I'm glad he's gone on to another practice, do I?)

And my mom couldn't guess that there was anything actually wrong with my foot, and she tends to be the diagnostician I trust. (Not just because she's my mom; she's also a nurse with a thousand years of experience, including a good long stint in the ER.)

And the doctor I brought it up to when I finally went in to see about getting something done with my hives. That doctor referred me for the hives, but blithely said, "Oh, I know EXACTLY what that is." And gave me exercises to strengthen a completely uninvolved tendon.

My allergist, at least, took my pain seriously, and included a check to see if there was arthritis in the joint, through one of his magic blood tests. But only because that could have an involvement with the allergies. Or something? Anyway, no arthritis.

And then I FINALLY went and bitched to my new doctor, and she was about to send me away again until I said, "Look. Couldn't it be a bone spur or a cyst? Something? There is now a visible bump, and it hurts to walk."

And she looked sort of annoyed, but sent me for an x-ray, and I felt like a dope for insisting.

But guess what? I have a bone spur that's poking into my Achilles tendon.

Son of a bitch.

But at least I know.

Conventions, Conventions, Conventions

Sat, 14 Nov 2009 17:00:54 GMT

Or, rather, just one convention: WindyCon.

The theme this year is steampunk, and the costumes are pretty fantabulous. I'm going to just go on a tour with my camera at some point, should I ever achieve any real downtime. Of course, my perceived lack of downtime has absolutely nothing to do with my schedule. It's personal choice, and shiny people.

Unfortunately, I haven't been to a single panel yet. There is an interesting one I'm missing right now, in fact, but the lure of the internet was too strong to allow me to go see if Baen really is for boys and if DAW is really for girls. (I think I know the answer, see, so watching other people debate it is slightly less interesting to me than it would otherwise be. Plus, we sort of pre-had the panel last night, hanging out in the lobby.)

This is not unrelated to the fact that I frequently find myself at panels and having the rude awakening that not everyone realized that my corner of the internet reached a consensus on something a few years ago, so why are we even debating this? And this is simple stuff, like how to deal with some minute technical aspect of writing, and not important stuff like how to be a socially responsible writer/fan with regard to feminism, violence against women, women in the military, racism, anti-racism, etc. But I also run into that, too. "How can you be so uninformed?" I marvel. "Don't you read ktempest? Or jimhines? Or at least Scalzi's blog, which I thought everyone read?"

But, in fact, my tendency to frequent saner places on the internet means that I forget there's a lot of insanity out there. And because I have a modicum of awareness on certain topics, I forget that there are people out there who don't even really know what the implications of colonialism really are. And don't care how you're problematizing post-colonialism in your alien invaders story. Which is also a rude thing to realize, in a way, even though you freaking knew that when you wrote the story, because that's why you put that entertaining stuff in it. You know. The Story part.

Anyway.

Ran into Rich Horton in the Green Room while getting my panelist sticker and ribbon, and offered to buy him a drink. We'll see if he takes me up on that. I thanked him profusely for liking my fiction, which is a strange thing to thank someone for, because it's essentially a visceral reaction, isn't it? But nonetheless. He swears Unplugged is coming out by the first of December, and I have to decide on the politics of giving anthologies containing one's own work out for presents.

I found dendrophilous, and had dinner with her and Erika... Found some really nice Thai. Remembered that I love coconut milk because it's like milk, but no lactose intolerance! I mean, I had that visceral "uh, oh, and me without my lactaid" reaction to the sauce on my Pa-naeng, but then remembered nothing bad was going to happen. Happy day.

Spent some good time in the lobby chatting with Elizabeth (dendrophilous and jimhines, and everyone who passed by. Jim knows a lot of people. I'm not surprised, I guess, since he's been doing this for a while. Met the archivist for SFWA, Lynne Thomas, and her daughter Katie, and her husband who I am ashamed to admit that I don't remember the name of. (Chris? But there was another Chris (Gerrib) last night, so clearly, there can't have been two! These things Just Don't Happen.) Also met Kerrie Hughes and John Helfers, which was cool. I learned an incredible amount about anthologizing just from random asides they both made.

Now, I'm spending my last nine minutes before kelly_swails comes to find me. I have had to drop the logline for my book on people about three times, which makes me glad I finally figured it out, even though I think the hook is too much of a spoiler. The logline, btw, is "An herbalist's apprentice in 15th century Romania becomes queen of the Underworld." This is a semi-problematic logline--there was no actual Romania in 1489--and at least one person asked if I meant the criminal underwold, and not, you know, Hades. But it works. Everyone looks vaguely intrigued when they hear it. Good enough.

In completely un-convention news, I got to visit my friends Elena and Stefano yesterday, and meet their little boy, Luca. They live in faculty housing for University of Chicago in Hyde Park, and their apartment is absolutely fantastic. Location, size, general niceness... all just wonderful. Elena and Stefano took a cat that dannimal and I rescued at the cottage a few years ago, and with them, the cat (Tina) has lived in Ann Arbor, Santa Barbara, and now Chicago. Tina is plump and happy, and absolutely adores Luca (and vice versa). I love a happy ending. Anyway, it's really nice to have my friends so much closer than California.

Tired, and haven't even gone anywhere yet.

Tue, 10 Nov 2009 03:50:51 GMT

I've got Windycon on Friday. I'm not actually looking forward to driving to Chicago, which actually speaks to Chicago driving and how much I hate that, and nothing else. I love me some four hour car trips to see friends. I hate me some driving in Chicago. Haaaaate.

The good news is, I'm rooming with dendrophilous, and kelly_swails has promised that we will throw down some drinks in an appropriate locale, and iuliamentis has promised to stop in at the con on Sunday. I also have a panel. (Looks up panel info.)

Sunday 10:00-11:00 a.m.

Lilac C: Rowling and Meyer
What are our kids reading now? Is there truly a young adult revival of
speculative fiction or are these anomalies? Are our kids reading more
SF or still playing it on the Wii(TM)? Find out from our panelists.
M. Haskell, J. Hines, R. Neumeier, J. Smith-Ready

Oh! With Mr. jimhines, I see. And R. Neumeier, I believe, is Rachel Neumeier who wrote The City in the Lake, which I read at penmage's enthusiastic recommendation, and it was very good, and later, when I was shopping for agents and saw that She Who Ended Up My Agent rep'd Rachel, I remember thinking "That's a goooood sign." (Among many good signs.)

Okay, so that's Windycon. The next weekend is More Seriouser Retreat (as opposed to Feral Writers Retreat). I have a couple of extra beds for that, btw... And I need to send out the invites for Hastings Point in the spring. And at some point I need to confess to my friends that I won't be hosting New Year's this year, since I'll be in North Carolina. And then Thanksgiving. And then Christmas.

Somewhere in there, I'm supposed to write the rest of my last year's NaNo novel (I'm clipping along, but my progress is going to take a serious dive this weekend). And... She Who Ended Up My Agent said that she's going to do one last read on my novel, and start sending it out to the (tuba notes) Editors.

(Of course, this morning, at the bus stop, I started thinking, "But I didn't get that thing right! And I think I forgot entirely about that thing! And there's a dangling modifier on page three!" But in fact, I don't actually remember forgetting anything, and I don't actually remember any dangling modifiers, either. I remember finishing the rewrite, and double-checking the list of things She Who Ended Up My Agent wanted me to focus on, and saying, "Yay, I'm done!" So I have to trust that I was not crazy when I did that, and just because I don't remember typing in a specific sentence, I really need to not email She Who Ended Up My Agent and ask her if I forgot those things. For one thing, she will tell me.)

Okay, writer-crazy done. Mostly.

Other things that are making me tired:

The 154 unread items in my inbox.

And the stories I need to put back in circulation.

And the fact that my dayjob is a non-stop thrill ride. I remember when one had the leisure to read 154 email messages in a week at my dayjob. Those days are long, long gone, apparently.

And my husband's enduring insomnia.

And my mother's unexpected visit this weekend for her cousin's funeral.

I would suggest that things should slow down, but in my experience, if I let things slow down, I get sick. So I may as well keep going too hard, and just avoid that, eh?

And....

Wed, 04 Nov 2009 05:17:26 GMT

That's a draft.

I drank so much caffeine to push through this that I wonder if I might not be best served by jumping into my pseudo NaNo project, but maybe I should *try* to lie down first. I do have Magical Dormouse Sleeping Powers at my disposal about 358 days a year. (The other seven days a year when I "can't sleep" do not actually count as true insomnia, the true insomniacs inform me.)

Things which are probably not true

Wed, 04 Nov 2009 02:52:12 GMT

Number 62:

The hardest-won revelations on the part of a writer in a book are the ones that will be most satisfying to the reader.

Well, I can hope, because I just had a hard-won revelation, and it felt soooooo good having that little piece fall into the narrative just so, shink, just like the wedge going into a pie token in Trivial Pursuit...

It probably feels so good to the writer because it's a release of tension. "HOW AM I GOING TO GET THIS TO MAKE SENSE?" --> "OKAY, THAT'S HOW, NOT TO BE DYING NOW."

Whereas, to the reader, it's probably just a gentle, "Ah. That makes sense." If that much.

*sigh*

My NaNo status, in case it was keeping you up at nights, is...

Sun, 01 Nov 2009 16:29:06 GMT

The half-book I wrote for last year's NaNo is what I plan to finish this year in November. However, if I add 50,000 words, it will probably be too long, so I'm only gonna write 40,000-ish--"ish" because when it's done, it's done, and that might be at 30k--and do some editing. Ultimately, no, I'm not doing NaNo, I'm just doing what I have to do so that I will have a book draft done in 2009 and not feel like a total loser because I have first-drafted exactly one piece of fiction this year ("Fine-tuning the Universe")--which I did manage to sell to Nature, but seriously, what? It was flash. I only finished one 999-word story this year.

Now, I've not been slacking, as you know. I've rewritten The Herbalist's Apprentice three times this year: pre-agent, post-agent, and then post-agent again. Each time was successively less intensive, and I have learned a CrapTonne from doing that. But rewriting does not new fiction make. (I've also rewritten a few short stories, but--repeat last sentence.)

Likewise, I've noodled around on and half-heartedly begun a number of other things. (In one case, whole-heartedly begun, but that's for after November.) But starting things does not new fiction make, EITHER.

So, yeah. NaNo 2009 = "Personal Novel Completion Month, So Help Me God."

Or: PeNoCoMo SHMeG.

To the Heights of Catwaxing, and How I Marched Back

Sun, 01 Nov 2009 02:01:02 GMT

It was pretty much after I made my second panflute of mini-Twizzlers that I realized I needed to institute the 15-minute rule again. The one where you set a timer for 15 minutes and you write for that long, and THEN you can dork around for a bit (5 minutes), but you have to work for the 15 minutes after that, and so on until it is time for sleepies or you finish your project.

Because. Srsly. We can't have more of this.

Also, when a people thought that maybe there were just possibly too many herbs in my book, except for the fact that the book is called The Herbalist's Apprentice, I did not think much of this assessment, until I started making a list of all the herbs mentioned, and had to start a new sheet of paper by chapter 5.

Le Collage

Sat, 31 Oct 2009 19:12:49 GMT

I wasn't sure if collaging a book at this late stage of the game was going to net me any insights, but it was a good break from the slog. And, as it happens, yes, it did net me some insights. The gold woman with her arm extended and the gold man pulling his sword--why, hello! So that's how those two characters relate to each other. Gold woman is clearly Persephone. Gold man is clearly Frumos. Clearly, Persephone caused Frumos's downfall. I mean, I don't know HOW yet, but clearly. Also, I learned all about Lacrimora's secret past as a cross-dresser. It makes perfect sense. She was totally the kind of girl who would dress up in boy's clothes and run around trying to break her own curse. Reveka just had some better resources. Talk about a villain who is the hero of her own story! I barely know how to keep her a villain in Reveka's story as is!

(If you click through, there are Notes.)

So, why book collaging? Jennifer Crusie does it. She does it a bit more elegantly than I do, apparently, which I only vaguely remembered after I finished mine. I've mostly been paying attention to Stephanie Burgis's book collages instead, which seems like a much more practical way to go about it for me--paper and glue--rather than building a dollhouse/shadowbox. In any case, I've always been intrigued by the notion that different plot and character connections than you knew might show up in a collage, and I confess, I'm a little surprised by how simply/accidentally that happens. I slapped two of the bigger pictures down, and immediately realized they were facing each other, and a whole 'nother dimension of backstory dropped into the book. Something that will only show up in maybe two sentences of this book, but is probably the lynchpin of the next one.

Anyway. Back to writing.

A Leetle Too Short, but Cute (Oh, Vanity.)

Sat, 31 Oct 2009 02:36:12 GMT

Got a haircut.

It's cute and sassy, but I am not sure what I was trying to prove. Mostly, I thought my hair had gotten too long and lacked vigor. This is about an inch shorter than I really was thinking, maybe 2, but on the other hand, it does not lack for sass.

Also, you know how they say your nose never stops growing? They are not lying about that. I am shocked by the nose-size in image one.

Also, I can't wait for the day that someone introduces me to my nose-twin at a convention. It happened to Cat Rambo at ConFusion last year. I saw the nose-twin again at Penguicon. I almost shouted, "HEY, CAT RAMBO'S NOSE TWIN!" but thought maybe she was having too good a time with the dude she was canoodling with, so I didn't, but trust me, it was hard not to do.

Also, I am far too pink for my own comfort. Like a little piglet. Ew. I am heartened by the notion that if I were a Vulcan, though, I'd be loads greener.

PS That's dannimal's office, with the navy blue flowered curtains. There are no other curtains in this house from the previous owners. Just his office. Yep.

On being the ice queen

Fri, 30 Oct 2009 17:08:11 GMT

Had a hard conversation with my stepdaughter last night. She thinks poorly of one of her teachers because the teacher does not seem to be showing the appropriate (to her mind) kind of emotion about the teacher's dying mother.

I said, "People show emotions differently."

I said, "I certainly wouldn't feel safe or comfortable expressing my sorrow and grief at work, particularly in front of teenagers."

I said, "Most people in a bad situation just do what they can to keep functioning."

I said, "Grief does not look the same on all people."

I didn't feel like I got through to her, but I often find I think that, and discover years later that she took everything I said to heart. --Because people do not always show comprehension in the same way, eh?

My mind is a jumble of emotions and images just reacting to this conversation. I grew up with a role model (my mother) who demonstrated constantly that the appropriate reaction to crisis is icy, emotionless, competent calmness. I tend not to be able to speak during moments of problematic emotion, and in my desire to remain calm, I've been called an ice queen, an emotionless robot, or just plain cold.

(For the record, those accusations hurt. And the bumbling conversations from the less emotionally-intelligent in the crowd, who decide that you must want to talk about all sorts of personal things because it doesn't appear to cause you any pain.)

It's a recurring theme in literature, the raging torrents of emotion beneath the smooth-faced character--your Elinors and your Darcys--but at some point, in spite of Vulcans, American culture seems to have bought into the notion that the only people feeling things are the people in tears all the time. (At least, I think it's the damn Americans.)

(No offense, but I can't stand the people in (edited to add:) incoherent tears all the time. How in Hell do you get any work done, if you're so busy emoting every feeling that comes across your brain?) (Further edited to add: Of course, I do recognize the hypocrisy here; it takes a lot of energy to repress, too. It's just a knee-jerk reaction to a certain type of person, one that I rarely meet with, but one who has impressed me a little too much over my lifetime./End edit)

Now, the flip side to being this kind of person is that when I meet a person who is genuinely less emotional than average, we run into a big disconnect. I can comprehend appearing emotionless. I can't actually comprehend not actually feeling things deeply or strongly. (So, maybe I'm just as bad as the ice queen haters, in a way, with the making assumptions and the wrong ideas about people?)

So, here's my wish. Don't have expectations on how people grieve. If you can't manage that, repress your expectations the way I repress my sorrows--at least, don't impose those expectations on others. Accept that if someone doesn't know you very well, they may not want to share their pain with you. And it is far better to assume that the emotionless robot is a mire of repression than actually an emotionless robot.

Earth has tilted, the whole sky shifted / On and on and on and on ....

Thu, 29 Oct 2009 02:18:12 GMT

First: I think cristalia (maybe buymeaclue) posted this a while back: A girl and a house: the gothic novel. Like whoever first posted it, this is here so I can remember it when I need to. I just realized that the sense of place is as valid a thing to write about as anything, and since I have my own problems with my sense of place, it might not be the worst thing to write about them. Wish-fulfillingly or otherwise.

Second: I have made up a writing exercise for myself. I am unhappy with a scene in my book. I decided to rewrite it from the POV of the second character (not quite the antagonist); I want to see if any different information is revealed, or not. Then I'll put it back in the first viewpoint. I'll let you all know how that goes. I may be onto something. I may be crazy.

Third: My office is very nearly clean, after a long flirtation with "the minefield" skin.

Fourth: I need to remember that caloric intake is non-negotiable. I was SO CRANKY this morning. I didn't eat breakfast. This was epically dumb. CalorieFail.

Fifth: There should be more. I have a lot going on. But I'm bounded by futility and annoyance and a need to just slog through. So, there won't be more. Even good days are tough days, on some level. I don't think it's anything bad; I'm sure it's all for the best, and there's growth in it.

Ah, writers

Fri, 23 Oct 2009 03:55:01 GMT

After huddling with my book solo for so long that I am beginning to feel like a pathetic chicken who has only managed to lay one egg, and an egg that won't hatch at that, I have finally remembered (I think I may have mentioned) that hanging out with other writers now and then can be of benefit.

Which is to say, I'm at the Feral Writers retreat for the someteenth year (it's actually the 8th), and now I'm officially the only person who has attended every single year since its inception (which makes sense since, you know, it's the family cottage). splash_the_cat had to bow out because she's pregnant with a snot baby in her head. (And also just pregnant the normal way.) dendrophilous has a work obligation that knocked her out, too. There has been some wailing and gnashing of teeth at our loss, but in the meantime, tonight we have steve_buchheit, sdrawkcabyaj, vidensadastra, and iuliamentis, which is (I think) a Thursday night record. (Last night, it was just me and vidensadastra, and we spent the time chatting and mostly didn't pretend that it was writing; though she wrote after I went to bed.) daveamongus managed to drive out and spend the day with us, too, and then will come out again early tomorrow morning after he gets the kidlets squared away, and later in the afternoon, Lawrence of No Known LiveJournal will tag in.

We have been vaguely wacky so far, but much of the humor has been around visual things, or absurd Laura Roslin-scolds-a-dog imitations, which are not so much quotable. But since splash_the_cat is not here to record our quotes, we have resorted to @feralwriters on Twitter as a means of recording. I am less quotable, I think, without Julie to parse me. Yay?

I've gotten a decent bit of work done; it helps to have an actual goal and stuff. I failed on bringing my headphones, which are kind of necessary (even with 7 participants instead of 9) to block out random chatting on occasion. But Dave is going to loan me a pair of headphones tomorrow, and regardless, I've already gotten more work done today than I've gotten done in the last week, or even at the last retreat. Hopefully, I'll be able to sustain the momentum--though maybe not tonight, since I've spent the last half hour looking for the photo of Ralph Lauren made skinny in photoshop... and sleepy time is coming.

Anyway, the writerly company I've been keeping of late has been very good for me--splash_the_cat and I even started up Write Club again--if only because it is only other writers who understand that, for example, 500 words is a pretty good day, and 2,000 words is an amazing day. And why staring into space or playing a game actually counts as work, no really, I swear.

One last thing. I forgot to post this before (I think): albogdan pointed a camera at jimhines (Jim C. Hines) and me at ConClave, and this video was the result. I only cringed 48.2% of the time while watching it. YMMV.

Rolling out

Wed, 21 Oct 2009 02:17:27 GMT

Packing for a four-night adventure, the first night of which occurs after leaving directly from work, means that inevitably I will forget something important.

Possibly this is why my to-do list (done on my Touch, where you can't see previous entries necessarily while working on new entries, like a proper list) consists of 3 entries to clean the kitchen, and one that screams: SOCKS, JAMMIES, TOOTHBRUSH

I have been to a number of important events without a toothbrush. This involves purchasing one, which then leads to having about 8 dozen spare toothbrushes--none of which ever get packed for trips. I've attended more cons than I can count--and I haven't been to that many cons--and done bridesmaid duty for at least one wedding without a toothbrush, and it always requires a special trip or getting a bad toothbrush in a hotel lobby. If I do manage a brush, I inevitably fail on paste. But I always, always, always bring floss.

I have been to the cottage more times than I can count without socks. I blame this on it being a summer cottage, and even when I'm going during a cold month, I think I don't need socks, because it's a SUMMER cottage.

I just came back from a night at my mom's house sans jammies. It was a cold night. Brr.

I'm getting smarter about little items. Like, I always keep my current make-up suite in a to-go bag. Which leads to putting on my make-up while waiting for the bus in the morning, on occasion, because, hey, I'm late, and I got it to go!

Anyway. I don't know if I used to be this forgetful (I feel like I wasn't--though my family of origin made a much less huge deal about these things than my current family), but I tell you, juggling about eight baby novels and a couple of adult ones in the head, plus all the short stories, plus the day job's small intrusions like "vinyl book straps!" makes it pretty damn crowded in there. I have yet to resort to writing stuff on my hand more than once a year, but.

Any tips for brain organization that I am stupidly overlooking?

Aha.

Mon, 19 Oct 2009 20:43:16 GMT

I've been kicking around my latest round of novel revisions for probably too long. Part of me is burnt out on this novel, just a smidgen, and I've been "refilling the well" as they say by mainlining the current seasons of just about everything on TV, and playing a lot of the Sims 2 with a hopped up Legacy Challenge )(explain to me the Sims Logic of this: my second generation girl, Deux, married a dude from college who Just Couldn't Get Along With Anyone, and when she married him (Toby Royce), she took the last name Royce. Then she divorced him, through an agonizing round of fights, because even though he was a big jerk to everyone, relationships in the Sims do not deteriorate based on how often your husband brawls with your brother, and I had to have her pick a fight with him THIRTY times before the option to break up with him came up. Actually--no. Picking fights didn't work; I had to have her kiss her new beau in front of him before anyone got pissed enough with each other to break up. Likewise, kicking him out of the house didn't make any difference to their love... And now he drops by all the time to steal the newspaper and knock over the trashcan. Anyway. The new husband's last name, Horowitz, disappeared; even though he did the proposing, he's now Cale Royce. Unfortunate for him.)

Also, K. now has Sims 2, and she's managed to kill three people and have two more taken by social workers in approximately 2 hours of play. She's a menace.

Anyway.

Part of my reluctance to really buckle down on the novel revisions has been because I'm sort of luxuriating in the fact I don't have a deadline, and working on other things in rotation here and there. I had writing group, and I wanted something new to submit to the group, for example. Partly, I'm going slowly and making a style sheet. And partly, I know that there are things that my agent has mentioned are problems that I am not satisfied with the easy solution to.

For example, my agent's note on one scene: "Not feeling R. is really *scared* here."

My first reaction was: "Well, that makes sense, because she's not, so maybe I need to just explain why she's not."

Second reaction was: "Might be more rewarding of a read if she were scared there."

Third reaction: "Maybe scared isn't exactly the right emotion."

Fourth reaction, today, in the car on the way to work: "DUH. I've shied away from conflict in this scene." My character is alone in the woods and hears something crashing through the forest towards her. She thinks, "Bear!" and climbs a tree. This gets her out of the way to witness a man fleeing through the forest, and then two men chasing him. At the end, a fourth man comes through, who has been tailing the two groups of men to see what is going on.

I've underplayed the inherent drama in watching a Hungarian spy running away from the Sylvania Chief of Prison's underneath my main character's nose, in the interest of Getting On With the Story. But I think, quite possibly, without making the chapters involved very much longer, I could have a brief encounter each with the spy and with the prison-chief and his man, and effectively make R. scared (a little) and also give her a chance to be brave, and in addition, add tension to the scene and to the whole book, and highlight the political situation with very little exposition.

I don't know a font big enough to write DUH in.

So, I'm sad my brain is moving so slowly on all of this, but I'm glad I got a chance to work this out.

Content

Wed, 14 Oct 2009 02:09:22 GMT

I'm experiencing that weird kind of contentment that comes when I am unsettled. I got a fortune cookie once, that I taped up on my desk: "Adventure can be real happiness." Just in case that curses me somehow, I have taped next to it: "Serious trouble will bypass you." (And on the other side is "Your wish is about to come true." (I have a lot of wishes, so that one is going to work for a while.))

In any case, some people can't be content while unsettled, but I find that I thrive on movement. I have my moments of peace, and enjoy them, but that kind of groove too quickly becomes a rut. I'm awfully rational for believing this, but: I'm a classic Aries. I excel at beginnings. (Except for when I'm writing them. Middles are more my forte there.) And movement.

I had some settling time recently. Some slow time. Some time holed up in my office with my book. (Gee, pretty much the whole year.) Lately, I've come out of my introversion-space and remembered that I like people and places and adventures. That adventure can be real happiness.

I bolted off to lonfiction's place to write amongst strangers on what basically amounts to a whim. I slotted in ConClave for no obviously good reason--none of my con-going posse would be attending. But it was all good. Strangers became acquaintances and acquaintances became friends. It's liberating to abandon the familiar, something that I forget all too often. But I always manage to relearn the lesson, just in the nick of time.

Back to the races

Sat, 10 Oct 2009 12:51:43 GMT

Had a really nice time at ConClave last night, though I'm still sort of appalled at how exhausted I am/was. Now, in order to be there for my 5PM panel, I did get to work about two hours early, so that certainly could have had something to do with it; and work was not in "light day" mode by any stretch. I put in a full day and then darted through rain and nearly-rush-hour traffic (which is a relatively minor deal in Ann Arbor, but it's still a deal--though it did provide me plenty of Stopped Cold time to freshen my make-up, pick a good radio station, and eat my celery and cheese snack).

I got to my panel about 10 minutes late and was the third person there, but I was followed by an 11-minuter immediately, and later, William Jones came rolling in through similar rain and traffic issues. We paneled. I found myself hating the gap between beginning writing and middle writing. Beginning writing is sincerely akin to adolescence. Things that shouldn't be significant seem soooo important. Knowing when and how to break the rules, and knowing when not to--it's not second nature early on, and seems fraught. And a lot of your problems can be solved with a little faith and self-confidence--and a lot of work. But you can't explain that to anyone, and have them be satisfied.

Oh, and @SSternberg came up and introduced himself to me and said he liked my journal and tweets, which threw me for a moment because his face looked familiar, and I never think anyone actually reads either, even when you are commenting and writing me back. Or, rather, I never think anyone I don't know is reading. Which is also ridiculous, and plays havoc with the theory of knowing, because I don't know, say, dichroic in real life, but I feel that I could pick her out of a crowd and that I do know her somewhat, as well as anyone I work with. Does any of this make sense? Probably not. Anyway, it was nice to hear someone enjoys my rather inane natterings.

Afterwards, I trundled off and ran into jimhines and had a nice chat, and then suddenly we were sitting in some stranger's hotel room interviewing each other for in front of a video camera. Seriously, what? Anyway. (Not so much of a stranger, actually; we have 22 mutual friends, I noted, when I went in to friend Al on FaceBook today.) So, at some point, there may be an interview online to point you to. After that, I followed Jim to his reading, which was freaking hilarious, and which I twittered.

And then I hit my last panel, which had about one attendee, and we managed to say some stuff, before breaking up early. I found ckd on the way out and made some lunch plans, and otherwise, booked out of there. It was only 11 by the time I got home, and it felt like 4AM. I tried to internet afterwards, and was falling asleep at my computer, so gave up and went to bed.

Later.

No idea where this came from...

Mon, 05 Oct 2009 03:39:17 GMT

But I found, tucked into a notebook, a list of books I read in part of 1991, written in my most elegant cursive--of that time.

February 1991
Seven Sons, Seven Daughters (Barbara Cohen)
Song for a Lady (Jacqueline Diamond)
Lady of Letters (Jacqueline Diamond)
Tehanu (Ursula K. LeGuin)
The Dreaming Place (Charles de Lint)
A Tale of Two Cities (Charles Dickens)
Roses (Barbara Cohen)
Elyza (Clare Darcy)
Folk Heroes of Britain (Charles Kightly)
Eugenia (Clare Darcy)
The Worthing Saga (Orson Scott Card)
Stone of Farewell (Tad Williams)
We Have Always Lived in the Castle (Shirley Jackson)

March 1991
By the Sword (Mercedes Lackey)
Lavender Lady (Carola Dunn)
Courting Emma Howe (Margaret A. Robinson)
Celia (Clare Darcy)
Eye for Eye (Orson Scott Card)
Shadow World (Crispin/Elliot)
King Arthur (Norma Lorre Goodrich)
Alanna: The First Adventure (Tamora Pierce)
In the Hand of the Goddess (Tamora Pierce)
The Woman Who Rides Like a Man (Tamora Pierce)
The Lioness Rampant (Tamora Pierce)

April 1991
Jane Eyre (Charlotte Bronte)
The Bloody Chamber (Angela Carter)
Tam Lin (Pamela Dean)
The Oval Amulet (Lucy Cullyford Babbitt)
The Sandalwood Princess (Loretta Chase)
Viscount Vagabond (Loretta Chase)
Knaves' Wager (Loretta Chase)
Taliesin (Stephen R. Lawhead)

May
Maps in a Mirror (Orson Scott Card)
Imprudent Lady
Lady Elizabeth's Comet (Sheila Simonson)
A Cousinly Connexion (Sheila Simonson)
The Bar Sinister (Sheila Simonson)
Love and Folly (Sheila Simonson)
The Bridge of San Luis Rey (Thorton Wilder)

June
Human to Human (Rebecca Ore)
The Rushden Legacy (Ellen Randolph)
Leonie (Diana Delmore)
Regency Charade (Margaret Mayhew)

I'm pretty sure May and June are not complete, and possibly neither is April, based on the changes in the writing (and the steep drop off, plus big gaps of space where I probably meant to fill things in).

About 12-13 books a month. I was clearly counting re-reads, but possibly not skimming comfort re-reads? I have memories numbering in the none-to-nearly-none of 98% of the Regencies listed. I remember everything else ridiculously well, however, as though I read them only a few years ago at the most. Even the three books I read for school (Dickens, Jackson and Wilder)

Strange.

this is how retreat is going

Sat, 03 Oct 2009 19:15:23 GMT

I would say that it is hard to keep the cat off my lap. But the truth is, it is hard to keep the cat off my bosoms.

Retreated

Sat, 03 Oct 2009 16:12:30 GMT

I am in the Dayton area to partake of some writerly company. Some fellow Codexians are having a bit of a retreat (which we are calling LonCon after the host, lonfiction). I'm hoping to hit up some attractions I found on Roadside America on the way home, which I meant to hit up on the way here, but I ran into the trifecta of lateness, detours, and go-back-for-left-behind cell phone yesterday.

So far, the food has been great, and I've gotten a very little bit of writing done, in between petting the awesomely friendly sphinx cat Howard and chatting with the other writers. Also, the misery of my memory key not working, so I don't actually have the most recent draft of my novel with me, as a result. I think. At least, I haven't found it yet.

So, I'm working on new something instead. Which is totally okay with me, even though I really wanted to be done with this novel (again).

Anyway, Danielle and Hel and Lon and I are sitting around writing, while we wait for kelly_swails and kosmo34 to arrive, and for lunch to cook. Lon's other half, Shelley, has recruited a neighbor (JJ), and they are performing magic in the kitchen. There's going to be bastilla for dinner, which I've only eaten once, and failed to make another time.

PS, I love Howard the sphinx beyond all reason.

Reading: My New Thing is Linking Through to Good Reads

Mon, 28 Sep 2009 01:39:08 GMT

27) How to Ditch Your Fairy by Justine Larbalestier

28) Chalice by Robin McKinley

29) The Magic Thief: Lost by Sarah Prineas

30) Norse Code by Greg Van Eekhout

31) Graceling by Kristin Cashore

Not Purely Self-Promotion

Sat, 26 Sep 2009 18:50:34 GMT

'cause there're are other people, publishers and products at stake in most cases...

I've been slightly remiss in pointing out recent publications. I wondered briefly if I should get a newsletter, since that would be entirely opt-in, but the fact is, I don't really generate enough material of newsletterly import to go that route, and frankly, I don't really like newsletters terribly much, so... I'd certainly not do it right.

Anyway.

Cute Robot available for preorder, or rather, your own paper copy of Unplugged: The Web's Best Sci-Fi & Fantasy - 2008 Download with the aforementioned cute robot on the cover, and a copy of my story "The Girl-Prince" in attendance, as well as many other fine, fine stories by many other smart, smart writers, some of whom are on this very friendslist such as beth_bernobich.

Hugo-winning Electric Velocipede has put out their most recent edition, with my story "Sun's East, Moon's West" inside, which is the story I took to Milford back in the day...

And "Fine-tuning the Universe" came out in Nature on September 3rd. That's my "Robots debating evolution" story.