Haunted Mirror

So today's rather-than-writing programme included LotR behind the scenes snippets, The Cat Returns (Ghibli anime--not as wonderful as Miyazaki but I love that Baron), and a few stories out of the Wizards anthology.

I also am behind by about a week getting my thoughts on The White Darkness together here. So.

Geraldine MacCaughrean's YA The White Darkness again tackles a whole different sort of story than she's written before with close attention to how this particular story needs to be told. This one is about a girl who loves Antartica, and especially "Titus" Oates, of Scott's doomed party of explorers. And the story here MacCaughrean decided to match to that historic background. I'd describe it as--



I've enjoyed all the stories in Wizards a lot, so now I know how to look for short stories I want to read. ^_^ Magazines are harder for me to get into.

Right. Just what I needed: a new, demanding story idea and opener!

Well, I wrote more of it than this, but for the Tuesday that is coming to a close I give you:
Jamie Duluth was considered to be in the world's top tier of Spirituals. He was also going to be a legacy student at Friedenheimer Institute of Higher Attainment. He wanted to be a normal kid. Honest.
...Oh, just leave me alone!

I'm actually in one of my idea-spurts, so this is not totally unexpected.
It is also totally explicable in terms of my reading:

I read Outlander yesterday.

It was a singularly unproductive day. (*_*)

It was an excellently written piece of work. I'm pretty divided about reading more of them, though.
The most beautiful moment in the book to me was when Jamie walks away from Claire, the most truly romantic. I must be a sot.

The great question in life of today is--if a book's bad, do you go on reading it?

I've got Maximum Ride here. I have it for a friend's recommendation (though that was a bit of a warning, actually) and a study. At least I thought a study.

Turns out, the Avatars books by Tui T. Sutherland are actually thought provoking in the way I need to put perspective on my lame little supers book. And this...well it's got that way of writing, which is crutch-ridden, overspoken so I can't enjoy a sentence of it. Not a one. Especially since the 14 year old girl sounds like what in a random pass I'd figure was a 17 year old boy.
Sexist? I still will claim there's a difference.
Even a precocious tomboy girl with a lot of stress on and violence to deal with I'm not sure would sound like so bit-off sentence male.

The problem is not that it couldn't work. But because J Patterson is a guy, it makes me suspect he doesn't have the chops to imitate how a girl talks.
I think this is a problem unique to me, but I'm just not that impressed.


I think I'm going to use my time reading something I like better. Or watching the Fullmetal Alchemist mini-series volume this same friend loaned me. Because while I'm agonizing about how to read all the stuff I'd rather not that she's excited about, I don't have any reservations about borrowing some of the anime.
I know I'm going to come off as picky to her. Which I am.
I don't put up with stuff I don't like.
I do like lots of things, though! I mean, is it a crime to avoid that sort of lazy writing you dislike most?

Mini-review for posterity
All-American Girl (Meg Cabot): kudos for a red-head goth girl heroine who blushes as easily and immaterially as we all do--I *heart* voice--though there's no significant difference in underpinning plot from her other books.

I bought stuff to pack today. We shall see how my luggage feels about it some other day. For now, I'm a bit more secure. A bit.

I've started "Women Who Run with Wolves" as my literature-ralated non-fiction. It's quite extraordinary.
    With my latest project (Aolon of the 5 volumes--at p.103 for Vol 4 w00t!) I deliberately thought about how my heroines were going to be alike and dissimilar. The main thread they have is this "Wild Woman" image. They are intuitive, but unabashed. Hirloa is a rather wide-eyed, random girl--her sister is quiet and domestic, but she has a wit and responsibility that is not precisely submissively childish. They are the two mothers of the heroines and heroes to follow.
The heroes aren't exactly the opposing repressed machisimo blunderbusses either. They are all in places of spiritual leadership (except Notable Exceptions who are just not there yet), they are all either artistic, or edging on it.

It will be intriguing to see what there is in this book to help me refine upon the characterization for this.

I don't know if it's a mistake to so engineer that they are all musicians or artists or sophistocates of some sort. I do know it's because I enjoy the company of such people that when I turn to secondary functions I tend to do too much artsy flourishes.

Today's Book Report:
The Game of Kings: And my woeful inadequacy, despite a very good tour of the unrelieved suspense landscape, is revealed. I really did try, with Shaim, this afternoon. But just as he didn't lose a toe in an odd river accident when he wasn't even paying attention, I just didn't see any point for those people to keep him locked up in a dungeon. My writing--episodic? I think so.
This is a tour-de-force of the essential backstory being withheld to great prolongued anguish and interest effect.
Lymond is one of the Trickster figures we all love so much--one of the more desperate I've encountered yet, or at least in the consciousness of the book--and he's rather obnoxious. He has a quote for everything, and all of them mean nothing to me. If I were either illiterate or able to spot more than half of them I wouldn't be so put out. Let it suffice that once I've done with an anthology of references to Surprised By Joy (C. S. Lewis' autobiography) I know what comes next.
But I enjoyed it quite a bit. Despite everything.
I'm, I believe, learning to not quibble with the flaws of other writers, to great support of my peace of mind. If only I'd catch them in what I do before turning it over to other people...

Hey, new friends! (I'll pretend their listening.)

In support of my claims to literary discourse, I proceed to say:
I haven't read anything I haven't written in a few days. I mean, novel things. But before that I had started

Jonathan Strange and Mr. Norrell

I didn't really get that it was a novel in the style of my favorite classics authors, only with magicians. Okay.
How Wicked is that?

Quite wicked. I'm only a few chapters in, but I love it. When I grow up for real (say, 64 or so) I want to write something like that. Just as clever, so not the same thing, but with that same classic deliberation and clarity, but  with the fey underlying. Though, as I said, I'm only a few chapters in. Shall we say, savoring it. But I don't think I have any more expectations to shatter. It dispenses with dense language, so my first preconception is quite done away with.

It's already improving my syntax, just talking about it. Well, not syntax, as I couldn't define the word in the most vague terms, but hear my word choice? Spectacular.