End of the Year Randomness
Eh, it’s the end of the year according to the calendar. My year starts the day after Samhain, so there’s a weird disconnect in the darkest quarter of the year between candy and the winter solstice.
I am very scattered today, having just finished the third Kismet book. It’s in first-draft form, which will mean a LOT of revising over the next few weeks. So, RANDOMNESS! It makes as much sense as a long one-subject post would from me. Trust me.
* Campaign For The American Reader asked me who I would cast in the Valentine books, if they were ever made a movie. Here’s my reply. Much thanks to Mr. Zeringue, who very kindly didn’t curse when I was over deadline.
This is a popular question–we revisit it every so often in the forum, too.
* Speaking of movies, I went and saw Sweeney Todd. Twice. I know a lot of reviewers were upset because the movie didn’t have every scrap of dialogue and every song from the play, but I enjoyed it quite a bit. It wasn’t the grandmotherly Angela Lansbury doing Mrs. Todd, but then, what movie could be? There’s a difference in mediums between movies and plays. I thought the film was both a lovely riff on Sondheim’s musical and a work of art in its own right–I mean, come on, Johnny Depp and Alan Rickman singing Pretty Women? *swoons*
I have often thought, and still think, that Mrs. Lovett is the big tragic figure, not the Beggar Woman. The Beggar Woman had no choice but to end up the way she did; she is essentially a passive creature. Mrs. Lovett is practical and active, and suffers the fate of all (implied) sexually-active or even just independent women in film/plays/television. *sigh* Todd is an interesting character, even more so when he’s played well, but he’s not truly tragic–just psychotic and depressed. Yawn. Not that he’s not interesting, as far as that goes–but it’s Mrs. Lovett who really holds my interest, and who I wonder about the interior life of.
* I know a lot of you are wondering when we’ll have a paper Steelflower. It appears that the publishing date for such a beastie is up in the air, instead of kinda definite like I was told. So…sorry about that. I do plan on going back and writing the second Steelflower book, tentatively titled Steelflower’s Song (how’s that for a one-two alliteration) this year.
* I’m getting a lot of mail lately asking about the next Watcher book too. Unfortunately I have no control over when those come out. The next one is Mindhealer, it’s finished and waiting for revision. So, if you want to know when it will be out, drop the publisher a line, because I have absolutely no control and really can’t say.
* Heh. Nureyev plus Muppets equals WIN!
Ohgod, I remember this one. I laughed for weeks.
* I finished Painter’s French Chivalry: Chivalric Ideals and Practices in Mediaeval France and am taking another crack at Holy Blood, Holy Grail. I think I was too young when I originally read it, and furthermore hadn’t read O’Shea’s most excellent The Perfect Heresy about the Cathars. (His picture of Montfort is awesome in its telling detail unearthed from contemporary accounts.) After I knock off Holy Blood, Holy Grail it will be time for another whack at From the Ashes of Angels, which was in its own way one of the major inspirations for the story of Japhrimel and the Fallen.
* Why, I ask you, am I suddenly in the mood to write nothing but fantasy? The sequel to The Hedgewitch Queen (unpublished, and maybe will stay that way), working title The Left-Hand Consort, is burning a hole in my head. Maybe I’ve just had enough tech noir/urban fantasy for now.
* I am not doing New Year’s Resolutions. It’s just too painful when I get to May/June and realize I haven’t even started on any of them. Instead, I’m going to focus on being a decent person every day. Seems to me there’s a lot more mileage in that than in a list of “resolutions.” Hell, even Congress isn’t abiding by its own resolutions anymore. *sigh*
* Be safe out there. I don’t drive from December 30 to January 2, just because of the sheer number of drunks on the road. I strongly advocate staying home, but if you have to go out, please please be safe and cautious out there. People can be nuts sometimes, especially while lubricated.
A happy New Year’s to you all. And to all a good night.
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