I would scream if I had the time
May. 8th, 2008 08:16 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png)
Sorry I haven't been all that entertaining lately here on the ole LJ. It's the end of the semester and I'm currently hip deep in finals. In other words, I'm spending all of my time ruining students' lives grading students' papers. This will all be over in another week, at which I hope to be back to normal, with some time to spare. Or as normal as I ever get anyway.
In the meantime, squeezing in an hour here or there, I managed to finish off chapter 19 of the work in progress, aptly titled "Well of Sorrows". I'll post a word count meter at the end of the post, so you can see how out of control this sucker has gotten.
And in other news, an interview with me has been posted at R. Schuyler Devin's blog. I met Mr. Devin at Norwescon, where he asked if I'd be willing to participate in his 6-sided interview at his blog. Of course I said yes. So go check it out. You can mock all of my answers to the question about what books/movies/etc I feel are modern classics. (I hate those types of questions; you'll see why at the interview.) Since I suck at that type of question, I figured I'd throw it out to all of you: What books/movies/TV shows in the SF and Fantasy genre do you consider "modern classics"? And by modern, let's say that had to have been released or on TV within the last 10 years. I'd be interested in what everyone has to say (since we recently had the "must haves" of 80s moviedom discussion here). I'm sure I missed something important and completely obvious in my answer.
And now, here's the word meter for the current update on the writing project from hell. Hopefully, I'll be back to more regular posts in another week.
Well of Sorrows
In the meantime, squeezing in an hour here or there, I managed to finish off chapter 19 of the work in progress, aptly titled "Well of Sorrows". I'll post a word count meter at the end of the post, so you can see how out of control this sucker has gotten.
And in other news, an interview with me has been posted at R. Schuyler Devin's blog. I met Mr. Devin at Norwescon, where he asked if I'd be willing to participate in his 6-sided interview at his blog. Of course I said yes. So go check it out. You can mock all of my answers to the question about what books/movies/etc I feel are modern classics. (I hate those types of questions; you'll see why at the interview.) Since I suck at that type of question, I figured I'd throw it out to all of you: What books/movies/TV shows in the SF and Fantasy genre do you consider "modern classics"? And by modern, let's say that had to have been released or on TV within the last 10 years. I'd be interested in what everyone has to say (since we recently had the "must haves" of 80s moviedom discussion here). I'm sure I missed something important and completely obvious in my answer.
And now, here's the word meter for the current update on the writing project from hell. Hopefully, I'll be back to more regular posts in another week.
| |
156,250 / 100,000 (156.2%) |
Well of Sorrows
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Date: 2008-05-09 01:00 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2008-05-09 01:31 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2008-05-09 02:31 am (UTC)That's actually about all I'm getting here, because 10 years isn't all that long...
Boy, I feel old.
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Date: 2008-05-09 02:08 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2008-05-09 04:53 pm (UTC)Cretin....
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Date: 2008-05-09 03:08 am (UTC)Comic/graphic novel wise -- Warren Ellis and Darick Robertson's Transmetropolitain, which began in 1997 and ran until 2002 or so.
Novels:
Richard Morgan - Altered Carbon
George R. R. Martin - A Storm of Swords if you want one novel, the entire Song of Ice and Fire series (which actually began in 1996) if you want a larger work.
Tim Powers - Declare
Possibly River of Gods by Ian McDonald.
Guy Gavriel Kay's The Lions of Al-Rassan falls just outside the 10 year limit, but will likely endure.
TV:
At least the first season and a half of Battlestar Galactica.
Buffy.
If we move outside the 10 year limit, the books I will always put right up are Lord of Light by Roger Zelazny and A Canticle for Leibowitz by Walter Miller, Jr.
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Date: 2008-05-09 02:10 pm (UTC)Modern classics
Date: 2008-05-09 04:05 am (UTC)The Matrix (first one) - Wachowski Bros.
Re: Modern classics
Date: 2008-05-09 02:11 pm (UTC)Re: Modern classics
Date: 2008-05-09 04:04 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2008-05-09 02:12 pm (UTC)Congrats on getting the semester over with. Good luck finishing everything off!
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Date: 2008-05-12 03:02 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2008-05-09 02:16 pm (UTC)I don't think I've read anything of Sean Russell's. I'll have to check him out.
LOTR should become classic movies, and of course Harry Potter will live on forever in both book and movie form (although the book form will outlast the movie form I think). Haven't seen the Nightwatch or Daywatch films.
I've lost track of both Heroes and Lost, and just haven't had the time to watch my Battlestar Galactica DVDs of season 1 yet.
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Date: 2008-05-09 11:53 am (UTC)The summer always makes me wish I had a laptop so I could work on stuff outside. I hate sitting in the den writing on a lovely summer morning. I'd be so much more productive out there on the porch with a laptop.
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Date: 2008-05-09 02:17 pm (UTC)And this is why I have a laptop. *grin*
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Date: 2008-05-09 04:23 pm (UTC)And I can understand being really busy. I am too, but not school. An overactive kitten is my reason. LOL It seems lately that he's taken an interest in trying to chew on wires. *sigh* He's like a baby, can't take your eyes off him for a moment. :p Oh yeah, and my desk is covered with stuff. lol
So, how's that short story contest going? You have a chance to read mine yet? *bats eyelashes* :p
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Date: 2008-05-12 02:00 pm (UTC)Caveat: the straight-to-PC ideas look more like what they do when they're finished (somehow they require less editing), but the 1st draft of pen-to-paper usually sucks (beyond the odd line here or there). Perhaps it's due to a need to see something on my screen of quality, & an innate sense that getting raw ideas down on paper might be a more valuable process in the long run, because raw ideas can be elusive (smoke em if you got em) & it's easy to cull the wheat from the chaff in the transfer to hard drive.
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Date: 2008-05-12 03:05 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2008-05-12 04:18 pm (UTC)While on my Mac I can type fast enough to where I have to stop and think because I passed what I had planned, which I'm fine with. :p I think the keyboard helps me a lot, because it doesn't take a lot of effort to press the buttons (unlike the PC's keyboard I'm on currently.) But I know one day, I will be forced to write with pen and paper. And I dread the day. :p
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Date: 2008-05-12 04:49 pm (UTC)I've been giving an occasional thought to typing without care for spelling/punctuation, & all things that can be corrected after the fact, in my next writing spree. I recognize I've been too anal about spelling off the top, which disturbs the flow of creativity, so I wonder if this approach can improve my straight-to-PC writing.
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Date: 2008-05-12 03:04 pm (UTC)I got all the short stories read and rated comments made and sent them all back. I didn't have any names to go along with the stories though, so I don't know which one was yours. *grin*
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Date: 2008-05-12 04:21 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2008-05-09 09:35 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2008-05-12 03:06 pm (UTC)Halfway done. Only 2 more finals to grade. And then it's the summer of writing!
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Date: 2008-05-12 03:30 pm (UTC)Classics!
Date: 2008-05-11 05:16 pm (UTC)But don't worry, JP, I have your books on my list for the next run to the book store! Now that I've finished reading (and editing, and revising) my second book while at lunch at work, it's time to get back to reading other folks real published works.
I've watched various episodes of the new Battlestar Gallactica, and quite frankly I don't like it as well as the original. True, that was a bit campy. I would have hoped that a new series would have stayed a little truer to the original. The new version, in my opinion is too detailed, too deep, and too dark, for me. Special effects are a lot better, but there's more to a series than that. I suppose that's why I believe the original Star Trek to be the best of them all. With the limited budgets they were produced on, the story and the acting had to prevail. Sometimes watching the original series is like watching a filmed stage play. As an audience we have to use our imagination a lot more. That helps draw us into the story.
Dave
Re: Classics!
Date: 2008-05-12 03:08 pm (UTC)In any case, if you read my books, let me know what you think! And let others know too of course. *grin*
Re: Classics!
Date: 2008-05-12 10:23 pm (UTC)And given a chance to read one or more of yours, I'll let you know what I think.
Lastly, because I've not yet read any of yours, I cannot rate them versus Naomi Novik's works. To me, the real catch of her stories is the relationship between Laurence and Temeraire.
Dave
no subject
Date: 2008-05-12 02:31 pm (UTC)Films I consider modern fantasy classics are Primer, Audition, Unbreakable, American Beauty, Starship Troopers, Punch-Drunk Love, Minority Report, The Lion King, Kill Bill, Storytelling, Zoolander, The Machinist, Waking Life, Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind.
Novels (I am not widely read, & tend to read older books that are easier to find
usedpreviously enjoyed): Barker's The Great & Secret Show, Weaveworld, Walker's Black Box.TV: Harvey Birdman, Brak, Spongebob, the last two seasons of Enterprise, Boston Legal.
Comics: Sin City, Marvel's Civil War event, Superman For All Seasons, The Walking Dead, League of Extraordinary Gentlemen volumes I & II (PLEASE do not mistake the travesty that was the LXG film as being remotely related to the books - completely different stories), the 2004-5 series of She-Hulk.
I've left off works other's recommended, like 1st The Matrix & the Potter books, etc.
And I must disagree with the LOTR films - despite being excellently written/cast/acted/filmed, I was as bored by them as I was by the brilliant prose that Barker put into the incredibly imaginative but exhausting Imagica. Heh - do I need to duck & run, too?
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Date: 2008-05-12 03:10 pm (UTC)I don't think you need to duck and run. But I do think the LOTR films will go down in history as classics, like Star Wars and Indiana Jones.
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Date: 2008-05-12 04:04 pm (UTC)I have the same opinion of Gone With the Wind the film. Maybe the book is head & shoulders above the rest of it's ilk, but the movie is exceedingly lacklustre when compared to it's contemporary-ishes like Harvey, Citizen Kane, All Quiet On the Western Front & the 1944 version of Gaslight.