Friday, April 28, 2006

Just a quick post...

...to say I'll be going out of town for a week, so no more posts until I get back. We're making our annual pilgrimmage to AZ (here's hoping it's less eventful than last time). We're going to the Grand Canyon, so I'm sure there will be a post full of pics when we get back.

Wednesday, April 26, 2006

Friends and the First Amendment

So the woman trying to sue some of the writers of Friends for sexual harrassment lost her case. Here's the full paper, but those interested in the First Amendment can skip up to page 37 for the Concurring Opinion. Have I mentioned I'm the geek that likes reading this stuff? I have? OK.

Here's the gist: the woman was hired as a typist/transcriptionist, so her job was to sit in the writers' room and type up what was said (why can't I have that job? I suppose the lack of shows being produced in the Twin Cities area is a factor). Apparently she found the degree of sexual banter going on disturbing. It all sounds rather juvenile: a bunch of guys bragging up their exploits, pretending to masturbate, and defacing words and pictures to make them dirty. Sounds a lot like high school. Nothing was directed at the woman in question (a lot of it was in reference to the actresses, who probably won't sue but I wouldn't be surprised if they never again work on shows where those guys are writers). This woman just found the environment intolerable.

The paper is interesting. It makes references and comparisons to several other harrassment judgements. It really shows how pervasive harrassment has to be to be considered, well, pervasive. It's quite a few notches beyond the point where I'd be looking for a new job, that's for sure. I've never been in a workplace like that, so it's a bit disturbing to read about them. And yet this Friends woman I can't summon a lot of sympathy for, mostly because no one was actually talking to her. Partly because HELLO! Had she never watched the show before she took the job? Plus, sitcom writers toss out dozens of jokes for every one that makes it into the show (which is why that job doesn't appeal to me - I'm too in love with my own words to toss them out and watch them get shot down like that. Plus, me? Not so funny). Count the sexual jokes in just one episode of Friends than multiply it by, say, 20. That's a lot of sex talk. And it's hardly surprising if a bunch of writers trying to amuse each other go a lot more blue then prime time TV will allow.

Most of what they were doing sounds exceedingly juvenile anyway, too juvenile to be remotely threatening. One writer brags up the shot he had with one of the actresses that he didn't take. Sorry, now I'm laughing again. It's like your geek friend who could have nailed that cheerleader when she was all drunk at that party that one time but he didn't, but he tells the story a million times and it never becomes more believable.

But my favorite is this quote:

Reich also acknowledged he and others altered inspirational sayings on a calendar, changing, for example, the word “persistence” to “pert tits” and “happiness” to “penis.”

Now that's funny. Juvenile, but funny. Mostly because I have a strong dislike to "inspirational" anything, I guess.

What is missing in this picture is the corresponding circle. The woman in question apparently only worked with the male writers and listened to them drone on and on about their exploits in the writers' room and the break room and the hallways. (And the idea that writing only happens in the writers' room strikes me as kind of funny. But read the Concurring Opinion for the perspective of the creative merit of what's left on the cutting room floor - still protected by the First Amendment even though you didn't use it on prime time TV). At any rate, what this poor woman needed was some time with the women who worked with these naughty boys. I guarantee you they were having some laughs at the expense of their male brethren. I can see them discussing the guys' famous exploits, and speculating on the fine ladies of the Niagara Falls area these guys were scoring with. Certainly much fun was had at the expense of the fellow that could have made it with one of the actresses (I'm so not believing that).

Monday, April 24, 2006

What throws me out of a fantasy novel

For writers looking to query their first novel, Miss Snark recommends reading other current first novels in the same genre to get a good idea of what your competition is like (rather than comparing yourself to, say, George R.R. Martin, etc.). So I've been reading a lot of first novels these past few weeks. Or should I say starting a lot of first novels. I've only made it all the way through two: The Prodigal Troll by Charles Coleman Finlay (which was a bit too much like Tarzan for my tastes, but otherwise the writing was good and I expect his second novel will be one I really enjoy) and Crystal Rain by Tobias Buckell (which is labeled sci-fi, but with its focus on forgotten knowledge and old gods it kinda feels like a fantasy, but on the whole could best be classified as a kick-ass adventure story except no one has a shelf for that). Otherwise, I've been doing a lot of grumbling out loud while reading these things. Believe me, reading that Amy Tan book last week was like a tall, cool glass of iced tea on a hot, muggy day. Bliss.

The book I threw across the room last night was so bad even the commas were pissing me off (to which complaint Quin said, "What is it with you and commas? Have you ever brought up commas and not have it all end badly?" Which is true, but those are stories for another time). But I don't really feel like complaining about the writing (although if your MC does the exact same thing, like "cry out in horror" 3 times in 2 pages, that's pretty much the end of the book for me, OK?). I'm going to talk about the other things that throw me out of a fantasy book. Most of it has to do with research.

Now I love fantasy, it's my genre. Because I love it, I expect more from it. (Be glad I'm not your mom). So here is my semi-list of a few things that throw me out of a fantasy novel.

First one: hallways. There is some question as to when historically hallways came into fashion (read this debate if you're interested, it hits most of the points I'm thinking of), and of course it depends on what part of the world we're talking about, and how rich the homeowners in question are. Here's the grub: if you tell me your blacksmith's house has a hallway in it, I'm going to want to know how he heats and how he lights it (and what he wants the dead space for anyway). The idea of bedrooms branching off a hallway is pretty ingrained in our modern brains, but back in the day it was a lot more efficient to just heat one room and have everyone sleep there (particularly if they are poor and the weather's cold). The one room house makes a lot of sense to me, but you don't see it much in fantasy (everyone wants their characters to have more privacy, I guess). A step up from that is interconnecting rooms, each with its own fireplace. This was the model for even rich people's homes for a long, long time. It solves the light and heat issue and gives some privacy since the rooms have doors between them (which makes me think of Nicole Kidman and her ring of keys in the movie The Others).

On a related note, baby sleeping in its own room. Didn't happen until, what, the Victorian age (and again only with the rich). Still doesn't happen in most parts of the world. Even if the mother is rich, she has a wet nurse and the wet nurse sleeps with the baby. But a baby sleeping alone in it's own room? I don't think so.

Some people are bothered by food in fantasy novels. The whole how did Samwise get potatoes since that's a New World vegetable thing. Unless your novel is actually set on Earth in the past, this isn't going to bother me. What does bother me is characters in an arctic climate eating tropical food. Or someone eating fresh, red apples in springtime. Do some research. What's the climate like where your story is set? What sort of food would grow well there? What could be tough to grow but worth big bucks if you managed to get a crop in? And what would be a rare delicacy from a far off place? Read some history books about what life was like for the commoners back in the day: only the rich had anything like a varied diet.

Another deal-breaker: literacy. If every character in your story can read and write, I'm going to have a hard time swallowing it. Let's go back to the blacksmith with his spacious home (he was in the book I couldn't manage to read last night). He and his wife were leaving notes for each other around the house. Let's leave out the rarity of paper for a bit. This young blacksmith would have been working at his father's side, learning the trade, ever since he was old enough to hold a hammer (and I'm going to bet those weren't often just 8 hour workdays). When did he have time to learn to read? Who taught him? Why? He's a blacksmith: you come up and tell him what you need and he makes it. He doesn't take written orders, now does he? No one was writing books that would interest a blacksmith until after the printing press, not to mention books were just flat-out rare and very expensive.

Also, everyone in these books is always fully literate: no one struggles with unfamiliar words or has dyslexia or anything.


*sigh*

You can see how seldom I'm pleased by a book these days. If you don't mind, I think I'll dip back into George R.R. Martin for a bit. I have a novella of his I haven't read yet. Once that's recharged my batteries I'll plunge back into these new novels.

Then I'll probably write another list.

Friday, April 21, 2006

Saving Fish from Drowning

About a year ago I read I book I really hated called The Lovely Bones. The narrator is a dead girl who is raped and murdered in Chapter One, and the rest of the book is her watching her family move on. They move on very fast. They are all very serene and accepting. Even when Mom leaves to relive her youth, no one is particularly upset. Some therapeutic sex is had - in one case rather disturbing therapeutic sex. But it kept reminding me of a MST3K quote from the short A Date with your Family: "Emotions are for ethnic people." It didn't seem to be a book about real people, or at least not the sort of people I know and identify with. I said at the time that if Alice Hoffman had written it would have been much improved. Not that Alice's characters are particularly ethnic (I don't know why that quote was always in my head), but they are always emotional.

(And what was with the fixation on women and children as victims? The book almost seemed to imply that when men are murdered it's not tragic. Why? They must have been asking for it? They should have been strong enough to make it a fair fight? I just keep thinking of a kid that was killed in Brooklyn Park some years back. He was 18, honors student, already accepted to college. He was sitting on the steps of his apartment building talking to a girl and was shot in the head with a stray bullet. The fact that he was 18 and not 8, man and not woman does not lessen the tragedy for me). Anyway, like I said, hated the book.

Which pretty much brings us to the novel I just finished, Saving Fish from Drowning. Not by Alice Hoffman but by Amy Tan, which would have been my second choice I'm sure. This is also narrated by a woman who dies mysteriously in the first chapter. Now this book I like (although it's not my favorite Tan; that would still be The Hundred Secret Senses). Is it just that I have more in common with crotchety old Chinese women than I do with dreamy young girly-girls?

No. I've said before the actual writing in The Lovely Bones is, well, lovely. Alice Sebold was a poet before she was a novelist and it shows. No, I hated that book because nothing made any freaking sense. The girl dies and she sort of hovers about, dogs sing in choruses and there's ice cream. She never once wonders when she's getting to heaven or anything of the sort. Did she have no expectations for life after death? Doesn't she feel ripped off or lied to? And we're told she's watching her family because that's how she wants to spend her time, but we're never told the mechanics of how she gets inside their heads.

I'm a spec-fic writer. We're all about the mechanics of how.

So. Saving Fish from Drowning. The MC in this one is a Buddhist, but a Chinese Buddhist which as she tells us means a bit of this and a bit of that. Her expectations for the after life and how they differ from what she's experiencing are brought up more than once. In Buddhist thought, the soul does not go on to the next incarnation right away, so there she is floating and waiting. Her friends were going to go on a tour to China and Burma with her as their guide; at her funeral they say a little prayer that she will be with them "in spirit", so of course she has to go. And how does she get inside the minds of the other characters? The MC tells us it's something Buddha would have called "the Mind of Others", and how she understands this changes as the book progresses.

And the characters are very real. It's an interesting catalogue of all the ways people can miscommunicate. I particularly liked the character of Harry Bailey, who works with dogs and constantly thinks that people will respond to the same behavior controls that dogs will. Sometimes he's right and sometime's he's wrong, but he was always amusing.

The Stephen King novel Misery also plays an important (and nongratuitous) part in the story, which I found amusing since the two writers are friends and bandmates in the Rock Bottom Remainders.

Tuesday, April 11, 2006

Just a quick post (with pictures)

So the mold in my office has been dealt with, the walls painted, and the furniture back. For the curious, here are some pics:


Thursday, April 06, 2006

The exciting paint-buying post, which is really about comics


Last night the whole family piled in the car and went to the hardware store to buy paint for the office. We have such good family fun! Oliver has been lobbying hard for Mace Windu purple; since I don't have particularly strong feelings about home decor or color options, we went with lavender (real purple would be much too dark in that room; it gets no direct sunlight). While the employee was mixing the color, my husband suggested we stroll down the mini-mall to the comic book store.

Like I'm gonna say no.

It's really a comics and collectibles store, so while Quin, Aidan, and Oliver looked at action figures I wandered the comic book section. I had half an idea to get another Hellblazer (origin for the movie Constantine), but they all have fancy titles, nothing obvious like Volume 1 or Volume 2, so I wasn't sure what would come next (an advantage of online shopping, you can always find out in two clicks of a mouse and never interrupt anyone doing their homework behind the counter).

Then I saw it. FRAY. I have heard of this Dark Horse limited run and always intended to track it down, but never quite remembered that I wanted to. And then there it was, a nice eight-issues-in-one-volume collection. The only one left. I think it was waiting for me.

For those not in the know, FRAY is a comic that Joss Whedon wrote about a vampire slayer in the future. I read all eight issues last night (my sleep schedule is so out of whack; it always takes a month for me to "spring forward" and usually even longer to "fall back". The government is evil. Wait, where was I?).

I would have dearly loved this comic when I was a teenager (I love it now, but you know what I mean). Back in those days I sought out all the woman-oriented Marvel titles - Dazzler, Firestar, Magik, Red Sonja - and while I liked them all in their own way, they were never quite there except for Kitty Pryde and Wolverine.

It's not just the writing in FRAY that is spot-on; the artwork is exceptional, particularly in regards to how the women are drawn. But that's apparently not a coincidence. As Joss says in the intro, "I had come to Dark Horse with one stipulation: No cheesecake. No giant silicone hooters, no standing with her butt out in that bizarrely uncomfortable soft-core pose so many artists seem to favor. None of those outfits that seem to casually - and constantly - reveal portions of thong. I wanted a real girl, with real posture, a slight figure (that's my classy way of saying "little boobs"), and most of all a distinctive face. A person."

At any rate, I was standing there in the comic store gazing longingly at my amazing find when Oliver comes up to me with a graphic novel of his own clutched tight to his chest. And he has a look on his face that says he knows he has to ask, but he also knows Mom is never going to refuse to make a comic book purchase. So he brought home Star Wars: Darth Maul. I'm not sure exactly what it is; he read it with dad at bedtime. Why he picked Quin I don't know; there was a lot of loud grumping on not knowing how to read comic books (Dude, top to bottom, left to right. If you can't tell which came first, they're probably meant to be simultaneous).

My son is already a comic geek. I'm so proud.