A good friend of mine died in London this morning at 4am. Aside from being a fantastic writer, he was kind, sweet, smart, and an all around great guy.

He'd been in intensive care since his collapse with E. coli infection on the 18th of November. I really have nothing else to say except my heart goes out to his life partner Sarah Biggs and to the rest of his family and to all his other friends. This should not have happened.

About halfway into New Moon, I started to get really angry. I started to think about how, teenage girls (and some older women, by the sounds of things at the hairdressers) are going to see this movie, no matter what. It's pretty much guaranteed that they are going to hand over their cash to see this, probably even more than once. I went with my cousin who sheepishly confessed she'd actually seen it as soon as it came out, cause she couldn't wait. She is not going to have been the only one.

I think it's the height of insult that the makers of this movie, given the assured revenue, did not invest more cash to respect the audience - the actors were terrible, the script was Gpd awful, the makeup was OMG BAD (anyone else wonder why Bella was in love with the clown face man/marionette doll?), really bad special effects and the plot - oh plot! where were you?! I missed you!!!!! The crapness of the filming, costuming and special effects just made me mad. I couldn't help but think that if this movie were being made for ... ooh .. a male audience? ... they would have spent more time making the effects and makeup more believable.

I found myself spending a lot of time checking out people's teeth. It's weird. Jacob's are really white - you can't help but notice them. But I could actually draw you a lot of the actors' teeth, I spent so long gazing at them. Was that just me?

Also ... I'm sorry. Is it cause I am too old now? But I. Just. Do. Not. Get. The. Edward. Cullen. Thing. There was this skill I learned in highschool - a place where you never want to stand out - I perfected the art of identifying guys who other people would say are really hot (but to me look ugly). It's something about the nose - which is always big and noticeable, and the narrow eyebrows. Or something. I guess he has this James Dean brooding thing - but (and this is where I might be old) the brooding dude? So unattractive! He's so busy being all introverted and wracked with angst about his own shit that he never really notices you. BORING!!! Plus, in New Moon, there is never actually any indication that Edward a) loves Bella or b) why he does. And you get no clues from her on the matter. I so don't give a shit about their story.

So all I was left with was to thoroughly enjoy the buff naked chests of the werewolves. Which ... well, look, are certainly worth the price of the movie. All warm and beating with blood, all alive and strong and buff. Yummy. I dunno that I necessarily think Jacob is good looking ... I couldn't decide (which is what I spent my 2.5 hours doing. That. And admiring his teeth). He pulled off broody and angsty far more believably than anyone else and frankly was the standout actor of the whole film. I could actually *feel* his emotions and his pain. And cared about it.

I'm annoyed at Meyer because before these books, I always fell on the vampire side of the vampire v werewolf dichotomy. We had Angel! And Spike! And Darla. And now, now I am so squarely in the werewolf camp, which to be fair always had Oz too. But ... hairyness and howling at the moon be damned. Give me Jacob over Edward any day.

My mother pointed this out to be from the first movie, and having seen New Moon (and I spose I'll see Twilight at some point) - the real story is the Cullen family and this writer is so skilled at avoiding plot that she just builds a bypass highway so she can be 100% sure that she bypasses it. By far the most interesting scenes in this movie happen inside the Cullen household. A total of 2 mins and 15 secs, at a guess.

Shame really.

New Moon verdict: it was slightly better than staying home to balance my books, but only for naked buff chests, rocky road choc tops, very white teeth and catching up with my cousin.

I've just given the cooker its pre-Christmas clean. Both ovens are gleaming and inside and out because I took the hob scraper to the burnt on grease on the glass doors and gave them a jolly good scraping. The worst shelves got a soak in the bath in deadly chemicals and the not so bad ones got a brillo scrub.

I think I may have killed my magic microfibre cloth and I had to rescue the hobscraper from the bin where I'd thrown it out with the newspaper.

Still, that's something else I can tick off the to-do list.

Rome
Mainlined most of the "Rome" TV series, over a few days. GOOD GOD this show is great. The historical stuff is very well used, and it just feels authentic ie graffiti, rubbish on the streets, lots of filthy people and the slums that never seem to appear in Ben Hur et al. Plus, when people aren't having crazy Roman-style sex, they engage in Roman-style killing. Top-shelf stuff.

Short Story
I have finished a longish short story that's been vexing me. When the first draft stalled, I realised I needed to do a number of things to resurrect it:
a) change from 3rd person to 1st
b) draw out a mind map, linking all the crazy shit I'd just dreamt up and making some sense out of my "ecology of the supernatural"
c) really let my freaky hind-brain step in and pilot this story into Crazy-Land ie "automatic writing, stop pissing and moaning and just get on with it you hack". What started out as a yawnfest moody emo piece turned into a messed up reworking of the Persephone myth - WITH A CREEPY ZOMBIE HORSE THAT BITES OFF PEOPLE'S FACES. I didn't realise the mythology thing until about an hour after finishing it, and certainly didn't intend to go in that direction. I think it works (but time will tell).

Star Trek, aka James Dean Gets a Space-Ship
Saw the new and improved JJ Abrams Star Trek movie, after having it recommended to me by every man and his dog. The verdict: pretty good, but not great.
Parts of this movie I enjoyed were the little nods to the previous instalments in the franchise, the way old characters have been revamped and reintroduced, and one or two pun-tastic moments that I won't ruin for future viewers of this movie. And Simon Pegg as Scotty? Fuck, that's just casting genius.
But it just wasn't that great a story. I really think that a person who'd never seen a single piece of Trekkia would go "hey, the special effects were pretty cool. And the good guys won, yay. That's nice, I guess." This movie reboot really does rely on the nostalgia of fans, which is a bit of a shame.
This isn't to say I didn't enjoy the movie, it was good fun. I guess I just don't agree with folks who are touting this as BEST SF EVAH. I would really love to see them use this same cast, and do something new and improved with the franchise, not just a "how we all met" story.
Oh, and there is NOTHING that Eric Bana can't do (don't talk to me about Hulk, I'm not listening, la la la)

Well, the Seekrit Project was finished tonight. The first draft. Who knows what the beta readers will say now... I've kind of hit the point with the MS that I've stared at it for so long I've lost all perspective on it.

But, it's done!

75,077 / 75,000 words. 100.1% done!

Softly, softly, catchee monkey. Or rewrite book. Or something!

I'm on target, which is gratifying. I'm still enjoying the story, which is a relief. *g* And so the work continues ...

11 / 20 words. 55% done!

Keep your fingers crossed for me!

50050 words!

Go Martin...

Go Martin...

Go Martin...

Go Martin...

Go Martin...

Go Martin...

The book isn't done, mind you. I think I'm probably a quarter of the way through the story, though it's difficult to tell at this point. I guess we'll just have to wait and see. But I think I'll take a brief break from it, catch my breath, and have a think about where it's going to go next.

Still... go me. :)

Where did I leave my glasses?

1. My current writing project does not suck as much as I feared
2. Gluten and lactose-free friands are ridiculously easy to make. And disturbingly tasty
3. Ditto on gluten and lactose-free pizza
4. Smershy has been weeing in both of our studys. Bad bad kitteh.
5. JJ Abraham's Star Trek movie was every bit as good the second time through as the first

Today, Sydney developed a dust-sky to keep me entertained.

Sydney Uni had a film and a wedding and other ephemera to distract us on our way to the Nicholson. The Nicholson Museum has four exhibitions running at once right now, which is ambitious. Some great stuff, but some disconcerting and depressing results of the odd focal points. The ancient world and the 19th century reinvention and memorising of the ancient world were entirely lacking in Jewish elements. In fact, if I relied on the Nicholson Museum for an understanding of my own past, I might as well not exist. Which gave me an idea for fiction, naturally, since I do exist. It also gave me teaching matter, which was one of the aims of the exercise.

I'm pretty positive I exist today. I cite as evidence another review of Life Through Cellophane.


PS I took a close look at several mummified hands today and asked Llyn if she would mind verifying my Very Important Conclusion. Not a single SF movie or series I can remember gets mummified hands quite right. I would say "tut, tut," but it might be interpreted as a pun.

Current stats:

Words: 11,360.
Total words: 101,678.
Reason for stopping: I sort of, well, ran out of book.
Music: the Discount Armageddon play list.
Lilly and Alice: my lap and the orange cat tree, respectively.

First draft stats:

Pages: 353
Chapters: twenty-five, plus a prologue and an epilogue
Started: August 22, 2008
Finished: November 28, 2009

Given how much time this book spent being "lower priority" than things with actual deadlines, fourteen months is a very respectable time to get from beginning to end. Midnight Blue-Light Special should go a lot faster, if only because I completely understand my world now, and what it's supposed to be like. I know the rhythm, I know the beat, and I can dance to it. I am...I'm staggered right now. I've been saying for a few weeks now that I was probably going to finish the book this month, but there's a huge difference between saying and doing. I've done. Draft one is done.

Draft two is going to involve smoothing out the continuity, fixing the pacing, and generally book-doctoring like whoa...but it'll probably be done by the end of January at the very latest, and that's with taking a backseat to Blackout, which gets to take over as my primary book now. Discount Armageddon is done.

I'm amazed and a little off-balance. I am now going to go eat ice cream and watch TV.

Here are today’s stats for the fabulous urban fantasy adventure about a neurotic vampire/thief and her wealthy blind client, now with Bonus! Cuban drag queen and military intrigue:

Project: Bloodshot
New Words Written: 4985 (Some added last night; only about 4000 today)
Present Total Word Count: 94,570 words
Goal: Draft Zero by December 12 -ACCOMPLISHED





Things Accomplished in Fiction: Wrapped it up, baby. Wrapped up all of it. This, ladies and gents and all others, is a Draft Zero.

Things Accomplished in Real Life: Virtually nothing. This has been eating my brain and I had to get it out, out, out. And now - best of all - I have almost 2 whole weeks to batter this puppy into a Draft One before sending it back to Anne! [:: does a little dance ::]

Reason for Stopping: BECAUSE I CAN.

[Crossposted to/from my website. If you'd like to comment, you can do so either here or there.]

Catching up. I went to see Superior Donuts by Tracy Letts (author of August: Osage County) last week. Not at all bad, but as with his earlier play, the beginning is slow and annoying and it takes awhile to adjust to the slow pacing.

Older middle-aged widower (Michael McKean, who is terrific) owns a dying donut shop in Chicago that was opened by his father decades earlier. The play opens with two cops who frequent the shop there before it's open because it's been vandalized. Ambitious next-door neighbor wants to buy him out and expand his electronics biz. Young African American kid comes looking for a job and brings trouble. Female cop flirts with the owner, thugs threaten the kid, the owner is all angsty over being a draft dodger during Vietnam. I enjoyed it, although as my theater companions pointed out, a fight scene was utterly unconvincing and unnecessary. Definitely worth seeing before it closes in a few weeks.

Last weekend and this weekend I started watching the Buffy spinoff, Angel, with David Boreanaz. First disc with four episodes left me doubted I'd continue (jeez, I loathe Cordelia). But...since I had the second disc home I figured I'd give it one more chance, as I remember that Cordelia grew on me during Buffy. And yes, the next four episodes hooked me, especially with Buffy playing a prominent (and very moving) role in the 8th episode. Tears fell. ;-).

Last week I also watched the french film I've Loved you So Long, which features a brilliant performance by Kristin Scott Thomas that should have won her an Oscar, yet didn't even get her a damned nomination. Woman (Thomas) gets out of prison after serving 15 years for murder, and moves in temporarily with her sister and the sister's family. It's utterly riveting and moving as the viewer sees Thomas's character slowly move back into the world. Highly recommended.

Last night watched Sunshine Cleaning about two sisters who in desperation to earn a living, open a biohazard removal/cleaning service-ie. they clean up after violent and non-violent but messy deaths. I enjoyed watching Amy Adams and Emily Blunt and appreciate that the story is about the working poor trying to make a go of it (rather than the usual middle and upper middle classes) but it's only ok, not great. Worth a look.

And I finally saw Juno, which I liked quite a bit. It really is a smart, sassy little movie, just like its heroine. Good acting.

During the two movies, my DVD player started going weird. Power shut off and I had to replay fast forward to get to where I was--at first I thought it was the DVD but nope, it happened with both discs...and then the damned thing turned itself back on...uh oh. A DVD gremlin. I managed to watch both movies, with the interruptions but have just ordered a new DVD player. The old one lasted 6 1/2 years, which isn't too bad.

Well, here we are at another Orycon. We turned up on Thursday night and nothing was quite ready (Thursday having been Thanksgiving, of course, and everything having been predicated on that) but that was okay - we were kinda early, after all.

Friday morning we came down to breakfast, said hi to a couple of people we knew, had breakfast, and went in search of important things like programs so that we could figure out where to go and what to do - but the Green Room people shrugged helplessly and said, "You'll have 'em when we get 'em..." - which finally happened a little later, AFTER the programming had already started, leaving the first few panels out there in something of a limbo - the panelists knew where they were supposed to be, because their name tents gave their itineraries and locations, but nobody ELSE knew anything about the panels or who was on them or where they were supposed to be and this year it was a new hotel anyway so even having a room name was no guarantee whatsoever of knowing its location (which could be in any of three separate wings of the hotel...) But we finally got hold of a program booklet, and it was off and running.

My first panel was at 3 PM, about "Alternative History" - and it was in what fellow panelist Michael Ehart called the "grown-ups room" - one of the ballrooms, a huge place with LOTS of chairs which made the panelists wonder whether we'd have an echo in the place if not enough people turned up to fill them - but the panel was surprisingly well attended and very lively (and Robin Hobb actually recommended my book to the audience, which was REALLY cool!) After that, straight after that at 4 PM, I had a panel I was supposed to be moderating, on whether artists and writers were "wired differently" and were moderately nuts, as it were, by definition. We had three writers, two artists, and a Jungian psychologist on the panel - and maybe as many people again, or even maybe fewer, in the audience. We decided that we were mostly just fine, thank you very much, and sometimes the rest of the world just needed to catch up with us dreamers while we ran on ahead and tasted the winds that blow sweet and terrible out of the sunrise... and I'm sure we gave that psychologist enough material to run a conference with...

After that, social time - dinner with a bunch of friends, and then lots of parties up on the party floor afterwards. We were moderate in our partygoing, and collapsoed into bed at around midnight.

8:30 this morning it was breakfast with Brenda Cooper, and then we picked up an entourage and made our way into the Green Room asking everyone we met, "excuse me, but do you know where the autograph tables are?" because in the program it said, helpfully, that authors would be signing at Table 1 or Table 2 but nowhere was the location of said tables actually specified. Some of our number so equipped and inclined even resorted to Twitter to try and find things out, and the plaintive, "Excuse me but does anyone know where the autograph tables are?" went out into the ether. (Yes. We found out. Eventually. Everything is fine now.)

Then we went to listen to radconbob read a short story which he is currently working on, which was a treat because we don't often get to see him wearing his writer's hat, he's always too busy doing organizational stuff or being goofy at parties (you know what's fun? As I type this, in the cybercafe here at Orycon, he himself is sitting right next to me and has no idea that I am talking about him... hi, Bob!!! [grin]) and after that it was my turn to read, and I actually had about seven people at the reading, which is not to be sneezed at, and a couple of them were even complete strangers who wandered in to listen TO ME and then left straight afterwards which made it evident that they had specially come there to listen to me. Which was rather nice...

Another panel in an hour, and then another, after that - and then lunch with some friends - and then I have an autographing at those mythical tables in the afternoon, followed by my appearance as the visiting pro at the Writers' Workshop where I'm to critique a couple of new writers' novels-in-progress. And after THAT, it's a question of find something to eat (probably accreting company on the way, as these cons are wont to go) and then more parties...

And then, Sunday, I have a nice lazy day, a concert I want to go to in the morning, and the Powells signing in the afternoon.

And then, Monday morning, we leave the hotel, hit the railway station, have some lunch in that nice little restaurant in the railway station building where we have yet to have a bad meal, and catching the afternoon train back home. Factoring in everything, home by 10, hopefully. (I miss my catses...)

And then I have a novel to finish...

But I'm running ahead of myself again. I have a panel in half an hour. About building a balanced mythos. I have to get my balance in order.

See y'all later. Maybe.

1. I'm taking entries for the pet photography ARC giveaway through the end of the weekend. No horses, snakes, or hermit crabs yet, but I'm holding out hope!

2. There's a shiny new interview with me over at Book Love Affair, discussing the next two Toby books, the first of my books as Mira Grant (Feed), how I keep myself from spontaneously combusting, and various other topics of interest. I'm answering questions throughout the day, so please, swing by, and see if anything sparks your curiosity!

3. I'm going to be appearing December 12th in San Francisco as part of the Writers With Drinks series. To quote the website, "Writers With Drinks combines erotica with literature, stand-up comedy with science fiction and poetry with essays." The show is at The Make-Out Room (3225 22nd. St., San Francisco), from 7:30 PM to 9:30 PM. The doors open at 7 PM. I don't know yet just how many drinks this writer will have, but if I have enough, my piece for the evening will probably be the full stand-up version of The Microwave Story. Be there!

4. In case that's not good for you (and it may not be, as not everyone is local to me), I'm also going to be doing a book reading/concert at the Wayward Coffeehouse in Seattle, on December 26th. Vixy and Tony are going to be there to help me blow the roof off, and there will be lots of other exciting goodies throughout the night. It's gonna be awesome.

5. I'm going to go finish Discount Armageddon now.

Loooong day. I woke up really early this morning, anxious that all my timings would come off right. I put laundry on at 7.30 and managed to get two loads done before I was off to the hairdressers. I seem to be growing my hair, which is new and I have no explanation for it. So I didn't get a cut, just colour and caramel foils.

I came home and did more cleaning, disinfecting and tidying before idling kindly popped in and looked at the leaking toilet. Things look grim. He's coming back tomorrow but suspects I will need to call a plumber back in. Sigh. There is still leaking. The bathroom has been fully disinfected, again. And I have a towel to hopefully soak up the leaks. And I turned off the tap. We shall see what tomorrow brings.

After all this excitement, I did a food shop, had a shower and finally sat down for the day when my mother popped in. She brought her dog and there was this hilarious moment when Benji did the meerkat stance in front of the other dog and that dog looked at him like, "dude, I dunno what you think you're saying but that's not 'dog'".

So my day kinda started at about 6pm. Whereupon I decided to just throw in the towel and kick back and take the night off. I've watched the Bogey and Bacall version of The Big Sleep. I enjoyed it even if it didn't make much sense - I have the prerelease version on Side B which I might have a look at tomorrow. Watching Bogey and Bacall on a Saturday night whilst sewing, sipping lemonade and feeling sleepy reminded me of many many happy Saturday nights at my grandmother's. We used to sleepover on a Saturday night for years as kids. And watch all kinds of TV with her - 21 Jump Street! And Bill Collins Golden Oldies. And we swooned over the leading men - Johnny Depp, Richard Grieco, Humphrey Bogart.

I miss her. She was thoroughly cool - let me call her by her first name cause she thought it was funny when I did at like 2 years old. So, in memory of her, I have followed The Big Sleep with 42nd Street - another movie we watched on a Saturday night together, both being avid fans of tap dancing. And it reminds me of being in 42nd Street and thinking of her.

I don't recall this movie being so darn saucy! It's awesome!!

Yesterday we made it through 4 stores worth of shopping before noon. Then promptly needed sustanance and sleep.

After the nap we went back out shopping yesterday. The final result yesterday was... 6 1/2 hours of shopping. Which means we finished the last of the list of people we still had to get gifts for. And helped my father pick out gifts for ourselves.

Gift List Win... Human Survival Rate - Epic Fail.

I want to sleep until after the new year!

I spent today at the Freecon. I spent the early evening at a nice Italian place in Haberfield, being happy with friends. As we left, the waiters and other diners walked past the table to see Llyn's sketch of the street. Tonight I'm watching good TV in good company. All this explains the sad randomness of my convention report,

The Freecon was fun. I was given leave to not be on the movie panel (claiming lack of movie knowledge) as long as I heckled from the audience – I asked exactly one question, which just shows how wise I was to beg off the panel. My reading was postponed until the afternoon, which meant I wasn't on a panel with Kate Forsyth (sob).

Ater her reading, Kate was asked a question about dreams and stereotypes and archetypes. She pointed out that you get the universal in novels by writing the particular ie creating strong individuals. Pamela Freeman had issue with Jung having convinced people about the truth of archetypes without clear demonstration that they existed.

What struck me was the number of Aussie spec fic writers who either have doctorates or are getting them. An intelligent mob. Also a mob that has interesting discussions because the theory and understanding of writing are so clearly related.

I did a quick tally of writers present here and at Conflux and their day jobs. There are public servants, scientists, newspaper/magazine bods, martial artists, computer bods, doctors, teachers of various types, lawyers, writers (ie day job is writer, including fiction, NF, technical, etc)

Nyssa was there and reminded folks about Awritergoesonajourney's latest competition (worth checking out – books as prizes! I can find you the URL when I'm home and using a normal size keyboard, if you want it). Next Carnival is mid-December, BTW and you can send suggestions of blogposts to Nyssa. That's not 'can' – it's 'should.' Otherwise how will the rest of us find out about all the cool stuff out there?

Writers who read before lunch: Richard Harland, Pamela Freeman, Kate Forsyth, Alan Baxter, Terry Dowling. I've already written here about Alan's books and about Pamela's trilogy (if this all happened too long ago, I can talk about them again. Just tell me.

One of the fine things about attending the same event year after year is being able to follow the progress of writers, and Alan and Pamela and Richard have had fascinating career developments in recent years.

Kate's writing has entered a magic zone recently. It just works, on so many levels. She's found a perfect place and is writing from it. I need to put her new books on my shelves with Elizabeth Beresford and Edith Nesbitt and Nicholas Stuart Gray. They have that same sense of magic and mysterious pasts being just a step way from our everyday.

Now I'm going to inflict liveblogging. It's irresistible. Richard Harland is interviewing Van Ikin

Richard has asked Van about SF in Australia in 1970s. There wasn't much, it seems. Van called one reviewer 'the beacon of science fiction.' Jh Baxter 1960s Pacific SF -that was about it. Paul Collins then appeared and did anthologies (I have at least one of these! time to revisit, since I doubt I've read it in the last 20 years).

Van Ikin wrote to Anne Saxton asking where to send SF stories in Australia. She said.”Send them to America,” but she also gave him one single address (Murrays in Sydney). He wrote and rewrote a story until it finally was published: he was paid $21. He didn't know what magazine, so asked a receptionist. He was called into an office, and eventually was given a paper in an envelope, July 1967 issue of Pocket Man, “Mum, I truly didn't know.” Damien Broderick, Albert Vann, A Bertram Chandler all published in that sort of magazine.

Van teaches at the University of Western Australia. Richard asked him “What problems do writers have?” For students in their first 3 years, it's often – translating a tremendous idea into structured actions. Van says need to find one's own way. Stick to who you are and do what you can do. Students' solutions, even if feeble, are the first proper step on the way to a real solution.

He also said that it's ery hard to rewrite entirely from a false draft – you will hear the echoes of the original. Also that students are a bit conservative in modelling new tech because their models are dated ie many people writing from their reading experience rather than from their lives.

And for the whole of the afternoon I was on panels or giving readings. No live blogging. so that's an end of Gillian-the-reporter.