interesting things

The world is full of story-fodder

Standard

I was going to drop this into the latest random link compilation, but it’s too cool to be buried there. Check out this news report on a story from more than fifty years ago in Scotland.

Yes, hundreds of children hunting vampires in a graveyard after dark–a vampire “with iron teeth” no less.

The story ideas that little news piece prompts are undeniable. The two simplest ideas would be to tell it from the POV of one of the children, if only for the chance to write about kids high on adrenaline because they’re doing something forbidden and dangerous. Some other writer might be able to write it from the POV of the vampire as it’s being hunted, frightened by the attention being drawn to it and indignant at being threatened by children.

It’s the POV of the parents that I find most interesting, naturally. A village where every kid has to be home by dark, and no one will talk about the local undead nasty, but what happens when the little ones find out on their own, and decide to be heroes?

I wonder if I can steal this for my next project.

Randomness for 3/19

Standard

1) LOLKIMs

2) WWII, as interpreted by Facebook

3) South Dakota legislators pass bill requiring schools to teach that global warming is partly caused by “astrological” forces.

4) The Twilight Drinking Game.

5) Contact lenses of the future! via SeattleGeekly

6) Obviously fake, but still funny.

7) A picture of Hugo Gernsback sporting the look that kicked off a thousand “parents’ basement” jokes.

Completing the circuit

Standard

FB users, this is an embed. Click through to watch it.

Randomness for 3/17

Standard

1) My son’s latest Lego stop-motion movie. Actually, it’s part one of a longer story, and yeah, I provide voiceover work. (But just a little).

2) Margaret Atwood sings!

3) Did you know that Amazon.com sells cans of uranium ore? Here’s one of the customer reviews: “I purchased this product 4.47 Billion Years ago and when I opened it today, it was half empty.”

4) Teal and Orange – Hollywood, Please Stop the Madness!

5) Rob Liefeld’s Dreams Are One Step Closer To Reality “You know, I really like shooting this machine gun, but I really wish I could be shooting another gun at the same time,”

6) “Die Hard in a tattoo” Someone’s a little crazy for that movie.

7) Dan Savage talks to the young woman at the center of the “Lesbians made us cancel the prom!” scandal. Also, you can find ways to help at the end of the article.

This is damn clever

Standard

Stick with it to at least the midpoint for a nice twist. (Facebook people, this is an embedded video; you can watch it at the blog, if you want.)

Pushing the Envelope in Urban Fantasy

Standard

The book I’m reading right now (without much enthusiasm, I must say–it was published in 2008 and includes a glossary of Yiddish words at the front. Am I such a dumbass that I do no know what tuckus means? Or chutzpah? This book thinks I am) is very safe and uninteresting. The book next in queu just the opposite.

I’ve mentioned that I’m a slow reader–I often don’t get to a new book in time to help promote a new release with a positive review; yes, I’m useless that way. The next book on my tbr list is the first Amanda Feral novel, Happy Hour of the Damned, which author Mark Henry once described as “Undead bitches eat people.”

So… anti-hero! Also humor that pushes people’s buttons, risks offense, dares to be outrageous–Actually, let’s just say, as the subject header reads, “pushes the envelope.”

So I read with interest this writeup of the new book on the B&N forums. Is the book tasteless? Offensive?

The author himself talks about the difficult things he’s done, including working with the mentally ill and “medically fragile” populations, and how so much cynical and dark humor comes from a place of grief and self-protection.

It’s very interesting, especially in a genre like UF, which is becoming more formulaic all the time. What new things can writers try? How can they break through reader expectations to create something new?

I’m damn tempted to toss my current novel aside and jump to the next in line.

Best Day Job for Writers

Standard

Wanted: Couch Potato.

Two cool videos my son found online

Standard

Both, of course, having to do with Legos

Cage matches

Standard

Suvudu has been running “cage matches,” a sort of March Madness for sfnal heroes and villains (check the left sidebar). They’re all in fun, pitting Vlad Taltos against Dumbledore, or Harry Dresden against Conan, and many others in fights to the death. Several authors with characters in the fight have contributed here and there, explaining why their character would win (although I think it’s hilarious that Jim Butcher is all “Conan would kick Harry’s ass!”)

But you know what? I don’t like it.

Maybe it’s ridiculous (okay, no maybes about it) but depictions of Hermione Granger being stabbed to death are distressing. In fact, I find most literary depictions of violence distressing; they only “work” for me because of the context. The context for the cage matches–“Let’s you and him fight to the death for no reason”–makes me want to stamp my foot and shout “No fair!”

Yeah, it’s ridiculous, but this is my gut-level reaction.

It doesn’t help that the “tournament of fighting” bit is one of the most snooze-inducing structures around, and is one of the reasons I gave up on anime.

Weirdly, I don’t have this same reaction to visual portrayals of violence. I’ll laugh like a hyena at The Three Stooges, and I’m as happy to see Batman punch a gangster in the face as any self-respecting comics fan. But in text? Nah.

(BTW, Ray Lilly would probably be seeded just above Lyra Belacqua, but only barely :).)

Randomness for 3/12

Standard

This is my 666th post on my WordPress blog. Continue reading… if you dare!

1) Would you recognize Der Fuehrer?

2) Money as motivation: “It’s certainly true that motivated workers need to feel that they are being paid fairly and adequately. Pink’s thesis, however, is that beyond that threshold, performance bonuses may actually be counterproductive, particularly when the work requires initiative, judgment and creativity.” The article directly addresses Wall St bonuses, but it covers a lot of other interesting ground, too. I have the referenced book on hold for my wife, but maybe I should read it, too.

3) How to make an origami swan.

4) Nathan Bransford’s Choose Your Own E-Book Adventure.

5) A pseudonymous TV writer/producer on Florida’s new morality restrictions on filmmaking in the state. This link will expire within the next two weeks. Update: Link dead.

6) Korean man marries pillow. In all my life, I never thought I would be in a position to type a sentence like that, but this is the internet age, and we must share all manner of human oddity.

7) New book reveals evidence that infamous French hallucination epidemic was actually CIA LSD experiment. In school I did a report on MKUltra, but I never heard of this incident before (not surprising, since so many of the MKUltra files were destroyed.