words

An Out of Control Chief Executive (in a Brave New World)

Standard

I don’t see a lot of movies in the theater lately. My health has been shit and in America that means money has been tight. Very tight. (Please buy my books and post reviews of them, and if you back me on Patreon, thank you thank you thank you)

However, there’s a new MCU entry with a black Captain America, and in defiance of the Worst People on YouTube, I was willing to throw an afternoon-matinee worth of my income into that big pool of box office returns. 

My spoiler-free take on the film:

  • Anthony Mackie should be a movie star (meaning, people see movies mainly because he’s in them
  • Brave New World is as good (and as flawed) as any of the ordinary MCU entries when the series was at peak popularity
  • It ditches the ironic snark of the last few films and thank God for that.
  • When is Sam Wilson going to get a love interest? 
  • Feige really needs to change the way he makes these movies.

The story is fairly straightforward: Thunderbolt Ross has gotten himself elected president, and he’s been trying to make amends for past mistakes both for his legacy as CiC and to make amends with his estranged daughter. He’s pushing hard for an international treaty on the exploitation of a newly discovered mineral, adamantium, inside the body of that dead Celestial from a few movies back.

What he won’t do is go public about his mistakes, even when they’re getting people killed by the dozens and eventually pushing the world to the brink of war. 

It’s up to Sam Wilson to figure out what’s going on and put a stop to it, and that’s a job that’s going to require a lot of action scenes.

If that sounds like the story is weirdly focused on the antagonist’s personal journey, it is. Wilson does have a personal journey of his own. Sort of. In the non-action scenes of the movie, he talks about feeling like he isn’t up to the challenge of being Captain America, and he even expresses his regret at not taking the super soldier serum. 

But because this is a Marvel movie, with different parts shot by different people, and in which a rough compilation of scenes were brought to Kevin Feige so he could whip up a storyline to glue them together in reshoots. 

Which is why, no matter how much Wilson talks about his fear that he could never live up to the standards set by Steve Rogers, that never once plays out in the action sequences (which are pretty terrific, honestly). Wilson talks about the possibility that he might come up short, but it never even comes close to happening.

It’s the biggest flaw this movie has. The second biggest is the on-the-nose dialog, but that’s par for the course with political thrillers. 

Is this the place to talk about President Hulk? Or President Red Hulk, I guess? The Hulk has always been a sort of werewolf for the atomic age, where instead of a fear of the beasts of the wild, it represented a fear of the destructive power of radioactive weapons unleashed by baby-men throwing tantrums. 

If I thought Feige could see the future, I would suspect this was a comment on our current political situation. It isn’t. It can’t be. Ross is a bad person, yeah, but he isn’t “You should drink bleach/ Isn’t my daughter fuckable/ Let’s take over that sovereign nation” level bad. Ross wants a treaty to allow international cooperation. A Trumpian figure would be trying to turn Celestial Island into the 51st state. 

Anyway, good movie. Fun action scenes. Great performances. It would have been a fantastic movie if they’d taken the time to make it a cohesive story.

—-

In other news, after a long reading drought, I’m finally reading something that I’m enjoying. There’s about 50 pages left, but as long as it doesn’t shit the bed during the ending, I’ll happily recommend it here. Details to come, maybe.

—-

Work on the final Twenty Palaces book continues in my every spare moment. I’m not as far along as I’d like to be, but I feel like I’m genuinely getting it right. I even have the ending–mostly–worked out. 

As always, revisions will be extensive and intense but progress is happening. I only wish it could happen faster. 

—-

I had more to say but I think I’m going to stop there so I can get back to the things that really matter. 

The Post I Actually Owed You Guys

Standard

Still hard at work on the last Twenty Palaces novel. Here’s a bit of reading I’ve been doing to help me get the right and most realistic tone for this last book. 

The book Scatter, Adapt and Remember by Annalee Newitz

I’m embarrassed to say that I was lying in bed last night a few nights back thinking about a scene I’ve been struggling with, and I suddenly came up with a workable solution. Did I get up right away and jot a note to myself for the morning? I did not. It was chilly and I was about to fall asleep. Plus, I literally thought to myself that this idea was too obvious and good to forget. 

I forgot it anyway. 

I can create it again but it’s a pain in the ass. I just need the space and time to think those thoughts all over again.  

Sorry for missing an August update. I’d say “I’ve been busy” but we’re all busy all the time and I still managed to find time to watch Secret Royal Inspector & Joy, so I have to come clean to you guys and admit that I didn’t have anything interesting to say.

That said: 

My wife and I usually close out the day by collapsing, in pain and exhaustion, in front of the tv for shows or a movie. Back when we had Netflix’s dvd service, it was the rule that any disc they sent got watched that evening and went back out in the morning mail. With that service gone, we’ve had to institute Film Friday. 

But we sort of fell behind on new and old releases, so I made a list and we spent a few evenings crossing off films. 

Here are some mini-reviews of the films we (or sometimes just me) watched, offered in the nearly random order they were added to my list:

I Saw The TV Glow: A beautiful, sad movie about being trapped in a hellish life and being afraid to leave—to be too afraid even to look inside yourself and recognize who you truly are. Also, about finding personal meaning in pop culture. Yeah, the movie flies in the face of traditional expectations, but I loved it and I’ll be looking into that soundtrack. 

La Chimera: This apparently got a standing ovation at Cannes but I’m mystified why. I’d believe the description of the film on Hulu is a copy and paste mistake except the characters’ somewhat unusual names are correct. Premise: an Englishman in Italy uses his dowsing ability to help a bunch of tomb raiders steal cultural artifacts and sell them on the black market. Also, he’s a jerk to everyone, including the beautiful woman who inexplicably finds him fascinating. Everything felt predictable except for the very last moments. Last thing: there are very few movie endings that I find morally objectionable, but this movie proudly sports one of them. 

Marmalade: Fun, mildly twisty cops and robbers story. Joe Keery is obviously having a good time and is charming as hell, but I have no idea why someone with Aldis Hodge’s charisma keeps getting cast as stern hardasses. Light and relaxing.

Kalki 2898 AD: Huge blockbuster out of India with lots of pretty cgi and the obligatory absurd action scenes. Fun to look at and laugh. Corridor Crew should do a segment on the eight-foot-tall old man who dishes out kung fu to the bad guys. Too long and it ends on a cliffhanger, but mostly inoffensive fun.

Dracula (1979): Underrated version of the classic story. I personally thing Frank Langella still holds the crown of “sexiest Dracula ever” but only because Louis Jordan was hobbled by 1970s TV budget production style. Olivier is terrific, as always, and was even willing to slide down a pile of grave dirt even as an actor in his seventies. The version we saw on Peacock was weirdly colorless compared to the trailers. I thought John Badham was being artsy but maybe it was just a bad, desaturated print.

The Imaginary: Solid, enjoyable anime about imaginary friends. The story, characters, plot twists, etc were all well done, but the real appeal of this movie is how beautiful it looks. 

Rebel Ridge: Seeing a lot of responses to this action thriller that complain about the action. Personally, I loved the idea of one black man (as Jamelle Bouie called him: “Black Reacher”) pitted against a group of corrupt cops. The police have to be careful to maintain the fiction that they have cleaned up their corrupt practices after a legal settlement nearly bankrupts the town, but they have a power and freedom to act that a lone civilian, who would go to prison forever if he killed or seriously injured one of these murderous officers, does not. Does it strain belief? Sure, but it’s rare to find a Reacher-style story that doesn’t. 

Mission Cross: Korean comedy action movie about a decorated female homicide detective and her mild-mannered house-husband who used to be a James Bond-level secret agent. Funny fluff with some solid action. 

Officer Black Belt: Speaking of fluff with solid action, there’s this. Winning young heroic lead with a support system of likable pals combines with well-designed fight scenes to make this predictable genre film an enjoyable 90-ish minutes

The Fall Guy: The whole world failed this movie. It’s funny, romantic, and has great stunt set pieces. This movie elevates “having fun” into a religious experience. Just a goddam delight. 

The Boy and the Heron: I don’t really need to recommend a Miyazaki movie, do I? It’s beautiful and heartfelt, and I’m not sure I understand the stuff about the blocks at the end, as though rebuilding and maintaining the world was as easy as stacking blocks as long as your heart is pure, but I don’t need everything to be clearly explained to appreciate this.

Loop Track: In a conversation on Bluesky I said that modern audiences are much more receptive to a slow burn if the movie is modern. In an older movie, a slow burn start just means a film is a creaky entertainment meant for our grandparents. Well, this is a slow burn horror movie from New Zealand about a hiker on a three-day loop track through the wilderness while he undergoes a long, slow nervous breakdown. All he wants is to fall apart in private, but he happens to fall in with others and can’t shake them. And, with all this going on, he begins to suspect that someone (something?) is stalking them. Liked it very much, especially the very end. 

The Dude in Me: There are an awful lot of Korean movies and shows about body-swapping, but this one (as far as I can tell) set off a series of copycats. In this, a cocky, swaggering gangster gets stuffed into the body of an introverted, bullied high school student. There’s some dumb bullshit about fatness, but aside from that I laughed aloud throughout, even at the parts that didn’t make any damn sense. If you can brush off retrograde nonsense about weight, this film is damn funny. 

Hundreds of Beavers: A genuinely hilarious comedy with almost no dialog in it. Made on a modest (but not micro-) budget by funny, intelligent people, willing to do whatever to make you laugh. Best enjoyed if you know as little as possible when you start watching, so don’t even check out the trailer first. Just watch.

Still on the list but not crossed off: Exhuma, Burning, Jules, Gone Girl, Cocaine Bear, Tenebre, Fitzcarraldo, Molli and Max in the Future and several more. 

Progress on Twenty One Palaces is ongoing, although I’ve stumbled on the problematic scene I mentioned above and need to rethink the solution. 

Breaking Ground on Twenty-One Palaces

Standard

TL:DR: On Saturday the 13th, a little more than a week ago, I created a new file in Scrivener called Twenty-One Palaces. Work on the last book in the Twenty Palaces series is ongoing.

Longer version: Earlier this month, I was struggling through my newest effort, a straight horror novel partly inspired by the work of Stephen King, and I hit a sequence in the novel that came alive for me as I wrote it. 

It was a scary scene with a lot of personal consequences and conflicts for the POV character. It had a lot of juice, if you don’t mind me using that phrase. It felt good to be writing it, in fact. 

Then the scene was finished and I moved on to other parts of the story. Writing went back to being a slog. 

It was then that I realized that the whole fucking book was supposed to feel that way. It was supposed to give me goosebumps while I was writing it, as my previous books did. 

Which meant I had to admit that this most recent book didn’t work. I closed the file and tried to figure out what to do. Toss it and start the story over from scratch again? Jump into yet another new book that has been tickling at the back of my mind? Return to a previous half-completed manuscript and get that ready to send out? 

I have a few of those. There’s a book that was meant to be a mix of cosmic horror and conspiracy thriller, except on a very small scale. (Does it sound weird to talk about small scale cosmic horror? To talk about small scale conspiracy thriller? Yes. Yes, it does.) There’s also a straight mystery novel that didn’t quite come together the way I would have liked. And, going way back before I even thought about starting The Great Way trilogy, there was a fantasy/police procedural set in a Rome-like city where humans are second-class citizens under the rule of a coalition of non-human beings. 

None of those choices were right. The mystery novel felt alive in the way I need a book to feel alive, but not in the first few chapters. The others would need even more work.

As for starting a third brand new book, that seemed like a terrible idea. It would mean starting from scratch and putting the often-promised finale for Ray and Annalise off even longer. 

The most sensible choice was to put everything aside and finish the 20P books before I died. Only problem: I had no idea how to end the series. I knew the enemy Ray and Annalise would have to contend with. I knew the setting. But I had no idea how I was going to defeat that enemy in that setting. 

On the thirteenth, I sat down to try to work out the details. Today, on the 22nd of July, I feel confident enough in the progress of this rough outline that I can announce it. 

The final book in the Twenty Palaces series is underway. 

Thank you all for your patience. 

That includes anyone who is expecting an email from me or whatever. I’m behind on everything. Sorry. 

An Update About Disappointing Things, and Things That Did Not Disappoint

Standard

Let’s talk about disappointment

First of all, the book I’m reading now is a bit of a disappointment. I’m not going to name it, but it’s a multi-author thing designed to showcase their talents, and I have been mostly bored so far. 

My son told me to quit it, which led to an uncharacteristically passionate tirade against “Sevens”. 

“No sevens!” he yelled. “Sevens are the worst! I am anti-seven!” 

By his reasoning, if a book, movie, game, whatever is an eight, nine, or a ten out of ten in quality and enjoyment, great! Keep going! If it’s a three or four out of ten, it’s easy to just put it aside. 

But a seven is something you mostly enjoy, then completely forget about. Pleasurable, but not pleasurable enough to be worth your time.

As a philosophy that seems pretty sound, except it’s coming from a guy who eats a whole lot of frozen pizzas. Anyway, it appears that having multiple authors is a lure that will keep me going, even though the book isn’t as promising as it seemed at first.

Second, one of the problems I mentioned in previous posts is that I’ve been struggling with a minor, nagging health issue that has an outsized effect on my life. 

Anyway, a few months ago I starting taking these injections of a drug that was supposed to put a stop to all that trouble. The allergist told me his wife had the same problem as I did but the injections cleared up her problem with no fuss. If I could get insurance approval, I could have the same benefits. I’d be able to exercise again and maybe take simple manual labor jobs. 

Well, I’m getting my third injection next week, and so far I’m not seeing much effect. Yeah, it should fade after each shot and each shot should increase the effect, but I’m wondering if the allergist is expecting a placebo effect to kick in here. 

There’s a certain manner doctors adopt when they try to placebo away a minor ailment along with an insistence on the efficacy of a particular drug. I feel wary when a doctor is telling me a drug is so powerful that we need to all sorts of precautions in place.

Sadly placebos have never really had a strong effect on me. If think if they did, I’d still love Star Wars.

Third, there’s New Fantasy Novel. 

Last week was the fifth anniversary of the date this (unnamed) book was sent to an initial round of publishers. Five years and one pandemic later, there are only two left who have it under consideration. 

If these last two pass, I’ll be releasing it myself as usual, and as usual paying Patreon supporters get the ebook free. 

Still, disappointing to get all those passes. 

Fourth, I mentioned before that I’ve been on a job hunt. It ain’t going all that well, in part because of the health stuff I mentioned above. In part because I’m not really good at much.

Fifth, we come to a topic that is not disappointing. There’s a show on Hulu/Disney Plus that I really loved called MOVING. It’s about two generations of ordinary citizens with superpowers and the way their governments try to exploit them. It has great reviews, and the negative ones all complain that it starts too slowly.

I’d disagree. I say it starts small. The show is a collection of small stories, starting with one kid whose power is more of a curse, then moving to this supporting character, then to that one. Sometimes it’s a love story. Sometimes it’s espionage. Sometimes it’s a wild, out of control murder spree. Often, it’s people fleeing from place to place, trying to live small enough lives that they can be incognito. Great stuff. 

Sixth, there’s the writing, which is also going well. I know I have to revamp the beginning again, but this time I pushed past all that and am working on the escalating tension part of the story. 

Even better, I feel like I’ve captured the feeling inside it. 

It’s still the most complex book I’ve ever tackled—even more complex than One Man. Revisions are going to be fun (in the “challenging” sense) but it feels fantastic to have momentum.

Finally, a question if you’ve bothered to read this far. 

Do you mind these updates with several topics all combined? 

John Scalzi does them one at a time, but I’m afraid if I did that it’d give away how many tv/movie recommendations I’d want to give. 

Also, I’m kind of dull. I don’t have pictures of beautiful places I visit or insights from fascinating people I meet. I don’t claim any expertise on political topics. We have no pets. 

Single topic posts might be more reader-friendly, but they might also be booooooring. Which would return us to disappointment again. 

Let me know in the comments on Patreon, or @ me on blusky, where I’m @byharryconnolly as per usual, if you think these should be shorter and more numerous. 

Stay safe. 

When A Show Is Renewed But The Storyline You Care About Most is Cancelled

Standard

Many—not all but many—movies have two genres. The first tells the story of the main plot line: the heist, the hunt for the spy, the fight to save the farm, the escape from the haunted house. Those are all the high-stress moments of the story, building tension to the finale. When the marketers cut a trailer, this is the genre they focus on.

The second genre tells a story in the down moments of the plot, when the tension of the main plot is allowed to ease and reset so it can be ramped up again. Traditionally, these would be romantic plots, but sometimes it’s a coming of age story.

TV does something similar. For example, Elementary was a mystery show that had, for its second, much smaller secondary plot, a little drama that played out within the main cast. Most focused on the growing friendship between Sherlock and Joan, but some were about Joan’s family, or Sherlock’s, or their circle of friends.

And since it’s an episodic show, the main-plot mysteries were one and done but the little dramas stacked one on top of the other, building over the long term to something wonderful.

Honestly, in TV it’s those tiny dramas, building one upon the other, that keep me coming back episode after episode. The Mystery of the Week keeps me entertained. The slowly changing relationships between the main characters makes me binge a whole season to Find Out What Happened.

Another example: for years, I was faithfully picking up Sue Grafton’s alphabet novels, one after another, because a) the private eye plots for each book were solid as hell, and b), the main character, Kinsey Milhone, discovered that she had a huge extended family that she knew nothing about, and the subplots of each book showed her inching closer to the family she never knew she had and wasn’t sure she wanted.

I really wanted to know what happened between Kinsey and her estranged family. I could find a solid mystery in any number of books, but the family drama is what kept me coming back.

Then the subplot suddenly shifted into a romantic plot featuring a good-looking homicide detective who used to be a hairdresser(!) which meant he could fix Kinsey’s famously terrible self-inflicted haircuts. I was so annoyed that I dropped the series immediately. I’d been coming back for the reconciliation with her family. The sexy hairdresser/homicide detective left me clammy.

One of the reasons I never watched House was that, while the main plots were interesting enough, I didn’t like watching the character dramas play out. It just felt so squicky. In fact, there are a lot of shows that I ditch after a few seasons because I feel absolutely done with the kind of subplot dramas the show puts its characters through.

Anyway, the reason all this has bubbled to the surface is the British show Miss Scarlet and the Duke. Brief description: Eliza Scarlet is a Victorian-era daughter of a police inspector and private investigator who is obsessed with being a private investigator herself, and of course she’s brilliant. “The Duke” is the nickname of a Chief Inspector of Scotland Yard, William Wellington. They’re childhood friends who love each other. The dynamic on the show is that he helps support her struggling business while she solves his most difficult cases.

Did I mention that they love each other? In season one they’re friends trying to accept their mutual attraction. Season two has them in a romantic relationship while Eliza’s dedication to her work keeps causing problems for William. Season three has them trying to be friends post-breakup, even though William begins dating Eliza’s childhood bully.

Then season four hit the library on disc and I was 100 percent ready for it. Three ended with the (now more adult and sensible bully) dumping William because he can’t admit that he’s still in love with Eliza. So four ought to be the season where they try again and actually make it work, right?

Well, no. Instead, William takes a posting in New York City. He tells Eliza that he loves her but that they need time apart.

And the next thing I discover is that season five will be called simply “Miss Scarlet” because Stuart Martin, the actor who played “the Duke”, is leaving the show.

Which I get. It can’t be fun to be the cop who scolds the main character for all the cool and fun ways they break the rules. Taraji P. Henson pulled the ripcord on Person of Interest because her role had changed and she’d become bored. I’m sure Martin believes there are better ways to spend the sexy leading man years of his life.

But I’m not sure I’m interested in a show without that subplot. The structure of each episode was such that each multi-season-long subplot was woven tightly into the execution of the mystery of the week. What, exactly, is supposed to fit into that space?

I have no idea, but it’s like imagining a Twenty Palace novel without Annalise. It just doesn’t make sense to me.

I mean, I’ll give season five a try, but I have to admit that I’m feeling a little cheated. If he’s leaving the show, I’m glad they didn’t kill off the character, because that would have sucked. I’m still disappointed in the unresolved ending of this four-year storyline, though.

(I should write shorter posts)

The new book, health, and a few other updates

Standard

It’s past time that I wrote an update about… Well, about everything. I’ve really only been waiting for my situation to be somewhat changed. It’s hard to motivate myself to pop up online and say Everything is good and bad in the same way as it has been for months. Here are some fun TV shows I watched recently. I hate to be dull.

First things first: Every spring, a number of SPFBO winners and finalists go on sale at 99 cents. This year, from April 13-16, there will be more than a hundred books—all having received positive reviews from the reviewers picking the contest winners—available at fire sale prices on Amazon. 

I’m posting this a day early, but most of these books should probably already be on sale right now. 

SPFBO Finalist Sale 2024

If you’re a fantasy reader, check it out. There are a lot of treats to be had (and a few of them are mine).

Progress on my new horror novel is ongoing. In fact, things have picked up a bit and I’m making better progress. In part that’s because some (but not all by any means) of the stressors in my life are letting up (more on that later) and some because I stopped throwing out the beginnings of the book and are just letting the story happen. 

I mean, I’m still going to have to throw out the beginning of this book and redo it, hopefully with ten thousand fewer words, but it’s nice to keep on keeping on. 

Recently, I read Catriona Ward’s Little Eve and reread Stephen King’s ‘Salem’s Lot. Both are amazing in very different ways. King’s novel feels like it’s all right there on the page. Everything is laid out for you and the story grabs hold of you and never stops pulling. I’ve said this before, but it reads like a thriller, which sounds like it should be a natural match for the horror genre, but my long history of discarded mass market paperbacks suggests that it’s a trick that’s actually hard to pull off. 

Ward’s novel is wonderful in a different way. It feels deeper and more upsetting, and also that more is being implied than I’m seeing. I may need to read it again to pick up all the clues to the mysteries at the center of it. Recommended if you like psychological gothic historical horror.

And I realize that I mentioned that I was in the middle of ‘Salem’s Lot two months ago when I posted my last update, so I’m publicly confessing to my ongoing reading slump. It started during the pandemic, and I’m feeling like the Ward novel is helping me break it. 

Then again, my son asked me to let him know when I finished my latest book because he wants me to try out a video game he likes. I can’t remember the name of it except that it has “Disco” in the title. Personally, my preference for video games leans toward monkeys throwing darts at balloons (in easy mode) but we’ll see. I do have Sundial and the most recent Robert Crais thriller on the shelf behind me, along with a few other options, just in case. 

A few weeks back, a number of people were pushing Netflix’s Blue Eye Samurai, and I bounced off it in my first attempt. It starts in the most boring way possible, with Our Mysterious Badass showing up in a restaurant and is then forced to deal with a violent narcissist and blah blah blah. It’s supposed to make us like the main character, but it feels like the usual bullshit. 

Still, the praise was steep enough that I sat down to try again with my wife. She loved the animation. I’ve said before that she really wants to see beautiful imagery in the shows she watches, and BES is honestly a step above. The story is goes to interesting places, too. Also recommended. (Trailer)

Finally, in a personal note, twelve years ago I started getting full body hives every time I did anything that raised my body temp. Cooking a meal, a hot shower, a tense conversation with my wife. Anything could trigger it. Over the counter allergy meds helped but not all the way. It became impossible to exercise or to even consider a job that was physical in any way. I went online to look into it and saw that there was no cure. The only relief I could hope for was that it might go away on its own, which could happen in 3-30 years(!)

As a result, I became more sedentary and more unhealthy over that time. 

Last fall, my new doctor arranged for me to see a specialist. At that visit, the specialist told me that there was an effective new treatment. His wife had the same issue that I do, and since starting this medication, her quality of life has completely turned around. 

He also told me that these reactions are an immune system problem and were not caused by environmental exposure like I’d thought. It feels weird that I find relief in that, but I do. 

Anyway, I need to get the first few doses of this injectable medication at the doctor’s office and, with luck, I will soon be active again. It’s been a lot of years of wearing long sleeves to hide the awful red blotches, or to sit in a cafe with my eyes closed waiting for the itches to subside. Things really could be looking up. 

It’s hard to express how excited I am about it. 

That’s all. I’ll try not to take so long for my next update. Thanks for reading. 

Writing Update, Personal Update, Pop Culture Update

Standard

It’s been too long since I dropped an update and talked about some random news, so let’s see if I can squeeze some time in for that right now.

Progress on the new novel has been glacial. I know that’s not what you wanted to hear, but I’m tackling a big story with a lot of POV characters, so I’m doing a lot of research and rewriting.

Also, I haven’t been 100% well. I don’t want to get into details here, but my daily wordcount goals are somewhat reduced. I’m still writing, but it’s a struggle and I’m getting pretty frustrated with myself. Not only does it suck for you, the reader, that it’s taking too long to get this next book solved and finished, it sucks for me. In a huge way.

It’s hard to overstate how unhappy I am about this, actually.

But this is the state of things at the moment and there’s no choice but to persevere. On the plus side, I have a new doctor who recognizes that I am more than just my BMI, so there’s hope in that.

To be clear, I’m not talking about Twenty One Palaces. This is the book I’m writing before that book which doesn’t have a title yet.

What else?

I’m pretty much walked away from social media. I unfriended everyone on Facebook and stopped looking at it years ago, although I still post whenever I have a new blog post to announce. I check notifications there every two or three months, so please don’t try to contact me there. I probably won’t see messages or comments for weeks, at minimum.

Also, they’ve changed the format so much that I’m not sure how to navigate it anymore. Also, there doesn’t seem to be any reason for me to learn.

I left Twitter, too, although I still occasionally check the Stranger Things account for news about the show. But now that the final season is in production, I’ve pretty much stopped that, too.

BlueSky is the only space where I hang out online nowadays. I’m byharryconnolly over there, if you’re curious. My follows over there make the site pretty political, which is fine and all but before Twitter became a collapsed outhouse, it was a great place to talk about pop culture and pop culture art. That’s harder to find on BlueSky. Not that it matters much, since I’m not there very much.

Speaking of pop culture art, here’s a quick rundown of random stuff:

I’m rereading Salem’s Lot. It’s just as fun as I remember and has the pacing of an avalanche. There are just a few snowballs at the start but the end is overwhelming.

Next up for me are a pair of novels by Catriona Ward. I heard good things and I’m hoping she can help me overcome my ongoing reading slump.

Musically, I’ve been listening to a bunch of The Breeders and Belly. Yeah, it’s old music. See Salem’s Lot reference above. I’ve always been like this. I could never take part in Hugo voting or whatever because I never read books as they’re released. The songs are still great, though, esp the most recent Breeders album.

In movies/tv, The Holdovers was moving but not lovely, which is a solid recommendation from me. However my wife likes a little eye candy in her films. Landscapes. Architectures. Gardens. That sort of thing. She she admired it but wished for more.

We definitely got our fair share of lovely images in the fifth season of Fargo, and the story was fantastic. I love it when stories that don’t seem much like SF/F throw a few sfnal tropes in there.

I enjoyed Echo quite a bit, in large part because I like street-level heroes. I’m not sure how I felt about the ending, though.

Yes, this is a story about a woman who’s disconnected from her community and her culture, so the way she levels up at the end made thematic sense. Also, Maya’s relationship with Wilson Fisk was complex, ominous and poignant, too. Still, it’s a show about a hero that kicks ass but the final confrontation had more than a bit of woowoo. It felt weak. Intellectually, I appreciated it. Viscerally, I felt vaguely disappointed.

And The Marvels just landed on Disney+. I’d seen it in the theaters and watched it with my wife Wednesday night. Honestly, I have no idea what people were complaining about. It was breezy fun with lots of color and light-hearted humor.

Also, while it’s a sequel to the movie Captain Marvel (and it helps to have seen that film) having seen the other parts of the MCU that it pulled story elements from seemed entirely optional to me. Everything that needed explaining was explained in The Marvels itself.

That’s all. I’ll try not to be absent for so long in the future, and when I come back, I hope to have better news.

NEW TTRPG STUFF FROM ME (ALL FOR A GOOD CAUSE)

Standard

Quick one this time:

To support charity, I wrote a little something for a role playing game, which is going to be being printed in a zine (called “Killing for a Cause”) currently seeking pledges on Indiegogo. 

https://www.indiegogo.com/projects/killing-for-a-cause-issue-1-bloodsuckers

The charity in question is the Against Malaria Foundation, which has been getting a big thumbs up from GiveWell for more than a decade. Check out the Indiegogo FAQ. If the goal seems a little high, that’s the cost for AMF to save a single life. 

And all the payments received—after Indiegogo and payment processors take their cuts—goes to the charity. 

Okay. That’s the charity part clarified. What about the zine itself?

The first issue of “Killing for a Cause” is called Bloodsuckers. Guess what it’s about.

The zine comes from Thomas Eliot, a guy I heard about because I backed his Fear of the Unknown Kickstarter some time back. FotU is a zero-prep horror game where you grab (or create) a themebook to play the subgenre you want to run. Apocalypse Mall? Crazed Killer Crashes A Party? Well-Meaning Scientist Creates Something Terrible? Pick a one and start your session by fleshing out the setting as a group. 

There are even rules for running noir. 

Anyway, when the game arrived in my inbox, it came with an invitation to contribute to the zine. I decided to try creating a themebook about ordinary people stuck inside the home of Extremely Terrible People, a plot that covers both Jonathan Harker (to squeak in under the theme), the fun kids from the film Villains, and of course the stranded motorists of The Old Dark House (1930’s version).

It’s not long, literally just a few pages, but themebooks are supposed to be short. They’re only a foundation. Start with a few questions re: the setting, a move to use when violating the dubious hospitality of the people you’re staying with, and a little more. It’s also easily adaptable for use in other games. 

Lots of other contributions, too. Micro-rpgs, art, content for D&D5e, and more. I haven’t seen the finished zine myself, but I’m betting it’s cool stuff.

If you’re a tabletop gamer, a lover of vampires, a hater of potentially fatal illnesses, or some mix of the three, please consider dropping a pledge. 

In personal news, I’m at work on a new novel that’s unlike anything I’ve done before. It’s going a bit slowly, though, as I’m also looking for a new day job. Wish me luck. 

A few years ago I wrote a bank robbery scene in passive voice

Standard

A few years ago I wrote a bank robbery scene in passive voice and the result was pretty funny. The robbers themselves completely vanished from the story–only the effects of their actions remained and honestly, I was laughing by the time I got to the end of the first and only paragraph.

I posted it online because I had gotten caught up in a (deeply stupid) argument about the subject. What exactly is passive voice, and is it always terrible?

To answer the second question first, no, of course it’s not always terrible. There are times when passive voice is exactly what a sentence needs. The whole point of studying writing as an art form is to recognize that words and sentence structures are tools that we can put to use. So, there’s nothing inherently bad about passive voice. It just has to be used correctly.

As for what passive voice is, the question gives me flashbacks to the person who argued “Blood pooled on the floor” was in passive voice because blood is an inanimate object and how could it therefore be doing the action? The active force was gravity, which might have been absent from the sentence but was the active force causing the blood to pool. Therefore: passive.

Which… sure. But we’re talking about literary structures here, and that argument misses the point.

Another sentence that’s not passive? “He was tall.”

Which brings me to Prosecraft, (link deliberately excluded) a service offered by a company using an AI called Shaxpir (a joke name that I didn’t get until I said it aloud.) Supposedly, you submit your work of fiction to them and they use Shaxpir to run a linguistic sentiment analysis to compare it with other previously published works in their database.

There’s one work by me in there. The Twisted Path.

Some authors are contacting the guy behind it all with angry demands to pull their works from his site as though this was another free pirate library. I’m not sure it is, though. If he’s bought these works legally, then run them through his dumb (more on that later) algorithm to analyze and compare them, I’m not sure that’s a copyright violation. If he’d been doing the same analysis and comparison with a notebook and sharp pencil, I doubt anyone would complain.

Others are unhappy by the idea that he’s using their works to “train” his AI, Shaxpir. But when I look at the site, Shaxpir seems to be another a word processor with some publishing and analytical bullshit thrown in. It doesn’t appear to be one of those enter a prompt and the AI will vomit a novel manuscript for you places. It looks a bit like Scrivener.

Maybe I’m wrong, but I’m not going to look any deeper into it, considering the quality of the analysis it does.

Judging by the Prosecraft page about my own work, I see problems with the service. First, listing adverbs–broken out into adverbs with an -ly at the end and those without–as a percentage of the total word count, then ranking the book in a “percentile” with other books in the database tells you nothing about the quality of the book. Adverbs are not a metric for quality. They’re a tool, and the only measure that really matters is whether the tool is used correctly.

Second, the service breaks down the text into “vivid” and “passive” words, then using the aforementioned sentiment analysis determines where your book is more of one of those things than the other. There’s even a little color coding for the text: the words the system codes as vivid are red, and the deeper the color the more vivid they’re supposed to be. Passive is the same but blue.

And state of being verbs are all rendered in the most intense blue.

Maybe the creator of prosecraft was a little careless with the way he labeled things. Maybe he liked the word vivid because he thought Vivid books are good books, and so he wanted to put something with a negative connotation at the other end of that scale. Therefore: passive. Passive is bad, right?

Except, in his blog post on the software, he posts an analysis of some text from one of his favorite authors, says it rates in the 99th percentile for Passive, then talks about how much he likes the guy’s writing, esp his use of “passive-voice constructions.”

No surprise then that, out of all that blue text indicating passive voice, only one of those sentences is actually in passive voice. The rest just use state-of-being verbs, which are not themselves passive voice, although there’s an argument to be made that they are not particularly vivid.

But you know what state of being verbs are? They’re really easy to identify.

So it’s a mess, really. The Passive label is being stuck on words/sequences that are not in the passive voice, and passive is used as a binary opposite to the Vivid label, which it absolutely is not.

If the books are being shared like a library, that’s bad and it shouldn’t happen. If they’re being entered into an AI so the algorithm can pull them apart and regurgitate them as works of fiction, that’s also bad and shouldn’t happen.

But as I see it, the main problem is that the service Prosecraft offers is a mess and is basically useless.

Edit: He took the website down. I knew I should have just been lazy and ignored all this. Now I’ve blogged about nothing.

Audiobook for The Flood Circle available for pre-order, plus a very happy surprise

Standard

On Tuesday, June 20th, the audiobook for The Flood Circle will be available. This is the Amazon/Audible link. Links to other vendors are already in the main post for this book.

If you want to pre-order it, you can do that now.

In other, unrelated news, the next issue of The Magazine of Fantasy and Science Fiction will have  a review of A Key, an Egg, an Unfortunate Remark, which I (self-)published more than eight years ago. Even more surprising is that it’s a positive review, from multi-award winning author Charles de Lint!

I have said a lot about this book over the years, but for once I’m going to let common sense take hold and shut the hell up. I’m extremely pleased to see this review and I refuse to bad mouth myself for a joke that no one will laugh at.

Please check out the review when the next issue drops, on June 27th, and the rest of the issue, too.