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Writing the last 20P along with birthday wisdom

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June Blog Post

For once I’m going to start with news about the book I’m working on, then move on to other topics that maybe no one cares about. 

I typically write the Twenty Palaces books with short chapters, but for my own convenience, I’ll separate them into sections, and each section will have a semi-cryptic little title such as “Seizing Treasures” or “An Uneven Apocalypse”. Basically, it creates manageable sections for searches, revisions, whatever. 

Well, last week I created a section called “The Ending.”

Felt weird, guys. 

Writing the Twenty Palaces novels has always been difficult, but this last one is legitimately kicking my ass. I’ve already thrown out a few opening sections, and now I’m trying to wrap up the story in a satisfying way. It’s not simply more challenging than previous books in the series, it’s more intimidating. 

I’m at the point that I think I might have to set this draft aside once it’s finished and let it marinate for a few months before I start work on it again. Maybe, at the end of that time, I’ll have thought up a decent title, too. 

During that delay, I’ll do one more revision on the last pure fantasy novel I’ll ever write, then I can return to this current book, then I can write something new to hand to my agent. I have a novel idea waiting in the shadows, impatiently tapping its foot waiting for me to get to it. 

Moving on: tomorrow, the day after I send this out, will be July 1st. I’ve said many times in this space that July 1st is not my birthday, but it is the day I celebrate my birthday. And this past birthday was my sixtieth.

I think, having reached sixty years of age, I’m finally able to admit that I’ve failed at achieving the lifelong dream I had for my writing. 

I’m grateful for the successes I have had, and also for the readers who are still interested in my work. 

Honestly, I feel very lucky.

But my books doesn’t excite enough people to build the large group of readers I’d hoped for when I was younger, and no matter how hard I try, I’m not as prolific as I’d like to be. 

Which means I’m just me, a guy who revises and revises, then thinks again and revises again, until I finally release something I’m not entirely happy with. I’ll keep writing, of course, for however many more years my body gives me, but I’m giving up on hope. Hope is poison.

In other news, I recently picked up a book by a new-to-me author that was highly recommended, who gave a smart and charming interview on a podcast I enjoy, and the book has a genre mix that I find genuinely exciting. 

Then I opened it up to the first page and read a scene featuring Our Hero having a breakfast meeting with a fat person who is eating fatly. 

I understand that spectacle is an ordinary part of storytelling, but a fat person eating bacon is not spectacle, and I’m not looking for a book that expects me to feel revulsion, contempt, and pity for a person who is like me. It’s cheap, thoughtless contempt. 

I’m still reading it, though. It’s got good stuff in it. 

And finally, I’m watching Ironheart and it’s genuinely weird. It has great characters and a solid cast. The story is engaging, the lead is appropriately troubled, and everything feels fresh.

But not the superhero tech. All the superheroing stuff that used to be the real highlight of these shows now just feels samey. It’s the idea of spectacle again, I guess. The story is great but the superpower thrills are just not there. 

Which is not to say that I’ve become immune to or exhausted by the inherent fun of superpowers. A few weeks back, I watched Kraven (because I hate myself, apparently) and the one and only thing it had going for it was the fluid superhuman strength and agility of the main character. That one element was beautiful to watch, like an incredible dancer or martial artist. 

So the appeal remains, but Ironheart doesn’t know how to exploit it.

And that’s it. I’m going to go back to work on the book. I hope everyone is doing well.

Progress on Twenty-One Palaces, Hands-Off, and Other Stuff

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It’s Saturday morning as I write this and I’m watching English soccer on broadcast TV–pretty much the only appointment TV I bother with any more–and thinking about the writing I did on Twenty-One Palaces yesterday.

I’m pretty sure that I described the final predator I’ll ever have to create for the Twenty Palaces novels. 

At this point in the series, it had become a bit of a fraught process. What could I do that I hadn’t done before? I’d done various animal-shapes. I’d done metal. I’d done crystal. I’d done pseudo-angels. I’d done wet sludge. I’d done lightning. I’d done rocks. The drapes were basically amorphous blobs. The cousins were brain worms (more relevant now than when I first wrote them 15+ years ago). 

And so on. The self-inflicted pressure to make each new creature as different as possible from what came before is not just professional pride or creative vanity. Repeating elements in creature design implies relationships between those creatures. Maybe people will assume one is the larval form of the other. Maybe that they evolved from a common ancestor. 

I didn’t want that. I wanted them unique and inexplicable. 

But it’s done. I wish I could say that this final design is the absolute best of them, but I don’t think I’ll live long enough to top the sapphire dog. 

That doesn’t imply I’m almost done writing this draft, though. I’m only now turning toward the climax, and it’s been a real struggle to figure out. Usually, by this point, I know how the story ends and can sprint through it. Not the case right now, unfortunately. The Twenty Palaces books have always been difficult for me, the guy who struggles with literally everything he writes, but this one has been the hardest.

Still: progress. 

I’m also thinking that I should change the title of the book. The story is not going in the same direction as it was when I picked that title so many years ago. We’ll see.

In other news, I went to the big Hands Off protest held here in Seattle (and around the country). The event was scheduled for three hours but I lasted almost two. Sadly, the pain in my legs–especially in the ankle I broke at 17 and never got treatment for–didn’t ease until eight days later. As much as I would like to be one of those people who march and chant, that’s not going to work out. 

It’s been a while since my last post so I haven’t had a chance to recommend new things. My wife and I both enjoyed the heck out of The Residence, which is a rare entry in the recent surge of whodunnits that actually cares about the mystery and the characters both. 

We also finally got around to a few Korean shows that have been ripening in the Netflix queue. Man to Man was a mix of romcom and action spy (on a Korean TV budget). I enjoyed it quite a lot, but I was surprised my wife did, too. She’s usually not a fan of romcoms. 

We also watched My Name, which is an engrossing gangster drama with a lot of action scenes. My wife was happy to see the woman from Gyeongseong Creature again, but thought the fights were a little too bloody. We loved it otherwise, though. 

I’ll stop here so I can get a little more writing done. In the future, I’ll try to keep these updates coming monthly. 

Take care. Speak out. Thank you for supporting my Patreon. 

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

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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. 

Learning to Love Horror Movies and some Patreon Annoyance.

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Two notes:

First of all, starting November, no one will be able to sign up for my Patreon through the Patreon app on Apple. The reasons are semi-complex and not all that interesting, but mainly don’t like that Apple insists on extracting 30% from every monthly donation (edited to add: my understanding is that this only affects new signups)

Folks who want to support my Patreon will have to sign up via desktop, laptop, Android device, or whatever alternative they can find. I’m sure this will cost me money, but it’s annoying to have another huge corporation sticking their fingers into my pockets and yours, and money is already so tight that the sacrifice of this small trickle of pennies won’t really matter.

Anyway, I’m pretty sure this situation with Apple is temporary.

Second, over on reddit, someone was talking about the appeal of horror movies, asking if viewers really truly honestly enjoyed watching them. 

It’s a silly question, obviously. Movies are entertainment and art. The people who watch them clearly expect to be either entertained or otherwise affected by them. But this person could not fathom the appeal in the same way that my wife doesn’t understand why I (or anyone) would choose to eat spicy hot food.

But in between the time I started typing this comment and the time I finished it, the post had been taken down. No idea why. 

Still, it’s advice. If you’ve always been horror curious but hate various aspects of the genre, like gore (I mostly hate that too, although I sometimes tolerate it now), or doom and gloom endings (mostly not in the mood for that shit), or jump scares (annoying but not a deal-breaker for me anymore), maybe this trick will make the effect of horror less severe and more enjoyable.

Here’s the comment:

—

Watching a horror movie is a safe way to experience the upside of being in danger–the chemicals that flood your body when you perceive a threat–without actually being in danger.

For a long time, I had a problem with scary movies, too. They stressed me out. Anxiety off the charts. Then I started focusing on older movies famous for being scary to the audiences of their time.

It turned out that the style of filmmaking, fashions for costuming and acting, and other “old movie” markers gave me the mental distance to feel a muted version of the scares without having to carry them with me after the film/show was over.

Now I’m able to watch modern horror, although there are still genre tropes I don’t like. Took a while to desensitize, but it wasn’t exactly punishment to watch great old movies.

I think it’s a lot like eating hot peppers. You’re not being burned–there’s an enzyme in the peppers that perfectly fits pain receptors–but your body doesn’t know that and floods you with endorphins. There’s no lasting harm but very real pleasure responses.

—

And if you’re one of those folks who have zero interest in scary movies, that’s great. Please unread the paragraphs above.

Happy Halloween.

October Update with an Important Notice about Patreon

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First up, I need to let you know there are new rules for Patreon. 

Apple has decided that anyone who joins a Patreon using the Patreon app on iPhone will have to pay a 30% surcharge on every payment so they can take their cut. 

It doesn’t affect other aspects of the service. You can still follow updates and whatever on your phone, but if you specifically sign up for a Patreon through an app on their phone, you’ll be charged more. 

I recommend signing up through a desktop or laptop, then reading updates however you like. 

As I understand it, this policy starts in November.

In other news, Spooktacular Shocktober is the time of year I dig out my old dvds and blu-rays to rewatch my little collection of old horror movies. Sadly, that’s not going to work this year because my blu-ray player seems to have lost the ability to recognize discs.

I’ve done the full online troubleshooting thing, powering things down and whatever whatever whatever. It resists repair. Sad, because a fair amount of my personal movie viewing comes from the public library, and while I’m okay with waiting to see any particular movie, I’m not really in a position to be paying for them. We’ll figure something out 

In writing news, Twenty One Palaces continues to allow itself to be written, but only reluctantly. A little frustrating, but survivable. 

Just yesterday I realized that a scene I’d written about a week before, in which Our Hero Ray Lilly startles an enemy by naming his supposedly secret base of operations would not work. Why, you ask? Because I had destroyed that building in a previous book. Totally wrecked it. 

The story couldn’t go forward without a place for it to go forward to, but I worked it out and everything is humming along again. 

In fact, just yesterday I ended my writing session with an awkward conversation between Annalise and a nameless walk-on character. As I signed off for the day, I thought “I’m going to have to delete that.” 

This morning I opened it up and realized that this exchange could be the perfect catalyst for a much needed breather moment that would not only reinforce Ray’s internal situation it would remind readers of the feel of the world they were moving in. 

Sometimes my subconscious knows its stuff. 

That’s it. Have a good spooky season. 

The Post I Actually Owed You Guys

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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. 

Everything Ages And Ceases To Function

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I had a blog post all written and ready to post that would have been a personal progress report as well as a report on the current state of Twenty One Palaces, along with a few other things, but you’re not getting that yet. Yesterday, I had quite the emergency.

My main computer (the one I’m typing this on, suddenly died overnight.

Figuring out what happened (hard drive got fucked) which easy/quick actions were not going to fix anything (let’s run Disk Utility repair function on literally everything) and which long term, hours-long processes would actually get things up and running (erase entire hard drive and reinstall everything from Time Machine) cost me an entire day.

Frustrating. But you know what? The expense of having a separate Time Machine external drive and the time I have spent over many years keeping it functional really paid off. That time and money reduced what could have been a huge calamity into a very frustrating day.

But now I’m on notice about this desktop Mac. I bought it in 2017, and I had hoped to get more time from it. I use it for just about everything except writing fiction, and that includes research, prescription refills, grocery orders, book promo, whatever.

But money is tight right now. I’d really like to it to keep running for a good many more years.

And then there’s my stupid, treacherous body. I’ve mentioned before that I have minor medical issues that are having much larger effects on my health. The new medication that was supposed to turn things around hasn’t had an effect, although we’ll now be increasing the frequency of the dosage and crossing our fingers.

But it’s these little defects that sometimes lead to complete failure, and I feel like that could describe the path we’re all on. My desktop spent all day on life support, and I sat next to it knowing I could be next.

The little laptop I write on is 11 years old (knock on wood), so really, failure for all three of us–writing machine, surfing machine, living machine–feels pretty tenuous.

Anyway, I’m putting morbid thoughts aside. I have a day’s work to catch up on, but that blog post will go live soonish. Tell your loved ones how you feel and back up your data.

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

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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

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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

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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.