Books
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Get some in audio format and listen on the commute.
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Read for 20 minutes before settling to sleep.
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Join the library. Go there often. Find a book. A comfy chair…..Take the kids.
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Take a couple of real books on the business trip. Read in line, on the transfer bus, in Starbucks, while waiting for buddies in the lobby to get the uber to the conference.
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Schedule reading ‘binge blocks’ of four hours and tackle the book stack and read a few books in parallel. The binging which is good for you.
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Fall in love again with reading.
Escape
Into a book.
A novel of a different world.
An explanation of something new.
Escape from the busyness for a while.
Good advice.
Welcome to Brandon Sanderson's Fantasy Empire
I have never read a Sanderson book, but I admire what he’s accomplished. The piece also casually mentions that he wrote twelve novels before one sold, which I think is something worth pointing out: Most “first novels” aren’t, and persistence is important to getting to that first book.
Also, underground lair. Want.
Giving Up the Ghostwriter
Not much of a ghost if she sucked this bad at stealing passages for books. Also, I can’t believe the publishers of these books did not find this plagiarism earlier.
J.K. Rowling’s New Book Just So Happens to Feature a Character Persecuted Over Transphobia
Cheyenne Roundtree, writing in Rolling Stone, talks about the new book by J. K. Rowling and the interesting premise it features.
Rowling’s new novel The Ink Black Heart — part of her crime thriller series Cormoran Strike and penned under the pseudonym Robert Galbraith — involves a storyline that appears to mirror Rowling’s public downfall after she continually made statements that have been widely condemned as transphobic.
She says in an interview that the premise matching her life is pure coincidence.
But despite the clear similarities to her own life, Rowling claimed to Graham Norton that it’s all just a big coincidence. “I should make it really clear after some of the things that have happened the last year that this is not depicting [that],” she said.
Does she think we are stupid?
I can’t think of anyone who has been murdered for being transphobic online. On the other hand, plenty of TRANS people HAVE gotten murdered because of transphobic celebrities using their platforms to punch down.
Be better, Joanne.
Reading
Nicholas Bate on finding more time for reading:
1. Always read for 30 minutes before any Netflix viewing.
50 Wonderful Things of 2018
Linda Holmes, of Pop Culture Happy Hour, adds to her annual end-of-year lists. I always find something I need to see, read, or hear.
Two Weeks
John Scalzi over on his blog just confessed to writing his latest novel, The Consuming Fire, in two weeks.
Two.
Weeks.
That’s crazy. It certainly took a toll on him and he obviously never wants to do it again, but maaaaan. Two weeks!
I’d like to, maybe, churn out my silly little YA novel in a year’s time. If I’m lucky.
The Spectrum of Possibilities
Rob Bricken, in his weekly Medium column Nerd Processor, talks about the upcoming final season of Game of Thrones, how it’s likely to disappoint, and why.
But the problem isn’t really with Daenerys, Tyrion, or all the other characters that may end up ruling Westeros or whether anyone rules Westeros or if it splits back into seven kingdoms or suddenly becomes a democracy or whatever. (Okay, that last one would be very crappy.) It’s that Game of Thrones is so popular and so epic and its ending so anticipated that every possible outcome, regardless of how good or bad it is, is inherently not as exciting as the spectrum of possibilities that precede it.That bit about the “spectrum of possibilities” is deliciously accurate. And it doesn’t just apply to how the Game of Thrones creators plan on ending the series. This problem is inherent in almost all of the upcoming genre television and movies.
How will Star Wars Episode IX wrap up the sequel trilogy? How can it be done without disappointing millions of fans?
How will the next Avengers movie wrap up the Infinity War story? How can they do it without millions of fans crying out in vain?
How will Westworld end? The Expanse? The Magicians? Mr. Robot? The list goes on.
How will the creators of The Big Bang Theory close out the series and will we ever learn Penny’s last name?
I’m not sure there are people wondering how Modern Family, Law and Order: SVU or Criminal Minds will end. Maybe I’m wrong. There’s definitely a fandom for This is Us that’s invested in the characters and timelines. The creators have done a fabulous job of teasing ideas and directions to keep viewers hooked and wondering where and how it will end. The “spectrum of possibilities” is the bread and butter of the show, along with the strong writing and character moments.
Of course, most of the time where characters go after the movie’s credits or show is off the air is in the realm of fan fiction or actual tie-in novels and comics. Want more seasons of Buffy the Vampire Slayer? They exist in comic book form and written by the guy who created Buffy. What happened after the end of the last Star Trek: The Next Generation movie? Read the novels.
Still, a fandom’s expectation for a satisfying conclusion has got to be a huge headache for the creators. I assume some just don’t care about the reaction and just want to tell their story and damn the torpedoes regarding fans (see Rian Johnson and The Last Jedi). I think other creators may try and walk the line of fan service and servicing the story.
I’d bet JJ Abrams will walk that line with Episode IX. Maybe David Benioff and D. B. Weiss will do the same for Game of Thrones. We will know soon enough. Meanwhile, I’ll write my own versions in my head and try not to scream when the creators do their own thing.
The Consuming Fire
I finished John Scalzi’s latest novel, The Consuming Fire, and was in the process of writing a short little review when I see that Warren Ellis has done the same and pretty much nailed the review in a way I never could.
THE CONSUMING FIRE by John Scalzi sees John pretty much perfect his frictionless high-speed platinum-pulp science fiction storytelling. I read it in two sittings. John’s stripped his style down to what people are saying and what people are thinking, with the bare minimum of staging, and the thing flies along magnetic rails. If John was a straight crime writer, he’d have five hundred million in the bank and Lee Child would be bending the knee. If you want to study how commercial fiction writing works, take a look at this.This is, by far, my favorite new science fiction thing. It’s going to make a fantastic television show.This is the second in his Interdependency sequence, and if you’re missing Game Of Thrones or The Expanse, this is both. Also, if you ever liked the Mission Impossible or Leverage tv series, you will fucking love this. It’s court intrigue, spaceships, and a lovely long con.
The Never-Ending Story
Amanda Hess in The New York Times has a piece that examines how nothing ever ends anymore in regards to intellectual property. Movies go on forever in sequels, prequels, and other adaptions. Cancelled television shows come back. The dead never stay dead.
We needed stories to end so we could make sense of them. We needed characters to die so we could make sense of ourselves.
It’s an amazing essay.
The Only Good Online Fandom Left is Dune
Sean T. Collins at The Outline explains the difference between Dune and the Extended Cinematic Universes of both television and film. There are no warring camps or whiney man babies upset that there’s a girl and a person of color leading many of these franchises. With Dune you just have nods and winks to lines and characters.
Dune references signal shared knowledge to those in the know, and that’s about it. Dune fandom is an un-fandom.
As soon as it becomes some sort of cash cow I think all bets are off.