The Horror...The Horror!

Recent reading: Frankenstein by Mary Shelly and Dracula by Bram Stoker--which I just finished this morning.
My review on these horror classics is simple: Frankenstein gets the thumbs down--Dracula, thumbs up!
Part of this is style--Shelley's tome is a story within a story (and sometimes even another level within that--and so never really grips one. Stoker, on the other hand, though he tells his whole vampire story in diary and journal entries, along with letters and such, often feels quite immediate, and often quite eerie.
Neither is the sort of horror tale to keep one up at night with lights on--or give one bad dreams--though Dracula definitely produces a shiver or two.
Another recent read: Wuthering Heights, which certainly qualifies as ranking in the eerie literary world, full of ghosts and such, is still set in a more real unreal world. Heathcliff is a scary old bastard, that's for sure, but the "love story" never gripped me--guess I'm not a true Bronte fan.
Best horror tales I've read would definitely include some Stephen King, like The Shining, Pet Sematary, and It.
Oddly, the spookiest book I ever read was Communion: A True Story, by Whitley Strieber, which is about aliens and the like, but written from such a skeptical "voice" that--true or not--it really frightens!
Next I return to the "scary" world of reading modern fiction...whoo-ooo...
hasta pronto!

Tolstoy, Tolstoy, Tolstoy!

Halfway-through with "War and Peace" and it occurs to me that even with the amazing scope of history, the drama of battles, and the cast of hundreds--among them, monarchs and Emperors--the book is just not anywhere as good as "Anna Karenina."
Mostly, I'm struck by how much better W&P would be with some editing...well, quite a lot of editing--I am an editor, after all!
Tolstoy was a gifted writer, of course, but he often fell prey to one of the writer's commonest traps: after writing some point quite clearly, he'd would write it again, in different words. Sometimes, he'd create a fine allegory or use a good metaphor for some situation his characters were in, but then, in case we didn't get the allusion, he'd state what he was sure we'd missed. I find that immensely irritating.
However, his ability to sum up a character in a few paragraphs is nearly unrivaled (Austen is a contender) and his descriptions of nature, as everyone knows, are usually compelling and always evocative.
This site has a good, short biography of Count Tolstoy, among others. He lived quite a strange and varied life.
Christopher Plummer was wonderful as Tolstoy in last year's film, "The Last Station"...Very vital performance...Helen Mirren was great as the Countess, naturally. I found the film to be slow, and flawed, but it sounds like it a good depiction of his last years.
On to the love story, now--Natasha has made her debut and the romance of the story is finally getting going....Or as Cap'n Russel likes to call them "the Rhoda parts" (one has to have seen or read "The Winds of War" to get this inside joke).
Hasta pronto!

A great writers conference coming up

Less than a week until the Southern California Writers Conference in Newport Beach--I'm busy reading advance submissions, and preparing for a fun weekend for words at my favorite writers conference. Check out their lively site, and make sure you watch some of the videos on scwc.tv--they are a hoot, and some are fun animated stories, but they don't pull any punches.
I am polishing my two talks: Design or Death: Packaging The Self-published Title For Success, and also Young Adult: Why Write it and How Not To.
The thing about the SCWC is that it's not about going to meet famous writers and hear them talk (though you get to do that, too) it's about writing...Their motto is "a writer is a writer, before, as well as after publication" which I love!
There are so many amazing people on staff at SCWC, including some of my very talented friends like Judy Reeves, Marla Miller, Robert Yehling and Mike Sirota. Plenty more great writers and instructors--some of whom I haven't met yet--too many to list. And the list of Agents and Editors reads like a real "Who's Who" of Publishing.
Most important of all: When you attend this conference, you will write and read your writing to others; share your pitches, pages and queries with professionals; be challenged to improve; and you will get lots of good input and feedback on your work, be it novels, non-fiction, or short stories.
You'll also have a grand time, laugh plenty (Michael Steven Gregory, one of the organizers and sometimes MC, is a natural comedian and Wes Albers is the perfect straight man!) and, if all goes well, you will not sleep an awful lot.
So, if you don't make it this coming weekend to Newport Beach (Hyatt Regency NB), make sure you plan on San Diego on Presidents Day weekend, Feb 18-21, 2011.
If I don't see you next weekend--hasta pronto!

End of Summer Thoughts

Labor Day weekend in San Diego: Gorgeous days, cool weather, shopping for fresh summer fruits and veggies at the Farmer's market, reading a friend's fine YA manuscript (busman's holiday, I know) and an excellent dinner with friends. Then today a bike ride along the waterfront to the Festival of Sail on the embarcadero.
If you haven't read "The Artist's Way" by Julia Cameron yet, you might not have heard of "artist dates," but the gist of the theory is that we need to live life to be able to write about it well. Julia recommends taking ourselves on "dates" a couple hours per week. Get out and smell the air, see the views, feel the plums--take a hike, visit a museum, a gallery, a park, an art show, a bookstore or a farmer's market...whatever will stimulate your senses and get the creative juices flowing.
A few thoughts from readings this weekend:
Finished up Sherlock Holmes story collection I was reading last week, and was struck throughout by the admiring, intimate, and--would steamy be too strong a word?--voice employed by the character of Watson whenever he refers to Holmes. We may all have missed something in our youth, but the homoerotic overtones are impossible to miss now. I love Conan Doyle's use of Watson as his "excuse" for recording the "tales"; good device.
On a different subject entirely, Tortoises through the Lens, the latest book from Sunbelt has earned some nice comments from the natural history buffs in Southern California. Glad to see it hit the "big time" in the LA Times environmental blog Greenspace on Sunday.
A good article about the way different people (in this case, couples, are reading their books nowadays. This NY Times piece reminded me of Captain Russel and I, but we don't argue about it, we just read side-by-side, he with his book, me with my iPod. I say, as long as people are reading, who cares what they are reading on, or how they are getting their words delivered...Why can't we all get along?
Hasta pronto!

The Day After Mother's Day (What does it really mean?)

Okay, I wouldn't have posted this yesterday, because who knows who out there is gonna get ticked off at me, but I really don't like Mother's Day. I love my mom, and I like celebrating her and the other mothers that I love, and the nearly-moms who have helped me along the way. But it's a day when I often feel odd, purely for being a woman of a certain age (I'm turning 49 this month) who is NOT a mother.
Anne Lamott to the rescue. This "Why I hate Mother's Day" essay by Lamott on Salon.com was sent to me by my dad, and I missed seeing it yesterday, because I was at my mom's house, celebrating Mother's Day. This was following the morning of people asking me "Are you a mother?" as if it was a test. Of course it is...If you're a mom, they'll wish you a Happy Day, if not, the person will quickly smile and say something to cover up how sorry they now feel for you.
I'm currently reading Charles Dickens' Little Dorritt (since it'll be hard to find in a bookstore, I don't mind linking to Amazon) which has some of perhaps the worst mothers in all of Dickens' books in it, or at least a couple of contenders, and somehow it was perfect to start the day with them...Especially with horrible Mrs. Clenham, who lies, denies, and always, always, is right and righteous (I won't do any "spoiler" stuff here, so yes, there is more to it--it is Dickens after all).
I say, let's not just celebrate every person who birthed a child--which, after all, is a pretty basic step in "mothering" said child. I'd love to celebrate something called Good Mother's Day, or a Good Aunt's Day, even a Good Mentor's Day. Considering the Octo-mom, it occurs to me that quality is better than quantity in terms of shaping the future, which is what we humans are up to, by raising children.
Isn't the most important thing not whether I have had children (or if anyone has) but whether I care about your children (if you have them)? In fact, the big question is how much we all care about all children, not just "ours." And that applies to all of "our" children, such as politicians who talk about "America's children" as if they were more valuable than other children around the globe.
A good way to celebrate Mother's Day, or any other day, might be to consider how we can better use our time, talents, and resources to help "mother" everyone's children...If we all tried this, even once in a while, we would surely all be better off.
Hasta pronto!