Beware the vicious placoderms!
So, the insomnia is back. This time it's got its hooks into me and Spooky both. She got to sleep about 4 a.m. I followed sometime thereafter and then was wide awake at 9 a.m., after some asshole decided to rev his engine for five minutes out on Moreland. Further evidence I have not yet mastered head-explodey. Or, if I did manage to burst his cranium with the explosive power of my sleep-deprived brain, I never heard the sirens. There would be sirens, wouldn't there? Eventually? Anyway, there were wild dreams that are fading quickly. The discovery that the "Loch Ness Monster" was actually an extant species of giant placoderm fish, a list of deaths that had been wrongly attributed to drownings, glimpses of vast, fishy shapes beneath black water. I haven't had a Loch Ness dream in ages. Also, there was a bit in there somewhere that had me collecting fossils from a limestone deposit on a terraformed Mars. But, yeah, this is the second night of too-little sleep, since I only got about five hours night before last.
The writing went well yesterday. I did 1,187 words on "For One Who Has Lost Herself," which brings the story's total word count thus far to 3,472. I'd hoped to finish it yesterday, but it had other plans. Perhaps, I hope, today.
Er...what else? *blink* *blink* Oh, yeah. I neglected the mention in that list of things I've let pile up on me that I've agreed to write a Dancy vignette for a chapbook to accompany the sold-out limited edition of Alabaster (there are still copies of the trade hardback available). I may do that as soon as I've finished "For One Who Has Lost Herself." I sort of have something in mind, something that I'd thought would make it into "Bainbridge" but didn't.
I caught a documentary last night on the new basal hominid Sahelanthropus tchadensis ("Toumai"), a really marvelous discovery from the Miocene of Chad (6-7 million years old). Sahelanthropus might represent the earliest known hominine and may not be too far removed from the chimp/human common ancestor. The documentary managed to turn out decent despite the fact that some fool thought it would be cute if the whole thing were narrated by the disembodied voice of "Toumai" (who apparently sounded a great deal like the Travelocity Roaming Gnome®).
Also, Spooky's finished the latest faerie, Sweetgum. There are photos up in her LiveJournal. Have a look. This one is on beyond cute (but not for sale). She says she's doing a ghoul next. That one will be auctioned.
It occurs to me now that in reacting to accusations that my writing is "too dark" and that I do not "create from heaven’s breath," I might have overstated my case. In truth, I do believe that writing about the darkness, as a thing unto itself, not merely as a means of finding light, is an entirely legitimate endeavor and one that is too often neglected. There is a terrible, wonderful beauty to be found in the darkness, and those who never stop to examine and embrace the darkness within themselves will never truly know the light, because they will never know balance. And yes, I may have more darkness in me than do many others, but it's nothing I'm trying to hide from. This is the sort of thing I'm talking about, for example, when I say that it's wrongheaded to view Narcissa Snow as no more than a "villain," created as a foil to Deacon and Chance, Scarborough and Starling Jane and the Benefit Street ghouls. Looking back, I know that I love Narcissa as much as the rest, and not in spite of who and what she is or what she's done. I might say the same thing of Spyder Baxter. Or Jimmy DeSade. Or Odd Willie Lothrop (you'll meet him soon, don't worry). I'm at least as much a thing of the darkness as a thing of the light, and it's only right for me to say so and reflect that equity in my fiction. Anyway...
Time to make the doughnuts. But first, don't forget that a mere nine hours remain in the "choose your own letter" Frog Toes and Tentacles auction. As always, your generosity will be greatly appreciated. Which is to say, bid please, if you'd like such a sumptuous thing as the leatherbound edition of FT&T with a black velvet and red silk "cozy" sewn and embroidered by me and Spooky. The power of the "cozy" compels you.
Wow, it's sunny outside...
The writing went well yesterday. I did 1,187 words on "For One Who Has Lost Herself," which brings the story's total word count thus far to 3,472. I'd hoped to finish it yesterday, but it had other plans. Perhaps, I hope, today.
Er...what else? *blink* *blink* Oh, yeah. I neglected the mention in that list of things I've let pile up on me that I've agreed to write a Dancy vignette for a chapbook to accompany the sold-out limited edition of Alabaster (there are still copies of the trade hardback available). I may do that as soon as I've finished "For One Who Has Lost Herself." I sort of have something in mind, something that I'd thought would make it into "Bainbridge" but didn't.
I caught a documentary last night on the new basal hominid Sahelanthropus tchadensis ("Toumai"), a really marvelous discovery from the Miocene of Chad (6-7 million years old). Sahelanthropus might represent the earliest known hominine and may not be too far removed from the chimp/human common ancestor. The documentary managed to turn out decent despite the fact that some fool thought it would be cute if the whole thing were narrated by the disembodied voice of "Toumai" (who apparently sounded a great deal like the Travelocity Roaming Gnome®).
Also, Spooky's finished the latest faerie, Sweetgum. There are photos up in her LiveJournal. Have a look. This one is on beyond cute (but not for sale). She says she's doing a ghoul next. That one will be auctioned.
It occurs to me now that in reacting to accusations that my writing is "too dark" and that I do not "create from heaven’s breath," I might have overstated my case. In truth, I do believe that writing about the darkness, as a thing unto itself, not merely as a means of finding light, is an entirely legitimate endeavor and one that is too often neglected. There is a terrible, wonderful beauty to be found in the darkness, and those who never stop to examine and embrace the darkness within themselves will never truly know the light, because they will never know balance. And yes, I may have more darkness in me than do many others, but it's nothing I'm trying to hide from. This is the sort of thing I'm talking about, for example, when I say that it's wrongheaded to view Narcissa Snow as no more than a "villain," created as a foil to Deacon and Chance, Scarborough and Starling Jane and the Benefit Street ghouls. Looking back, I know that I love Narcissa as much as the rest, and not in spite of who and what she is or what she's done. I might say the same thing of Spyder Baxter. Or Jimmy DeSade. Or Odd Willie Lothrop (you'll meet him soon, don't worry). I'm at least as much a thing of the darkness as a thing of the light, and it's only right for me to say so and reflect that equity in my fiction. Anyway...
Time to make the doughnuts. But first, don't forget that a mere nine hours remain in the "choose your own letter" Frog Toes and Tentacles auction. As always, your generosity will be greatly appreciated. Which is to say, bid please, if you'd like such a sumptuous thing as the leatherbound edition of FT&T with a black velvet and red silk "cozy" sewn and embroidered by me and Spooky. The power of the "cozy" compels you.
Wow, it's sunny outside...