As I understand many other writing types do, I often gravitate to soundtracks when I put music on while I write. The absence of lyrics keeps the language processing centers of my brain free, and unlike proper classical music, soundtracks are written with the intention of staying in the background while you focus on something else instead of ( Read more... )

What I've been reading

I reread Swing, Brother, Swing. One of Ngaio Marsh's strengths is making me care more than I would ordinarily about the one-off heterosexual romances in the B-plots, and Carlisle/Ned are one of my favorite pairings-cousins and childhood friends (the socially-acceptable version of sibcest!) who play a longstanding game where ( Read more... )

More like Friday fic this week, whoops. Apparently I've mostly been reading other things this week.

British Library, Cotton Domitian viii, Item IV, ff. 70-80: Historia Johannis (3913 words) by longwhitecoats
Chapters: 1/1
Fandom: Sherlock (TV), Sherlock Holmes & Related Fandoms
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Author Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
( Read more... )

I decided that the Wednesday reading meme should have a fannish counterpart, so I'm initiating Friday fics. Unlike my Wednesday reading posts, I'm not going to include absolutely everything I've finished with scathing write-ups of stuff I hated or was utterly bemused by, just things I think someone else should conceivably read if they're into that ( Read more... )

Oh, I am the luckiest girl in all of fandom today, and I win at New Year's Resolutions (Recipient Division, that is) for all time, because today
( Read more... )

I bought a supporting membership for Chicon 7 so I could nominate, read and vote for the Hugos this year! Nominations are due by the 11th, and I've sorted what I'm nomming for Best Novel, because novels are a thing that I actually read on a regular basis. When it comes to the various lengths of shorter fiction, zines, artists, editors, fan writers ( Read more... )

Logorama, winner of the Oscar for Best Animated Short, is fantastic. It has a little bit of a Tarantino-style narrative about a car chase to tie it together (complete with what is euphemistically known as language, which had already outraged several iTunes reviewers by 11:00 PM because ZOMGit'saCARTOONwon'tsomebodythinkoftheCHILDRENZ), but what ( Read more... )

Things that are awesome today:

1. The movie version of Fantastic Mr. Fox, which I saw with my father this afternoon. He was deeply floored by how awesome it was, because he had heard nothing about it and was just expecting a fun kids movie. I was expecting it to be pretty awesome and was still floored by how awesome it was ( Read more... )

Heads up, all: the very cool Small Beer Press is doing a bit of spring cleaning on their warehouse and they're clearancing out some titles for $1.

I personally already have a copy of Kate Wilhelm's useful and thoughtful Storyteller: Writing Lessons and More from 27 Years of the Clarion Writers' Workshop, and I just picked up a copy of Laurie J ( Read more... )

Q: The Lost Books of the Odyssey seems to function less like a traditional Homeric epic and more like a sort of post-modern self-contained literary universe. Can you explain ( Read more... )