Soccer, RPP, and Vampires (My Week)
21 Jun
The week got away from me again. It’s been a good one though, soccer, and random business for RPP, and vampires.
Soccer
1. The US controls their own fate in World Cup. Now let’s see if they can actually play a first half instead of just surviving it! Oooh. Sadly, however, I have to miss the Algeria match on Wednesday, because I’ll be on my way to Pittsburgh for the Interpol show. I couldn’t miss it for anything less, but… Interpol. 650 capacity venue. Mmmm, no choice. Probably good for my blood pressure anyhow.
2. The French team has imploded, which is sort of like soccer karma for how they got in. I have no quarrel with France as a country, but for Ireland’s sake, I must now say in my best Nelson Muntz voice: Ha-ha!
3. I’m revisiting my high school affection for Alexi Lalas. I miss his crazy hair, but he cracks me up talking about the French business and the Italians taking dives. If he weren’t like 7 feet tall I’d want to squish him. But seeing as I’m like 5’2″, that’d just be awkward.
Red Penny Papers
1. Stuff is aligning in terms of the entertainment one hopes to provide. Excitement! Thanks very much to everyone who’s given it a shout-out– can’t say how much I appreciate it.
2. As of last night, I do believe I’ve sorted out more art, as in a cover for the first issue. As you may have noticed, my obsession with art is nearly as severe as my obsession with awesome stories. More excitement!
Vampires
So as many of you no doubt know, the first book I ever finished properly and submitted to agents (all 6 of them…) was a vampire book– of a kind of fucked up paranormal romance bent, even. The agents who requested partials said the same stuff: good writing, good characters, needs tightened up. Badly. Seeing as even back in 06-07 when I was doing this I mostly expected a lot of eye-rolling, I was pleasantly surprised. The advice all says to move on to another project and not keep flogging the same damn book to death, so I did. But every now and then I go back to it and am amazed at how much I’ve learned in the interim.
I’m almost happy with it again. Not sure what the fuck I’m gonna do with it when I am, but hey.
Also, in re vampires, it’s become almost as passe to say you’re tired of them as it has been for years to say you like them. But please let us not allow some adolescent fancy dictate our affection for one of the finest monsters ever conceived by humanity. I will be honest: I have not read Twilight. I have read the beginning and many excerpts, and it convinced me that the writing was not to my taste. And while I realize it’s not cool to base a judgment of a series on that and some movies– oh my god, the movies are so, so bad. So please believe me when I say that I dislike Twilight and all it stands for*, in particular the watering down of The Pretty Monster, intensely. No, vampires should not always be pretty, but the cool thing about them is that they’re the only monster you can’t see coming. That is scary.
But as this link I’m pretty sure I got from Corinne tells us, P is for Paranormal– Still. And True Blood is like badass vampire crack– even Snoop Dogg is in on it. Yeah that crosses the line between appreciation and objectification, I know. But it’s hilarious and weird as hell, and my morality meter is pretty insensitive. See footnote.
*I was genuinely offended watching New Moon at one point. There’s this woman who’s married to a werewolf, and she has these scars on her face. Because once he freaked out and she was “standing too close”. So you know, it wasn’t his fault, it was hers for standing too near, and he loves her, really, and she’s a good and devoted wife–
I had to chug my gin and tonic to keep from crying. I’m not all about fiction being morally responsible, quite the opposite, but Jesus Christ. Apparently it’s even more blatant in the books. Do you know how pissed I would’ve been if I’d paid money for that? Oh my god, I would’ve had to break something.
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Now playing: The Clash – Straight To Hell (Unedited version)
via FoxyTunes
I am getting quite excited for Red Penny Papers! It sounds very promising so far.
Whenever I get all barfy over Twilight, I remind myself that a large portion of their fans are teenagers. As a teenager, I liked many things that I now realize suck. This gives me hope ; )
Barry, I’m excited too– but I guess I already said that. Repeatedly. Yay though, I’m glad you are too!
Nat, that’s precisely what I usually do, and it really is good fun. Hell, I still like a lot of crap, and I have absolutely no issue with anyone who loves Twilight– I respect their honesty and our differing opinions. I don’t believe in shame!
(But I can’t laugh off the battered wife thing. That was a whole new level of barfiness. Dude. :/)
I’m with you. When did spousal abuse become sexy?
SERIOUSLY. Hey, here’s something teenage girls need to see– codependency at its most horrific and abusive presented as A Goal They Should Have.
The Red Penny Papers is getting cover art too!!! Fan*friggin*tastic.
I always have and always will love vampires, but I’ll be holding off writing a book about them for some time.
BOO to pretty vampires! and all those pretty faces like in American soap operas. Give me Klaus Kinski in Nosferatu any day of the week! I think if they remade it Steve Buscemi should be the vampire.
can’t wait to see the Red Penny when it comes out and vampires should scare the shit out of you, not try to date you.
Oh but Cate, can we ever have too many vampires? (Seeing as only a few of them are interesting anyhow, particularly!)
Alan, I am all for equal opportunity vampirism. Some of em are ugly, some of em not– Steve Buscemi would be AWESOME.
Jamie, yes. SCARY. EVIL. MONSTROUS. Thank you very much! (Well okay I do like True Blood… in which vampires date their food. But still, the vampires are scary there
)
Gotta chime in on the Twilight thing -
I finally gave in and read the first book last year, after having been harassed by middle schoolers at school for years. Didn’t like Bella. Didn’t like Edward (he reminded me of Angel on Buffy, who at least had the decency to not sparkle in sunlight). But the thing that bugged me most? Bella wanting Edward to kill her so they could be together, and a blurb I read of Book 4 (couldn’t bring myself to read past Book 1) in which she’s battered, bruised, etc. after her wedding night, but it was “worth it”.
Yeah. Great message there. Goes right along with your observations on the werewolf’s wife.
With so many GOOD paranormal YA books on the market, how did this ever get to be such a phenomenon?
/rant. Thank you for listening!