Vicissitude and Season

For a bunch of reasons I don't want to say much about 2015, and also I have to make a feta-tapenade tarte soleil, so this part of the post is short. (The whole thing will be short; I am not claiming in-depth analysis in the latter part.) Actually, baking something semi-complex that may not turn out is a good symbolic end to the year, and certainly good food has been a lifeline for me, one which I intend to continue hanging on to as 2016 begins. Gardening was perhaps not so satisfying, but I'm hoping to make progress in some new projects, and either the weather will be better (it could hardly have been worse) or I will continue to get used to the new abnormal.

A few things worth mentioning that I really enjoyed this year: I got to see Vienna Teng in concert, I helped my sister get our family's WWII letters up on the internet (if you're interested, it starts here with an introduction my grandfather wrote well after the fact), and I took myself on a road trip through the Midwest and finally got to spend time with penwiper26 in person. And there's also been the federal grand jury service, which has at least been moderately interesting and has another year to run.

My creative energy, at least writing-wise, was really low this year, and I've made very little progress on The Seed Time (book five), but I did manage to do some good-quality editing on Not Time's Fool, and come hell or high water, which is not a trivial phrase these days, I will get it published by the end of January. I have, however, come round to feeling essentially non-fannish (though I am still enjoying watching and reading lots of things), and have no desire to write fic. For the moment I'm still getting those kudos emails every day, which is nice (new people turning up in the fandoms I wrote in), but I expect that to diminish this year unless something happens. Which it may. Who knows.

Which, ha. The one bit of fannish impulse I have at the moment seems, unexpectedly considering that two years ago I was going to drop it altogether, to be toward Doctor Who - at least, I am spending some of my downtime watching old episodes, and I enjoyed most of this season and the Christmas special. Come at me with your nitpicks and continuity slips, but I thought the latter was fun and charming and sweet, which is a pleasant change of pace, and I have done the fannish thing and looked at River's timeline charts and thought about doing a marathon in chronological order (if such a thing is possible and if I had the time - maybe as a prize after getting the book out). I guess people complain that her timeline is too complicated, but I like that kind of thing (and have written one that's as hard to figure out if not quite as romantically bittersweet). But since I did manage to watch the Library episodes again I started thinking about character arcs and what it means to finish them, or at least "finish" as opposed to leaving them hanging out there unexplained and/or uncompleted. I mean, what if we'd never gone back to River after "Silence in the Library"? Would it have been a worse story, if we'd never known who the hell she was? Yes and no? I suppose, considering that the Doctor's story went on, he had to run into her at some point, so perhaps it's not a fair example, and I know that the whole Steven Moffat Loves Puzzle Women thing is mixed up in this, but on the one hand I am satisfied to feel some closure to the circle and in another way I feel it's Just. Too. Much.

I remember when I wrote the Vorkosigan story "Single Combat," which was a prompt fill and meant to be a one-off, and got a lot of comments about when was I going on with the story - which I did end up doing, but for a while was determined not to, because I thought the open-ended ending was a perfectly good one. I think the urge to go on and finish things, to fill in the gaps, is a fannish urge and a genre-related one - and maybe it's that I have been reading a fair amount of "literary fiction" this year (Jane Smiley's trilogy about the Langdon family is really good, by the way), but I'm getting more dissatisfied with the need to Just Go On (reference not unintentional). Not that I'm going to leave the Waters of Time books hanging without tying a few things up neatly, whether Five or Six is the last one, but (and this goes back to the quote from Ancillary Mercy in my last post) I feel the need to acknowledge that things are not neat and tidy either in real life or fiction, and someday I'd like to write a book that just ends, dammit, and doesn't care where.

Happy New Year, all!

1) I almost have a cover! I need to work on balancing the color (or lack thereof; it's all sepia-ish) but I think I should be done today, and then very little is stopping me from getting the book together and uploaded. This time around I'm pretty sure I'll have a different cover for the ebooks than the paperback, because the print cover uses a wraparound background image with another image covering most of it on the front cover, and not enough of the background shows there to be comprehensible alone. So much as I hate to lose the planes-that-look-like-birds, I think the ebooks will just have the broken violin. Will post on the blog when it's done. (I am still not sufficiently talented with image software (using GIMP now) to make it what I want, but IT IS GOOD ENOUGH SO THERE.)

2) TV catch-up: a) Need to stop dozing off during POI, but that's my fault not the show's; I especially loved Root's turn as French Mary Poppins; b) speaking of which, Doctor Who had some spot-on moments during the season finale, and I have decided that it's not worth dwelling on the places I didn't think they quite made their points, because the misses were fairly close (by the way, has anyone written the story where ( spoiler )?); Castle, WTF? though I suppose you get the "it was only a dream" pass.

3) We will be getting the polar-vortex-whatever during the day today, though at nothing like the power the center of the country has been experiencing. Our local weather gurus have predicted some "mood flakes" tonight, another term for "conversational snow." I have been a little too occupied with cover-building and the like to do as much outdoors as I should have been doing; maybe I'll manage to go pull out the pepper plants today at least.

4) Music recs. First, my son and a friend, together known as Red Wheelbarrow, have a little album out which you can listen to (and pay what you want to download) here, if you should wish to. As Patrick says, it's a bit rough around the edges, but hey, the price is right, and new artists should be supported, and I think they do a splendid job: Helen has a lovely voice and Patrick plays multiple instruments well and I am not prejudiced at all. Album is original music; you can listen to their covers here.

Second, on a more experienced and professional level, a friend sent me the latest of Zoe Mulford's CDs, "Coyote Wings," and I am now interested in getting her others. Excellent songs, very personal and yet universal, great lyrics and themes and thoughtfulness. And, as I figured out soon after glancing at the liner notes, she is the sister of one of Patrick's directors/teachers/now-colleagues at the theatre camp he attended for many years and now works at in summer, and in fact one of the songs, "Acrobats," which you can listen to at the "music" link on her site, was written to celebrate her brother's wedding (to another employee of the same camp as well as of the commedia troupe they both belong to which I think I have referred to here before). So that is cool.

I'm back. You can read about my garden visits here; otherwise, here's the continuation of the previous post.

Last Wednesday I was in St. Johnsbury VT, and did see the Athenaeum before I left (splendid!), then drove a long way by back roads across New Hampshire and Maine and wiggled my way down to the coast, where I stayed a couple of days with my uncle and aunt, sorting out books and walking on the beach and watching "The Roosevelts." Then (see garden blog) I popped up to the Coastal Maine Botanical Gardens (lovely!) and then down to my dad's in MA for another couple of days, then (see garden blog) to Tower Hill Botanic Garden (I am forever intrigued by which gardens decide to be botanic and which botanical, and which pluralize themselves, but never mind) and then to New Haven CT to spend the night with my sister and brother-in-law and their cats. Then Monday I drove down to PA and spent the night close to Chanticleer Garden which I was going to visit again the next day until I checked the website and discovered it was closed on Tuesdays. Oops. So I drove home, stopping to outfit myself at an Eddie Bauer outlet store on the way. The end.

I was cautiously pleased by last night's POI season four premiere - if they keep that up, it'll be a good season. ( Spoilers )

I need to catch up on the openers of "Sleepy Hollow" and "The Good Wife." And I'm watching "Doctor Who" despite misgivings; speaking of betrayal and difficult transitions, I got pissed off at everyone being disappointed in Clara for reacting badly to the regeneration. After all, it's a shocking event if you're not expecting it, and she's the only one of the New Who companions to witness one of his* except Rose, who at least got David Tennant out of it. Not that Capaldi is without his attractions, but I'm getting a vibe of back-to-the-sexless for this season. Back to it being a rather creepy kids' show, perhaps. Anyway, I've caught up on that and am enjoying it, without huge amounts of enthusiasm, but without wanting to throw things at the screen either. (It's on my lap; there wouldn't be much windup room.) I love the new opening graphics, the new TARDIS, and the eyebrows. And Danny Pink, whose surname must be significant.

*Amy and Rory saw one, but it wasn't the Doctor's.

ETA: I did watch the Sleepy Hollow ep, and ha, still love this crazy show, although Franklin did his kite and key experiment in 1752, but the SH timeline has never made the slightest sense anyway.

Random update:

Thing One: Trying to write my Irrelevant Gift Exchange story in a few days (with absolutely no guidelines, since I never heard from my giftee, so going with "what pleases me"). It will be fine, I'm sure, if I can just get myself to put down words.

Thing Two: Watched "The Time of the Doctor" the day after Christmas, and was distinctly underwhelmed. It all felt unoriginal and… I'm not sure "unrealistic" is the right adjective, considering the framework, but yes, that. Alas.

Thing Three: Went out with Younger Son to see The Hobbit Part the Second last night, and found it great fun, viewed as an action movie with occasional Brooding Dwarf. I reread the book quite recently, and noted how very uncinematic it is, at least by today's standards, so I have no objection to the changes made, though really it was pretty much all changes. I especially enjoyed ( minor spoilers ) It's also tremendous fun that they get to reference and foreshadow Lord of the Rings, adding both dramatic tension and little jokes (wee Gimli!).

Thing Four: Also, played some Vienna Teng in the car on the way to the theatre, and ha, how great is it that I can now be the Cool Mom sufficiently to introduce the nearly-20-year-old to music that is not really old and that he likes.

Thing Five: So thanks again for that to raven and also congrats on being Really Completely Married Now. :)

Thing Six: It is almost the end of the year and how did that happen? At least I got one big thing done that was on my list, heh.

Update on the book: making progress. I've done a few more updates on the website (including mockup cover and blurb for Time and Fevers, if you want to look ahead). I wrestled the interior of the print edition into shape, having a little fun in the process (drop caps!) and need to embark on e-book and print covers for real. I'm looking at early December, if nothing goes wrong. Which it will, but hopefully not too devastatingly.

Probably tomorrow I will take the deep breath and post first promos on Facebook (still have not made an author page there, and need to get in the habit of actually posting, but if I know who you are I'll friend back). I started a Twitter today, and have done nothing with it but following bunches of mismatched people/others (starting with Bear, of course), but let me know if you're there.

I'm going to take down the chapters I put on AO3, since they're on the website now.

In other time-related news, Doctor Who wow! Night and day.

So it is entirely typical of me that a declaration of new intent results in a) a little bit of publishing research in between being busy with other things, b) a depressive spiral, c) my cat getting sick. And today was migraine day. But I think I'll be back on track soon. (And the cat is improving, though I was really worried for a couple of days because he stopped eating, which is kind of like a fish not swimming.)

All that (plus having finally finished the seasons of "Castle" (which, semi-yay for the final relationship and career cliffhanger, although the show is lunging shark-wards) and "Doctor Who" (which, I have had it with Moffat, I mean it this time. I want to scrub it all from my brain and replace it with a vid of Clara to "Girls Just Wanna Have Fun")) meant that I watched a heck of a lot of Lost episodes, semi-randomly (my initial plunge-through this spring started not where I'd left off but with the first episode Ben (Henry) was in halfway through season two, whereupon I watched straight through to the end, and then, naturally, started up at the beginning again until I got back to halfway through season two. And since then I've been dipping in occasionally, first to watch all the Ben-centric episodes again, and then to watch nearly all of seasons five and six. So this week's dose was the parts of three and four I'd ignored before (except for "Exposé" which I'm not likely to ever watch again).) Re-immersion prompts a few observations:

1. The level of detail entirely rewards multiple viewings, as does the intricate plot. Knowing what's coming makes me appreciate even more how well-woven the storyline is. For example (trying to say this without horrible spoilers) the episode in season three where Mikhail helps save Naomi, and then Charlie doesn't want to let him go, but Desmond does anyway, oh so painfully ironic, considering what Mikhail does at the end of the season, ow ow ow. I know from personal experience how weird serendipity can be when you're writing something long and complicated, but the number of times things work out tidily in this plot means huge amounts of planning as well. (Not that they tie up all the threads by any means, but it's so fun watching them construct what knots exist.)

2. The villains are beautifully villainous in their differing degrees, and it's an understatement to say they don't shy away from violence, but it's interesting to observe that none of the violence is sexual. Imagine how much more creepy Martin Keamy would be if he threatened to rape people. I mean, I'm glad they didn't go there, but it's kind of weird that they didn't. The show objectifies right and left (and yeah, there are more shots of scantily-clothed women, though let us also note the entire episodes that Sawyer spends with his shirt off (well, there's at least one)) but all the sex is consensual (even if Jack's tattoo isn't, god I wanted to slap him so hard). I'm wondering if the non-sexual villainy all spun off of Ben somehow; he's capable of many horrible things, but I can't imagine him raping anyone or ordering it done.

And okay, speaking of which:

3. Michael Emerson your face. (Also holy shit what a wonderfully-constructed character; I cannot say it too many times. I could write entire essays, but I won't subject you to them.)

On another topic entirely, I may entertain myself this summer building that playlist-by-minor-association that I've been intending for ages. This is the one in which the order is determined by bits of lyrical coincidence such as (to pull from my previous subject lines) Laura Marling's "Goodbye England" next to Ella Fitzgerald singing "A Ship Without a Sail" because they both mention hats. Or "I Think You Know" by Julia Nunes with "When I Decide" by My Terrible Friend, since both reference large hands. I've always wanted to organize a library this way, but can't since a) I share mine with other people and b) I can't keep it all in my head anyway. I did manage to graft this desire onto my 17th-century Amsterdam bookshop-owner Maarten Rijnacker (one of my more adorable creations if I say so myself); here's the discussion other people have about it:

"I am not yet come to that place in my tale," said Saskia haughtily. "But it is strange that you of all those assembled should ask..." She shook her head. "No. It is a tale that must be told in the proper order. But what is that order? My mother, in her tidy house, would know; my father, looking over the carefully-kept accounts of his business--"

"Then think yourself into Maarten's shop," said Olivia, "and pull a book off the shelf, and then the next, and find that there is sense in their ordering, no matter how strange it may first appear--"

"You have been there!" cried Saskia. "Do you know, I once discovered that he had shelved Hugo Grotius's Mare Liberum adjacent to a manual on breaking and training horses, in French not even English so the witticism did not strike me until days later. The training method was horrible and vicious and I was sorry for the poor horses; it did not occur to me then to be sorry for the sailors. And a romance about Alexander on the other side of Grotius."

I am hoping to do some library-reorganizing this summer, but it'll consist of moving all the drama and perhaps other categories to Younger Son's room once he gets his childhood toys packed off the shelves, so as to create some room on the downstairs bookshelves for everything now shelved on the floor, like my entire Reginald Hill collection and half my gardening library. No, there is no such thing as too many books...

I'm going to finish this fic today if it kills me. (Which would be rather inconvenient.)

There are moments when I laugh and feel like doing that meme again where you list "ways you can tell you're reading something by [me]" especially when I write a sentence with nine "and"s in it:

"Oh, John," is all he says, and John translates thank you and how foolish can you be and I don't deserve you and I'm never going to tell you why, and he wants to rise up and pin Harold to the chair and kiss him unmercifully and squeeze the self-pity out of him, and he doesn't move.

(By which you can tell that I didn't resist Finch/Reese, although I think it's going to be self-restraint right down the line. But don't hold me to that. This is not a week for story structure and predictability.)

In completely unrelated fannish news, it's not like my husband is particularly tuned in to how fic works, but he does come up with great crossovers sometimes; out of the blue he proposed Doctor Who/Mad Men and after some discussion we agreed that Joan would make the most awesome companion in the history of ever, and now I want someone to write that. But not me.

Okay, so avanti_90 asked for Sherlock as Time Lord and song #2, which is The Great Curve by The Talking Heads. And as soon as I saw that I knew Irene had to be in it too, because she is The Woman. And so this happened, this very strange thing, and if I had to post it somewhere I wouldn't know whether to call it Sherlock/Irene or Sherlock/John or Sherlock/Earth, but luckily I don't have to choose, I can just dance with it. What it is with dancing today, I don't know, especially since I can't do it, and I love dancing to this song.

Anyway.

( cut is bigger on the inside )

I am absolutely in love with this thing I'm writing (8K words so far, and I'm not nearly done), which probably means it's terrible, but when I have finished writing one more scene and two and a half epilogues, and L. is back from her trip, I will send it over and ask her to knock some sense into it, and should be able to post by the weekend.

It has a French proverb as epigraph, and the title is from Simon and Garfunkel, and it is a bloody love story, not the Simon and Aral part, though of course that too.

*flails some more*

Also, Doctor Who. Actually, the part I enjoyed the most wasn't even the episode, though that was very good even if I didn't buy the Amy and Rory thing for an instant, but the preview for next week at the end. "Dinosaurs. On a spaceship!" I was saying to L. last night that this might add a certain frisson to some of the Vorkosigan books. (The day is saved! Here comes the Prince Serg and her TYRANNOSAURS.)

My fic has no dinosaurs. It may have a frisson or two, though.