Inspired by a forum post at the lovely Wonderlands... here's some of the books I'm looking forward to this year.
The Mystery of Grace - Charles De Lint (It's Charles De Lint. Big Love!)
Irons in the Fire - Juliet E. McKenna (It's Juliet E. Mckenna! Ditto!)
Bone Crossed - Patricia Briggs (So far the series has been fun with the icky romance stuff at bare minimum and very subtly handled.)
Dragon in Chains - Daniel Fox (It's the super-sekrit identity of a lovely author chap, also Chains is said to be rather fab according to the early reviews and those lucky peeps that got their hands on an arc.)
Graceling - Kristin Cashore (A new Gollancz author - looks good.)
Red Gloves - Beth Vaughan (Also a new Gollancz author, and also looks good.)
The Ace of Skulls - Chris Wooding (Just because it looks like fun!)
Best Served Cold - Joe Abercrombie (Because Joe Abercrombie is a god!)
Jasmyn - Alex Bell (Another Gollancz new author, and it looks interesting.)
Republic of Thieves - Scott Lynch (A ha! At last, Mr Lynch, you have delivered!)
Orcs: Bad Blood Two - Stan Nicholls (Stan Nicholls! Orcs!! How can you want more?!)
The Spy who Haunted Me - Simon R. Green (Because Simon Green is the dude! Also am loving this series.)
The Prodigal Mage - Karen Miller (Because am a new fan)
Witches Incorporated - K.E. Mills (Ditto the above)
In Ashes Lie by Marie Brennan (Because Midnight Comes was aces!)
Destroyer of Worlds - Mark Chadbourn (Yay! Mark Chadbourn! A scarily intelligent chap who does mythic/urban fantasy fantastically and it's a fab series.)
Living with Ghosts - Kari Sperring (Because I heard Kari on a couple of a panels at Eastercon '08, and she was great! Also, it looks fascinating!)
06 January 2009
05 January 2009
Shattered
As we've got a shiny new year to play with, I've decided January is going to be the month of Nano: the revenge! Otherwise known as, let's do one of those Nano projects that didn't get done in November...
So this month's project is going by the temporary title of Shattered and is a heroic fantasy set in an alternate Britain. There will be wild battles and trips to the underworld and goddesses up to all sorts of hijinx and if my stumbling attempts at web-fu are working, below should be a progress meter courtesy of Zokutou...
So this month's project is going by the temporary title of Shattered and is a heroic fantasy set in an alternate Britain. There will be wild battles and trips to the underworld and goddesses up to all sorts of hijinx and if my stumbling attempts at web-fu are working, below should be a progress meter courtesy of Zokutou...
| |
3,195 / 50,000 (6.4%) |
30 December 2008
Year End bits
- Oh noes! Elastic Press is ceasing to be... Andrew's done a full press release thingy on the Elastic newsfeed, a copy of which is also on the BFS boards. 'tis a great shame as Elastic always put out some neat looking books.
- Coo... Stan Nicholls of the The David Gemmell award thingy reports that they've had 800 votes since they opened the polls on boxing day. How cool is that! And that's just to get the long list to short list. If you've not voted for your fave heroic fantasy book of the year, get over there and do so as the voting is dead simple and you don't even need to register on their website or anything. Apparently, the final award will be given out at a do in June, at the Magic Circle HQ in London. Crikey! (Must remember to mention this to our Hell's magician boyf.)
- Ooh er... Newcon 5 is down for 26th - 27th September '09. Which, unless I'm very much mistaken, is the week after Fcon is due to be... Oh that's going to be interesting... :-> (Of course, the Fcon site is due a major relaunch next month so our details aren't up on the current site yet...)
And talking of David Gemmell, have recently read Legend and Waylander as I'd never read them before and thought I really should get around to it... Legend was pretty intense and it had me hooked right up until the end... and then there was a bit of a cop out with one of the characters and a miraculous resurrection when they really should have stayed dead. Bugger. Things were going so well until then. Didn't help that the purpose of the resurrection felt like a blatant rewarding of the hero chap by bringing his woman back to life. A woman that died a decent fighting death too. Sigh.
Waylander didn't quite have the intensity but the ending was a bit more solid and the characters were very well drawn.
Also read Ravens of Avalon by Diana L Paxson - which I picked up from our Jan at the last Fcon. Apparently this is connected to the Mists of Avalon series that Marion Zimmer Bradley did (which, of course, I hadn't read...) But Ravens was some serious fabulous stuff - it was a pagany telling of the Boudica story just busting with enchantment all over the place. So, quite naturally, I then had to read Mists of Avalon by MZB just to see where it all began and I was totally blown away by it. Utterly, absolutely, magical stuff. Doing the Arthur thing from Morgan le Fay's perspective. Brilliant!
Also read Duma Key by Stephen King. Definitely a cracking good yarn, that one. Bit of a heartrending death towards to the end and some great characters.
Now I've a pile of Xmas and birthday books to get through so hope everyone had a fab Xmas and have an excellent new year!
- X -
09 December 2008
Daemons Are Forever
So I have just this minute finished reading Simon R. Green's Daemons Are Forever and I'm already champing for the next one. (Due around April next year, I think...)
Not that I'm at all unbiased, as I'm a bit of a Simon Green fangirl, but Daemons was ace! For why? Well, for a start, I always find Mr Green's stuff eminently readable, and Daemons is no exception.
Edwin Drood makes for a fun main character as he stumbles from hijinx to disaster and back again, saving the world with wild magics, weird tech and a fantastically depreciating sense of humour. And he's got the perfect partner in Molly Metcalf, witch of the wild woods. This would be another thing I love about Green's work, he always creates fabulous partnerships (Hawk and Fisher being my absolute favourite...).
There's family politics and bloody battles... and a Deathstalker crossover! (...and a very cool one at that! Yay!) As well as some promising things for future volumes.
Although Daemons does suffer from the first couple of pages being a bit on the infodumpy side it's generally one of those that begs the wild ride cliche to be liberally applied to any attempt to describe it. So if you haven't already read it, now would be a perfect time to add it to your Xmas list...
Not that I'm at all unbiased, as I'm a bit of a Simon Green fangirl, but Daemons was ace! For why? Well, for a start, I always find Mr Green's stuff eminently readable, and Daemons is no exception.
Edwin Drood makes for a fun main character as he stumbles from hijinx to disaster and back again, saving the world with wild magics, weird tech and a fantastically depreciating sense of humour. And he's got the perfect partner in Molly Metcalf, witch of the wild woods. This would be another thing I love about Green's work, he always creates fabulous partnerships (Hawk and Fisher being my absolute favourite...).
There's family politics and bloody battles... and a Deathstalker crossover! (...and a very cool one at that! Yay!) As well as some promising things for future volumes.
Although Daemons does suffer from the first couple of pages being a bit on the infodumpy side it's generally one of those that begs the wild ride cliche to be liberally applied to any attempt to describe it. So if you haven't already read it, now would be a perfect time to add it to your Xmas list...
01 December 2008
Nano Finite
And we're done! :->
Final Nano wordcount - 108,678! Woot! Thanks in no small part to a mini competition between me and two others yesterday as we updated word counts every hour until closing in the bid to out do each others wordage...
On the regional word war front - yesterday England Elsewhere managed to crawl to first place... alas, 'twas but a brief victory as by this morning and the final numbers, Ireland had beaten us over the head and snatched back their top place. So we end this year at number 2. Which is, if memory serves, a few places better than the very tragic placing we had last year.
Worldwide, still number 12, and still beaten by London. Bah, humbuggery.
However, all numbers aside, this one was a particularly good Nano. I'll lay claim to two (short) novels finished (one of which is even polishable), a very bad very short story, half a SF novel, and the opening chapters of two urban fantasies. Plus a few bits of random blathering. We like random blathering...
And now there's books waiting to be read, and work to be done...
Final Nano wordcount - 108,678! Woot! Thanks in no small part to a mini competition between me and two others yesterday as we updated word counts every hour until closing in the bid to out do each others wordage...
On the regional word war front - yesterday England Elsewhere managed to crawl to first place... alas, 'twas but a brief victory as by this morning and the final numbers, Ireland had beaten us over the head and snatched back their top place. So we end this year at number 2. Which is, if memory serves, a few places better than the very tragic placing we had last year.
Worldwide, still number 12, and still beaten by London. Bah, humbuggery.
However, all numbers aside, this one was a particularly good Nano. I'll lay claim to two (short) novels finished (one of which is even polishable), a very bad very short story, half a SF novel, and the opening chapters of two urban fantasies. Plus a few bits of random blathering. We like random blathering...
And now there's books waiting to be read, and work to be done...
27 November 2008
Nano day 27
Word count: 88366. Lawks a mussy, could be better. Can I use sudden attack of the sinuses as an excuse? Nah, didn't think so. :->
We are number 2!! in the regional wordwar... hurrah! Number 12 worldwide... still being beaten by London (bastards!).
And in other news... 'tis my birthday, I'm old.
Also, received many many books! (They know what I like!)
That will be all...
We are number 2!! in the regional wordwar... hurrah! Number 12 worldwide... still being beaten by London (bastards!).
And in other news... 'tis my birthday, I'm old.
Also, received many many books! (They know what I like!)
That will be all...
23 November 2008
Nano day 23
So here we are with one more week to go of the fabled Nanowrimo and my total is up to... (drumroll please...) 81,038. Cool! Was hoping I'd be well past 100k by now though... must be something a bit psychological going on as I slowed down considerably after hitting 50k. Och well. 100k by the end of the month of there will be foul punishments and torture. Oh yes indeedy.
The sci fi thingy is stalling a bit. I've got very holey B and C plots that may need to be axed completely. On the plus side, I've worked out a way to do a cross over with my space pirates that were going to appear in one of the other potential Nano projects. So, yay!
Problem being, need way more research on that and the other potential projects to be able to launch as manically into them as I did on Taurus. So I've done a few thousand words on a couple of other things to add to the multi nano mash up wordcount, including a sequel to Taurus. Which is one of the things that's going to need the research. This time all things Ancient British - so running from Celts to Romans to Vikings with anything else I can get away with.
So December is apt to be read until you go blind month. Always a good thing!
Nano stats: England Elsewhere have dipped to number 12 in the world region wordage - beaten on these shores by those bastards in London....
In the UK regional wordwar, we're at number 3! Woot! Thanks mainly to one brilliant person who's at 160k already. Not jealous. Oh no.
Authonomy
I really wasn't going to do much on Authonomy this month, cos of the Nano thing, but it's so easy to get distracted. (This possibly explains why my wordage is stalling a bit!) Also, they added some new features and someone tempted me to read their book.
Which I did. And which I totally recommend. So check out Sim by Jak Brienhead - it's a fab YA scifi/fantasy thing wherein our hero discovers the ability to move between worlds and fight off the terrrrrrible destiny he keeps getting flashes off. It's well written, totally compelling, plenty of action and generally excellent. And totally free to read. (and if you happen to want to sign up and vote for it, I'm sure Mr Brienhead would be quite chuffed!)
In other news... snow! Wheeee!
The sci fi thingy is stalling a bit. I've got very holey B and C plots that may need to be axed completely. On the plus side, I've worked out a way to do a cross over with my space pirates that were going to appear in one of the other potential Nano projects. So, yay!
Problem being, need way more research on that and the other potential projects to be able to launch as manically into them as I did on Taurus. So I've done a few thousand words on a couple of other things to add to the multi nano mash up wordcount, including a sequel to Taurus. Which is one of the things that's going to need the research. This time all things Ancient British - so running from Celts to Romans to Vikings with anything else I can get away with.
So December is apt to be read until you go blind month. Always a good thing!
Nano stats: England Elsewhere have dipped to number 12 in the world region wordage - beaten on these shores by those bastards in London....
In the UK regional wordwar, we're at number 3! Woot! Thanks mainly to one brilliant person who's at 160k already. Not jealous. Oh no.
Authonomy
I really wasn't going to do much on Authonomy this month, cos of the Nano thing, but it's so easy to get distracted. (This possibly explains why my wordage is stalling a bit!) Also, they added some new features and someone tempted me to read their book.
Which I did. And which I totally recommend. So check out Sim by Jak Brienhead - it's a fab YA scifi/fantasy thing wherein our hero discovers the ability to move between worlds and fight off the terrrrrrible destiny he keeps getting flashes off. It's well written, totally compelling, plenty of action and generally excellent. And totally free to read. (and if you happen to want to sign up and vote for it, I'm sure Mr Brienhead would be quite chuffed!)
In other news... snow! Wheeee!
16 November 2008
WF Saturday fun
So yesterday was the long anticipated Write Fantastic in Wokingham Library thing. Totally rocked!
I'm sure I've said it before, but Chaz Brenchley and Juliet McKenna are absolutely ace when they do things together and I could totally have listened to them talk on for longer. (Alas, the library time keeper hovered at the door, dead on 1pm so we had to be kicked out.)
So, it was mainly a creative writing seminar thingy. With slides! And handouts! Cool! And a reading list! Of which there are many books I haven't read so I can hit up the local libraries and try and grab them. Will probably have to hit Wokingham rather than my little local one though, as I've already burned through the interesting books that Lower Earley has!
Then there was the workshop portion, which showed how awake (not!) we all were. Basically, picking out the main elements for a new story. Some of the ideas were definitely a bit strange. (magical talking donkey!) But it did highlight how scarily intelligent both Chaz and Juliet are as they were picking out deep and meaningful themes behind lots of the ideas. (Oooch, did my head hurt!)
So, a little head hurty (I'm a simple soul!) but definitely fun. I'd totally go to a WF full day event if they did one.
I'm sure I've said it before, but Chaz Brenchley and Juliet McKenna are absolutely ace when they do things together and I could totally have listened to them talk on for longer. (Alas, the library time keeper hovered at the door, dead on 1pm so we had to be kicked out.)
So, it was mainly a creative writing seminar thingy. With slides! And handouts! Cool! And a reading list! Of which there are many books I haven't read so I can hit up the local libraries and try and grab them. Will probably have to hit Wokingham rather than my little local one though, as I've already burned through the interesting books that Lower Earley has!
Then there was the workshop portion, which showed how awake (not!) we all were. Basically, picking out the main elements for a new story. Some of the ideas were definitely a bit strange. (magical talking donkey!) But it did highlight how scarily intelligent both Chaz and Juliet are as they were picking out deep and meaningful themes behind lots of the ideas. (Oooch, did my head hurt!)
So, a little head hurty (I'm a simple soul!) but definitely fun. I'd totally go to a WF full day event if they did one.
10 November 2008
Nano day 10
Wordcount: 54,164!!! Do I hear a woot! :-) And also a woohoo! Virtual drinks all round.
Coincidentally, have reached the end of the Taurus plot. (Apart from those three chapters in the middle I've been avoiding. They're all basilicas, mithraeums and the University of Newcastle. Which means more than your basic flyby wiki research.)
So while I'm procrastinating over that, am straight on to Nano book number two. Title as yet not a clue, but it's a scifi thing with control freak A.I.s, survival horror hijinx on distant space stations and a motley crew of miscreants on a stolen ship who are constantly trying to find ways to stab each other in the back before the ship A.I. gets them all killed.
As yet, only twelve people have died so far. Well, unless you add the 4000 odd that carked it in one of the flashbacks. Still, the night is young.
Other nano stats - as far as general wordage goes, E:E is at number 10 worldwide. Top English region on that one.
However, we're not doing so well in the regional wordwars. Yesterday saw us at number 5, so I'm hoping we can claw our way upwards tomorrow...
In other news, procrastination being everybody's friend... saw Doomsday the other day. Goodness that was a lot of fun. Totally mad. Possibly improved by never having seen Escape to New York if the odd bit of online chatter is any judge. Except that there seemed to be a couple of scenes missing here and there which jumped the plot a bit. Use of music was cracking!
Also saw Wanted, which was better than the chatter allowed. A couple of naff bits, but some funky action sequences. Very weird listening to James McAvoy do the American accent. It's like listening to Daniel Craig in Tomb Raider 1 or Rosalind Pike and Karl Urban in Doom. There's just something totally wrong about the voice doing the accent. And is there something about changing accent that makes them all do it in deeper voices? Maybe that's where it gets disconcerting. Och well...
Coincidentally, have reached the end of the Taurus plot. (Apart from those three chapters in the middle I've been avoiding. They're all basilicas, mithraeums and the University of Newcastle. Which means more than your basic flyby wiki research.)
So while I'm procrastinating over that, am straight on to Nano book number two. Title as yet not a clue, but it's a scifi thing with control freak A.I.s, survival horror hijinx on distant space stations and a motley crew of miscreants on a stolen ship who are constantly trying to find ways to stab each other in the back before the ship A.I. gets them all killed.
As yet, only twelve people have died so far. Well, unless you add the 4000 odd that carked it in one of the flashbacks. Still, the night is young.
Other nano stats - as far as general wordage goes, E:E is at number 10 worldwide. Top English region on that one.
However, we're not doing so well in the regional wordwars. Yesterday saw us at number 5, so I'm hoping we can claw our way upwards tomorrow...
In other news, procrastination being everybody's friend... saw Doomsday the other day. Goodness that was a lot of fun. Totally mad. Possibly improved by never having seen Escape to New York if the odd bit of online chatter is any judge. Except that there seemed to be a couple of scenes missing here and there which jumped the plot a bit. Use of music was cracking!
Also saw Wanted, which was better than the chatter allowed. A couple of naff bits, but some funky action sequences. Very weird listening to James McAvoy do the American accent. It's like listening to Daniel Craig in Tomb Raider 1 or Rosalind Pike and Karl Urban in Doom. There's just something totally wrong about the voice doing the accent. And is there something about changing accent that makes them all do it in deeper voices? Maybe that's where it gets disconcerting. Och well...
05 November 2008
Nano day 5
Current word count - 32,193! Woot!
And even better, England: Elsewhere is number 2 in the UK regional word war!
Also, E:E is also number 8 worldwide as far as wordage goes, which can't be bad either... :->
Book number one, currently going by the name of Taurus is turning into quite a surprising beastie. The body count is up to 61 - 8 archaeologists, 13 named mercenaries, 22 unnamed mercs & associated support staff (do support staff count as mercs?) and 18 hedonistic party goers who picked the wrong island to park their boat at. Gosh, all this carnage is exhausting.
Still gutted about one of the surprise deaths. (Shut up. I know. It's only fiction.) He was such a nice boy too. He was going to end up married to his agent and everything.
But there was a last minute reprieve for the other one. It was very close though.
And also, one of the mercs who was definitely supposed to have died managed to crawl out alive too.
Cool! :->
Questions that have arisen:
Is a minotaur in a leopard print bikini a bit OTT?
And do you still call female minotaurs minotaurs?
And can they swim?
And how big a pack of minotaurs can you get away with before it starts getting ridiculous?
And also, could any of said pack hit the broadside of a barn with a decent gun or would the weird shaped heads screw up their aim?
And just how many explosions can one underground temple take before it makes an island cave in completely?
Enquiring minds need to know... :->
Over on Authonomy some brave peeps have uploaded the first 10,000 words of their Nano efforts. Rest assured, I won't be inflicting that on anyone with mine! Not until it's gone through at least three edits. Which is not going to be happening until next month at the very least.
Meantime, I've some more plot to find, and a mad panic to do the chapter outlines for the next potential one as I'm almost at the end of #1 and, dammit, there's a wordwar on!
And even better, England: Elsewhere is number 2 in the UK regional word war!
Also, E:E is also number 8 worldwide as far as wordage goes, which can't be bad either... :->
Book number one, currently going by the name of Taurus is turning into quite a surprising beastie. The body count is up to 61 - 8 archaeologists, 13 named mercenaries, 22 unnamed mercs & associated support staff (do support staff count as mercs?) and 18 hedonistic party goers who picked the wrong island to park their boat at. Gosh, all this carnage is exhausting.
Still gutted about one of the surprise deaths. (Shut up. I know. It's only fiction.) He was such a nice boy too. He was going to end up married to his agent and everything.
But there was a last minute reprieve for the other one. It was very close though.
And also, one of the mercs who was definitely supposed to have died managed to crawl out alive too.
Cool! :->
Questions that have arisen:
Is a minotaur in a leopard print bikini a bit OTT?
And do you still call female minotaurs minotaurs?
And can they swim?
And how big a pack of minotaurs can you get away with before it starts getting ridiculous?
And also, could any of said pack hit the broadside of a barn with a decent gun or would the weird shaped heads screw up their aim?
And just how many explosions can one underground temple take before it makes an island cave in completely?
Enquiring minds need to know... :->
Over on Authonomy some brave peeps have uploaded the first 10,000 words of their Nano efforts. Rest assured, I won't be inflicting that on anyone with mine! Not until it's gone through at least three edits. Which is not going to be happening until next month at the very least.
Meantime, I've some more plot to find, and a mad panic to do the chapter outlines for the next potential one as I'm almost at the end of #1 and, dammit, there's a wordwar on!
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