Orpheus and the Pearl

Nice review of the new edition over at Skull Salad! Check it out!

I like "strong emotional core" - that's what I try for!

Deathly Hallows, Part 1

Very good. I'm not sure what it would mean to someone who hadnt read the book. (I read the book several years ago and was still struggling to understand what exactly they were doing at any given point, or how it was logical for them to be running of to wherever.) Some people were saying how sad it was - but come on. The scene they're thinking of was pretty easy (and predictable, even if you hadn't read the book). And the crucial scene (I think the only one anywhere in the series that acknowledges the difficulties of our protagonists' triangular relation, and the only one where Ron shows any jealousy) was handled well. I think Rowling makes her teens WAY TOO chaste and innocent, so that scene has to be ramped up and vivid enough to carry the weight of what would be (I think) an overwhelming, constant tension if this were real life.

NEW D2L2 Cover!

Permuted's decided to standardize the covers for the three volumes of D2L! Here's the new cover for D2L2 and I think it looks cool! I can't wait to see the cover for D2L3!

Proofreading

My first pass through DL Snell's edits on DYING TO LIVE: LAST RITES is now done and sent back to him! I still like the story! A lot!

The Walking Dead

Sorry - I've been meaning to post about this, but it's been a crazy couple weeks with school and appearances and with taking the kids to their various activities.

Well, it's definitely gory enough for "regular" zombie fans, but other than the one scene last night of procuring the necessary gore to camouflage themselves, I don't think it'll gross out "regular" regular people. And the series follows the lead of the original very well, in making it not about fighting zombies: the zombies only very occasionally surface as an imminent threat for a couple minutes of fight and/or flight each episode. (They're a bit faster than I imagined them in the comic, but of course it'd be hard to gauge speed and agility there.) Other than that, it's the humans' variously dysfunctional relationships - and their occasional moments of kindness and compassion - that drive the viewers' interests. And that, to me, is one of the directions in which all zombie stories have to go if they're going to last more than 90 minutes. (Other directions would be comedy, or with zombies with rising intelligence so we could consider their point of view and begin to sympathize and/or wonder about what they're up to.)

So, it's a welcomed addition to the zombie genre, and a welcomed addition to the TV lineup.

Winner!

Congratulations to Kelly Brewer, who won a free copy of DYING TO LIVE: LIFE SENTENCE!