This is an amazing short story by Jeremiah Tolbert, published by Fantasy magazine.
I hope you'll take a read: it's insanely clever, well-written and full of epic geekery!
Thursday, 28 July 2011
You Have Been Turned into a Zombie by a Friend by Jeremiah Tolbert | Fantasy Magazine
You Have Been Turned into a Zombie by a Friend by Jeremiah Tolbert | Fantasy Magazine
Ghost Story is here...
Okay, so I may be a year late with the latest review, compared to other reviewers. But, I thought that publishing my review of Changes here, now, is an incentive to review Ghost Story which was released on July 26th.
I cannot wait to get my mitts on this latest book... I became enraptured by the series at around the mark where Changes was due to come out. Luckily I never had to wait between my fixes for the earlier books. Unfortunately, now I've caught up to Butcher.
What makes this worse is that I live in good old England, and without the conventions and book signings that I can go meet Jim and see him answer questions like the American fans, I have nothing to fill this time with.
Never mind. I shall be caught up in the wondrous world of the Dresden Files for the next week or so. Yay!
I cannot wait to get my mitts on this latest book... I became enraptured by the series at around the mark where Changes was due to come out. Luckily I never had to wait between my fixes for the earlier books. Unfortunately, now I've caught up to Butcher.
What makes this worse is that I live in good old England, and without the conventions and book signings that I can go meet Jim and see him answer questions like the American fans, I have nothing to fill this time with.
Never mind. I shall be caught up in the wondrous world of the Dresden Files for the next week or so. Yay!
Changes by Jim Butcher - A review
Changes is the twelfth book in the Dresden Files and is by far the most unpredictable and thoroughly enjoyable. Fans of the series will no doubt notice the change of title-style. Previous books in the Dresden Files have been titled with two words, each having the same number of letters; Storm Front, Dead Beat, Proven Guilty and White Night, for example. To take the title literally, the whole book is about change. Not only the title changes, but the characters and themes within the book are subject to a quick twist in the other direction; the plot itself twists almost as much as Chris Nolan’s latest mind-fuck of a film, Inception, does. There is no doubt that by the end of the book the reader’s emotions will be screaming for mercy – you will feel that a very part of your soul is missing until you can salve it with the next book, Ghost Story.
Changes in a nutshell: Changes is the best novel of the series, so far (and that’s important, because after this explosive book there’s no doubt that the series is only going to continue to blow our minds). It begins with the premise that Harry Dresden’s daughter has been kidnapped by the Red Court vampires – so far so horrifying. Red Court vampires may look sexy, alluring and wanton on the outside but on the inside their monstrous appearance is enough to turn anyone off. The strangest part is that Harry never knew his daughter existed. Susan Rodriguez, Harry’s ex-love and the mother of the child, never revealed it to him – until it was too late to stop them taking her. This tantalising opening pitches Harry, Susan and Martin (Susan’s operative partner in the Red Court-killing Fellowship of St Giles) into a race against time for clues in Chicago that will lead them to their stolen child.
To be honest with you, it’s very hard to find anything wrong with the book. This is not a result of any sort of ‘fandom’ that I may, or may not, be deluded by – I never let things like enjoying the previous books of a series influence how much I enjoy this book. I genuinely find it nigh on impossible to fault this book. The characters are superb, any writer would be half as lucky to have such interesting and entertaining characters populating their series’. The themes running throughout the book are interesting and some are unequivocally shocking in their execution – think about how far you would go to save your daughter from murderers and criminals – but that’s the beauty of the story, even though the protagonist is forced into a difficult choice, he remains true to his character that has been present right form the very beginning!
It’s safe to say that Jim Butcher has more than stepped it up a gear this time around and shows his true intentions with the series as a whole. The climax has some brilliant revelations and twists, each foreshadowed in previous books (as far back as the pre-novel chronology), and needless to say you will be stunned by some, if not all, of them. I was. To cap it all off Butcher ends the novel on a cliff-hanger of Epic proportions, capital E and everything.
As far as actual writing style goes, Jim stuck to his trademark adrenaline-rush action, laced with humour. He excellently balanced it in this book, even with the darker plot and tone. There are plot points which were left hanging, no doubt to be explained in the next book – Ghost Story.
Those readers who have had previous issues with his books will find no new charms to win them over, but anyone who doesn’t love the Dresden Files will be forever mired within the miasma of shit that passes for good fiction these days. Jim Butcher is writing a character driven, humour-laced, action packed urban fantasy series and he’s not making any apology for it and nor should he! Run, babbling and jumping like a madman, to your nearest bookstore and find out for yourself as to why this series is heralded as the Gold standard for all Urban Fantasy books.
Tuesday, 26 July 2011
Assassins and spies...
There's a couple of new posts over at my fiction blog: The Meandering Story.
I changed the style of the blog this time by posting something entirely from a new character's perspective, and with no entry from old Pyrelle. It's more of an actual scene from a story than a diary excerpt, too.
Enjoy.
I changed the style of the blog this time by posting something entirely from a new character's perspective, and with no entry from old Pyrelle. It's more of an actual scene from a story than a diary excerpt, too.
Enjoy.
Conflict, a writer's tool...
It's interesting how writers use conflict as a focus point for fiction, it's what drives a story forward... without it, it would be like trying to power an engine with water... a failure.
Would you rather read a story about how Dave and Molly live in their comfortable semi-detached house, with two kids running about, and two luxury sedans in the drive - in short, the ideal family? Or, how Will and Fiona have to move from town to town, city to city, always running, always dodging - because he gambled their last savings away and she is too much dependent upon him to lead a normal life?
Conflict. Most of us try our hardest to leave it out of everyday life; I mean, it can be a pain if every two minutes you have to argue with someone about something; your brother about going into your room and taking your possessions, again! For example.
Conflict is something that we, as people, try to escape from, but then use, as writers, to provide an unstable platform for our characters to stand on - something that will topple their world, down into the obscuring murk that lurks at the bottom of the shit heap. And then, we pile on a whole tonne of crap on top of their heads, for good measure. It's interesting! It makes the real people laugh, cry, love, hate, tell our friends, tell strangers, tell no one... it drives us to feel.
Up here, in the clouds of comfortable living. Up here, where the shit we put our characters through can't reach us. Up here, where we lie to ourselves.
Would you rather read a story about how Dave and Molly live in their comfortable semi-detached house, with two kids running about, and two luxury sedans in the drive - in short, the ideal family? Or, how Will and Fiona have to move from town to town, city to city, always running, always dodging - because he gambled their last savings away and she is too much dependent upon him to lead a normal life?
Conflict. Most of us try our hardest to leave it out of everyday life; I mean, it can be a pain if every two minutes you have to argue with someone about something; your brother about going into your room and taking your possessions, again! For example.
Conflict is something that we, as people, try to escape from, but then use, as writers, to provide an unstable platform for our characters to stand on - something that will topple their world, down into the obscuring murk that lurks at the bottom of the shit heap. And then, we pile on a whole tonne of crap on top of their heads, for good measure. It's interesting! It makes the real people laugh, cry, love, hate, tell our friends, tell strangers, tell no one... it drives us to feel.
Up here, in the clouds of comfortable living. Up here, where the shit we put our characters through can't reach us. Up here, where we lie to ourselves.
Tuesday, 19 July 2011
Four posts and an introduction...
So, I'm having a great time over on The Meandering Story, up to the fourth post that furthers the narrative... and it's reached one of the points where I feel that I don't want to write about, because it wouldn't make for great reading, and so I just skip it and jump forward by so many years. I can always come back to it later.
Writing in first person is actually quite a new experience for me, and so is writing in my own voice. I have written in third person limited for almost every story, because I thought that first person was too limiting... but having read some great novels in first person (the latest being Wuthering Heights) I've decided that it is the way to go, especially for particular genres.
The way that in first person, you can play with the narration so easily is enticing, I must say. It's like sliding a piece of coloured paper over a spot light, tinting the resulting light in another shade; being able to represent characters, situations and places through one character's eyes is a great tool to have at your disposal. In third person this is, as far as I can make my tired mind think, impossible to do.
Okay, time to sleep.
Hasta lugeo, amigos.
Writing in first person is actually quite a new experience for me, and so is writing in my own voice. I have written in third person limited for almost every story, because I thought that first person was too limiting... but having read some great novels in first person (the latest being Wuthering Heights) I've decided that it is the way to go, especially for particular genres.
The way that in first person, you can play with the narration so easily is enticing, I must say. It's like sliding a piece of coloured paper over a spot light, tinting the resulting light in another shade; being able to represent characters, situations and places through one character's eyes is a great tool to have at your disposal. In third person this is, as far as I can make my tired mind think, impossible to do.
Okay, time to sleep.
Hasta lugeo, amigos.
Monday, 18 July 2011
The Bronte Parsonage Museum
I took part in an English trip to the, as the title suggests, Bronte Parsonage Museum today. It's a really nice place, to be honest. Truly rural England at it's foremost best. Haworth is a tourist hotspot, if today can be any judge, and as such it has to look good - obviously.
A very nice lady, called Sue, from the museum gave us two lectures, one about the life of the Brontes in general, including the father, brother and two lesser known sisters; and another about Wuthering Heights in particular, because we are studying it for our second year.
The lectures were great, and I took plenty of notes - it's always handy to do that, as these erudite scholars are experts in their chosen fields and as such have some cracking quotes to include in essays. I didn't know anything, near enough, about the Bronte family before today, and definitely wasn't sure about the rest. Some interesting stuff there... for example, the sisters all published their first works under pseudonyms (because, let's face it, men were given more of the spotlight in those days) and they called themselves Currer, Ellis and Anton Bell; each respectively Charlotte, Emily and Anne.
Funnily enough, they were subject to much criticism when first published, and for Wuthering Heights in particular, got very bad criticism. However, in general, they were liked. Over the years, they have been very popular with the majority of the population, whilst critics have not been very impressed.
Also, I really like this bit: Charlotte first sent her novel The Professor to be published, but it was rejected, and Currer Bell was sent a nice rejection letter that had some great advice, "We don't like this, but you are very talented. Send us something more exciting!" And so, she did. Jane Eyre was sent to the same publisher and when he began reading it in the morning he couldn't put it down... and had to cancel his luncheon engagement, and carried on reading through the afternoon... and had to cancel his dinner engagements too! He finished reading the book and obviously decided to publish it straight away, with it actually getting published quicker than the other two novels. It became an instant success. I haven't read it, have you?
The museum is cool in other ways, for their bookshop has the Wordsworth Edition copies of the Bronte books and they actually own the copyright for them, and is allowed to sell them for £1.99 each! Actually amazing value. I bought Shirley and Villette, both by Charlotte - unintentionally, I might add. I wanted even more value for my money, so got the two longest ones there... I would have bought Jane Eyre if my friend hadn't picked the last one up!
Go visit, it's in Haworth.
A very nice lady, called Sue, from the museum gave us two lectures, one about the life of the Brontes in general, including the father, brother and two lesser known sisters; and another about Wuthering Heights in particular, because we are studying it for our second year.
The lectures were great, and I took plenty of notes - it's always handy to do that, as these erudite scholars are experts in their chosen fields and as such have some cracking quotes to include in essays. I didn't know anything, near enough, about the Bronte family before today, and definitely wasn't sure about the rest. Some interesting stuff there... for example, the sisters all published their first works under pseudonyms (because, let's face it, men were given more of the spotlight in those days) and they called themselves Currer, Ellis and Anton Bell; each respectively Charlotte, Emily and Anne.
Funnily enough, they were subject to much criticism when first published, and for Wuthering Heights in particular, got very bad criticism. However, in general, they were liked. Over the years, they have been very popular with the majority of the population, whilst critics have not been very impressed.
Also, I really like this bit: Charlotte first sent her novel The Professor to be published, but it was rejected, and Currer Bell was sent a nice rejection letter that had some great advice, "We don't like this, but you are very talented. Send us something more exciting!" And so, she did. Jane Eyre was sent to the same publisher and when he began reading it in the morning he couldn't put it down... and had to cancel his luncheon engagement, and carried on reading through the afternoon... and had to cancel his dinner engagements too! He finished reading the book and obviously decided to publish it straight away, with it actually getting published quicker than the other two novels. It became an instant success. I haven't read it, have you?
The museum is cool in other ways, for their bookshop has the Wordsworth Edition copies of the Bronte books and they actually own the copyright for them, and is allowed to sell them for £1.99 each! Actually amazing value. I bought Shirley and Villette, both by Charlotte - unintentionally, I might add. I wanted even more value for my money, so got the two longest ones there... I would have bought Jane Eyre if my friend hadn't picked the last one up!
Go visit, it's in Haworth.
Saturday, 16 July 2011
The Meandering Story...
I started a new blog for a collection of fiction pieces which are all the same "story" as it were, but from different character viewpoints in (probably) each post.
It can be found here.
The introduction has been posted, where I tell you my purpose for writing it, and I shall post a link to each new addition to the story on here.
It can be found here.
The introduction has been posted, where I tell you my purpose for writing it, and I shall post a link to each new addition to the story on here.
Monday, 11 July 2011
Those inescapable feelings of excitement, worry and impatience...
Here I am, sat at 3:20 in the morning, writing a blog post because I feel crap about not writing for ages.
Loads of great things have happened recently, and most excitingly I went down to Bangor, in Wales, on the 2nd of July for an Open Day at Bangor University. I've been looking at one of their courses (Creative and Professional Writing) for a while now, and I was finally able to actually talk to someone from the Uni and see what they had to say on the subject... not to mention speaking to the English school (as opposed to the Creative Studies school) and asking them their views on the English with Creative Writing course. He (the lecturer from the English school) wasn't very good at that, and the lecturer for Creative and Professional Writing was much more open to my questions, giving me as much detail as she could - comparing the courses in an objective and very helpful way.
I actually started the application process for UCAS and University the other week, and I have already put Bangor down as one of my options, and UCAS reminded me of the need for a portfolio of work (not that I needed much reminding, it says so on the university site). This portfolio will be the source of some stress, I'm sure. When I asked, she seemed to only need a small amount of my writing, to demonstrate my ability to write coherently apparently, and nothing larger than 500 words.
Yet... that is awfully small.
I've written 14,000 plus words in my eventually-will-be-a-novel, Exile, already and the one short story I've completed to an... acceptable standard is around 4,500 words. I've got a review that's around 1,600; a flash fiction piece with an interesting style and voice, around 300 words...
Argh, what do I choose? Which is the best of my work? Do they want examples of poetry, too? If so, I hope they enjoy free-form poems, as the only structured ones I have are "emo" haiku, which were amusing to write but totally tongue-in-cheek and definitely not what I want my first impression to be.
Is my first impression supposed to show that I have a natural talent for this kind of thing? Or, is it designed to highlight areas that I need to develop in, and therefore warrant a three-year course studying the art of writing, both creatively and professionally?
Which then brings me to: Do they want an example of fiction and non-fiction?
Fortunately, I did ask about the department attitudes towards genre fiction (science-fiction and fantasy to us, normal, folks; as opposed to those high-and-mighty literary types) and she, thankfully, replied in the affirmative towards receiving it gladly and joyfully. She mentioned that an awful lot of sci-fi was written in the department, and that they, and I quote, "love it".
Then again, she did say I could e-mail questions to her... but I feel that asking her a question as simple as "how far above that word limit can I go?" at this very early, yet amazingly important, stage could be dangerous. In a non-lethal, non-threatening to my person, way.
Oh dear.
It's now 3:43, 3:44... I want another cup of Glengettie tea and I'll watch some Friends before sleeping.
In case you're wondering, and can't see the link... I'm excited about going to University at Bangor (I really, really want to go to Bangor...), I'm worried that I won't get accepted or get the grades I need once I have been accepted, and thirdly I am impatient at the time it is taking for me to receive my AS results. Dammit, peoples, I need to know how I did!
Also... do I drop a subject that is the source of so very many debates and discussions on extremely interesting topics, just to make the others easier? I can see advantages, and disadvantages....
I need three Bs at A Level to get the maximum needed UCAS points for most of the courses I've looked at, including Bangor. I am currently studying four subjects... but I can imagine very easily that I did horribly in my Philosophy and Ethics papers (one qualification) and I do not want to continue it for the second year. They might not let me.
I'm rambling!
So, to recap:
Excited: University!
Worried: Accepted for a place and grades?
Impatient: Need to know my grades.
AdÃos amigos, hasta luego.
Loads of great things have happened recently, and most excitingly I went down to Bangor, in Wales, on the 2nd of July for an Open Day at Bangor University. I've been looking at one of their courses (Creative and Professional Writing) for a while now, and I was finally able to actually talk to someone from the Uni and see what they had to say on the subject... not to mention speaking to the English school (as opposed to the Creative Studies school) and asking them their views on the English with Creative Writing course. He (the lecturer from the English school) wasn't very good at that, and the lecturer for Creative and Professional Writing was much more open to my questions, giving me as much detail as she could - comparing the courses in an objective and very helpful way.
I actually started the application process for UCAS and University the other week, and I have already put Bangor down as one of my options, and UCAS reminded me of the need for a portfolio of work (not that I needed much reminding, it says so on the university site). This portfolio will be the source of some stress, I'm sure. When I asked, she seemed to only need a small amount of my writing, to demonstrate my ability to write coherently apparently, and nothing larger than 500 words.
Yet... that is awfully small.
I've written 14,000 plus words in my eventually-will-be-a-novel, Exile, already and the one short story I've completed to an... acceptable standard is around 4,500 words. I've got a review that's around 1,600; a flash fiction piece with an interesting style and voice, around 300 words...
Argh, what do I choose? Which is the best of my work? Do they want examples of poetry, too? If so, I hope they enjoy free-form poems, as the only structured ones I have are "emo" haiku, which were amusing to write but totally tongue-in-cheek and definitely not what I want my first impression to be.
Is my first impression supposed to show that I have a natural talent for this kind of thing? Or, is it designed to highlight areas that I need to develop in, and therefore warrant a three-year course studying the art of writing, both creatively and professionally?
Which then brings me to: Do they want an example of fiction and non-fiction?
Fortunately, I did ask about the department attitudes towards genre fiction (science-fiction and fantasy to us, normal, folks; as opposed to those high-and-mighty literary types) and she, thankfully, replied in the affirmative towards receiving it gladly and joyfully. She mentioned that an awful lot of sci-fi was written in the department, and that they, and I quote, "love it".
Then again, she did say I could e-mail questions to her... but I feel that asking her a question as simple as "how far above that word limit can I go?" at this very early, yet amazingly important, stage could be dangerous. In a non-lethal, non-threatening to my person, way.
Oh dear.
It's now 3:43, 3:44... I want another cup of Glengettie tea and I'll watch some Friends before sleeping.
In case you're wondering, and can't see the link... I'm excited about going to University at Bangor (I really, really want to go to Bangor...), I'm worried that I won't get accepted or get the grades I need once I have been accepted, and thirdly I am impatient at the time it is taking for me to receive my AS results. Dammit, peoples, I need to know how I did!
Also... do I drop a subject that is the source of so very many debates and discussions on extremely interesting topics, just to make the others easier? I can see advantages, and disadvantages....
I need three Bs at A Level to get the maximum needed UCAS points for most of the courses I've looked at, including Bangor. I am currently studying four subjects... but I can imagine very easily that I did horribly in my Philosophy and Ethics papers (one qualification) and I do not want to continue it for the second year. They might not let me.
I'm rambling!
So, to recap:
Excited: University!
Worried: Accepted for a place and grades?
Impatient: Need to know my grades.
AdÃos amigos, hasta luego.
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