subdee

Finished after three days of scary obsessiveness. I thought I was getting an amusing game about gay lawyers with tragic backstories and was surprised to learn that what I'd actually gotten was social commentary. ( SPOILERS )

My final thought is that Phoenix Wright is my hero. XD No seriously.

Also, for the record, it's Gumshoe/Edgeworth. "Close working relationship," is that what they're calling it these days? Fandom is really letting me down here XD. Why the insistence on Wright/Edgeworth (or Edgeworth/Wright)?! Shipping these two together is crazy talk in the face of OVERWHELMING CANONICAL SUBTEXT I AM TELLING YOU.

CANIS HAVE YOU SEEN THE LATEST TSUBASA CHAPTERS

IT'S CLOVER + LOVELESS

FOR THE WIN.

And I feel like if I post a spam entry, the world will end, so here, have some reviews.

( Ursula K. LeGuin, Earthsea )
( A Scanner Darkly )

Specialized pronunciation meme! Occasionally on the internet you run across phrases you may never use offline -- that don't even have meaning offline. ( How do you pronounce these things? )

I realized I shouldn't spam people who just want to read fanfic with endless nattering, indecipherable notes, and the books I am reading for class...so of course I am spamming the flist with them instead, XD. Scroll past if you've seen this already.

Research: Victorian Ghost Stories. One thing you notice is that they tend to be written in the first person -- or else, like Kipling's, detached third. There's no limited third and barely any omniscient third. I think this is because in order for something to be truly frightening, it has to be outside the understanding of the reader. First-person keeps the reader's viewpoint confined while still giving a sense of "being there" but I actually thought the detached perspective Kipling used was scarier. When you can't see into anyone's head it's like peering into an alien landscape. Though really, as much as the writing this comes from the Menace of India thing he has going on, so I shouldn't praise him too much.

Anyway, what pulls you into the story with Kipling isn't the POV, but the way he describes the atmosphere -- you call feel the heat and humidity.

Why are my ideas for Jojo all so HARD.

Part 1: Victorian Ghost Story
Part 2 (aftermath): Kafka in Argentina
Part 2 (aftermath): Politics of Urban Redevelopment
Part 4: Bakemono Hijinx
Part 6: Existential Vignettes
Part 7: Cowboys vs. Indians...sort of. More like national myth-building. The Steel Ball Run (the race) is part of the American narrative of expansion, it's a statement that says that the United States now extends from one end of the continent to the other. It's like the transcontinental railroad (built in 1869; SBR is set in 1890), staking a claim to the land so that you can push the Indians off. What Araki does is tell the story of America the way American themselves tell it (for proof SEE POCOLOCO).

This kind of ties into:

( The End of Victory Culture, Tom Engelheart )

P.S. Tari, I just got your card! ^^; Or actually, I just found your card, in a pile with other unopened mail from before the holidays. OMG JONATHAN/DIO, YOU ARE AWESOME, THANK YOU SO MUCH.

( Year in Fic Meme )

Total = 31909. I didn't write much this year. XD; Actually that's not true, I wrote a lot of book reports and school essays. Anyway what you can see from this list is that I am most productive when I have a lot of free time, and write nothing (or hardly anything) when I am in Michigan concentrating on school or depressed. March was a relatively full month by way of being a release of pent-up creativity (aha), while the frustration of October and November drove me to write something, anything, in December. -_- Being a reason for why the December fics (and Type B Orchestra) aren't very good. My goal for this year is to increase my stamina (stop posting things I'm not happy with just because I am too lazy to work on them some more) and to finish a few original things.

High-level considerations typed in a comment to petronia:
It's admirable. I gave up thinking about my writing on that level months ago. ^^; It wasn't getting me anywhere. I'm still at the point where what I need to do to improve is WRITE MORE and quit posting half-finished things just because I am bored with them. At this point I have to approach every story on its own terms.

...Right now what I'm trying to do is make sure every story concludes in a way that ties together its emotional heart, not just the action, while also not being TOTALLY unsubtle and clumsy. It's what I've been trying to do all along but I think I've been missing the mark lately. At the same time I don't want to hide the strings too much; I think people like the fact that the strings are visible.

Currently working on the entry for holmesian (yes I know it's due today). Debating what to write afterward -- there's the MoSH fic and Chandelier to finish, Call Me Anytime, Soubi-and-Yuiko fic, Mushishi fic, Death Note where I try to actually write like a sociopath. Leaning toward this last one. Further down the line there's the multi-chapter Hunter x Hunter; I think I need to start this in a month when I'm not doing anything else, fandom-wise (February?).

Doesn't this sound like a yaoi manga? ( Cut )

From A Bigamist's Daughter by Alice McDermott. What's disturbing isn't the book as such but reviews on the back that say things like "McDermott's novels are like family albums, each scene hazy with the faded light of history, nostalgic as faded Polaroids." Is the reviewer READING THE SAME BOOK I AM READING? The one where the main character automatically dismisses ugly people, imagines everyone naked, is furious at her mother for changing her haircut? I picked up this book after reading Child of My Heart and wondering if no one else thought it was creepy that the main character in that book could accidentally let a child die and not feel remorse. All the reviews said things like it was a touching and poignant view of childhood. So I wondered, am I hallucinating the fact that the author is a well-adjusted sociopath? ( Read more... )

And while I am baring my soul to the world, here's a meme I've wanted to do for a long, long time, but didn't because I thought it would be arrogant:

Introduce Yourself! Tell me
1. Something about yourself,
2. Where you met me,
3. Why you friended me or vice versa,
4. What kind of entries you enjoy seeing here, and
5. What you wish I would post more of.

Posting this meme is like admitting that there are people on my friendlist I don't know personally. XD; it's true, but I didn't want to admit it because I wanted to live in a happy imaginary place where I am completely approachable and read everyone's journals and always reply promptly to comments. So please, just...fill out the meme. ^^; Unless you'd rather not.

Small linkblog: Livejournal Etiquette. Maybe we should write a guide to behavior. And then we could sell it for lots of money (built-in audience -- 2 million and counting!) and everyone could go back to doing exactly what they'd been doing before. XD. Anyway, this is hilarious though I obviously don't agree with the rule on introductions. Sometimes it's hard to come up with something worthy to say, and people who don't comment should be just as welcome to read a journal as people who do. It would also be hypocritical of me to ask for them -- I used to always introduce myself, but lately I haven't always bothered, particularly in cases where the person has a lot of other readers and I am unlikely to be friended back.

I should really finish this essay, if for no other reason so that I can write for holmesian with a clear conscience. January 5th is a Friday, thank God. I have two scenarios in mind but I'll probably just write the easy one.

worldserpent asked if you have to be smart to write a character who is smart, or a poet to write a character who is a great poet. No more than you have to be a detective to write a character who is a great detective, I think. In the case of holmesian I am starting with the Key -- the one (semi-obscure) fact the detective will use to solve the crime -- and building a mystery around it. I'm not as smart as the detective, but because I'm working in reverse, I can fake it. Probably.

As an author, you have a huge advantage over the characters, because you get to dictate the circumstances of the story -- create a world in which the actions of other characters reinforce the gennnnnius of a resident artist, or the set-up itself does, or where the focus is elsewhere and you can cheat or shortcut your way around showing anything explicitly. It's the Bill and Ted effect. XD Bill and Ted are the ones with the Time Machine, so they're the ones who can, after everything is over, go back in time one week ago to rig the metal cage that will fall from the rafters to trap the bad guy.

The other main factor to this is how smart -- or poetry-enabled -- your readers are. I think it's safe to say that an author can generally fool readers who are at the same "level" or lower, plus as many other readers as don't mind being fooled. After all there are plenty of people, even critical people, who are willing to play along.

This is old news but ties in so neatly that I can't resist linking: Ohba/Obata dialogue from Death Note 13. Note, spoilers!

( Comments, mostly running to OHBA IS A FREAK OH MY GOD )

I also caught the first 10 episodes of the Death Note anime. It's really good. ^^; The anime is almost exactly the same as the manga -- I even recognize specific panels -- but tighter, somehow. The author had a vision for the manga but didn't always succeed with it, whereas the people making the anime know where the story is headed, and have more experience and more time, and they're fixing it up. I think? Anyway, the production values are really high, and the fan translators doing the subs are better than the fan translators who did the scanlations.

( More )

Annnnd this entry is long enough. Next time: Earthsea, Island, The Good Shepard, Kazuo Ishiguro and other holiday book and movie purchases.