Thank you everyone for the v-gift snowflake cookies! You are all made of awesome.

This list comes to you courtesy of the adult TBR pile.




GREYWALKER, Kat Richardson. I bought this and then husband stole it from me. *sigh* But I hear it's great urban fantasy. Someday, I might get to find out if he ever gives it back!




HAPPY HOUR OF THE DAMNED, Mark Henry. Head over to Mark's LJ at mdhenry to help him save Amanda Feral.





THE ACTOR AND THE HOUSEWIFE, Shannon Hale. I'm really behind. Have been wanting to read Shannon's adult stuff for ages. Here's a little something off my usual paranormal/epic fantasy beaten path.




THE NAME OF THE WIND, Patrick Rothfuss. I used to love epic, and this would certainly have been my cup of tea way back when. Help him out in his Worldbuilders fundraiser, if you haven't already.




BITTER NIGHT, Diana Pharaoh Francis. I've been wanting to read this one for a while; I really liked Di's description of it when she told me about it at World Fantasy a couple years back.

So, there ya go. A few more books to add to your shopping list! Stay tuned for Part Tres, in which I'll suggest some YA titles I adore. :)

http://deweydivas.blogspot.com/2009/12/nyrb-challenge-13-another-christmas.html

Rock Crystal by Adalbert Stifter, translated by Marianne Moore and Elizabeth Mayer, is a perfect little gem of a holiday tale, unsentimental, and with no mention of Santa Claus. It is thus a book for all ages and even the most grinchly and cynical of readers.

On Christmas Eve two children, Conrad and Sanna, are travelling back from their grandparent's house when a sudden snowstorm hits, a blinding whiteness that "drew its ever narrowing circle about them, paling beyond into fog that came down in waves, devouring and shrouding everything till there was nothing but the voracious snow". They quickly get lost in the mountains but manage to find shelter for the night among some rocks. They stay awake - and thus alive - by drinking the strong coffee extract their grandmother had packed. The next day they are found by rescuers from both their own and their grandparents' villages.

It's a simple story but very beautifully told. Sifter has some wonderful descriptive passages, particularly of the glacier that the children end up crossing. It is unknown terrain that is equal parts magical (the children hear it moving and groaning in the night), and threatening with its hidden crevices lying below the snow. Its spectacular caverns of blue, "deeper and finer than the vault of heaven itself", co-exist with dangerous walls of jagged ice, "cracked and fissured, with innumerable meandering blue veins". The children remain optimistic but they go round in circles and simply can't find a way off the mountain in the storm. If you've ever been lost on a hike, you'll relate to the mixture of bravado and fear that Conrad feels as he tries to keep his younger sister safe. This is also a lovely tale of two isolated communities who view each other as strangers, until they come together to help find the missing children.

Read it now before global warming melts the glaciers into the stuff of fairytales.

Setting: modern, rural United States (The origin of the myth doesn't really matter though as long as it's something that could conceivably be found in a book.)

Searches: changeling, myth demon children, folklore demon children, demons possessing children, mythological creature trinkets

So, I've got an idea in my head for a creature and I want to know if it matches or comes close to any demons or creatures from myth or folklore. In the story, the creature takes the form of a young, autistic girl, and draws energy from another child through a trinket that the other child wears. The creature also has the ability to nudge people's minds to make them believe what she wants them too. (And, if it's relevant at all, the child wearing the trinket is immune to this power.)

My first thought was "changeling." Some of the information I found about changelings matches up (especially the autism), but I wanted to see if there was anything that matched better. Or, in case changeling most certainly doesn't match up well enough, if I should just make up a name for it.

Sorry if any of this is confusing. Let me know if I need to add more information. And thanks in advance!

Hello all! Back with a question.

I know a lot about the Louisville, Kentucky of today, and recently started a story set there. However, I ALSO started writing the back story of one of the characters, who was born in the late seventies/early eighties and grew up in Louisville in a poor, probably sketchy neighborhood, and preferably in one of those dinky shotgun houses that are all over Louisville (and pretty cute and gentrified now, though still relatively cheap to rent).

My problem is, I don't know enough about Louisville in the eighties and early nineties to say just where that neighborhood is. I know Germantown used to be pretty rough, and some people have told me that Bardstown Road and the waterfront were also not places you wanted to be after dark.

If anyone was living in Louisville from around 1985 to 1998, or knows anything that might help me out, I'd love to hear from you.

Thanks a bunch!

http://bowjamesbow.ca/2009/12/06/twenty-years-ag.shtml

Twenty years ago today, a young man walked into a classroom at the L’Ecole Polytechnique in Montreal, took out a gun, ordered all of the men to leave, and shot fourteen young women because they were “feminists”. The man’s name, of course, was Marc Lepine.

And while his act took place in Montreal, killed Canadians, and while it had a tremendous impact on Canadian policy, and while the murders of these fourteen women are being commemorated by Canadians across this country, it would be a mistake to call this just a Canadian event. Even on my twitter feed, I’ve encountered memorials to this event from people who aren’t Canadians. — from an American currently on a work visa in the United Kingdom; from an Australian; the list goes on. Throughout the world, men and women are remembering this event, expressing horror at what the hatred of one man can lead to, especially hatred against our sisters and mothers and daughters whose only crime is to want as good of a life for themselves as their brothers and fathers and sons enjoy.

It has been noted that while Marc Lepine’s name is now unfortunately almost a household word, the names of the women he killed have almost faded into obscurity. To commemorate this tragedy, it has been suggested that the names of those women be posted, so that they may live too. I shall do that here:

• Geneviève Bergeron (born 1968), civil engineering student
• Hélène Colgan (born 1966), mechanical engineering student
• Nathalie Croteau (born 1966), mechanical engineering student
• Barbara Daigneault (born 1967), mechanical engineering student
• Anne-Marie Edward (born 1968), chemical engineering student
• Maud Haviernick (born 1960), materials engineering student
• Maryse Laganière (born 1964), École Polytechnique budget clerk
• Maryse Leclair (born 1966), materials engineering student
• Anne-Marie Lemay (born 1967), mechanical engineering student
• Sonia Pelletier (born 1961), mechanical engineering student
• Michèle Richard (born 1968), materials engineering student
• Annie St-Arneault (born 1966), mechanical engineering student
• Annie Turcotte (born 1969), materials engineering student
• Barbara Klucznik-Widajewicz (born 1958), nursing student

And, from here, I have nothing more to say, because the rest of it has been said by John Baglow — you may know him better as Dr. Dawg. Read his post all the way through. He says everything that needs to be said about the vileness of the act, and the vileness of those who would downplay this event, and deny that we still have far to go to ensure that the rights of my daughters are as protected as my own rights.

Please forgive me for not replying to each comment individually. Let me say thank you all so much for the comments in my last post. And the info on Helen too. Everyone is extremely nice. I'm so flattered. XD

I was out all day and came back late. But I just had to give in to my muse at draw Helen. XD

( Eddis under cut... )( Read more... )
My next step is to try to draw them with more emotions, like Helen smiling, Attolia frowning, and Gen... being Gen. XDD

And I do wanna draw Costis. will need to extract his description out of the book when I have time.

To answer some of the questions in the last entry, yes, sometimes I color. I have an deviantart account here. But coloring takes time and energy which I can't afford right now. Whoever want to color my art (which I'll be thrilled), consider it a free game. ^_^

Whew~ that's quite long. Hope I didn't make too many horrible mistake with my English. ^^

It's meme time!

http://smartcanucks.ca/bookcloseouts-canada-take-an-additional-50-off-christmas-books/

http://smartcanucks.ca/?p=20380

Bookcloseouts is running a special on selected Christmas Books from now until December 11.  You can take an additional 50% off Christmas themed books.  It’s a great time to pick up some great stocking stuffers.   And don’t forget they have free shipping on all orders over $35 right now (coupon code: freeshipping password: bookcloseouts.com) and if you click through the SmartCanucks cash back section you can also get 7.2% back from your bookcloseouts purchases!

Remember that Bookcloseouts prices are in US dollars but they ship from Canada so there are no duty charges.

Click here to go shopping at Bookcloseouts.

One of the things I like best about the Christmas season is the music. As I'm one of the few people at church currently who play a keyboard instrument, that means I get to be involved in a lot of it. (There are people who play other instruments very, very well, but there aren't many places where say, a trombone really fits the atmosphere.) For the Christmas dinner this weekend, every group (men, women, youth, children) are doing a musical number. The Relief Society (women's organization) is singing What Child is This, accompanied the piano, as well as the violin. Musical talent is equally dispersed throughout the world, but not everyone reads music, so we got to teach people the harmony and then add the instrumentation. I'm lucky in that the violinist has been standing right next to me. It is a lovely song (esp. the version where the chorus has three different sets of lyrics, instead of repeating the first one). But that violin! I just want to crawl inside it! There was a cello playing with the choir at stake conference a couple months ago, and because I was playing organ I got to be near it, too, and I had the same reaction. That resinous wood sound--I just want to dive inside it and feel it all around me! I think there was a character in a Madeleine L'Engle book like that, who wanted to lie under the piano or organ or something, and feel the vibrations--The Young Unicorns, maybe? It's been a while since I read that one...

Then last night my girls and I (and PMB, whose life's mission is to play the organ--watch for him at a pipe organ near you in 20 years!) got out The Oxford Book of Carols, one of the best things anyone ever gave me for Christmas. Since everyone got the swine flu, it's taken a while to get our voices back, but finally we could sing! It was so nice. The best songs to me are the old traditional English ones (The First Nowell, What Child is This), and also the German ones (Es ist ein Ros' entsprungen). Oh, but the Latin ones are good, too, as are the macaronic ones (isn't that a lovely word? It means half in one language, half in another), like In Dulci Jubilo/Good Christian Men Rejoice. We tried the Czech ones for the sake of heritage, but I confess I can't read Polish or French very well. The letters don't say what I think they should say. But it was fun. I hope my kids keep liking music because I've always wanted to play the piano for my family and have them all get into singing. Not to go perform or anything, just to get into it for the sake of enjoyment. I just like to be in the middle of it, not just watching. Messiah sing-a-longs, for example = fantastic.

Dear Spam Overlords,

I am aware that it's been awhile since I've written a fic using subject lines from my spam folder. And yes, I realize that I occasionally look to the spam folder for advice, as if it were some sort of mythical Freudian psychic sage with a fetish for replica watches and hot singles, hopped up on viagra and c1alis.

But really. When I'm having trouble with my Ben Grimm fic wanting to be slashy, you give me this?

"If you had a larger thing in pants, your life would have been better."

a) He's big enough.
b) I'm not sure my life would have been, no, and
c) I'm choosing to interpret this as advice for Ben to keep his pants on, kthx.

Tripping on Vi@gra love,
tartanshell

http://www.kidliterate.com/2009/12/06/melissas-2009-favorites-part-one/

http://www.kidliterate.com/?p=399

I thought about doing a “best of,” but who am I to say that? Also,  the books I loved the most are not necessarily the BEST books of the year in some cases. I tend to rate highly on readability and sell-a-bility, being a bookseller.  Sometimes that coincides with the ones that are likely to win awards/are the highest form of literary genius etc, and sometimes it doesn’t. So: favorites.

These are in no particular order, and if I reviewed the book here earlier in the year, I’ll link to the review. And I probably won’t do more than two or three per post. Also: I’ve been asked to do some holiday gift recommendations, and the specific requests will be fulfilled in other posts, but I’ll put a little note at the end of each favorite to tell you who I think might like that book best.

Today: two picture books.

1. THE SLEEPY LITTLE ALPHABET by Judy Sierra, illustrations by Melissa Sweet.

This has been a huge hit in our house since the moment of publication as well as being a big success for me at work. The premise is that it’s time for all the little letters to be tucked into their beds, but a number of them aren’t quite ready. By the end of the book, though, they’re all snoring Z Z Zs. I know this entire book by heart, and I never get tired of reading it:

It’s sleepytime in Alphabet Town!
As moms and dads run round and round
the little letters skitter-skatter
helter-skelter. What’s the matter?

Uh-oh! A is wide awake!
And B still has a bath to take…

One by one they take us through the steps most kids go through at bedtime…F has got the fidgity wiggles; M is mopey; N is naughty; X expects a great big hug. And at the end of the book, they’re all tucked in to their own little beds with something that begins with their letter either tucked in with them or sitting on a nightstand beside them or something (L has a lamp; T has a teddy bear etc). This is an utterly charming read with lots to see in each lively picture.

We have been reading this to Molly since she was about 2 1/2 and she’s a little over 3 now and still loves it. I think it’s good for anyone from 2-4, and it also makes a great gift for new parents building a collection. Order THE SLEEPY LITTLE ALPHABET from an independent bookstore!

2. OTIS by Loren Long

Mr. Long wrote this as a sort of homage to books like MIKE MULLIGAN AND THE STEAM SHOVEL, and the influence and respect for Virginia Lee Burton and others like her are all over this book. Someday, I believe, OTIS will be remembered just as fondly as the books that inspired it.

Otis is a hardworking, joyful little red tractor who likes both his work and his playtime. He has a heart as big as the farm he lives on, which helps him to soothe a scared little calf to sleep with his gentle puff putt puttedly chuff. One day, however, the farmer shows up with a brand new big yellow tractor and Otis is put out to pasture. It will take a very bad day for the farmer to realize just how valuable Otis is (which of course he does).

I was lucky enough to be at an MBA breakfast where Mr. Long explained the origin of this book and showed slides of the art as it went through various color schemes. I had him sign my copy for Molly, and it has been a favorite in our house ever since. We can all be heard letting out the occasional putt puff puttedy chuff. It’s been just as big a hit at the store, too, appealing to a wide range of customers.

OTIS works for anyone who loves a good story. Molly has never shown any like for modes of transportation before; the story is the hook here rather than the fact that Otis is a tractor. She had just turned 3 when we started reading this. It’s long-ish, so this is good for a 3 who likes a long story, and also for 4s and 5s primarily. Order OTIS from an independent bookstore!

Hi guys!

I hope everyone is having a lovely day. And if you're not, I hope your day gets significantly better. I had been working on an icon batch for The Big Bang Theory, because a certain someone *cough* gidget_zb promised me fic if I did. So, I'm delivering something of a down payment here. And this has gotten long. I apologize.

teasers



the rest here @ sinequaicon

So this is speculation on Sophos 'Stache on the cover on CoK but its also SPOILERish 'cause it is based on something that someone who has read the ARC, but its a comment that been said also in another non-spoiler post. I haven't read the ARC, so its just speculation on my part and not spoilerish?

So I've put the speculation on Sophos 'Stache in the reply and not this post.

OKAY I just discovered the "Aoteoroa" music video by Minuit.



This may just be the best thing ever. It is certainly one of my favourite New Zealand music videos ever.

The pink and white terraces! Te Tiriti! The land marches! Kate Sheppard! Dame Whina Cooper! The Wahine disaster! No nukes! Māori flag! Stop the tour! Māori and English, equal rights! And then, oh gosh, there we all are, muddling through as best we can, with as much joy as we can muster, which is quite a lot.

(Also there is a dude with a tuatara on his arm. My feelings for tuatara are bountiful).

And I love the lyrics. Not saying, "yes, all this bad stuff happened but now it's over!" Can we undo what has been done? I think the video is pretty clear that we can't. No, we have sticks and stones and bruises, and you and me, we are a New Zealand. Not the New Zealand (and as the title/lyric divide demonstrates, perhaps not even a "New Zealand"). But look at us, there.

I am not terribly coherent, because I am extremely happy.

But! if you like things that are set in New Zealand, like this music video, or, say, Christmas stories, today is your very last day to sign up for a holiday story by moi. It is not as cool as this video, but it does include:

1) Delicious food

2) A recipe

3) Simply criminal levels of cuteness.

http://seema.org/2009/12/moooooooving-part-deux-so-vast-majority.html

Moooooooving, part deux

So the vast majority of the move was completed by 3 pm today, meaning I surrendered the other apartment. So all stuff was out and honestly, I turned it over cleaner than when I lived it. For example, I dusted the baseboards. Who knew baseboards could collect so much dust? Also, I found out that while dusting/cleaning my ceiling fans that the blades were made out of particle board painted white so all those fears I had of metal blades falling off a spinning fan and impaling me while I was innocently sleeping or watching television were clearly misplaced. Also, for those of you who remember this famous incident, I removed the last of the egg still stuck on the ceiling (disclaimer: I left it there as on purpose as a reminder of what shortcuts in the kitchen could end up).

The thing about moving is that you always have more stuff than you thought you did and I swear to god there's like this magic field around my old apartment, that every time I "emptied" a room, more stuff just magically appeared. It was insane. What's also true and very annoying is that when you're shifting things from one place to another, you're constantly moving things around, stumbling over them, and finding it just impossible to get stuff in the right place because you have to move thing A to make room for thing B but then thing A is blocking thing C. It's a vicious circle.

Also it got to the point that I thought that carrying groceries from the car was just like moving.

Right now I've got one bedroom that's basically impassable. The kitchen is an open plan, thank goodness, so only one entrance is impassable. The laundry room and front hall closet are now unblocked which is awesome because I was tripping over shoes and coats and also couldn't do laundry. It's a sign of progress that the living room is basically set up (including a very patriotic Christmas tree!) and that the bedroom and both bathrooms are clear and able to be used. And except for that one entry into the kitchen, the kitchen is fully functioning. Hopefully by Friday, the kitchen/foyer/dining room mess will be taken care of because company comes on Saturday.

The Story Siren is hosting a Debut 2010 Author Challenge. You can follow the link in that previous sentence for full details, and to sign up to participate, but here are the basics:

"The objective is to read a set number of YA (Young Adult) or MG (Middle Grade) novels from debut authors published this year. I'm going to challenge everyone to read at least 12 debut novels! ... You don’t have to list your choices right away, but if you do feel free to change them throughout the year. ... Anyone can join, you don’t need a blog to participate. If you don’t have a blog you can always share your views by posting a review on Amazon.com/BarnesandNoble.com/GoodReads/Shelfari, or any other bookish site. The challenge will run from January 1, 2010- December 31, 2010. You can join at anytime!" There are prizes up for grabs; more details at the Story Siren's blog.

I'm honored that several people have put The Secret Year on their challenge list, but even if you don't pick my book, I encourage you to participate. I've learned a ton by reading more than three dozen 2009 debut books this year. I can probably identify the cutting edge in YA/MG publishing now more than I could at any other time in my writing career, because the only books newer than what I've been reading are the books that haven't even made it to the ARC stage yet.

Another advantage to my own personal debut challenge was that I read books that I might not have read otherwise. I hadn't read a book about fairies (or faeries) in years, but R. J. Anderson's Spell Hunter and Cyn Balog's Fairy Tale both delighted me. I don't read much historical fiction, but Jenny Moss's Winnie's War took me back to the 1918 flu pandemic.

I don't upload this sort of thing very often, and I don't see myself doing it much in the future, but just for this post, here's a scrolling slideshow of some 2010 debut titles (from the Tenners) you might want to put on your challenge list. If trailers are more your thing, you can visit the Class of 2k10 website, which has a trailer of the Class of 2k10 books.

School Library Journal has an article on the 2010 Morris Award nominees, and it looks like they're planning some festivities at Midwinter this year!

I'm really excited about this, as it will be wonderful for all of the honorees to get together with the committee. I've been a little worried that the shortlist might have the effect of fostering a sense of "winner" and "losers," instead of the Medalist and Honorees of the other ALA awards... and that publishers might not publicize their honor books the same way. Those silver seals are too darn pretty to leave off!

Now we can get on with speculating about what everyone will be wearing in Boston in January...
(Me? I'll be in Kansas City in my pjs, watching the online telecast with everyone else!)