Speaking of reviews, FLORA'S DARE hits the big-time with a shout-out in Salon.

To wit:

"Flora's Dare" by Ysabeau S. Wilce

From THE CALIFA POLICE GAZETTE...sailing to Byzantium since 852

In the New York Times today, David Gessner muses on trying to balance the writing life with the working life. He's trying to do both, though teaching creative writing may not be as detrimental to the writing life as say, working as an insurance agent.

Certainly, Sieur Gessner makes an excellent point when he says: "After all, there’s something basically insane about sitting at a desk and talking to yourself all day, and there’s a reason that writers are second only to medical students in instances of hypochondria. In isolation, our minds turn on us pretty quickly."

On the other hand, descending into this sort of insanity is a necessary part of the creative process (so believe I), so if one does not have the luxury of disappearing into one's work, it can be difficult to make progress. As many others have pointed out, writing is the act narcissistic act, the act of a megalomaniac, and neither of those qualities tend to be conducive to being a good employee.

Yet, most writers do need to work just to eat, and to get out into the real world to avoid disappearing into their imaginary worlds, and that's not a bad thing. Believing that one is too focused and tormented to hold down a job is not necessarily the best way to approach one's discipline. And in the end, being a successful writer (published or not) is all about the discipline. It is discipline that turns a scribbler into a writer.

I've had jobs and written at the same time, but my out-put is better when I'm only working on books. Currently, I'm lucky, as writing is my only job. That's about to change, and I'm worried about being able to do big jobs at the same time. But one thing about discipline--it can be cultivated, so right now I'm trying like mad to grow some!

From THE CALIFA POLICE GAZETTE...sailing to Byzantium since 852

Reviews of FLORA'S DARE are starting to trickle in, and I'm tickled to say that they are so far pretty positive.

I'm particularly pleased that several of these reviews have picked up on aspects of the book not normally commented on by readers--world-building, or the characterization of Flora's parents, etc. Of course it's lovely when people love the story, but even more lovely when they notice all the nit-picky stuff you really sweated over, but which often recedes into the background--and you can't tell if anyone noticed at all.

Anyway, here are two reviews to wet your whistle:

The Rush that Speaks LJ

SCI FI.Com

From THE CALIFA POLICE GAZETTE...sailing to Byzantium since 852

So, FLORA'S DARE is finally available in fine bookstores near you, as well on Amazon.

I would be remiss if I didn't point out that this fine book would make an excellent house-warming, birthday, anniversary, get-well, graduation, or baby gift.

Buy soon and buy often!

From THE CALIFA POLICE GAZETTE...sailing to Byzantium since 852

Just in:

KIRKUS REVIEWS

August 1, 2008 issue

FLORA’S DARE: How a Girl of Spirit Gambles All to Expand Her Vocabulary, Confront a Bouncing Boy Terror, and Try to Save Califa from a Shaky Doom (Despite Being Confined to Her Room)

"Fourteen-year-old Flora Nemain Fyrdraaca ov Fyrdraaca thought everything would get better when her father’s sanity returned after her adventures in Flora Segunda (2007). Instead, he’s turned into a slave driver, making Flora wash dishes, dust her bedroom and study, study, study. Flora wants to find someone who can teach her magical Gramatica, but when an enormous tentacle attacks her out of a dance-club toilet, she’s drawn back into her city’s intrigues. Earthquakes, rebellion and a giant squid threaten Flora’s home, best friend Udo has been possessed and perfect sister Idden has gone AWOL. Flora and Udo are hilarious protagonists in a crackpot setting: While Udo zombifies bandits while wearing lip rouge and frock coats, Flora swims through the magical Current with sexy Lord Axacaya. Many fantasy novels have spunky heroines who challenge traditional gender roles; Flora’s world doesn’t so much subvert gender as find our received notions completely irrelevant to its own society’s complex mores and culture. This fresh and funky setting is rich with glorious costumes, innovative language and tantalizing glimpses of history. (Fantasy. 12-15)"

From THE CALIFA POLICE GAZETTE...sailing to Byzantium since 852

So about a month ago, I finally finished reviewing the galley's of FLORA'S DARE, the next segment of Flora Fyrdraaca's big adventure. Galleys are now gone to the place there galleys go to grow into real books, and so officially FLORA'S DARE is done. Finito. Finished. Over. Done.

And I have to say that I feel pretty good about it, over-all. Of course, there are always those moments where you think: I Suck, the Book Sucks, the World Sucks, whydidieverthinkthiswasagoodidea, and then you mope around in woe and trouble deaf heaven with your bootless cries, and etc. I had a few of those moments during the writing of FLORA'S DARE, but they were few, and their memory has now faded, and I am happy with the finished result. I think it is MUCHO MUCHO better than FLORA SEGUNDA, for one thing, which is a great relief. It's always a huge worry that your second book will not be as good as your first, but I'm not worried about that at all. Poor FLORA I really got put through the mill, was rewritten umpteen times, and suffered from being cobbled together--and in places, the scars show. FLORA II came out in a much more cohesive manner, and only had to be revised once, and had no cobbling.

I did end up rewriting the last 50 pages in 36 hours when I had one of those last minute brilliant ideas, but that worked out in the end too, and I'm pretty happy. I hope everyone who reads the final result will be pretty happy too. Book is scheduled for September 1st...

Oh and I can't remember if I ever officially announced the title change, so I shall do so now. For ages, I had been called the book FLORA REDUX, but the Publisher Powers that Be weren't so keen on that title, so I went back to the title board and finally came up with:

Flora's Dare: How a Girl of Spirit Gambles All to Expand Her Vocabulary, Confront a Bouncing Boy Terror, and Try to Save Califa from a Shaky Doom (Despite Being Confined to Her Room)

Nicely long and unwieldy, huh? I aim to please.

From THE CALIFA POLICE GAZETTE...sailing to Byzantium since 852

In my long Period of Silence, I have been lax about chortling over two huge honours that FLORA SEGUNDA has recently received.

One, of course, is the nomination for the Andre Norton Award, given out annually by the voting membership of the Science Fiction and Fantasy Writers of America. I'm in supremely good company here, for the other nominees include Sarah Beth Durst, Steve Berman, Nnedi Okorafor-Mbachu, and Rex Adam. The award, which is specifically for young adult fantasy and science fiction, has only been around for two years, but it's the only award out there that targets the YA SF&F audience, so it's a great honour to be nominated.

Also a great honour was FLORA SEGUNDA making the James Tiptree Award Honours List. The Tiptree Award is given out specifically for books that explore or expand our concepts of gender. Since gender is one of my compelling interests, and exploration of gender is one of my driving forces--and an important aspect of my writing. I think about gender construction constantly when I write, and constantly as I world build, and it pleases me greatly that the Tiptree Jury recognized this!

From THE CALIFA POLICE GAZETTE...sailing to Byzantium since 852

Finally, FLORA SEGUNDA has been shrunk and rewrapped and is now available in paperback. For reasons that I can't quite determine, it doesn't come up on Amazon if you search under either my name or the book's title, but it's in the great Amazon database somewhere, and so hopefully those who need to find it will find it.

The cover looks much cooler in real life; tho' I liked the hardback cover well enough, I have to admit to some pleasure that Crackpot Hall, rather than Madama Flora, is now the focus, and ever-so gothic-y, too!

I got some super happy blurbs, from super fab people, including Diana Wynne Jones, Kelly Link, Charles de Lint and The New York Times.

Woo!

From THE CALIFA POLICE GAZETTE...sailing to Byzantium since 852

I've lived in a couple of punk houses in my time, and tho' none of them were quite as punk rock as those l the punk houses described in this New York Times article, they had their charms.

There was the Fortress of Ultimate Darkness, in which we fought a never-ending battle against giant attacking cockroaches, and there were impromptu punk rock jam sessions in the basement. There was a giant Led Zeppelin collage in the bathroom which I guess isn't very punk rock, but was very cool. Also, there were monkeys. At one point we had an infamous punk rockstar living behind a curtain in the laundry room (cheap rent)...

And then there was the All Girl House where no man was allowed to set foot, and no meat was allowed in the kitchen, and we painted Viking runes on the walls of the enclosed porch, and the giant red bathroom which I have written about earlier, and the hallway full of bikes. This house was in such a bad neighbourhood that you could only leave the house at night in groups, which was a super big drag, but the rent was cheap. It also had no heat, and so we used to sit in front of the open oven when it got really cold, which, in retrospect, was probably not so very smart. I was standing in the kitchen of the All Girl House when I heard on the news that Kurt Cobain had killed himself...

Tho' the Times article sticks only to punk houses, of course, there ain't nothing more punk rock than living in a tent. There was the time I lived with various members of the Horses of Instruction, down by the China Basin pig processing plant in a punk shebang made out of flour sacks and a leather duster that I kipped from the cloakroom of the Blue Duck. It's a hard call to say who was grubbier--the pigs or the band, and that part of the basin has a tendency to flood when it rains, so it was awfully damp. The band's drummer finally set the shebang on fire trying to make chile brownies (lesson: clean the soot out of your stove-pipe!). After that, me and the leather duster (I think it might have been an old duster of impenetrability because it didn't burn) moved to a room over the Mono Real where I was working as a pot-girl at the time. This room was small, and smelled of always as coffee, but at least it was dry and it didn't also contain a ten piece band and a praterhuman drummer that spit sewage.

From THE CALIFA POLICE GAZETTE...sailing to Byzantium since 852

Speaking of Devices & Desires, the first volume in K.J. Parker's Engineer Trilogy--well, it's really good and I highly recommend it. Paul Witcover recommended it to me months ago; I bought off Amazon UK because it wasn't then available in the US (now there's a very stylish trade paperback out), but it sat in my Pile while I finished FLORA'S DARE.

Now FLORA'S DARE is gone from my hands and I've been making good inroads into the Pile, and Devices & Desires has been devoured, dispatched and much enjoyed. It's high fantasy, but with a twist--instead of being founded on magic, the Obligatory Evil Empire has been founded on a system of technology so arcane and complicated that it might as well be magic, tho' as far as my paltry engineering knowledge tells me, said engineering is all quite real world. There is no magic at all--no wizards, no witches, etc., just artisans, craftsmen, and--hunters. The Non Obligatory Evil Empire is very medieval in tone--or at least, idealized medieval, operating within a chivalric code that probably didn't actually exist outside of literature. At first thought, one would think that pitting these two vastly different societies--one tres gallant, the other very Big Blue, wouldn't work but it does. Very well. Very originally well. Yeah, saying a fantasy book is stunningly original is a bit of a cliche--and hardly ever actually true--but I think that in this case the claim is well made. I've not read such an unfantastic fantasy book in a long time, if possibly ever. And I mean that nicely, as a good thing. High fantasy is not my thing normally but this book--high fantasy--is just my thing.

Clearly the author knows lots about systems engineering and the art of courtly love and makes good use of the details for these two sports. Should you be worried that the characters get lost in this shuffle, no fear. There's lots of shifting points of view, usually coming back to the same five characters. And although none of these characters are instantly compelling, they all quietly grow on you until you find yourself really caring what happens to them. They have a certain modernity to their speech which should be jarring in a high fantasy book--people are told to "buzz off" for example--but somehow that isn't jarring at all. In fact, the casual language is a refreshing change from the normal high-faultin' medievally language usually found in this genre.

In fact, I would say that about the series as a whole--it is deceptively quiet--at first it feels as though maybe not much is happening action-wise and that there's too much introspection and exposition on mechanical matters. You don't feel bored, but you don't feel compelled either--but you keep reading and then suddenly you realize you've been totally sucked in and can't wait to find out what happens next.

I'm in the middle of Evil for Evil, volume 2 of the series, and am trying to pace myself. Each book is 700 pages long--that seems like a LOT but you'd be amazed how quickly those pages fly by. I'm in danger of running out of book before I run out of travel.

Oh, and did I mention one of the most deviously evil bad guys to come along in a long long time...?

From THE CALIFA POLICE GAZETTE...sailing to Byzantium since 852

Are these two books I see before me...Their spines towards my hand...Come, let me clutch them--

And in clutching them, I become annoyed. Viz.:

So I have two big fat mass market paperback books in front of me. One of them is the UK paperback edition of Devices & Desires by KJ Parker (Published by Orbit). The other shall remain anonymous (because what I am about to complain about is not the author's fault) but it's published by a major US publisher. Both books are approximately the same number of pages: 700 plus.

But there the similarities end.

D&D has a nice matte cover, made of nubby parchment looking paper, mostly covered with words, with a small line drawing to illustrate. In width it's probably about 4-5 inches thick. That's pretty thick, but the paper is nice and sturdy and the spine is good, and so it's easy to open and easy to read.

The US book is also 700 pages, plus, but it's only about two inches thick. This is because the interior pages are so thin they are practically newsprint, and the spine is weak. This book may be the best fantasy novel EVER, and in fact, it was nominated for A Major Award--but I can't read it. I tried, but the paper was so flimsy that it was hard to turn, and the ink smudged. All of these annoyances kept throwing me out of the story--and finally I gave up. Which I realize is dreadfully unfair to the poor writer who had no control over any of these issues...but....

Now I understand that probably there wee some cost issues involved the choices that the US publisher made. The book retailed for 6.99 which is about average for a mass market paperback, and the cover was embossed and foiled, which I guess cost more, and which I suppose is supposed to attract readers--but then what is the point of attracting readers if the book is unreadable?

Well, maybe I'm just dainty in my desire to have non-blurry type and non-flimsy paper, and a binding that won't crack. And willing to pay a dollar or so more to get these luxuries.

From THE CALIFA POLICE GAZETTE...sailing to Byzantium since 852

So I add my voice to the growing chorus of reminders that Nebula nominations close on the 31st, and for all you SFWAwifians out there--this is your big chance to make your dues seem worthwhile, and also, more importantly, to bring to wider attention the high-lights of your reading year.

It takes ten recommendations to put a work on the preliminary ballot. There's lots of good stuff on the Recommended List that only need a few more nominations to nudge it over that threshold--including, (dare I say), FLORA SEGUNDA, which is currently standing at nine recommendations...(!!)

Check out the report, which is available on the SFWA website, and see if there is anything you feel strongly enough about to put your recommendation behind. The Andre Norton Award in particular could use some love...we are in the middle a golden age of YA books, and not much is ending up on the ballot via the nomination process. I realize I'm as guilty of this as anyone, and I've made it my new year's resolution to rectify that fact. The Norton hasn't been around that long, and is still in the process of sinking into the SFWAian fore-brain--so let's try to see if we can raise the Award's profile a bit...

If you were thinking about nominating anything at all--novel, short story, novella, novelette, young adult--now is the time. After the 31st, it's all shoulda wouda counda. The Nebs are one place that your vote really does count.

From THE CALIFA POLICE GAZETTE...sailing to Byzantium since 852

Now that it is miserable slushy muddy freezy icy outside, Bothwell has to wear his booties when we take long walks. He's not so super keen on these booties, but he's even less keen on slushy muddy freezy icyness getting between his toes, so wear the boots he must. Once he's got them on he usually forgets about them, but while I'm trying to wrestle his limp paw into the boot itself, Bothwell turns up the Misery until it could probably be seen in South Africa.

Life's tough.

Anyway, once we get on the street, so many people stop and ask us where we got the boots, that I feel safe in recommending them now to anyone who might have a dog with delicate paws. The brand is called Neo Paws, and I highly recommend them. The boots are sturdy, and if put on properly impossible for Dog to get off, no matter how high he prances and shakes his legs. The website has instructions on how to measure paws, and they are very easy to deal with--I initially bought the wrong size for Bothwell's back feet, but I had no problem exchanging; in fact, they didn't even wait to receive the old boots before they sent me new ones.

In fact, the boots are so good that they are used by Search and Rescue dogs all over the country. If that's not a recommendation, I don't know what is.

Neo-Paws also has rain-coats, seat-belts, and Doggles. I'm not sure that Bothwell is ready for Doggles, but if he decides to join Devilman on his motorcycle we'll have to talk...


p.s. Speaking of Bothwell, while we were out in the back yard earlier today he sniffing around some trees; when I called him back, he ran towards me joyfully, with the back half of a poor little rabbit hanging out of his mouth. Yuck! He didn't kill it--just found the left-overs, but still, disgusting...

From THE CALIFA POLICE GAZETTE...sailing to Byzantium since 852

Whoo-hoo--Bilskinir Blue has been named Colour of the Year--2008!

Of course, they don't call this shade Bilskinir Blue; they call it blue iris or shade 18-3943. But we know better, don't we.

That Paimon, he's subtle and behind the scenes, but he's busy.

Last year Devilman started to leave books that he had finished reading on the El for others to find, hopefully read, and pass on. A stealthy way to encourage reading, plus give a book a second chance at a reader, rather than spending the rest of its life languishing on a book shelf.

Now, according to the NY Times, I see that once again he is an early adopter; whereas Devilman was just doing his book drops with no thought of tracking, members of Bookcrossing register their books before letting them go, and then hope that whoever picks the book up will notice the registration number, and check into the website with their wheres/whens of their findings.

It's a cool idea; even if no one ever acknowledges finding the book, there's always the hope that whoever finds the book will read it and appreciate it. Of course, in today's security paranoid age, you might want to be careful of where you drop your book; it would defeat the purpose if the copy of The Shining ended up triggering a bomb disposal unit. But some things are worth the risk.

The closest I've ever come to giving a book to a stranger was back when I lived in Yerba Buena. I was riding the N-Judah one day, while reading a copy of A Rebours. A kid got on, looked about maybe 16-17 years old. He had long hair, a battered leather messenger bag and was wearing a 1950s suit and a tie. In a sea of track suits and hoodies; he stood out--definitely he was going Against the Grain. I had seen him a couple of times before, and he was always dressed the same. When the street car got to my stop, I shoved the book at him saying: "You should read this." He took it and I jumped off. I have no idea what he thought; probably that I was crazy--but I hope he read the book...I never saw him on the street car again...So that's not quite the same thing as Bookcrossing, but still, my attempt to do my small part in introducing young minds to the decadent movement and Gustave Moreau.

I have sometimes been tempted to sneak small press books onto the shelves of commodity bookstores but never had the nerve to try.

In today's NYT an article about "white space" which is (apparently) the name given to places where people do actual work, as opposed to their desks where they are supposed to be working but can't because their desks are too cluttered with nick-nacky work that is getting in the way of their real work.

The phrase is new to me, but not the concept. I find I've been an aficianado of White Space for some time. Despite the fact that my desk is enormous (I inherited it from Devilman who bought it years and years ago from OfficeMax but then abandoned it when the legs broke...I fished the top out of the trash and my pa made new legs out of gas pipes, and aqui, as good as new)...despite my desk's size, I can't seem to get any work done on it. Probably because it's always covered with crap: pens, pencils, notebooks, lamps, stamps, ink wells, cards cases, tape rolls, jewelry boxes, books, dog treats, plastic squids, bottles of black nail polish, pictures of John Bell Hood and U.S. Grant, a holiday Jack Ball, etc..

So I only sit at my desk to web-surf and blog. When I need to write, I go to the dining room table which is blissfully clear of crap, and gets sunlight in the afternoon. (My office has windows facing west so it's pitch black by 2 p.m.) The dining room is where I wrote most of FLORA'S DARE. FLORA SEGUNDA was mostly written in my parent's laundry room in Arivaipa Territory; it's tiny and warm and floods with light in the afternoon.* I find lots of natural light helps with the creativity immensely. Many people go to cafes to write but that doesn't work for me. While there are many nice cafes in Porkopolis, I don't find any of them conducive to lingering in, plus, I personally get really annoyed at people who park in cafes for hours and hours nursing the same cup of coffee, monopolizing all the tables so that those of us who just want to sit for ten minutes to drink our cappuccinos can not. Also, I get distracted by people watching. In my dining room and my parent's laundry room there are no people to distract you, just grunting sleeping dogs, who are easily tuned out.

So those are my current White Spaces, which would more accurately be defined at Dark Green & Gold Lincrusta Space, and Sunlit Laundry Machine Space.

How 'bout you?

A couple of months ago, I was somehow suckered into getting a subscription to The New Republic. I say suckered because I normally don't agree in the slightest with the slant of most of their political coverage, and find their arts reviews to be a bit high faultin' even for me. But in the December 10th issue, I find an editorial I wholeheartedly agree with (with which I wholeheartedly agree).

In The Battle of the Book the TNR editors lament the disappearance of the professional book review from print media. Quoth: "A newspaper discloses its view of the world clearly by what it chooses to cover and not to cover, and with what degree of rigour and pride. When you deprive the coverage of books of adequate space and talent, you are declaring that books are not important, even if you and your wife belong to a book club and your Amazon account is a mile long."

I'm going to breeze right over the TNR's assumption that newspapers are controlled completely by men ("you and your wife"), 'cause now that Katherine Graham is dead, they probably are, and agree with the rest of the article. It's true that we are in a golden age of book reviewing, in terms of what is available on the web, but as web reviewers wax, newspaper reviewers wane, or become increasingly dumbed down, and this is a real pity, I think. Writing an intelligent thoughtful book review which places in the book in question into a historical and artistic context and which sparks readers to consider the book in a new and unexpected way is difficult. (That's why I don't review books myself, except in the most cursory "I like it this is why" fashion.) There should be more challenging book reviews, not less. Newspapers used to pride themselves on supporting this type of book review. With a few exceptions, and growing dimmer every year, no longer.

Recently there has been some controversy over whether or not book bloggers are bringing the reviewing world down; it's not my intent to get pulled into that controversy. In my mind there is room for everyone: amateurs, semi-professionals, professionals. The more book reviews the better--but even today newspapers, for better or for worse, still carry with them an aura of privilege--the attitude that if something is important it will be covered in the newspaper, and if it's not, then it can't really be that important. By dropping book reviews, the newspapers are sending a powerful message--plus, the price point of a newspaper is much lower than a magazine, thus reaching a wider range of people. The TNR has a point, I think, when they argue: "The intelligent discussion of a book has the power to change its reader's ideas about how he votes or who he loves--to furnish nothing less than a 'criticism of life'...Book reviewing is a training for controversy, without which no open society can flourish."

Newspapers & magazines who still maintain vigoruous and challenging interviews, IMHO, include: The Financial Times, The Wall Street Journal, The Washington Post, The New Yorker, The New Scientist, The Economist* & The Guardian. Alas, that most of these publications are magazines, not newspapers. I do not care one wit for the reviews in The New York Times, which seem to be written solely for the purpose of shilling "high-brow" fiction and inspirational up-lifting ladies' book club books.**

I leave you with one last quote: "When a book review is done well, it transcends leisure. It inducts its reader into the enchanted circle of those who really live by their minds. It is a small but significant aid to genuine citizenship, to meaningful living."

Hear Hear!

The other night I had a new idea for a new novel.

Flora isn't in it. Actually, no one we already know is in it, but it is set in Califa. It's a love story.

High concept: Bluebeard crossed with The Little Mermaid crossed with the Beggar's Opera, lashed with a heavy dose of Goth (the music and the revival.)

Low concept: What if the little Mermaid gave away her voice & tail to marry the Prince only to discover that the Prince was Bluebeard? What would she do then, huh?

Did I mention it was a love story?

Anyway, so the idea just came to me full-form and I've already written the opening. Of course, I'm supposed to be thinking about the further adventures of Flora, but I may well work on this for a time, while I continue doing research for the next Flora book. It's nice to work on something that feels less under the gun. And it's nice to be excited about an idea, too. I've been wanting to write something more explicitly fairy-tale riffing (though there is a fairy tale riff in FLORA'S DARE), and also something more explicitly a girl's first love, but nothing specific had come to my mind previously.

I usually start stories with characters--I can have a vague idea, but if if the idea has no character attached to it, then the idea doesn't go too far. But sometimes a character just springs full formed, a la Athena, from my brain and then its just a matter of listening to what the character has to say. Once the character introduces him/her/itself, the rest is easy. So, I suppose I should really say not that I had an idea for a story, but rather that a character wanting to tell a story--her story--popped in last night. I hope she's gonna stick around for a while, 'cause I think it's a pretty good story.

(it seems to be Environmental week here at the CPG Society Page--!)

Interesting article at the NYTimes on whether buying local is always good for one's carbon footprint--the equation is slightly more complicated than one might think...About six months ago The Economist ran a similar article, so I'd already been considering most of the points raised in the Times article. I would not by any stretch call myself an environmentalist--maybe barely environmentally conscious, but I suppose it certainly behooves all us to think about our own actions regarding the environmental impact of our choices, and thus am I thinking.

On the other hand, if you think too hard about the various contradictions, trade-offs, conflicting reports, etc., you'll soon find yourself completely paralyzed--crushed with guilt for whatever choices you might make! Have you ever noticed that these days EVERYTHING is Bad for You, Bad for the Country, Bad for the Environment, Bad Bad Bad...?

So in prep for decorating the Xmas tree, I was unwrapping the Xmas ornaments, which I inherited from an elderly great uncle who is with us no more...He didn't use this ornaments much in his last years, and so most of them are quite old and fragile. I haven't used them much recently either, so they are still in the old paper in which he wrapped them last, lo those many years ago. And I really do mean old paper, including old paper towels, old Kleenex, and old napkins. The kind of paper that is meant to be disposable, and which doesn't usually survive more than a few weeks, much less forty years.

One of these old napkins appeared to be of the cocktail species; you know the kind, cute little picture on the front, pithy sayings on the back. (Do they make them this way anymore? I'm not sure?) Circa mid-1960s, I'd judge. The cute picture shows an old timey country scene: covered bridge, furry little surrey with a fringe on top, etc. "May all the bridges you cross be covered ones" the napkin says hopefully. On the back, the platitudes continue:

• You'ns ain't the only pepples on the peach.
• We grow too soon oldt and too late schmardt.
• Put your umbrella up. It's making down out.
• They looked the window through.
• Hope it gives what it looks like for onct.
• Run the Alley Up. Jump the Fence Over.
• Sorry you don't feel so pretty good.
• The coat doesn't fit, not?
• Run the steps up.
• My, you look good in the face.
• Sign: "Keep the Paint Off".

• Don't eat yourself full--there's pie back.

I can't help it; I adore Courtney Love. Ayah, so she's done some super crazy things, some of which are horrible and not to be applauded, but, you know, I still love her. She's like the last great rockstar, and her music is incredible. Doll Parts remains one of my favorite songs. She is clearly beset with the same issues as most modern women, including body image, motherhood, money-management, and dating, but she's played out these issues in an incredibly public way in an arena that even today remains pretty male-centric. (Rock and roll). She's a Dionysian gal in an increasingly Apollonian world.

And Madama Love is pretty self-aware too, and amazingly lucid, considering everything, as this interview in the Telegraph attests. Consider this quote: "I used to play up to it a bit when I was on drugs because who cares: sex, drugs, rock?'n'roll, waaaah! I always seem to come number two to Keith Richards in lists of greatest hell-raisers of all time. But if I was a guy, I wouldn't even be on the list! I didn't know it was such a guy's job. It's like playing football in high heels and lipstick; no wonder it smears.'"

Ayah, so.

Plus when was the last time a celebrity blogged so candidly about money? Apparently she's got some ID theft and credit score problems, and she's offering herself up as an example of why women should keep track of their own finances. (You have to click through to get to her blog--her typing is hit or miss but her entries are always interesting.)

That Madama Love is alive today at all is a credit to her survival skills; she seems to be in a up-turn phase right now and I hope it continues. And I'm looking forward to her next album, which is supposed to be out next year.

Look at this adorable little white hedgehog...

I love high fashion.

Actually, perhaps I should clarify. I am very interested in fashion--after all, clothes do make the man/woman/child/butler--but I love couture. Fashion is all about creating market frenzy and marketing frenzy, constantly coming up with new things for people (women) to buy, and then denying people (women) the right to buy those things via price, deliberate shortage, or sizing. It is interesting to see how fashion reflects society, etc., but--

Fashion makes women feel bad; bad they can't wear it, bad they love it, bad they can't afford it, wah wah wah. The lady-mags that shill for fashion are full of pernicious articles that kill women's souls, make them feel inadequate and lacking, destroy their self-confidence and I say this woefully because I like some of the lady-mags, but I have sworn off of them because they are poison. (All except for W, which is full of $500 dollar per oz perfumes, and fashion layouts so abstract you can't even tell what the clothes look like--impossible to take seriously.)

For the most part, the lady-mags do not cover couture, because couture is fashion taken to extremes and of no use to the average ladies. You can't afford it and you couldn't wear it if you could.

What exactly is couture? Couture is...well, I'll let the Master of Couture, John Galliano, via an interview with the FT, explain: "I think couture has to be the dream...it is the undiluted, unrestrained idea."

No one expects to wear couture in its purest form. It's too expensive, too cumbersome, too crazy. And because it's divorced from actual market forces, it is fanciful, insane, dreamy, abstract, visionary. Re Dior's 2004 Collection, I again quote the FT: the "Austro-Hungarian Princess collection, where models loomed on 6in platforms complete with crowns, corsets, and fur-and crystal-trimmed exaggerated hourglass figures; and last January's Japan-inspired Origami collection of New Look meets kimono suits and dresses, folded and pleated in ever more elaborate and mind bending constructions." Those aren't the clothes you wear to go to Starbucks; they are clothes that foster revolution. (In the case of the French revolution, literally--more on that in a later post.)

And for those few ladies who can handle modified couture, well, no one expects them to wear it on their own: even today a Dior dress has more scaffolding in it than the Empire State Building.

Couture is the science fiction/fantasy of fashion. Designers are unfettered from reality; they use clothing to create stories, to explore ideas, to imagine new worlds and new civilizations. Couture reflects on history past, and reshapes it into history future. It is no less an art form than painting or sculpture. I find it endlessly fascinating; and consequently, I spend a lot of time thinking about how people in Califa dress. It don't always come across in the text, as not everyone may be interested in reading very detailed descriptions of the beading on Flora's Catorcena dress, or the pattern of frogging on Buck's dress uniform--but I still think about it. Califa is my own version of Couture, I guess. Perhaps not as visionary, but a good deal less expensive!

Anyway, this post was inspired by an article about John Galliano in last week's How to Spend It section of the FT. You can read the article in full here, via some weird pdf-like interface. It starts on page 9 and contains some fantastic pictures of Dior dresses, as well as John Galliano and his do-rag being very thoughtful and passionate.

Well, I was finishing FLORA'S DARE, and I have been over at live-journal (yswilce).

I'm thinking about actually switching all the way over to lj; so if you haven't been following me there, and wish to follow me at all, you should try catching me there. I've done some cross-posting but not a lot and am not sure if I'm going to continue here. After being introduced to the lj format earlier this summer, I am finding it to be a lot more friendly than the blogger format. There's something about actually having friends which may be somewhat high-school, but is also rather comforting. (You don't have to have an lj account to read an lj journal)

So that's where I've been.

Now that FLORA'S DARE has gone to the copy-editor (woo!), I can resume my voyage on the U.S.S.S. Sofa...yesterday's voyage took me to the Outer Zone or the O.Z., via the Sci-Fi Channel's miniseries TIN MAN.

TIN MAN is an up-dating of The Wizard of Oz. Most of all the old favourites are still there, Dorothy, Toto, The Cowardly Lion, the Scarecrow, the Tin Man, but re-imagined--sometimes imaginatively, other times not so much. Dorothy is now a slacker chick with a motorbike named DG; Toto a shape-shifting tutor; The Cowardly Lion a Lion-like empath; the Scarecrow a political prisoner whose brains have been removed as part of a reeducation process; and the Tin Man, a Jimmy Stewart-like sheriff. Like I said, sometimes imaginatively, sometimes not so much.

Anyway, there's some very cool special effects, tho' it's a huge pity the series is not in HD, and some very cool magic stuff. Like most hero's journey type narratives, the characters spend so much time on the road (when do they eat, when do they sleep, when do they pee?) that the story is more about the journey than about the hero. Also, like many CGI heavy series these days, all the money has gone into the CGI; for example, the Wicked Witch only has one outfit. Now, if you were the wicked witchy overlord of a huge magickal kingdom would you only have one outfit? Naw, I didn't think so...you'd be John Galliano's dream client...Also, losing out to CGI is the plot: clearly they decided not to waste too much money on writers either. The story is riddled with plot-holes the size of black holes. Does the director not notice these holes, wondered Devilman, or does he just not care? Says I: No and yes.

However, Tin Man does have some of my favorite, oft overlocked actors: Alan Cumming, Neal McDonough, and the vastly underated Callum Keith Rennie, who I'm just dying to have play Hotspur in the joint Peter Jackson/Terry Gilliam multi-billion dollar movie version of FLORA SEGUNDA. (Tho' I admit to sometimes having a yearning for Michael Biehn instead.)

The Wicked Witch's thugs have very cool leather trenchcoats. Too bad they don't know how to man a picket line, patrol, or secure a perimeter. Why do Evil Baddies always have such useless goons? Perhaps they can't compete with Blackwater. Maybe they should just hire Blackwater; I'll bet those jerks would jump at the chance to work with flying monkeys and wear ankle-length leather trench-coats.

Anyway, I wouldn't go out of my way to watch Tin Man, but if you happen to catch it, you could probably watch it and read a magazine at the same time, and not be too bored.