Delve into the secret history of the Old Races and discover the stories that shape the world of the Negotiator Trilogy! AVAILABLE NOW!
Four hundred years ago, master vampire Eliseo Daisani and dragonlord Janx both fell in love with a mortal woman. This is her story.
Margrit Knight has debts to pay. Watch the Negotiator aftermath unfold in these five new stories of the Old Races!
After fighting at her side for over a year, Gary Muldoon must leave shaman Joanne Walker to face a battle only he can win… AVAILABLE NOW!
Joanne Walker & Jane Yellowrock must find and defeat the magic that brought them together–or find themselves EASY PICKINGS! Available now!
Young Indiana and I went down to the Botanic Gardens a few days ago, and although the light was, er, raining, I rather liked this picture anyway.
So I have a reader, a woman whose name I know from the occasional email and several crowdfunding campaigns and chatting here and there over the past few years. Nice lady. Someone I think of in that fuzzy “friend” territory that the internet creates, you know?
Acquaintance, however, is probably more accurate, since I didn’t learn that her oldest daughter is affected by something called Smith Magenis Syndrome until a few days ago, when Eleri cautiously announced she was doing a fundraiser. For their daughter, SMS causes behavioral issues, developmental delays and sleep disruption. She’s currently at a theraputic facility, and while she’s gone, Eleri is hoping to make their back yard a safer place for their little girl.
They’re aiming for what seems to be a very modest $2500, and are 10% of the way there. If you’ve got a dollar or ten to spare, maybe send it their way? Eleri’s been very supportive of me over the years, and I’d love to be able to help give some of that back to her.
Thank you. <3
I could do a whole calendar of herons, although I don’t think other people are as captivated by them as I am. :)
Maria’s one of the other Luna alumni who got picked up at the same time I did. She’s done a kind of splendid shooting star rise, reaching the NYT with first book, and going on to take the YA world by storm since then.
This book might work better for that audience. There’s nothing particularly wrong with it (except a language thing Maria’s chosen to do in all her books which I understand but find jarring), but I was underwhelmed, which leaves me feeling like probably I just wasn’t a good audience for it. There were a few things I liked quite a lot–Avry, the heroine, is a healer who assumes other peoples’ injuries and sickness to heal them, and the way that worked is nice. There are murderous plants, which is always a good touch. There’s a romance that–
–actually, that’s one of my problems with the book, I think. The romantic interest pretty much comes across as a jerk, and I not only never warmed up to him, but I didn’t really believe Avry doing so either. Particularly since there’s a much nicer alternative.
Maria’s got a YA SF thing that I’ll be picking up, but I don’t expect to read any more of this series. Ah well. Can’t like ‘em all, even when people you know write them. :)
This is probably the first night shot I ever took that was worth anything. It was taken during a photography course offered in Cork, which I enjoyed enormously and should probably do more of. Although not in Cork. :)
I, despite several warning signs to the contrary, managed to be *so certain* that the Meat Loaf Farewell Tour concert that I bought tickets for in _December_ was tonight, May 19, that I did not check the tickets until I got to the concert venue tonight and nobody was there.
The concert was on Friday, the 17th.
Fuck.
And we didn’t get the house we were hoping to.
I’m going to go watch Sherlock and drown my sorrows now. *sigh*
I couldn’t post to LJ for the past 24 hours or so, so there’s a sudden rash of posts from me as things propagate. Sorry.
So far this week I’ve won tickets to FF6 and an upgrade to my Meat Loaf concert ticket. I clearly need to go buy lotto tickets tonight.
Young Indiana and I went to the Botanic Gardens the other day. A couple of kids around age 6 saw us and stood there grinning at us so hard I thought their faces would explode. It was a little freaky, actually. Just standing there grinning, they were. Finally I realized it was because I was SPIDER-MAN. I’m so used to wearing that hoodie I forget its effect on small children. :)
We finished watching s1 Arrow last night. HOLY CRAP! OMG! HOLY CRAP! HOLY CRAP! Then we had to watch an episode of Castle as a unicorn chaser. Fortunately it was the s5 Christmas episode, so it made an excellent unicorn chaser. *palipitations*
All is at rest.
Picoreview: Moulin Rouge is still exactly the kind of thing you’d like if you like that kind of thing, and definitely not if you don’t.
One of the local cinemas is doing a Baz Luhrmann month running up to his Gatsby this week, so Ted and I went to see Moulin Rouge (still can’t type that without typing Rogue first) last night, for probably the 3rd or 4th time on a big screen for me, at least.
I’ve no doubt become more accustomed to Nichole Kidman’s voice through repeated listening to the soundtrack, so she seemed vocally much stronger to me than she did when I originally saw the film. Ted mentioned that too, so that was kind of a nice unexpected bonus. And it also kind of struck me this time, as (weirdly) it hadn’t before, that the fragile breathiness of her voice had a pretty good in-story reason for it. Indeed, every time she really belts it out she coughs or passes out, so yeah.
I always think of Kidman as a particularly reserved, ice-princessy sort of actor, which makes her flinging herself around squealing (Luhrmann must have just had everybody check their dignity at the door for that film. “Like A Virgin”, OMG. Still. Even knowing it’s coming, OMG. :)) in the first elephant scene just all the more agonizing. And funny. Ewan McGregor’s expression of bewildered horrorified embarrassment is just wonderful in that scene.
As is, of course, his sudden burst into song. The first time I saw it, the film already had me quite thoroughly by the time a bunch of old guys began singing “Smells Like Teen Spirit” (a song which I now feel basically exists to be snarled out by old men at brothels), but it was “This Is Your Song” that pretty much made me fall in love with the story. And with Christian, just as Satine does. :)
I also especially and particularly like “Roxanne” and the tango scene. It’s better in the DVD extras, mind you, because they have the whole uncut tango from all four camera angles, and although I think the cutting was very good and necessary for the structure of the storyline, I come from the Fred Astaire school of thought, which is I want to see the goddamned dance, stop screwing around with multiple camera angles and cuts. But the raw power of that scene just thrills me.
Kidman’s costume for “The Show Must Go On” is still one of the most gorgeous pieces of clothing I’ve ever seen. I found myself actually holding my breath in anticipation of seeing it. It may also be my favorite song in the film, although I didn’t even know it before seeing Moulin Rouge (Rogue) the first time.
Some of the super-fast-forward things bothered my eyes more than they did when I saw it in the theatre before. I don’t know if that’s because I was very tired, or because the theatre was smaller than the others I’ve seen it in so I was closer to the screen, or what, but a couple of times I was quite o.O over those bits. Overall, though, delighted to have gone and seen it again.
They’re doing a John Hughes retrospective next. Who wants to go see The Breakfast Club with me? I’ve never seen it on the big screen!
The cathedral featured is St Finbarr’s, and the towers there are known as…I forget what. It’s something to do with being financed by the Irish stout makers, so they’re Guinness and Beamish, or something like that. :) And it’s possible that the apse picture was taken inside there. :)