Wednesday, September 29, 2004
It's done. Finally, it's done. I finished "Bradbury Weather" about 5:30 p.m. yesterday. I did 1,351 words yesterday, bringing the total length of this story to 15,097 words, which, in my estimate, makes it a short novella instead of a short story. Today, Spooky and I will read through the whole thing, beginning to end, to see how it works as a whole, looking for errors, etc. It will be published in a few months in the second issue of Subterranean Magazine, along with a new interview and a reprinting of "Andromeda Among the Stones."
This morning, I got word from my film agent that a couple of Very, Very Big producers want to see The Dry Salvages. I shouldn't say who, of course, but they don't get any bigger. I doubt this will come to anything, but it's a good feeling, nonetheless.
The cold Spooky and I caught at Dragon*Con has left me with one of my interminable, lingering coughs.
What else happened yesterday? I fell asleep on the sofa again. We cooked a big pot of chili with lime, fresh jalapeno, and tequila. We rented Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind, one of those films I'd refused to see in a theatre for fear of it being spoiled by cretinous, loud-mouthed fools. It was worth the wait. Brilliant. Beautiful. More poignant than I expected. A film that is simultaneously frightening and sad and sweet. Sweet is not a bad thing, if it's not handled by a hamfisted moron. Whoa. I just used "moron, "cretinous," and "fools" in the same paragraph. Good for me. Anyway, I thought Jim Carrey's performance was very strong. A very, very fine film. Afterwards, Spooky told me the story of Hobart the One-Footed Duck of Piedmont Park and Frank the Luminous Goldfish of Doom (who is, you see, responsible for Hobart's handicap). Then we went to bed early, around midnight, and I fell asleep to Lisa Gerrard and candlelight.
Thanks to everyone who voted in the "Best Novel" poll yesterday, all fifteen of you (a total of 89 people have voted so far) . But I still need eleven votes to reach 100. So, please, if you haven't voted already, click here and scroll down to "9/24/04 12:51 pm." Thank you.
Back to Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind for a second. I really did love this film. I think Joel Barish will be added to my list of heroes.
I was just reading about some cretinous, moronic fool (yes, all three at once) giving Douglas Clegg shit for not blurbing his book. Poppy has already expressed my feelings on this sort of thing quite well, so I shall be lazy and quote her:
I understand that it can hurt when, after you've sweated blood writing a book, someone who could help you says they don't have time to read it. I know that. But as a writer yourself (I'm addressing the imaginary rude person here, of course), you should know that writers often need to exercise careful control over what goes into their heads. It may not be that your book doesn't interest me, but that I'm in a phase where I need to read about a certain subject, or in a certain style, or can't read fiction at all for fear of having someone else's voice bleed into mine. It's never personal. Furthermore, when you ask a writer for a blurb, especially a writer you don't know, you are intruding on his life and putting him in a slightly awkward position, because he remembers when he was young and hungry and had to do that kind of thing himself. (He's likely still hungry, but never mind.) That's not necessarily bad or wrong -- it's a hazard of the trade -- but the writer owes you nothing. Even a polite refusal is gravy. Being rejected and ignored are hazards of the trade too, and you'd do well to learn that early.
Damn straight.
11:11 AM
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