Moose Girl Dream Dance, Hurrah!

[mrissa]

One thing last year's Year Of Sick seems to have given me is the ability to nap. I could never really nap before unless I was sick. Now I can if I need it. For example, the alarm went off at 4:45 this morning so we could get markgritter to the airport. I got up (@#%&$%#$) and took him to the airport and read lj and went and got breakfast with timprov when Perkins opened. (And let me state for the record that "when Perkins opened" is not a phrase that should have any meaning, because what good is Perkins if they don't stay open all night? It's not like you go there for the food. Imagine the horror that would have been my college years if we'd had to spend our 2:00 a.m. Perkins runs at Happy Chef instead. Even if we would have pressed the button.) And then I hung out with T. until he went to bed, and then I worked a little bit on easy revision stuff, and then I read a bit, and finally I went back to bed! And slept! And now I feel better! And not so much like someone dumped toxic waste in my shoulders! And more capable of abusing the exclamation point!

In my nap-dreams, dichroic was starting to write a book with elk in, so I was telling her what it's like to write books with elk in. (The answer, in case you're wondering: very hard. The books I've written with elk in are much harder than the ones that left the elk out. My advice from this experience: skip the elk whenever possible.) (On the other hand, it was nice to have someone with whom I could be "The Moose Girls.") Also in my nap-dreams, papersky was telling me that she'd seen my books last time she'd been in China, she just hadn't picked up copies because she didn't know me at the time and also she doesn't read Chinese. I started trying to argue with her that I don't have any books* out in English, much less Chinese, but she was able to describe details of the plots as summarized for her by her Chinese friends, so I had to conclude that my books were indeed out in Chinese. Then I got a check from my Chinese publisher, and dichroic and I did a Moose Girl Dance over to the bank to cash it, with papersky walking alongside us holding the dog's leash and shouting, "Hurrah!" at appropriate intervals. (What is a Moose Girl Dance like? Very stompy. Somewhat noisy. Upsetting to the dog. But the dog liked papersky and would behave for her, so that worked out all right.)

This is why Heathah's husband tells me not to tell people my dreams, but in truth I'd rather have my brain than someone else's.

And I need to remember that when I get back to non-trivial revision bits, but first I need lunch.

Oh, and I know which story I'm writing longhand in my new paper journal now! "Carter Hall Judges the Lines." It's the one for you, wilfulcait. It will be fun. There is peewee hockey, and there are Greek goddesses, and I'm excited to be writing it. And it's good to be excited about what you're writing at least some of the time.

*Edited to add: I should note, before markgritter reads it and starts the old argument up again, that he would have me say I don't have any novels out in English. Because I do have books out. Every time we do this, I argue that work-for-hire doesn't count, and every time he says it's a book and I wrote it and they put my name on it and published it and gave me money, not vice versa, and therefore it counts. Take whichever side you please.

Comments

Authorship

[mackatlaw.livejournal.com]

I need to get somewhere with my fiction writing so I won't be frustrated, but I know I need to spend the time to get better with it! It may be harder for me to concentrate than other people, but that's not much of a reason to stop: hard is hard. There will always be something (teaching classes, money woes, legal work) to put time into. Of course, I choose to put time into thinking or dealing with those things, at least to some degree.

I'm sorry about the guys who bothered you on your walk with your doggy. The old saying goes, "Men are afraid women will laugh at them; women are afraid men will kill them." There's some truth to that, and I'm sorry that you were threatened.

Re: Authorship

[mrissa.livejournal.com]

I fear that getting somewhere with your fiction writing is unlikely to be non-frustrating. I say that based on not only my current position but also on reports from further along the process.

But it's a different kind of frustrating, and that can sometimes be enough.

Re: Authorship

[mackatlaw.livejournal.com]

It will depend on how much I welcome the challenge. To write a novel, have it unsold, and then continue to write more? It must require a certain state of mind, dogged determination and plain old faith.

I also submit that it's a problem of a different order than the other problems in my life, and that could make for a nice challenge.

Oh! I finished your Teraphim story recently. Was it a stand-alone, or have you done other Bible-based interpretations? I particularly liked the character of the nephilim, the gardener who was the son of an angel and a human. He wasn't a ruler of men; he was a great gardener, which I thought was a very good matching example of finding the role in society where you fit.

Re: Authorship

[mrissa.livejournal.com]

So far it's a stand-alone, but I'm not ruling out more works with the same characters or in the same world.

I am extremely skeptical about rulers of men and other grandiose roles. That's likely to show up elsewhere in my fiction, too.

Rulers of Men

[mackatlaw.livejournal.com]

I'm also fascinated by the powerful, not so much by the trappings, but by the responsibility. People living together in large groups require leadership of some sort. What amount and what type depends on your political theories, but someone or a select group needs to make the hard decisions. But "with great power comes great responsibility," etc.

The Romans used to have someone follow the emperors around at court and whisper, "You too will die." It reminded them that no matter how powerful they were, death was more powerful and they were mortal.

What other fiction about rulership and grandiosity do you recommend I check out, particularly by you?

Re: Rulers of Men

[mrissa.livejournal.com]

We seem to have missed each other here: by skeptical, I don't really mean fascinated. For example, in my first two novels, I upset one of my first-readers by having the powerful Dream King in one world be a nurse in this world rather than something more powerful and grandiose. And in my more recent YAs, there's a thoroughly Icelandic skepticism of kings and kingship, with a deliberate absence of grandiosity.

However, one of my next projects will probably be What We Did to Save the Kigndom, whose protagonist is kind of the female, sorcerous equivalent of Richelieu; check back with me then.