Galley Ho!

~ James Viscosi ~ Leave a comment

This is just a short note to let all who may be breathlessly waiting for Dragon Stones know that it has entered what might be called the “galley” phase, where I order finished copies from Lulu.com and go through them with a highlighter to fix any remaining formatting or style issues (at least, things that I consider formatting or style issues).  I’ve already been through this process with Long Before Dawn and it probably took about two months, but I expect it to go faster this time now that I’ve already done one.  I expect to hit my target of releasing Dragon Stones some time in June, though it won’t be available from book stores until 6-8 weeks after that due to the ISBN lag time.

In the meantime, I’ve started editing my next release, Father’s Books, a ghost story (of sorts) that I wrote after A Flock of Crows.  By now I’m sure everyone realizes that I can’t write a “normal” ghost story, but that’s the easiest way to label Father’s Books right now so I’ll stick with it.  More information will surely follow!

The Amazon Kerfluffle

~ James Viscosi ~ 1 Comment

Last month, it came out that Amazon.com is instituting a new policy that print-on-demand publishers, such as Lulu.com and Hard Shell Word Factory (publisher of Night Watchman), must use Amazon.com’s own POD service BookSurge* or have the print editions of their books dropped from the main store (though they can still be sold by third parties through the Amazon marketplace). Some companies, like Lulu, quickly caved … uhhh, agreed to use BookSurge; others, like Hard Shell, are taking a harder line and refusing to accede to Amazon’s new rules. The net result, for me, is that Night Watchman may be disappearing from the Amazon.com store in the future. I will be watching to see if this happens; so far, it’s still there, but they only have one copy left (“order soon — more on the way”).

I haven’t quite decided yet what I think of this whole thing. I’m not really sure that Amazon doing anything differently from Wal-Mart, which is notorious for beating up suppliers to cut costs and lower prices.  I don’t think Wal-Mart runs its own factories and requires its suppliers to use them, though.  (I could be wrong; if I wanted to do stuff like “research” and “fact-checking” I would be writing non-fiction.)  I guess I’d have to say that on the face of it Amazon is being anti-competitive and the ultimate upshot is likely to be higher POD costs, but we’ll see how it shakes out.  I don’t have much to lose whether my books are on Amazon or not.  The ones who do have something to lose are, I think, the small publishers; a lot of folks in the small press and self-publishing world are extremely agitated about Amazon’s move, and some are calling for a boycott.  Will a boycott succeed?  Probably not; it’s likely to be more symbolic than anything else.  After all, Amazon has been boycotted before, notably over their one-click patent.  The Internet was a smaller place then (fewer tubes) and the boycott still had no noticeable effect.  The current issue at hand is about as arcane as the one-click patent issue, and just as few people care about it; I think Amazon will just get away with it, until and unless it attracts attention from regulators (i.e., never). In any case, I am neither an economist nor an MBA, so my opinion on such matters is probably worth about as much as I make on sales of my book from Amazon.com —  i.e., next to nothing.

Anyway, if you’re looking for a copy of Night Watchman and you can’t find it at Amazon, you can always buy it directly from any number of places, like Barnes and Noble or directly from Hard Shell.  Or you can just swing by the house and pick up a copy; I’ll even sign it, too.

*Disclaimer: I used BookSurge to tear apart, scan, and republish A Flock of Crows is Called a Murder after the original publisher, DarkTales, went out of business.

Review: “Idiocracy”, or, “Mike Judge Says It’s YOUR Fault The World Is Going To Hell”

~ James Viscosi ~ 1 Comment

So the other day we watched Idiocracy, which tells the story of a man who is put into cryogenic sleep and awakes centuries later to become an interplanetary delivery boy in a world populated by aliens, robots, and talking severed heads. Oh, no, sorry, that’s Futurama. Actually, Idiocracy is the story of Joe, who (along with a woman named Rita) is part of an army cryogenics experiment that goes awry. When Joe and Rita awaken 500 years after being frozen, they discover that the world is populated by rejects from the early elimination phase of shows like American Idol, Survivor, and The Real World, as well as the sort of people who try to emulate the things they see on shows like Jackass. (Somehow, despite being complete morons, they manage to keep all their high-tech equipment more or less functional. We can probably assume this equipment is serviced by robots like Bender [Futurama again, sorry].)

The conceit behind this dystopian future is that all the smart people dithered too much over having kids until it was too late, or only had one or two, while the nitwits from Jerry Springer were popping out offspring by the dozen, until eventually they more or less took over the world. This conceit is so plausible that it’s actually frightening.  (I don’t see any kids running around the house here. Sorry, Mike. Do dogs count?)

Anyway, when our hero, average Joe (his name is, literally, Joe), awakens to this new reality, writer/director Mike Judge has plenty of satirical ammunition, which he expends cheerfully obliterating everything from ubiquitous product placement and corporate sponsorship to “reality” shows like Ow My Balls to mass-market consumerism to monster truck rallies. He even gets in a few digs at Child Protective Services that are only marginally less realistic than what we saw earlier in August Rush. While not quite up to the level of his earlier Office Space, there are a number of giggles to be had in Idiocracy.  The relentless stupidity of the future population does eventually get a little wearing, but if nothing else, the President and his cabinet members have plenty of flair.

Idiocracy put my wife to sleep in about 45 minutes, which is pretty good for satire. I definitely heard her laughing once or twice, too.

Interview With The Dragon

~ James Viscosi ~ 1 Comment

Somehow, an interlocutor has managed to interview T’Sian, the dragon from Dragon Stones, without getting burned, eaten, or squashed.  Perhaps that’s because the interviewer is a very cute chow-chow mix.  You can read the interview at Cody Bear Asks.  Don’t worry, the interview is spoiler-free!

Book-In-Progress Review: “World Without End”

~ James Viscosi ~ 3 Comments

Ken Follett’s The Pillars of the Earth is one of my favorite books (even before Oprah featured it), so when the quasi-sequel World Without End came out, I immediately wish-listed it over on BookMooch. A few weeks later it arrived in an enormous package — this is one massive book, just like its predecessor. I’m not that far into it yet so I can’t do a full review, but I can say that it doesn’t hook the reader immediately the way that Pillars did. However, it does seem to be better than the last Follett book I read, Night Over Water.

One thing that is obvious already, though, is that the author’s breast fetish is operating at full tilt — pretty much every single female character who wanders across the page has her breasts stared at, felt up, fantasized over, or otherwise put front and center (so to speak) of her character’s description. Some would suggest, accurately, that all this indicates is that Ken Follett is a dude. But come on, Ken! We’re supposed to at least pretend to occasionally raise our gaze above chest level! You’re going to make the ladies paranoid, and that’ll just make it tougher on all of us …

Having said that, I have of course written my share of such descriptions, especially in my vampire book, Long Before Dawn (available now!). But you know how vampires are; being dead and all, they don’t have many amusements besides stalking humans and drinking blood (Spike’s addiction to the soap opera Passions notwithstanding; most vampires don’t have television in their crypts), so they spend a lot of time being horny.  Which, I guess, makes them not so different from Ken Follett and the rest of us guys … 😉

Free Software for Writers (and Artists): The GIMP

~ James Viscosi ~ 5 Comments

Writers occasionally need to make use of imaging software, as I mentioned in my earlier capsule writeup about Inkscape.  That program is a drawing package; but sometimes you may need to edit or enhance a picture or digital photo, rather than drawing something from scratch.  This is where The GIMP comes in.  Intended as an alternative to Adobe Photoshop-style applications, GIMP stands for “GNU Image Manipulation Program” (again with the acronyms); it can be used for photo retouching, image composition, and image authoring.  I’ve mostly used it for photo retouching, although I do occasionally use it to mush a couple of pictures together into something else.  I used The GIMP to ever-so-slightly lighten the cover of my vampire book, Long Before Dawn.  Those who are graphically inclined could create their own artwork from scratch using The GIMP’s bewildering array of tools, controls, and filters.  It has so many advanced features that I don’t know what 80% of them do, but they would be manna to an artist.

GIMP is available for Linux, OS X, and Dominant Operating System(TM).  If you are already familiar with Adobe Photoshop, you may want to look into GimpShop instead, which attempts to replicate the Adobe Photoshop UI experience.  (I’m not, so I haven’t)

Review: “Enchanted”

~ James Viscosi ~ 2 Comments

So the other night we watched Disney’s Enchanted. First, a caveat: My wife can’t stand Disney princess cartoons. They rank one notch above anime in her book, with their huge-eyed tiny-waisted opera-voiced waifish heroines. Enchanted, of course, is Disney’s spoof of their own canon. It’s not a spoof in the way that Scary Movie is a spoof of Scream, though, but more the way that Scream is a spoof of other slasher flicks — if you’re not paying attention, it looks like the thing it’s poking gentle fun at. (Make extra sure to listen to the lyrics of the songs, especially “Happy Working Song”.)

Enchanted boasts an excellent cast, particularly Amy Adams and Patrick Dempsey as the principals. (I still have trouble looking at Patrick Dempsey and not seeing the kid from Can’t Buy Me Love but that’s because, as we discussed in the 16 Blocks review, I’m old. And a guy.) James Marsden is quite funny as the dimwitted, self-centered, but good-hearted cartoon prince, and unleashes not a single optic blast; Timothy Spall is a hoot as his sidekick. The movie contains no serious stumbles or wasted scenes until the very end, with a rather unnecessary and incongruous climactic fight between the heroes and the evil queen (gleefully played by Susan Sarandon). They even get the dance frame more or less correct for the big waltz scene, although someone could have at least choreographed a few twinkles or promenades or sahsays instead of just a bunch of lady’s underarm turns. But, you can’t have everything.

My wife stayed awake for the entire movie, although afterwards she tried to claim that it wasn’t really that good of a film. But hey, a rating system is a rating system, and I didn’t really see her doing anything besides watch Enchanted for 100 minutes or so.

It’s A Raft, But Only In Great Britain

~ James Viscosi ~ 3 Comments

We have an inflatable bed that we use for houseguests. This bed has a built-in electric air pump that is used to self-inflate the mattress. Setting it up this week, I noticed something interesting about the warning on the side:

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As you can see, the warning for the United States clearly indicates that the bed is not for use in water, but no such warning is given for Great Britain. Why the difference? I can think of a few reasons:

  • Water in Great Britain is different from water in the United States (infused with faerie magic, perhaps) and this permits the bed to be used as a raft there
  • People in Great Britain aren’t as fat as Americans so the bed is more likely to support them when used as a raft
  • The manufacturer doesn’t care if the British drown or electrocute themselves
  • The British are smart enough to realize that an inflatable bed is not a pool toy
  • People in Great Britain can read English and will get the information from the U.S. warning anyway

And the last, most likely, reason:

  • Nobody in Great Britain has yet successfully sued the manufacturer for failing to explicitly state that, hey, you might not want to take this bed that has an internal electric motor and power cord and use it in your swimming pool

As Steve Dallas says: “God bless America, land of the lawsuit!”

Review: “August Rush”

~ James Viscosi ~ 22 Comments

So we watched August Rush tonight at our friends’ house around the corner. I wouldn’t normally do two reviews back to back, but I wanted to get this one done while the memory of this claptrap was still fresh.

August Rush is the story of a boy named Evan who’s in an orphanage but dreams of finding his parents. All I can say, after having seen this movie, is: <KRONK VOICE> “Riiiiiiiiight.”

WARNING: Spoilers follow. If you plan to see August Rush (please God, don’t do it), you may want to stop reading.

Continue reading “Review: “August Rush”” →

Review: “16 Blocks”

~ James Viscosi ~ 3 Comments

So last night my wife wanted to veg and watch a movie, because she’s had a long, hard week at work. Let’s see, what do we have from Netflix … hmm … looks like we have 16 Blocks and Ghost in the Shell. She already knows that 16 Blocks is a cop movie with Bruce Willis where “lots of people get shot”. She has never heard of Ghost in the Shell.

WIFE: What’s Ghost in the Shell?
ME: It’s a classic anime movie.
WIFE: Anime. <PITCHES VOICE REALLY HIGH> That’s where the girls all talk like this and giggle hee hee hee!!!! all the time.
ME: I don’t think Ghost in the Shell is like that … it’s a classic, like Akira and Cowboy Bebop.
WIFE: Mmm. We’ll watch 16 Blocks.

So now we know that although my wife hates cop movies where lots of people get shot (except for Running Scared, which she loved, but that’s a comedy so it doesn’t really count), she hates anime more. In goes 16 Blocks.

16 Blocks is of course the film in which Bruce Willis’s broken-down alcoholic guilt-ridden limping cop has to escort Mos Def’s oft-unintelligible (I had to turn on subtitles to understand all his dialog) witness 16 blocks to the courthouse so he can testify before a grand jury. He has to do this by 10am, or the jury’s term ends and the testimony becomes moot. Unfortunately, Bruce Willis is unaware that Mos Def is going to testify against some dirty cops, including Willis’s ex-partner, played by David Morse. If this reminds you a little bit of the Clint Eastwood film The Gauntlet (at one point, our heroes even end up on a bus, surrounded by heavily armed cops) then congratulations — you’re old!

All of this may sound like I’m dissing 16 Blocks, but I’m not. I actually quite enjoyed it. The performances from the three principals are excellent (anything with David Morse in it is worth watching), and in several cases where the film could have gone the Hollywood blockbuster route, it didn’t. 16 Blocks put my wife to sleep in about 45 minutes, which is rather astonishing for a film of this nature; not only that, but when she woke up, she was actually interested in how it ended.

A note about the alternate ending: It’s good to see that the filmmakers considered doing something a little unusual with the denouement, but unfortunately, the alternate ending just didn’t work for me. A big theme of the film is that people can change, but in the alternate ending, they changed a little too quickly for my taste. It’s still worth checking out, though.