Leo: (July 23—Aug. 22)

You thought you'd seen the worst humanity had to offer, but that was before you read fan-fiction set in an alternate universe where Hawkeye Pierce and Father Mulcahy are lovers.

Warriors/Anabasis comparison

Alex, how did you figure out why I wanted it?

http://www.enm.bris.ac.uk/anm/preprints/2004r03.pdf

Best,

Joel

Also, what influence did "The Warriors" have on "Gangs of New York?"

Additionally, how valid is the ratio:

"The Warriors" is to Xenophon's "Anabasis"
as "West Side Story" is to Shakespeare's Romeo and Juliet?"

Or as "Throne of Blood" is to Macbeth?

Finally, as many of you already know, excerpting from:

The Ultimate Science Fiction Web Guide: Authors "S"

William Shakespeare (1564-1616): greatest English poet/playwright
"The Tempest" (1611, revised in First Folio 1623) is
a superbly wrought, graceful play, with some of the Bard's best lines.
It was also so science-fictional as to have been rewritten into the modern
film "Forbidden Planet" {hotlink to be done}. Here's the key:
* Prospero, Duke of Milan, Magician = Dr. Morbius (Mad Scientist)
* He studies magic = He studies the alien technology
* Magic Island = Altair-4 (Alien Planet)
* Shipwreck = Forced landing of Spaceship
* Beautiful daughter Miranda = Beautiful daughter Altaira
* Brutish servant Caliban = Robbie the Robot
* Ariel, Spirit of the Air = invisible "Monster of the Id"

Is that why you wanted it? I just posted it because when I saw that table, I gasped out loud. I've seen the movie but had never even considered that it had classical roots. But come on, the name of the gang leader is Cyrus!

As I writer, I really, really struggle with plot. I can write paragraphs and scenes fine, and I can worldbuild all day long, but I sit and stare at my screen and my characters sit and stare at each other. I know the advice is to steal plots, but for some reason that just doesn't seem to work for me. Maybe I abstract plot at the wrong level? Maybe I'm stealing from the wrong people?

There are plenty of super-excellent writers and editors who hang out here: can I hijack a tiny portion of this open thread and ask for advice?

If I remember Renault's Fire from Heaven, Aristotle had Alexander reading Xenophon, which apparently made him into a fan of Persian culture (Persiaphile?).

Authors on the adaptation of their work:

Ursula K. LeGuin comments on the Earthsea television drama.

Philip Pullman on the brouhaha surrounding the upcoming Dark Materials films

I had an argument with an acquaintance the other day about "You have to have published short stories to get published." Which she had learned from Sources In The Publishing Industry, and was trying to foist off on me.

Augh! Augh! And other frustration noises!

*goes back to working on the novel*

Just for fun, I watched the original adaptation of Le Guin's The Lathe of Heaven back to back with the more recent one. What a contrast - they spent all of $5 making the PBS version from 1979, and it so totally outclasses the much more produced contemporary version. The new version is so unfaithful to the storyline that it's almost unrecognizable, whereas the only major defect in the PBS version is that people stopped being gray.

So, it can be done. A good Le Guin adaptation is possible, just not, apparently, by contemporary TV producers.

Comparing either the book or film to "Gangs of New York" makes about as much sense as comparing it to the "Our Gang" comedies, or "Till all the seas gang dry," for that matter.

A good chunk of the day has been spent saying stuff like "Gee, the guy in the next cube would know where those are . . . wait, he's not here!" and "Sorry, only ____ knew how to do that."

I should have taken that position as bag changer on a prairie-dog vacuum when I had a chance.

Medeophile. :-)

I'm still struggling, but I learned a lot about plot by taking the advice of one of my favorite writers, Suzanne Brockmann. She said she learned plot and pacing by writing TV scripts (not paid or anything). She said to pick shows you already know and love and then practice the patterns of the show--end on a cliffhanger at commercial breaks, etc. It really helped me because I could tell when I had enough story...or not. For me, a forty five page screenplay is a lot easier to do as an exericse than a 450 page novel. I also really like the Evil Overlord Generates A Plot, by our hostess.

Is it just me, or does Chris Rock show up as an extra in a pan across the crowd at the big gang meeting? It's right before the leader gets shot. I know he would've been 14 or so, but I'll be damned if it doesn't look just like him.

I woudn't want the, er, member warming garment to be made of an itchy wool, though.

Joel, I will never have the patience to do that but you've given me an idea for a collar.

So, you have an emotional reaction to "Gangs of New York?" I'd love to know more.

Joel Davis:

Thank you for posting that yarnaceous link. In a rare example of keeping my Mathematical Demon under control, I wanted to post it much earlier, but waited to see if someone normal would do so.

Stefan Jones:

Thank you for sharing that. Painful as it is, and personal, I suspect that Emperor Bush II has guaranteed that we'll be seeing a lot more of it.

I found myself oddly sympathizing with Ronald Reagan, who was traumatized by seeing his father's unemployment during The Great Depression, and thereafter, even as President, being unable to fire anyone, however necessary.

My years of mostly full employment (1973-1991), which overlapped my years of college and grad school, gave way to a roller coaster of wealthy months interspersed with scrape-the-last-peanut-butter-from the jar.

Again and again I saw bloodlettings in the small, medium, and gigantic companies where I worked. It's a fad taught in MBA programs that these help the bottom line. Actual data does not support this theory.

Inevitably, they fired the people who actually knew how to do stuff, kept the ones who knew nothing, and promoted the ones who did actual daily damage, sometimes (as on the Space Shuttle program where I worked in Safety) deadly damage. Who played golf with/went to church with/went boozing with/smoked dope with/went swingdancing with/ slept with the boss was highly correlated with retention and promotion.

Who spoke the truth/ helped the customer/ rationally allocated resources was highly correlated with non-raises and termination.

I'm a Capitalist, but not a Worshipper-of-the-so-called-free-market. Today's workplaces make me weep.

Schools are businesses too, with the instructive question "who are the customers?" The same pattern that I cite for corporations applies to schools. Yesterday I collected my last meagre paycheck of the year. I will not know until at least 3 January 2005 if I have any position at my university or not (I mentioned why on an earlier thread). Several kindly Making Light people recommended that I apply for High School teaching jobs. I've been doing so for several years.

I may have already gone on too long. Thank you again.

:-)

But sheeat, the current method of conducting layoffs is massively insulting and bad. "Thank you for your service. Here's an envelope with a check. Here's a box."

If my manager had been offered, say, an extra two weeks severance in exchange for staying on a week to turn over responsibilities and knowledge, he would have done it and things would be going a lot easier.

Since that's not worth further discussion, and I haven't seen _The
Warriors_ or read Greek poetry, I will say a few words about -- about
-- hm. Cold out, isn't it? I hate cars. This version of "Bohemian
Rhapsody" has accordions but no singing. Fipple! Tweak! I really
should work on my electroluminescent top hat this weekend.

I believe the misguided corporate thinking is, if you lay someone off and then let them hang around the office a minute longer than necessary, there's no telling what kind of retributive rabble-rousing / file-deleting / paperclip-stealing / coffee-mooching they might get up to. Best to get it done with quick, walk them supervised out the door, and change all the locks and passwords.

I'm not saying it's logical, efficient, or humane. I'm personally of your opinion: the best way to protect company resources is to maintain an atmosphere of respect so revenge doesn't occur to anybody. I'm just expressing my belief, having been laid off before, that this is how human resources people think.

Some advice, since you asked for it.

First: Don't be afraid to do things just as an experiment. Everything you do doesn't need to be publishable. Trying stuff to see if it works is a good thing. Knowing you're only practicing can be quite freeing.

Second: What plot is for, is to keep everything from happening at the same time. Plot is character, plot is pacing. Work on those things. Meanwhile, steal plots while you're practicing.

Third: Learn how to steal plots. You don't steal a plot by taking a plot and copying it. You have something, like some characters, and you want something to happen. When you steal a plot, it will come out different anyway because your characters are different. But what you want to do is have a plot that works for them. So to start, when you're practicing, steal a plot that's ludicrous for them and see where it goes. Say you had the characters from Northanger Abbey. Put them into the plot from Sophocles Electra. The first thing you notice is that you can't start there -- I mean you can't start where Electra starts. The second thing is that Catherine's brother, who is really insignificant in NA, needs to become Orestes, so you have to think about him a lot. Then you realize that Catherine's boyfriend will have to be Pylades, and you think about the relationship between O and P, and then between Henry and his father and you realize that that's where that story could become Electra, with the General as Agamemnon. By the time you've finished poking at this, what you'll have won't be recognisable as anything, but it'll have a plot. Consider minor characters in the plot you're trying to steal. I stole Framley Parsonage for Tooth and Claw, but of my major characters in T&C, one of them gets about two lines in the original and two of the others have an implied off-page existence, one doesn't even have that. The scene I start with happens off the page of FP. T&C can best be seen, plotwise, as a variation on a theme of FP, and I think it's best where it gets most away from the original. But the point is, by writing anything with your characters, it goes away from what it was and develops baroque sprouts, and this is a good thing.

Fourth: Steal plots from silly things that have fuzzy holes in them. I wrote something once based on the plot of "Hotel California". I wrote three things of 10 kwords each (and no, you can't see them) based on the plot of "Famous Blue Raincoat", from the POVs of the three main characters. Forget about plot and do the other things, but if your characters take the plot away from where it's "supposed" to go, measure that against where it's going to end up and make it all balance. Songs are perfect. So are fairy tales and myths, because often the way we have them we have raw plot without motivation. There's the line from Galaxy Quest, "What is the rock's motivation in this scene?" I got a whole short story out of "What is the mirror's motivation in telling the queen she isn't the fairest of them all?"

Fifth: if you have characters and you have things happening, you can do what I call plot simulation, where it becomes indistinguishable from plot to the reader. So instead of stealing a plot, get some events, some big complex hairy events, and set them in order, and push your characters into them. Say a coronation and an abduction and a legacy and... also, either steal two plots or set up two lots of events, and set them going against each other. Work out the timing of everything, and when you get stuck with one set, consider how the other set will be interacting and where that will be. "Shouldn't we be getting to the execution about now" can be a godsend when plot-stuck. Take your characters out of their situation and pitchfork them into other things -- know you're going to put in a spaceship chase sequence about two-thirds of the way through, and figure out why later.

This might not work. None of it might work. But that doesn't matter, you're only practicing, just like me.

Steve: I believe the misguided corporate thinking is, if you lay someone off and then let them hang around the office a minute longer than necessary, there's no telling what kind of retributive rabble-rousing / file-deleting / paperclip-stealing / coffee-mooching they might get up to

Yeah, it is an extension of the way IT layoffs or firings have been handled for some time. The classic form of the dotcom layoff is that everybody is invited to one of two meetings. At one, probably larger meeting, those whom the shadow has passed over this time learn of your imminent demise. Then everyone goes to lunch. Those of you at the other meeting are informed by someone from HR that your services are no longer required, and manila envelopes are passed out with your check, COBRA and other HR forms, a short and insincere letter from either the CEO or your boss, and any transitional benefits they choose to extend. All your system access was canceled as you entered the meeting. A rent-a-cop (often retained just for this event) escorts you to your desk, watches you pack, checks off the inventory of what you are taking, and escorts you to the door, hopefully before everyone else returns from a well lubricated lunch. No goodbyes or farewells on company time. You can barely hear the whisper of the axe . . .

I got to miss being the object of this particular exercise myself, but I have frends whose stories are strangely similar -- there must be a book about how to do this. I was once laid off twice in 18 months. The first time was quick -- it was handled well by my immediate supervisor and his boss, We were given the rest of the day to pack up without a lot of supervision, and we had interviews with other firms set up by our boss. After a couple of contract jobs, I became the sysop for another firm. When their parent company decided to close that division, I was offered a substantial bonus to stay on a full 90 days to shut things down. (As people left, I ended up becoming the de facto overall facilities manager.) My last day there, I was called by the first company and asked to return. Overall, a strange experience.

www.perseus.tufts.edu and look under the Classics link--they have online text of both the Greek and an English translation.

*I say mostly, because Xenophon was almost as distractable as Herodotus when it came to interesting details.

Now that's cool advice.

Is this a scam? I know money is always supposed to flow towards the author so I'm worried, but it doesn't sound as bad as the definite scams. She isn't required to pay anything to have the poem published. Just if she wants a personal copy.

Nonetheless, I pass on to you the most useful stuff I know about plotting, courtesy of my playwrighting teacher Frank Gagliano (which I was able to follow about half the time while writing for his classes, so there you go).

The smallest unit of plot is the event. An event occurs when pressure builds up to the extent that someone has to do something to alleviate it. "Put your characters in the pressure cooker," sayeth Frank; the forces exerting pressure can be internal or external, but the stronger they are, the more momentum the event will have.

The event's resolution will hopefully create a new pressure. The Ring must leave the Shire, but now the hobbits are alone in the wild; Cordelia chooses integrity over duty, and Lear exiles her. The new pressure builds until it creates a new event, and so on.

This is part of what's behind the "two guys with guns" trick - introduce an immediate high-pressure situation that must be resolved, and then make everyone deal with the consequences.

When one event follows another in this way, the plot is something that is allowed to happen more or less organically, as the resolutions present themselves until there's a Story. And this allows the narrative to unfold from the inside - what happens is the result of the decisions people make, rather than an artificial structure imposed by the author from above.

When in doubt, increase pressure; pressure makes plot happen.

They would appear to be scammers.

It doesn't appear to be terribly legitimate, judging by the scorn unearthed in a google search. Sounds like it'd be prudent to steer clear of that outfit.

Getting the Scoop on Poetry Contest Scams

The Worst Poetry Contests

Keep googling for "noble house", plus various other terms such as 'scam', 'beware', or 'problems'.... a lot of people have had unpleasant experiences with them.

I used to be an astronomer. We'd get calls at the observatory about naming stars after people. And I would patiently explain that the company offering to name a star after their girlfriend/boyfriend/deceased loved-one for $50 were scammers. They'd send the victim a certificate and a catalogue listing their star with its position and name. And then I get the call from the lady who has bought a star for her baby who died one week old. She wanted me to send her a star chart and tell her about the star. Which I did. I couldn't tell her the truth.

I don't like hatred, but on that day I came very close when thinking about that company.

The fact that you asked the question yourself suggest that, somewhere in your spine, you probably already know what you intend to do.

FWIW, you don't have to be blunt with it: "These guys are scammers who only care about your cash" isn't the only way to say it. You could phrase it more positively: "I looked up those Noble House guys on the Web, and it sounds like they don't really do a lot of publicity. They mostly just sell the books to the people whose poems are in them, so you might not get a lot of readers. I wonder if you could do better? Maybe try selling your poems to some magazines?"

Of course if she does try to place her poetry in legitimate markets, she's in for a world of rejection, frustration and vanishing reward. This is true even if her poems are brilliant enough to find an audience. It's more true if they aren't. If she simply wants a quick self-esteem shot, and forty-five bucks won't mean missing any meals, don't tell her she sucks if she chooses to go with the Noble House people. If she wants long-term self-esteem, though, she ought to know that there are in fact people who publish poems and get money for them, or at least copies of the journals. Never a lot of money, and it's an uphill climb all the way, but it's been known to happen.

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A9255-2004Dec17.html

bottom of the page.

This is the second time I've been published in the FFA section, the first time was when a headline writer wrote about tanks fainting.

At last, a problem I can fix (mp3 link).

Jonathan Vos Post, I'm suspending your Electrolite and Making Light posting privileges for the next two weeks, which means you're out of here until New Year's Day.

You are not mindful of the company in which you find yourself.

You've posted far too many messages that had little or nothing to do with the discussions in which they occurred.

You've been a burden on the conversation.

Furthermore, you've failed to take cognizance of the longest-running and most heavy-handed series of hints and suggestions I've ever given anyone in all my years as a moderator.

See you in 2005.

Teresa Nielsen Hayden
Moderator, Enforcer, and
Wielder of Arbitrary Power

I made him incredibly happy by showing him that pdf.

He wanted to know if anyone has worked out a pattern for a Klein bottle yet. I told him I'd ask.

And hey, isn't this supposed to be an open thread?

But that's just my opinion. I wouldn't want to get on the wrong side of a Wielder of Arbitrary Power...

dollop: I don't think Chris Rock is in The Warriors. But the woman on the bench in the park, who turns out to be an undercover cop, is Mercedes Ruehl, early in her career.

Julia, there is indeed a knitted Klein bottle, and it turns out to make a good hat. There's a knitted Mobius-strip scarf that goes with it. You might make your mathematician friend happy by giving him this link:

http://nielsenhayden.com/makinglight/archives/004347.html

It's a post I did a while back on geek knitting, collecting as many of these oddities as I could find.

http://www.windpub.com/literary.scams/D-Barry.htm

You don't, of course, need my approval for your policy decisions: you're the moderator here. That said, thank you. Anyone who wants to go on at that much irrelevant length can start their own blog.

Of course, one good sneeze and your cranium gets sucked into n-space.

Thanks. E-mail away...

Don't forget that the characters off-stage should be taking action simultaneously with the characters currently on the page.

I had the damnedest time putting the plot of my first novel together until I realized that most of the cast (including three different sets of antagonists) was just sitting around doing nothing while the main characters were onstage. My plot at the time was a sort of arbitrary teleporter that brought them into contact for pre-ordained setpieces and then ignored them again. Total crap.

I sat down and drew up four different timelines, noting who was where, and what they were doing, at what times. When this was finished, I had a chart that showed me exactly where everyone's plots and schemes would intersect, usually with fireworks.

Once this was done, I was even able to go back and erase things, keeping the first major plot intersection as a new starting point and re-extrapolating from the fallout. It really made the whole thing seem much more organic and lively. So don't forget that every character should be active, all the time, even if the reader doesn't see these actions except through their eventual consequences.

I would so do this, but I can't knit. In fact, I'm a negative knitting quantity. I actually suck talent from knitters when I drive past their houses; baby sweaters end up lopsided, with two necks. Dog comforters turn into Chinese finger traps.

I'm amazed (and rather thankful) that they haven't remade that film.

Although . . . the first-pilot episode of "Star Trek" is a kind of hommage to FP, and I thought not a bad one.

Scott, that's one of Pat Wrede's great pieces of advice for getting out of plot bottlenecks: take note of what your secondary characters have been doing in the meantime.

Barbara, I've always figured Robbie was Ariel. The wizard only has two servants, and the Monster from the Id is an obvious Caliban-analogue.

Robert, granted, in the real world you can control your own vowels. Here, only my sense of honor keeps me from messing with your use of judgment and acknowledge.

I've really only just learned to knit, and by knit, I mean the regular plain knitting stitch; I think it's called a gauge stitch. I've now made several squares (sans holes or dropped stitches !) for baby blankets. Last week I learned to purl. I can cast on, and cast off. I thought I'd practice making squares of various combinations of knitting and purling, since I'm still doing some very odd things from time to time. I like knitting, but frankly, it's the kind of thing that's really hard for me, so I know I need to practice more.

I'm not overly adept at learning spatially-related tasks from books, and I tend to do most things backwards, but umm--I kind of like this. I've got a couple of friends I can ask very specific questions of. Now where do I go from here?

Although they're currently sold out of the Klein bottle hats, I'd like to put in a plug for the Acme Klein Bottle company responsible for such fine manifolds. I ordered my chemist wife their Klein Erlenmeyer flask for Christmas, and I got a warm and funny acknowledgement e-mail ten minutes after placing the order.

It was only after I'd responded back that I noticed the name of the proprietor. It's Cliff Stoll -- author of The Cuckoo's Egg and eminent countergeek. I'm delighted to see he's keeping himself entertained these days.

I learned to knit at a child but only became adventerous recently (from scarves and simple baby sweaters to things like Teddy Bears).

I also apparently knit oddly, I've had a lot of people watch me for a while, then say, "Okay, that looked odd to start with, but you were obviously taught how to knit by a left-hander (and I'm a right-hander)."

But things always come out okay, even if they don't always start promisingly. Right now I'm trying to learn how to make socks/foot warmers.

Connor Freff Cochran has produced a new, unabridged reading by the author (with songs and music) of Peter S. Beagle's _The Last Unicorn_. Peter's an amazing reader -- I haven't actually heard this reading, but I've loved listening to him read (and I don't usually like readings). Downloads will be available before the end of the month, and CDs/tapes will be available in early Feb. And early purchasers will get a limited edition of a new short story which continues the story (and a damn fine story it is, too!). www.conlanpress.com -- check it out.

The tenuous connection with TNH and Making Light -- the illustration they're using is from Leo and Diane Dillon, who also live in Brooklyn, and who I got to visit once whilst visiting P&T. And they're only using that illustration because I saw an incomplete version that the Dillons showed at a slide show at one of the few conventions they've attended, and told Connor that it existed. And I'm just totally chuffed that I managed to get that painting finished by bringing them together....

The announcement here is one of the very first about the existence of this site.

How's the move going?

At one point, I did teach myself to knit with my right hand as well (in order to do a 2-color pattern without switching the yarn color every 3 stitches), but I prefer lefty knitting for general use. I won't go into why, as lefty vs. righty knitting debates seem to get people as whipped up as Red Sox vs. Yankees.

And I still want to see the performance of both plays with the same cast that the characters in Pamela Dean's Tam Lin got to see.

"The Cage" (available largely intact on video, BTW) and _Forbidden Planet_ share a similar sober vibe.

Specific plot stuff:

* Protagonists come to rescue shipwrecked explorers. One of them is an alluring beauty.

* Ancient, accomplished civilization falls prey to technology . . . in this case, memory records and something like virtual reality. Not fatal, but the Talosians are effectively as moribund as the Krell, who fell prey to a wishing machine.

I don't think this is a cheat or plaguarism on Roddenberry's part. He chose to model his "Horatio Hornblower in Space" series after a somber but wonder-filled movie.

I'm disappointed how few of my cow-orkers know what it is.

I also have print-outs of pictures of Burgess Shale critters, so people will know what the test machines "Opabinia" and "Wiwaxia" are named after.

Oh dear, now we have to accessorize.

Jewelry by Arisia, obviously, with a heavy ceramic bangle from Firsk in native yellow. (We're thinking golds and blacks here.)

Second Foundation garments from the Earle Bergey Collection.

Hermes scarf. The god, not the other guys.

To cover up, a hooded leather cape by Isaac Mizrahi, for a touch of the mundane.

Lorgnette by Weissenbroch & Söhne.

Something from Isher; probably an energy derringer with pavé diamond optics in a garter holster. (This isn't> streetwear, darlings.) Because the right to buy weapons is the right to shop.

And a Snakeskin temporal displacement bag from Judith & Fritz Leiber; if you forget something, you can always go back and put it in.

The shoes are an interesting problem. Probably a pair of Instrumentality heels in 18k from Smith Cordovan, though I'm not actually sure one wears shoes with this outfit; holographic nail treatments might be better.

Yes, you're right, I can't be trusted with any arrangement of words.

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A10074-2004Dec18.html

The author looked at the reviews of a book similar to his/hers (in this case, Guy Gavriel Kay's Last Light of the Sun) and picked up my email address from a review I left there. He/she sent me an email saying basically that if you like Kay's, you might like mine, and also was slightly apologetic about being mixed in with "vanity press" authors which might make him look bad. The publisher of the book was XLibris, which I know nothing about.

It sort of bemused me, as it was a very polite email, and could, I suppose, be a reliable marketing effort - except most people loathe spam, and might be moved to leave a bad review at Amazon in retaliation. Has anybody else had this happen? And what do you think of the strategy?

I wouldn't retaliate, if that's what you're asking. And even if it's technically spam, if the author addressed you directly then it's spam on the very shallow end of the asshole pool. It sounds like a sincere marketing attempt by a person who just wants a little validation. That doesn't mean you should buy the book, of course. (And XLibris is in fact a vanity PoD press, albeit a relatively non-evil one.)

I've done similar myself. When Randy Milholland at Something Positive was talking about online superhero fiction last week, I dropped him a line with a pointer to my blogfic, saying I thought he might like it. I didn't expect anything to come of it, and as far as I know nothing has. I figure the popular sites probably get a few dozen e-mails like that a day. But I don't believe it hurts, either, so long as you aren't obnoxious about it. When you're relatively unknown, the only way to make people aware of something you've done is to tell them.

One of the characters in Bad Magic has a "Schroedinger's cap" in his bag. (Page 62.) And yes, TNH figured I'd typoed "Schroedinger's cat"-- but after I said it was okay as written, she didn't ask me what a "Schroedinger's cap" was. We were both in a hurry, so I figured I'd get back to it later...

My idea for what a "Schroedinger's cap" does is it's a last-ditch emergency protective measure. You can put it on any time you want-- but at the next instant in time someone observes you, there will be exactly a 50% chance you'll be alive. (Hey, if you're standing next to a hydrogen bomb that's about to go off, it's better than nothing...)

My father could use one. The product he has only comes with online docs, which he doesn't seem comfortable using.

Thanks...

1) The prices *will* be on the website as soon as the techies on the team hook up our new shopping cart software to our new merchant account software to our new secure file downloading software and make it all work. They tell me this will be very soon now, and I certainly hope they are right.

2) The prices weren't there yet because, frankly, no one was supposed to KNOW about this yet. The site that is there now was set up just one week ago, and was intended solely to prove to the merchant account bank that we weren't selling porn, drugs, or a chance to come gamble. The web being what it is, of course, people started to find us anyway within less than 24 hours and here we are scrambling to catch up. (As problems go, it's one I'm actually happy to have.)

3) Here are the prices. $30 for the downloadable MP3 version (available as soon as the filehandling software works). $40 for the CD edition (available in February). $55 for both together. Plus a small shipping/handling charge which will vary depending on whether you are a US resident or live overseas. California residents will also have to pay CA sales tax.

4) The first 2000 customers will also get, for free, the signed limited edition hardcover of "Two Hearts." That will ship around mid-January.

Anything else anyone wants to know, I'd be happy to answer. Just email me.

BTW, Tom was being kind when he referred to Audible.com's cut as "way too big." Their standard deal is that they take 88%, and as far as I'm concerned that's robbery.

I shall certainly ask my local library to get the CD version of this.

My brain works that way: it automatically does any available arithmetic. At least the prices here are consistent. (One sandwich shop I used to go to in the Fulton Fish Market before they touristized it had a swiss cheese and avocado sandwich, an avocado sandwich with added swiss cheese, and a swiss cheese sandwich with added avocado at three different prices.)

Even American Express only wants about a point more than Visa/MC takes from merchants; somewhere in the 3-5 percent range, as I recall.

Which print version? Current hardcovers are getting close to that price, but are still a bit less. First editions are a lot more. THE LAST UNICORN is currently available as a trade paperback at about half the price -- but last I looked, the actual cost of producing a trade paperback is significantly less than the price of producing any (even a mediocre) audiobook. I haven't heard this book, I have no investment in it (except that two old friends are deeply involved!) -- and I think that at the length it takes to read and record this particular story, the cost is very appropriate. And knowing the prinicpals -- this won't be mediocre. What Connor and Peter have done seems very parallel to the "cool limited edition book" approach to audio (without the bonus of a limitation). And the short story (which is, I say as an outsider who's read it, of a quality to match the novel -- it's prime Beagle, and I do not say that lightly) sort of adds limitation back in. I currently don't have a working sound card or CD burner, so I'm not planning to download it myself (full disclosure).

Connor, I didn't mention numbers because I didn't think it was my place to do so.

Or -- yer talking outa yer hat dude, that's not how costs work -- n-th copy ain't same as first copy, which you assume.

Stefan, you do know that there are some very nice Burgess fossil toys these days as well? I like this set from the Royal Ontario Museum which has an Opabinia and a Wiwaxia. There's also the Chocolasaurs, a Japanese series of prehistoric creature toys that includes Opabinia, Anomalocaris, and Hallucigenia.

I'm sure they would say that they -do- line up the reader, given their website devoted to audio books.

One thing I know they do is arrange with various hardware companies that make MP3 players to provide special support for Audible-format MP3 files. An Audible-compatible player must be capable of remembering exactly where you were when you last stopped listening to any book. Thus, you can stop reading book A anywhere you want, read book B for awhile, then book C, and when go back to either A or B and you will automatically resume exactly where you left off.

Also, they have several buying plans for "heavy" consumers of audio books. For 20 USD per month you can get 2 books, regardless of their list price. They run occasional sales at that price (10 USD per book) for as many as you want to buy.

I'm not sure whether any of that justifies the purported 88% commission, but if they weren't keeping that much I doubt they could provide such good deals as they do on their monthly plan or their sales, both of which significantly reduce the cost of audio books to the consumer.

(By the way, I have no affiliation with Audible other than as a happy consumer.)

I'm planning on reviewing grammar over break. I wondered if anyone here has read Eats, Shoots and Leaves? Is it fun and good? I want to brush up but have fun at the same time.

And of course the very day that I see it and think, "Oh boy, two recent-ish Making Light posts got together and had a Hitherby baby," there's an open thread here so I can spout off about it. Must be the work of the Fanfic Devil!

May I commend to your attention The Deluxe Transitive Vampire: A Handbook of Grammar for the Innocent, the Eager and the Doomed, by Karen Elizabeth Gordon.

It's not the best grammar reference in the world for a quick lookup or to get a specific question answered, but it's a good general read, and the example sentenes are consistently entertaining if you're in a Gorey sort of mood.

Having now gone back and read the rest of this thread, it seems I have more things to be all excited about (i.e. the upcoming Last Unicorn audio book).

The following is not Legal Advice. I am not a lawyer. Do not rely on the following statements for any reason whatsoever. Don't. Really.

If that's the complaint, NCSoft may actually be in trouble. The "Statesman" stuff is crap, as are the causes based on the abilities of users to name their avatars whatever they choose (note that they HAVE prevented use of actual TMed names). But the ease of construction of TMed characters? That's a little worrisome, especially if discovery finds documents tending towards that being in the intent of the designers (not unlikely, is my guess. And if design notes on the claw option says "Three! like Wolverine!", well...) or if the options presented take some of Marvel's design choices as default (the three-claw thing is a good example here: if a Mutant:Scrapper:Claws choice produces three claws in a Wolvie-like configuration, I'd worry. If they're more Molly (or Lady Deathstrike, a less-notable Marvel entity) or generic Werewolf, things look better.).

But the general disparagement of Marvel's suit, is not, I think, warranted.

That array of services is broader than I'd thought. I didn't realize that Audible's format is non-standard; that would obviously add cost to the equation. Thanks.

By "consistent" I meant with each other; that is, I didn't see any arbitrage possibilities.

Wow! I said to myself, this is what a writer does when showing a character -- not describing, but demonstrating. I filed it away for the day it would be useful. Well, now I'm getting older and older, and it's time to hand some of this brilliance off to others, who probably know it already, but what the h*ck.

By the way, speaking of squeezeboxes, I'm just listening to Bach's famous Toccata & Fugue in d minor played by Russian virtuoso Sergei Slepokourov. Technically, it's a bayan, not an accordion, but the tone's pretty similar. That's some mighty sweet squeezin', Sergei. (He also does Voices of Spring and Largo Al Factotum.)

Geek knitting alert: Cat Bordhi has published two books of patterns, all of which start with moebius strips in some way. The first one is called A Treasury of Magical Knitting. I can't vouch for the quality of either the patterns or prose, but the premise is at least amusing.

What am I missing here?

See also Wikipedia entries on "whining hypocrite pissants," and "sad song just for you, played by the world's smallest violin."

[Clueless nobs: This is satire]
Mayor: "Our 'multicultural' holiday plan is succeeding brilliantly! The fools don't realize that 'Kawanzaa' is a pagan ceremony for paying tribute to African Demons!"

Aide: "The 'dreidel' encourages them to gamble, and the blood sacrifice reenacted by the Menorah* lighting we'll doom them for sure!"

Alderman: "Violent video game sales are through the roof! Soon their souls will be ours!"

Demon in corner: "HAW-Haw!"

* "Satan's Candalabra."
[/Clueless nobs: This is satire]

What am I missing here?

The fact that the insert has nothing to do with religious observance, but relates only to the like-named commercial buying frenzy? That is, it's not instruction, merely the usual meaningless PR verbiage, dressed up in the usual fall fashion. I doubt even its creators consider it as religious advice. It says what it says because (1) that's the customary expression of good will this time of year when the recipient's religion (or lack thereof) is unknown, and (2) it makes the store/company/whatever look better than blatant expressions of corporate greed.

This all assumes, of course, that the insert contains the usual blather put out by companies after Thanksgiving. If it doesn't, do share the details with us.

http://www.aclu.org/SafeandFree/SafeandFree.cfm?ID=17216&c=206

The only thing more sickening than the thought of having a president who approves of stuff like this is the smuggery we're going hear defending said approval.

Isn't this the plot of the Lost Buffy Christmas Episode, the one written when Joss Whedon was on vacation?

The seller wants $25.00 shipping and handling on top of the high bid.

This is like telling someone planning on riding a unicycle from New York to San Francisco to stay in the *right hand lane* the whole way on I-80 because they need to be *sure* they'll be in position for that tricky exit to the Civic Center once they get over the Bay Bridge.

Of course, this item won't sell, because Shelia didn't specify that the four novels and the rights were not "NIB."

Please, no bidders who are not serious in paying for this package deal for the copyrights and movie rights! If you're not serious with no doubts of paying, then please bid and know that the merchandise and contract will be sent to you once the payment and S & H cost is paid in full to my account through the paypal process only.

I love how many times in her posting she goes back to harp on the $25 s/h fee. I think I've figured it out: $25 is an amount of money that is real for her, and she'd be pissed to lose it. $250,000 is play money, and so she's simply not able to understand that anyone paying $250,000 for something really ought to have the $25 kicked in for them.

With the kind help of Alison Heath, who talked her produce manager into ordering the fruit for me, then FedExed it to me, I have now achieved a long-term ambition: making strange ornate candied citrus-peel slices by cutting up Buddha's Hand citrus latitudinally. Some of the slices look like those daisies people used to stick on their Volkswagens. Others are stranger. Many of them are little roundels, sliced from the long pointy appendages. Even better, they're delicious. Citrons make the very best candied peel.

If anyone wants to buy the movie rights to my book for a quarter mill, I throw in shipping and handling for free, cause I'm just that kinda guy. Call now. Operator standing by. Offer expires midnight tonight.

ElizabethVomMarlowe: I'm still struggling, but I learned a lot about plot by taking the advice of one of my favorite writers, Suzanne Brockmann. She said she learned plot and pacing by writing TV scripts (not paid or anything). She said to pick shows you already know and love and then practice the patterns of the show--end on a cliffhanger at commercial breaks, etc. It really helped me because I could tell when I had enough story...or not. For me, a forty five page screenplay is a lot easier to do as an exericse than a 450 page novel.

A friend of mine gave me that advice. She was using Babylon-5 as a plotting learning tool. (And I saw what she was getting at once I hit, I think it was, S3?) Studying the structures and the way Anvils of Doom came upon the characters and how to do that. And it seems to have worked reasonably well for her.

I can't speak so well to that because the place I usually fall down and suck rocks is characterization, so I'm studying Buffy for that. :-]

Anyway, when I have to think explicitly about plotting, when the arc and sweep of the story hasn't spread itself out in my head (it's kind of like what it feels like to compose, actually, seeing how the [musical] themes weave in and out and develop and knot to a close, even if I am a total piano/orchestra amateur and real musicians/composers might do it otherly)--when I have to think about it, it helps me most to frame it in terms of conflict. I am usually for torment, anguish, and things beating up other things. (Yes, yes, very low on Maslow's hierarchy of needs, moving on.) Figuring out what people, or things, or institutions "want" and how to frustrate them. (I usually get stuck on institutions and have to humanize the conflict, in longer works. Have I mentioned I suck rocks at characterization?)

I have no idea if this is of use to anyone else, but it comes together in my brain so there is a small chance it might come together in someone else's.

*leaves the thread in agony, but knows there will be much +more+ good stuff to read here in the morning*

I've watched it twice, spent the first time muttering to myself "...this was much better in the book..." all the way through and enjoyed it only moderately, spent the second time actually experiencing the thrill of Miyazaki's animations, and came out much more happily wowed.

However, Howl still expresses his displeasure with green slime, so I must be content.

Well, what’s more or less desirable is personal matter, of course. Some people like listening, some people like reading, some people go back and forth depending on context. An audiobook is clearly more desirable than a printed book if your only spare “book” time is while driving to work.

But the real thing driving the price differential is the much higher cost of audiobook production and manufacturing. The new LAST UNICORN audiobook is more than seven hours long, has a lot of original music, was professionally recorded on a top-of-the-line Pro Tools HD system with expensive microphones...and all that was just to get the audio component in place. Then you add a real graphic designer, professional photography, cover art by the Dillons, packaging sufficient to hold seven CDs efficiently but attractively...whoa brother, but it does add up.

There is a reason that most well-done audiobooks are by bestselling authors, and just about everybody else gets low-value production and packaging (or doesn't get audiobook publication at all). Unless a publisher knows that they are going to sell a lot, they just won't risk spending the money.

We certainly hope to sell a lot, but there’s no guarantee of that. Truth is we put so much into making the LAST UNICORN audiobook great out of sheer obsession with quality and love for Peter’s work. It’s what it deserved.

Kate: “I shall certainly ask my local library to get the CD version of this.”

Thanks!

They process the audio that is supplied by audiobook publishers, and prep it in their own proprietary formats for various players at various audio qualities. And they do provide a growing base of reachable customers, which now totals around 165,000 subscribing powers. And of course they maintain a slick website and pay for a lot of advertising and the cost of a lot of bandwidth and data delivery technology. They also have an extremely high overhead cost in terms of office space, people, salaries, proprietary programming, advertising, big bonus payments to suppliers who bring in subscribers, etc.

In fact, their overhead is so high that they actually lose money even taking 88%. Last year they were net negative $3m on around $27m in revenues. The year before they lost even more, and the year before they lost even MORE. In fact, they have yet to see a single profitable year. Without a steady influx of venture capital they would have been out of business long ago.

I have an industry analyst acquaintance who thinks they are actually a deliberate “loss-leader,” meaning that the major book publishers are using other people’s venture and investor money to fund the creation of a viable downloadable audio market, with the intent of swooping in and buying an “unprofitable” Audible on the cheap after that finally happens. Given some of the players in this particular game, he could easily be right.

Actually, manufacturing costs are mostly fixed and follow pretty clear rules in respect to economies of scale. But *production* costs are wildly variant.

An example: When we do our scheduled audiobook of Peter’s THE INNKEEPER’S SONG, our production costs will take a big, big leap because we’ll be casting close to a dozen professional voices instead of one (and all but two of those voices won’t be willing to work mainly on spec, as Peter and I will in order to increase our shot at eventual profitability). Plus there is the time and expense of casting that many people in the first place. INNKEEPER is really going to eat a hole in our bank account when we tackle it.

Enough with the audiobooks already. We're all readers, and Peter has a bunch of books in the pipeline. Here's the current news.

All of these should see print in 2005 from various places.

1) SUMMERLONG. His first new fantasy novel for adults in 12 years. Illustrated by me (my first book illustration job in more than 20 years: lordie!)

2) SMEAGOL, DEAGOL, AND BEAGLE: ESSAYS FROM THE HEADWATERS OF MY VOICE. Peter tackles his many sources of literary inspiration, from POGO to George Brassens to T. H. White and, of course, Tolkien. The latter essay, from which the book takes its title, goes into gory detail about the writing of his screenplay for the 1978 animated LORD OF THE RINGS, and includes great chunks of it by way of example.

3) THE FIRST LAST UNICORN AND OTHER BEGINNINGS. Peter opens up his filing cabinet for a tour of might-have-been and never-quite-was. Among other things this book includes the *very* different abandoned 80-page first draft of THE LAST UNICORN; a sentence-by-sentence annotated analysis of the Butterfly's classic speech; and the four chapters that Viking cut out of A FINE AND PRIVATE PLACE before publication. Cool stuff all. Illustrations and cover by Stephanie Pui-Mun Law.

4) RINGERS. The "coffee table book" companion to the documentary film RINGERS: LORD OF THE FANS, which gives a sociocultural history of the impact of Tolkien's books on world culture and the arts.

5) An as-yet-untitled children's book, Peter's first, from Scholastic's Blue Sky Press. Illustrated by Leo and Diane Dillon.

It's going to be a very nice year.

Well, you know, those rights weigh a lot.

Please remember, it's the copyright and movie rights that you're buying and not my original copy of each of the four novels.  I will send a CD that has all of the book covers- front and back, as well as the stories in the novels of their content. That's what will be yours and my name will no longer be on the novels, instead... yours can be.

Book covers. Front and back. But not, you understand, her original copies of the novels. Just so we're clear about that.

thank.goodness.

And you very nearly made me literally salivate with this news:

When we do our scheduled audiobook of Peter’s THE INNKEEPER’S SONG, our production costs will take a big, big leap because we’ll be casting close to a dozen professional voices instead of one

*This* I will pay to own, assuming I can listen to samples and make sure the voices don't clash with what's in my head [*], because _The Innkeeper's Song_ is one of my favorite books in the world and doing it with a full-cast is the only way possible.

[*] Another peril of audiobooks (again, for me). I tried listening to Pratchett, because there are lots of them and they would make good commute listening, but couldn't get more than an hour into _Jingo_--Vimes doesn't sound like that. I couldn't tell you what he *does* sound like, but it isn't like that, not to me. Similarly, Lois McMaster Bujold has just announced that Blackstone has picked up a bunch of her Vorkosigan backlist, and well, it would be a lucky break indeed if Miles sounded on tape like he does in my head.

Name That Hero:

He's 4' 10". He's had hip replacement surgery. He's slightly manic, brilliant, but a little odd. He's got a dry sense of humor, often aimed at himself.

He's been in and out of the government, largely due to his close childhood friendship with the head of state. Although he's upper class, he tries to improve the lot of the less fortunate.

The first half of the punchline, to spare a lot of comment pile-on: "No, Miles Vorkosigan is 4' 9". Guess again."

I suppose it says something that my friend thought it was even jokingly *plausible* that I'd do such a thing. :-p

Also, JonH? I don't know how much depth your dad wants out of Quicken, and I've barely scratched the surface of the thing, but when I was having a little trouble using it for personal finance records/planning, I found _Quicken 2005 for Dummies_ was pretty clearly written and had what I needed. If your dad has specific questions, he might stop by a bookstore and page through a copy (for whatever version) to see if it addresses them.

::drooooool::

"Finishes mortality"? Is this like ascending in NetHack--you become immortal after getting enough Testimonies?

And here I thought it was going to be an odd typo for Morality . . .

I've been experimenting with it, using various kinds of lemons, and limes. So far the Persian Sweet Lemons, if they have thinner than usual skin, and the Meyer's Lemons have been the best.

For me, the key is slicing the lemons Really Really thinly, and letting them percolate, so to speak, in the two cups of sugar overnight.

I have also cheated by adding a little vanilla extract, or using vanilla sugar.

The hardest part was finding the right knife to use; instead of The Spouse's Fancy Knife, I'm using a cheap serated knife meant for bagel slicing.

Shaker Lemon pie is one of the pies I'm using as holiday presents this year. The other is a chocolate mousse pie my mother invented that's frighteningly easy, and twice as unhealthy.

Good to be here,Teresa.

I certainly don't want to break any rules, so a little guidance would be helpful. Since I am Peter's business manager (not to mention friend, collaborator, sometime illustrator, sometime publisher, sometime producer, and general all-around reliable buddy in the foxhole) everything I say about him and his work does, in some way, come back to my benefit. Is there a way I can share information without stepping over the line? Please advise!

Well, Peter will have final say over all the voices. I can't guarantee that what he likes will match what is in *your* head (grin), but at least they'll come close to matching what is in his.

He'll be the voice of Karsh the Innkeeper. He has asked me to audition for the Fox, but I'll happily step aside if we find better. As for the rest...we'll, the search is on.

Speaking of voice weirdness in audiobooks: someday I hope to get the audiobook rights back for TAMSIN so we can do it over, because the current version has Peter himself reading it, and I have to say it's just....weird and a little creepy, even...to hear a gruffish 65 year-old male voice doing first-person teenage girl.

My only complaint is that there's not enough of it. :)

(I'm about halfway through.)

And I wish that the Schmuck and all his plutocratic associates got relegated to such types of work for an extended period of time, and the pay rates involved, and the working conditions, and had to -live- on it. They are SO smug about "job creation," -they- should have the personal experience of the types of jobs being created in the US, losing -their- affluent cushions of disdain and smugness. I'd say relegate them to working for Wal-Mart EXCEPT they would never get the -low- paid jobs at that company I suspect

I had a migraine back around 5 PM, from dehydration and was longing for the First Break of the shift I was working. Taking my misery out out on the people I was dealing with was not appropriate. I started envisioning castrating [expletive deleted] slowly with thin slice after thin slice instead....

Thanks! I'll take a look.

It's bound to be better than the mid-90's Quicken (for Mac) manual he's been looking at, especially considering he's using a modern Quicken on a PC.

Citrus is fibrous, and cuts like it, even if the fibres are forming bags for lots of flavoured water.

Serrated knives tend to work better for heterogeneous stuff, and particularly heterogeneous fibrous stuff, unless the knife is all of fine -- the rate at which the blade widens back from the edge is low -- keen -- the cutting edge is formed by a narrow angle -- and even -- the cutting edge is smooth down at a microscopic level.

This a value of sharp that most craft blades or commercial razor blades don't meet, or not for long; very few of them have particularly even edges.

One of the advances of the modern world is half-micron chromium dioxide grit applied to optically flat mylar by a static deposition process that leaves the individual particles precisely aligned with each other. I use this stuff on my kitchen knives, and can generally neatly slice up over-ripe tomatoes with them, but it must be acknowledged that as a process it's much more time consuming than just getting something serrated in the first place.

No kidding...

I got to watch my job (research assistant, working for a non-profit organization that puts grad students into government labs) go away, thanks to new security rules.

Since I don't have the appropriate tickets punched (and it's a delay of 5-24 months, depending on the level of ticket to be punched), I'm not eligible for a job with the contractor that has stepped into the role of supplying grad student labor.

It seems to me that the success of this kind of book is an indictment of our society. It's as though we glorify stupidity instead of recognising the great achievements of humans and of the glorious intelligence that allowed those achievements—an intelligence that we all share.

(tnh, what's the correct way to quote something with quotes in it? I changed his double quotes to single quotes, but that's a change to what he had. That's one good thing for the FORTRAN method of writing text strings (7HFORTRAN): you start by giving the length, so there's no quoting or escaping needed. This is really helpful to people who program in dozens of languages each with subtle differences in their escape mechanisms. The downside is that you have to be able to count. It's also less than easy to determine which flavor of whitespace something is.)

===

Hum, sorry, that bit of a joke story was inspired to me by reading the "Bad, bad Santas" thread, and I thought it would have been sad to let it disappear just like that.

I have an industry analyst acquaintance who thinks they are actually a deliberate “loss-leader,” meaning that the major book publishers are using other people’s venture and investor money to fund the creation of a viable downloadable audio market, with the intent of swooping in and buying an “unprofitable” Audible on the cheap after that finally happens. Given some of the players in this particular game, he could easily be right.

I don't know that you need this to be part of a sinister plot. That sounds like the same basic trajectory that Amazon followed, after all, and as far as I know, they're doing pretty well these days. (If I'm wrong about that, I'm sure someone will correct me...)

I'm not really convinced that immediate profitablility is really the best way to evaluate new businesses-- in fact, I'd say that the Wall Street obsession with instant gratification is a major problem. Amazon's willingness to suck up short-term losses, and be up front about doing so, is one of the reasons why they were one of the few bubble-era companies that I respected. And, probably not coincidentally, why they're one of the few still around.

Audible might conceivably be doing the same sort of thing: taking short-term losses in order to build a customer base which will make for long-term success. Or, they might be part of a nefarious scheme. Tough call.

(I've been meaning to write a long rant about this sort of thing, but I never quite have the time, and now Blogger is completely hosed for some reason, so I couldn't publish it even if I did. And I'm not about to go all JVP on you, and post it here...)

Eat them, before they eat you.

What you say is true, but it's also a pure surface objection. It is, literally, judging a book by its cover. If you're a genuine novice in a subject and don't want to become an expert, you just want a practical familiarity, the books can be quite useful.

I had the same basic problem with the titles as you. Then we had to buy a house. Once I swallowed my pride, Home Buying for Dummies turned out to be the most efficient way to find out what I needed to know for my time and money. Since then I've bought a couple more, on business plans and the like, and they've been worthwhile.

Now the only one I claim any sort of moral objection to, with a sideways smile, is Sex for Dummies. (On the basis that, if you can't figure it out because you're a dummy, I'm not entirely sure you ought to be reproducing.) >8-> Even that one's reputed to be of some value, though, as it's by Dr. Ruth.

Steve Ely replied:
What you say is true, but it's also a pure surface objection. It is, literally, judging a book by its cover. If you're a genuine novice in a subject and don't want to become an expert, you just want a practical familiarity, the books can be quite useful.

I'll agree that this is a Good Thing-- I was re-doing my work web page earleir this week, and lamenting the lack of good HTML information for people who don't need to have the parts of the document defined, but aren't (and don't want to be) professional web designers. If that's what the "For Dummies" series is (I can't say I've ever looked at any of their books), then good for them.

I just wish they'd give them less embarassing titles.

The very, very first ____ for Dummies book (I believe it was DOS . . .) came out when I was working for a second-rate technical writing outfit that churned out OEM manuals for DOS, Windows 3.0, Norton Desktop and so on. These were sold for packaging with low-end home PCs.

I forget the name of the Dummies publisher of the time, but they were giving away copies at a trade show. I picked it up and showed it to my boss. We were both blown away. It was essentially what we were doing, but . . . good. Really good. Better than the official Microsoft / Norton manuals. Fun to read and informative. With cartoons!

I hadn't bought a Dummies book for ages, until I got a dog, and picked up Dogs for Dummies as a general reference. It's pretty good.

Anyway, I don't think the concept is celebrating stupidity. In a sense, it does acknowledge that Americans don't love intellectualism, but at the same time it provides a safe way for folks to go about repairing the deficits in their practical knowledge.

I ran into this twice-- Home Decorating for Dummies and Cooking for Dummies. I was expecting chapter titles like "Why Paint is Not The Enemy" and "Gravy Demystified" Instead, HDFD explicitly assumed I had a budget of US$10K / room for redecorating, and CFD launched right into helpful tips like "Practice your sauteeing technique by flipping M&Ms."

Apparently, what I actually needed was Remedial Home Economics For Bachelors and Other Mindless Dolts.

(Small print: one or both of the texts may well have been _The Complete Idiot's Guide to X_ instead.)

The books can be remarkably uneven, but I do like to skim them when I'm thinking about trying something new.

Oh, and Stefan, there are plenty of good books that will help demystify gravy. When I was a teenager, I got a lot of mileage out of the (not sure of exact title) Some Homemaking Magazine's Step by Step Cookbook, which did not use a panoply of mixes and canned products and which did have lots of photographs of how things should look at various stages. That book and a steady diet of Julia Child TV shows helped make me unafraid of the kitchen.

----

I also note that those two wrold-changing jodhpur posts appeared and disappeard. Don't tell me that it was post spam. Aaaargh!

http://home.comcast.net/~stefan_jones/kira_jumps_hoop.ASF

ASF format video. Kind of dark. Several false passes. But she does it.

Next year, we add some flames.

For clarity, Xopher, can I ask you to be more specific on the title?

I ask because, although I've got no reason to disbelieve you on whatever Witchcraft title was bugging you, I'm a very good friend of the author of The Complete Idiot's Guide to Paganism, Carl McColman, and I wouldn't want people avoiding his book by mistake.

He's 4' 10". He's had hip replacement surgery. He's slightly manic, brilliant, but a little odd. He's got a dry sense of humor, often aimed at himself.

Sounds kinda like Robert Reich to me.

I don't remember the author, either, but I'm pretty sure it was a female name. It wasn't Silver Ravenwolf (now THERE's an light-on-ethics writer), but I can't remember the name.

Ding!

I thought she was Lady Moondrip's joke. You mean there is such a person?

*googles*

Oh my. It looks like several people find her books objectionable on those grounds.

"I didn't like this book. The Author talked down to the reader like we really are idiots."

So. You bought a book called The Complete Idiot's Guide, and you're mad, because the author treats you like... an idiot?

What are you, some kind of, I don't know, idiot??

Me, I've been waiting with dread for the series to reach "Special Education for Dummies."
"The Complete Idiot's Guide to Special Education" would do, too, I guess.

Tarnished Silver.
A forum page.
Another forum page.

Looks like she's actively and enthusiastically despised. I had no idea.

(continued on next rock)

Fluffy Behavior 101
Fluffy Bunnies explained.
More on Fluffy Bunnies.
A bit more on Fluffy Bunnies.

(continued on next rock)

The Official Fluff Bunny Tradition Website.

Silver's Dolphins of the Artic Moontide of Pearl Underbelly Fluff & Lightbringers Coven's "Big squishy hugs to you all!" Page.

The Mystical Wiccan Coven Grove of the Glittery Butterfly Unicorn of Magical Healing and Holy White Light of Divine Spiritual Spiffiness and Enchanted Smiling Faerie Goddess of the Brilliant Light of Wonderfulness's "Greetings from the Fluffy Bunny Coven!" Website.

The MWCGGBUMHHWDSSESFGBLW application.

That's as in:

Willow: Talk. All talk. 'Blah, blah, Gaia. Blah, blah, moon. Menstrual life-force power thingy.'

Buffy: No actual witches in your witch group?

Willow: No. Bunch of wanna blessed be's. Nowadays every girl with a henna tattoo and a spice rack thinks she's a sister to the dark ones.

I hate them. Fortunately they have a short halflife; they decay into either reasonable people or ex-Witches.

One thing, though: Much as I love Buffy, there was nothing Wiccan about Willow. Wicca is primarily about worship of the Divine Power as manifest in nature. Magic is one means to that end; it serves about the same purpose in Wicca that prayer serves in Christianity. The silly group dismissed in Season Four was much more Wiccan than Willow. (A young-in-the-Craft, probably Fluffy-Bunny Wiccan group, to be sure.)

Willow was basically a ceremonial magician, though she did some shamanic things as well. I never saw her worship anyone or anything. I have to say that I was offended by their use of the term Wicca to describe her -- but not NEARLY enough to seriously blunt my enjoyment of the show!

I can't speak to any of the other "for Dummies" books, although I've mocked them to my sister, so I don't know how good they are generally. I was sort of desperate to figure out how to do one particular thing and couldn't find it (easily?) in the manual and the "for Dummies" book had the answer, and pointed out some neat features beside, so I am satisfied with it.

I admit that the "for Dummies" and "Idiots" and whatever titles are humorous, but they don't offend me particularly. After a lifetime of having my mom ask questions like, "What good is a college degree if you can't even figure out the geometry of making your bed?" (I majored in math), walking around with a "for Dummies" title doesn't especially bother me. 8-) (I decided that I wasn't going to be able to make the non-Euclidean geometry bed-making argument fly with my mother...)

I don't know (as I said) anything in depth about Quicken's features, but my needs are very modest, and it does the job. This may well not be the case for other people...

Mercedes Lackey had a silly short story about this, which is on the web; it was her first Diana Tregarde story (I haven't read the novels). You want to search for "whoopie witch" if you don't want to read the whole thing.

That story is collected in _Werehunter_, you might give that a shot.

http://www.somethingpositive.net/sp12222004.shtml

Synchronicity!

The Amelia Peabodys (up to but not including the last three books) are wonderful. I started my father on the audio books from Audible recently and he seems to be enjoying them. One thing— the first book, Crocodile on the Sandbank, is somewhat different from the rest, so it's probably worth listening to the second one before deciding whether you like the series. You might consider treating Crocodile as a prequel and just start with the second book, which is what I did by accident.

I guess I just don't see the obvious advantages this belief system has over monotheism (pick your own flavour). But then, I was only born once (and I am not born again), because I think it's only one go per customer, folks. So what would I know?

Nothing. Not a damn thing. No knowledge. Try that in Greek.

Neo Paganism is just as rich with controversy as any other religion. The current high level of interest in things Celtic has spawned an entire cluster of authors writing about things Celtic, and most of them are pretty wretched. I've reviewed a number of books on Celtic paganism, mostly for the Green Man Review, and out of frustration I wrote an FAQ for neo pagan scholars.

It has not, in general been taken well. I really did try to moderate my tone. But I swear some of these authors make things up and haven't the skill to write fiction, so they pass it off as fact.

When a friend of mine was studying Christian theology, she had to learn Hebrew, New Testament Greek, and Latin in order to do any serious Biblical study.

These languages were considered essential groundwork for her studies in the texts on which her religion is based. And, while there's a vast body of Christian writings to draw from, she was constantly encouraged to go back to the primary sources in order to write on the texts.

When I studied Early Christianity my experience was the same. I would have been laughed out of class if I'd tried to base my work only on secondary sources---any undergrad should know better than that. And I'd have been equally ridiculed if I'd relied only on antiquated commentary or translations, without understanding the current scholarship on the topic.

It seems very strange to me that neo-Celtic "scholars" would ignore the guidelines that might lend academic legitimacy to their work and research. Do they want not to be taken seriously?

Yeah, there are lots of stupid people out there, and many of them decide it's cool to call yourself a Wiccan. But . . . we all cherish certain irrational beliefs, most especially in the area of religion/magic/superstition. Saying nasty things about other people's superstitions doesn't make your own superstitions any more valid.

It seems like a situation where if you throw one stone, three stones will come sailing back and hit your glass house.

What I found was not just a mention that pair kerning had been removed from the product, but a long paragraph celebrating the fact that the author's delicate sensibilities were no longer afflicted by seeing a command that he didn't understand the meaning or use of, and how wonderful it was that the manufacturer had made the software friendlier to the skill-impaired.

It's not that unusual that reading a product manual puts one off using the product -- used to be the norm with printers, still is with unassembled bicycles -- but, as Paul Veyne might put it, this was like stickering the package with NEW! IMPROVED! LESS GOOD!!

You are bidding on my Christmas Bonus! I am an Aircraft Mechanic, and the company I work for, Horizon Airlines, has blessed me this year with a wonderful Collectable coffee mug. It is made of Fine China. I know this to be true, because when I turn it over, it says china, in fine letters. It is adorned with printed images celebrating our sacrifices to the Company...

I think you are quite right in saying "some of these authors make things up and haven't the skill to write fiction, so they pass it off as fact." Along with that, some readers take *anything* in print as verified fact. As one person said to me, "They couldn't print it if it wasn't true."

The combination is most unfortunate.

Apparently, people across the country are embracing Festivus (for the rest of us).

Listening to Ms. Willis on NPR this afternoon--although I confess I missed part of the interview--I'm still not sure how ironic these celebrations are. I expect they'd be a little ironic, but maybe they're 100% ironic. Who knows?

Does anyone here celebrate Festivus? Anyone partake of the annual Airing of Grievances?

I'm not a "there're no bad feelings" believer; I admit the possibility that there are things that one should want never to feel, if only because our sentiment is a parent to actions. But many say that there are things about which we should be angry, and it might go the same for contempt.

And how could I otherwise in good conscience fill in the blank in "I have utter ________ for the career of Karl Rove,"?

Something she read recently convinced her that she's actually been a Wiccan all her life. (Probably involved her youthful love of horses and unicorns).

Note that this is a woman who, while living in the Carolinas, went through a phase of Christianity which involved throwing out all her kids' toys and an (apparently inculcated) belief that "My Little Pony" toys are Satanic, with all the different colors having occult meanings.

Andy (with mischief aforethought): Do you ever push the "come here" button on the elevator more than once?

And I don't do fan letters.

On odd Christmas songs: the latest Phoenix New Times has their annual column on seasonal music, and reports that "Millie Pulled A Gun On Santa Claus" by De La Soul is "Perhaps the most brilliant Christmas song ever involving pedophilia, murder and incest".

There's MORE THAN ONE?!

And don't get me going about Barbara Walker. People who tell me about her tend to get lectures on footnotes and why they are important.

But then, I'm not a fluffy bunny Pagan at all. For me, Witchcraft is a religion, not a fashion statement, dammit.

I do some things as tradition that others do as superstition -- Hopping John on New Year's for example. I don't believe it will affect my wealth in the new year at all, but it's a nice tradition for the day.

On a more serious note - my 15 yo niece is getting into Wicca. She is a serious type and fond of books. Can anyone suggest a good book on Wicca I could give her to help start her on her way? Thanks!

(*) cf the traffic-light sensor outside my office, which originally worked only when \two/ cars were waiting to cross the main road -- I had such \fun/ getting into work on weekends until I figured that out.

My faves:

Scott Cunningham's The Truth About Witchcraft Today and Wicca: A Guide For The Solitary Practitioner ... Good introductions to walking the path. Lightweight on history, but solid on ethics and spirituality.

Margot Adler's Drawing Down The Moon (whatever the latest edition is, get that one) ... An almost anthropological study of the Neopagan movement today. Debunks a lot of those pesky "Burning Times" and "Cult Of The Great Goddess" myths. A must-read for a solid grounding in fact.

And lastly, Isaac Bonewits's Real Magic ... Magic and the occult from a more-than-Wiccan point of view. Gets his snark on real good. Also a good read if you're looking for ideas on how to incorporate magic in a fantasy novel. This guy says so.

Mileage may, of course, vary. These are the books I found most helpful when I was in your niece's shoes. Wish her a happy Solstice for me! (And a merry happy blessed whatever to everyone else, as appropriate!)

Another book by my friend Carl McColman. Carl was the senior druid in the Atlanta ADF (Isaac Bonewits's Druidic group) grove some years back, and he married me and my wife. In some ways one might consider him a fluffy bunny; but he's also one of the rare breed of Neopagan believers who draws a sharp line between historical practices and the synthetic Neopagan religions of today. He strongly believes that one should inform the other, but he doesn't confuse them.

Final plug: with the talk on magical ethics here, Xopher and others may be pleased by one of Carl's other books, Before You Cast a Spell: Understanding the Power of Magic. He doesn't actually provide any spells or rituals in it. It's about the whys and why nots, not the hows.

Hah! That's where they've gone!

I'm also running Safari 1.2.4 under OS X 10.3.7. Novel...

My articles on Wicca and Druids can be found on the University of Virginia's web site for the New Religious Movements. Just a note - they've been altered by students. Alexandrians, for example, are not named for a city in Egypt. I also wrote the workbook for the ADF course of study. I've been interviewing pagans for over thirty years for an archive in a couple of universities, as well. What you'd call primary source material, I guess.

Anyhow, I just wanted to pipe up on that subject since I can claim some background in it. Nice to see you all...

Thanks - I hadn't heard of that one, and it sounds like a valuable addition to the bookshelf.

Also, in mentioning Carl, thanks for stating much more succinctly than I could have: he's also one of the rare breed of Neopagan believers who draws a sharp line between historical practices and the synthetic Neopagan religions of today. He strongly believes that one should inform the other, but he doesn't confuse them. I was briefly interested in a book called The Wiccan Mysteries but began to drift away from it after the author exasperated me one too many times on that point. (This is, by the way, exactly why I mentioned the Adler book.)

Can anyone tell me which book this comes from?

I have no idea, but I'd just like to note that I am grateful beyond words that there are places where a question like this can be asked.

I don't have my copy to hand, but I'm fairly certain this is from near the end of the first, The Colour of Magic, when Tethis the sea-troll is describing how he fell to the Discworld.

Dylan, many thanks.

I would swear that NYTimes.com had a link generator of their own, but I can't find it just now. If I dig it up again I'll pass it along.

BUT.... we went to Bloomington, IL the weekend immediatly afgter Thanksgiving for the Bob Tucker's birthday party and I finished my brought book, "The Amazing Dr. Darwin" by Charles Sheffield. It was a wonderful read, once I got over the fact it was more anthologty than the novel I thought it was. BUT I finished it before we got to St. Louis. When browsing in the Barnes & Noble in Bloomington, the only thing that remotely appealed was The Color of Magic. I'm enjoying it immensely.

I think I'm going to have to buy a buttload of books eventually. Like we need more in this house.

Apologies if it comes across like I'm trying to pass myself off as some kind of Pratchett expert, which I'm not, and many people are perfectly aware of his stuff. But I never like to miss an opportunity to push my faves.

The Particles link to the Wall Street bonuses story brings to mind an odd fact: The amount of Christmas tips I received from my mail delivery customers this year more than doubled from last year (from about $125 to $350). Not that I'm complaining, but I'm scratching my head and wondering what might be behind such a drastic change.

Don't be intimidated. The books run in several threads rather than being a single sequence, and each book usually has enough about current circumstances (instead of rehashing the back story) to make sense on its own. Reading them more-or-less in order doesn't hurt -- it's nice to know just where Susan comes from that her response to monsters under the bed amounts to "take names and kick ass" without wasting time taking names -- but isn't critical.

Besides -- think of all the fun you have ahead of you. (I don't reread much of anything, but I reread most of the existing books ~5 years ago to make additions to the concordance and did \not/ find it a chore.)

Lisa Spangenberg: I want those recipes! Please?

Teresa: That candied Buddha's hand peel sounds yummy. One of the dishes we had at the epic dinner at Trio had Buddha's Hand zest on it. We all (me, Tammy Coxen, Mark and Priscilla Olsen) thought of you.

Omnes: I don't buy those idiot and dummy books because I have to be really careful about the messages I send to my subconscious. It believes them. I'm not being funny; I'm absolutely serious.

Freff: OMG!!! All those Beagle books. We'll be in Heaven around here. Thanks for letting us know.

Kate: I loved the Peabody books, but the later ones were less interesting and I haven't read the last few. I listened to one of the books on tape (I-5 from SF to LA: very long, very boring) and enjoyed it a lot.

MKK

If you figure it out, be sure to let me know. I need to pal around with Nanny and I want to apply to the Unseen University. Just to make them nervous.

MKK

Meanwhile I'm listening to _So You Want To Be A Wizard_, which I haven't re-read for some time, which is working well; I had an insane fit of the giggles over Fred and his hiccups, which nicely offset the earlier twinge when we met Nita's parents for the first time.

Mary Kay, you can go to the recipes I mentioned thusly:

Shaker Lemon Pie

Chocolate Mousse Pie

Teresa and everyone else who has enjoyed or participated in the "self-publishing" threads will probably appreciate today's "Non Sequitur", in which Danae becomes "a published novelist", and even "critically acclaimed".

I hope this doesn't mean 2005 will be the year of spam. I hope instead 2005 will be the year of pear champagne and good movies on DVD (The Long Goodbye, choice inspired partly by the pastiche thread) and cats and husband cuddled on the couch. Happy New Year, y'all!

Happy new year to all here, especially our lovely hostess.

Checkitout soonish, 'cos I think they go into archives after 2 weeks, when they become visible only to paid-up registered members who can store their favourites. This one may very well go into 'cult classic' mode, like Calvin & Hobbes' "Big Picture" strip.

No shit, there I was, September 1976, driving back across the country from the Kansas City Worldcon, with Hilde, Patrick (still just plain Hayden at the time), and Bill Patterson.

And we're driving across the long, boring, flat, boring, monotonous, boring spaces of Kansas and Oklahoma, when suddenly Patrick says:

"Zoom!"

"What?" I say.

"Schwartz!" says Bill.

"What?" I say again.

"Profligiano!" cries Patrick.

"What?"

"Zoom!" "Schwartz!" "Zoom!" "Profligliano!"

This goes on for... okay, it probably wasn't hours, but it seemed like it at the time... with me, totally clueless, going "What? What? What?" all the way through. With NOT ONE WORD of explanation from Bill or Patrick about what they were doing.

So finally, finally, TWENTY-EIGHT FRIGGIN' YEARS LATER, I get -some- idea of what the hell they were doing.

*sigh* Patrick could be a bastard back then, y'know?

Maybe something that should be passed over in silence.

Some close variant of this was played at my college back in the mid-'70s -- and I couldn't figure it out then, and even after reading the rules, I can barely follow it now. While it was never high on my list of Unanswered Questions, I'm equally astonished that it's taken nearly 30 years to have somebody at least point me to the explanation.

re: "I hope instead 2005 will be..."

2005 is the year of the semiprime, because 2005 = 5 x 401. Both 5 and 401 are prime numbers. A semiprime is a number which is the product of exactly two prime numbers. This hasn't happened for a few years, and won't happen again for a few years. Extra credit for the first to say when...

Happy New Year!

re: "I hope instead 2005 will be..."

2005 is the year of the semiprime, because 2005 = 5 x 401. Both 5 and 401 are prime numbers. A semiprime is a number which is the product of exactly two prime numbers. This hasn't happened for a few years, and won't happen again for a few years. Extra credit for the first to say when...

... and I hope that 2005 will be the year that JVP responds on this blog with more non-mathematical content than mathematical content...

[JVP's livejournal being a profoundly apt place for the interesting mathy bits...]

Fair enough. That also seems to be what our gracious hostess Teresa asks.

Bill Blum:

Can anyone update us here on the Frank Kelly Freas tragedy, if true? 150,000 people are incommeasurable with one, but Freas is (was?) sui generis.

Can anyone update us here on the Frank Kelly Freas tragedy

I'm moderately fascinated to observe the speed with which Wikipedia has updated - This page was last modified 23:50, 2 Jan 2005.

They don't have any more information than I've seen elsewhere (to whit that he has expired) though.

Service, burial, memorial schedule & addresses.

Very sorry to lose Kelly Freas. We all knew it had to happen, but seeing him always tended to make one hope it just wouldn't, somehow. I'll treasure those interactions I had with him, particularly when he said he liked my quick sketchy art better than the tediously worked out art. How liberating! Thanks, Kelly!

See also this exchange, in which Randolph Carter enmeshes a poor, unassuming Nigerian crook in a tangled web involving the Necronomicon, Cthulu worshippers in Kentucky, and a certain Detective Sipowicz...

Rabbi Yisroel Kelemer was Officiant, and addressed such distinguished guests as Lydia Van Vogt, Forrest J. Ackerman, Harry Turtledove, Karen Anderson, J. Neil Schulman, Marv Wolfman, and Craig Miller.

A brochure, with a Menora on the cover and thumbnail data on Frank Kelly Freas, featured the poem "When Earth's Last Picture is Painted," by Rudyard Kipling [1892]. Also distributed was a photograph of the deceased on a "Chicago in 2000" collectable card with more data on his first publication, Hugo Awards, and ASFA Presidency.

Besides the widow Laura, and family members, those who spoke in loving memory of "Kelly" included David Gerrold, Brad Linaweaver, and John Hertz. One could almost imagine Kelly's gremlin grin through the light from the stained glass windows as the Rabbi extolled the fame of the next speaker, a world famous writer, and Jerry Pournelle approached the podium, just as the Rabbi said: "and so I give you... Larry Niven!"

Amid howls of laughter, Larry spoke before Jerry. I have notes as to high points of several of the heart-felt testimonials, but I shall not indulge myself by recounting them, nor to intrude on the private details of the reception that followed at the Freas home. Due to inclement weather, shifting chaotically between downpour, sunshine, and hail, the public interment was cancelled, and a private family ceremony will be held at Oakwood Memorial Park in the near future.

Among those quoted or cited at the Funeral Service were Bob Aspirin, Poul Anderson, Terry Carr, Gordon Dickson, Ted Cogswell, Robert Heinlein, Dick Allen, Brian Aldiss, and Isaac Asimov.

Among many floral arrangements was one from the Dorsai Irregulars.

Oh my name is Donald Rumsfeld
I'm as oily as can be,
I push aggressive wars from lies,
As US policy,

I had old ties with old Saddam
But now he's enemy,
And when it comes to Osama,
It's okay he's still free!

I follow George Bush,
We're CHRISTIANS here,
I follow George Bush,
From Cheney's ear,
I follow George,
He tells so,
And since I like to run the war,
To Baghdad back I'll go!

Oh my name is Donald Rumsfeld
And I push a party line,
I send the soldiers out to war,
Equipped so very fine.

The generals don't have the guts
To tell the public that
Their troops were sent out unequipped,
Sans armor they got SPLAT!

Oh my name is Donald Rumsfeld
And I'm proud of what I do,
This is a CHRISTIAN nation,
Spreading the Word that is so true,

And while it was from elsewhere
The attack on New York came
I have called down vengeance
On Iraqis just the same.

I had lots of word to say Saddam
Was guilty of all crimes,
The ones he did and ones that he
Did not commit at times,

I put my effort into knocking
Baghdad back centuries,
Back to times when it should
Have been a CHRISTIAN city!

Warren Ellis just posted:

* * *

Will Eisner: 1917-2005

Will Eisner passed away on January 4th, 2005 at the age of 86 following quadruple bypass heart surgery.

Will Eisner was one of America’s few truly great pioneers in the comics form, and one of the originators of the literary modern graphic novel.

To play Devil's Advocate on this: the right wing talking heads are pointing out that Kofi Annan didn't interrupt his ski vacation in Wyoming either. He also took three days to get back to work after the disaster.

The dollar value of our aid was going to be a matter of public record anyway, and if he didn't announce a figure it would've been the first question reporters hounded him on. The amount of aid we're sending (monetary and otherwise) has since gone way up. I also think it was a damn clever move to put his dad and Bill Clinton in charge of relief fundraising, thus defusing any reluctance on pure partisan grounds.

All that said, however, I'm with those who say that our donations as citizens should matter most in an emergency like this. Sending the military to help, airlifting supplies, hey, that's cool. That's something I can't do. But cash? I can pick my own aid organizations (and I did), and be confident that the money's being spent more efficiently than if it trickles down to them out of my taxes. We as individuals need to reach out. That's much more important, and we have more control over it, than how our government reaches out.

Of course, as the publisher controls the pursestrings, it wasn't long before the first Idiot's Guides and Complete Idiot's Guides appeared on store shelves. The first ones tended to be substantive revisions of existing titles: The Plain English Computer Dictionary was rereleased as The Complete Idiot's Guide to Computer Lingo. The publisher's business savvy was borne out over the esthetic objections of the editorial side, as the Idiot's Guides began to outsell pretty much everything in the MCP catalog. Shortly thereafter, for unrelated reasons, I left MCP, although I continued to do some freelance work for a few years after that, including many Idiot's Guides.

Speaking of the style objections upthread: Right toward the end of my career freelancing for Alpha, I got a call from one the editors there about an Idiot's Guide that had already been through several development passes and a full copyedit, and yet lacked the necessary sense of whimsy. The author, it seemed, was irretrievably humorless. So, for the first and last time in my life, I was hired as a comedy writer, to inject whimsical gags into the text. It was a strange gig, as my own sense of humor tends toward the extremes, and this needed to be funny, yet strictly middle-brow.

Later I found that the series had been so successful that the parent company (Macmillan) opened a second Alpha Books office in New York to handle the non-technical titles. So, if you see an Idiot's Guide on a tech subject, it was developed in Indianapolis, but if it's about wine tasting or Wicca or weightlifting, the damage was done in Manhattan.

To this day, if you look on the back page or the intro to most Idiot's guides, you'll find a bit of smarmy boilerplate like, "Of course you're not an idiot, but sometimes blah, blah, blah can make you feel like one...." This bit of marketing is basically the rationale that the publisher used to sell editorial on the idea, rephrased for public consumption.

Third 'graph: AQ: "irretrievably" s/b "irredeemably"?

John Brockman of the Edge Foundation has asked 120 noted scientists, writers, and other thinkers the question, What do you believe is true even though you cannot prove it? Their responses are varied and interesting.

Death And Taxes.

The image is huge. But very much worth the download time.

I guess this just confirms blogs really have hit the mainstream. The market leaders have started eating each other (er, I mean strategically merging).