Movie Review: War Horse

Denisa and I watched War Horse the other day. I had fairly high hopes for the film, It got above 70 on both Rottentomatoes and Metacritic. It's directed by Spielberg, based on what's supposed to be an awesome play (which was in turn based on a children's novel). Also? It was nominated for 6 Oscars, including Best Picture,

Sounds like a winner, yes?

But it just wasn't. It's beautifully shot. It looks fantastic, and I was impressed to read that almost all of it is real--digital effects were just used in one 3 second shot. Other than that, the whole thing is actual stuff being done by actual people.

What didn't work for me, then? I think the biggest problem was that the story was too big. Too many plot points and characters to cover, and the stakes were never really established. In a nutshell, the story follows the adventures of a horse (Joey) in World War I. Joey encounters a lot of different humans, and he has good experiences with some and bad experiences with others. And this could have been really awesome. I enjoyed seeing the sequences depicting the war and how things were done at the time, and there were some very well done bits and pieces, but in the end, it feels like you're watching a pinball game from the point of view of the pinball.

Joel doesn't do enough to warrant being the main character of the movie. The various humans in the film don't do enough either. So what you end up with is a slice of life movie masquerading as an action/adventure. That's not a good combo. Maybe if I had been expecting just a slice of life film, it would have been different. I'm not sure. But I don't think so. When I'm watching a movie, I want the main characters to be resourceful. To be people (or horses) who take an active part in their fate. Sitting back and being there doesn't usually cut it.

Even overlooking this big problem, there wasn't enough of an actual story to keep me engaged. First there's life on the farm (which started well enough, and gave me hope for the movie), but then we're with a series of owners. Each time, you wonder why we're with this owner at this time. What will happen here that makes everything make sense. And it never comes together.

In the end, I'm left with a movie that looks fantastic, has a great score (John Williams), and . . . seems to be trying too hard to be an Oscar winner. It's like an overenthusiastic high school drama student. Very earnest, and that's all well and good, but this is the big leagues, son. Bring a story that counts, and bring some acting that works. (Did I mention the acting didn't work for me? Likely because I was never engaged in the story.)

Still, I recognize sometimes I'm off in my reviews. Did anyone out there see this one and want to disagree with me? Was I too harsh? Let me know in the comments.

Defining Death: Vodnik Chapter Fourteen

I've already discussed how the actual character of Morena had to change at the last minute during the revision process (check out that discussion here). This is the actual chapter where the transition took place, of course,

For this week's commentary, I wanted to discuss how I decided to handle death in Vodnik. I knew that I wanted to have the Slovak personification of Death show up, but how did she behave? What was her day to day schedule like? What did she like?

The knee-jerk reaction for me when I think of Death personified is one of two options: The Ghost of Christmas Yet to Come (from Dickens' Christmas Carol) or Death from Terry Pratchett's Discworld. For the former, you've got a big ominous skeleton in a hood going around freaking people out by being spooky. In the latter, you've got the same character essentially, except now you have him do funny things every now and then. Humor plays a much bigger role for Pratchett than for Dickens. Go figure.

I already knew that my version of Death wasn't going to be the skeleton-in-a-hood routine. Here's an image Shawn Boyles did for the mythology guide over on Tu Books' website.

So. Still the scythe, but no hood. I wanted the image of Death to still be ominous. But I also wanted a touch of humor in there, as well.

For me, that came as I fleshed out the character. Gave her some basic human traits (she likes cough drops, she has a sense of humor, she likes American football).

Next question to tackle--how does she get everything done? There are people dying all over the world. What are her boundaries? What happens if two people die at the same time? If she's just in charge of deaths in Slovakia, how does she keep track of them all? How many people die in Slovakia, anyway? I had to research up some of these statistics and do some basic math for this, then extrapolate some world building based off of that. She'd need to be able to freeze time, for one thing. What would the world be like when she did that? (I took some of my mental image of that from elements of CS Lewis's The Great Divorce.)

How long can she freeze time? Why doesn't she do it all the time? Questions questions questions. And then there was the question of how long she'd been doing this. Is Death a job? A permanent position? (That, of course, led to other elements of the book--like Death in the Modern Day.)

It's important to note here than I am far from an intensive plotter. I'll write a general outline of a book, and then I'll flesh it out as I go. (For Vodnik, I was even less of a plotter.) This means that I explore things as I go. My friend Isaac Stewart compared it to set design for movies. You make the facade look perfect, but if you glance behind it, it's all two by fours and nails. Nothing finished there. This works--but the trick is you have to have all the facade covered everywhere that shows up in the finished product, so to speak.

What this means in practice is that sometimes you'll be blazing along in your writing, and then you discover there was an area that you left unfinished. You've got to go there, but you don't know what "there" is. For me, that's when I have to go back to brainstorming mode until I've got that ironed out. Often, this results in me having to iron out other places that are affected by the changes I just made to the new section. Part of me thinks it would be better to just plot the whole thing out in the first place, but I know me and I know how I write. I'd inevitably drift off script sooner rather than later, and all that plotting could well go down the toilet.

Did this happen in Vodnik? Some. I had no plans to have Tomas get the manual for Death in the book. And yet it popped up in the middle of once scene. This meant I had to figure out what it was--what was in it, how it worked. I'll probably have to wait and discuss this at a later time, though. Out of time for today, and this is already late as is. (I blame the Olympics. They're making me stay up even later than I usually do.)

Opening Ceremonies Time! Why I Love the Olympics

As you all no doubt know, the Olympics start up again tonight. I for one am very excited. I've always liked the Olympics. The first ones I can remember are the summer Olympics in 1984 in LA. My family had a VHS tape of the Olympic Highlights, and I watched it multiple times. It had the opening ceremonies, Carl Lewis, Mary Lou Retton--good times. I was totally hooked. (Here's a sampling from the opening ceremonies--TRC just watched them with me, stunned to find out jetpacks had been invented that long ago, and that we still don't have them in our daily lives. Come on, Science!)



What do I like about them so much? I think the biggest thing is that I have this crazy idea that they bring the world together somehow. That with everyone watching them, we have this sort of shared communal experience that everyone can relate to. So often the various cultural differences are focused on in the news or politics. In my experience, people have fundamental difference, yes. But we have many more fundamental similarities. We feel the same emotions, have the same basic goals from life.

And a whole lot of us are competitive. :-)

I like how our entire country can cheer for the same team. Much as I'm a Yankees fan or a BYU fan, I don't really relish the amount of hate and vitriol that can pop up between Yankees/Red Sox or BYU/Utah fans. I'm more of a good-natured joshing sort of a fellow. Being mean-spirited about it, or really getting frothy at the mouth . . . that's not my style. I enjoy sports much more when everyone can root for the same team.

I don't particularly like how much the medal count has come to be emphasized so strongly. Does it really matter if the US wins fewer medals than another country? I like the individual competition--not the overall "My country is better than your country." Because--really? We beat you in the relay, so we're better than you as a country? How stupid is that?

I like the drama of the Olympics. To see how individuals overcome trials to emerge victorious. NBC has done a very good job with presenting that drama over the years. Sure, sometimes they ham it up a bit too much--and other times, they refuse to show the actual sports in favor of showing more and more drama. But now I can watch all the sports on my iPad whenever I want, so I'm willing to put up with NBC going over the top now and then.

For the summer Olympics, I really like track and field, swimming, and gymnastics. Probably because these are the sports that have been shown the most over the years. I'm going to try my best to watch some of the lesser-viewed sports this time. Judo? Fencing? Taekwondo? Table Tennis? Yes, please.

How about you--are you excited? Why or why not? Favorite sports? Please share!

An Official Ramble--Discovering How Big the Pond Really Is

As I've watched my son go through school and take various lessons (swimming, skiing, tennis--my town has a wealth of offerings for kids. It's fantastic), I've been reminded of my own experiences in school and life in general. He's so enthusiastic about things, and he's more than a little over-confident, if I'm telling the truth. He's always convinced he's the fastest in the world, or the best at reading, or the best swimmer. No matter what he sees, he's sure he can do better.

This came out really strongly in the last winter Olympics. He was taking skiing lessons at the time, and I watched some of the downhill men's event with him. He was amazed at what they were doing, then said calmly, "They go about as fast as I do."

I know I was this way when I was younger. I graduated as one of the valedictorians from my high school. I got great scholarships to a great university. I felt like I could do anything--be anybody. Of course, life inevitably cures most people of that. For me, it happened when I tried to get into 9 different PhD programs. I had a 3.98 GPA, double major, double emphases in my MA program--I thought I'd get into a bunch.

I got into none.

For TRC, some of this has already happened. He's up to level 3 now in swimming lessons, and this seems to be the level where they stop playing with the kids and start really teaching them how to swim. TRC went to the first lesson full of swagger. He was the best swimmer in the world, after all.

Then they made him swim from one end of a real pool to the other. Nine feet deep at the deep end. And he discovered something: he wasn't nearly as good as he thought he was. It was difficult. He had to have help to make it the whole way. He also discovered something else: some of the other kids didn't need help. They could do it all on their own.

He wasn't the best swimmer in the world.

This happens all the time, of course. And I for one am very thankful it does--despite what a painful learning experience it can be at times. When we first start learning something, we're so focused on ourselves that it's hard to compare what we can do with what other people can do. Get a bit better at it, and you start being able to look around you at other people doing that same thing in your area. It reminds me a lot of the opening shot to Contact. Here it is:



The farther we zoom out, the more competition there is. The more competition there is, the more we realize we're not as good as we think we are. This isn't a bad thing. It helps keep us humble.

This happens with my writing, as well. At first, I was writing just for me. I evaluated how I was doing on my own. Then I got a writing group, and it was all about how I was doing in comparison to those other three, then five, then eight people. Then I was in a creative writing program, and I could compare myself to fifty or more. And then I was trying to get a publisher or an agent, and I was comparing myself to thousands or more.

When my book came out, and I was now forced to compare myself with all the other published authors who have ever lived, something happened. I stopped trying to compare myself so much, and I started focusing on myself again--just like at the end of that pan out scene in Contact. We see there's so much else out there to worry about, that in the end, it's just enough to worry about ourselves. Worry about what we can do. Being the best we can be.

TRC and I will watch the swimming events at this year's Olympics, and I'll be watching him to see his response. Will he still think he swims as fast as they do, or will he just be amazed at their skill? It's all part of growing up.

Competition is fine. It helps us strive to be better. To constantly improve. But it's also important to have that humility--to realize there's someone else out there better than you. Probably lots of people better than you. The internet is helping us see that, of course. As communities get larger and larger, it's impossible not to notice how much talent there is in every area. It's an exciting time to be alive.

And that's all I have for you this Thursday.

When the Well Runs Dry. Literally. Meaning an Actual Well. My Well.

Right before we left for Quebec, we started noticing something strange with our water. It would shut off at random times. You'd be in the middle of a shower, and then suddenly poof! The water turned off. It would come back on thirty seconds later or something--without you having touched the spigot at all.

This is not what you want to have happen to you in the shower. It's also not an ideal water situation for your house.

But vacation beckoned, so we had to leave the problem be for then, hoping that when we got back, magical fairies would have come and fixed it. All I can say is that if the fairies did come to fix it, they did a pretty awful job. The problem's still ongoing--even after having not touched our water source (a drilled well) in five days.

After extensive testing (and replacing the pump switch, which seemed like it could be the problem), we've discovered it's either a case of our well going dry, a leak somewhere in the line from the well to our house, or a faulty pump. I'm kind of rooting for the faulty pump, just because I have a feeling that will be less expensive to fix. (Though who really knows.)

The good news is that we still have water. As long as we don't use too much at one time, we have no issues at all. It's when the tank gets too low that thing shut off. Of course, the problem's there all along--the pump gets water in thirty second bursts, it appears--as opposed to non-stop pumping, which is what it ought to be doing. It does that--all the time. We just notice it when we use too much water. Make sense?

So . . . looks like I might have to call the well guys to come fix things. I know one of them personally. We'll start there. Here's hoping it's not too expensive of a fix, since we already spent a lot on the refinance. But this is why we have savings, I suppose. It just means we might not have enough to do much in the way of renovation this year . . .

Quebec for Beginners

Just got back from a family vacation to Quebec on Sunday--we'd been there since Wednesday. I've been to Canada once before, but when I was young enough that I don't really remember any of it that clearly at all. Just the fact that I'd been. Since we live so close to the country now, it didn't make any sense that we hadn't actually visited it. Especially since Quebec City was only four hours away. That's about as close as Boston.

So we made the trek, and I'm back now to talk about it. Picture-free, alas. My camera is with Denisa, so I can't post the pics here. They'll be up on Facebook soon enough, though. Anyway.

There were a lot of unknowns on this trip. It didn't help that neither of us had had the time to really do some proper research about what we wanted to do and see. We thankfully had some friends who've been to Quebec many times, and they had great tips for what we shouldn't miss, but as for what to expect . . . we'd heard the city was "very European." However, we'd only really heard this from people who haven't been to Europe. So we weren't quite sure what to expect.

The border crossing was something Denisa was expecting to be simple. When we crossed the border between Czech Republic and Slovakia back in pre-EU days, it involved the guards staring at our passports for a bit (staring at mine--the American's--for quite a bit) and then waving us through. How much different could it be here?

Quite a bit.

They asked a slew of questions (Do you have any weapons? Do you own any weapons? Have you ever owned any weapons? Do you own mace? Do you own a taser? I'm not making this up). Then we had to park the car and go inside and wait while they did who knew what for about 15 minutes. Maybe some of this had to do with the fact that hardly anyone else was driving across the border. So . . . bored boarder patrol guards? In any case, it was quite extensive (and it was almost as extensive on the way back, although the American guards were friendlier.)

Gas was much more expensive. Somewhere around $4.90/gallon--thankfully, we were able to tank up right before we entered the country, and then made it back home on that one tank of gas.

We stopped for some food before we got to the city, and I had my first taste of poutine. Basically a French Canadian meal consisting of french fries covered in brown gravy and cheese curds. It was interesting. I think I liked it. :-)

I was surprised when we got there at how little English the woman at the restaurant spoke, but I figured there'd be more English when we got to the city.

Not so much.

I've been to a fair number of foreign countries. I'd have to say that Quebec City wins the award for "least amount of English spoken" if you don't count Eastern Europe. (Which I don't. Eastern Europe was all Russian until fairly recently, and it's becoming much more English-friendly lately.) Quebec was defiantly French-only. Some English spoken, but much less than in other countries--though it's certainly possible I just had a less-ordinary experience.

The city is very European. It didn't feel like I was just a few hours away from home, that's for sure. It sits right on the St. Lawrence River, with the Chateau Frontenac towering above the lower city, filling much the same role as a castle. It reminded me of Salzburg in many ways. The Old City is walled (the only walled city in North America north of Mexico City). The architecture is very Old World. I tried to compare it to Boston or Philadelphia, and the feel is just . . . different. Philly old city is colonial. This wasn't.

The food was great, although bakeries are definitely not the city's strong suit. We made several trips to bakeries, and we had to hunt to find them. Not much in the way of good bread--at least not in the touristy Old Town. Maybe it's better outside that area. We had crepes, which were highly tasty. And--ironically--some good Italian food. Did manage to get some goodies at a bakery we found, and they get two thumbs up from me for their chocolate cake. Chocolicious.

At the same time, it was all tremendously expensive, I thought. Crepes were $13 each. Dinners ran around $25, everywhere you went. (Note: I didn't visit the 2 McDonald's we passed. It might have been cheaper there.) Riding the little funicular up to the Old City was $2/a person for a thirty second ride. Brunch at the Chateau would have been $50 each. (We passed this time around.) Don't expect to go and do too much for cheap. (Though we did have a condo right downtown, which was very reasonably priced for a group, and we managed to get some tickets for a river cruise at almost 50% off, which was nice. Thanks, AAA!)

We saw much of the Old City: walked the walls surrounding it, avoided the throngs of Pink Floyd fans in town for a concert, checked out the battlefields, walked 398 steps up to said battlefields, saw Montmorency Falls from the cruise ship, visited the Museum of Civilization to see a really cool Samurai exhibit, shopped in the artsy areas, walked (and walked, and walked) (note: the toy store Benjos, while a great toy store, is a very long walk for a hot day with an 8 year old and a 4 year old).

All told, I highly recommend it. We'll be going back for sure. The kids had a great time, and there was still plenty of things we'd wanted to see but didn't get around to actually doing.

That said, it was nice to come home and get back into the swing of things here. Busy busy busy . . .

How about you all? How many of you have been to Quebec? Thoughts?

Chapter Bumps and Fate vs. Free Will: Vodnik Chapter Thirteen

Interestingly enough, this is a chapter that didn't change almost at all from the first draft to the last. Tomas was always going to save someone's life from Zubata/Morena. He was always going to ignite her wrath, and he was always going to be scared stiff of the consequences.

So what to talk about in this chapter's commentary?

One thing that *did* change was the addition of the chapter bumps--the little excerpts from Death in the Modern Day (DitMD) that start each chapter. These were a relatively late change to the novel. A lot of the material existed in the early drafts, but it was given in-text. I'd break the action to have Tomas read a long section of DitMD. My editor noted that was a clunky way to get that done, and I came up with putting them all in as they are now to see if that solved the problem.

I feel like it did a great job. Of course, I had to go back and write some new bumps, and not all of them have a whole lot to do with what's in the chapter in question, but it was a lot of fun. I really enjoy this writing technique, since it allows me to offer extra insight into the world from a point of view other than my main character. I've used the same approach in Cavern of Babel (my alpaca fantasy novel) to give a bunch of fun alpaca facts, and I've put it to use in my currently-being-shopped-around novel, Tarnhelm--each chapter begins with a quote from a noir movie that has something to do with the contents of the chapter.

I think one of the reasons I like chapter bumps so much is because they're a way to add extra material in, but not intrude on the reader. If the reader wants to skim them, she can. Or she can delve into them and enjoy them. My friend Brandon Sanderson uses them very well in his Mistborn series, and that's one of the things that made me like them so much--seeing what they're capable of.

On another note, I want to get a little meta. It's about my own book, so I suppose this is sort of self-congratulatory in a way, but oh well. It's my blog, and I can write what I want. Here's the deal: Morena has a handy little book that has listed all the times and places where a person's going to die. She knows the causes. This is a fundamental argument in favor of Fate as far as the Slovak side of mythology is concerned. Adam was scheduled to die at that time and place. Nothing he did could have changed it.

And yet, Tomas managed to do that, which throws the whole system into the air. If random acts by people can change Fate, how in the world can Fate function? Yes, you've got Morena around to iron out the little details, but you could certainly argue that doesn't hold much water. Any fluctuation in a big system like All of Humanity would create ripples that would create waves that would mess everything up.

So the question of the day is, "Did Morena set Tomas up?" Was this all just a big ruse to get Tomas to kill the vodnik? Is Vodnik ultimately arguing for fate or free will? How? If I were reading this book as someone other than the author, I think it would be kind of fun to go through and look to see what evidence there is in the text for each side of that issue.

Then again, I'm a writer/librarian/English MA holder. I like strange things.

New Church Callings

This is more of an informational post for those of you (family and friends) who care, but Denisa and I had a reshuffling of church callings recently. (For those of you who don't know, in the Mormon faith, people are "called" to a church responsibility that lasts until their next calling.)

For the past 2.5 years, I've been the Elder's Quorum President--essentially in charge of keeping watch over the 20-45 year old men in this neck of the Mormon woods. It's a big time investment. I usually spent around 5-10 hours on it a week, sometimes more, sometimes less. Denisa's been the First Counselor in the Stake Young Women's Presidency--meaning she helped keep watch over the 12-18 year old Mormon girls in northern and central Maine (I'm really oversimplifying this, but oh well.)

She was just called to be the president--so she's the person in charge of that now. A much greater time commitment. And with that, I was released as Elder's Quorum President and called as the secretary, instead. (No more making decisions. Just keeping minutes. AOK with me.)

So Denisa's very very busy, and I've been using my freed up time to try and take things off her. Helping clean more, doing the dishes. That sort of thing. It's been working out okay so far, but I know she's been stressing about it a fair bit.

She'll do a great job. Join me in wishing her luck. :-)

Another Two Belated Television Recommendations: White Collar and Psych

Once again, I'm probably late coming to this party, but I wanted to throw this out there--Denisa and I have been watching and enjoying White Collar and Psych. They're both light mysteries, with plenty of comedy to keep them flowing along. Are they the best shows I've ever watched? No, not really. The plots are a bit flimsy at times, and you can see the USA formula churning a little too easily now and then. (At this point USA seems determined to just have as many of these light mysteries as they can. Pick a quirky character (Monk, Psych, Burn Notice, White Collar), give him a few unique traits, add in some best friends with opposite, complementing traits, and have them go around solving crime.

Then again, there are worse shows out there to watch. At least the characters are mostly original. I don't know if I'd watch these for weeks and weeks on end, but they're fun enough for 40 minutes at the end of a long day, and you don't have to suffer through commercials. :-)

In Psych, the main character is a schlub who's lazy and fun loving, but also is fantastic at noticing small details. He can analyze a scene in an instant and recall it all later. He's managed to get a job moonlighting as a psychic for the police--who don't think he's psychic, but strangely don't seem to care. They keep having him come back to help them solve crimes. (Although as a quibble, it never makes sense to me why the police in shows like this are always so reluctant to turn to the hero of the show. He always solves the crime. Are they that stubborn or that stupid that they consistently turn down the best option for finding out whodunnit? Also, why doesn't the local town just fire most of the police force and have the main character solve crime solo?)

In White Collar, the main character is a con man who's made a deal with the FBI to solve cases with them instead of rotting in a jail cell. He's fun loving and fancy free, though there's of course the requisite Bigger Plot--a missing girlfriend who he's trying to find. The show's fun enough, though again, one marvels that there are so many expert con artists the FBI hasn't been able to catch . . . until the main character comes along, at which point they start getting nabbed at the rate of one a week.

But those sorts of problems aren't new. Every themed show has to deal with that in one way or another. All part of the willing suspension of disbelief. I just imagine it's made worse by watching shows back to back instead of week to week.

Still, Netflix Instant Watch really is perfect for television, and I hope they start adding a wider range of shows eventually. I'd love to see some of the newer ones, but then again, I've watched so many of them now that a lot of the awesome backlog I had accumulated is gone. Such is life.

Whitney Award Nominations Open (Hint Hint!)

(Sorry for the pic--I couldn't resist.) Important to all Vodnik fans. The Whitney Awards are open to nominations right now, and Vodnik is eligible. What are these awards? They're supposed to celebrate excellence in Mormon literature--meaning in this case, literature written by Mormons. (For more information on them, check out the FAQ.)

They have categories (that Vodnik would qualify for) in Best Novel, Best Novel by a New Author, and Best Youth Fiction--Speculative. To nominate Vodnik, all you need to do is go here and fill in the form. You don't have to be a Mormon to nominate. You just have to be older than 12 and not be the author (that's me), the publisher, or anyone monetarily involved in the book.

One more time, for those of you who missed it. Here's the link to nominate Vodnik, by Bryce Moore.

http://whitneyawards.com/wordpress/nominate/

:-)

Thanks in advance. :-)

In other news, I'm off to Quebec for the next few days, heading out with family to go exploring. Denisa's going to try and find some awesome bakeries, and I'm going to . . . just be awesome. We've been told that Quebec City has a very European flavor to it, and we've got high hopes.

The bottom line is that I'm not sure how much I'll be able to post. I'm going to write some posts in advance, so you're not completely without my comforting presence, but if you don't see me posting things of Facebook or Twitter, now you know why.

Camping Adventures--Flagstaff Lake

I took the fam off camping on Friday. We didn't actually stay very long. A friend had set a tent up for us in advance, and we rolled in around 6pm, then left Saturday around 10am. We had company coming for the weekend and had to be back to finish cleaning the house. So since I didn't tend the fire at all, set up the tent at all, cook anything at all . . . I'm not sure I can really count it as an official camping trip.

But we did have a good time. It looked like this, pretty much:


Very peaceful. We haven't actually been camping since we moved to Maine, much to my chagrin. With DC being a baby, we chose to wait until she was older before we started branching out. The kids had a blast. There was a lake to swim in, marshmallows to eat, Jiffy Pop, hotdogs--all the camping requirements. The bugs were out in force--despite my best efforts to drown them in DEET--and DC is still scratching, but I think she'd gladly go again.

Flagstaff Lake actually has a very interesting history. It was enlarged back in 1950, and they had to flood a town (Flagstaff) to do so. Quite controversial at the time.

We also went canoeing on the lake, and I'm happy to say no one got wet. :-) It was a bit windy, and it was my first time canoeing on a lake, and we were doing it all on our own, so I suppose that's something to be proud of.

Not sure if we'll be able to get out again this summer, but autumn's a possibility. We just have to slow things down and have less to do . . .

And to commemorate the occasion, here's one of my favorite clips from The Great Outdoors. It's just missing the part at the end where Candy comes home to find what the raccoons did to his house.

Reverse Prejudice: Vodnik Chapter Twelve

A lot happens in this chapter. Tomas finally gives a tour, we see Death again, Vito makes another appearance, Tomas has another water vision--but what I'd really like to focus on today is the scene where Tomas sees Americans for the first time, after having been away from America for a few months. Here's how Tomas describes it in the book:

I heard it long before I saw them. Loud, cacophonous talking that sounded more like a flock of seagulls than people communicating. Katka and I turned at the same time to see a group of twenty making its way up the hill, all of them dressed in bright colors and stupid hats, all in stars and stripes. It was the first time I’d ever looked at a group of Americans and seen them as other people might. Were we all that obnoxious?

 I put this scene in for a number of reasons. First and foremost, I wanted Tomas to note how much he had changed in the time he'd been in Slovakia. Contrasting himself with other Americans is a good way to do that. Of course, this begs the question--are American tourists the same as Americans? And in a book that has a major theme speaking against racism and prejudice, is it fair to have the main character attribute a group of people's behavior to their nationality?

Obviously I think it is--I left that part in the book. :-) But I left it in very deliberately. For one thing, it reflects a feeling I often had when I was living in Germany. I was there for two years--long enough to start to feel quite different from the other Americans I'd meet now and then. At the same time, I never felt like a German, either. When you're living in a different country for a long period of time, you start to end up in a sort of limbo-state, where you don't fit in anywhere. (I remember hearing that Arnold Schwarzenegger has that problem these days. His accent in English is obviously foreign, for example, but in Austrian, his accent is too American. He literally has nowhere he can go where he can just blend in. Not that he'd be able to do that anyway, being Ah-nold and all, but you get the point.)

My instinct when I was in Germany was to try and do what Tomas does here--distance myself in many ways from my countrymen. They were too loud. Too rude. Too _______. I think I'd meet an American sometimes and be surprised by something about them, and then my knee-jerk reaction was to say "That's how all Americans are."

This is ridiculous, of course--and I don't believe it now. Saying all ______ are _______ is a good sign that you're being prejudiced. It's much more accurate to take people on a case by case basis. Though of course, stereotypes do become stereotypes for a reason. Is it safe to say many Americans are brash, loud, and boorish when they're in another country? I'd say--unfortunately--yes. Just like many Japanese tourists take far more pictures when they're in tourist mode than Americans do, for example.

Some of these differences are due to contrasts in cultures. Slovaks are--on the whole--much blunter than Americans, for example. They say what they mean. If they think you look fat, they'll tell you outright. This isn't being rude by Slovak standards, but it is rude by American ones. So when a Slovak tells me I've put on weight and should go on a diet, should I be offended? When Americans are brash and loud--in comparison to European standards--should they be yelled at to quiet down?

I don't have any answers about this. People often cite the Golden Rule: Do unto others as you would have others do unto you. But I think this misses the point--especially in cross-cultural instances. In those cases, it would be better to say "Do unto others as they would have others do unto them." In other words, approach and treat people not how you think they should be treated, but how they think they should be treated. If everyone was a little more open to seeing the world from another person's point of view--and acting accordingly--I think we'd all be a lot better off.

If you don't dismiss a cultural as "different" and therefore "worse," you're much likelier to learn things about other people, have a great time in different countries and cultures, and be a better person.

That's the me-as-a-grownup talking. The sixteen year old me? He'd totally have done what Tomas did in this chapter. Dismissed an entire group of people with a single label. "American." Therefore brash, loud and obnoxious. It doesn't help that they confirm this, through the grandmother in the scene who's so insistent on getting a good deal. (I saw this play out at Trencin Castle, by the way. True story.)

I could go on, but I'm out of time. Bottom line: I thought about taking this scene out during the revision process, but after contemplating it, I decided it was even more important that it stay. Tomas experiences prejudice, but he's prejudiced himself in turn. It's not a one way street, and it's easy to have it crop up in your viewpoint when you least expect it.

Mormons and Money: My Response to the Businessweek Article

Sheesh. It feels like I've been writing a lot of Mormon posts over the past few months. Not my real intent with this blog, but at the same time, a lot of my friends come here for my take on Mormon current events, so I kind of feel obligated to oblige. And--probably due to the Romney run for presidency--Mormons have been in the news a lot lately. Up this time? Businessweek did a smear story on Mormon finances. (And for the official church response to the article, go here.) Why do I call it a smear and not a balanced article?

Because that's what it is.

The entire slant of that article is very anti-Mormon, from the way it paints Thomas Monson as the head of the corporation, to the way it frequently cites ex-Mormons for many of its sources. (Hint: if you're talking to people who have left a church and are now making money writing books about that church, chances are they have an agenda. And that's to sell those books. It's not to write about how great the church was.) The Mormons it does cite, it does so in an effort to paint us all as money-grubbing greedy pigs.

Yes, I might be taking it a bit more sensitively than a non-Mormon would, but what would you expect? And I'm sorry, but when the cover image is this gem, there's not really any way to take the article other than as a smear:



So. How accurate are the facts of the article? I'm not an insider when it comes to Mormon business affairs, but I do have some connections, and I've seen how things run "behind the scenes" to a small extent. I can speak to how things are conducted on a local level, and I know that a large chunk of money goes out to individuals in need in the community on a case-by-case basis. I know that no one's getting rich on a local level from the church. That's a fact.

But once you move up the ranks to the upper echelons of the church, are people making money?

Again, I don't have access to people's bank accounts, so I can't guarantee that they're not. But if they are making buhzillions of dollars, they do an excellent job of not spending any of it. My grandparents used to live in the same condo complex that Gordon Hinckley (the prophet before Thomas Monson) lived in. I would see him and his wife in the elevator sometime. It was a nice condo complex. It had a pool (I loved that pool) and an exercise room I used once. But it wasn't a multi-millionaire's hangout. My grandfather was an organist, my grandmother a school teacher--if that gives you any idea.

The Mormon church is a pretty small community, even with it getting as big as it is. (14 million members now, probably around half of those are actually active). Especially in Utah, it's not a community where you could be throwing money around and not have it come back to bite you. Too many eyes to see it.

That said, yes, I believe some of the church leaders have a great deal of money. I'm not sure how much. They made that money--for the most part--in their individual business ventures before they became church leaders. Among the current Twelve Apostles, there's a heart surgeon, U of Chicago law professor, nuclear engineer, president of Papermate, several university presidents, a healthcare executive, and lawyers. All of them retired now, of course--but all of them made a whole lot more money than I make, you can bet that. Should they have left their full time careers that provided for their families, only to start making minimum wage? Some in society seem to think church and wealth have to be an either/or. Mormons definitely don't believe that. And I guess that can come across as grating to people. That said, Mormons are very generous with their money. Just look at how much Romney has donated. But then again, he donated it to the church, so it "doesn't count."

Sometimes it seems that non-religious people feel like anyone who's religious really ought to be wearing burlap all the time. Mormons definitely don't take that tact. We certainly believe you can be spiritual and financially successful. Of course, we don't believe your personal financial success is an outward indicator of your spirituality--despite the efforts of Businessweek to paint us like that.

The article has an unspoken accusation that the church leaders are getting rich off this. That because the church doesn't show all its finances to whomever asks, it must be trying to do something nefarious. The City Creek mall is a prime example of this. The church spent a lot of money on the project, so it must be a conspiracy of some sort. Here's my take: downtown Salt Lake was dying. People were moving out, and it wasn't exactly the place you'd enjoy hanging out on a Friday night. Certainly not with a family. Smack dab in the middle of downtown Salt Lake is Temple Square--a tourist destination for people coming to the city, and  also the center of church operations. If the downtown had continued its downward spiral, that spot would have lost much of its utility to the church. Investing the money in the City Creek Center is a way to counteract that trend.

Again, what it comes down to for me is that if this is a crime or part of some scheme, who's benefiting? The for-profit operations of the church are run as companies. They pay their taxes. I can see the contrast between what's typically thought of as religious matters and business matters, and how they bleed over into each other in some areas of the Mormon church.

Where does the money go? You've got BYU, where tuition is $4,500 per year for Mormons--$9,000 per year for non-Mormons. That's a steal--and it's that low because the church values education highly, and subsidizes the prices for students. You've got the operating costs of all the buildings and properties across the globe. You've got serious welfare efforts--both on a global and local scale. You've got 50,000 missionaries out in the world. They pay $400/month each, true. But they get a whole lot more than that back, depending on where they're living. You try living on $400/month and see how far it gets you in New York City.

Plus, the church is very much into practicing what it preaches. It teaches its members to save money. To live prudently. To make wise business decisions. Should it come as a big surprise, then, that it's thrifty with its money? That it benefits from the good business sense of its leadership? What do people want--an institution that's deep in debt? One that gives 100% of its money to other institutions? I think the church is in a lose-lose position with some people.

I don't know. If you think Mormons are secretive and up to no good, this article is going to confirm that belief. My blog post won't likely do much against it. People can say I've been taken in by the church. That I'm brainwashed or whatever. But like I said, I'm not uninformed. My family is friends with a lot of church leaders, including some of the current Twelve Apostles. These are good men. They aren't pulling a fast one on anyone. If they are, they're seeing no benefit from it other than little 0s being added to some bank account somewhere.

I just don't buy it.

Helpful Writer's Block Solution: An Internet Off Button

So after writing my big I-can't-stand-writing-middles post yesterday, it still took me a while to actually get my bum in gear and write that 1000 words. And while I was procrastinating, it didn't take much thinking to find out why I was having such trouble.

The internet.

It's everywhere. It's always on. And it's always entertaining. (New movie trailers! New Flash games! Fascinating Wikipedia articles! Facebook! Twitter! FailBlog!) It also happens to be on the same machine I use to write--the computer.

So I could go buy a type writer (not necessarily the best decision from an editing standpoint), or I could look for an Off button somewhere. I chose to go the Off button route. Basically, I wanted something that would turn off the internet--or close to it--for a set period of time. Something that, once I flicked that switch, it wasn't going to come back on. Because I know me. And I know how easily distracted I am. I'll be writing, I'll come to a part that's a little speed bump, and instead of getting over it, I'll check Facebook to "give myself some time to think." The theory was that if I didn't have that outlet to turn to, I'd sit and get over the bumps as they arose.

The tool I settled on is Cold Turkey. I chose it mainly because it's free. You install it, then select what time-wasting sites you want to disable. (It comes with some presets, and you can add as many as you like.) Not quite the internet bomb I ideally would use, but close enough for me to use it instead of some of the paid offerings that were out there. You tell it how long you want to disable those sites, and then you click OK. Once you've done that, there's no going back. Try to cheat it, and it disables the sites for a full week.

Slash and burn, baby.

I turned it on, then closed down my browser completely. No tabs. No anything.

I wrote 1,400 words in less than an hour

I'd call that a success. It worked again this morning, too. Every time I wanted to avoid writing, I had nothing to avoid it with. This is a Very Good Thing, and hopefully it'll get me through this bump and into the ending of the novel, which will be much easier to write.

Anyway--that's what I've done. What do you do to avoid distractions? Most of you probably have much greater willpower than me. I know. Sad that I have to turn to technological means to keep myself focused. Maybe I'll get better at that over time . . .

Frustration Incarnate: Book Middles

I'm not a fan of middles, at least not when it comes to writing. I've been working on a book now for the past few months. It's basically a YA Ocean's Eleven--with magic. It's ideally supposed to be a fun romp through an intricate fantasy underground. And from the responses of people who have read sections of it thus far, it's succeeding.

If only writing it were proving to be as fun.

I've already blogged about how finding a character's voice can be a tricky thing for me to nail down. (The biggest problem being switching from writing the end of one book--where the voice has had time to become very concrete and easy to write for me--over to the beginning of a non-sequel. My writing just keeps trying to veer back to that last voice, and it takes a lot of effort to avoid that.) But once the voice is down, then the book starts to pick up speed.

I've got the voice down now. I know the main character better. It's easier to write what he's thinking and how he's responding to situations.

I know how the book begins. (I've now revised that--three times. It'll likely be revised a couple more.) I know how it ends. (Less likely to be revised as heavily.) But sitting down to write the part I'm at right now--the middle--is just proving to be like pulling teeth. Getting that 1,000 words done each day is taking nothing less than pure determination. I sit down at the keyboard and stare at the screen, then find myself thinking of all the things I'd rather be doing. Checking Facebook. Twitter. The news. Writing a blog post. Cleaning the house. Mowing the lawn. Researching something.

Anything but actually writing.

I know this is stupid. Every day, I see firsthand how actually writing that 1,000 words isn't as difficult as it seems at first. I barrel through it, and I'm done for the day. It's a great feeling. But then the next day rolls around, and I'm right back there in front of that darn blank spot on the computer screen, watching the cursor blink and wishing it would just type itself.

Why is this such a difficult part?

I think it's because the beginning is sort of like a puzzle, and I enjoy puzzles. Figuring out how pieces fit together. The ending is exciting. You get to write the build up to the climax and then have a great big scene. That's a lot of fun. But getting from one point to another--in a way that's interesting to audiences, and makes that big climax make sense . . .

Tricky.

Anyway. I don't mean to complain too much. Really, this whole blog post is an illustration of my point. I'm writing this instead of getting my 1,000 words done. Which only postpones the inevitable.

Anyone out there have tips on how to handle the doldrums of the middle? Please share.

Downton Abbey Fans: Have You Checked Out Foyle's War?

I remember back when I was working in the Orem Public Library media department (loved that place!), a lot of people would come in for the TV series. Foyle's War was a constant favorite. I never had the time or interest back then to check it out--too busy with grad school and the like--but when it popped up in Netflix a week or two ago, I decided to see what the fuss had been about.

Complete awesome.

The show is a series of 1.5 hour murder mysteries, all set against the backdrop of Britain in World War II. It's not a series about the war--it's a series that's historically informed by the events of the war. Think of it like Mad Men without the booze and hopeless feeling that none of the characters will ever redeem themselves. Or Downton Abbey, with people getting murdered.

Good times.

Denisa and I both really love the show. The plots are twisty turny and very complex, the actors do a splendid job (I particularly like how consistent Foyle is played, and we both think Sam is fantastic) and the balance of history and mystery is just right. You get details about how life was like back then, without it turning into a Ken Burns production. For example, there's a mystery that takes place right before Dunkirk, and you see the character's responses to the rescue effort. The show starts at the beginning of the war, so you have the firs  few episodes filled with people second guessing Britain getting involved. You see that even WWII wasn't a "everybody knows this war is the right thing to do" sort of thing. True, it dabbles in a bit too much melodrama now and then, but so did Downton, so I'm okay with it.

I really like how the episodes are self-contained, so you can consume one per evening and not be tempted to go for two. (3 hours of Foyle, it turns out, is a bit much. 1.5 is super. Speaking from experience.)

If you're a fan of mystery or period dramas, I heartily encourage you to add this to your queue. Anyone out there already seen it? Am I just late to the party again?

Talking with Clouds: Vodnik Chapter 11 (and a Deleted Scene)

It really feels like chapter 11 should have something to do with going bankrupt . . . but it doesn't. Oh well. For those of you keeping track, this is the chapter where Lesana comes to actually talk to Tomas and plead for his help. Not a long one this time. It was pretty much created from the ground up during the revision process. Lesana in draft 1 didn't have a whole lot to do in the here and now. She couldn't speak (there's a scene I cut where she speaks by using clouds. Let me see if I can find that, actually--it was a fun little bit that got revised into oblivion). (Why couldn't she speak? Because she's made out of water. I can't remember the reason, honestly. It made sense at the time, but then during revision, it stopped being logical, so I ditched it.)

Anyway, with so little "screen time," it was hard for audiences (and Tomas) to really connect to her. And I had this whole subplot with her trying to escape the Vodnik, and without her actually showing up to explain that . . . it didn't work. So this scene came up.

Anyway--not much to add about this chapter, so I'll just leave you with the deleted scene for this week. After reading it over, it reminded me of several changes that the book went through beyond what I had recalled. Lesana originally had no real connection to the Vodnik. Not that she was aware of, at least. She'd been dead for so long that she'd forgotten. She had a much more detached personality, too. (The underlined parts, in case you were wondering, were how I used to denote that it should be italicized. Kind of a dated notation method that I no longer use, actually.

Hope you enjoy it!

DELETED SCENE: Cloud Lesana

[Just to put this in context, this originally took place right after Tomas went on the tour of the castle with his uncle. He's at the top of the tower, and his uncle and Katka just left, giving him some alone time.]

I sighed and stared out over the city and up at the clouds.  It was a sunny day--I don’t think it could have been as hot as it was if it weren’t--and the clouds that managed to endure the heat were fluffy cotton balls, the kind of clouds that probably got beat up in high school because they were too scrawny.  The funny thing was that usually fluffy clouds like that appeared high up in the sky, but if possible, they seemed closer than they had a few minutes ago.

I focused on one in particular.  It looked almost like a woman walking toward me, with her hair blowing in the wind and separating out into cloud trails.  The more I studied it, the more I could picture it.  That little bump on the head was the nose, and there were even two puffs where her feet would appear from under her dress.

The cloud seemed to get smaller the closer it got to me, making it so that it stayed the same relative size.  I probably would have been freaked out, if it weren’t for one thing: as it got closer, I could make out two dots where the woman’s eyes would be--looking almost like holes where the sky broke through the cloud, except the color inside them was too dark for the sky.  It was sea blue.  And the nose was unmistakable.

Lesana.

I took a moment to look around me.  No one was near, and I didn’t hear any sign of the tour coming up.  This was about as alone as I was going to get at the castle.  I looked back at the girl.  “Hello?” I said.

The clouds swirled and moved, seeming in one way just to be buffeted by a stray patch of wind, but at the same time making it look like the girl raised her hand and held out a finger in the universal “wait one minute” pose.  When she was even closer, I looked down into the courtyard.  What would people think if they looked up and saw . . . a cloud.  Come to think of it, they probably wouldn’t think much; she wouldn’t look like a girl from below--just a close cloud.  It might be worth a “huh, look at that,” but not much more.  As long as it didn’t look like I was talking to it.

When I looked back up, Lesana was close enough to touch.  She stood there in the air, hovering.  She lacked any details, besides the eyes.  It was as if someone had taken cloud and molded it like clay into the shape of a person.  She was like an unpainted white model, just a bit puffier.

“Lesana?” I asked.

She seemed confused, although it was hard to tell the emotions of a cloud.  She opened her mouth to speak, but instead of sound coming out, little written words emerged, each one delicately etched in wisps of cloud.  It was the strangest way of talking I’d ever seen.  What did you call me?

I had to squint to read it before the breeze snatched it away.  Her speech--handwriting--seemed flowery and archaic, with flourishes at the ends of the letters.  I cleared my throat.  “Lesana.  That’s your name, right?” 

She frowned and thought for a moment, then nodded and said/wrote, “I think it might be.  Yes.  Lesana.  How did you know?”

That stumped me.  “You mean you haven’t been sending those vision things to me?”  It was the only thing that had made sense.

She shook her head.  “What visions?”

I glanced behind me back the way I had come up.  Katka and Lubos had said I wouldn’t have much time, and I wanted some answers.  I turned back to Lesana.  “Never mind that.  Why did you decide to talk to me now?”

I’ve been wanting to talk to you ever since I saw you--the wind blurred a few words before I could catch them--night, down by the canal.

So that was her, too.  “Oh,” I said.

You saw me then, yes?

I nodded, and she nodded back.  I thought so.  I’d never seen anyone notice me before.  And you see others, too?

I nodded again.  I was talking to a cloud.  And worse yet, I was attracted to her.

I remember hearing about people like you, back before.

“Before what?”

Before I died.

Dumb question.  “What happened to you, then?  How did you get to be this way?”

Lesana shrugged.  I don’t remember.  It’s been too long.  She turned and pointed down to the city.  I remember I used to live there, though it didn’t look like that then, of course.  It was more like this.  She breathed out a large amount of cloud, and once it left her lips, it assembled itself into a perfect diorama of a small city house, sort of what you’d expect Sleeping Beauty to stay in when she was slumming it as a peasant.  If that’s what the fashionable architecture had been like when she died, Lesana had been dead for a while, but that’s what I had thought anyway.

Once I’d had a chance to look at the house, she blew it away and continued.  Something must have killed me.  Maybe it was a witch, or a Rusalka, or a Vodnik.  She shrugged again.  I think it had something to do with water, though.

“Why?” I asked.

She gestured down at herself.  It’s what I am now.  Water.  Most of the time I don’t even bother to make it so I can see who I am, but when I want to, I can appear as long as there’s water near.  The canal’s the easiest--I can--the wind caught at her words again--water there and make almost a real body.  Other times, this is all I can do.

Lesana looked around for a moment, down at the ground, out at the city, then back to me.  I have to go.  Will I see you again?

“Of course,” I found myself saying without even thinking.

She smiled.  Good.  Anywhere there’s water.  The canal would be nice.  And without so much as a goodbye, she broke apart into a thousand shards of cloud that quickly vanished in the breeze.

“That was something, wasn’t it?”

I looked over, startled to see a man standing next to me.  “What?” I said.

“That cloud.  Never seen one so close before, and break up like that.”  He shook his head.  “It was something.”

I looked back to where Lesana had been standing and nodded agreement.  “It sure was.”

The Refinancing is Finished--Should You Look Into It, Too?

It took about two months--and a whole lot more stress than I hoped it would--but the refinance finally closed yesterday. Surprising how just casually browsing the web one day can lead to so much activity over two months of your life, but I suppose a lot of even bigger life-changing things start with such small things.

We've almost lived in our house for 5 years now. We've now refinanced twice. The initial rate we had was something like 6.625%, as I recall. Three years ago, I refinanced because rates seemed so rock bottom: I got 5.25%, and I was very happy. My payments dropped 11%. Then rates kept falling. And falling. And I was leery of refinancing again, because house prices had fallen, as well, and I didn't want to have to get Private Mortgage Insurance.

But they fell some more. And house prices had come up some, so I went for it.

We closed for 3.875%. Our payments are dropping 17%. Compared to our original payments, we've come down 24%. That ain't bad, being able to save that much money each month. The bad news? Our house's appraisal is now down 13% from what it appraised for when we bought it. That meant that we had to chip in some of our savings to cover closing costs and avoid PMI. (Not a good time for us to be trying to sell our house, either. Good thing we're not planning on doing that.)

The good news? We had enough savings to cover that, leave our emergency savings alone, and still have enough left over. It helps to have so many different income streams coming in (my day job, writing, Denisa's online job, her bread baking, both of us teaching--some of those streams are a lot smaller than others, but they all contribute). But it's definitely true that it takes money to make money sometimes--if we hadn't had that money from our savings, we wouldn't have been able to save as much money as we will now in the future. And if we'd had debts from earlier (student loans, credit card debt), we would have been hosed, as well. (Really, a large part of the credit for us having enough savings goes to Mint, which I still use every day to keep track of finances. It's such an awesome budgeting tool. If you're having trouble staying on top of your finances and you're not using this . . . you really need to start. It's free. And the longer you use it, the more helpful it becomes.)

Anyway. If we don't refinance again, we'll still have paid the house off before we retire, which is my main goal. So hooray for that.

Would I recommend people refinance right now? Yes. With a few stipulations:

• Know how much you have left on your mortgage. It's not easy to refinance unless you are doing it for 80% or less of the value of your home. (Over that, and the banks get skittish. They start wanting PMI--which is pricey and you do NOT want--or they try and con you into getting a home equity line of credit (something our bank "helpfully" tried to do when our appraisal came in too low. I said no thank you (the line of credit was going to cost a ridiculous amount of money in monthly payments--it would have meant our monthly payments would have gone down by only 3% instead of 17%. I was no math major, but I can see a bad deal like that from a mile away. Yikes!)
• Be fairly confident of how much your house will appraise for. This is the one thing that was really tricky for me to anticipate. And I turned out to be wrong. The problem is that the appraisal cost $450 or so, and I was going to have to pay that one way or another--even if I decided not to refinance. I didn't want to pay $450 just to find out I couldn't do it.
• If your loan interest rate is currently within 1 percentage point of the advertised mortgage rates, then it's probably not worth it. (Them closing costs are expensive, folks). Rates today are around 4%. That means if your rate is between 4% and 5%, then I'd probably not do it. If it's over 5%, I'd definitely look into it. Especially if
• You're planning on staying in your house more than 3 years. If refinancing costs $2000, and it will save you $200 a month on payments), then it will take 10 months before you've earned that money back. If it costs more and saves less, obviously that time gets longer. No need to refinance if you're just going to move next year or the year after.

Anyway. It worked for us right now, and I'm glad we did it. I'm even more glad that it's over.

Adventures in Bed Buying

Yesterday, to celebrate our nation's freedom, I drove with the fam to Sears to pick up a new bed. The one I've been sleeping on is the first one Denisa and I got when we were married. (Well, technically the first one we got was the air mattress that we used for a few weeks until our bed arrived. Our first apartment smelled strongly of cat urine--especially the closer you got to the carpet. Sleeping on an air mattress for two weeks in that apartment? Not the best experience I've ever had in my life. I've come a long way . . . )

Anyway. I've decided that mattress makers go to extremely great lengths to make sure the consumer is as confused as possible before he or she makes an actual purchase. There was Sealy, Serta, Memoryfoam, Sears-o-Pedic--and some other brands I've already blocked from my memory. And while all of them had similar features, they all called them something different. This would be like a car manufacturer deciding to call their tires "firbles", their engines "bagdoodles", and their air conditioning "tiddledings." ("It's got a brand new set of firbles, and the tiddledings work great, even when the bagdoodle is churning away.") Maybe if you have a PhD in bedding, you might have a chance of telling them all apart, but if you don't, fuhgeddaboutit.

Then there's pillow tops, memory foam, firm, plush, ultra plush, ultra firm plush, double plus bad firm. (I like firm beds and I cannot lie. You other brothers can't deny . . .) It's enough to make a guy go cross eyed.

And then there's pricing. Sears was running a sale yesterday. But the list price for the mattresses was like $2500, and then there was 50% off, and another $200 off for kicks, and another 10% off because why not . . . They're practically giving them away, right? Except it still cost us $800 for what we picked out. (The Franchesca TI2 firm, in case you were wondering.) And we got the set, not just the mattress, because I was assured that if I just bought the mattress, demons would come and ruin in overnight. The box spring apparently keeps the demons at bay. Go figure.

But hey--at least I don't have to do this for another decade or so, right? By then, maybe they'll have figured out the demon problem. Science can do some amazing things these days, you know.

Oh. I also had a BBQ. But something tells me buying a mattress was much more in line with what our founding fathers intended us to do on Independence Day.

When Did You Feel Most Patriotic?

Happy Fourth of July, everybody. I wasn't really planning on doing much of a blog post today--it's a holiday, after all. But I did want to throw something up here. A collective question to you all--when did you feel most patriotic? I'm talking about a specific time/day.

For me, there are two days that I remember distinctly. The first is right after 9/11. I was reading gas meters at the time in Utah, and every house had an American flag out. Those things were everywhere, and I remember just thinking how proud I was of our country--that things could go so wrong, and we could come together to be unified. I would imagine a lot of other people felt the same back then.

But the time that sticks out in my memory the most was a high school football game in October of 1997. It might have been November. I was already graduated by then, but I was at home waiting to go on my mission to Germany. I went to the game, and as they played the Star Spangled Banner, I had an epiphany: I was leaving this country. Not for a week or two, but for two years. For a nineteen year old kid, that was a pretty daunting realization. And I recognized for a bit just how big a part America played in my life. Yes, it's not like I had my life on the line for my country, but it was a strong enough experience that I still remember it, fifteen years later.

So how about you? Any particular times stand out? Please share. And have a safe and happy Fourth of July.

Book Review: The Hollow City

My friend Dan Wells has a book coming out today. And he was nice enough to give me an advanced copy so I could read it ahead of time. Verdict? Awesome. I wrote up a review for Elitist Book Reviews, in fact. Here's the start:

Dan Wells has had quite the run. The John Cleaver series--starting with I AM NOT A SERIAL KILLER--was a fantastic blend of Horror and Fantasy with a YA tone (although it wasn't really marketed as YA in the US). His novel PARTIALS has been getting some really strong reviews. So I was pretty excited when I got my hands on an ARC of his latest work, THE HOLLOW CITY.

I'd heard him describe the basics: a story told from the point of view of a paranoid schizophrenic, Michael Shipman. A man who literally can't tell what's fantasy and what's reality. He's seeing faceless men, and is convinced they're trying to kill him. But no one else can see them, and he hasn't been taking his medication in months. To make things worse, there's been a serial killer at work in the area. Someone's been killing people and essentially destroying their faces, and Michael is a prime suspect.

Go check out the full review. Good old fashioned schizophrenic main character paranoia fun. And you should totally buy Dan's book--or ask your local public library to get a copy.

Research in Writing: Vodnik Chapter Ten

As I looked over this chapter, I discovered that--lo and behold, nothing really significant changed in it over the course of revisions. Obviously it didn't really exist before Katka had a brain tumor, but once that got put in early on, this was a chapter that hung tough the whole time. I think a large part of that is due to the fact that it just worked well. Good tension, good introduction of conflict, character building, setting details--it's a chapter that gets a lot done, even if it isn't one of the flashier sections of the book.

When I'm writing a novel, my first drafts will only rarely have really effective chapters. They'll be centered around one or two things: advance the plot or develop characters or something like that. But in a final draft, all the chapters need to be working on different levels. Doing multiple things at once, or else it becomes hard to justify their presence in the novel, and the material they cover gets gobbled up into a different chapter. (Brings to mind an interesting mental image of a society of chapters. Chapter Darwinism, so to speak.) This was a chapter that was formed and then defended itself from any intruders.

On the other hand, actually writing this chapter wasn't too easy. Mainly because it starts off with the seizure, and I distinctly remember sitting at my computer, ready to write the scene, and then freezing. I had no idea what really happens with seizures. What are you supposed to do if a person has one? How do they respond? You make them bite something, right?

I had no idea, and in order to write the chapter properly, I needed to know. This is a case where having the internet is a great big benefit. Before, I would have had to go off to the library to do some searches. Now, it was a few keyboard clicks away. But I still had to inform myself and read up on the topic. Then comes the next trick: making sure the section doesn't read like a medical manual.

Just because you've done the research for a section doesn't mean you need to include it all on the page. I needed to know enough to understand what was going on, but then I needed to tell it all from Tomas's point of view. That meant putting myself back into the frame of mind I started in: Tomas sees a seizure for the first time. He has to do something. What is it? Well, he did what I thought I would do in that situation--prior to all my research.

The paramedics then show up and do what they're supposed to do. Through Tomas watching that, I was able to insert a fact or two, but the large bulk of my research went unused for the actual chapter. That's okay. I'm pretty confident it was a better chapter because I was informed. Things like actually knowing what you're writing about bubble up to the surface in surprising ways. I'm all for the subconscious.

Anyway. One last note--I struggled throughout the book with characters not wanting to talk to each other. Tomas's family really has a problem with communication. There are so many secrets--big secrets--and nobody wants to talk. Ever. Tomas is frustrated that his parents do this, but he does the same thing to them with his problems in the book. This carries over into the racism of the book. Tomas experiences the effects of prejudice, but he also makes biased assumptions about others. No one's completely free of this.

For the communication issue, it was difficult to get the balance right. I'm generally the sort of guy who'd rather just get something out in the open than hedge around it. For most things. So writing about a family that had years of experience ignoring huge gaping problems . . . it was a balance game. Because as an author, you don't want to have the readers get frustrated with how little communication is actually happening. Characters can't not communicate just "because." There needs to be reasons, and those reasons need to be explained. Otherwise, it all comes across as a plot device, not an actual plot.

That's all for this week. Thanks for reading!