Tuesday, June 07, 2005

Words, Music & Verse

Here's an interesting post/rant about series books. Sounds like a minor case of idiocy on the part of publishers, but they know best, right? The point Wen Spencer raises is confounding, to both writers of these books and potential readers of these books. Readers of Fantasy and Science fiction often like their books in series, and when a writer publishes book 3 in a series, new readers who are considering trying the writer would naturally like to start with book 1, logical right? Speaking from my limited publishing experience and with print-on-demand technology, I don't think it would be too difficult to reprint, say 1 or 2 copies of book 1 for every 5 to 7 copies of book three, when the proverbial book three publishes. Then again, what the hell do I really know. This is something I've bitched about before.

As for Wen Spencer herself, I know of her books, and I've seen some relatively favorable things about them. I think she won the John W. Campbell award a couple of years ago. Her books look interesting, aside from the somewhat garish cover for Tinker. I keep meaning to give her writing a shot. I should really keep a running list of books and writers I want to try in my wallet.

On musical related note, I know I'm one of the few people in New Jersey that doesn't really care for Springsteen and his newest song is just painful to my ears. I actually prefer Bon Jovi, at least their more recent music. Again, I think I'm in the minority on this one, too, but why is everybody loving Green Day's latest musical effort? I never cared for them very much, but every song I've heard from this new album is really, really annoying and is like an ice pick in my ears. Not to mention the fact that the local rock station seems to play them at least once an hour. Ugh. At least, musically speaking, I have Friday to look forward to, I will be seeing Judas Priest.

Yet again, production on a movie of Watchmen ceases, which is a good thing.

The Flash movie looks to be based on the Golden Age character. I don't know if this is a good thing, though I suppose if successful, the Flash is a very generational character with several men as the Flash, and could be a franchise. This also makes some sense since script-writer David Goyer wrote the early issues of the relaunch of JSA a few years ago, so he does have a familiarity with the character.

More good press for Pal Scott.

Lastly, a little dark bit of verse I conjured up today:

Life in Darkness
We create fictions
To assuage the reality that bombards us
A veil of unreality
More comforting than the harsh truth
Below the surface
A life simmers unsuspected
Shadows belie the truth of darkness
Amorphous and oblong
Are the shapes of reality
Not the clear lines of fiction
We seek truth and understanding
Of something we can never completely comprehend
Lives and understanding are placed in clean lines of context
The lies we convince ourselves are the truth
These are the realities we choose to live in
Who do we seek for the real truth?
What is the real truth?
Belief is subjective
Faith is powerful
Absolutes though sought
Are ultimately are unwanted
The best of both worlds
Is the amalgamation we create
To live in solace everyday
- (c) 2005 R.H. Bedford

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