fiction online

So many of the non-novel Hugo nominations are online for free reading? Of course it would be scifi. But awesome anyway.

A Song of Ice and Fire serialization

George R R Martin's epic is one of my favorite series, nevermind that it looks almost permanently stalled for now. Currently, the pilot episode of a proposed "Game of Thrones" tv show is going through post-production, after which HBO will decided whether or not to pick it up.

Today I found photos of the cast.

Sean Bean is playing Eddard Stark, which I feel is perfect casting. all the Stark kids are appropriately handsome, although the actor who plays Robb looks a bit like a thug in his photo on that site. I'm particularly pleased with Jon Snow's casting, as Jon is one of my favorite characters and Kit Harrington is a thespian who is switching over to TV for this series.

I was disappointed by the casting of Nikolaj Coster-Waldau as Jaime Lannister, however. I always thought of Cersei and Jaime as strikingly fair, classic beauties. Nikolaj is too rugged and much older than the Jaime I'd pictured in my head. After all, he is barely 30 at the beginning of Game of Thrones.

I'm curious now to see, if the show gets picked up, who will play Renly. Although his age is vague, I always thought he was in his early 20's and dashingly handsome. He couldn't have been that much older than Loras Tyrell, who probably yet 16 then.

Also, read on GRRM's not a blog that the Targaryen scenes were filmed in Morocco. The locations are going to be amazing.

fifteen

Taylor Swift - New Music - More Music Videos

So I admit it, I've been listening to Taylor Swift. This song reminded me of Don Bachardy and Christopher Isherwood. I'm going to get Isherwood's A Single Man soon and read it before Dec. 11, when Tom Ford's adaptation comes out. (Tom Ford, another person with whom I have a love/hate relationship.)



via

We are the people that rule the world /

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I saw Up yesterday. It made me laugh and cry, but I was still bitterly disappointed.

Carl and Ellie's story, told as it is mostly in images and without words, had me bawling. I don't even know why, as it's a fairly typical story of two people growing old together.

Dug made me laugh. The Cone of Shame, in particular, was a nice touch and its use at the very end is a nice illustration of how the circumstance can influence a person's identity.

But holy crap. The Wilderness Explorer (a Boy Scout parody) kid, Russell, was beyond annoying. It got to the point where I was groaning every time he came on screen, which was basically every minute of the last 3/4ths of the movie. His existence just reaffirmed my opinion that kids suck. Every minute on screen he was whining, pouting, or arguing. Or looking "sad." I put sad in quotation marks because that kind of "ohhhh poor me I'm a puppy don't kick me" look doesn't work well unless it's on a puppy's face (read: Dug).

The part that angered me, though, was the ageism against Carl. Oh, sure, he's 70+ and the real hero of the movie, but that doesn't stop the old-people jokes from flying fast and furious. My question: What's the point of making a character a hero if the movie just makes fun of said character the entire time?

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Today I read Someday This Pain Will Be Useful, by Peter Cameron. It's about an 18-year-old boy, James Sveck. He has gotten into Brown but is thinking about abandoning college to live in a no-name town in the Midwest and pick up a trade, all because he hates people his own age and would much rather be a loner. He is the quintessential rich white city boy. He doesn't fit in anywhere. He spends his time thinking about the past, and hates pop culture but is at the same time very aware of the culture. He's able to pinpoint a Marimekko dress that is worn backwards, and identify a Comme des garcons shirt. Those are pretty obscure high fashion brands!

The one part that stood out the most to me was when James is attending the American Classroom, one of those week-long camp things run by conservatives that supposedly give you experience in civics and government. Actually, James is telling the reader what happened during his stay with the American Classroom, which happens several months prior to the present of the book. James likes to sit alone at the tables because he is acutely aware of his own uncomfortableness with other kids and also disdains the rules that govern their (and his) lives, such as having the back of the bus reserved for the "cool kids." (Oh, how I remember that the cool kids were always in the back, and you really wanted the back seat, and how this one bus driver would reserve the back seat for the birthday kid.)

During the intermission of a dinner theater performance, another girl invites James to sit with her table. James is disgusted because he recognizes that she thinks she is doing him a favor, and is trying to be nice, but he doesn't think that it's nice at all. He would much rather be alone.

And so I find this a really strange book to put in the young adult section of a bookstore or a library, but that's where this book is classified. I suppose it's for all the loners of the world, but I can't say if this is an optimistic book or not. James finds that not even his dream of living in a beautiful old home in the Midwest can stand up to scrutiny. He ends up attending Brown, but it's not an active decision.

This worldview is so completely from all the other books and movies out there. this one says it's okay to feel like James does, although it probably won't make you happy.

When I read this book, I ended up just feeling sad. I recognized all the social awkwardness in myself, but I was also too cowardly to buck the silly rules that James disregards.