There’s always one clock that you forget to reset. It’s in an out-of-the-way location and it completely slips your mind. And yet, that’s the one that you notice and believe the next day. The one that makes you wonder why on earth the morning is going by so slowly. Then you realize your mistake and you leap forward an hour once again.
I really did not want to get up at 5 a.m. today for my writing session, but I did anyway. I’m on a mission to clear off my desk. I have two more book reviews to write (one of them is all but finished), a short story to finish and a Storytellers Unplugged essay to write. Then I have to reread a novel and write something about it. Then I’m going to spend a day or two cleaning up my short story submissions. I have a bunch that have been out far too long. A couple of them have probably been rejected by default, but I want to check up on a couple of others and then get all the ones that are lying fallow out to new potential homes.
Once all that’s done (before the end of the month), I’m going to start working on a novel again. I’ve been putting that off for far too long. It’s time.
I posted my review of The Burn Palace by Stephen Dobyns yesterday. It’s a really cool book that keeps you guessing all the way through. The omniscient point of view reminded me at times of the opening of Black House. I was never sure how supernatural the story was going to be. I’ve only read one other of Dobyns’ novels, but I think I’ll check some more out when I have the time.
The folks at The Tomb of Dark Delights posted a new review of the revised and updated edition of The Illustrated Stephen King Trivia Book this weekend. In part: “Stephen King fans will love this entertaining and completely updated collection of minutiae about the author and his work. Opening this book is like opening a bag of Cheetos—you just can’t stop once you get started.”
More than one person has been evicted from Survivor with an immunity idol in his pocket, but no team has ever gone home from The Amazing Race with an Express Pass in their back pack before. I can’t help but appreciate the irony that the team they gave the second pass to won the leg, and one of the contestants is in a cast. John seemed very que sera sera about it all. Jessica, not so much. They were also the team that went to some random address and started building something and it wasn’t even part of the race. No wonder the old guy there looked so perplexed.
We watched Anna Karenina this weekend. It’s only about the fourteenth time someone has made a film out of this novel. Playwright Tom Stoppard scripted this one, and it might be tempting to assume that he was responsible for the theatrical staging, but apparently that was the director’s idea. It’s a little disorienting at times. Characters walk through the set, changing outfits on the fly. Flats move into and out of frame as the scenes transition. It’s all quite stylish and fascinating, but the story is so complex that adding an extra layer of complexity doesn’t serve it well. This film concentrates on the love story, jettisoning some of the politics and other subplots of the novel, but it’s a difficult story. There was a waiter at a local restaurant that I go to after work sometimes who saw that I was reading and engaged me in conversation. He was a young Hispanic guy with a pony tail and he proclaimed that he had just finished reading a book. I admit my prejudice when I assumed that it might be Twilight or something of that ilk but, no, it was Anna Karenina. He wasn’t sure whether he liked it or not yet—he was still working that out. I have to say that I wasn’t terribly fond of this story. Keira Knightley was just fine, but her character is a difficult one to like.
