I’ve finally caught up with myself in revising the current story from restricted third to first person. At first, it looks a simple task, changing “he” to “I” throughout, but there really is a subtle but important difference between the two POVs, even when the third person perspective is filtered only through a single character. It’s like you step up the magnification factor several degrees. Instead of reporting the third person character’s thoughts, you wear them. The 3100 word section ended up at 3600 words when I was finished with the rewrite.
I finished reading Frayed by Tom Piccirilli last night. I talked a bit about it yesterday, but let’s back up a bit. The book, about 100 pages in length, is published by Creeping Hemlock, and the production values are high. The dust jacket is attractive, and beneath the DJ is a lovely illustrated cover as well. Not many publishers do much with the boards, but this is a nice looking volume fully clothed or stark nekkid. Inside, there are effective B&W drawings throughout. The section breaks each get a full page, devoted to bizarre section titles that are produced to look almost like the ravings of a mad person. Perhaps they are.
As for the story—Piccirilli managed to keep this reader off balance for the duration. Anytime a character visits an insane asylum, I expect The Ninth Configuration or Shutter Island…or “The System of Dr. Tarr and Professor Feather.” Who is sane and who is insane? Are the inmates running the asylum? Piccirilli uses that expectation to good advantage. Many characters claim to be asylum staff, but are they? If so, which?
If sanity could be measured with a gauge, the protagonist’s needle would be a hair on the plus side and his best friend’s a tad to the negative, which explains why one is visiting t’other at the cushiest insane asylum I’ve ever read about. The inmate is there because he tried to murder his friend and then himself. That these two characters, both writers, have a history is an understatement. One is commercially successful (but currently blocked), the other critically successful and writing up a storm at the asylum. Their mutual antagonism dates back decades, and the nature of their first argument is the crux of the book. The story gets increasingly metaphysical. At one point I was afraid it was going to veer off into metafictional, but it pulls up short of that. The tale is finely crafted, like a funnel that gathers up a load of details and focuses them on the climax, which is exactly where and when it needs to be.
I’m almost finished writing my review of The Queen of Bedlam, but I won’t be posting it on Onyx Reviews until closer to publication date. Ditto for The Missing by Sarah Langan. I also watched this week’s episode of The Dead Zone (not bad, but I’m not fond of storylines where Johnny gets visions that are self-referential and self-fulfilling—if he hadn’t had a vision, the events in the vision wouldn’t have happened). Another obviously French Canadian guest star (Maxim Roy) playing Elaine. Did they think her accent was going to pass for Boston. Really? Also watched The Closer. A fairly by-the-numbers serial killer episode with little suspense to speak of. Even the climactic scene only lasted about 30 seconds.
Another Torchwood episode, “Out of Time.” At first I was thinking—hasn’t this been done to death? Three people get sent into a different time period with no hope of getting back. Far enough into the future (55 years) that there’s scant chance anyone they knew is still alive (with one exception, in this case). Still, following the trajectories of the three fish out of water was interesting and their fates compelling and, in part at least, unexpected. I liked the emotional role reversal between Owen and Diane where he rambles on for about five minutes describing what their relationship has done to him and she responds, simply, “I love you, too.”
