Fiction log - July 2015

Fiction books
G K Chesterton. The Scandal of Father Brown (e)
G K Chesterton. The Secret of Father Brown (e)
Brian Clevinger, Scott Wegener. Atomic Robo and the Dogs of War (e) (re-read)
P C Hodgell. The Sea of Time (e)
T Kingfisher. Bryony and Roses (e)
T Kingfisher. Toad Words and other stories (e)
Sharon Lee, Steve Miller. Necessity's Child (e) (re-read)
Tony Nicholls. Aladdin: The Story of a Boy (e)
Tony Nicholls. Humpty Dumpty: The Egg's Files (e)
Tony Nicholls. The Sleeping Beauty in the Wood (e)
Ursula Vernon. Castle Hangnail (e)

In progress
Sharon Lee, Steve Miller. Dragon Ship (e) (re-read)
George MacDonald. The Princess and Curdie
Tamora Pierce. Cold Fire (e)
Terry Pratchett. Witches Abroad (e) (re-read)

Non-fiction books in progress
Jung Chang. Empress Dowager Cixi

( short, screen, and stage )

( books bought and borrowed )

Top of the to-read pile
Matt Fraction, Christian Ward. Ody-C volume 1

Five Things Make a Post: Somewhere in the world, this still counts as a Friday Five

1. A signal boost I had intended to do sooner: August is naarmamo, National Art Making Month:

Basically in August we hope to make one piece of art every day. NOT NECESSARILY VERY GOOD ART. But a finished achievement of artistic endeavour.

A picture, a painting, a photo, an icon, a sketch, stick figures, a line on a page, a model, a sculpture, a finger painting, a finger print, a song, a poem, an interpretive dance, a bruise, a something. We are surprisingly non-judgey about what counts as art :)

And it really doesn't have to be very good. I try to stress that quite a lot. There are people here who have never drawn a thing, people who only ever do art in August, people who are very much doing it for fun rather than greatness. There are also people who are very good at art indeed, but who still find it a challenge to devote time to it every single day. Don't be intimidated, it's all good.

With it being every day for a month, the emphasis is much more on getting something done rather than getting it done particularly well.

I'm thinking of giving it a go this year.


2. I have been to the gym at least once a week since I mentioned I'd started going again. I might like to have managed more often, but it's still a good deal better than not going at all.


3. Every now and again somebody will try to get a theatre improv group up and running here, and I'm always there when they do, and usually there'll be a workshop or two and maybe a performance evening and then nothing until the next time.

This time, we might be on to something. The people running it got organised and arranged a series of workshops over the weeks leading up to the first performance night, some of them at different times of week so people who couldn't make it to some could make it to others, and even though only half the people who attended workshops were available and willing to perform on the night that was enough. (And the fact that it's people, plural, running it this time is I think also an important factor. They're both people who've tried individually before and not got far; by joining forces they're able to cover each other. The fact that they could offer workshops on nights that one or the other wasn't able to be there is not the most subtle example of that, but it's not the least important either.)

The performance night went really well, and it looks like we've got enough momentum going to do another set of workshops and another performance night soon. (Quite a lot of people had praise for my performance in particular, which was nice, but I don't think that's really the most important thing. And, as I tried to explain to some of them, improv is really a team effort and any standout performance is being invisibly supported by the efforts of everybody else in the scene.)


4. And that's pretty much the only acting I've got done so far this year, because the opportunities for acting in regular productions have tended to clash with other commitments. Including, as I've mentioned, the fact that I couldn't act in the short play season because I was busy directing one of the plays.

I don't think I've mentioned yet that I will busy directing again later this year, as I've been tapped on the shoulder to direct the Christmas show. We'll be doing a pantomime called Humpty Dumpty: The Egg's Files, which I've noticed is somewhat awkwardly titled; if you know the plot you can see where the title comes from, but if all you know is the title it's probably giving you the wrong idea about the plot. It's about a small egg-shaped robot who has been entrusted with certain secret files which might help the noble rebels overthrow the evil Galactic Empress (and her chief enforcer, who wears a face-concealing mask and breathes noisily).

It seemed like a good time to revive it, considering what else is being revived this December.


5. It's one of the lesser-known laws of nature that any arbitrarily-selected quiz night team that includes me will always come second. It happened again last night. I also won a spot prize with my rendition of "That's a Moray", and took the third prize in the big raffle. And, more importantly, had a lot of fun spending an evening hanging out with friends. It was a good night all round.