Temple b. Matthew Reilly

I'm a Reilly fan and I simple adore his formula, which is often as follows:

[1 bad ass action hero + one impossible mission / conspiracy theory + 1 1/2 killer animal x 100 or more military acronyms + area diagrams and illustrations of detonation devices + 40 cliff hangers - spared casualties x notoriously evil villian x 20 WTF = Novel]

Well, my latest Reilly discovery, 'Temple' pretty much follows that formula. The bad ass action hero is named William Race and well...he's not really trained to do half of the shit that he does in this book. An every day joe turned Bond is how I describe him.

'Temple' is a tale within a tale and really I enjoyed the very Indiana Jones type feel of the novel. It is about a very special artifact which is not only the symbol of a tribe's spirit, it is potentially the means to destroy the planet. Yup, that Matt Reilly, gotta luv him. I think my biggest problem with the novel was how spectacular the main hero was. I mean moreso than the average joe hero in 'Contest,' William Race is just too damn lucky and gifted for me to even try to believe in.

Now Scarecrow or Black Knight....*cries* I wish for a new book everyday. Anyway, if you like tales of Incas, impossible odds, planet killer nukes, terrorists, intermilitary battles and more military hardware than you can shake a stick at... you'll like 'Temple.'

Mountains of Mail both Paper and Visual

There is never enough time in the day, whether you have a full time job or no and outside of word count goals, which may or may not be made, there is the other element in an e-published writers life...the mail. Why did I specify 'e-published,' because I seriously doubt that trade and house writers spend as much time on the web.

E-published writers, and I could be wrong, spend a lot of time on the net. We need to. We heavily promote there, we get information and correspond there, but whoa can the mail pile up. List groups are good, but when you have a ton of them and most on digest, more than half of the messages go unlooked at, I can barely decipher one group from the next. There are promos, announcements, events, chat calls, and snark, craft information and other items, some that I can use and some that I can't. There is important publisher correspondence mail like statements and contracts, family joke mail, retail sales mail, bill mail and offer mail, all bunched in together and when I think about the distraction of checking my mail boxes (yes I have 2) every day, I get moody. I should be writing but instead I'm looking at the new pics a friend just sent from Cheeseburger, or I am looking for submission responses or filtering spam, or speed reading through digest lists.

It may sound like I am complaining, but like any junkie, it's meaningless drivel. I can't blame the internet for Writer's Lapses (not blocks), I am just easily distracted and have little self control. So in the event that it seems like I lurk on lists, don't respond to mail, and don't participate in a ton of things, I review a lot but hone in on little...my inbox waits for nothing. Allways filling, allways growing...if only my word count were the same. I wouldn't feel so guilty.

Zoe and Cougar

I have a new addition to the Den, an orange Tabby named Cougar. I adopted him as a companion for my beautiful calico, Zoe. To say that it took a long time for her to stop hissing and growling at him would be putting it mildly. Now she only swats at him when he bugs her to play when she is trying to nap. Out of all the photos I've taken of him and Zoe, this one is the most precious. Getting them to eat in the same place without attacking one another was a feat in itself. They don't really share a bowl, this was just the moment when I realized I didn't have to have Cougar's food bowl in my room anymore. They both eat in the same area now, and each has there own bowls filled with their own food. Now the big task is trying to get them NOT to eat out of the other's bowl. Cougar is the more voracious eater.

These two amuse me to no end and are heavily inspiring my werecat piece, but more than that, I am just happy that they are finally warming up to each other.

Progress and Non-Progress Reports

Most of the time, I am a multi-tasking fiend. I can watch movies, play a video game, chat and write. Sometimes I even eat too. I do it in the classic, multi-tasking ADD fashion, I bounce my attention between three or four tasks. (My editor may kill me if she knows this) But seriously, the more things I have to do at once, makes me happier. I get a rush out of it.

Focus...yeah right. I purposefully watch old action movies and B-movie monster flixs while I work because they don't hold my attention and I can write with the background noise. I can watch 'Transformers' or 'The Hulk' up to three times a day. I like the sound of carnage and occasionally, I look over to see Blackout or Ratchet on the screen.

What I cannot do however, is be productive during riveting, cerebral, engaging programs. I am currently in this small catchup with formerly ignored series mode. I watched all 9 episodes of 'True Blood,' five episodes of 'Sons of Anarchy' and a season and a half of 'Dexter.' Have 3 more episodes of Dexter to get through... Needless to say my word count has suffered a great deal. There is no way I can work while watching such attention-grabbing entertainment.

I want so much to finish the second season tonight, but I had to put my foot down and tell myself that there was work to be done. Currently, I have 43K written on 'The Heart of Bast.' I have 7 more chapters to write and with a personnal goal of completion set for mid-December, I keep telling myself the sooner I catch up on all my shows the sooner I can get back to business. I even put 'The Hulk' back into my dvd player to type this blog entry, but the urge....just one more episode...I need to be more disciplined, but knowing that I have a problem is half the battle, right?

True Blood Review

One might have thought with the references to ‘Alien Nation’ and the encouragement of a coworker that I might have checked out this show sooner, but with my aversion to the dandy vampires (I prefer the hybrid-monster types), I had not even checked out the advertisements.

It took the recent hint of a werewolf, mentioned by the aforementioned coworker to get my interest in the show. With the Halloween holiday swiftly approaching, I decided to check out the show and see what it had to offer. You know I wanted to make sure that the weres were properly represented ;D

I started Thursday night and finished up on Halloween. Eight episodes of the gifted Sookie, the dashing and brooding Bill, the insane puppy-dog stupidity of Jason, the psycho confrontational Tara, the wicked dark chocolate of Lafayette and the noble but daft, possible werewolf…Sam.

Now what I like about this show is that isn’t just watching Jason sink to new lows, both coital and non, but that it touches on the serious issues of racial rights and tolerance, that it is beautifully shot and that the sex scenes are pretty smoking hot! I like the vampires do show some vulnerability. I absolutely adore Lafayette’s twisted, devilish ways and my gawd did Stellan Skarsgard produce a handsome Viking named Alexander (aka Eric).

The depictions of the south, and mainly of Louisiana are stunning and gorgeous, although why vampires would prefer the hot, swampy, alligator-riddled lands of LA when they could have the cool, solid earth of the north baffles me. I absolutely adore the one Cajun character they have and I have to admit that I crave every volatile interaction between Sam and Tara. Vampire Bill’s backstory was also highly fascinating.

What I don’t like…True Blood does remind me a tad of ‘Alien Nation’ but it reminds me of Anne Rice and “Gone with the Wind’ much more. As a not quite southerner (Maryland is below the Mason-Dixon line, even though most of us don’t think so), I will never understand the fascination with billowing nightgowns. Sookie running through the yard in a night gown to get to Bill…um…okay. Petty I know, but then Tara, despite all her sass, often reminds me of Mamie the concerned maid, who helps bustle gowns and do hair while the mistress ponders her two suitors. Now, outside of my bizarre plantation-film flashbacks, the plucky wunderkind that is Sookie, sometimes irks me. Bubbly and daft one minute, then fiery and determined even in the face of a master vampire, can be a bit much, but then I am not a fan of that type of heroine anyway. So, I would suppose all that I dislike about the show has more to do with me than anything technical or in the prose.

It is a damn, good show and I will admit that I will be checking out the latest episode on Sunday. Perhaps not just to see what goes on with Sookie and Bill though. The signs are there, pretty heavily that there is a werewolf and while the rights of vampires are all well and good, I want to see the werewolf unleashed, transformed and dishing out some pain! Vampire rights…Will there be werewolf rights is the question I want answered!