research goldmines

Once again, I am reminded to be grateful of my position at a large university, with all the informational resources that provides. Not only do I have electronic access to the Oxford Dictionary of National Biography (no more reliance on Wikipedia, and far more detail than I’d ever get there!), but I have the libraries.

And a list of nine more books I want to/need to go check out and read for Midnight Never Come. Doing a lot of research doesn’t mean you reach a point where you know what you need to; it means you become steadily more aware of how much you don’t know and should. (Nor am I yet to the point where I just have to tell myself to let it go, though sometimes I really wish I were.)

Ah well. Here we go again.

getting back on my feet

I came home from London Wednesday, and spent Thursday mostly being a useless lump of uselessness. But the last two days have been solidly productive: good progress on unpacking (or really, organization after unpacking), to the point that the kitchen is finally all put away, and of course writing.

I’m liking my current plan for approaching this novel. For the month of June, I need to produce thirty thousand words (an average of 1K a day), but this number will only count things written in chronological sequence. That is, neither flashback scenes nor things I let myself skip ahead to write will qualify for the day’s total, because I might not end up using those.

So I got about 2K or so while gone, and another 2K the last two days, for a current total of about 14.5K. Plus two future scenes while I was out to town, and today, some special bonus earl of Leicester flashback action. (He’s dead by the beginning of the novel, so the only way I can include him is in flashbacks.)

Authorial sadism: getting advice you don’t understand, and being held over a barrel by your political rival.

LBR quota: we’ve had all three, lately. Though the love is looking a bit bloodstained.

clearing some tabs

Apropos of nothing: these earrings amuse me.

Apropos of fanfic: since I managed to attract much more discussion than usual the last time I talked about fanfic, I know there are more than a few of you who would find these two interesting. First, something about the whole FanLib wankery (which I presume you’re aware of), discussing fanfiction as a mode of cultural production. And second, a lengthy post from Making Light (home of the Nielsen Haydens and others), on the sucking pit of quicksand that is the question of legality and fanfiction, with a very useful section toward the end about the disclaimers people slap on their stories.

I don’t know if I’m as optimistic as part of that post is, about the likelihood of a given piece of fanfic being declared “transformative” if challenged in court, but it’s true — as far as I’m aware — about that being the real sticking-point. And when you look at it in that light, you could probably have an interesting argument about which is the more transformative work: Terry Brooks’ The Sword of Shannara or HobbitChick4Evar’s latest installment of her epic Frodo/Sam slashfest. One copies the plot of The Lord of the Rings point for point; the other does not. I don’t know which side of that argument I’d be on, honestly, or whether I’d declare either (or both) transformative — but the point is, I think the argument could happen, with good points on both sides.

(Having said that, hells yeah is “The Game of the Gods” transformative. That thing’s freaking brilliant. Middle-Earth fanfic and parody/critical typology of Mary Sues, all rolled up in one entertaining package.)

Anyway, I figured I’d toss those out there so I could close those tabs and stop having them clutter up my browser.

Lymond reminder

Lymond book-blogging begins soon, probably tomorrow. (If you aren’t sure what I’m talking about, see this explanation. If you want to be added and haven’t told me so, drop me a line here. But remember that you do have to have read all the books, unless you want the entire series spoiled from the first post on.)

btw

I’m not currently getting e-mail notifications of comments, so I thought I’d drop a heads-up here that I have responded to comments on the trip posts; if you aren’t getting notifications either, or haven’t signed up for them in the first place, you may want to go back and see if I replied to you.

Day Four: In which I cave in

The spirit is willing, but the flesh is weak. I take the Tube to St. Pancras instead of walking. It’s cold outside, and I can’t be certain how long the walk would take, nor do I have a map that shows the area. So I head for Blackfriars.

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Day Three: In which I giggle over a question mark, and flirt with hypothermia

Dinner update from last night: OMG I love Wasabi. Not the green stuff; the restaurant. Not only were they open at the dinner hour (which most of the eating establishments in the vicinity aren’t), but they gave me a giant container of yakisoba and a Coke for four pounds forty, which is the cheapest actual meal I’ve had here, barring the complimentary breakfast from the hostel.

Anyway, Friday. An excellent day that ended with an excellent demonstration of my stupidity.

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Day Two: In which I get led around by nice people

Last night I got the arch of my left foot to pop, which cured the shooting pains. Unfortunately, though today contained about half as much walking as yesterday, that was still about 40% more than my feet wanted to do. If I can survive Westminster tomorrow morning, though, I think I’ll live. After that, there will be more sitting, less walking.

So let’s continue with my perambulations, as taken (mostly) from my journal, whose formerly sleek black exterior is rapidly becoming war-torn indeed.

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Day One: In which there is much walking

Woken up at 6:30 this morning by a fire alarm. Good morning, London.

The rest of my shared room decided they might as well get up, so after a failed attempt to go back to sleep (and mind you, I didn’t get to sleep until after 1 a.m.), I get up, too. We might as well get started.

I have many things scheduled for upcoming days, but nothing for today. This is deliberate. Today is just for the City.

For those not familiar with its history, a brief primer: London the city is a sprawling monstrosity, but the City of London is a tiny thing, approximately one square mile, and back in the Elizabethan era, it was all there was. The City; some suburbs beginning to burst out of its walls; Westminster upriver, connected by a thin thread of development; Southwark across the Thames, connected by the one and only London Bridge. I’m staying in a hostel near St. Paul’s because I wanted to be in a place that existed back then, and where I could walk the City.

There’s almost nothing here that dates back to the sixteenth century, though. The Great Fire saw to that in 1666, and what it missed, the Victorians got. I have to scrounge to find Tudor-era buildings; that’s what the next few days are for. But the City is still here, and that’s what today is for. Many of the streets are still right where they used to be, even if now they’re lined with Starbucks and Pret. Sir Christopher Wren had grand ideas after the fire for how to redesign the city into a more harmonious pattern, but while he was busy planning, Londoners were busy rebuilding — right where everything had been before. I walk different road surfaces than my historical characters did, but the roads themselves are often the same.

So today was a wandering day, and what you get is a wandering journal.

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