Tag Archives: humor

April 8, 2013 · 9:37 AM

The Host

I wrote a little while back about how I was conflicted about seeing the movie The Host, based on the novel of the same name by Stephenie Meyer.  The reason I was conflicted is because I actually liked reading The Host, but I don’t particularly want to support Stephenie Meyer.

I ended up seeing the movie anyway.

It was not as bad as you might think.  It followed the book really, really closely, which amazed me.  Especially since one of the previews before the movie was for the sequel to Percy Jackson & The Olympians: The Lightning Thief.  Did anyone else see that movie?  I mean, it sucked by anyone’s standards, but it was even worse if you read and enjoyed the books.  That movie was nothing like the books.  It was a rip-off of the books written by someone who had read the back cover.  Or maybe just the title.  Who asked for a sequel to that incredibly bad movie?

Anyway.

The Host was a good book.  It had strong, female characters, it had a pretty interesting plot that was only marginally stolen from Animorphs.  It had two love interests, one for the female protagonist, and another for the alien inhabiting the female protagonist.  I found this to be pretty cool, and really well done.

The biggest problem I found I had with the movie was that the girl who plays Melanie (female protagonist who gets inhabited by peaceful, mind-controlling, probably communist alien) was only good at playing one half of her dual personality.  See, in the story, Melanie is this strong woman who refuses to give her mind over to the little alien slug in her brain.  As a result, the alien and Melanie end up sharing a brain and a body.  Melanie is not in control of her actions, but she’s still there in her head, yelling at the alien.  The alien, meanwhile, is more soft spoken and gentle.  So while the actress – Saoirse Ronan – was really good at playing the gentle alien bit, her portrayal of Melanie was unconvincing.  She didn’t sound strong or confident at all, and all her lines as Melanie felt forced.

A lot of lines were delivered poorly by the younger actors, in my opinion.  The older, more experienced actors were fine.  And, randomly, so was the kid who played Jamie – Melanie’s younger brother.  He was pretty decent.

Would I recommend seeing The Host in theaters?  No.  It only made 11 million dollars at the box office on its opening weekend for a reason.  It just wasn’t executed very well, despite staying true to the book.  Would I recommend seeing it at all?  Sure.  If you read and liked the book, you’d probably get a kick out of this movie.  It just doesn’t seem extremely necessary to go see it in theaters like I did.

That was a lot of words with very few pictures.  Have a hula hooping Mini Bex:

Hula-Hooping

And a comic:

Writer's-Block-Strip-22

And a Word of the Day:

Word of the Day: Bastion (n) –  1. A fortified place.  2. Anything seen as preserving or protection some quality or condition.

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March 27, 2013 · 8:14 PM

Too Close to Call

My last post was my 100th!  I can’t believe it.  Happy 100th post, WriteRight!

100 Posts copy

I want to talk to you today about what happens when you need to edit a book that you know way too well.  This has happened with Hellbound, obviously, but with other books I’ve written as well.  Still, Hellbound is the book du jour, so I will be using it as my example.

I recently received some good advice about how to improve Hellbound that made me wonder why I hadn’t thought of it myself.  After all, no one knows your book better than you, right?  So why can other people bring something to the table that you feel you never would have thought of on your own?  Has this ever happened to you?  It has to me.  A lot.

The reason, I recently discovered, has to do with how close you become to your book and your story.  On the one hand, it is inevitable that an author will start to know his or her story like the back of his or her own hand.  It is an important part of the writing process.  You want to become involved in your own story.  That’s how good writing happens.

On the other hand, what happens to me a lot of the time is that I read a section of a book I’m writing and think “Yes, this part is grammatically correct and follows the plot, therefore it does not need changing.”  So I leave that part alone, and I concentrate more on the other points I’m working on changing/fixing.  This has happened with Hellbound, as I said, where I have read a part of it so many times that it doesn’t even occur to me that it can be changed.  For example, this conversation from the first chapter of Hellbound:

“You’re trying my patience, Re-di-Tor,” the Devil gritted out.  “You have a job to do and I expect you to do it.”
“Yes, Tor,” Aiden sneered.  “What will it be this time, Tor?”
“I like that tone.  You remind me of your mother.  Keep it up.”
     He turned to one of his servants and signed yet another form, which disappeared a second later.
     “Your new assignment,” he began, “is in a school.  Some foolish teenager has actually invoked the Rit-di-Malos.  I need you to find out which insolent child the escaped soul is inhabiting and bring it back.  Promptly.”
     Aiden could barely believe what he was hearing.  It was almost too good to be true.
     “You mean I actually get to go to school?” he asked.  “I’m going to have to interact with other kids my age and socialize and live a normal life?”
      “Your age?  Kids your age?” Tor paused to bark out a laugh.  “There are no kids your age.  You’re three hundred and seventy-five years old!”
     “Three seventy-six, dad.  You missed my last birthday.”

That passage has been in the book almost since its start back in 2011 (I’m guessing about the year, but I think that’s right).  So it never occurred to me to change it.  Not until I received the suggestion to expand Aiden’s job.  I’ve always had the idea that Aiden would be told where he had to go, but it makes more sense to have him figure out where he needs to be himself.  This gives him more responsibility and works better for the overall plot.  (You’ll just have to take my word for it on that last bit, until you can read the book yourself and see why).

This is why I have always stressed the importance of getting outside opinions about your book.  Because sometimes you’re just too close to the situation to make that call, and other people can offer an unbiased perspective.

That’s all I have to say for the moment!

Writer's-Block-Strip-21

Word of the Day: Opine (v) – to hold or express an opinion.

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March 23, 2013 · 4:38 PM

Mistaken Word Identity

Hello.  How has your life been these days?  Mine has been hectic.  On top of trying to find work to pay for my career as an author, moving to a new state, and writing, my computer is still pretty broken.  It won’t even open Firefox anymore, which sucks because I am used to using it as my browser.  I even tried uninstalling and reinstalling it.  No luck.  Can you even break a web browser?  Apparently I can.  I am that kind of special snowflake.

Anyway, I was on a plane for reasons, and I was reading a book.  The book was called Supernaturally.  It is the sequel to the book, Paranormalcy, by Kiersten White.  The first book had a unique enough premise, so I thought I’d read the second.  That’s usually how things go.  The problem is, the second book left me with kind of a bad taste in my mouth.  Don’t get me wrong, it’s not terrible.  It’s pretty standard for the new Young Adult Paranormal Romance genre that is all the rage these days, and that I, myself, write for.  The thing is…I don’t know.  It just wasn’t for me.  One of the big problems, the one I wanted to talk quickly about, was that I think the author used a word incorrectly.  I know this shouldn’t be a big deal, but it really pulls me out of the book when I see a word used to mean its exact opposite.

So we’re going to do the Words of the Day a little early here.

Nonplussed (adj) DOES mean: utterly perplexed; completely puzzled.

It DOES NOT mean: Unfazed.  Cool.  Calm.  Unaffected.

That one gets misused a lot, because it sounds like it should mean what it doesn’t.  I will add the disclaimer that White might have been using it correctly.  The character could have either been confused or nonchalant, but I got the impression he fell into the latter category, in which case “nonplussed” was the wrong word to use.

This happened to me one other time, a while back when I tried to read a book called Tithe by Holly Black.  She used the word “enervate” to mean its exact opposite and I just kinda lost a few respect points for the author.  “Enervate” is another word that sounds like it should mean its opposite.

Enervate (v) DOES mean: to deprive of force or strength; destroy the vigor of; weaken.

It DOES NOT mean: To energize.  Give energy to.  Fill with life.

It just sounds like it’s supposed to mean that.

Watch out for those words, and others like it.  Just a helpful hint.  I’ve got another post for you about my recent editing process for Hellbound, so look out for that soon!  Hopefully with pictures.  (Dare I risk plugging in my tablet?)

Word of the Day (even though I already gave you two): Lugubrious (adj) – mournful, dismal, or gloomy, especially in an affected, exaggerated, or unrelieved manner.

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