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Hanukah drabble offer: Comment here with one of my fandoms and a prompt and I will try to do at least one drabble a day during Hanukah, which begins Dec. 4. If I am ambitious enough I may try to have one that stands as the shamash and continues eight nights. I do not, however, promise nine on the last night! (Fandoms: Buffy, Chuck, Firefly, Heroes, Nip/Tuck, Smallville, Supernatural, X-Files, or anything else you think I know and might be willing to try.) ETA: Prompts need not have a holiday/Jewish theme, and drabbles may not either.
Michael Marshall Smith, The Servants: Mark, a young boy dragged from London to a out-of-season seaside resort, resents his new location and, more, his new stepfather, who’s changing his mother in all sorts of unpleasant ways. But all isn’t as it seems, in his family or in their house; the downstairs tenant leads him into a strange netherworld that also seems to be falling apart. Smith’s portrayal of Mark’s resentment and resistance to unhappy facts is brutally honest, viscerally real, and never condescending. If anything, I thought the fantasy aspects of the story were a little pat, but I still enjoyed the ride.
Sarah Monette, The Bone Key: A series of stories about Kyle Murchison Booth, a bookish museum worker who keeps getting dragged into murderous occult situations. I want more Mildmay and Felix. This is much more Lovecraftian horror than her other work, and it’s diverting enough, but – well, it’s supposed to feel formal, I guess, somewhere between Wharton and Lovecraft with rigid social conventions encountering the unspeakable. You’ll probably like the stories if you like her other work or if you like Lovecraft done by people who can write, but I felt the clever author at work, whereas with Felix & Mildmay I get caught up in the characters and worldbuilding. Bonus points for Booth’s privately unapologetic sexuality, which is pivotal to some of the plots and irrelevant to others, just as it ought to be.
Lawrence Block, Hit Parade: A series of stories about Keller the hitman, in which Keller reassesses what he wants from life (mostly, stamp collecting). Despite Keller’s moments of making human connections and some updating of Keller’s life to deal with post-9/11 security and anxiety, his amoral nature is never really in doubt. The very last story, in which Keller encounters what is clearly Watership Down as mutated by a litigation-averse editor, is the most chilling because it stands as implicit commentary on the kind of people who’d happily read about Keller: What, it asks, are you doing enjoying this monster?
Harlan Coben, Promise Me: Myron Bolitar, the star of previous Coben novels, returns with an impulsive promise to two young girls of his acquaintance: If they’re ever in need of a ride from a non-drunk driver, they can call him anytime, anywhere, no questions asked. Unfortunately, one does, and immediately thereafter disappears. The resulting investigation connects to an earlier disappearance and puts Myron in six kinds of danger. The plot relies heavily on coincidence and on Myron’s effortless ability to call on people from all walks of life, but no more so than other thrillers of this type, and it moves briskly.
Firefly: The Official Companion, vol. 2: Still good fanservice, though they were scraping the bottom of the spaceship for some of the extras. Gorgeous photos; cast interviews fawning over the fans; and scripts for the remaining filmed episodes, but nothing unfilmed. There are mentions of a few possible storylines that the writers were kicking around, but not much detail – and nothing on Book’s backstory, sadly. Well worth it for the pretty.
Michael Marshall Smith, The Servants: Mark, a young boy dragged from London to a out-of-season seaside resort, resents his new location and, more, his new stepfather, who’s changing his mother in all sorts of unpleasant ways. But all isn’t as it seems, in his family or in their house; the downstairs tenant leads him into a strange netherworld that also seems to be falling apart. Smith’s portrayal of Mark’s resentment and resistance to unhappy facts is brutally honest, viscerally real, and never condescending. If anything, I thought the fantasy aspects of the story were a little pat, but I still enjoyed the ride.
Sarah Monette, The Bone Key: A series of stories about Kyle Murchison Booth, a bookish museum worker who keeps getting dragged into murderous occult situations. I want more Mildmay and Felix. This is much more Lovecraftian horror than her other work, and it’s diverting enough, but – well, it’s supposed to feel formal, I guess, somewhere between Wharton and Lovecraft with rigid social conventions encountering the unspeakable. You’ll probably like the stories if you like her other work or if you like Lovecraft done by people who can write, but I felt the clever author at work, whereas with Felix & Mildmay I get caught up in the characters and worldbuilding. Bonus points for Booth’s privately unapologetic sexuality, which is pivotal to some of the plots and irrelevant to others, just as it ought to be.
Lawrence Block, Hit Parade: A series of stories about Keller the hitman, in which Keller reassesses what he wants from life (mostly, stamp collecting). Despite Keller’s moments of making human connections and some updating of Keller’s life to deal with post-9/11 security and anxiety, his amoral nature is never really in doubt. The very last story, in which Keller encounters what is clearly Watership Down as mutated by a litigation-averse editor, is the most chilling because it stands as implicit commentary on the kind of people who’d happily read about Keller: What, it asks, are you doing enjoying this monster?
Harlan Coben, Promise Me: Myron Bolitar, the star of previous Coben novels, returns with an impulsive promise to two young girls of his acquaintance: If they’re ever in need of a ride from a non-drunk driver, they can call him anytime, anywhere, no questions asked. Unfortunately, one does, and immediately thereafter disappears. The resulting investigation connects to an earlier disappearance and puts Myron in six kinds of danger. The plot relies heavily on coincidence and on Myron’s effortless ability to call on people from all walks of life, but no more so than other thrillers of this type, and it moves briskly.
Firefly: The Official Companion, vol. 2: Still good fanservice, though they were scraping the bottom of the spaceship for some of the extras. Gorgeous photos; cast interviews fawning over the fans; and scripts for the remaining filmed episodes, but nothing unfilmed. There are mentions of a few possible storylines that the writers were kicking around, but not much detail – and nothing on Book’s backstory, sadly. Well worth it for the pretty.
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Clark/Lex, and what they'll never have.
Is that a good prompt?
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(Edit: Punctuation is GOOD!)
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Clark/Lex: candle-light.
(I like the idea of a Chanukkah story via lights and oil and warmth and more the story of Chanukkah than trying to make the characters work with the religion, but, um, drabble.)
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Or heck, it's for Chanukkah, after all -- any Mandy Patinkin character. (Bonus points for either Alien Nation or Criminal Minds.)
Prompts: dazzle; blue (colour, mood or music); light in the darkness -- use any or all as the inspiration strikes.
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I have heard of Harlan Coben, mostly that he sells unbelievably well and his prose is, at best, workmanlike. I'm always on the lookout for thrillers that are not offensive in their politics, their misogyny, or their prose, so would you recommend?
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If you don't mind, I'd like to request (Jewish) Mulder on faith, following the time/space continuum, so on the run after The Truth. And I will love you forever. Not that I don't already. I just turned in a term paper which used Iolokus as in discussion of feminist interpretations of Euripides in the late 20th century.
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Medea
There were some things that I was confused on, such as the spelling of "Iolokus". It's my understanding that this title refers to the island that Jason and Medea visit after stealing the fleece, but "Iolchus" is the transliteration I'm more familiar with.
Also, I didn't know quite what to make of the structure. The first installment of Iolokus was so heavily influenced by Medea, as you've said, but I still felt that there were some strong influences in the later installments. For instance, the character of Jason Lindsay, who factors more into Agnates, I thought has more in common with the mythical Jason than Mulder does (especially as in the Herodotean version of the myth, Jason rapes Medea).
Anyway, thank you, and Happy Hanukkah!
Oh, and yes, character wise, Mulder is so much more interesting with Jewish heritage. But that's not because I have a bias or anything. And I think that David Duchovny once said that he thought of Mulder as Jewish, which to me is good a reason as any to ignore the minor evidence which may speak otherwise.
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Re: Medea
Honestly? We misspelled the name of the island. And by the time we knew that, it was already too well-known! Our bad.
Unfortunately, I didn't save all the email we had about constructing the story. Here's (http://rivkat.livejournal.com/130672.html) some reconstruction of our early discussions. The first one was Medea, the second more unstructured based on external references, the third The Tempest, and the fourth back to unstructured. However, I don't believe authors control interpretation and lots of stuff got in there that we didn't consciously intend; I don't remember what we thought about Jason, but I like your reading a lot. I wouldn't be surprised if we consciously chose his name for that reason, but I can't say for sure.
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Heroes - a grown-up Claire (maybe in her thirties or forties?) -- "This one goes out to the invisible children, as yet unborn"
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Smallville - Clark/Lex, rebirth and joy
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I found you when I started reading Clex this September :-)
If you don't mind, here's a prompt I'd like to see written:
Smallville, thief!Lex