Do you have a theory (could it be bunnies? *) ? If so, I invite you to pop over to the Scholar's Blog Spoiler Zone where I've posted a list of my predictions. Feel free to come and tell me that I've got the wrong end of the stick or to ask if I've been at the Butterbeer!
(* A Buffy the Vampire Slayer joke - I can never think of the phrase "I have a theory" without immediately thinking of Anya's song in "Once More, With Feeling"...)
A quick reminder that the 14th Carnival of Children's Literature will be held over at Chicken Spaghetti on Monday 21 May 21st and the deadline for submissions is Thursday 17 May. Susan's chosen the theme of "Fiesta! A Multicultural Celebration". She says The theme is for fun; I love a good fiesta. If you have a book-related post on another subject, that's fine, too. (No web-based original fiction, please. That's another carnival altogether.). If you want to participate, check out Susan's own post on the subject, and if you've forgotten (or don't know) what a Carnival of Children's Literature is, then check out Susan's helpful explanation from March.
The US Sci Fi Channel has announced that it wil begin screening the third season of "Doctor Who" at 21:00 pm on Friday 6th July 2007, just a couple of weeks after season 3 finishes airing in the UK. New Companion, Martha Jones is going to blow your socks off !
It was Shakespeare's birthday on April 23, so I've been on a bit of a Shakespeare buzz again this week and I offer you the following (still on the theme of Time) from my favourite play by Shakespeare:
I wasted time, and now doth time waste me;
For now hath time made me his numbering clock:
My thoughts are minutes; and with sighs they jar
Their watches on unto mine eyes, the outward watch,
Whereto my finger, like a dial's point,
Is pointing still, in cleansing them from tears.
Now sir, the sound that tells what hour it is
Are clamorous groans, which strike upon my heart,
Which is the bell: so sighs and tears and groans
Show minutes, times, and hours.
King Richard in Richard II.
I particularly love the first two lines of this sonnet:
Sonnet 30
When to the sessions of sweet silent thought
I summon up remembrance of things past,
I sigh the lack of many a thing I sought,
And with old woes new wail my dear time's waste:
Then can I drown an eye, unused to flow,
For precious friends hid in death's dateless night,
And weep afresh love's long since cancell'd woe,
And moan the expense of many a vanish'd sight:
Then can I grieve at grievances foregone,
And heavily from woe to woe tell o'er
The sad account of fore-bemoaned moan,
Which I new pay as if not paid before.
But if the while I think on thee, dear friend,
All losses are restor'd and sorrows end.
... Nithreus. Everyone seems to be doing this at the moment (well everyone who's a fan of "His Dark Materials"), and I couldn't resist joining in. You can find out your Daemon via the Golden Compass movie website.
Mine isn't settled yet, so if you want to check whether you agree with how I see myself, feel free to comment on whether or not you agree via the link in the graphic. It won't settle for 12 days.
Marcus Sedgwick's new YA book, Blood Red, Snow White
Written with all Sedgwick's usual Gothic style and featuring some cleverly created bridges between history, biography and fairy tales, Blood Red, Snow White is a multi-layered novel that is sure to prove a best-seller. This book is out in July and was received for review from Waterstones.com.
Just a quick reminder that discussion of the next book, Garth Nix's Lady Friday
Rose: But, it's like... think about it, though. Christmas. 1860. Happens once. Just once, and it's gone. It's finished. It'll never happen again. Except for you. [Pause] You can go back and see days that are dead and gone and a hundred thousand sunsets ago... no wonder you never stay still...
The Doctor: Not a bad life.
Rose: Better with two.
("The Unquiet Dead", Season 1 New Doctor Who)
Kai Meyer's The Wave Runners
14 year old Jolly is a pirate (and is named after the pirate flag, the Jolly Roger). She was bought in a slave market as a young child and has been brought up by the dashing pirate Captain Bannon. During her years aboard the Maid Maddy she has learnt many of the necessary pirating skills that she needs to survive, but her greatest talent is one she has had all her life: Jolly is a polliwiggle, someone who can literally walk on water. She believes that she's the last of her kind still alive. When the crew of the Maid Maddy are ambushed and everyone else is killed she starts to wonder if the real target of the attack was herself, rather than Captain Bannon and his crew. She manages to escape from her ship and is washed up, nearly dead, onto a small island where she is rescued by a young boy named Munk who, it turns out, is also a polliwiggle. However, in spite of their remote location someone discovers the truth about the pair. After Munk's parents are murdered by an entity called the Acherus, the two polliwiggles decide to try to discover the identity of whoever is behind the attacks. They soon find themselves in the middle of a swashbuckling adventure where they meet up with a number of unusual characters, including the mysterious Ghost Trader.
I enjoyed this story. Jolly and Munk are interesting characters, as is the explanation for their ability to walk on water. The tale is set in the 17th century - but I suspect it's an alternate universe to ours (though I confess I've not found the time, yet, to check out that theory). The Ghost Trader is also a fascinatingly mysterious character - I hope we'll learn a bit more about him in the later books.
This story was originally written in German but it's been beautifully translated into English and manages to maintain a sense of adventure and excitement throughout the story. Kai Meyer has an English website here. This book was received for review from the publisher, Egmont, and it's out in May. It's also available from Amazon.com, but in the US it is called Pirate's Curse (The Wave Walkers)
I've posted my fourth "Doctor Who" novella over my Who Fiction Blog today. This is the one that burned in my brain for nearly two weeks whilst I finished writing the third tale, and as a consequence I was able to write the entire first draft over the four day Easter weekend. Roughly 22000 words in four days - I've never written so much, so fast before...
Jen Robinson, over at Jen Robinson's Book Page, has posted the 13th Carnival of Children's Literature. I missed this last night - Jen caught me sleeping ! Do go over and take a look at the many and varied posts that Jen has gathered up - but be warned, it'll take some time to get through them all.
If you're new to Blogging and are wondering what is a Carnival of Children's Literature, please check out this helpful post from Susan Thomsen at Chicken Spaghetti. Susan will be hosting the next Carnival on Monday 21 May and the deadline for submission is Thursday 17 May.
I've just posted a review of Malcolm Rose's Circle of Nightmares over on the Scholar's Blog Spoiler Zone.
I won't be posting a review of Doctor Who's Season 3 episode 4, "Daleks In Manhattan" during next week, as it's the first of a two-parter (written by Helen Raynor - the first woman to write for New Who), so expect both "Daleks In Manhattan" and "Evolution of the Daleks" to be reviewed together the week after next.
Talking of the Daleks, users of the BBC Doctor Who website were recently polled to discover the scariest monsters in the Whoniverse - and the Daleks were voted number 1 (to my surprise since I find the Cybermen far more chilling!)
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In other news, I've been lucky enough to receive an ARC of Marcus Sedgwick's new YA book, Blood Red, Snow White
This week I've been very busy with background reading for my fifth "Doctor Who" novella and with novel reading, so I've got a handful of book-related news items to share with you.
Harry Potter fans will soon get to experience the magic of Hogwarts, at a theme park which Universal Studios is close to finalising a deal to build at its amusement Park in Orlando, Florida. More at Deadline Hollywood.
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The BBC reports that J R R Tolkien continues to generate huge interest among his devoted fans as his final book The Children Of Hurin
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Publishers Weekly reports that Science Fiction publisher and Hasbro subsidiary, "Wizards of the Coast", is launching a new imprint in 2008 dedicated to adult fantasy. (And on a completely random, pedantic, note, why is there no apostrophe in the name "Publishers Weekly", hmm ?)
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The Independent reports that the Carnegie of Carnegies shortlist has been announced. The ten titles are (the "blurbs" are the Independent's, not mine):
* SKELLIG David Almond (won in 1998)
A tale of a creature beneath the garage
* JUNK Melvin Burgess (1996)
The lives of young heroin users
* STORM Kevin Crossley-Holland (1985)
Girl discovers the secrets of a marsh
* A GATHERING LIGHT Jennifer Donnelly (2003)
Novel about a real murder
* THE OWL SERVICE Alan Garner (1967)
A terrifying legend re-emerges
* THE FAMILY FROM ONE END STREET Eve Garnett (1937)
Portrait of a working-class family
* THE BORROWERS Mary Norton (1952)
Tiny people live beneath the floor
* TOM'S MIDNIGHT GARDEN Philippa Pearce (1958)
Adventures in a magical garden
* NORTHERN LIGHTS Philip Pullman (1995)
First of the trilogy His Dark Materials
* THE MACHINE-GUNNERS Robert Westall (1981)
Second World War novel
You can vote for your favourite Carnegie (or Greenaway) at their website - I've actually read half of the list (Garner, Norton, Pearce, Pullman and Westall), and I voted for The Owl Service.
In this week's episode of "Doctor Who", the Doctor revealed to Martha that his home planet, Gallifrey, had been destroyed in the last great Time War with the Daleks, and that set me to thinking about the destructive nature of Time, which led me back to Shakespeare, again:
Sonnet 19
Devouring Time, blunt thou the lion's paws,
And make the earth devour her own sweet brood;
Pluck the keen teeth from the fierce tiger's jaws,
And burn the long-lived phoenix in her blood;
Make glad and sorry seasons as thou fleets,
And do whate'er thou wilt, swift-footed Time,
To the wide world and all her fading sweets;
But I forbid thee one most heinous crime:
O, carve not with thy hours my love's fair brow,
Nor draw no lines there with thine antique pen;
Him in thy course untainted do allow
For beauty's pattern to succeeding men.
Yet, do thy worst, old Time: despite thy wrong,
My love shall in my verse ever live young.
Sonnet 2
WHEN forty winters shall besiege thy brow
And dig deep trenches in thy beauty's field,
Thy youth's proud livery, so gazed on now,
Will be a tottered weed of small worth held:
Then being asked where all thy beauty lies,
Where all the treasure of thy lusty days,
To say within thine own deep-sunken eyes
Were an all-eating shame and thriftless praise.
How much more prasie deserved thy beauty's use
If thou couldst answer, 'This fair child of mine
Shall sum my count and make my old excuse,'
Proving his beauty by succession thine.
This were to be new made when thou art old
And see thy blood warm when thou feel'st cold.
I've just (finally) posted my review of Doctor Who Season 3 episode 3 - "Gridlock" over on the Scholar's Blog Spoiler Zone.
The Doctor: There was a war. And we lost.
Rose: A war with who? [The Doctor doesn't answer, seemingly lost in thought.] What about your people?
The Doctor: I'm a Time Lord. I'm the last of the Time Lords. They're all gone. I'm the only survivor. I'm left travelling on my own cause there's no one else.
Rose: There's me.
("The End of the World", Season 1 New Doctor Who)
As when Elaine Magliaro of Wild Rose Reader emails to tell me that she's written an Acrostic Poem for me... How totally cool is that?
(An acrostic (from the late Greek akróstichon, from ákros, "extreme", and stíchos, "verse") is a poem or other piece of writing in an alphabetic script, in which the first letter, syllable or word of each verse, paragraph or other recurring feature in the text, spells out another message.
And how I wish it were true that my personal physician was the Doctor from Doctor Who !)
Julia Golding's Mines of the Minotaur
Connie is almost unique. She is a Universal, which means she has immense power. The problem Connie has is that she doesn't really know how to use her power, and neither does anyone else in the Society for the Protection of Mythical Beasts because it's been so long since they had a Universal in their midst. Only one person understands Connie's potential and that's the evil shapeshifter, Kullervo. What Connie doesn't know is that he has started infiltrating her dreams, causing her to sleepwalk and raise a devastating storm. And when she's awake, the darker side of Connie's power is beginning to feel increasingly attractive, especially if she's angry or upset. When her best friend, Col, discovers what's happening, he begs Connie to seek help, so she turns to the Society, the group of people and mythical beings who are meant to protect her. But they're so terrified by what she tells them that they expel her. Feeling abandoned and scared, Connie visits an old abandoned mine where she finds she isn't alone as the mine's full of sick mythical creatures that the Society has forgotten. They are led by the once-proud Minotaur who, having been blinded in a fight, is now a broken, nameless creature. However, he gives Connie the courage to face her dark side, and in so doing begins to heal himself. I like this series, but the books still seem very didactic, especially on the issue of environmentalism. Somehow it feels too in-my-face (which I find distracting), moreso than the anti-slavery themes of the Cat Royal series.
The first two books in the Companions Quartet are The Secret of the Sirens
I've posted my third "Doctor Who" novella over my Who Fiction Blog today. The fourth will follow in a few days.
Zoe Marriott's debut novel, The Swan Kingdom
Marriott's retelling of Anderson's tale looks at the following questions that are not answered in Anderson's original tale:
The Edge of the Forest (April) is finally up. Here's what's in store this month:
The Edge of the Forest will return May 10. If you're interested in writing a feature article or a review for the May, June, or July issues, please drop Kelly a line.
My poetry offerings this week are again inspired by "Doctor Who". As I mentioned in my review of "The Shakespeare Code", the Doctor quotes the third line of this poem by Dylan Thomas:
Do not go gentle into that good night
Do not go gentle into that good night,
Old age should burn and rave at close of day;
Rage, rage against the dying of the light.
Though wise men at their end know dark is right,
Because their words had forked no lightning they
Do not go gentle into that good night.
The rest of the poem, including an audio version, is available here.
Then Will Shakespeare starts to quote to Martha
Sonnet 18
Shall I compare thee to a Summer's day?
Thou art more lovely and more temperate:
Rough winds do shake the darling buds of May,
And Summer's lease hath all too short a date:
Sometime too hot the eye of heaven shines,
And oft' is his gold complexion dimm'd;
And every fair from fair sometime declines,
By chance or nature's changing course untrimm'd:
But thy eternal Summer shall not fade
Nor lose possession of that fair thou owest;
Nor shall Death brag thou wanderest in his shade,
When in eternal lines to time thou growest:
So long as men can breathe, or eyes can see,
So long lives this, and this gives life to thee.
though he only manages the first line before he's interrupted by the arrival of Queen Elizabeth I. (I have to say, the look on the Doctor's face, as Shakespeare starts his recitation is utterly priceless ! A combination of disbelief and bemusement - as if he's wondering why Shakespeare wants to quote poetry to Martha, although Shakespeare's been flirting with Martha all the way through the episode...)
I've just posted my review of Doctor Who Season 3 episode 2 - "The Shakespeare Code" over on the Scholar's Blog Spoiler Zone.
You may recall that I mentioned Jay Amory's The Fledging of Az Gabrielson
Az Gabrielson is a member of the Airborn race - who evolved centuries ago from ordinary humans after a climatic change that left their world covered in dense cloud. The winged Airborn race now live in "sky cities" which perch on top of vast columns that stretch hundreds of feet above the perpetual cloud. But beneath this cloud lives another, less fortunate race, the Groundlings (who are generally believed by the Airborn to have become extinct). The Groundling's society largely revolves around keeping the supply elevators which take everything that the Airborn need up to the sky cities. (Most Airborn believe this process is automated.) The procedure for keeping the supply elevators full and running is overseen by a group of Deacons who are the upperclass of Groundling society. The Deacons are a cross between religious leaders and factory overseers. They organise the collection of supplies to the Airborn from the Groundling people and in return, they promise that Groundlings will be resurrected as Airborn after death.
Unfortunately some of the Groundlings believe this is just pie in the sky when you die, and they organise themselves into a group called Humanists and start to plan a revolution. They begin picketing the supply depots, which leads to supplies to some of the sky cities falling off. The Airborn notice this and decide they'll have to send someone to investigate. Enter Az, who is a misfit amongst the Airborn as he has never developed wings. He's recruited by an agent of the government to go down to the ground to establish, if he can, why the supply elevators are coming up empty. So Az goes off and gets caught up in the unrest and events unfold pretty much as I expected...
So, what about Jay Amory's criticisms. Does he uphold his argument that adults shouldn't let teens go off alone to deal with complicated situations ? Well no, not in this book at least. Amory complained that:
[Adult characters are] only there to be ignored. They introduce the young protagonist into the action then step back and play no further part, except maybe at the end.
Harry to stumble and bumble along and get into dreadful, life-threatening scrapes for several hundred pages
Lady Cassandra O'Brien: Moisturise me! Moisturise me!
("The End of the World", Season 1 New Doctor Who)
I apologise to everyone who's been hoping to see a book review here some time in the past week and found only poetry and vaguely writerly witterings. I've got reviews pending of The Fledging of Az Gabrielson (Jay Amory), The Swan Kingdom (Zoe Marriott), The Twin Dilemma (Eric Saward) and The Butterfly Tattoo (Philip Pullman), plus the non-fiction The Science of Doctor Who (Paul Parsons) this week. The reason I've not been writing reviews is that my fourth "Doctor Who" story was burning holes in my brain and I needed to get it onto paper before I could write anything else. Now that I've spent the entire Easter weekend doing just that, I can concentrate again (once my brain stops reeling from the shock of writing about 25000 words in the space of four days, that is!) So this will be a review-filled week, I promise.
In the meantime, don't forget the third Scholar's Blog Book Discussion has kicked off over on the Scholar's Blog Spoiler Zone - please do join in if you've read Terry Pratchett's A Hat Full of Sky.
Having the tales of a Time Lord in my head means that I keep finding bits of poems about Time rising up out of the stores of poems that are also in my head, so this week I bring you three poems about Time by three different poets in different ages.
The Fleeting Years
Alas, Postumus, the fleeting years
fall away, nor will piety cause
delay to wrinkles or advancing
old age or indomitable death.
Even if you sacrificed a bull
each day you couldn't placate tearless
Pluto, who with his waves imprisons
thrice-strong Geryon and Tityos -
and those waves, my friend, must needs be crossed
by all who feed on the earth's bounty
whether we're kings or wretched peasants.
In vain we'll try to avoid cruel Mars
and the inconstant disturbances
that course the roaring Adriatic -
in vain through the autumn will we fear
the south wind, harmful to our bodies.
We must see the wandering, sluggish
Cocytos - the infamous offspring
of Danaus - the son of Aeolus:
Sisyphus damned to his ceaseless toil;
we must leave behind the earth and home
and pleasing spouse, and none of those trees
you tend will follow you, its short-lived
master, except the hated cypress.
A worthier heir will drink the wine
you guard now with a hundred keys: he'll
drench the pavement with your best - more fine
than that on which the highest priests do feast.
- Horace
On Time
Fly envious Time, till thou run out thy race,
Call on the lazy leaden-stepping hours,
Whose speed is but the heavy Plummets pace;
And glut thy self with what thy womb devours,
Which is no more then what is false and vain,
And meerly mortal dross;
So little is our loss,
So little is thy gain.
For when as each thing bad thou hast entomb'd,
And last of all, thy greedy self consum'd,
Then long Eternity shall greet our bliss
With an individual kiss;
And Joy shall overtake us as a flood,
When every thing that is sincerely good
And perfectly divine,
With Truth, and Peace, and Love shall ever shine
About the supreme Throne
Of him, t' whose happy-making sight alone,
When once our heav'nly-guided soul shall clime,
Then all this Earthy grosnes quit,
Attir'd with Stars, we shall for ever sit,
Triumphing over Death, and Chance, and thee O Time.
- John Milton
I Could Give All To Time
To Time it never seems that he is brave
To set himself against the peaks of snow
To lay them level with the running wave,
Nor is he overjoyed when they lie low,
But only grave, contemplative and grave.
What now is inland shall be ocean isle,
Then eddies playing round a sunken reef
Like the curl at the corner of a smile;
And I could share Time's lack of joy or grief
At such a planetary change of style.
I could give all to Time except - except
What I myself have held. But why declare
The things forbidden that while the Customs slept
I have crossed to Safety with? For I am There,
And what I would not part with I have kept.
- Robert Frost
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(I finished the third of my Doctor Who novellas on Wednesday night and I'm about to spend most of the long Easter weekend in starting to write the fourth one, the idea for which unfolded in my head nearly two weeks ago. The idea's been buzzing around my head ever since, whilst I finished the third one, so it's going to be a relief to get it out of my head and onto paper !)
The third Scholar's Blog Book Discussion has kicked off over on the Scholar's Blog Spoiler Zone - please do join in if you've read Terry Pratchett's A Hat Full of Sky.
Jabe: Then, stop wasting time ... Time Lord.
("The End of the World", Season 1 New Doctor Who)
I've just posted a review of the Doctor Who Season 3 first episode "Smith and Jones" over on the Scholar's Blog Spoiler Zone. In fairness to anyone who intends to watch Doctor Who's third season but may not get to see the episodes yet, for whatever reason, reviews of the episodes will be posted over there each week.
