Things to read and watch 11/04/11

William Gibson, The Art of Fiction No. 211
Here is the full text of the long interview The Paris Review conducted with William Gibson. Tuck in, kids!

Why Science Fiction Writers are Like Porn Stars
Last weekend, Glen Duncan wrote a trollish piece in the New York Times comparing genre writers to, well, porn stars. Charlie Jane Anders at i09 has some questions for Mr. Duncan. The piece includes portraits by SF writer, Richard Kadrey (whose books you should be reading, by the way).

The Decemberists Played on Austin City Limits 
And I missed it. Their album, The King is Dead, is one of my favorites of the year so far. The fact that I can watch this episode on-line makes me very happy.

Here's their video for "The Calamity Song." Enjoy.

Thing to read, listen to 10/10/11

The Broadcast of Comics
Warren Ellis has a new, long think-piece about digital comics and web comics. This is relevant to my interests, of course.

Ian Fleming interviews Raymond Chanlder
Via the very fine SuperPunch.com, comes this 24-minute long interview featuring two masters of their craft.
The transcript of this talk may be found here.

Modern Horror Defined by Edgy Realism of the 1970s
FInally, from NPR.org come this nice piece about the current state of the horror genre. The article also includes a link to an excerpt of Shock Value which is a book that I think I'll have to put on my to-read list.

Something you should read, weekend edition

The Big Sexy Problem with Superheroines and Their "Liberated Sexuality."
A couple of days ago, Laura Hudson wrote a great piece over at Comics Alliance about the way mainstream comics represent female sexuality. It really deserves to be read by everyone with an interest in the comics medium


This is something I think a lot about since I like to write female characters. I don't think I'm guilty of any of the offenses mentioned in the essay -- I hope I'm now -- but it's always good to be mindful, right?

Some things you should read

My Instapaper page is overflowing with good stuff lately. Here are a few examples. I think I may try and do a more regular links feature...


[A]n orgy of art for its own sake.
I'm lucky to know the graphic novelist, Craig Thompson, and I was very pleased to see his new book, Habibi, reviewed so well in The Guardian.

Embed a Comic Book on any Facebook Page.

Frankly, this just seems sort of neat.

Slave Labor... has decided to go digital-only with their periodicals.
This is a reflection of how terrible the comics market is at the moment. And a damn smart move on Slave Labor's part.


WHAT SERIOUS WRITERS CAN LEARN FROM GENRE COMRADES IN ARMS
An interesting read, though I admit to being a bit self-serving since I hope to someday be a successful genre writer.

Ellen Ripley Is Clearly the Best Female Character in Scifi Film, and That's a Problem

John Scalzi speaks truth.

Tidbits 5/23

This makes me both sad and joyful: An archive of mugshots of Freedom Riders.

This seems like a worthy Kickstarter project to back: A book of interviews and articles all about a subject near and dear to my heart, comics. If you don't know about Kickstarter, please do yourself a favor and go to their homepage and read about them. There are many fine and worthy projects that could use your financial support.

I've recently subscribed to Rolling Stone magazine (Amazon.com had a special offer), and today the subscription paid for itself by introducing me to the band The Head and the Heart. The video below sealed the deal, but really, I knew I wanted to buy their album after reading the following quote from singer/guitarist Josiah Johnson, "If there's such a thing as a neo-folk movement happening right now, it's simply a reflection of the fact that music has become so negative, bands decided to go in a different direction. We are shamelessly happy."

Some things worth reading 03/22/11

Mulholland Books has pretty quickly made itself an indispensable site, in my opinion. Many of its features skew toward the crime genre, but some of it is more general. Here are two examples:

Derek Haas recently wrote an article entitled "Seven Things Novelists Should Know About Screenwriting." I don't think I need to be explain what it's about, do I?

The next day, he offered a follow-up: "Seven Things Screenwriters Should Know About Writing Novels."

"Hollywood Shadows" by Dana Goodyear tells the story of how one therapist helps Hollywood screenwriters overcome writer's block.

Links 1/21/11

This year is off to a lousy start, posting-wise. Not sure when that will change. I am sick. My wife is sick. My son may still be sick. It is a time of pestilence here in the Kreutz Gallardo household. But some day all will be well and I will start to write again and posting here will resume. Until then, enjoy some links to articles I've read over the last few days!

Rick Bass, who is an instructor at Stonecoast, has advice for beginning writers. Oddly, "Run away!" is not on the list.

Welcome to Project: Iceworm, a city built under the ice of Greenland.

Mexican drug lords are now importing foreign models and beauty queens as their girlfriends.

How have I been a fan of SF for so long without knowing about The Turkey City Lexicon? This lapse in my education was remedied by workshop instructor, and all-around swell guy, Jim Kelly. I note with interest, and without comment, the definition of the term "slipstream."

Links 1/5/11

There was a night during Cortes's conquest of Mexico that he was very nearly handed his ass by the Aztecs. It was called La Noche Triste. (Via Wikipedia)

Knock know. Who's there? Alternate universes, baby. (Via New Scientist)

Hey, look, somehow Jenny McCarthy was wrong all along. There never was a link between autism and vaccination. Who'd have imagined...

Links 12/30/10

Jess Nevins gives a close reading of Mary Poppins and he can reach only one conclusion: It's a horror film! “Mary Poppins’ mirror image moves and acts on its own. It smiles now—but what is it doing when the children are asleep? Is it still there, looking at them? Does it—can it—affect the children’s reality? Heroes nods at this, with Mirror Jessica haunting Niki, but the show doesn’t make full use of this. Neither does Mary Poppins, but in context Mirror Mary Poppins is actually more disturbing than Mirror Jessica.”

The best, most disheartening analysis of the Wikileaks affair so far comes from SF writer Bruce Sterling. Everyone involved, including Julian Assange and Wikileaks, gets taken to task: “Diplomats have become weak in the way that musicians are weak. Musicians naturally want people to pay real money for music, but if you press them on it, they’ll sadly admit that they don’t buy any music themselves. Because, well, they’re in the business, so why should they? And the same goes for diplomats and discreet secrets.”

Like me, you may still have folks asking you how Twitter works or why you do it. Designer Jessica Hische has put together a simple and conclusive explanation called Mom, This is How Twitter Works. I will be directing people to this page a lot, I think.

Links 12/28/10

Via BoingBoing comes this collection of Civil-War-era photos of battlefield injuries. Not easy to look at, but fascinating and informative.

Tineye.com. Reverse image search. Have a cool image but you don't know the artist? Tineye seems like it could help. Useful is good.

Once again, Patton Oswalt speaks truth. This time about geek culture: “The coming decades—the 21st-century’s ’20s, ’30s, and ’40s—have the potential to be one long, unbroken, recut spoof in which everything in Avatar farts while Keyboard Cat plays eerily in the background.”

Links 12/26/10

I have heard rumors that Delicious.com is going away. This distress me. I like that site a lot. (For those that don't know, Delicious is a bookmarking site. Rather than create bookmarks on your computer's web browser, you save them to the site. This means you can access them from any computer with internet access.) I'm hunting around for a replacement site. If anyone has any suggestions, please let me know. I've started using Mister-Wong.com, but I'm not falling in love with it so far.

In the mean time, I'm going to start saving links right here. I figure that this site won't ever go away, right? I also figure that people might be interested to see what's catching my eye. Some of this is for specific projects, some of it's just because it's weird and informative and of general interest.

James Burke: Connections. One of the finest documentary series ever produced on television. EVER. Now available to stream on your Internet viewing device (otherwise known as your computer).

Jaguar Warrior - Wikipedia.

Aztec Warfare - Wikipedia.

Stone of Tizoc - Wikipedia.