seanan_mcguire:

I've spoken before about my love of fanfic, and how it allows you to do things you can't necessarily do "in canon." One of those things, one of my favorite things, is the alternate universe. What would have happened if Toby had never become a fish? If Thomas had convinced Alice to go back to the Covenant with him, instead of leaving it for her?

If someone else had been the first to die?

I have written an alternate ending to Feed, picking up at what was originally chapter twenty-five. It's called Fed, and I'm very pleased with it, in part because it shows that no, the original ending wasn't the worst possible outcome. This was.

Fed is kindly being hosted by Orbit, thus preventing me from becoming a blibbering mess in the week leading up to the release of Blackout, and for right now, you can download and read by liking the Facebook page they've set up specifically for this purpose. (It's getting a one-week Facebook exclusive for marketing purposes, and I surely would appreciate it if you went and hit the "like" button.) This is full of spoilers, so I recommend against reading it if you haven't read Feed.

Rise up while you can.

miss_shad, posting in little_details:

One of my stories set in Japan features a ghost as the villain, and not just any ghost either: she's the main protagonist's ancestor.  

In life she was pretty nasty; she was obsessed with having amazing descendants.  When her son failed to live up to her expectations, she treated him like crap.  Now, as a ghost roaming the earth, she continues to make life miserable for all her descendants (as none of them have ever reached her crazy ideals), namely siccing her unsavory "friends on the other side" on them.

I'm on the fence with this scenario though.  I can see her haunting​ her descendants and making life hell for them, but the using other ghosts/demons to carry out her deeds seems to be stretching it a bit (though she was a medium in life and had a kitsune as an ally) So I guess what I'm asking here is, does anyone know of any other ghost/supernatural myths or legends with similar themes?  (And they don't necessarily have to be Japanese in origin) 

I've done Wikipedia research on ghosts etc in Japanese folklore but nothing really seemed to fit.

seanan_mcguire:

The John W. Campbell Award for Best New Writer is currently open for voting! This award uses the same nomination and voting mechanism as the Hugos, even though the Campbell Award is not a Hugo, and will be presented this year in Chicago, during the Hugo Awards Ceremony. Having been on the Campbell ballot in 2010, I can testify that it is a huge, huge honor to be nominated, and that it gets your name in front of a lot of eyes that might not otherwise have heard of you.

(I can also testify that winning is amazeballs best thing oh my sweet Great Pumpkin corn maze paradise wonderful. But that's probably true of winning most awards that you really, really want.)

If you are currently a member, either Attending or Supporting, of Chicon 7, you are eligible to vote for the Campbell Award, along with the Hugo Awards. If you're not a member, either Attending or Supporting, you can view the membership rates by clicking right here. A Supporting Membership comes with voting rights and the complete Hugo packet, and is only $50.

Because writers who are eligible for the Campbell are, by their very nature, relatively new writers, it's possible that you don't know anything about this year's candidates. Jim Hines has sensibly decided to help you with this little problem, and has conducted interviews with all five of this year's nominees. Go, read, and be enlightened!

We have a truly awesome class of Campbell nominees this year; any one of them is worthy of the tiara. Because remember, the Campbell is one of only two major genre awards that comes with a tiara (the other is the Tiptree).

In closing, I present the comic strip I drew to commemorate my own eligibility:



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girlgeniuscomic:
( Girl Genius Comic for Wednesday, May 16, 2012 )

<3 I am working hard on getting the pre-orders for Volume 11 listed...in the meantime, the new GIRL GENIUS NOVEL is out: Agatha H and the Clockwork Princess! We got a Publisher's Weekly Starred Review! So wonderful!--Kaja <3

taste_of_water, posting in little_details:

Terms searched for: various combinations of; poisonous plants, animal poison, Japan, organ failure, infection like symptoms, blood poisoning. Working my way through the '~medicine: poisoning' tag.
Setting: Warring States period (Sengoku) Japan. Our world.

I need a character to murder a healthy female in her mid-teens and to get away with it.
The female character is recovering from or newly recovered (I haven't decided on which yet) from two broken legs. Ideally I want her death to appear to be due to some complications connected to her injury, and for it to work quickly enough/be serious enough for her not to be able to tell anyone. 

I'm thinking of some kind of poisoning, but the girls' private doctor would intervene if he noticed any obvious tampering with the wound and I also haven't found a poison that would give symptoms similar to an infection.

Does anyone have any idea of what sort of poison I could use or is my scenario impossible?

I'm more than open for suggestions, thank you in advance for any help.

citrinesunset, posting in little_details:

I've been working on a story about a sixteen-year-old girl in London during WWII. Specifically, during the Blitz, so I'm thinking about 1940. However, I'm having some trouble because some important parts of the plot depend on what sort of access she has to American films and information about Hollywood and American stars.

I want her to be very enamored with Hollywood and American movies, but would she realistically have much access to this stuff during the war? Would she have any access to American media? I've read that UK theaters were closed for a time due to concerns about safety, but I haven't found anything more specific than that, and it didn't say anything about films being imported from other countries.

Secondly, assuming her having access to Hollywood movies or at least news is plausible, I wanted her to have a crush on a popular American actor, but could use some ideas about who it could be. I'm looking for a Johnny Depp or Leonardo DiCaprio sort of figure -- an actor who would have been popular with young women at the time, and would have been seen as a heartthrob. Obviously, my character could be attracted to anyone, but the point here is that she's more attracted to this guy's image and popularity, so I want the 1940 version or equivalent of your stereotypical teen heartthrob. I know a decent amount about movies and actors from that period, but I don't know a lot about how different demographics perceived them at the time. That is, who was popular with young people vs. older crowds. Would someone like Errol Flynn work?

I've done some searches like "Hollywood film distribution, 1940s, UK," "1940s teen idols," "Movies in London during WWII" and variations thereof, but I'm not finding a lot of stuff that seems to address these questions, and I don't honestly know what to search for. So I'd appreciate some input -- even a nudge in the right direction. I don't need a ton of background. I mainly need to know if my plot is plausible, and find a few specifics like an actor she can like and a few films she might have seen. So thanks a bunch to anyone who can help.

clwilson2006, posting in little_details:

OK, Here is the problem. I'm told that the horizon is approximately 3 miles away, I know this is dependent on height of the person and curve of the earth and what not. I can find numerous formula on the internet.

What I need to know. Say my character is six foot tall, and looking across a desert landscape, I need the horizon to be TWO miles away, so is the planet he is standing on bigger or smaller than earth? I just cannot wrap my head around it. Math and science are not my thing, when I google things like "how far is the horizon" I get formula for Earth, not as if he was on another planet.

help?

seanan_mcguire:

And now, the May 2012 current projects post, which makes me a little sad, because I made the April post from Cat's place in Maine, and I am not in Maine now. Oh, well. This is the post in which I tell you what I'm working on, and you finally understand why I don't have time for tea. To quote myself, being too harried to say something new: "These posts are labeled with the month and year, in case somebody eventually gets the crazy urge to timeline my work cycles (it'll probably be me). Behold the proof that I don't actually sleep; I just whimper and keep writing."

Please note that all books currently in print are off the list, as are those that have been turned in but not yet printed (Blackout, Ashes of Honor). The cut-tag is here to stay, because no matter what I do, it seems like this list just keeps on getting longer. But that's okay, because at least it means I'm never actively bored. I have horror movies and terrible things from the swamp to keep me company.

Not everything on this list has been sold. I will not discuss the sale status of anything which has not been publicly announced. Please don't ask.

( What's Seanan working on now? Click to find out! )