Ouch

I very cleverly managed to clobber my foot by catching my toe on the couch in passing, and I'm walking with a limp. I went to the doctor's today and got an X-ray. There isn't a fracture, but the doctor thought there might be a small bone chip displaced; she's going to have a radiologist review the film. So I wear dorky athletic shoes and do no on-the-feet sorts of exercise for a week (although I suspect I'll do some upper body weight-lifting and/or abs). I've dug my cane out of the basement that I used when I was pregnant with Delia and plan to use it for the next couple of days, just until the swelling goes down.

Bottom line: not really serious, just annoying.

Books for February, 2005

The Child Goddess by Louise Marley. First time read. Quite pleased with this one; I wrote Louise a congratulatory e-mail. Every book I've read by her has been a winner. Some authors/books I read simply as a reader, some as the critiquing writer. Louise is one of the ones I read as both, simultaneously, taking mental notes on how she does certain things while also unreservedly sinking into the story.

The Summer Country by James Hetley (jhetley). First time read. My reaction to this is rather more complicated. Unlike with Louise's book, I didn't write to jhetley with my reaction, because I've been sorting it out for days, and so will fumble to do it here, publicly. My reaction, I think was rather complicated because what jhetley is doing is much closer to what I'm trying to do in the ice palace novel (grumble: or I would, if I could ever get back to it). Unlike Louise's book, which is set (to a large extent) in an alien world, jhetley is telling a story of magical happenings bleeding into a real modern world--although he also switches to the magical world for part of the book. [Edited to add: There are plot similarities, too: woman discovers magic within herself that she didn't know she had as a result of an encounter with a mysterious man. Which, come to think of it, was the plot of my first book, too.] I felt a kinship with him, perhaps, also because he got such a nice cover review from Charles DeLint; DeLint also said equally nice things about Swans. And I see exactly what in jhetley's work appeals to DeLint, the same sorts of things he noted that he liked in Swans, which is logical, because it's exactly what DeLint is all about: making the magical world break through or bleed into the real world, but each is written about truthfully, each needs the other.

Oh dear, I'm not making myself at all clear. The Summer Country reminded me of War for the Oaks (I wonder if you get tired of the comparison, jhetley, but I mean it as a compliment; that book really got under my skin when I read it), it reminded me of DeLint's work, it seemed to be doing some of the kinds of things I'm trying to do in the ice palace book. And yet, it was all different, because jhetley's work is darker than mine. Those of you who have read Swans may scoff; after all, the body count was pretty high in that book, but what I mean is, jhetley's work is dark, shading, perhaps, into horror.

I thought a lot about that after finishing the book. I saw that he was writing sort of in the same niche as me, but doing it entirely differently. This seems like an obvious observation, but weirdly, it bothered me, because I wondered that while I tell myself I write no lies and all the truth that I can, could it be that I just lack the nerve to do the sorts of things he does? (In some respects, he also reminds me of Tim Powers, who also writes about magical happenings in modern-day cities, except that Powers carves up his protagonists so much more dreadfully than DeLint.)

I've been chewing this over for days. I read the book very much as a writer, taking notes, meta-examining everything. I ended seeing all the first novel-ness of it (and that is no denigration, certainly, for mustn't we all learn to write novels by learning the ropes on our first one?) yet admiring his skill with language, with description, the sensory immediacy, the gut-impact of what he does to his characters. Hmm. Not sure if that was at all clear. Best I can do, though, sorry. jhetley, I liked it, I envied you, I'll happily read the next one, I want to do something like it to but at the same time felt I never could and am not quite sure whether that is a Good Thing or a Bad Thing. (My Inner Wise Writer tells me it is a Good Thing, because after all, Little Grasshopper, I must find my Own Way, the inimitable way that only Peg Kerr can write. Still, I wonder . . . ) Oh. Great cover art, too.

Lost in a Good Book by Jasper Fforde. First time read. This is the second in the Thursday Next series. I did love it, and am pleased by his wildly creative plot twists, and his blending of humor with truth. Amazing of him to have hit upon a fate for Thursday's father at the end of the book that's both so sadly poignantly heroic and simultaneously so blackly hilarious.

That's all for the month. Short month, though, and heaven knows I had a lot of other stuff going on.