I've been madly trying to get caught up on fest reading (sshg_exchange, hoggywartyxmas, hp_holidaygen, mini_fest, whew!!). I'm doing fairly well, though I still have a long way to go on mini_fest, but I have also on occasion been seduced into other channels.

The most surprising and fascinating was Seven for a Secret (AO3). I have no recollection of how I found it, because I was following links upon links upon links (you know, like you do) and the trail is long gone cold, but it doesn't matter. What matters is that these are marvelous, dark reimaginings of seven fairy/Disney princess tales. Jasmine finds out the punishment for stealing in a Middle Eastern country; Belle witnesses the French Revolution; Sleeping Beauty awakes only to find everyone around her falling into a new kind of sleep, and more. They are disturbing, yes, but so creative and so beautifully, vividly told -- as good as Angela Carter's The Bloody Tower, or Tanith Lee's Red as Blood: Tales from the Sisters Grimmer. Luckily they're short-shorts (the total word count is only 6390) so you can get through them all during, oh, tea-and-a-cookie-or-two.

Speaking of cookies, I got a couple of Barnes and Noble gift cards for Xmas and promptly ran out and bought the Smitten Kitchen cookbook. IT IS FABULOUS. Tons of new recipes that aren't on the website, gorgeous photos, and it really does lie flat on the counter when it's open, just like advertised. Much cooking will ensue in the New Year!!

...don't forget hp_holidaygen! There have been some great stories posted so far, with more to come, so toddle over and take a look. Aside from my lovely gift, we also have a peek at Minerva's school years, a description of a Malfoy Christmas, a story of Severus' desolate Yule as headmaster, snarky!Draco, and much much more. Most of them are fairly short, so you can dip in for just a few minutes here and there without investing an entire evening (because of course we all have lots of claims on our time over the next few days!). So what are you waiting for? Go!!

An early work by Hans Christian Andersen has been found at the bottom of a box near the Danish fairy tale writer's home city, experts say. How amazing is that? A brand new fairy tale by THE author of fairy tales! Apparently it's called Tallow Candle and is about candle that's all neglected until someone notices its worth. Sounds a bit like a wax Velveteen Rabbit (which that one always makes me cry -- I can't even explain the Velveteen Rabbit to somebody without crying).

So yay, new fairy tales :)

My gifts (yes, plural!) have posted on sshg_exchange, and I tell you now: RUN DO NOT WALK to read All Shadows Pass Away. I am blown away by the gorgeousness of the prose, the vivid lushness of the descriptions, the liveliness and depth of the dialog...There are cats and libraries and walled gardens, Tuscany and Wales and Hogsmeade, there are theological/philosophical debates and picnics, there are echoes of myth and legend, and most of all there is so much love in all its forms: friendship, healing, loyalty, desire, passion, faith.

As if that weren't gift enough, the same Mystery Author also created a lushly beautiful piece of art based on my story A Price Beyond Rubies which looks like a page from an illuminated manuscript and which forms a perfect linking device between that story and hers.

Even if Santa leaves me nothing but coal this year, I will consider myself supremely well-gifted indeed :)

hp_holidaygen has begun posting, and guess whose gift was first under the tree? Mine!! Some wonderful, talented, generous person has written for me a bittersweet tale of mystery, friendship, loyalty and love, with (of course) a Hermione determined to Figure Things Out -- and all set in a fantastical, mysterious, enticing library that I would give my eye teeth to visit (ah, but perhaps I shall someday!). Not to mention that they have linked in ancient myths like Orpheus and Eurydice, Lot's wife, etc. -- I've always been fascinated by retelling of myths and fairy tales, so this is an extra extra bonus. Hermione encounters a series of "old friends" as she makes her way towards her goal, and the glimpses we get of what has happened to them all in the intervening years add a nice richness and complexity. Truly, I am a lucky recipient, and could not have asked for more!

Go ye and read: Don't Look Back.

Blecch -- HATE the new posting interface. Way too 70s looking with the rounded corners, and all those little fields make me feel as though I'm filling out a form. NOT what I am wanting when I go to share brilliant insights with flist. Thank goodness for "switch to old version."

I see that C.S. Lewis is being honored -- or, I should say, honoured -- with a memorial in Poet's Corner in Westminster Abbey, right up there with Shakespeare, Chaucer, Kipling, Samuel Johnson et al. I'm pleased for old Jack, but my gruntle is more than a little dissed by the fact that, really, Tolkien should have gotten the hono(u)r first. I just don't see how ten transparent Christian allegories, no matter how lovely and pleasant to read*, top the incredibly rich and detailed world that Tolkien created, complete with millennia of myth, legend and history and at least four different languages, not to mention a cracking good quest narrative. Nevertheless, congrats, old boy.

Speaking of Tolkien, of course we all know that the opening of The Hobbit is now only two weeks away, and Mr Psmith and I have already bought our tickets for the midnight opening (I haven't been to a midnight opening in I-will-not-admit-how-long and am almost ridiculously excited about it). In honor of The Big Day, a_execution posted an interesting discussion of several of Tolkien's characters which you might be interested in.

Alas, no matter how long I live, I fear my reaction to movie!Legolas will be forever colored by the hilarious Very Secret Diary of Legolas ("still the prettiest member of the Fellowship"). Heeeee....

* Not to mention the Problem of Susan

During filming of The Hobbit, Ian McKellen had an angsty moment over the fact that he was acting with thirteen dwarves and yet not a single actor was there on camera with him -- all he had were 13 photographs of the dwarves on top of stands with little lights; whoever he was "talking" to their light would flash, but the actual actors did all their camera time separately and were filled in later by the computer techs. "I cried, actually. I cried. Then I said out loud, 'This is not why I became an actor'. Unfortunately the microphone was on and the whole studio heard..."

I sympathize with him. Much as I love special effects and amazingly realistic goblins, dwarves, dragons, monsters, spaceships, etc., there's something missing when 90% of what you see was produced inside a computer. The best, most memorable performances I've ever seen are live: Phantom of the Opera, Les Mis, Jesus Christ Superstar, The Mikado, even the junior high musicals I was in (under protest) and the high school musicals I worked tech crew on were magical in a way that movies can't be. When you know there are no second takes...when the actors are responding in real time to the audience...there's a wonderful feedback loop that gets going, and its remarkable. Light years different from what happens in a movie theater, where your reaction makes no difference at all to what's playing on screen.

This is also why I'm very excited about the movie version of Les Mis that's coming out next month. Instead of the usual approach, where the singers do all the singing in the studio months ahead of time and then have to time their acting to what they did weeks earlier, this production is allowing them to sing in real time, while they act. It's an interesting middle ground between live performance and movie-musical, and the actors are pretty excited about it.

We've already bought our Hobbit tickets; may have to snap a couple of these up as well.

From Cake Wrecks, an awesome tribute to Hostess snackables (the photos are great fun as well):

"And the prophet said, cast ye your countenance toward the Walmart, and follow thy heart to the junk food aisle, for there the snack cakes are distributed in a manner wonderful to see. For the munchies are upon you, and the hunger is deep. Look with wonder upon the gifts you have been given. Of the puffed cheese and popped corn, you may eat, but not the HoHo. Of the jerky and Nutella and Doritos you may have your fill, but not the Twinkie. Of the potato chip, plain or barbecue, ranch or sugar coated, you may eat, but not the Donette. Of the oil based snack of dubious origin you may eat, but not the Ding Dong. Though your craving be deep, think not of the little chocolate cupcake with the white squiggle thereupon. For the punishment is upon us and Hostess is no more. And the people wept."

Lamentations 8:11-20

...or is it??...

I thought this clip would be up on YouTube dozens of times, but there were only two! Apologies for the annoying fuzzy text over about 30 seconds near the end -- my only other option was the BBC's official clip, but they cut it short so it ends before the fade-in of the field of poppies. Which is, you know, kind of necessary for the full impact.




In Flanders fields the poppies blow
Between the crosses, row on row,
That mark our place; and in the sky
The larks, still bravely singing, fly
Scarce heard amid the guns below...


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