June, 2009
Red Cliffs Trailer
Jun
26, 2009 |Filed in:
UncategorizedFor those of you who are not familiar with my book or with the history it’s based on, the John Woo movie, “Red Cliffs” covers the pivotal battle of the Three Kingdoms period. I thought you might be interested in seeing this trailer of the movie. I have seen the movie on DVD and it ends on a cliffhanger. I’ll warn you, the first ten minutes or so is bewildering to the unitiated who knows nothing of these characters or their struggles. After that, the movie is an excellent character-driven story based on two strategists from Romance of the Three Kingdoms. Red Cliffs has not been released to theaters in the U.S.
Here’s the link to the trailer: http://www.examiner.com/x-1378-LA-Foreign-Film-Examiner~y2008m10d25-John-Woos-epic-Red-Cliff-marks-monumental-shift-in-Chinese-cinema. I’ve also embedded the trailer at the bottom of the page.
Variety Magazine reports that this is the highest grossing film in the Chinese movie making industry’s history. What’s more, it’s only part one.
Asian Themed Books by Caucasian Authors
Jun
22, 2009 |Filed in:
UncategorizedI thought this might be an interesting question. Does anyone have a list of reading material covering books set in or around Asian culture? Seeing as how I’m not Asian at all, but have an interest, I’m fascinated by those western authors who, like me, chose an Asian setting for their novels.
There are a few I can think of off hand:
- Alma Alexander – Secrets of Jin-Shei and The Embers of Heaven (“Jin-Shei” is great. I haven’t read “Embers” yet, but I love that title!)
- Daniel Fox – Dragon in Chains (I haven’t finished reading this, but the beginning is incredible.)
- Adrienne Kress – Timothy and the Dragon’s Gate (I have to confess, it’s still waiting to be read.)
- Lian Hearn – Tales of the Otori (I’ve also not yet read these. So much to do, so little time!)
Feel free to list any good Asian-themed books! These just fascinate me because of where the authors have come from.
ORA Conference Notes
The file attached with this post is a list of typical ways in which men and women behave, courtesy of Leigh Michael. She was one of the incredibly professional speakers at the Ozark Romance Authors convention. Alas, my notes are not as well-organized as her talk because I wasn’t able to write that fast.
I did try to put opposing behaviors together.
This is not meant to be a definitive list, neither is it to be used to pigeonhole characters. It is designed to help authors with appropriate dialogue and action responses as related to the sexes. For instance, you aren’t likely to hear a male character ask: “Does this look okay?” A male character is much more likely to say: “It makes you look dumpy.” Then that character must pay for his error in judgement. Use it sparingly. A little goes a long way toward making believable characters. A lot will make them garish stereotypes.
Subject Matter for the Next Book
Oi, I forgot how hard it was to nail down what I did and did not want to cover in “Romance”. It took me a year plus five more years of learning how to write a God-awful first draft! I’ve read about 1/4 of Outlaws of the Marsh/All Men Are Equal and while the stories have high points, there’s nothing yet that moves me so much that I want to write about it. Let’s face it, you have to be in love – in long-term-LUST – with your source material to write an historical novel. I just haven’t hit on the story line yet. I will keep reading.
Went to a wonderful Writers Conference over the weekend. It was the Ozark Romance Authors’ conference and not only were they a warm, fuzzy group, the speakers were also terrific. I will try to post my notes in a few days as the material’s worth putting out to my (massive) public forum of readers.
I met Angie Fox at the conference and look forward to reading her books, once I’ve got a break in the deluge of reading material I requested from the library. Have you ever noticed how it all comes at one time? I’m returning much of it unread. I’ve kept notes on what I’ll need to re-request. Sigh.
Any way, Angie was an amazing source of information. I really hope I meet her again someday. Maybe when I’m on the other side of the book signing desk and I can tell her what our talk meant to me. I tried after the conference, but I didn’t want to hog everyone else’s time. I do need to query her agent. She suggested I do so.
Queen Breaks Into Song!
Another one bites the dust!
Jenny Rappaport passed, but said the plot looks strong. I’m still holding out to see what Jill Grinberg has to say. She was my initial choice of agent and I still think she’s a good fit. I’m not likely to hear from her for at least two weeks. I think I’ll turn blue by then if I don’t breathe, so I’m singing.
Another one down, and another one down! Another bites the dust…