LitBlog Co-Op

Before the Aussie day posting starts, let’s see what Katharine Weber — whose Triangle is all the rage over at the LBC this week — has to say to the Bernard Pivot Questionnaire. (Inspired by the ladies of Seven Impossible Things, I asked Nicola these questions last week, you’ll remember.) Katharine’s answers are absolutely delightful (especially #5).

1. What is your favorite word?    
       Lunch.

2. What is your least favorite word?    
    Moist.

3. What turns you on creatively, spiritually or emotionally?    
    Echoes and integrity.

4. What turns you off?    
    Dishonesty and ugliness.

5. What is your favorite curse word?    
    Fuckwit.

6. What sound or noise do you love?
    The shuffling of a deck of cards.

7. What sound or noise do you hate?
    Other people’s television.

8. What profession other than your own would you like to attempt?
    Psychotherapist.

9. What profession would you not like to do?
    Manual disimpaction technician.

10. If Heaven exists, what would you like to hear God say when you arrive at the Pearly Gates?
      Love your work!

The feisty and fabulous Melissa Moorer has weighed in on Always, and I don’t want y’all to miss it. So consider this a brief Always Week revival. Among the things she has to say is:

So, since I’m in a brain cloud, I’m going to do what shouldn’t be done and talk about the queer thing. I realize that this is a no-no. There’s the fear that this will somehow ghettoize these books (and therefore doom them to mediocre sales) and Yes, I know, we’re supposed to be talking about the writing, the structure, the characters, but Aud’s gay! And strong! And this is (surprisingly) not a combination I see very often. In fact, I’ve seen the argument repeatedly that we shouldn’t want strong female characters to be gay (I’ve seen this argument most around Starbuck, and typically made by lesbians) because that would somehow stereotype all strong women as lesbians. Why is this so terrible? Apparently it is. Most of the lesbians in media are very…well, they certainly couldn’t kill anyone with a flashlight. In fact, I’m pretty sure they couldn’t change a tire or make a fist either. They’re almost always stripped of strength, power, and anything that signifies butch and or even queer. They read as straight girls (and I mean that in the worst possible, hyper-feminized way)…who just happen to like other girls. And the tough women? They’re almost always straight (Starbuck, Ripley, The new Bionic Woman, Faith, Buffy, Sydney, Veronica Mars). I’ve even seen people argue vehemently that Vasquez in Aliens was straight, which completely breaks my brain, but it’s not like there’s any concrete evidence to the contrary.

You’ll really, really want to go read the rest.

Meanwhile over at the LBC, Levi Asher has taken over the discussion reins and is doing some fun stuff in honor of Katharine Weber’s Triangle. Don’t miss: this excellent interview, her 5X5 books, and some thoughts from Scott Esposito.

And Always week wraps up today with a podcast by the Amazing Carolyn Kellogg aka Pinky. Music and talking from Nicola! (And embarrassing babbling by yours truly.)

And yesterday Hannah Wolf Bowen posted a nice review of the book you should check out.

Thanks to all y’all for commenting and following along. Please, if I haven’t convinced you yet, buy this book and read it. I’ll try to round up all the festivities in one big post over at the LBC tomorrow for easy revisiting.

• The marvelous Gavin J. Grant has the reins at Bookslut this week and he has a little interview with Nicola over there today. (He’s also apparently about to get Cheney’s back gun mag collection, but you’ll have to read the roundtable to get that not-joke.)
• And over at Metroblogging Seattle, Melissa Tyler has some lovely things to say about Always.
• The full roundtable extravaganza is up: part 1 from Monday, yesterday’s part 2, and today’s final installment.

• Nicola’s 5X5 Books today over at About Last Night courtesy of CAAF.
• There’s also the roundtable extravaganza, with great convos going on in the comments so far: part 1 from yesterday and today’s part 2 today.
• And see Kassia’s meditations on genre and when readers cross the aisle (which I already linked to once here!). We’ll be talking about some of these same issues in the final installment of the roundtable.

Updated:

Really, really, really don’t miss Nicola’s guest essay at Booksquare about the difficulties (and joys) of writing a series character who changes and genre expectations and the whole ball of wax. A snippet:

I hadn’t set out to write a series character (I was halfway through The Blue Place before I understood the novel was merely the first act of the play that was Aud); I’d never really considered how it might be to write more than one book from first person. I wasn’t ready. So when I sat down to write Stay in the same bullet-train, cold-edged, urban-metaphored style as The Blue Place, I was shocked that it wouldn’t work. Aud was not only in a different geographic and emotional place, she persisted in seeing and responding differently. I kept writing then throwing away chapters, and then one day, duh, it hit me: change the metaphor systems, change the focal length, change the expectations. That is, change the voice. Just don’t change it too much.

The following folks did a flat-out fascinating roundtable on Always — Matt Cheney, Colleen Mondor, Meghan McCarron, Kassia Krozser, Dave Schwartz (and me). The first installment is up now at the LBC.

Oh, and, please drop me an e-mail or a comment if you’re posting about Always or Nicola Griffith this week, so I can include it in a daily round-up I’ll be doing.

And my post about Always is up at the LBC site. Always week kicks off next Monday.

Hey, y’all, head over to the LBC this week where we will be celebrating the wonder of Alan DeNiro’s fiction.