Basilisk Opening Theme is a post from: David de Beer

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And . . . I finished Terry Goodkind’s Confessor and thereby The Sword of Truth series.

That’s all I have to say about the book itself, really. Like so many other people, this series was exciting once and turned out to be a giant disappointment to me. Actually, that’s not true — it’s more like by the end of the series I couldn’t summon the energy to care one way or the other.

By this time, if you loved Goodkind all the way, then this book will be the perfect ending. But, if somewhere along the way, you stopped giving a shit then this book is not going to change your mind¹.

But I’m not interested in discussing the merits, or failures, of this particular book nor even of where and how and why the series ended up disappointing me nor even the numerous documented epic fails! of Goodkind’s writing itself. I shall even refrain from going on at length as to how this book was the most abominable copyediting failure I’ve read in my life².

I’m more intrigued as to why this series was so succesful, why I enjoyed it once upon a time.

I’ve been pondering this for a while, but especially since reading a chance comment on Sherwood’s blog (I forget which post, sorry), where the commenter raged against the injustice where “bad” writers like Stephanie Meyer sell so well while “good” writers are being ignored.

My comment then was along the lines of:

To the people who love Meyer’s books, she really IS a good writer.

And right now, more than the failures of Goodkind and Meyer and Grisham, etc, what interests me is why are they so popular?

In other words — what are they doing right? And they must be doing something right otherwise such a huge mass of people wouldn’t have responded.

Hell, I wouldn’t have been reading The Sword of Truth all this time if once, somewhere, it didn’t do something right for me³.

If anyone’s read Twilight I’d be interested to hear some opinions as to why it was so popular. As to Goodkind:

Before it became a requirement for Richard Rahl, god of gods, superest of the supermen, to stand on a stage and deliver pages and pages of ringing rhetoric, he was just a man.

His name was Richard Cypher. He had no extraordinay skills, apart from being more perceptive than most. There was less prophecy and more accident — being the one in the wrong place at the wrong time kind of thing — in those days. More human courage and resilience and less of this destined to be the Amahallah⁴ nonsense.

He had no magic. He hadn’t yet become superman with a blade. He was just a dude determined to help a lonely girl save a world. And what a character Kahlan Amnell was in the beginning! She, by accident of birth, was set apart from society, hated and feared, and as a consequence a very lonely person, destined to never do something as simple as allow herself to fall in love. She had every reason to surrender to bitterness and reject the society that kept her at a distance for no crime other than what she was. But she didn’t — even with every last one of the Confessors (her own kind) apart from herself, murdered, and with hardly any true allies and no friends to turn to, she was still determined to fight on behalf of the people, to keep them free from tyranny.

I liked that.

I’m one of those people that argues against our fictional heroes needing to be super-people, endowed by accident of birth for greatness. I want ordinary people to be my heroes. Of course, an ordinary person by definition cannot be a hero. This, so the arguments on the forums have informed me, is why fictional heroes need an “edge”, need extraordinary accidental birth defects to “mark” them as being heroes.

Ordinary people cannot be heroes.

Ah, au contraire mon ami!

What separates the hero from the ordinary person is not any special abilities or birth defects but rather that when the moment comes, the ordinary person stand around and says, “someone needs to do something. why isn’t anyone doing anything?” The hero and heroine says, “someone needs to do something. But, no one is. And if I don’t do it then who will? How can I ask someone else to do something I won’t?”

Particularly in epic fantasy, the consequences of a moment such as I’m talking of is usually the destruction of the world as it is known. That is a hell of a responsibility to bear.

The hero is the one who’s willing to shoulder that responsibility, to be like Atlas and carry the world on his/her shoulders. Even if he is the littlest person with no wizardry and no noteworthy warrior skills and he doesn’t even know the way to Mordor.

In the beginning, Richard was an ordinary man thrust into extraordinary circumstances and who became extraordinary because of his ability to rise to the occasion, to find a way to get the job done, for being willing to carry the burden of the world’s future.

I liked that, and I still do.

Why else did I respond to Goodkind’s series?

Well, simply put I think he wrote from the heart. He wrote his characters with a deep, almost painful passion, and I did respond to that, did respond to Kahlan and Denna and Nicci, Zedd and Gratch and, imo the most heartbreaking but ultimately most courageous of them all, Rachel.

There were some truly memorable and vivid scenes in the books that’ve stayed with me for a long time. I can’t explain the specifics of those scenes except that they’re the kind when Goodkind thrust his characters into the darkest possible scenario, where he makes you believe they can die and the desperation they have to somehow, somehow, win through. They are the climaxes, small and big, where everything, life and death, is in balance and you don’t know which way it will swing.

It’s not the existence of the scenes themselves but rather how vividly they were written that makes them so memorable. I saw them, I remember them, I was there the moment it happened.

Offhand, George Martin is the only other writer I can think of who can match that ability. For as long as I desire to read books I’ll never forget Eddard Stark’s execution. That moment when the order goes out and the axe lifts and Arya Stark hits the ground running. She doesn’t think about it, she’s a little girl alone in a mass of hostile or apathetic people⁵ and her small sword is a joke and there is absolutely no known way according to the rules of phsyics that she can prevent Ned’s death but all she knows is that her father is about to die and she has to save him.

It’s probably no accident that Martin usually reserves the bulk of these scenes for Danaerys. And it works.

Yes, I am fond of those big epic scenes and before Goodkind overdid them, he did them well and they meant something.

There were little scenes too — Richard crying while he drove his sword into Denna; Kahlan with her hand on Richard’s chest, wanting to be with the man she loves and knowing she can’t. While Goodkind didn’t have the range of little scenes other writers have, the one or two kinds of little scene he did have he wrote well, very well — Vivid. Passionate. Memorable.

He was also able to create the genuine belief that actual harm could come to his characters. Too often, I think, books never quite rise to their promise because the writer just can’t convince me the characters are in danger, that they can and will be hurt, that there will be repercussions and consequences and that victory comes at a price. Basically, I never fully engage, never fully immerse.

anyhoo, this has gone on quite long enough and those are some of the more important things that Goodkind did well, imo, and possibly explains some of his appeal.

The Goodkind appeal is a post from: David de Beer

1. if you hated it from the beginning then obviously that’s not going to change
2. seriously — horrible. shocking they expect me to pay money for something that is just plain shoddily put together
3. this once, and only once, I shall admit to having applied the words “greatest epic fantasy of all time” to Robert Jordan’s Wheel of Time. It didn’t last long, about book 4 or so
4. the Chosen One. don’t ask
5. ahem, them ordinary folk who stand around and say, “why don’t someone do something?”

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Please give me examples and also explain how it differs from YA. Actually? If someone could give me a breakdown on the whole age classification thingy in fiction that would be lovely.

Also, does it actually matter?

I remember being 11, 12 or so and reading whatever looked interesting, and more often than not it was “adult” books. Picked up the bulk of my swearing vocabulary from those books. Learned many ways in which to kill a man. And so on and so forth.

Andre Norton was apparently a YA author. All I know is I loved her books. I do recall being irritated at the books marked as “for teens”, often suspecting them of talking down and skirting issues the adult books were more at ease with. So-called adult fiction hooked me because there was this sense of partnership, of equals. There was no tabooks in subjects, nor in the ways in which they were explored or discussed. As a teenager, those were the qualities I appreciated and responded to.

In my bookseller days, it always intrigued me how similar many of the teens were to how I’d been — at a certain age (13-16) they became interested in adult authors. The adult buyers, were the ones who had issues with profanity, violence, sex and “uncomfortable subject matter.”

I’m no expert in YA or kids lit or whatever. But I, for one, always thought that classifications based on age was ludicrous and more for the sake of the adults/ parents than the kids/ teens themselves.

Middle Grade Fiction is a post from: David de Beer

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What is a Dead Link? — it’s a link that no longer works. When someone clicks on it, it says “404 not found, page not here, u stupid, go away!” ok, maybe not the last bit, not usually…

The point is that a dead link occurs when a post or website you once linked to is removed. The link is broken. Sometimes this is temporary (the hosting server goes down, site is under maintenance), other times it’s more permanent — blog is dead; post has been removed; website changed something in its structure.

It matters why?

1. Search engines.
2. It’s embarrassing to the blogger who linked in the first place.
3. It doesn’t help the person being linked to since the link no longer works and therefore his site cannot be accessed.
4. Most importantly, it doesn’t serve the purpose for which it exists — it doesn’t help the person clicking on the link find content that’s interesing/ useful/ funny.

The fault in these cases invariably lies on the side the linker cannot control — on the side of the linkee party. Linkee parties are usually not aware they’re causing problems when they do something on their side that causes all the links pointing their way to go fubar.

I suggest using something like Google’s webmaster tools to help you.

Some bloggers use links more than other bloggers and, obviously, some will care more than others because the problem isn’t current links. It’s usually older ones.

Having dead links as part of my blog does disrupt my obsession to order and neatify the universe, so

What to do about it?

Well, I only know wordpress and one of the handiest tools I ever installed is Janis Elsts’ Broken Link Checker plugin.

Every time you log into your wordpress admin, it scans through all your links and will give a status report. If it finds any broken ones, it provides you the option to unlink immediately, without needing to access the exact post or page. Now, I’m usually a bit patient here, giving a site a couple of days to see whether they get the link back up or not before choosing to unlink. Also, a side effect of this plugin has been a slowly growing awareness of which websites&blogs are routinely in the habit of pulling their content down, go down often, or give me irritations for whatever reason.

This is good to know so that in future I simply don’t bother linking to them at all and save myself future irritations.

I highly recommend this plugin for wordpress users — it runs in the background, is easy to install and manage and hey, it helps you do your bit to keep the web clean.

Kind of like an automated process to pick up trash in your neighbourhood. Neighbourhoods where there’s a lot of litter and trash lying around are not the kind of neighbourhoods I like to visit and I’m enough of a snob to dislike the people who live there on principle.

Dead Links on your blog is a post from: David de Beer

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1) What time did you get up this morning?

It’s Saturday, so sometime between 7-8?

2) How do you like your steak?

medium rare

3) What was the last film you saw at the cinema?

Transformers 2.

4) What is your favourite TV show that is still on TV?

5) If you could live anywhere in the world where would it be?

Scandinavia or Ireland.

6) What did you have for breakfast?

tobacco and coffee. oh, food breakfast! then, couple of sausages. raining today, need heat and meat.

7) What is your favourite cuisine?

lasagna

8). What foods do you dislike?

peas, unless it’s green peas taken fresh off the plant, because they have no flavour. But I can tolerate them when cooked because they have no flavour. Dislike? liver. sushi. liver. sushi. liver. sushi =

YUCK!

9) Favourite place to eat?

Right now, I like Seeman’s. They have delicious morning & lunch buffets.

10) Favourite dressing?

does mustard count?

11) What kind of vehicle do you drive?

Ford Bantam

12) What are your favourite clothes?

pajamas. Very relaxing to wear.

13) Where would you visit if you had the chance?

everywhere.

14) Cup 1/2 empty or 1/2 full?

ok, you know, this question…it bugs me. A cup cannot be half full or half empty. It’s just half.

“I want a half full cup of water.”

“I want a half empty cup of water.”

“I want half a cup of water.”

15) Where would you want to retire?

Stillbaai (Still Bay)

16) Favourite time of day?

the witching hour

17) Where were you born?

East London

18) What is your favourite sport to watch?

NFL or rugby. tennis, when Federer’s playing Nadal

19) -21) stuff about who you will tag, blahblah.

22) bird watcher?

sometimes

23) Morning person or night person?

night, absolutely.

24) Do you have any pets?

yes.

25) Any new and exciting news you’d like to share?

no

26) What did you want to be when you were little?

fighter pilot

27) What is your best childhood memory?

christmas time at Jeffrey’s Bay.

28) Are you a cat or dog person?

The only cat I ever had left me, so I think I’ll stick with dogs.

29) Are you married?

no

30) Always wear your seat belt?

most of the time

31) Been in a car accident?

Never play chicken with a tree.

32) Any pet peeves?

probably.

33) Favourite pizza toppings?

cheese, mushrooms, bacon, spare rib, russian, there’s too many. pizza = awesome. period.

34) Favourite flower?

those colorful ones over there.

35) Favourite ice cream?

There’s this factory not too far from me who sell direct to the public and they make the bestest, most delicious-est vanilla royal cones and Italian kisses.

36) Favourite fast food restaurant?

Roman’s Pizza!

37) How many times did you fail your driver’s license?

4

38) From whom did you get your last email?

Mrs. Helen Claims, informing me that I’ve won 750,000 pounds. Just need to send my name and information to some place in Ireland.

39) Which place would you choose to max out your credit card?

Outer Limits, my comic book store. Also, used to be my rpg store and I do covet those World of Darkness books even if we never play anymore. And, they have plenty fantasy&skiffy books, and interesting non-fiction sections.

40) Do anything spontaneous lately?

Switched from rice to raspberries on Farmville (Facebook game).

41) Like your job?

I do, actually.

42) Broccoli?

wtf is broccoli? To me it’s a word I see in books, no visual connotation to any real world object at all.

43) What was your favourite vacation?

The last one. It is always the last one.

44) Last person you went out to dinner with?

Met J. and his wife for breakfast buffet at Seeman’s not too long ago.

45) What are you listening to right now?

the drone of my laptop’s fan

46) What is your favourite color?

blue

47) How many tattoos?

17 + 14 – 31= my no. of tats

48) How many are you tagging for this quiz?

I can’t count that high.

49) What time did you finish this quiz?

15: 42

50) Coffee Drinker?

YEBO!!

50 Questions is a post from: David de Beer

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A lot of coaches have a tendency to stay too long with people with potential. We call them coach killers. As soon as you find out who the coach killers are on your team, the better off you are. You go with the guys who may have lesser talent, but more dedication, more singleness of purpose. You spot them and stick with them because in a big game, they’ll win it for you.

Shula is one of the most succesful coaches in the history of the NFL, including mentoring the 1972 Miami Dolphins, the only team in the sport’s history to go undefeated in the season and win a Superbowl.

There’s many a bitter fan of whatever sport who has spent numerous frustrating seasons who’ll find a resonance in Shula’s words.

Now, Shula may have been talking specifically about the NFL, but I think this is a caution that one can apply far beyond just sports, or only people for that matter.

See, it’s about a particular mindset and personality type. It’s about people who just keep letting you down. It’s not that they can’t do the job, or can’t be more responsible or whatever. It’s not that they’re bad, either. In fact, that’s the worst part of a coach killer — sometimes they do come through. They are not inadequate or stupid or plain bad people. Sometimes they show glimpses of the quality of worker or person they can be. Sometimes they are courteous and conscientious.

And then, just when you get your hopes up that maybe they’ve turned a corner and things are going to be better now, they let you down. Usually badly.

It would be better if they sucked, if they were obviously not up to playing in a higher league. Not skilled enough to master the job requirements. Plain assholes as people.

Whether you’re  a coach, an employer, a family member or a friend or, for that matter, a fan of the writer/ actor/ musician, the choice is easier when it’s straightforward. When they suck.

Coach killers don’t suck. They show you just enough that you invest in them. That you caution yourself to patience. That you remind yourself some writers bloom late, that actors and filmmakers and musicians do make comebacks all the time, that players and employees who might look the least capable initially can and do turn out to vindicate your faith. People go through rough patches. Some take longer to settle. Some as youngsters are the kind of wild and reckless wash-ups that only their truest friends and parents can continue to love and support but we always believe there’ll come a moment when they make the conscious choice to make something of themselves, when they’ll reward what so often comes down to nothing but blind faith on our part.

And they do, many of them do reward that faith.

When people are young, when players are in the beginning of their careers, when employees are new, and when gadgets and internet tools are fresh and wobbly — they 100% resemble coach killers.

They are the same, on the outside, on results and behavior.

The difference lies on the inside, where we can’t see, in the mind and personality.

The one person will reward your patience a 100 times over. The other will break you.

Coach killers will drain you — of hope, of money, of resources, of attention, of everything. They’ll take and produce only enough so you can never get yourself so far as to finally cut them loose, to sever the ties.

Make no mistake — the coach killer is the one who absolutely, always, ends up being the one who benefits, who thrives while you wane. Those moments when they suddenly look like they might have turned a corner, when you get your hopes up all over again, is just part of this particular personality — probably so deeply ingrained they have no control over it — and nothing but an illusion. Call it an evolutionary strategy. A technique the parasite employs by instinct when it senses its host is about to harden itself, cast it off, cut it loose.

The parasite can’t survive on its own. But the only way it can survive is to, inevitably, bring down the host, wither it, reduce it.

In sports, we call them coach killers, these young men and women who never seem to shape up. As fans, these are the writers who’s books we keep on buying even though they disappoint us again and again and again until finally we can’t handle the insult anymore. And it is an insult when they serve drivel and expect us to keep dishing out our money.

ah, hell, you know these writers and bloggers who’re always going, “please link me! please tweet me! please review me! please comment me! please help me! me, me, me!” I promise you many of them are nice and kind and will be wonderful and grateful so long as you dedicatingly bitch yourselves to them, and they will be nice and kind when you don’t, and I guarantee that when they day comes that you ask them for a favor, they’ll turn around and walk away. When you refuse to be of service to them, they will forget you ever existed and find a new eager bitch.

You want this kind of online “friend”? You want to keep supporting this kind of writer or actor or singer? You want this kind of player on your team?

Forget that and let’s get serious about coach killers:

The real life equivalent of coach killers are sociopaths. I struggle to fathom the pschological make-up of these people. Why they become the way they are and how they can just keep on being the way they are without regard for others, how one person can so deliberately use another. How to tell them apart, absolutely, from those who’re just a bit wilder and reckless and callous for a brief time. Yeah, this latter group look like fuck-ups, they screw up plenty but they can and do turn it around. Coach killers have no intention to stop using other people.

I do know you can’t afford to have these people in your life. You cannot afford to let them sink their hooks into you. I do know you must harden yourself 365 and a quarter days² for so long as you both shall live.

Coach killers won’t kill you. They’ll simply destroy you and then move on to the next host.

They are parasites, the non-mutually beneficent kind. They are our friends and family. That’s not the scary part, it’s the hard part. Giving up on friends and family, giving up on people, is never easy and never should be.

Sometimes you have to.

The Coach killers is a post from: David de Beer

1. I saw this quote on Turf Show Times, a blog passionate about the St. Louis Rams
2. 366 in leap years

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