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The February man still shakes the snow from off his hair and blows his hands
The snow has glassed over: when I walked downhill to catch a train this afternoon, I had to put my feet in the pockmarks of previous tracks so as not to skid to a rapid and embarrassing demise in the street. I had to chip off the front steps before it was safe to retrieve the mail. The wind has the same sheer-ice solidity; when it rises, it feels only like a heavier chill scalded to the skin. There's a cartoon in the most recent New Yorker: "Long term, I'm worried about global warming—short term, about freezing my ass off." But I love this weather. At least it feels like real winter, not some barren, sunny counterfeit.
It would be nice to blame Patrick Leigh Fermor for "Notes Toward the Classification of the Lesser Moly," which is now available along with the rest of Zahir #12, but I think it's more likely that Mary Stewart is at fault. This is one of the few pieces of historical fiction I've ever completed, and I'm still slightly stunned at the amount of research required to make me feel comfortable about 1200 words. (If I ever decide to write a historical novel, I'll have to live in a library for a year.) It's also one of the few stories for which I've ever written notes by hand—on the back of a twice-folded printout about vineyard tours in Nova Scotia, apparently—and for the hell of it, I reproduce them below. All strikeouts are mine and the relative position of the lines. The fact that a couple are scribbled diagonal to one another, you will have to imagine for yourself.
Eldon SorleyRethymno? Andonis
1915—1987 Therissos Leftaris
1989 at the foot of the Lefka Ori
(what post in the British army?)
27 in 1942
winter 1942
The Atom Bomb moved from Greece to Crete in October 1940
and the Telegraph Key joins resistance after Battle of Crete
latest possible date?
ELAS—1943?
It is not that the old gods no longer walk on Parnassus and Ida
I hope this encourages at least someone to buy a copy.
In a similar vein,![[livejournal.com profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/external/lj-userinfo.gif)
lesser_celery reports that Midrash is now available from Shocklines and Not One of Us #35 and #36 from The Genre Mall. Since here I have no notes to offer as proof, you will have to take my word that the stories published therein are worth reading.
It would be nice to blame Patrick Leigh Fermor for "Notes Toward the Classification of the Lesser Moly," which is now available along with the rest of Zahir #12, but I think it's more likely that Mary Stewart is at fault. This is one of the few pieces of historical fiction I've ever completed, and I'm still slightly stunned at the amount of research required to make me feel comfortable about 1200 words. (If I ever decide to write a historical novel, I'll have to live in a library for a year.) It's also one of the few stories for which I've ever written notes by hand—on the back of a twice-folded printout about vineyard tours in Nova Scotia, apparently—and for the hell of it, I reproduce them below. All strikeouts are mine and the relative position of the lines. The fact that a couple are scribbled diagonal to one another, you will have to imagine for yourself.
Eldon Sorley
1915—
1989 at the foot of the Lefka Ori
(what post in the British army?)
27 in 1942
winter 1942
The Atom Bomb moved from Greece to Crete in October 1940
and the Telegraph Key joins resistance after Battle of Crete
latest possible date?
ELAS—1943?
It is not that the old gods no longer walk on Parnassus and Ida
I hope this encourages at least someone to buy a copy.
In a similar vein,
lesser_celery reports that Midrash is now available from Shocklines and Not One of Us #35 and #36 from The Genre Mall. Since here I have no notes to offer as proof, you will have to take my word that the stories published therein are worth reading.
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Clearly we need to write a surrealist travelogue . . .
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*looks hopeful* *prays*
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I found it a bit hard to believe at first as well, but there actually are vineyards in Nova Scotia. I don't know the others well enough to say, but Jost produce some quite lovely wines. (Better than anything made here in Connecticut, for sure. ;-)
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Congratulations. It sounds very intriguing. And I can understand what you mean--I feel uncomfortable writing in even a contemporary real world setting. I don't think I'd have the stamina for historical fiction.
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I've tried before and it's almost always burned out. It's not so much that I need all the information I research for—it's that I feel so uncertain about even the details of everyday life, I wind up checking everything; I never know what I'll need. For example, almost nothing about the German invasion of Crete, Unternehmen Merkur, made it into the finished story. But I still read several articles about it . . .
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YES. I feel like drawing a card in the morning to see if Tragic Death by Slippage and Car Smooshing is likely.
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The Chariot says your chances are not good . . .