yakalskovich | Epic fantasy is epic

Entry tags:

game of thrones,
tv

Epic fantasy is epic

Slowly getting hooked on 'Game of Thrones'. I like how they take time to tell the story, give you time to start caring about all those characters. My favourites so far are Tyrion Lannister, and Littlefinger, and I must admit to a certain predilection for Danaerys despite the fact there this feeling of "one trope too many" around her which so far prevents her from developing much non-tropical personality.

I find it slightly worrying that the entire series of books isn't even completely written yet. Eventually, Wikipedia assures me, people are certain that the three story lines (only starting out at where I am) of a power struggle in King's Landing, Danaerys beyond the sea, and Jon Snow up at the Wall will come together. But how can they if they aren't written yet?

What I like is how there are really alien elements in the familiarity of High Fantasy's perpetual middle ages, starting with the odd square things the priests (or whatever, Maesters?) wear on their shoulders at Jon Arryn's funeral rites at the very beginning, mediterrenean/oriental elements both in King's Landing and beyond the sea, and the steampunk/fallen former technical civilisation elements at the Wall. Suddenly, clockwork elevators and steel t-beam constructions, whoops! That tells us that many long winters ago/before the dragons came/ whatever, civilisation was much more advanced. The Wall itself -- what in blazes might have built it?

So many delightful answers that might be so many years in the coming. I don't know that I'll want to read the books (my to-be-read-pile has reached Pluto, who tells the books on top of the stack that he's a planet, never mind what those haters say), but I guess until somebody commits bad shark-jumping the way Supernatural has, I'll be along for the ride, show-wise.-

ETA: Ahahahahahahhhh, Guppy Sandhu as a barbarian warrior! I knew I know that face!!! That made me hoot with laughter, and totally killed my Suspension of Disbelief there, as bad as Caserta in Star Wards Episode 1... Now I scared the cats away with my raucous laughter.-

ETA2: Now with pictorial proof:

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

For me it was the prospect of living in South Dakota or Alabama...

There just aren't any jobs out there and even then they don't pay enough to allow you to travel.

And I have no desire to live in a backwater. :)

I do it for fun, keeps my brain happy. Of course, if I get my novel published, I shall be happy, but I will never make a living off that.

If I don't research anything, I'm probably sick or overextended at work. Usually, there's always something I'm getting into and poking online and finding stuff out about.

I know! I could never have done religious history if I'd stuck with Soviet Russia and I was born to attend Divinity School!!

I sometimes suspect I like the process of hunting knowledge better than the actual results.-

I like both.

I love doing tons and tons of research just for the back ground. LOL

And details! Learning details about the most banal things is just wonderful. And places -- I love going to places I research and find out the things you only know by being there. Like St. Petersburg. Re-reading my WIP the other week, I was amazed how much research I'd poured even into throw-away remarks, like the way you couldn't possible turn left off Nevski Prospekt into the driveway of a palace...

I know! Like the street surfaces of Worcester, Mass in 1918! (too many potholes).

I have spent hours pouring over maps and have had a thoroughly enjoyable morning.

I should have been an archaeologist...

like the way you couldn't possible turn left off Nevski Prospekt into the driveway of a palace...

Soooooooo funny! When my husband was writing his history of jazz, his copy editor said "this stop doesn't exist on the Chicago line".

So he actually photocopied old pictures of the stop to send to her. It did exist in 1916, just not in 1996! lol

Oh yes, that not only happened (notoriously) in London and New York...

Honestly, I think I could handle being a copy editor these days now that I have been playing for beta for several fanfic writers.

I've advised fanfic-going-pro writers as well, about all sorts of detail and research -- especially about 19th century Germany, which sounds cool in theory, but poses a language barrier to the research by English-speaking people.

I have to say I find this whole "fanfic writers moving into publishing" trend funny -- and I don't mean to sound arrogant, tho' I know it comes off that way.

Do they have any idea how hard it is to get published???

Dreadfully. But some of these people are getting published, or are already published and writing more. So being their 'Prussian beta' is a fun way for me to get things to research and interesting questions to answer.

Very few. And if you speak to editors from the big publishing houses, they will tell you that having a following of free readers online does not translate to having a paying readership who wants to read your original work. Cassandra Clark made it because Meyer backed her and big.

I don't really mind how successful they are financially as long as they write interesting things for me to pluck apart...

LOL

Good for you!

I just find myself wondering at the --

naivete?

audacity?

Not sure what word I want there. I mean, the idea that because someone will read your fic based on a character/plot/fandom that they adore somehow translates into a ready and willing fan base who will gobble up your original work is --

Well, kind of stupid, really. Sometimes I feel like they have no contact with the reality of the business.

I think I spend too much time teaching teenagers! LOLOLOL

Yes, that is the main gap between fanfic and professional original writing: - how to get people to care about your original characters! If you use pre-existing charries from canons, with a fan base, that is a given. But how do I make my readers care about Felix and Dmitri...

Most writers use vanity presses -- they pay to have it published. In the case of Clark, Meyer paid to have it published and then pushed it hard and it rode the Twilight fame.

But the actual published writers still hold down full-time jobs. One of my favorites (who came from LJ and is a good friend) is Clare London. She's an accountant. :D

http://www.amazon.com/Freeman-Clare-London/dp/1608200043

She's an amazing writer and weaves a killer plot.

Oh look!

Musings on the 1918 bestseller list
1. The U.P. Trail by Zane Grey
2. The Tree of Heaven by May Sinclair
3. The Amazing Interlude by Mary Roberts Rinehart
4. Dere Mable by Edward Streeter
5. Oh, Money! Money! by Eleanor H. Porter
6. Greatheart by Ethel M. Dell
7. The Major by Ralph Connor
8. The Pawns Court by E. Phillips Oppenheim
9. A Daughter of the Land by Gene Stratton-Porter
10. Sonia by Stephen McKenna

I think my friend

essayel has mentioned Clare London as well at some point.-

Oh I friended her! I saw you mention something about her and then saw her journal and she looks delightful.

She's probably like, "WHO ARE YOU???"

And I am smiling saying "the russky connection!"

essayel is wonderful. I totally adore her to bits. She's always worth reading, both her fics and her observations.-

(no subject)

idylchild.livejournal.com - 2011-05-31 20:33 (UTC) - Expand

(no subject)

yakalskovich - 2011-05-31 20:37 (UTC) - Expand

(no subject)

idylchild.livejournal.com - 2011-05-31 20:38 (UTC) - Expand

You use real life characters, so people already care about them!

I told you the Russian monarchy is hot and it is. Publishers will put out calls to see what is being written and what they need and that is always on the list.

Nobody ever even heard about them, except people that are interested anyway. And people who are into Russian nobility might not like what I have to tell about them.

Well, yes, that can make you a bit unpopular.

Of course, historians regularly slam Nicholas for being such a complete bungler! How anyone could be so completely incompetent...

I'd have said I don't bother with the imperial family, really; but re-reading what I have, I came on that long stretch of conversation between two of my characters going on about how incredibly incompetent, inefficient, wasteful and infuriating everything is...

So yes, there is that as well, among many other offensive things.