Sunday, October 26, 2008

Everybody sing...

Five more days 'til Halloween...Sil-ver Shamrock

We spent the day at the Springs Preserve, a desert-eco museum located on the site of the original springs that brought settlers to the Las Vegas valley for the first time thousands of years ago. Neat place, and to make it even cooler, they had it decorated for Halloween. They did some kind of Halloween show after sundown, but... reality calls--laundry to do, grocery shopping beckons, Amy has homework, and we were tired of walking.

I'm about halfway through Cormac McCarthy's The Road. What an amazing book. I've never read his work before, but he is obviously one of these authors that makes other authors question their choice of vocation. He breaks the rules in a way that makes me want to re-write everything I've ever written (until the realization sets in that I could never do it as well as him and I'm best off plodding along on my current route).

I was up until midnight last night finishing my third draft of a story for the Cafe Doom contest (thanks for the heads-up, Cate). I'm kind of nervous putting my work out for peer-review (peer here meaning people much more experienced than I). It was a fun break, but now its time to bury my head into Mojave once again. Kind of funny, but I read or saw several things today at the museum that may make their way into Mojave; I'm actually writing the book using Google Earth to lay out the geography of the story and the journey of the MC, and seeing the geographic history of this valley helped me think in those terms. I thought it would be fun if, knock on wood, Mojave was published, I could put out a kmz file (Google Map overlay) with info on the story, kind of a Tolkein-esque map of the story.

4 comments:

Rob Brooks said...

The Road is one of the best books I've read in a long time. Just amazing. I read it at a point where I'd gotten away from writing a bit, and it brought me right back. I read McCarthy's Blood Meridian shortly after--can't say I was as pleased. But I can't think of enough good things to say about The Road.

Cate Gardner said...

Ooh, good luck with your Cafe Doom entry. I sent mine in over the weekend and then panicked that it wasn't good enough. Ah well, it is done now.

And, reading through last years competition thread, it seems the gentleman who won last year was a new writer and it was his first story. How cool is that.

Aaron Polson said...

Best of luck with the Cafe Doom entry. I feel like I'm missing out, and need to tackle The Road. There will be time, I'm sure...

Unknown said...

Love The Road. Love it. If you haven't googled the movie images for the movie, do it.

They are awesome.