Today is an auspicious day! I have delivered the first draft of Rabble, the sequel to Skulk, and I've also been given the go-ahead to show you something incredible...
First of all, here's the blurb:
Meg Banks is the metashifter, the only person in the world who can shapeshift into any one of the five creatures that guard London’s deepest magical secrets: fox, rat, spider, butterfly and raven. But with great power comes… well, you know the rest. To gain control of the five weard stones, the sorceress Victoria will stop at nothing, including using Meg’s own estranged mother against her.
Will Meg choose to use the stones’ power herself or keep them safely hidden? And can she work for peace, or must she destroy those who stand in her way?
And now... if you're ready...
Seriously, you might want to take a deep breath...
Maybe hold onto something...
Right? Right?
I can't get over this cover, it's so beautiful! My thanks again to the Strange Chemistry geniuses who came up with this!
Things and Stuff is a grab-bag of things that've been on my mind this week. In this edition I am too busy to blog, so instead: foxes, butterflies, ravens, rats, spiders. Warning for arachnophobics: Thing 5 is a close-up photo of a spider. I've picked the spider image that gave me the least creeping horrors, but your tastes may vary. Thing 1: a Skulk
Gorgeous (C) unfortunately I can't find the photo source for this one, please let me know if this is your photo, it is beautiful.
Thing 2: a Rabble
Also known as a flutter or a swarm, but rabble is so much cooler (C) National Geographic
Thing 3: a Conspiracy
Oh yeah, this is definitely a conspiracy (C) Wikipedia
Thing 4: a Horde
The cutest, laziest horde (C) photo source also unknown
Thing 5: a Cluster
This is not a Cluster, because it's only one spider, but it was hard to find a photo of several spiders that did not give me the creeping horrors, so I went with the one that made me smile (C) Uda Dennie
I'm late! I totally forgot to do my Friday post this week. In any case, Things and Stuff is a grab-bag of things that've been on my mind this week. In this edition: exposition, Once, ghosts, eyeballs and editing
Thing 1: Exposition
How much is too much? Too little? How long can someone realistically talk without being interrupted?
I've been editing like a demon this week. My brain has turned to mush. Here is a picture of a bunny.
Yep. (C) www.acuteaday.com
Thing 2: Once
I went to see Once on Wednesday, and it was really awesome. The sheer musical skills on stage were enough to keep me hypnotically glued to the stage - add to that some really lovely emotional moments and a couple of great laughs, and you have a very good night out.
The play itself didn't entirely live up to the flawless performances - I didn't care quite as much about the central relationship as I wanted to, and the girl definitely starts out as a straight down the line manic pixie dream girl and arguably stays that way even though very much does have her own stuff going on. But in the context of something that was otherwise so, so lovely, those are actually quite small problems.
Gold (C) the Broadway cast at the Tony Awards
Thing 3: Ghost stories
Two nights in a row this week I've dreamed complete ghost stories, with endings, and both made total sense at the time. I need to try to write them down. One was a slow burn creepy thing that started out normal and ended up with a mother and baby ghost and bugs everywhere, and the other was a huge haunted castle story with a group of tourists from the 30s, a million doors that looked exactly the same and a brilliant twist ending... that I just can't put my finger on in the light of day. There was some good stuff in there, though.
Thing 4: Giant gelatin eyeballs
I helped make two of these this week. It was supposed to be a prop for Odyssey, but it didn't turn out quite as well as we'd hoped - the first one I threw away prematurely, and the second one worked better, but then I forgot to put it in the bag that J was taking onto the field. So now I have a slightly broken giant gelatin eyeball in my fridge.
Thing 5: I haven't got time to do a thing 5, I have to get back to editing. Here is a really nice picture of a fox having some thoughts.
