The Amazing Spider-man

I never read comic books as a kid...I guess it's the whole girly-girl thing.  But, I was a huge tomboy, so go figure.  But, my baby brother was a comic book, science fiction kind of guy, and I would watch a lot of it with him.

And still, I love it!

I've discussed remakes and re-imaginings with all of you before, and probably so many of us have wondered when some fresh new ideas will come to someone.  But, I have to admit, I really enjoyed "The Amazing Spider-man".

Like every other version, Peter discovers himself, love, and the importance of family.  But, you fall in love with the vulnerability of Andrew Garfield as Peter Parker, and the innocence of Emma Stone as Gwen Stacey.  Can I just say Emma Stone is the Meryle Streep of tomorrow.  She freaking disappears into every role.  And what can I say about Sally Field and Martin Sheen.  One of the things I enjoyed about this movie was the cast and their acting.  They didn't overact because someone told them they were in a science fiction movie. They didn't all run around speaking in odd little voices.  No.  They "acted" and they did it well.  They knew and understood their characters because they made me care about them: their desires, losses, loves, and dreams.

And the romance writer in me love Peter's little whisper in Gwen's ear!  Awh :-)

Great action, appropriately crazy villain, maybe a touch too long, but overall fun escape.

I won't name this one

This book I won't name because I'm not sure if it was me or the author :-)

This one had a more formulaic love affair: fireman and writer.  I think it depends on what kind of story you like to read.  If you want to feel a little more comfortable with your story and know where it's going, this would be your type of book.

Within pages, you know the couple will be together, and you know he'll rescue her.  After all isn't that what heroic firemen do?

I think a lot of my difficulty with the book stemmed from some of the paragraphing.  Character point of view was, at times, difficult for me because there were no spacial of character indications of POV changes.  And the transitions weren't always smooth.  I reread several passages to have a better idea of what was actually happening.

The character development flowed easily enough, but the two leading characters were both distrusting loners, where do you think the story is headed?

Short and simple, the story wasn't complicated, and overall, I was satisfied at the end.  But, I guess, I wish mainstream publishing houses didn't always throw the formulaic story at us.  I'd be nice if they gave us a little credit for wanting something more.  It may not always be hugely successful (financially,) but until they give it a shot, who really knows.

What type of book do you like?  Do you want to know what happens, or do you like a few surprises?  Do you need the pretty bow wrapped around your ending?

Erotica v pornography

According to Wikipedia,

Erotica (from the Greek ἔρως, eros "desire") are works of art, including literature, photography, film, sculpture and painting, that deal substantively with erotically stimulating or sexually arousing descriptions.

while the definition of

Pornography or porn is the explicit portrayal of sexual subject matter. Pornography may use a variety of media, including books,magazines, postcards, photos, sculpture, drawing, painting, animation, sound recording, film, video, and video games. The term applies to the depiction of the act rather than the act itself...

Depending on where you stand on this issue the difference in the two may be too subtle for differentiation.  And, honestly, I'm not here to debate the moral correctness of either.  But, instead in this age of Fifty Shades of rey,  I was extremely shocked to see a news broadcast on CNN regarding a request to ban porn in hotels.      I have never rented porn in a hotel, but I don't know if I'm okay with people affecting my ability to rent porn if I want to rent porn!

According to the CNN report...
-Omni Hotels discontinued it's offering in '99
-Marriott plans to phase out it's offerings by '13
-Choice Hotels leaves it to the discretion of it's franchisees


Whether or not you choose to watch porn or read erotica, I guess, for me, the operative word is "choose."  If I chose to read Fifty Shades of Grey, shouldn't I be able to walk into any store and pick it up?  And shouldn't it be the same way for my porn?  I guess I can still go to one of those wonderfully well-lit inviting porn shops and pick-up my porn :-)

Character Inspiration

Every time I watch Pathfinder, I fall in love with this man a little more.

Karl Urban, actor

Can't really say that I've ever wanted to visit New Zealand.  But, now, I think I may have a reason :-)

Authors what tools do you use to know your readers?

Personally, I'm a huge fan of blogging!  I was one of the first to use and love Digg, Reddit, MySpace (yes, MySpace,,,betcha some of you miss it now,) FaceBook took me a little longer to get into, StumbleUpon, and Tumblr.  Lately, I find myself being a bit of a Twitter junkie!

But, how do we use these tools wisely, and not spread ourselves too thin, and end up using all of them poorly?  I don't think I'd know what I'd do without networking everything, or scheduled calendars.  I can sit one day and a schedule out months of uploads and not think about it again.  Or, I can hop onto Twitter and FaceBook everyday :-)

But, there is always something new around the corner: Instagram, Pinterest, Triberr.

Join me this week at Romancing the Pen as my guest, Shelly Bell, author of A Year to Remember, discusses Triberr with us.  And let us know what you think as readers and writers.  What should we use, and how much is too much?

Rules for writing fiction

As written for The Guardian by Annie Proulx, journalist and author.

1 Proceed slowly and take care.

2 To ensure that you proceed slowly, write by hand.

3 Write slowly and by hand only about subjects that interest you.

4 Develop craftsmanship through years of wide reading.

5 Rewrite and edit until you achieve the most felicitous phrase/sentence/paragraph/page/story/chapter.