Looking north to the sea...
Aug. 30th, 2006 11:58 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
greygirlbeastMonday was sort of a mess, what with one thing and another, but there was work, just no proofreading. So, yesterday, a day behind schedule, Spooky and I proofed chapters Six and Seven of Daughter of Hounds ("Shadows and Flame" and "Star," respectively). Also, my editor sent me the semi-final cover layout:
It's not the direction I'd have gone, but it's quite cinematic and sexy and will probably sell more books than the other, less literal approach I'd have taken. Daughter of Hounds is a hard book to sum up in one image, if only because, for much of the novel, there are two interlinked but somewhat independent narrative threads (Emmie and Soldier). I'm assuming that the woman in the image is meant to be Soldier, even though, in the book, I say she's blonde with shortish hair. Actually, in my mind's eye, Soldier looks a bit like Katie Sackoff in Starbuck mode. And I don't know what's up with the "fuck-me" boots. But. I like the fire and the road and the trees and the clockface back behind it all. It's a cover that manages to capture some part of the flavour of the novel, even if it is, undeniably, a little over the top. There is, indeed, a lot of fire in this book. Oh, and the shotgun's nice. Anyway, please, please preorder Daughter of Hounds. The preorders matter very, very much. I just hope that people who buy it for the bad-ass, gun-totin' babe on the cover aren't disappointed when they discover the book spends half its time on an eight-year-old-girl.
Last night, we watched Terrence Malick's 1998 adaptation of James Jones' novel The Thin Red Line. I saw it once in the threatre, but I've been wanting to see it again since seeing Malick's The New World (2005) a few weeks back. Spooky had never seen it. I was even more taken with The Thin Red Line on this second viewing. I was also struck by the similarities between it and The New World, visually and thematically. I could go on about this film all day long, but I think what impresses me most is Malick's approach to the dissolution of ego and the loss of individuality in war. There's a reason we lose track of any given character, why they seem to come and go and merge one into the other. In the end, there is only a single soldier, neither American nor Japanese, neither quite alive nor quite dead. Also, Malick's insistence on keeping Nature in the foreground, his constant reminder that the petty affairs of man are just that, petty, makes both The Thin Red Line and The New World especially powerful films. As one soldier in TTRL says repeatedly, "We're dirt. We're just dirt." Indeed. Malick doesn't spend all that time on images of the natural world just because he likes the scenery. He's showing us the dispassionate observer, which is also the dispassionate stage, the greater character in these dramas, and thereby gifting the films with a transcendence and tragedy they might never achieve in the hands of a more conventional storyteller. The wars of men come and go, terrible games by which men seek to raise themselves up, and yet all men are only blades of grass in the wind, or dirt, or waves upon the shore. And through it all, horror is perfectly paired with beauty and awe. The Thin Red Line is surely the most important war film since Apocalypse Now.
Later, we watched another episode of Firefly ("Safe"). Thanks again to whoever it was sent me the DVDs for my birthday last year. I am greatly enjoying the series the second time through.
Right. Time to read...
It's not the direction I'd have gone, but it's quite cinematic and sexy and will probably sell more books than the other, less literal approach I'd have taken. Daughter of Hounds is a hard book to sum up in one image, if only because, for much of the novel, there are two interlinked but somewhat independent narrative threads (Emmie and Soldier). I'm assuming that the woman in the image is meant to be Soldier, even though, in the book, I say she's blonde with shortish hair. Actually, in my mind's eye, Soldier looks a bit like Katie Sackoff in Starbuck mode. And I don't know what's up with the "fuck-me" boots. But. I like the fire and the road and the trees and the clockface back behind it all. It's a cover that manages to capture some part of the flavour of the novel, even if it is, undeniably, a little over the top. There is, indeed, a lot of fire in this book. Oh, and the shotgun's nice. Anyway, please, please preorder Daughter of Hounds. The preorders matter very, very much. I just hope that people who buy it for the bad-ass, gun-totin' babe on the cover aren't disappointed when they discover the book spends half its time on an eight-year-old-girl.
Last night, we watched Terrence Malick's 1998 adaptation of James Jones' novel The Thin Red Line. I saw it once in the threatre, but I've been wanting to see it again since seeing Malick's The New World (2005) a few weeks back. Spooky had never seen it. I was even more taken with The Thin Red Line on this second viewing. I was also struck by the similarities between it and The New World, visually and thematically. I could go on about this film all day long, but I think what impresses me most is Malick's approach to the dissolution of ego and the loss of individuality in war. There's a reason we lose track of any given character, why they seem to come and go and merge one into the other. In the end, there is only a single soldier, neither American nor Japanese, neither quite alive nor quite dead. Also, Malick's insistence on keeping Nature in the foreground, his constant reminder that the petty affairs of man are just that, petty, makes both The Thin Red Line and The New World especially powerful films. As one soldier in TTRL says repeatedly, "We're dirt. We're just dirt." Indeed. Malick doesn't spend all that time on images of the natural world just because he likes the scenery. He's showing us the dispassionate observer, which is also the dispassionate stage, the greater character in these dramas, and thereby gifting the films with a transcendence and tragedy they might never achieve in the hands of a more conventional storyteller. The wars of men come and go, terrible games by which men seek to raise themselves up, and yet all men are only blades of grass in the wind, or dirt, or waves upon the shore. And through it all, horror is perfectly paired with beauty and awe. The Thin Red Line is surely the most important war film since Apocalypse Now.
Later, we watched another episode of Firefly ("Safe"). Thanks again to whoever it was sent me the DVDs for my birthday last year. I am greatly enjoying the series the second time through.
Right. Time to read...
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Whee!
Date: 2006-08-30 05:29 pm (UTC)It's the take-charge, stompy, competent-looking sexy death chyk on the cover, see. People (of both genders) bought the Robson by the dozen based on the cover alone (cos her previous books honestly didn't sell very well). It's sad I know, but my little bookseller heart is thumping already at your cover shot.
I already loved your writing (duh) and stock the two that I can currently get, but this is a book I can merchandise.
no subject
Date: 2006-08-30 05:30 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2006-08-30 05:34 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2006-08-30 05:45 pm (UTC)What would you have preferred for a cover image?
no subject
Date: 2006-08-30 06:11 pm (UTC)i am digging all the background stuff though...
The usual dissenter
Date: 2006-08-30 06:27 pm (UTC)You know, I'll admit off the bat that I don't like the emphasis on the Soldier-analogue. "Fuck-me books" aside, she seems far too self-assured for any of your characters. I'll have to agree with the above that this looks far more like an advert for some alternative Road Warrior. Perhaps if the Soldier-analogue were to be more fatigued or dragging the shotgun, or if she were not so obviously the intended focus for the image. I don't know. Silhouettes of the two characters would have been fine for me.
I have no doubt, however, that this sexy, attention-grabbing kind of cover will likely boost sales if only on the random curiousity factor. Perhaps this is some form of "mid-lister support"; well-intentioned if somewhat questionable in tone. Any chance of seeing other optioned covers (even if there's no chance of seeing them executed)? I'd be curious to see what other mock-ups were made.
Along this line, I heartily suggest a for-the-hell-of-it contest to develop alternative covers for your previously published novels.
Re: The usual dissenter
Date: 2006-08-30 06:32 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2006-08-30 06:44 pm (UTC)-although, the flames and the clock look pretty neat-
no subject
Date: 2006-08-30 07:01 pm (UTC)I was thinking about it, and there's a surprising number of war movies that are pretty fucking amazing, and it's not a genre that I immediately think of producing amazing films. However, Deer Hunter seems to grow more amazing each time I watch it, and I think that's because after getting over the whole R/R sequence, I've started noticing how well done the town and the people that live in it are portrayed.
The other one that nails me is Big Red One, which was amazing even before they restored the original footage (the sequence in the asylum messed with me for a long time), but with the added footage it's devestating. I think it's called The Restoration or something along those lines.
no subject
Date: 2006-08-30 08:07 pm (UTC)Still no Alabaster. How did a reader from Switzerland get the book before I did in New Jersey? :)
no subject
Date: 2006-08-30 08:13 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2006-08-30 08:17 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2006-08-30 08:19 pm (UTC)Not really the Dancy I imagined. Not bad, I guess … just different.
no subject
Date: 2006-08-30 08:37 pm (UTC)although i'm diggin the 'new' cover of THRESHOLD, i just don't really see it as 'my' dancy.
no subject
Date: 2006-08-30 10:30 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2006-08-30 09:41 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2006-08-31 01:51 am (UTC)