Top Breast Cancer Surgeons Discuss Advanced Surgical Options

Visit FuelUpToPlay60.com to access new Spanish-language materials and get your school involved.

Video 1 Preview Image Caption

The Amgen Biotech Experience empowers teachers to bring biotechnology into their classrooms to spark students� love of science and features a hands-on curriculum that introduces students to the excitement of scientific discovery.

Simple steps for Alzheimer's planning.

2nd Annual Women�s Lung Health Barometer Animated Video

March of Dimes volunteer ambassador and world famous photographer Anne Geddes is featured in a PSA to raise awareness about preventing preterm birth and give more babies a healthy start in life.

Addressing the urban diabetes challenge

With this bold new campaign, St. Baldrick�s shows kids as their truest selves � fun-loving, carefree, refreshingly honest, and always a little goofy. Donate today at StBaldricks.org.

A landmark study helps to explain the genetic roots of cancer risk in children and how this may ultimately change patient care in the future.

Food Safety During Power Outages

Video of legally-blind photographer living his Whole Day, as he captures a celebration of senses and movement

Brad & Jenny Lost 400 lbs. Together

BAREMINERALS� SKINLONGEVITY� TV ADVERTISEMENT

Tony Bennett talks about what it means to have Keep Memory Alive�s 20th annual Power of Love� gala honor him with a 90th birthday celebration on May 21, 2016

Broll of pregnant women, doctors, prenatal exam, healthy & sick babies. Antidepressant use among reproductive-aged women is common. If you�re pregnant, or are planning a pregnancy, speak to your doctor right away.

Meta Heart 2 Heart Featuring Michael and Gene Strahan

Ask About the Curve Public Service Announcement

Mary Murphy partners with Osteo Bi-Flex�

STOUFFER�S�, FIT KITCHEN� headed to Tempe, Arizona to host Fit City Event featuring a competitive softball game with a twist coached by two of baseball�s biggest stars encouraging fans to find their fit

Tim McGraw wants to hear from you!

Ryan Lochte explains the feeling of Gentle Laser Hair Removal

Miami Gala celebrity B-roll for download

If we talk about the frequency, the TDS return may be revised multiple times, which allows taxpayers to make corrections as and when needed. However, it is advisable to avoid excessive revisions to prevent complexities in record-keeping.

Dear Friends,While generating the Justification report by using the latest utility version available in the TDS CPC portal ( Utility version 3.1) i'm getting the following error :"JR-Err971:Subscriptt out of range. Please report to TDSCPC with this descripttion."After t

If you're searching for a trusted digital marketing agency in Australia, Abhiwan Technology is here to elevate your online presence. Specializing in SEO, social media marketing, content strategy, and PPC, Abhiwan Technology tailors its approach to

Download CA Intermediate Cost and Management Accounting Question Papers New Course Sep 2024 in PDF. For other question papers of CA Inter May 2024, Nov 2023, May 2023, Nov 2022, May 2022, Dec 2021, July 2021, Nov 2020, Nov 2019, May 2019, Nov 18, May 2018, Nov 2017, Nov 2016, May 2016, May 17, may 2016, CA IPC Nov 2015, CA IPC may 2015, CA IPC Nov 2014 check similar section. Previous years Taxation CA IPCC IPC question papers can also be downloaded using Search. You can also search and download may 2015 Final question papers here. We are providing ca final question papers of may 2016 for Financial Reporting FR, Advanced Financial Management AFM, Advanced Auditing and Professional Ethics, Taxation, Corporate & Allied Laws,Advanced & Management Accounting AMA, Direct Tax Laws DT, Indirect Tax Laws IDT and IPCC/IPC may 2015 question papers for Advanced Accounting , Business, Law, Ethics & Communications, Taxation, Advanced Accounting , Auditing & Assurance, Information Technology & Strategic Management ITSM.

Download CA Intermediate Financial Management and Strategic Management Question Papers New Course Sep 2024 in PDF. For other question papers of CA Inter May 2024, Nov 2023, May 2023, Nov 2022, May 2022, Dec 2021, July 2021, Nov 2020, Nov 2019, May 2019, Nov 18, May 2018, Nov 2017, Nov 2016, May 2016, May 17, may 2016, CA IPC Nov 2015, CA IPC may 2015, CA IPC Nov 2014 check similar section. Previous years Taxation CA IPCC IPC question papers can also be downloaded using Search. You can also search and download may 2015 Final question papers here. We are providing ca final question papers of may 2016 for Financial Reporting FR, Advanced Financial Management AFM, Advanced Auditing and Professional Ethics, Taxation, Corporate & Allied Laws,Advanced & Management Accounting AMA, Direct Tax Laws DT, Indirect Tax Laws IDT and IPCC/IPC may 2015 question papers for Advanced Accounting , Business, Law, Ethics & Communications, Taxation, Advanced Accounting , Auditing & Assurance, Information Technology & Strategic Management ITSM.

Download CA Final Advanced Financial Management (AFM) Question Papers New Course Nov 2024 in PDF. For older question papers of CA final May 2024, Nov 2023, May 2023, Nov 2022, May 2022, Dec 2021, Nov 2020, May 2019, Nov 2018,CA final May 2018, Nov 2017, May 2017, CA final may 2016, CA final Nov 2016 check similar section. Previous years CA final Financial Reporting FR question papers can also be downloaded using Search. You can also search and download may 2015 IPCC & IPC question papers here. We are providing ca final question papers of may 2016 for Financial Reporting FR, Advanced Financial Management AFM, Advanced Auditing and Professional Ethics, Direct Tax Laws DT, Indirect Tax Laws IDT,Integrated Business Solutions (Multidisciplinary Case Study with Strategic Management) and IPCC/IPC Nov 2023 question papers for Accounting, Business, Law, Ethics & Communications , Cost Accounting & Financial Management CAFM, Taxation, Advanced Accounting , Auditing & Assurance, Information Technology & Strategic Management ITSM.

The Knifedads talk about the meaning of Knifedaddery, and how to survive a Florida Drugfight

A self-reflection on the paradox of sexuality and coming to terms with why I need to claim mine.

This week, I want to talk about corporations using global tragedy to “get their brand name out there” and otherwise profiteer off of human misery.

Welcome, you have arrived at: Yourself

Väike-kirjurähn on Euroopa väikseim rähn, olles kõigest varblase mõõtu. The Lesser Spotted Woodpecker is the smallest woodpecker in Europe, being only the size of a sparrow.

Before I start talking about Victor LaValle's beautiful book, a point of housekeeping: Now that an eon has passed, I've finally updated my praise and awards page for Jane, Unlimited. I have a bad habit of never getting around to this task until it's time to start clearing things out for the new book. The nice thing about it is that I get to revisit a book that's dear to me, years after I've stopped thinking about it. Jane is a book that divides readers for sure. I want to thank everyone who got that book and took it into your hearts and brains. If you don't know about Jane, Unlimited, here's a quick intro: An orphan named Jane arrives at an island mansion owned by a friend, then quickly starts to get the sense that strange things are afoot there. At a certain point, when Jane needs to make a decision, the book breaks off into five different decisions she could make — and each decision takes her into an adventure in a different genre. There's a mystery story, a spy story, a horror story, a sci-fi story, and a fantasy. They're all connected and interwoven; and yes, the multiverse exists :). It's a weird book and I'm very, very proud of it! If you're curious, I'll point you to the NYTBR review, which is concise and generous and does a good job expressing its flavor.


So. Today I want to talk about the craft of using existing, well-known stories to fortify your own story — thus building ready-made narrative magic into your story's foundations.

Reimagining a classic story is, of course, an age-old tradition. There was a time when I read all the King Arthur retellings I could find, though this list shows me that I missed a great many. Some of my all-time favorite books come from this tradition: Tam Lin by Pamela Dean, a retelling of the old Scottish ballad that takes place in a fictional college in Minnesota in the 1970s; Deerskin by Robin McKinley, which I held close to my heart while I was writing Fire and which is based on the Charles Perrault fairy tale Donkeyskin; Ash by Malinda Lo, a lesbian retelling of Cinderella. Every writer who goes down this path has their own take on whatever story they're reimagining, disrupting the familiar in their own unique way so that we can get some objective distance and consider the story again in a new light. One of the best things about stories is the way they all change and grow in meaning and significance with every new story that joins the pantheon.

Victor LaValle's The Changeling is a modern-day, New York City-based retelling of the old changeling folktale. In the classic version of that tale, fairies steal a human baby and replace it with something else, usually a (creepy) fairy child. In LaValle's retelling, the focus is the emotional journey of the baby's father, Apollo Kagwa, whose wife Emma Valentine starts acting odd after their baby is born. Horror ensues. In the wake of the horror, Apollo must figure out what the heck just happened, and how to move on.

LaValle's take on the changeling story is unique in plenty of ways. For example, the way race and gender factor into the power dynamics. The choice to center the point of view around a father. The extreme horrificness of the violence that occurs. The story's broad-ranging modern-day New York City settings, from a fancy Manhattan restaurant to Apollo's home in Washington Heights to an abandoned island in the East River to upscale suburbs and a forest in Queens. These are the sorts of alterations commonly made by writers retelling old stories: time, location, culture, tone. When we know we're reading a retelling, we expect changes in these categories.

But LaValle does something else too: he infuses this book with many, many stories that aren't the official story he's retelling. The Changeling is a book positively swimming in story. And one of this book's charms is that as a consequence, Apollo spends a lot of the book making mistakes about what story he's in. LaValle uses stories to illuminate, but also to mislead. I think it makes for a really unique approach to characterization.

It also steers Apollo through a character transformation that I find exquisitely touching, for reasons I'll try to explain without spoiling the plot too much.

Apollo Kagwa's father, who disappears before his fourth birthday, is a white man from Syracuse. His mother, Lillian Kagwa, is a Black woman, an immigrant from Uganda, who raises him and who recognizes early on that her son lives and breathes stories. Lillian can't find enough books to satisfy young Apollo. He also has a mind for business. When Lillian discovers that Apollo has been selling his books after reading them, she helps him establish a used bookselling business. In due course, he grows up to be a rare bookseller.

Unquestionably, this is the story of a man who knows all about stories. As a rare bookseller who spends his time digging through rude and racist people's basements looking for valuable treasures, Apollo deals in stories. He seeks stories out, recognizes their value, owns them, sells them. He also builds stories around himself as protection and comfort, often repeating to himself, in moments of anxiety or fear, the mantra, I am the god, Apollo. I am the god, Apollo. And he uses stories to comfort and ground himself — particularly Maurice Sendak's picture book Outside Over There, a changeling tale that Apollo believes his missing father lovingly left for him.

So. Apollo knows stories. And yet, as I said above, as this story plays out, LaValle gives us evidence that Apollo is often wrong about what story he's in. He admires the wrong people in his life as heroes (for example, his father). He misses the incredibly powerful sorcerers right in front of his eyes: his wife Emma; Emma's sister, Kim; Emma's friend, Nichelle; his mother, Lillian. As he moves through the world, he imagines he sees fairy tale traps where there are none, and he misses the huge, important fairy tale turning points, the moments that really matter. The clues are right in front of his face. Sometimes the women in his life even announce them aloud to him, and he still disregards them. Like all of us, the story Apollo tells himself about his own life is flawed and distorted by his own wishes, heartbreaks, assumptions, and biases. Among those biases, by my reading, is the tiniest edge of unconscious condescension to women. Or maybe even that's going too far; maybe it's simply that Apollo fails to see and appreciate the women around him fully. He's a good man. But he doesn't quite get it.

And yet, Apollo's story is one of transformation. Over the course of this book, through a great deal of trial and tribulation, Apollo learns to see what story he's in, who the heroes are, and who has the power to create a safe world for him and his family. And who are these heroes? Ultimately, women. What Apollo learns is that he's in a story in which he needs to see and respect the intelligence, insight, and power of women. Black women, specifically. By my reading, this is a tale of a well-meaning, vulnerable, flawed man learning feminism.

Maybe you can see why I love it?

And I also love how it's done. I love the way this book swirls with stories, and the way both the reader and Apollo are moving along on different paths through the stories, trying to understand which of the stories matter to Apollo's story, and how.

It makes me think in a fresh, new way about how to weave other stories into one's story, whether one's story is a retelling, or just a story with narrative influences. There's no end to the creative approaches to this — but if you're imbuing your own story with other stories, I do think it's a good idea to choose a deliberate approach. There's a danger in trying to use other stories in your story as a shortcut for creating mood and meaning. The author who throws lots of existing stories into a book might create the impression of depth, but you want to make sure it's not just an impression. You don't want to use other stories to obscure an empty hole or a weak foundation in your own story, or make it seem like your story has meaning it doesn't have. I say this as a writer who's familiar with that moment when, after trying to shoehorn a known story into something I'm writing, I realize I'm being lazy. I'm trying to make someone else's work do my work. Or maybe I realize that I simply don't know enough about my own story yet, and I'm using those other stories to obscure that fact from myself.

If you're alluding to another story in your story, there needs to be a reason. Ask yourself, what structural function are these references performing? What manner of tool are they? What do they accomplish? Why have I chosen the stories I've chosen?

There doesn't need to be a profound or complicated answer, but there needs to be an answer. For example, in Rebecca Stead's When You Reach Me, Miranda's favorite book is A Wrinkle in Time, for what turn out to be some pretty straightforward textual reasons. In the space of that book, it ends up being a perfect allusion. In the review of Jane, Unlimited I linked to above, the reviewer notes that it turns out there's a reason Jane wears Doctor Who pajamas. Though I wouldn't call Jane my most straightforward book, there are some pretty straightforward reasons I dressed her in those pajamas! You can have simple or complicated reasons for referring to other stories in your story. It can be a reason that's quiet, subtle, and small. It doesn't have to be groundbreaking. But you have to link those stories to yours in meaningful ways, and you also have to make sure that your own story is the biggest and most relevant story in the book. If you find yourself trying to create depth in an insubstantial story by borrowing someone else's story, then I recommend spending some time focusing on the hard work of your own story.

And if, in the process, you find yourself jettisoning some of the references to that other story, or even abandoning that other story altogether? That's fine too. One of my current works in progress started out as something of a Peter Pan retelling. It's now come so far from that point that the only remaining allusion is a couple of names — that I'm probably going to change, because the book doesn't need them anymore. That book needed to grow the way it did. J. M. Barrie's book was my path in; my story needed to start with his, then diverge. Another example: Earlier in this post, when I explained that Jane, Unlimited is about an orphan named Jane who comes to a mysterious house, maybe you thought of Jane Eyre. In early drafts of that book, I kept trying to work in versions of actual scenes from Jane Eyre. For example, I tried hard to find a place for a scene paralleling the one where Jane almost gets run over by Mr. Rochester in the dark. Eventually, I let all that go. At a certain point, the needs of my story became a lot more important than strengthening allusions to Jane Eyre (or Rebecca, or Winnie the Pooh, or any of the other texts that Jane, Unlimited references). I found a balance with all the allusions — or I hope I did, the reader is free to disagree! — and tried hard to focus on my story, my versions, my point. I think Jane still swims with those other stories, hopefully in ways that create depth, and part of getting to that point was letting some of it go. Often it doesn't take much to invoke a story that's part of our cultural consciousness.

To demonstrate that often it doesn't take much, let's return to The Changeling. I want to show an example of what I've explained about how this book uses stories to elucidate Apollo's failure to recognize his own story. I'll focus on one scene that I think encapsulates the skill with which LaValle layers story over story over story — to tell Apollo's story about misreading his own story. It's also wonderfully written, so that'll be fun to talk about too :).

The scene I'm going to look at takes place over the course of Chapters 11 and 12. The setting is a fancy New York restaurant that evokes a fairy tale aura. If you want to read along, you'll find this scene on pages 41 through 51 in the 2017 Spiegel & Grau hardcover edition. Point of view shifts in this book, but these two chapters are told from Apollo's point of view.

First, some context: in the scene after this scene, Emma Valentine gives birth to their child. (That's an incredible scene too! It happens in a stopped A train on its way to Washington Heights!) This means that the scene I'm about to talk about is Apollo's last chance to understand his own story before everything changes. As I think you know by now, he fails. He barrels into  parenthood still unable to see what's in front of his eyes, and the consequences are catastrophic.

But first, he has dinner at a restaurant! Or rather, he doesn't have dinner, because the items on the menu are terrifyingly expensive, so he just fills up on bread — but we'll get to that.

Let's start with the opening of Chapter 11. We're on Duane Street, a fancy street in lower Manhattan. Apollo has just been digging through the old, abandoned books of some rude people in Queens. Now he's meeting Emma and Emma's friend Nichelle for dinner at Bouley, which is a real New York restaurant. Or rather, it used to be; it closed in 2017, the year this book was published.

Here's how the chapter starts: "Entering Bouley Restaurant felt like stepping inside a gingerbread house. .... when he opened the door and stepped into the foyer, he found himself surrounded by apples. Shelves had been built into the wall, running as high as the ceiling; rows of fresh red apples and their scent enveloped him. The door to Duane Street shut behind him, and Apollo felt as if he'd stumbled into a small cottage off an overgrown path in a dark wood" (41).

(By the way, if this room sounds too playful, magical, or wonderful to be true — here's an article that includes a photo of Bouley's apple entrance: "What's David Bouley Going to Do With all Those Apples When He Closes His Flagship Restaurant?")

So. With these opening lines, LaValle accomplishes two things: (1) he fixes a real-life restaurant firmly in the world of fairy tale. And (2) he signals to us what story Apollo thinks he's in. Because we all know that when Hansel and Gretel step into a cottage off an overgrown path in a dark wood with walls made of gingerbread, cake, and candies, things do not go well for them.

I don't want to take any of the fairy tale references in this book too literally or drag them out too far. Though LaValle can be pretty explicit sometimes about what he's referencing, his touch remains light, and I don't want to beat it to death. But as I said before, Apollo doesn't eat anything but bread during this dinner. He tells himself it's because he's afraid of the bill, but we also know that on some unconscious level, he thinks he's inside the story of Hansel and Gretel. And if you're inside that story, you know damn well that it's not safe to eat the food! Of course, as it turns out, Apollo could eat anything he wants safely, because Nichelle is paying for the dinner. Apollo's wrong: his story isn't Hansel and Gretel.

This is a pretty straightforward example of how this skilled writer uses a conscious and deliberate reference to a widely-known story that then shows us that Apollo is a little bit lost inside all the stories of his life. Also, as settings go, this description of the foyer of Bouley is evocative and beautiful. The sentences of this book are eminently readable. It's something I noticed again and again: despite a fair amount of description, my eyes never glazed over and I never struggled to picture what was being described to me. LaValle doesn't use flowery language or waste words. He tells you what it looks like and he tells you how Apollo experiences it. And he attaches it to story spaces we already know, spaces that are part of our cultural language of stories, so it feels familiar and right. For me, at this point in the book, it was enjoyable to be a little bit lost with Apollo, because the language was so lush and the setting so fairy-tale familiar; because I myself, sitting outside the story, could go eat something if I got hungry, without worrying about evil witches; and also because I had some grounding that Apollo doesn't have. Apollo doesn't know that his own book is called The Changeling. He's just trying to survive each new story, whatever it turns out to be, as he steps into it.

LaValle does a good job creating sympathy in the reader for Apollo's mistakes and confusions. Consider Apollo's experience as he moves further into Bouley: "The dining room's vaulted ceilings had been laid with eighteen-karat gold leaf sheets, and on top of that a twelve-karat white gold varnish, so the ceiling seemed as supple as suede. The floors were Burgundy stone, overlaid by Persian rugs. If the foyer felt like a woodland cottage and the waiting area a haunted parlor, the dining room became an ancient castle's great hall.….Apollo felt as if he was trekking through realms rather than rooms. If there had been men in full armor posted as sentries, it wouldn't have surprised him. And in fact, when the maître d' reached the right table, there was a queen waiting there. Emma Valentine, too pregnant to stand" (42).

This is one of the dangers of being a story man: If your entire life is steeped in story, you're going to see those stories everywhere. Surely that makes it confusing to isolate which story is yours?

On the other hand, Apollo totally notices that Emma is a queen — but then he dismisses it. This is another danger of a life steeped in story: you make associations and assume that they're metaphors. Emma isn't like a queen. She is a queen — or if not a queen, some other category of extremely powerful and important woman. Maybe one of Apollo's problems is that he's so steeped in story that he can't get hold of what's real? Or maybe he believes in magic within the context of a story, but he doesn't believe in magic in real life? Or maybe he lives too much inside stories, and needs to wake up and live his real life?

This is what good layering does. It leaves the reader with lots of fascinating and fun questions!

By the way, Emma has her favorite stories too — and LaValle's choices for her illuminate her character to anyone who's paying attention. The most important movie from Emma's childhood, which she watched repeatedly in her hometown library in Virginia, is a Brazilian movie called Quilombo, "the only movie in the entire library that had black people on the cover. Of course I wanted to watch it!" (28). It's a movie about the slave uprisings in Brazil, and it "shows tons of Portuguese people getting killed by those slaves" (28). At dinner, Nichelle brings it up: "This girl tried to get me to watch a movie about a slave uprising when I was busy trying to figure out how to marry that boy out of New Edition" (47). While Apollo is worrying about eating the food, LaValle reminds us that Emma is engaged in matters of disruption to major power structures. Ding ding ding! Pay attention, Apollo!

But Apollo is too hungry and anxious to pay attention. The dinner progresses as dinners do. Apollo, not knowing that Nichelle is buying, becomes more and more horrified as Nichelle and Emma order delicacy after delicacy. Nichelle gets roaring drunk. Emma, who rarely sleeps anymore, is drifting, half-asleep in her seat. "Apollo, meanwhile, had ingested nothing but tapwater and the restaurant bread. While the bread tasted magnificent, it wasn't enough. By dessert, Apollo and Emma had low batteries, but Nichelle seemed wired to a generator" (46).

Near the end of the dinner, Emma leaves the table to find the bathroom. She's thirty-eight weeks pregnant and "That flan wants to come back up," she says quietly (47). When she leaves, Nichelle, like any good soothsayer in any good folktale, takes the opportunity to try to tell Apollo what matters.

First, she tells Apollo that "There's a nude photo of your wife in an art gallery in Amsterdam." Then she explains that before Emma married Apollo, Emma went to Brazil, where "she had a few adventures" (48). In particular, "Emma met this Dutch photographer down there in Brazil" (49).

Nichelle goes on to explain that one day while the photographer was taking photos in an abandoned factory, he needed to pee, so he left Emma alone with the equipment. And she decided to take a picture of herself, setting up the shot with a timer. "She makes the shot in front of a wall that's been half torn down so you can see she's standing inside a man-made building that's gone to the dogs, but over her right shoulder you can see the forest that surrounds this factory. Two worlds at once. Crumbling civilization and an explosion of the natural world. / "Emma walks into the shot, and just before the shutter clicks, she pulls off her dress and takes that photo nude!"

What's the photo like? How does Emma look? "Wiry and fierce, naked and unashamed. She's looking into that camera lens like she can see you, whoever you are, wherever you are. She looks like a fucking sorceress, Apollo. It was one of the most beautiful things I've ever seen" (50).

So, here's Nichelle, telling Apollo what he's glancingly considered before in a fond, condescending sort of way: Emma is a sorceress. Nichelle is saying this to Apollo in simple, straightforward words: Emma is a sorceress, with a great capacity for adventure.

What is Apollo doing during this conversation?

He's sitting there thinking to himself, "Dutch photographer? / Dutch fucking photographer?" (49)

And when he finally speaks, what does he say?

"'And the Dutch guy?' Apollo asked. 'What was his name?'" (59)

This moment is, of course, the stuff of everyday real life and the stuff of fairy tales. Jealousy and possessiveness, leading to a character's blunder or misbehavior. In fairy tales, we see jealousy as an archetype — like the queen who decides to destroy the young woman who's usurped her position as the fairest of them all. In Apollo's life, it comes across as fairly typical and annoying sexism.

Nichelle's response to this question contains everything. Everything this book is about; everything that leads to catastrophe, and ultimately to Apollo's growth and transformation: "Nichelle watched him quietly for seconds. She narrowed her eyes when she spoke. 'I'm trying to tell you something important, and you are focused on bullshit'" (50).

For just a moment, Apollo gets it. He falls "back into his chair as if Nichelle had kicked him" (51). He tells her he's ready, he's finally listening.

And then the maître d' appears, sprinting across the restaurant, shouting for Apollo, because the baby is coming. Which means that everything is about to change, and it's too late.

Apollo's failures in this scene are familiar and understandable, even when they're annoying. He's hungry, distracted, and worried about his wife who's probably vomiting flan in the bathroom. Also, Nichelle is completely, obnoxiously drunk, so why should Apollo recognize the power or truth of her words? Maybe I should clarify that at this point in the book, I didn't appreciate that Emma was a legit sorceress either. We haven't learned the stakes yet, and we don't know how much we're going to be needing a sorceress later. But more to the point, most of this book is from Apollo's point of view, and right now Apollo is hungry, distracted, and worried. There are more important things to worry about, or so he thinks. And I care about him. Even though as the reader, I'm better positioned than he is to recognize his mistakes, I'm right there with him.

This all comes down to LaValle's skilled balancing of story and character. So much comes across in this one scene, and there are so many other equally rich scenes. If you like to sit in that place where spinning stories come together, you should read this book.

I'll close my study of The Changeling by adding this: I know enough from my own experience as a writer to suspect that while LaValle was writing this book, he wasn't always certain what story he was writing either. As we write, our story keeps surprising us, interrupting us, frustrating us and sending us off in the wrong direction. But not only did he find his own story (and Apollo's too), but he did a beautiful job weaving all the other stories in.

If you're writing something that alludes to other stories, I hope you'll find LaValle's use of classic stories exciting, rather than intimidating. When you ask yourself, Why this story?, it's an opportunity to figure out how far along you are in establishing your own story. If you don't have an answer yet, maybe you need to be focusing less on the classic story and more on your own story. If you have a few answers, but you're completely overwhelmed and not sure how many references you should make or where anything is going — take a moment to congratulate yourself, because that sounds to me like progress. When you're in the middle of writing something, there's always a sense of overwhelm and confusion about how well you're balancing things. You have a few potential answers? Great! Soldier on, and after a while, check in again. What's your story now?

And that's that. I hope you've enjoyed my post about the balance of story in Victor LaValle's The Changeling!

Reading like a writer.

U.S. District Judge Matthew W. Brann speaking to the only lawyer still willing to argue Trump's case in Pennsylvania, Rudolph Giuliani, on Tuesday:

“You’re alleging that the two individual plaintiffs were denied the right to vote. But at bottom, you’re asking this court to invalidate more than 6.8 million votes, thereby disenfranchising every single voter in the commonwealth. Can you tell me how this result can possibly be justified?”

Hello everyone. You might expect that while we are having to endure this comical yet terrifying attempted coup, my subconscious mind would be having a field day, giving me creative dreams as usual. But here's the dream I had Tuesday night, after that disgraceful show in Michigan: A Republican demagogue, anticipating his loss in the next election and wanting to prime public opinion, begins shouting as loud as he can about how the Democrats are going to steal the election. He loses the election. Then he tries to steal the election, again by accusing the Democratic victors of stealing the election. Rank-and-file Republicans fall in around him, supporting his baseless claims. A depressingly shocking number of voters believe him.

Not a lot of creativity there, subconscious.

For me, the most stressful part of all of this is how terrifying the GOP has become. A massive web of baseless lies that are believed by a gigantic number of people is terrifying. It's what my books are about. Of course, as a fantasy writer, I've always known I'm writing about real life.

 I found a recent episode of the Ezra Klein Show helpful in contextualizing the crisis that's been created by the Republican Party. In it, Ezra talks with Anne Applebaum, who studies authoritarianism. As a writer, I appreciated that the episode included a close study in character. The character of real people, of course, like Lindsey Graham and Laura Ingraham, but writers are naturally interested in the characters of real people. It's how we write believable imaginary people! Anyway, check it out if a grim perspective will help you get your feet on the ground. Don't check it out if what you need right now is comfort or reassurance, however. Those are valid needs too. And I have a couple of TV recommendations for that as well!

About a month ago, I finished watching Jane the Virgin, which now has a permanent place in the upper echelon of my favorite TV shows of all time. It is so funny, so sweet and full of heart. It has political relevance, in a way that will make you feel hopeful. It's about families, writing, relationships between women, parenthood, magic, and it has characters you'll love so much that when you finally finish the last episode, you'll wander around feeling bereft for a while, or at least that's what happened to me. The plot is so absurd that you don't have to worry too much about bad things happening. The voiceover narrator is an absolute delight. I love this show so much, and if you've never seen it before, now might be the time!

Also, last week I started watching Crash Landing on You, a South Korean TV drama in which a South Korean heiress has a hang-gliding mishap that drops her into the North Korean section of the DMZ. A very serious (and brooding) captain in the North Korean Special Police Force finds her and reluctantly decides to help her hide. It's very, very funny and keeps surprising me with its sweet moments — one of my favorite combinations in a TV show — and like with Jane, I'm falling for all the characters. Each episode seems to be incrementally longer than the last episode, to the point that my addiction to the show is interfering with the rest of my life, but I'm enjoying it too much to care. :o)

By Source, Fair use, https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?curid=62530475

These are my recommendations for today… Hang in there, everyone. ????

Hi everybody.

The question I get most is: "Where do you get your ideas?"

Generally, when I'm asked this question, it's at a book event where it's difficult to answer, because… Well, the answer is long, and complicated, and hard to pin down, and most of the time, I don't really remember how it happened. When an idea starts to arrive, I get to work. I'm not paying attention to how it's happening, or how it would look to an outsider. 

But — a few weeks ago, a new book idea started knocking on the door of my mind. And this time, I decided to pay attention!

What follows is probably the most detailed explanation I'll ever give of where my ideas come from. More specifically, where this particular idea came from, because it's not always the same. But my experience of the past few weeks has been fairly typical for me, and I'll add that there are a few activities I need to engage in every single time, if I want an idea to take root. Namely: PATIENCE. LISTENING. And, LABOR. Book ideas require a certain honed receptiveness, and they require a LOT OF WORK. 

I'm yelling because I'm trying to push back against the idea that ideas simply come to writers. Yes, some parts of ideas come to writers. But when I first get a book idea, what "comes to me" probably comprises about 0.1% of what could properly be called a book idea. Often, it's little more than an inchoate feeling. With patience, listening, and labor, I transform the idea into something I can grasp, and work with.

I'll add that yes, we do hear sometimes of writers whose ideas "simply came to them," fully formed. I'm going to take a guess that (1) this doesn't happen very often, if ever, with books that have complicated structures or plots, and (2) writers who are blessed by ideas in this way probably have a long-honed practice of receptiveness.

Anyway. Warning upfront that this may be a little unstructured, because the process is a little unstructured. It's challenging to describe, and I'm still in the middle of it. But here's what my last few weeks have been like.

A few weeks ago, while watching a TV show that had a certain mood/aura that'd really sucked me in, I found myself drawn to the idea of a story involving three characters. I'm not going to tell you what TV show I was watching, and I'm not going to tell you anything about my three characters, because story ideas are intensely, intensely private. The first time I say anything publicly about it will probably be years from now, if and when this book is ever scheduled for release. But let me try to explain a bit about that moment when the first glimmering of the idea appeared. 

Like I said, I'd been watching a TV show when it happened. But my three characters weren't characters in that TV show. Nor did anyone in that TV show relate to each other the way my three characters seemed to want to relate. Nor did my three characters seem to live in a world like the world of the TV show. The TV show helped to launch the idea at me because of the show's mood and its feeling, and how much I cared about the people in it. But my idea? As is often the case, my idea came from something I saw missing in the TV show. Not missing because there was a flaw in the TV writers' story; I loved their story! But missing (for me and possibly only me) because their story was not the story I would have told.

I think that a lot of my idea seeds come from my adoration of other people's stories, but also from my noticing what's missing in those stories, for me. What story I would've like to have seen told; what characters the story lacked.

Anyway. So this idea of these three characters came to me. But when I say "idea of these three characters," already that sounds more substantial than it was. I knew they were three humans (or humanoids; I didn't know what genre the story was, so they could've been aliens on another planet, for all I knew. In fact, I actively considered whether they might have different biology than ours). I knew they cared about each other, but I didn't know in what way. I knew they were facing a challenge that would strain all of their relationships. I thought they might be grown-ups, but I wasn't sure. I thought I knew at least two of their genders, but I wasn't sure. I knew they lived in a world with magic, but I didn't know what "magic" meant in the context of their world. I didn't know where they lived, or when they lived (past? future? futuristic past? postindustrial future? any of about a hundred other possibilities). I knew a whole lot of things that the characters weren't, and that the world wasn't — which is another way of saying that my sense of what this story was was actually more defined by all the things I knew it wasn't. (Apologies if this is vague. I'm not being intentionally vague! I'll try for some concrete examples: I knew I didn't want to write a story where partway through, someone suddenly discovers they have an inborn power they didn't know they had. I knew I didn't want to write a love triangle. There's a certain kind of high-handed fantasy tone that I knew wasn't right for this story. But I didn't know what I did want yet at this point.)

Really, all I knew was that I seemed to be having an idea.

So, like a writer, I did what I needed to do: 

• I made space in my mind for receptiveness. (I scheduled uninterruptable alone time. I stopped listening to podcasts while I was out walking, and instead, just walked, so my mind could wander. I put aside non-urgent tasks for a while so that I didn't have the feeling of a to-do list hanging over my head. I gave myself permission to wool-gather, to become vague and absent-minded. I set three timers any time I cooked anything so I could feel free to forget I was cooking, but also not burn the house down. I remembered to thank my husband frequently for being willing to live with a space cadet.)
• I thought about what fertilizer might help the idea to grow, especially fertilizer in the form of books, TV, and movies. I put all other books, TV, and movies aside. (I kept watching that same TV show, and I also began reading almost exclusively one writer who had a narrative tone — and also subject matter — that helped me sustain a mood that felt concurrent with the mood of my own idea. Why does this kind of intake help? It keeps my mind in a story space, while also giving me something to bounce my own ideas off of. It's a kind of reading, or watching, that involves a state of constant interactivity and reactivity. Everything I'm consuming becomes about something else that I'm looking for. It's difficult to explain, maybe because it gets back to that inexplicable moment when new ideas form.)
• I made sure that every single time I had any new thoughts relating to my idea, I wrote them down. (This meant making reminders on my phone; sending strings of emails to myself; choosing a notebook where I began to jot things down; sending texts to myself on my husband's phone, if his phone was closer to hand than mine.)
• I looked at my schedule to give myself a sense of if and when I might have a few days soon to put my current writing project aside and give some true, devoted time to this new idea. (I was, and still am, in the middle of revisions of the next Graceling Realm book when this happened, and that was, and still is, my absolute first priority. As exciting and intense as a new idea can be, it can't unseat me from my current object of devotion.)

By chance, last week, I did in fact have some time away from my revision while it was briefly with my editor. I was able to devote an entire week to the new book idea. So, next, I'll try to describe what a week of intense idea-gathering looks like for me! (Though I should say that this will differ from book to book. It's been pretty clear to me from the beginning that this new idea is going to be slow to grow — planning this book will take way more than a week. In contrast, last fall, I found myself with a new and sudden book idea that coincided with the end of another project, so I had some free time and was able to sit down and hammer out the entire book plan, which took only a few days. I think this is because that book was shorter and less emotionally complicated than this new book will be, and was set in a less complex world. Also, at the time, I was absolutely thrumming with the adrenaline and momentum of having just finished a writing project, so book-planning became a way to channel that energy. Often these processes are subject to whatever else is going on in my life.)

So. My week of intense idea-gathering looked a lot like what I've already described — reading, watching TV, but now also with long hours of sitting staring at a blank page and/or lying on my back staring at the ceiling — but with a more specific goal. Namely, I was trying to figure out what my main questions were. For me, every book starts (and continues, as I write) with an extremely long list of questions that I'm trying to find the answers to, but it takes work to figure out what the questions are. The questions can be very different from book to book. And it's essential, at the beginning, to identify what the main questions are.

When I'm first idea-gathering, I use very short notebooks in which I scribble down all my random thoughts as they come (I like using these twenty-page notebooks from Laughing Elephant, because they're short enough not to feel intimidatingly important). Then I have one longer, thicker notebook which is for my more coherent thoughts — my more serious book planning. During my week of active idea-gathering, I came up with the following list of major questions, worthy of being written down in my thick, "serious" planning notebook:

MAJOR QUESTIONS.

• What is magic?
• How does bad human behavior manifest in this world? (for real *)
• Where/what culture does each of them come from? What family?
• How is society governed?
• Who is each of them — as a person and as a power manifestation?
• How is the narrative positioned?
• What is the plot?
• How do humans relate to the rest of the natural world?
• What is gender? (for real *)

* and by societal definition

So. I'm not sure how closely you looked at those questions — but they are pretty gigantic questions! It took me a week to identify all of them. It's going to take me much, much longer to answer them. Which goes back to my point that ideas don't just "come to me." The merest seed of an idea might come to me, and after that, I make the space, and do the work.

As I began to hammer out my questions, I continued to read, watch things, and wool-gather, but with more intense focus. Because now I was also trying to answer these questions as they came. It was interesting to observe the order in which I began to find the answers. Not surprisingly, probably since my novels tend to be character-based, it was the character-based questions that drew me in first. “What is gender" in particular, because I have a sense that in this story, my characters' relationships to gender are absolutely integral to who they are, and I can’t get very far with a book plan if I don’t know who my characters are. I also started to gather some clues about their personalities and their strengths. Enough that after a couple of days, I got to the point where I suddenly knew I needed their names. Names ground everything, and they can also change some things; at a certain point, I can't make any further progress without names. I spent one entire day last week mostly just trying to figure out three people's names. Once I had the names, I was able to return to my questions.

Then, not too long after that, a moment arose where I knew, again quite suddenly, that what I needed next was at least the broad strokes of a plot. If I’m a little scornful about the concept of inspiration — because it’s a concept that dismisses how hard I work! — I do believe in intuition, and also in experience. Intuition and experience told me that I'd reached the point in my planning where the needs of my plot would hold the answer to a lot of my other questions. Like, how this place is governed; what constitutes bad behavior; and even some character things, like what culture each of my characters is from. Sometimes, once you know what needs to happen in a story, it becomes easier to picture the structure of your world. Because a plot comes with needs; once a plot exists, it limits some of your other options. For example, let's say your plot involves a particular kind of government-based corruption. Well, thinking about that corruption will probably start to show you some of your options for the structure of the government. Once you know the structure of the government, you might begin to understand who holds governmental power — which can lead to answers about how families are structured. Which can lead to answers about culture, which can lead to answers about the societal definition of bad behavior, etc.

So. I reached the point where I needed at least a sense of my plot. But: plotting is a HUGE job. I knew it wasn't something I could do in just a few days, and at this point I also knew that I was going to need to return to my revision soon. So, intuition told me that it was time to stop. Not stop being receptive; not necessarily stop reading or watching the helpful things; not stop sending myself emails, texts, and reminders; but stop trying to make any real, meaty, major progress on this book idea. I needed to save the job of plotting for when I next had a stretch of uninterrupted worktime. Maybe another free week or two somewhere, between other projects.

So, I did some final organizing of my notebook. I transferred things into it from other notebooks and I designating a huge number of empty pages in it for future plot thoughts and future character thoughts. I did this even though in this book, as in most of my books, I sense that character and plot will ultimately end up being the same thing, so it's not going to matter much which thoughts I file where. (In other words, most of my plot is going to spring from who my characters are, and many of my characters will spring from the needs of the plot.) But at this messy stage in planning, it's important to me to feel organized. The illusion of organization stops me from feeling as overwhelmed as I probably should be feeling. So I label things, and delude myself that I can contain this messy process inside a nice neat notebook ????. 

I organized my notebook, and then I put it aside. Today I'm still open to thoughts about my new book idea, but it's not my entire worklife anymore... it's more of a promise for the future. It'll probably be good to have it simmering on the back burner for a while. I'll be able to approach it with a new freshness when I sit down with it again one day.

So. I'm not sure how satisfyingly I've answered the question "Where do you get your ideas?" After all, this idea is still very much in progress. I figured out a lot of stuff last week, but mostly what I figured out is a long list of all the things I don't know yet. There will be many, many more workweeks to go before I'll be able to claim that I truly have an idea for a book. 

But this is my best shot at an answer to the question of where my ideas come from! I guess the point I want to convey is this: I don’t necessarily believe in inspiration. But I believe that sometimes a writer will start to get the merest sense of a story that's missing from the world, and find herself wanting to write that story. At that point, if circumstance allows her the time and space to enter a state that is extremely internally-focused and possibly involves a lot of intake (reading, watching other stories), or if not that, at least an extreme level of sensitivity and receptiveness, of seeing, of listening... And if she puts in the work… her idea-seed will start to take root, and grow into a real, workable idea that might one day be the beginnings of a book! 

And of course, every writer does this differently. Many writers don't plan or plot ahead of time. They figure out the idea as they write. So there's no right or wrong way to do it. 

But this is my best explanation of how I do it.

Godspeed to all writers.

Just a note to those readers who receive my blog post via email: The service that provides this, Feedburner, is shutting down in a couple of weeks, so I'm going to be migrating my subscribers to a new service. If you get an email from me in the next couple of weeks, please pay attention, because you may need to reconfirm your subscription with the new service! 

Thanks, and stay tuned!

Check out the latest developer updates for Google Earth and Google Maps Platform, including grounding with Maps.

From helping you explore even more with Immersive View to taking the stress out of your drive, here are updates on Google Maps you won’t want to miss.

Introducing enhanced agency tools and new curation capabilities for managing workflows, forecasting and direct deals with publishers.

We recently launched a completely reimagined version of Machine Learning Crash Course.

The Final Jeopardy clue for November 12, 2024.

The post Final Jeopardy Today November 12, 2024 – Question, Answer, Wages & Winner appeared first on ComingSoon.net - Movie Trailers, TV & Streaming News, and More.

HBO CEO Casey Bloys has given an update on the Game of Thrones movie reportedly in the works. Speaking during a press event on Tuesday, Bloys did confirm that a movie is forthcoming. However, he stressed that it’s more in the development stages than actually being fully fleshed out. Bloys considered the project more of […]

The post Game of Thrones Movie Update Given, George R.R. Martin Will Be Involved appeared first on ComingSoon.net - Movie Trailers, TV & Streaming News, and More.

Renowned singer Chappell Roan has stirred discussions among her fans after she commented on Billboard’s post that stated that she has parted ways with her management team and manager, Nick Bobetsky. She recently made headlines after her name was inducted into the list of candidates who are nominated in the big categories of next year’s […]

The post Why Fans Think Chappell Roan Has Fired Her Manager Nick Bobetsky appeared first on ComingSoon.net - Movie Trailers, TV & Streaming News, and More.

As General Hospital welcomes back Lucky Spencer, fans are wondering if he will leave Port Charles once again. Jonathan Jackson’s character came back to the show recently in order to help with Lulu Spencer’s liver transplant. However, the General Hospital spoilers have dropped hints that he will not be staying for long. Without further ado, […]

The post General Hospital Spoilers: What Does Lucky Spencer Want? appeared first on ComingSoon.net - Movie Trailers, TV & Streaming News, and More.

Fans of Netflix’s The Cage are eagerly speculating about the series’ future. With its engaging storyline about a young fighter who wants to go pro and be the next MMA fighter in intense action, the show has built a dedicated following. However, viewers are anxious to know if it has been renewed for Season 2 […]

The post The Cage Season 2: Has Netflix Canceled or Renewed It? appeared first on ComingSoon.net - Movie Trailers, TV & Streaming News, and More.

The internet has been buzzing with excitement over what many fans initially thought was an official Agent Venom trailer from Sony. The clip, featuring Tony Revolori as Flash Thompson transforming into Agent Venom, quickly went viral and sparked discussions about a possible new Venom movie. Fans seem to be excited about the prospect of seeing […]

The post Why Fans Think Sony’s Agent Venom Trailer Is Real appeared first on ComingSoon.net - Movie Trailers, TV & Streaming News, and More.

Writer’s Digest is celebrating its 100th anniversary, which is pretty epic. At the same time, the parent company of F&W is also declaring bankruptcy. It was the best of times, it was the worst of times… I’ve been at the writing game since the early 1990s. I was a teenager when I first mailed off […]

We are joined by U.N. special rapporteur on the occupied Palestinian territory, Francesca Albanese, who says Israel is committing genocide on Palestinians in the Gaza Strip. Facing accusations of antisemitism from Israeli and U.S. officials, Albanese is in New York to present her report, titled “Genocide as colonial erasure,” which finds that Israel’s genocide is founded on “ideological hatred” and “dehumanization” and “enabled through the various organs of the state,” and recommends that Israel be unseated from the United Nations over its conduct. She argues that Israel’s attacks on U.N. employees, including the killings of at least 230 U.N. staff in Gaza, its flagrant violations of U.N. resolutions and international law and the unique status of “the first settler-colonial genocide to be ever litigated before [an international] court” justify this unprecedented measure. Israel’s continued impunity, Albanese warns, “is the nail in the coffin of the U.N. Charter.”