M. K. Theodoratus, Fantasy Writer, blogs about the books she reads--mostly fantasy and mystery authors whose books catch her eye and keep her interest. Nothing so formal as a book review, just chats about what she liked. Theodoratus also mutters about her own writing progress or ... lack of it.

.

Tuesday, December 8, 2009

Brrrrrrrrrrrrrrr..... & Bummer

Trivia:  Did errands and treated ourselves to lunch out after staying inside yesterday. Tomorrow we have to go out again.  While prancing through the snow, a lens dropped out of my glasses.   (No, it wasn't in the car.) Gotta get it replaced.

Lessons from My Reading:  Almost through with Carol O'Connell's Bone by Bone.  What a lovely bunch of twisting characters.  (I'm pea soup green with envy.)  I count five main characters, a couple of which could be the perp in the brother's death.  Plus, the several secondary characters are just as finely drawn ... with a couple more possible suspects.  So far, the guy with the strongest motive (getting the sh*t beat out of him by the MC/detective/suspect) hasn't appeared on the stage much.  Have some 100 pages left to go.  Really like the CBI agent -- who I think of as a cross between Miss Marple and and a gamer -- who's kicking the sheriff's butt.

Think of Cold Case on steroids here.  You couldn't possibly fit all the characters into a 45 minute TV show.  (The rest of the hour is eaten up by commercials.  Maybe this is a reason so many book adaptations fall on their face when compared to the books???)

Thinking of all the character development and motivations twisting around the inter-relationships, I can just see the overlapping plot board set up to keep everyone straight.  It must be as complicated as those used in real law enforcement to trace the progress of a case.

Also am eying P. D. James' Talking about Detective Fiction.  It came in today (one of the reasons we were running around).  She agrees with me about Agatha Christie's plastic characters. heh. heh.  I used to be considered sacrilegious because I preferred Dorothy Sayers' mysteries to Agatha's.  Christie was married to an archeologist (Murder in Mesopotamia).  It was an anthropological solidarity thing, I think.

Progress:  Demons.  Should get the last three chapters polished tonight.  So, if the sky falls on my head and an agent does ask for a full, I'll be ready to send it -- once I consolidate it into one attachment.

No.  My characters don't have half the twists that O'Connell's do.  But then, I'm writing about kids and gargoyles.

1 comment:

Patricia Stoltey said...

Kay -- I wish you great luck with your queries. Keep us posted.

I also have to go out again today to run a couple of errands. Maybe I'll add thermal underwear to my outfit.