…ly gender-typed (though there are a few women fighters), but Gemmell never denigrates what women do, and indeed his fighters often find themselves envying women, knowing that the greater courage is on their side. And his heroes are just impressive and memorable, and he never hides that they have terrible flaws, but can rise above them (it’s been rather a lot of years, but I can remember Tenaka and Druss and Ananais quite clearly). All in all, very…

…the street urchins–sorry, I have a nasty mind), and the other one ends up coming out of left field, and feeling a bit forced as a result (a side effect, I suspect, of too many reveals piled up). And I really wish people would stop thinking a Sherlock Holmes novel needs to have Moriarty, Mycroft, and Lestrade in it to be successful. I’m personally holding out for more Mrs. Hudson, because what the world needs is more women around Sherlock Holmes……

…reminisciences of how important Terri Windling is and has been to the field. Well, now she’s in deep legal and financial trouble, and there is an awesome fundraiser with cool places to help her out. See here for a list of what’s on offer….

…every single word. The first one is that this concept of “gender characteristics” sounds very much like something that a long-standing Anglophone speaker would come up with: a lot of Anglophones I’ve met have been fascinated by the idea of giving gender to nouns, but in a very odd way. No, I don’t think of a table as female. I think of it as gramatically feminine, which is a different beast. There is a difference–yes, they’re not totally dissocia…

…I might not have written half a novel in November, but I did total 50k words of original first drafts and non-fiction (blog posts for guest blogs). Can I collapse now?…

…sinh cỏ.” Literally (I think, the translation is mine, and I’m not at “can understand effortlessly” stage): “Heaven made the elephant, [and] Heaven made grass”. I think it’s “God will provide”, but I could be wrong (translating a proverb word for word not giving me much about its actual meaning). And a less-lovely one: “Trọng nam khinh nữ”, which means “hold men in high esteem, despise women”. No prizes for the interpretation, it’s pure Confucian…

…the union of the dragon Lạc Long Quân and the immortal Âu Cơ: they had a hundred children together, but because they were so different (he was a dragon from the deep seas, she was an immortal and only felt at home in the mountains), they ended up separating. Lạc Long Quân, summoned home by his mother, took half the children and went towards the sea; and Âu Cơ took the other half into the mountains. This was the origin of the Vietnamese people. I…

…and adventure book. Very much looking forward to book 3! -David Gemmell: hum, a lot of books? Finished the Drenai books, and found one I hadn’t read (the very last one, Swords of Night and Day). The earlier ones are still those that carry the most punch for me; I suspect partly because of nostalgia. Also read Lion of Macedon/Dark Prince, which is basically Greek legends on crack (I exaggerate a bit, since Gemmell obviously documented himself well…

…City of Silence” by Ma Boyong (translated by Ken Liu): part 1, part 2. Incidentally, the blog is also looking for fiction they could showcase–preferably set outside the US/UK, or by authors from outside the US/UK (note that this overlaps with, but is not *quite* the same thing as fiction by US/UK PoCs). No payment, unfortunately–everyone’s a volunteer and the website runs on a shoestring, but you’d be contributing to a worthy cause; and they take…

…in until midnight on the 24th of December). So, basically, they’re going round the “underworld” rock before getting there. A detail of the crib characters (the santons). One of the reasons we picked those over other choices was that the Virgin Mary isn’t standing up, but is resting, and we both felt this was a more realistic position for someone who’s just finished labour. I wish we had more space for putting in more characters, but, as said befor…