Little Bear Blue

And sort of a review, and a rare public post, and I'm quite confident that fully half of the people reading here already read these, but for everyone else... (x-posted to tumblr and my blog)

I’m looking forward to Celia Lake’s upcoming Best Foot Forward SO MUCH that I’ve reread nearly all of the previous books, novellas, and short stories. Some of them twice.

Best Foot Forward, as the blurb tells us, is about Geoffrey Carillon and Alexander Landry, and the ripples of Carillon’s friendships elsewhere. Rereading with an eye toward setting myself a foundation for BFF, then, made constellations appear in the backlist, some of them rather neat.

If you’re new to Celia Lake, then I recommend reading in publication order first, although they’re designed to be read in (nearly) any order. But if you’re already familiar, then come with me on this journey.

Outcrossing, Ancient Trust, Goblin Fruit, On the Bias and Unexplored Territory (Ancient Trust and Unexplored Territory being free stories that fill in some of the background pieces) make a very lovely Carillon-shaped constellation. Eclipse and Chasing Legends (the last story in the book Winter’s Charms) give as complete a picture of Alexander Landry as we’ll get until BFF is out. In combination, we have a sense of these two men, a bit, and a sense of how they might be together on the page.

But there are so many MORE constellations. Eclipse sings well with Casting Nasturtiums, the first story from Winter’s Charms, and if you’re reading Winter’s Charms you probably want to read Wards of the Roses before reading Country Manners, and in fact Wards of the Roses ties back into Ancient Trust, and Country Manners makes sense of one or two things in Outcrossing. And then Magician’s Hoard is nice to have (along with Eclipse, and perhaps With All Due Speed, a free short about Thesan and Isembard) before reading Chasing Legends.

It’s probably worth getting (re)acquainted with Cyrus Smyth-Clive as well, which means reading Carry On, Sailor’s Jewel, and The Hare and the Oak. That last is especially good as it delves into the Council’s role in Albion, and the running thereof. Alexander is a Council Member, but what does that mean exactly? The Hare and the Oak adds a little bit of context to what we may have gleaned elsewhere.

Carillon’s constellation includes the Edgartons, and therefore: Pastiche, to introduce Richard and Alysoun, Complementary, to get better acquainted with Gabe’s Aunt Mason, and then The Fossil Door, to get better acquainted with Gabe, and to meet Rathna. Rathna’s story is referenced in Eclipse, and Thesan turns out to be rather the thread that is tying this blog post together. It’s because of her that I’m seeing constellations, after all.

Lizzie Carillon nee Penhallow is important, seeing as she’s Carillon’s magnetic north. Her story is in Goblin Fruit, On the Bias and Unexplored Territory, of course, but then we learn a bit more about her family by following her younger sister Laura in In the Cards. Laura returns to lend a supportive ear (and a bit of a wardrobe) in Point by Point, which deals with, among other things, the aftermath of Magician’s Hoard.

There are three books not mentioned at all so far: Seven Sisters and Fool’s Gold work well in concert, with Fool’s Gold being nearly a direct sequel to Seven Sisters. Both go deeper into the Pact, and the Fatae, and in general give us a deeper understanding of the world. And of course, Seven Sisters brings us around again to constellations.

Mistress of Birds is the outlier then: only lightly connected to the others, but nonetheless connected by dozens of slender threads. It delves deeper into a different sort of land magic, more closely aligned with the magic of Thesan’s family than the grand rituals of the Council. What it does, however, is give many concrete examples of magical folk talking to non-magical folk, and grounds us in the background of THAT, which comes up in Best Foot Forward rather a lot.

I rather suspect that I’ll pull out various of these clusters and write about them individually, but for now, in anticipation of Best Foot Forward, an overview of sorts.

"Resting is an action, not an absence of action"

I suppose I could post here. Although realistically, I'm going to continue to not-post here just like I've been not-posting over on LJ.

eventually I will populate my reading list with all of the people whose posts I wish to read. It's a slow process.

I may just be cranky, or it may be a side effect of the internets. I like reading fiction, and just... reading the fiction. Not having long involved arguments about what would happen if this particular fantasy element in that particular fantasy story were actually true, and how our world would be different. Because dude. It's fantasy. That's the POINT.

so in the interests of not being a slug, and using a little less gas, and generally being good to my body and the earth, I dug my bike out of the basement, pumped up the tires, found my helmet (need a new one, I think) and took the old green bike for a spin. I still remember how to ride. I think this is a good thing, and I think I'm going to try to do more biking to the train, and riding the train, and things.

I need lights too, if I'm going to be biking at night. I wonder if Mom has spare lights.

I took the last train home last night - the train that leaves north station at 12:10a.m. and if you're not on it you're staying in town overnight or your overly indulgent friends are giving you a ride home.

Weird people take the last train. I swear the two guys sitting nearest to me were time travelers, almost used to this century, but not quite. They wore hats! Not ball caps, but real hats - a straw boater and a trilby, to be exact.

The train is full of stories, and I think I need to spend more time on the train, gathering stories and seeing what I can do with them. My time travelers clearly belong to Diana Wynne Jones, but maybe a character of my very own will wander by for me.

I used to arse myself to write things when I was in front of my computer. Perhaps I can get that back. I have very real writing goals, and this needs to be the year - this is the year I turn 30, and having a divisible by ten birthday must Mean Something.

If only people had seven fingers instead of ten, we would celebrate... well, actually we would still celebrate birthdays that end in zero, it's just that I would be turning 42 this year. Hmm. I guess I can't start giving my age out base 7 can I.

I wonder... oh dear. I wonder if I can sustain a base... it's gonna have to be eight or six, because I can't justify... nine. I can manage tri-symetry and a base nine system, perhaps... No, eight, I think. I wonder how long I can carry that story. I wonder if I can come up with a plot.

Well. My bizarre math-based (base math based?) digression appears to have born some fruit. Now, to try and Do Something.

I think I'm not planning to link this to lj so much. Perhaps I'll change my mind. A new blog is a goodness - I'm feeling much more like little bear blue than like the computer room kitty these days.

Of course, the middle of the night is not the time for this sort of thing.

If I'm lucky, there will be more writing. I think the knowledge that not so many people are reading this so far will help.