Happy World Book Day!

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World Book Day is marked by over 100 countries around the globe, and originates from Catalonia. Books have been given as gifts on St George's Day for over 80 years, and most countries will be holding World Book Day on 23 April. However, the UK and Ireland like to be different, so our World Book Day is today!

Reading is a wonderful pastime and a brilliant way to help children learn, and understand the world around them. Why not give a book to a child you know? Check out the World Book Day site to find out what specially produced £1 books are available. (Make sure you let their parents know so you don't get accused of anything underhand!) Happy reading!

Shameless Self Promotion

Tweet Today, it is my turn to be unveiled as part of the new Chinese Whisperings project! It's really rather exciting, seeing oneself on a web page that's not yours (and, I would venture to guess, less confusing than seeing yourself appear someone distinctly unpleasant). If you'd like to take a look, have a wander over here, although it pretty much will redirect you back here! I even answered five questions on the website, the answers to which are here.

I feel like I'm bursting with ideas at the moment. I'm redrafting the third instalment of The First Tale, from my Tales from Vertigo City serial, and I'm redrafting my first novel, Fowlis Westerby. The redrafting process hasn't been as painful as I thought it might be, mainly because I did a lot of revision while I was still writing it (I know you're not supposed to, but yah boo sucks to the establishment). I do have a couple of plot holes I want to fill, and I want to expand a couple of secondary characters, but hopefully I'll have my first revision complete by the end of April, at the latest.

I've also got another idea floating around in my brain, but I'm letting it simmer just below the surface before I even attempt to get anything solid on paper. There is, after all, the possibility of biting off far more than I can chew...

And the Oscar goes to...

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I'll be honest, I never intended to write anything about the Oscars, but I find that I can't help posting at least once on the subject since films I actually enjoyed have been nominated this year (I won't gripe about the absence of Moon...not in this post, at least).

I read a rather interesting article in the Evening Standard on Friday that seemed to believe Avatar deserves to win Best Picture simply because it was seen by more people than The Hurt Locker. I'm not entirely sure of the logic behind this - how can a film be 'better' simply because it makes more money at the box office? What I think the author of the article fails to realise is that just because a film makes a lot at the box office, it doesn't actually mean that all of the people who went to see it actually liked it. Indeed, box office receipts certainly don't take note of how many people walk out before the film is even finished. Anyway, my basic point is that every person on the planet could go to see a film, but it doesn't necessarily follow that it's a better film than one seen by only eight farmers and a goat in the back of beyond.

The article went on to say that Avatar won't win because it's science fiction, which is a genre notorious for failing to pick up awards, and that the Academy will overlook it in favour of the typically 'highbrow' or intellectual fare also nominated. It's true that the Academy often goes for low-budget, obtuse movies that are 'challenging' as opposed to 'entertaining', but I don't think it's fair to apply this logic to Avatar vs The Hurt Locker. After all, The Hurt Locker is a taut thriller that just happens to have a political backdrop (not to mention a stellar performance from Jeremy Renner). If Avatar doesn't win, it won't be because it's science fiction - it's because it's just not as good as The Hurt Locker.

Similar logic was applied to the category of Best Director. According to the article, Kathryn Bigelow will only win because she would be the first woman to win the award, and would thus make the Academy look 'progressive'. Ignoring the inherent sexism of such a statement, could it not be possible that Bigelow might beat Cameron because The Hurt Locker was simply better directed than Avatar? Don't get me wrong, I grudgingly enjoyed Avatar, but it's hardly in the same league as The Hurt Locker.

I'm pretty much ignoring the other categories because the winners are either a foregone conclusion (Up will blatantly win Best Animated Film, despite the fact Pixar have done much better) or because I just don't care, although I do have one other win that I'm swinging for. I REALLY want Colin Firth to win Best Actor for his performance in A Single Man. It's not normally my kind of film, but something about the trailer really caught my attention (Tom Ford has done a wonderful job on his first film). I liked Colin Firth back in 1995 when he played Mr Darcy in the BBC's adaptation of Pride and Prejudice but I was somewhat disappointed in the intervening years to see him continually reprise the role. I'm not the biggest fan of one-trick ponies...but then I went to see A Single Man today with Nadia (author of the In The Mists blog) and I was both shocked and pleased to see that not only can he act, he can act very well! The range and depth of emotion he manages to convey whilst portraying a fairly uptight and emotionally repressed English professor is astonishing, and I would absolutely love it if the Academy could also recognise his talent.

Fiction Friday #3

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Here's my attempt for this week's Fiction Friday challenge on the Write Anything blog. Today's challenge is;

The bag was empty except for a smudged slip of paper which said, “Sorry.”

“Bitch!” Casey screwed up the bag and threw it into the bin by her desk.

“Something wrong?” asked Anna.

Casey sat back in her chair. A scowl contorted her face.

“Yes, something is wrong. I asked that useless cow to get me a couple of cinnamon swirls to get me through the afternoon, and instead I get an empty paper bag. How am I supposed to meet my deadline without a sugar fix?”

Spectral pastries danced across her vision; she even thought she could smell the sugary icing. In fact, she realised she could smell the icing. A thought occurred to her and she fished the bag out of her bin.

“Why did she bother giving you the bag if the bakery had run out?” asked Anna. She didn’t even glance up from her computer. Casey wondered if Anna ever really paid attention.

“They hadn’t. She ate them herself. She ate them, and then left the bag for me.” Casey tossed the crumpled bag onto Anna’s desk. “She’ll be more than sorry when she gets back.”

“All of this fuss over cinnamon swirls?”

“It’s the principle of it! I paid for those pastries! And to include a cursory note – that’s not an apology, it’s a slap in the face.”

Casey stormed out of the office, slamming the door.

Anna listened as Casey stomped down the corridor toward the lifts. She sighed deeply, before wiping sugar icing off her hands.

Writing A Web Serial

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I've just posted the second instalment of my new series. This particular series is called The First Tale, as I'm planning on a whole set of stories set in my fictional city of Vertigo.

It's a whole new challenge writing a weekly serial but it gives me a deadline (and therefore the motivation to write regularly) and it's nice to do something a bit different. I'm already buzzing with ideas for the next few instalments, although in some ways I'm "flying by the seat  of my pants" as I'm letting the plot take me where it will!

What are your opinions on serials?

A hand drawn Disney film? It can't be!

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I just posted the first instalment of my new web serial over at my new blog, Tales from Vertigo City. Go follow the blog, or subscribe, and you'll get a new instalment every week!

In other news, I went to see The Princess and the Frog today. I bet you didn't guess that I'm a Disney fan, eh? I love their work, up until and including The Lion King (although I do have a soft spot for The Emperor's New Groove). I have to admit that I never thought I'd live to see the day when I'd be sat in a cinema in 2010, watching a hand-drawn 2D cartoon. It felt slightly surreal, but at the same time, perfectly normal. Why shouldn't Disney go back to doing what they do best, when all their efforts at 3D films have sucked?

It's somewhat surprising that the mastermind behind The Princess and the Frog should be Pixar genius John Lasseter, but then again, the man has a passion for storytelling. What he's done here is given us a fairytale with a twist, but without going down the self-indulgent Shrek route. Set in 1920s New Orleans, our 'princess' is hard-working Tiana, a waitress with dreams of running her own restaurant, while our prince is a lazy playboy out to marry a rich girl after being cut off by his royal family. Tiana is feisty, and a lot more intelligent than your typical Disney film, and once you ignore her "Hard work will get you everything you want" spiel, she's quite likeable. Naveen is spoilt and charming, and a little more like the lazy royalty we're used to reading about in the tabloids.

As ever, the boy-meets-girl plot is given a little makeover, since our girl meets our boy when he's a frog. Prince Naveen adopts this amphibian persona after a run-in with the local voodoo witch doctor, Dr Facilier. As Disney villains go, he's not bad, but he's no Ursula or Maleficent. Anyway. Prince Naveen mistakes Tiana for a princess and gets her to kiss him (thinking this will turn him back into a human), though it does little more than turn Tiana into a frog. 

The pair end up in the bayou and seek the help of the local voodoo wise woman. Aided by a Cajun firefly in love with the North Star and a jazz-loving alligator, they get into the usual scrapes and perform an assortment of musical setpieces, none of which reach the dazzling heights of The Little Mermaid's 'Under the Sea'. I won't sport with your intelligence by asking you to guess the ending, but despite its veneer of Hollywood happiness and fairytale gloss, The Princess and the Frog is actually an enjoyable little film about recognising what's really important in life, and the value in balance. Naveen is all play and no work, while Tiana is the other way around, but neither are truly happy until they realise there's a compromise in there somewhere.

The musical numbers aren't bad, and as I've already said, Tiana makes a refreshing change as a Disney heroine, although I can't help thinking the realities of life as a black woman in 1920s Louisiana weren't quite as rosy as Disney would have us believe. The characters are rounded and likeable, although not quite as iconic as those from Disney's 'classic' oeuvre, but to be honest, I don't care. I'm just glad to see Disney back doing what they do best, allowing Pixar to do what they do best, while they piss all over their competition.

Strange things are afoot at the circle K...

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Hello, all. Apologies for the absence - many things are afoot in the crazy world of Icy at the moment. I just got engaged to my fabulous other half, I've gotten involved with the very excellent Chinese Whisperings project, I'm trying (and succeeding) to keep up with my reading (I'm onto my second book of February - first was John Marks' Fangland, now it's Jasper Fforde's Lost in a Good Book), and I'm learning Russian.

Still, I am a writer, and you'll (hopefully) be glad to know that I'm actually writing again. Not only am I redrafting my beloved novel, Fowlis Westerby, I'm also going to be doing something slightly new. At the end of January, I posted a flash fiction called Still Running, and it got a lot of people asking questions on Twitter. It seems that people wanted to know more, so I've decided to write an online serial, using my flash as a starting point! I'll be starting a new blog purely for this purpose, and I am to post a new installment every Friday...starting tomorrow!

Call back, won't you, and check it out...

(In lieu of any relevant stock imagery to accompany this post, I decided to go with a photo of my own, purely because I like it. It was taken inside Dover Castle last summer...)