It is not a secret that I’m a big Christmas softie. I’m not fond of romances* but I devour Christmas romances. Christmas romcoms? Even better. I’ll tear up at any movie above 2.5 stars. It’s just who I am.
One of the few things I regret about losing cable is missing out on ABC Family’s 25 Days of Christmas programming. All the other stuff I can get eventually via Netflix, Hulu, DVD, or Amazon Prime. But it’s hard to keep up with 25 days of programming on a channel you don’t get.
So anyway, a few years ago I reviewed Christmas songs, and this year I’ve watched several movies and read several books and I will be bringing them here so you don’t have to wonder which you shouldn’t waste your time with.
I will rate on several levels:
Stars
Storytelling
Characters
Closeness to Christmas Carol
Feminism **
Romance
Is Christmas Saved?
Any other misc categories I come up with
Hope you enjoy them. This should be fun.
Some future reviews (And I will take requests):
Movies:
Christmas Kiss
Marry Me For Christmas
12 Dates of Christmas
Books:
Trading Christmas
Miracle (And Other Christmas Stories)
Call Me Mrs. Miracle
The Christmas List
Bah! Humbug
Dashing Through the Snow
* I’m not putting down romances, not at all. I love a good romance subplot in a book, but I rarely pick up a straight romance that doesn’t have other genres woven in.
** If a Christmas movie stars a woman, it almost inevitably has to do with her career, an old love left behind, or giving up on her childhood home. Movies that encourage women to quit the high profile job to come home to high school crush and her small town family really piss me off. And there are some that are surprising in their pro-woman storytelling.
Apple Harvest photo by Mike McKay via Creative Commons
Do you measure news by the bushel? I do, now. Here is the news from the harvest. Or something.
I took a good chunk of September off to finish my book, tentatively titled Six Wakes. I left social media, blogging, and did minimal podcasting. And I kinda forgot to announce this. Sorry about that.
But the book, at least draft 1, is done. I’m happy with it. It went some places I didn’t expect, which is always exciting. I know there are some things I need to fix on rewrite, and only hope that my editor and I agree on which areas need fixing. It was a hard slog. I was behind, and had really built up a lot of angst about how to write this book. But when the deadline began to loom, I got to work.
I may do NaNoWriMo this year, but on the other hand, September was my NaNoWriMo. I won’t tell you how many words I wrote, but it was a lot.
I’ve taken some days to recover. There was the mental strain, but also on the last day of writing I did so much that my right shoulder and neck muscles locked up big time. After five days of menthol patches, painkillers, massages, heat, and a massage pillow, I am finally feeling no pain when I sit at a desk. Now that I’m back, I have major work to do for the launch of Mothership Zeta this month, and some other work on some outstanding Bookburners work, and I have to think about the next thing I’m writing.
Well I’ve already thought about that last thing. I want to do a Christmas story, as I haven’t done one in a while. It will be set in the Shambling Guides universe, and have Zoe taking an unexpected trip to London during the holidays. I started it last night.
Other things upcoming for me: this month at Ditch Diggers, Matt and I are interviewing the amazing comic book writer Kelly Sue DeConnick. For ISBW I will be doing the debriefing on my novel. And for the Patreon supporters, I will be doing yet another NaNoWriMo note for every day of November. May be audio. May be video. Who knows? And to get these little nuggets of support, all you have to do is pledge a dollar. Yup. EVERYONE who supports via Patreon will get this special series of audio and video. *
For the rest of the year, I will also be showing the Softer Side of Mur when the holidays come around, as I’ll be reviewing Christmas movies and books. Many of them will be romcoms.** Unsubscribe as you like, haters. I like what I like. There is a place for SF and romantic comedy in my little heart. But I won’t be holding back. I will warn you off the bad ones. And lordy, there are some bad ones.
SPEAKING of Bookburners, episode 5 comes out this week, which starts the second chunk of stories. If you’re not aware of how we divvied it up, four of us split the season into four episodes each, and we’re more or less evenly spaced, having one story in each set of four. (meaning I could have written episodes 4, 8, 10, and 13 instead of, say, 5 6, 7, and 8. I think I wrote those four. Numbers are hard, I just remember plots.) Regardless, my first story, Episode 4: A Sorcerer’s Apprentice, is out now! Here is a peek:
Browsing Asanti’s library by herself was Sal’s new favorite hobby. She had never seen a place like this, though it reminded her most of a moldy old library relatives had shown her in Savannah, Georgia, with humidity-damaged first editions of The Adventures of Tom Sawyer and Gone With the Wind and A Christmas Carol.
Her team kept suggesting she should relax between missions. She really didn’t need to be at headquarters sitting around, they said, why didn’t she enjoy Rome when she had the chance? But in a city where she didn’t speak the language and had few—all right, the number was closer to zero—friends, Sal had nothing to do. There was only so long she could read, listen to music, and lie over Skype to friends in America about her life in Rome. At least here in the library she could learn something, or maybe run into a team member and have a real conversation.
That’s it for me. How are you? ***
* No I’m not calling it a podcast. I am an old school angry podcast veteran who knows that podcasts are something (ANY file – video, audio, even PDF) you subscribe to via RSS. There is no RSS feed for this content. It is emailed directly to you, and you will LIKE IT. *shakes cane at clouds*
** I’ve already started reading. Because to review a lot of content, you have to start early. This is brilliant. I have finally found a way to enjoy Xmas stuff early and no one can fault me for it.
*** Yeah, I know I don’t allow comments here. Tell me on Twitter. Or email. Just know I’m thinking fond thoughts about you, OK?
I like Friends. I acknowledge that it’s problematic (OH SO WHITE, and at least one joke per episode mocking one of the men for being feminine) but it is also
Funny
Groundbreaking regarding gay marriage in pop culture
Really funny
I don’t get how so many different people can be so close. Ross is constantly mocked for his love of science, for example. You’d think once he’d like to hang with people who don’t pretend to fall asleep when he says anything about his work. There are glaring inconsistencies: Chandler moving from Knicks fan to a feminine dude who never watches ESPN and knows nothing about sports. Monica and Chandler arguing about buying an arcade game and then Monica freaking with joy when Phoebe buys them a Ms. Pac-Man machine. Monica being hyper competitive until she’s in charge of a kitchen of people who don’t like her, then she is someone who fears conflict. Where the hell did Ben go? Why doesn’t Ross react to Rachel taking Emma to France with her?
I was thinking about Joey the other day, the guy who sleeps with women and never calls them back. Reprehensible behavior and it makes me wonder why the women in the group like him. But I realized something startling recently: Joey respects women’s agency. If a woman says no, he is done with the pursuit. No “why” or wheedling or following or creeping.
It happens several times:
He hits on the woman at the medical research lab, asking if he can do a study on his effect on attractive receptionists, she says they already have the results and they’re not good, and he says OK and walks away.
He is set up on a double blind date with Phoebe’s friend but focuses only on convincing Phoebe that he and her blind date are old friends. When his date gets up to leave, he says, “you’re leaving too?” and she says, “I will stay if you can tell me my name.” and he says, “have a good night.”
We don’t see the full conversation, but after Charlie dumps him in Barbados, he is sad, but says he has to go get another hotel room for the night. He doesn’t argue or try to make it work at least till they get home.
He may be superficial and only want hot women. He may have a revolving door to his bedroom. But Joey respects “no.”
If you don’t understand how revolutionary this is, read some stories about women dealing with men on online dating sites.
Then I got the NoStringsAtttached [sic] messages, with multiple guys sending me messages asking me to watch them cam, or meeting up with them within the hour, or talk with them on the phone or cyber. I would say no and they usually didn’t take it too well.
Also, a horrible feeling that there are some terrifying, awful men out there that will in one breath call you the most beautiful creature in the world, and then—when you fail to meet whatever demand or expectation they’ve laid out for you—will say things to you that you’re pretty sure only get said during prison riots.
I’ve read so many stories about women who get, “hello beautiful.” and when the women say, “not interested” the guys turn into “well I was just messaging you to make you feel good about yourself, you fat bitch.”
Aside: Needless to say, I’m unbelievably grateful that I met my husband before online dating took off.
Ross and Chandler both do some questionable things. When Phoebe is sending massage clients to Ross’ apartment, and a client shows up when she isn’t there, Ross says he’s a masseuse too because the woman at the door is very attractive. The joke is that she has brought her father there to be massaged, and Ross has to rub an old man for an hour. Hahahaa! But I keep thinking about the lengths he would go to in order to touch a woman. Erk. In another episode, Chandler poses as another man when a woman makes a wrong number phone call, sets up a date with her, and then when her date mysteriously doesn’t show up, he arrives as himself to console her. Which isn’t quite tricking her into bed, but he tricks her in order to eventually have sex with her, nonetheless. So on the surface, Joey is the worst to women, but his flaws are all out in the open.
Say what you will about Friends. You’re probably right. But it definitely had some nuanced characters and the most womanizing character on the show was also the one who accepted women’s decisions without question.
I love city building games. Resource management, man, I can play all day making sure that there’s enough power, food, gold, mana, whatever. Make my people happy, that’s my jam.
I also love Fallout. Mix the Stepford 1950’s optimism with a futuristic dystopia, throw in some giant moles and roaches, and you have got yourself a game.
So I got all excited when I saw that Bethesda has done an iOS game called Fallout Shelter where you are an overseer in charge of one of the vaults, and your job is to keep your people working and happy. Fallout and city building. Peanut butter and chocolate, man. We are THERE.
I’ve already brought down two vaults. One fell to a radroach infestation when I wasn’t looking, bodies EVERYWHERE, and the other one is struggling along, trying to make enough food but everyone is dying of radiation poisoning anyway. I’m trying to bring it back but wondering if abandonment isn’t the way to go.
Then I started a new vault. Vault 777. Vault 777 was going to be me learning from my past mistakes. I was set. I had a plan.
A bit of gameplay: the way you unlock new rooms to put in your vault is to increase the population. Sometimes new dwellers show up outside, and later in the game you can build a radio room to encourage other outsiders to come and move in, but until then you have to increase your population the old fashioned way. Not wanting to have my people die at the mandibles of roaches (do roaches have mandibles? I can’t remember…) while their skin is melting off from radiation, I decided to increase my population as fast as possible. I put the women in the living quarters with various men, and the bad pickup lines started flying. Sometimes they danced. (When they’re unhappy, they may still start a courtship dance, and it’s fascinating and terrible to watch. Very emo.) Sometimes magic happened, other times I had to try a new dude in the room.
Then I started feeling uncomfortable. The women come out of the rooms in yellow maternity sweaters and go back to their jobs, and and no one seemed to object to being a brood mare (at least they weren’t painting WE ARE NOT THINGS on the walls), and you can’t accidentally have children sleep with parents (the dialogue is, “it’s so nice to spend some time with my family,” and there is no dancing) but I realized…
I’m Immortan Joe.
This?
Or this?
All right, I’m not REALLY Joe. I’m not keeping these woman as MY wives. And it was clear that if the romance magic wasn’t happening, the dwellers were content to just dance sluggishly until I gave up and put them back to work – and the women do have important jobs in medicine, water, food, and power to keep the vault running. They’re more important than their lady bits.
Not to mention I’m not a hideous dude with boils.
But still. It’s the future, the world has gone to radioactive shit, and I’m fixing it by making women pregnant. Paint me white and bring me my WarBoys. Valhalla is calling. WITNESS ME.
I really hope they fix the crash bugs.
Women can’t wear the mayor suit or the tunnel snakes jacket. Are you KIDDING me, Bethesda?
I’ll buy that Hannibal Lecter is brilliant. I’ll buy that he’s the most sophisticated guy that makes royalty look like the guy in my sixth grade class who dropped out of school because he was 16. (He wasn’t much to talk to, but boy he got picked first in softball ALL THE TIME.) I’ll buy that he has Bruce Wayne-like wealth where you don’t see him do much work but you see the result of his spending. I will EVEN buy that he is the devil made flesh, someone who watches the world with disconnected interest, poking at anthills to see how the ants will rebuild after the devastation. (This is how Mads Mikkelsen plays him, a Lucifer-like sociopath.)
But, god or not, Hannibal Lecter has the same hours in the day as the rest of us. And that’s where I don’t buy him.
Let’s look at a typical Hannibal day, as I imagine it:
530am- get dressed, make gourmet breakfast of last nights kidneys and eggs. Vacuum brewed coffee. Contemplate the world and the rude.
630am- Calisthenics, yoga, whatever he does to keep his “person suit” looking good. Shower. Dress very purposefully and tie his tie in a way that only tie enthusiasts know how to do it. (Some fanboy in Hannibal’s world has a Pinterest account with all of the creepy stalker shots of his ties. When Hannibal finds out, he will eat him.)
730am- clean up from breakfast, tidy up his bedroom. Leaves house perfect.
830am- work. As Hannibal trusts no one, he must spend the morning on paperwork, doing his own admin and accounting and scheduling.
12pm- lunch. Small gourmet bistro. He lingers. Hannibal doesn’t rush his food.
130pm- Time for patients. Somehow he makes cray-cray money on his four patients that he sees daily.
530pm- after-work errands. Again, I believe Hannibal trusts no one, so he does grocery shopping, dry cleaners (SO MUCH DRY CLEANING), and bank on his own. While Hannibal may use a gourmet grocery delivery service for his truffles and he has his Jamon Iberico and his illegal ortolan suppliers, I bet he shops for his bleach and his scrub brushes and his plastic on his own.
7pm- Time to cook dinner. Whether it’s for himself or a party, it will be gourmet and it will be perfectly prepared. A macaroni noodle has never crossed his lips.
9pm- Real work time. First off, gotta go see Miriam Lass, the hostage he’s brainwashing. Feed her. Probably bathe, replace tampons and toothpaste supplies. Bit more brainwashing. Drive back.
11pm- Murder time. Gotta stalk, kill in just the right way, clean up all evidence, arrange the remains in a horrific puzzle piece for Will Graham, the true love of his life. One more evidence-cleaning pass. Measure twice, cut once, that’s what Hannibal lives by.
3am- Home. Shower. Probably should do an evidence-pass through the house to make sure he didn’t track any evidence in, like a naughty dog.
4am- Read. Listen to fine music. Practice the harpsichord. You can’t let these skills atrophy.
5am- bed.
At some point in there he had the time to slice up Dr. Gideon and cook and feed him, while doing skilled surgery so that Gideon was neither doped up on morphine nor in visible agony.
It doesn’t add up. I don’t even think I’m giving him enough time for his hostage. Wasn’t she in Virginia? An hour or two away? I can’t remember and the wiki doesn’t help. Still, that takes a long time to do all that.
We can assume Hannibal cleans house on the weekends. But that’s a big, fine place, and he’s a wax-your-floors and polish-the-silver kind of guy. So his house cleaning has got to be an all-day thing.
And, yes, I know he doesn’t kill someone every day. His freezer would overflow. Duh.
But. It was the realization (brilliant, horrifying) that Miriam Lass was alive and a brainwashed hostage that broke me. You mean he does everything he ALREADY does, and manages to not only have a hostage and keep her alive, but have the time to travel to see her and BRAINWASH her too? Not enough time in the day, man. Just not enough time.
See, evil geniuses can’t afford sleep deprivation. Get enough sleep dep, you start acting drunk.
LECTER YAWNS, SQUINTS AT WILL: Will, are you wearing a crown of human thumbs tied together with orange yarn?
WILL, LOOKS DOUBTFUL: No, Dr. Lecter, why would you ask such a thing? Are you all right? Is this another test?
LECTER STUMBLES AND FALLS, SMILES UP AT WILL FROM THE HARDWOOD FLOOR: Totes. Just need a nap. Will, you’re my best friend. I don’t tell you that enough. We should totally eat someone together.
LECTER FALLS ASLEEP. WILL CALLS JACK TO ARREST HIM. END OF SERIES.
If you ask me, the move to Florence was probably a relief for him. No more worrying about his basement stash of meat, or his patients, and the only person he needs to brainwash is, conveniently, living with him. (Can’t WAIT for Bedelia’s story. That was my HOLY SHIT! moment in the first S3 episode. I’d been waiting for the story of what happened during her attack. Still many unanswered questions.)
IN other news, if you’re a Hannibal fan, you MUST read this blog. The food designer from the show regularly blogs each episode, and it’s fascinating reading about what she does, and how she handles things like Lawrence Fishburn’s dietary restrictions, and how hard it is to find a red grape this time of year. The latest blog post reveals that she was the mastermind behind Ep1’s snail theme.
.jpg)
This?