MORE DUELING HOOKS

Hey kids, what time is it? Ten points to Gryffindor if you said it's time for Captain Hook!

Sure, James M Barrie's enduring pirate captain may be 110 years old (or more, if you subscribe to my version of the character in Alias Hook, where he's been frozen in time—at age 43—since 1724). But the time has never been more right for the witty, sardonic old rogue, who's enjoying something of a mini-Renaissance right this minute.

Over on TV's Once Upon A Time, we have the handsome young leather-clad incarnation of the character played for a couple of seasons now by Colin O'Donoghue. It seems like this Captain Hook (aka Killian Jones) was brought in at the beginning of the second season chiefly as a villainous adversary to Robert Carlyle's Rumplestiltskin/Mr. Gold character.

But viewer response to the sexy Irishman was so positive, this Hook has since been promoted to the role of principal love interest to the show's nominal heroine, Emma Swan. But Emma's love interests have an unfortunate way of ending up dead—remember the handsome sheriff who had his traitor's heart squished (literally) by the evil queen? Remember Pinocchio?—which may be why Emma's been so standoffish.

Still, last night, with calamity looming (calamity is always looming in this show), Killian/Hook got another chance to plant a big smooch on Emma. That gurgling sound you may have heard was millions of women all over America melting over their remotes.

Meanwhile, Hook is coming back to the big screen in a big way in next summer's Pan. The movie won't be out for seven more months, but official studio portraits of the main characters were released this week.

No doubt inspired by the popularity of the OUaT character, the producers went with a younger vibe for their Hook, as played by Garrett Hedlund. In what purports to be an origin story of Peter Pan,  the boy Peter is whisked off to the Neverland, where he falls in with the notorious pirate, Blackbeard—one of whose crewmembers is the youthful James Hook. Apparently, the two of them team up to save Neverland from their lunatic boss. (Played by Hugh Jackman, from whom I'm expecting plenty of  scenery-chomping brio!)

I'm not sure what time period—if any—the movie is meant to be set in. That flintlock Hedlund is grasping looks appropriate to the Blackbeard era, although not so his clothing or his haircut. Doesn't he seem a tad neatly coifed for a pirate?

As I mentioned in a previous post, J. M. Barrie says in his novel, Peter And Wendy, that James Hook once sailed with Blackbeard, so I suppose the storyline isn't all that far-fetched. It's Hook becoming allies with that infernal boy I may not be able to swallow; but I suppose it's all in the telling.

And then, this Thursday (Dec 4), batten down the hatches for Peter Pan Live, an in-studio production of the venerable stage musical to be broadcast live to a TV screen near you.  And speaking of venerable, the intrepid Christopher Walken—iconoclast that he is—is going against the youth-vibe trend to bring seasoned menace to the role of Captain Hook.

A veteran hoofer from way back (remember him tap-dancing on the bar in Pennies From Heaven?), Walken also promises to bring a bit of the ol' soft-shoe to the deck of Hook's ship. (It's a musical, remember?)

I can't say that any of these gentlemen are exactly my vision of James Hook. But I'll be cheering them all on, thrilled that the good captain continues to, er, carve out a place for himself in popular culture!

WOODS AND WOLVES

If any further proof were needed that fairy tales are taking over our popular culture, consider this—a new trailer for the movie version of Into the Woods!

While this musical fairy tale mashup from composer Stephen Sondheim and scriptwriter James Lapine wowed Broadway in 1987, it's taken almost 30 years for the show to make it to the big screen. But now, at last, the timing seems to be right.

For one thing, Disney's live-action Once Upon a Time TV series (or, as we like to call it around my house, the mosh pit where old Disney characters go to die) continues to be a big hit.

Yes, I despair of them ever giving their Captain Hook character anything to do besides trail around in Emma's wake, pining for her.

 Still, I hear from many readers of Alias Hook how much they adore Colin O'Donoghue in the role, so I'm grateful to him and the show for helping to make the character sympathetic to the mass audience.

Anyway, it's no coincidence that the Disney company is also responsible for getting Into the Woods up on the big screen. (There must be a Faustian bargain inked in blood somewhere that no fairy tale spinoff can ever again be produced without Disney participation.)

And it's interesting that the director is Rob Marshall, famed for his film adaptation of Chicago. More recently Marshall directed the fourth Pirates of the Caribbean movie, On Stranger Tides, which no doubt accounts for Woods securing Johnny Depp in the featured role of The Wolf.

I understand there's some distress in the blogosphere over this casting, that some fans were hoping for a wolfier, perhaps CGI version of this character in all his scary beastliness. (Although I do think it would sort of break the illusion when he bursts into song.

But wolves exist in fairy tales to symbolize the dangers of the outside (read: grown-up) world to supposedly innocent children like Red Riding Hood. And what more dangerous predator is there than Man?

Besides, look how cool Depp looks in his Zoot Suit and big, furry ears! I can't help but think of the slick, anthropomorphic wolves in the old Warner Brothers cartoons drawn by Tex Avery.

The rest of the cast is not exactly chopped liver either: Meryl Streep as the Witch, James Corden and Emily Blunt as the pivotal Baker and his Wife, Anna Kendrick as Cinderella, and Chris Pine (newly discovered—by me—as an entertaining comic actor) as Cinderella's Prince, to name but a few.

Onstage, Into the Woods was a sardonic meditation on what happens after Happily Ever After, and a wistful cautionary tale to be careful what you wish for.

If you've never seen the stage production do what I did: nip off to the library and borrow the original Broadway cast production on DVD.

So when the film version opens Christmas Day, you'll be all set to marvel at how enduring, alluring, and open to endless interpretations fairy tales continue to be.

THE TIME LORD

Terrific acting highlights gripping Hawking bio "Theory of Everything'


Stephen Hawking is one of the most famous and admired figures in the world.

A brilliant mathematician, cosmologist, and researcher into the relativity of space and time, he's a university professor, a popular guest on the lecture circuit, and the author of many non-fiction books that make complex science comprehensible to lay readers. (His A Brief History of Time was on the bestseller charts for five years.)

He's such a pop culture icon, he's even appeared as himself in episodes of Star Trek: The Next Generation, and The Simpsons.

Young Prof. Hawking

And almost all of the above was accomplished with Hawking confined to a wheelchair during the inexorable progression of a motor neuron disease related to ALS. The image of Hawking slouched in his motorized wheelchair, communicating through his robotic voice synthesizer, is so well-known, it's difficult to imagine him any other way.

But that changes with The Theory of Everything. A smart, funny, and tender biographical drama that begins with Hawking as a vigorous young grad student at Cambridge, it also tells the enduring love story of Hawking and his first wife, Jane.

Attn Oscar voters: Redmayne as Hawking

Scripted by Anthony McCarten (from a memoir written by Jane Hawking), the film is directed by James Marsh, who made the absorbing documentary Man On Wire. Marsh proves to be just as adept with narrative drama, abetted here by his two stars, the exceptional Eddie Redmayne as Stephen (yes, the Oscar race starts here), and the formidable Felicity Jones as Jane.

Redmayne is terrific at every stage of Stephen's life. Gradually robbed of an actors usual tools—movement, voice, facial expression —he still manages to convey Stephen's lively intelligence, his active participation in the life around him, his dry sense of humor.

Remarkably clear-headed, yet moving, Marsh's film defies expectations of what an "uplifting" biopic can be—just as Hawking (now 72, in real life) defied all expectations. The Theory of Everything simply celebrates tenacity—in life, love, and ideas. (Read more)

SPLENDOR and MAGIC

Kate Forsyth is serious about fairy tales.

The author of several series of magic-infused children's books, she's also in the midst of earning a doctorate in fairy tale retellings. But there is nothing academic or plodding about her marvelous adult historical fantasy, Bitter Greens.

To call it a mere retelling of Rapunzel does not even begin to do justice to this ambitious, absorbing, and imaginative novel.

When I was writing Alias Hook, I didn't realize that the retold fairy tale had become a genre unto itself. I just became so obsessed with the character of James Hook, notorious villain of the Neverland, that I knew I had to tell his story in his own voice.

It seems that Forsyth's book had a similar genesis—her fascination with formidable Frenchwoman Charlotte-Rose de Caumont de la Force, a real-life writer at the court of Louis XIV who set down one of the earliest versions of the Rapunzel tale in 1697.

Indeed, Charlotte-Rose is a lively and irresistible protagonist, as imagined by Forsyth. But hers is only one of three distinct stories of three dynamic women that span two hundred years of European history in the course of the novel.

Their stories are  braided together as intricately as the strands in Rapunzel's rope of red-gold hair.

One protagonist is Margherita, daughter of a mask-maker in Renaissance Venice. At age 12, she's stolen from her parents and imprisoned alone in an impregnable tower by the hundred-year-old witch, La Strega, who uses the girl's virginal blood in black magic rituals to preserve her eternal beauty.

Another protagonist is, of course, Charlotte-Rose herself, who will ultimately write the story in French as Persinette.

A portrait of Charlotte-Rose—I hope!

 (This title, meaning "Little Parsley," refers to the Faustian bargain by which the girl's parents are lured by the witch into staking their daughter's future on a handful of bitter greens.)

Charlotte-Rose's fierce wit and scandalous romances make for compelling reading; the minute she is banished from court and incarcerated in a nunnery in the first chapter, divested of her fancy clothes, her hair, and—quelle horreur!—her writing implements, I was completely hooked!


And, perhaps most unexpectedly, Forsyth's third protagonist is La Strega herself, Selena Leonelli. Daughter of a prostitute mother brutally assaulted before her eyes, apprenticed to a witch, ageless courtesan and dangerous sorceress, she's determined to make the world pay for the injustices done to her.

While none of these women qualifies as the popular modern cliché of the "kick-ass heroine," each is wily, independent, and courageous in her own way. And each of them is worthy of redemption.

Indeed, how the tale of Persinette is revealed to Charlotte-Rose is one of the most satisfying strands in Forsyth's grand design.

Forsyth's prose is gorgeous, her storytelling layered and complex in this splendid, magical feast of a book.

* * *

The cool thing about fairy tales is how open they are to interpretations, by diverse artists as well as writers. Look at these visions of Rapunzel I found! The Arts and Crafts-era illustration (top right) was done by Heinrich Lefler, ca. 1905. Lower right is a lovely painting from a book of Grimms Fairy Tales by F. W. Darlington, ca. 1930s or 40s.

TRUST THE FARCE

JTC delivers witty backstage comedy 'Enter the Guardsman'

It's a plot as old as the theatre itself: a husband disguises himself as another man to try to woo his own wife and test her fidelity. It was already a little creaky when Hungarian dramatist Ferenc Molnar made it the basis of his 1910 farce The Guardsman. But it gets a fresh update, with lively songs and an irresistible backstage setting in Enter the Guardsman, the second offering in Jewel Theatre Company's 10th Anniversary season.

With a witty script by Scott Wentworth, the show features original songs from composer Craig Bohmler and lyricist Marion Adler. JTC fans will rejoice to hear that this is the same trio whose earlier collaboration, the terrific film noir musical, Gunmetal Blues, was a popular JTC production a couple of seasons back.

The source material isn't quite as dynamic for Enter the Guardsman, but director Art Manke's impressive staging, Kent Dorsey's wonderful set and lighting design, and a great cast make for an entertaining evening of theatre.

Pizzo, Ledingham, and one grand illusion of a set!

Set in the early Downton Abbey era just before the First World War, the story unfolds entirely backstage at a theatre where a popular actor and actress hold forth every night onstage. But after six months of marriage in real life, the Actor (David Ledingham) is beginning to wonder if his wife is growing bored with him. He worries that she's reached "the maximum length of her romantic attention span." Indeed, his wife and onstage partner, the Actress (Marcia Pizzo) fears that the routine of married life may be the death of romance.

Prowling about on the edge of the action is the Playwright, played to sly and silky perfection by David Arrow. He acts as both the narrator, drawing the audience into the tale, and instigator for the drama onstage. The accomplished cast manages to turn what is basically a story of insecurity, wanderlust, and mistrust into something light and breezy.

But the real star of the show is Dorsey's brilliant set, a plain brick wall behind the actors' dressing tables on which is projected the interior of a grand theatre—its audience facing us—to which the Actor and Actress play their parts in pantomime, beyond a scrim, whenever they go "onstage" to perform. It's a nifty extra layer of illusion in show that celebrates the place where acting, art, and fantasy collide. (Read more)

STARRY KNIGHTS

Space pilots race to save humanity in thoughtful epic 'Interstellar'

Nobody has ever accused Christopher Nolan of thinking too small. A  master of the brainy action thriller, his films are as crammed with ideas and concepts as vehicle chases, and explosions (are although there are plenty of those too).

From the brilliant intricacies of Memento and The Prestige, to The Dark Knight (the best and broodiest of his Batman trilogy, with its good/evil Doppelganger undercurrent), to the wildly imaginative Inception, Nolan knows how to deliver a feast of a film that keeps viewers chewing over it for days.

His latest, the sci-fi epic, Interstellar, is no exception—although in this case, it takes a lot longer for Nolan's cool, cerebral storytelling to start pulling the viewer in. Those who categorically dislike sci-fi will find much to protest here—like lengthy sequences of gigantic pieces of hardware lumbering through space while orchestral music swells on the soundtrack.

Surf's up on one wet planet in Interstellar.

 Placing star Matthew McConaughey front and center most of the time feels like a naked stab at down-home folksiness to soften the film's cold edges.

And yet, just when the ponderousness of it all threatens to take over the film, the prickly human element that Nolan and his co-screenwriter brother, Jonathan Nolan, have been seeding into the plot from the earliest scenes finally starts to pay off.

The relationship between engineer/astronaut-turned-farmer, Coop (McConaughey), and his daughter (played first by little Mackenzie Foy, and then as an adult by Jessica Chastain, as the narrative time-loops around) is especially nicely wrought.

This work of cautionary speculative fiction begins in a too-near future where climate change is eroding Earth's resources.  Coop  gets a chance to join a team of explorers who will be flying through a newly discovered wormhole on a quest to find another habitable planet for the human race. (Read more in this week's Good Times)

FLYBOY

Michael Keaton walked away from the first modern (ie: Tim Burton) Batman franchise after two films. So he's inspired casting for this black comedy about a movie actor named Riggan Thomson, once famed for playing an onscreen superhero called Birdman.

Now, years later, he's trying to reinvent his career and himself—and hopefully rediscover his self-respect along the way—by mounting a Broadway drama. It's a problematic project he's directing from his own adaptation from the downbeat works of Raymond Carver.

This set-up provides the chance for filmmaker Alejandro G. Iñárritu (best known for serious fare like Babel and Biutiful) to deliver his dark, but often scathingly funny observations on pop culture, celebrity, and priorities—in particular, the ongoing battle between art considered serious and substantial, and the philistine popularity of the movies.

"Popularity is the slutty little cousin of prestige," says Mike (Edward Norton), an actor hired at the last minute who might save the show with his brilliance or destroy it with his loose-cannon unpredictability.

Iñárritu brings plenty of nifty style to the table. The film unspools in a series of long, intricately connected (but not nausea-inducing) tracking shots as it follows various characters around through warrens of backstage passages, in and out of dressing rooms, on and offstage, over catwalks, and down Broadway itself.

The soundtrack is mostly edgy percussion, and the hyper-reality of the close way the camera follows characters around in their personal dramas is balanced by a touch of magic realism as Riggan tries to suppress the cynical alter ego—in full Birdman regalia—who follows him everywhere, urging him to forget about acting and become a movie star again.

A few too many false endings dull the story's impact, and the lines between metaphor and narrative get a little blurry (as Riggan may or may not occasionally fly over the Great White Way). But Iñárritu makes cogent points about media and fame and our quest to be "important." He also elicits fine performances, especially from Norton, Emma Stone, as Riggan's recovering druggie daughter, Amy Ryan, as his ex, and Keaton himself.

SNOW PLOWED

Human nature tested by circumstance in intriguing Force Majeure

The French title of the Swedish film Force Majeure literally means superior force, as in a force of nature, or what we might call and Act of God. It generally refers to an unexpected circumstance completely beyond human control, most often a natural disaster like an earthquake or tsunami. But it's used ironically in this cerebral thriller, where the drama hinges not on a natural disaster, but the split-second response of oh-so-fallible humans in its path.

Directed by Ruben Ostlund, and already Sweden's official Foreign Language entry for the 2015 Academy Awards, the film tells a simple-seeming story about a young family on a skiing vacation in the French Alps. The father, Tomas (Johannes Kuhnke), works too hard, as his wife, Ebba (Lisa Loven Kongsli) tells another tourist at their swanky resort hotel, high in the snowy mountains. So they've packed up their two young children, Vera and little Harry, for five days of relaxation and family time.

On the second day, while the family is having lunch on the restaurant balcony, overlooking a spectacular view, the snowpack on the nearest mountain begins to move. It's not giving too much away to reveal that the movie continues on from this point. But damage that may prove to be irreparable has been done to Tomas and Ebba's family unit, and to their relationship.

Ostlund's design is fascinating in the way the film's central incident becomes a litmus test for gender, family, and even age issues among all who witness it, including the audience. (Read more)

UP JUMPS THE DEVIL

Radcliffe can't solve dilemma in Horns

It's always fun to watch Daniel Radcliffe in his post-Potter career. Not that he's been trying to shed his Harry Potter persona, exactly, so much as stretching the boundaries of what he can do—as well as testing the outer limits of his audience's expectations.

From the troubled stableboy in Equus on Broadway, to the mournful young widower in the Gothic  thriller The Woman In White, to the youthful Allen Ginsberg on the cusp of his outlaw sexuality in Kill Your Darlings, Radcliffe has taken roles that challenge prevailing ideas of who he is as an actor.

But none yet perhaps so challenging as Alexandre Aja's horror thriller, Horns, in which Radcliffe stars as Ig Perrish, the misfit protagonist. Suspected by everyone in his small, Northwestern town of the brutal murder of his girlfriend, and stalked by the sensation-hungry media, he wakes up one day with ram's horns sprouting from his head, and the gift of eliciting the truth (however tawdry) from everyone around him. An unexpected talent that sets him on a hunt for the real killer.

I bought into the first third or so of the story. Radcliffe offers up some intense, yet  sardonic moments, his American accent is pretty good, and there's a subversive, black-comedy kick to the way the newly diabolical Ig starts giving people permission to act on their favorite deadly sins. It has something to do with the way they're all compelled to reveal their most shameful, innermost desires in his presence.

But sadly, the film eventually crosses the fine line between devilish social satire and ham-fisted, cheesiness. I haven't read the source material, the horror novel by Joe (Son of Stephen King) Hill, so I don't know where to lay the blame for all the wretched excess. All I know is the film finally crumbles under its own heavy-handed good/evil symbolism, its jumbled-up Biblical metaphors (snakes, wings, crucifix, horns), and a prevailing sense of overall nastiness.

Radcliffe will emerge, of course, unscathed. Next up? He'll play Igor in a reboot of Frankenstein. Okay, I can't wait!

RAISE YOUR VOICE

A journalist friend of mine, making the leap into fiction, once got some conflicting advice about "voice" in a novel. She asked me what the formula was. If only there was one! In my experience, finding a novel's narrative voice is a mysterious process of intuition, alchemy, trial and error. Every book is different, and each one demands its own storytelling voice.

My first book, The Witch From The Sea, had to be written in first-person subjective by my heroine, Tory; her perspective on the life-changing events happening to her in the novel were so much more wry and humorous than an indirect third-person narrative could ever be.

The shaping of Tory’s personality is what the book is about, so I really heard her telling her own story. It later evolves that she’s keeping a log of her adventures, but the first-person narrator doesn’t always have to be setting down her thoughts as part of the story. It’s okay for the author to write from inside the character’s thoughts as she reflects.

Runaways, my sequel to Witch couldn’t be told in the same way because too much of the plot depends on things Tory doesn’t know. So I had to switch to third-person omniscient, that is, switching around between the viewpoints of different characters as the plot demands. (Alternating scenes or chapters from the heroine’s viewpoint, the hero’s, the villain’s etc.) This way, the reader gets more info about the big picture than any one character has, which hopefully creates suspense or anticipation from the reader wanting to see what happens when certain events or characters or agendas on a collision course finally do collide. This is useful when characters are in opposition to each other, but may not know it; it's especially useful to plunge into the mind of the villain/antagonist to get the lowdown on his or her diabolical plans.

Vintage log books: a great way for a heroine to tell her story

One of my novels (not in the Witch series) came to me in first-person present tense. (“Sun stabs through the leaded glass in the window. I can see the way they smirk at me when they think I’m not looking.”) Don’t ask me why, but I was physically unable to write it any other way. I needed to be inside the protagonist’s head, reacting to every little stimuli the instant it happened to her. It made the whole story so much more immediate!

This is also the narrative voice I used for Alias Hook. That’s just the way the protagonist, Captain Hook, started "talking" to me in my head, looking around the Neverland and telling me what he saw and what he thought about it all.

 Readers may need to know more than your characters

This put a few constraints on the plot; I wasn’t able to wander off and follow my heroine around Neverland as much as I would have liked. But since so much of the action depends on James Hook's emotional evolution—letting go of the past, giving up the game, understanding the true nature of his fate, and earning the possibility of freedom—it turned out to be the best way to tell his story. His is also a journey out of isolation, which the reader shares by being right there inside Hook’s viewpoint the whole time.

That he can be such an unreliable narrator—meaning his interpretation of events is not always exactly correct—makes the story so much more interesting! And practically interactive—it's up to astute readers to get wise to James Hook, decipher his fears and prejudices, speculate about what might really be going on, and root for him to (finally) get wise to himself.

First-person present tense used to be thought of as sort of weird and experimental; one story market I submitted to wouldn’t even look at anything written in that format. Then for awhile, it seemed like every other novel was coming out in first-person present tense (including Philippa Gregory's Boleyn family bestsellers).

But these things go in and out of fashion, just like anything else, so best not to worry about the market, or what other writers are doing. If your protagonist wants to do all the yakking, let her. If you’d rather address your readers with a nudge and a wink, like Thackeray, and let them know more about what’s going on than the characters know, then do that. Trust your own instincts, Grasshopper. Just start writing and the story will tell you how it wants to be told.

YET ANOTHER HOOK

Look who's making a comeback in pop culture!

That would be Hook, Captain Hook, to you.

Sure, the title of the upcoming live onstage TV broadcast is Peter Pan, but look who gets the dominant position on the poster. And, yes, that's Christopher Walken under those black piratical curls.

I like Walken a lot as an actor, although he is not exactly the way I pictured the character in Alias Hook. And while he'll bring the requisite blue eyes and his innate sense of menace to the role, he might have to finesse his New Yawk accent a bit.

This upcoming holiday production is brought to you by the same folks who tested the waters with The Sound Of Music Live last December.

 The idea is to take some creaky, oops, I mean venerable old stage musical, infuse it with fresh young blood, and stage it in real time to be broadcast live, just like in the good old days of live TV on kinescope. This was semi-successful in Music: the kids were cute, and Carrie Underwood sang well as Maria, although her acting was a slightly different story.

In Peter Pan Live, they'll hew to the 100-year-old tradition of casting a grown woman in the role of Pan, in this case, Allison Williams, from Girls. In the theatre, you can almost make a case for this: actual children can be difficult to work with, and, at least nowadays, there are child labor laws. But, I'm sorry, on TV, a grown woman looks like a grown woman, no matter how short they cut her hair. Just sayin'...

On the other Peter Pan movie front, Pan, coming out in the summer of 2015, no pics have yet been released of Garrett Hedlund in the Captain Hook role. (That's the project featuring Hugh Jackman as the dread pirate Blackbeard.) Stay tuned for further details!

AGAINST ALL ODDS

Coal miners, gay activists join forces in exuberant 'Pride'

They were not the most natural allies you could imagine: a clutch of hip, young gay and lesbian activists from London and the working-class denizens of a remote Welsh coal-mining village far. Yet these two diverse groups made history together with an audacious show of solidarity during Britain's lengthy Mineworkers Strike of 1984.

And now their story is dramatized with plenty of heart, humor, and verve in Pride, a crowd-pleasing valentine to diversity from director Matthew Warchus.
   
Scripted by Stephen Beresford, Pride invites viewers into a pivotal moment in social and political history. In 1984, smack in the middle of Margaret Thatcher's iron-fisted, union-busting tenure as Prime Minister, the notion of out and loud gay pride was only just blinking its way out into the daylight.

When the National Union of Mineworkers in Britain launched what became a year-long strike for improved conditions, putting their jobs and families on the line for basic human rights, a collective of gay activists in London felt a sense of kinship and decided to help publicize their plight.

Warchus and Beresford assemble a mixed cast of historical and fictional characters to tell their story. At its center is Mark Ashton, the real-life gay activist played in the film by Ben Schnetzer (almost unrecognizable from his role, as the Jewish youth hidden in the basement in The Book Thief). Leader of an informal group of like-minded, politically savvy folk who meet at a Soho book shop, Mark forms the group Lesbians and Gays Support the Miners (LGSM), and takes to the streets with his friends to collect money, food and clothes for the striking miners and their families.

There's dissension in the ranks from both sides the first time the activists drive their "Out Loud" bus over the Severn Bridge to the tiny South Wales hamlet where they deliver their donations. But the film is fueled by smaller stories within the bigger picture of individuals battling their own prejudices and learning to work together.

Imelda Staunton, Dominic West, Paddy Considine, Bill Nighy, and Andrew Scott (best known to US TV fans as "Jim Moriarty" in Sherlock) offer their usual sterling support.

Pride glosses over some facts; it never acknowledges the real-life Mark Ashton's commitment to the Communist Party, which inspired his progressive politics. Yet it succeeds as an entertaining, often deeply affecting, and exuberantly told blueprint for tolerance and solidarity—against all odds. (Read more)

THE BRINY DEEP

Feel like you'd like to dip your toe in a tropical ocean this weekend?


Swim with a sea turtle?


Dive to the briny deep in a steampunk submarine?


Maybe glimpse a mermaid or two?



Well, you're in luck—and you don't even have to leave Santa Cruz to do it! Just surf or snorkel your way over to Beth Gripenstraw's Open Studio.

For one weekend only, Beth has converted her living space just off Mission Street into an underwater extravaganza!


A pair of dolphins leaping over a coral reef greet you as you climb the front steps.


The entryway is full of tide pools and kelp beds, and as you enter the main room, a giant sea turtle and his entourage of jellyfish swim lazily by.

Glide into the showroom where Beth displays her colorful, sealife-decorated ceramic platters, bowls, urns, and earrings, along with her sea urchin pots.

Just keep an eye out for these no-nonsense guardian mermaids; they're watching your every move!



But I have to say, my favorite is the dining room, transformed this year into the interior of Captain Nemo's Nautilus submarine, from 20,000 Leagues Under the Sea.

I love the gears, gauges, and tubes along the wall, to regulated the engine (they even belch out steam!), the bolted metal door and window frames, and, of course, the octopus—or is it a giant squid?—watching it all from outside the cabin window.

Of course, the captain's table is set with Beth's festive dinnerware, which this year includes square, starfish-decorated trenchers and vibrant fish-shaped plates.

As a matter of fact, Beth's exuberant ceramic pieces are grouped all around the house, along with her quirky and imaginative watercolor paintings. So don't get so bedazzled by the environment that you miss any of them!

Now hear this: Beth will NOT be open Encore weekend, so tomorrow (Sunday) is your last day to enter her world. So chart a course for #232 in your Open Studios Guide, and enjoy!

ART BEAT

Pier Pair, Doug Ross.

Yes, I know, it's been more about words than pictures lately here at the ol' blog. But the 2014 edition of the venerable Open Studios Art Tour is in full swing

The main thing that's new about this year's event is the official Open Studios Art Tour Guide. This year, it's no longer in calendar format, and while that may be sad news for day planners, it's good news for artists and their fans.

With only four images per page, the featured work of every participating OS artist is bigger, brighter, and much easier to see.

Everything else about the Guide is the same as always, including the ridiculously reasonable $20 price tag, maps, and all the info you could ever possibly need to know about the artists.

The Queen, Peggy Snider.

I hope everyone got a chance to get out and visit some fine local artists in their natural habitat last weekend—despite the infernal heat (it melted the tape right off Art Boy's OS posters around the neighborhood!), and the Giants and 49ers games on TV.

We are grateful to all those intrepid souls who made it to our door last weekend, including those of you who bought original art, prints and cards. Thank you! We will also be open for Encore Weekend, October 18 and 19 (Aschbacher, #124 in your handy OS Guide), and let's hope for more salubrious weather by then!

In the meantime, here are some artists I'm looking forward to visiting this weekend!

Doug Ross: Clean, beautifully composed silkscreen prints in elegant colors. Marine life is his specialty, so if you love seals, sea lions, and otters as much as I do, don't miss him! (#157)

Peggy Snider: Her hand-built ceramic sculptures, large and small, are soulful, evocative, mystical, and rich with inner life. (#287)

Ronald Cook: Exquisitely hand-carved, one-of-a-kind musical instruments and pieces of furniture inspired by Early American and Early European designs.
(#269)

Beth Allison Gripenstraw: Beth doesn't just open her studio; she creates entire immersive environments featuring her playfully painted ceramic tableware, jewelry, watercolor paintings, and life-sized papier-mache animals. From an African safari to Paris in the 1920s, you never know where she's going to take you next. (#232)

(Although judging from this year's postcard, above, I suggest you bring your flippers!)

Anyway, have fun out there this weekend! And check back here tomorrow for an update...

CLASS ACT

Pleased to see that Alias Hook gets top marks today from the School Library Journal, as the lead book in the SLJ's "Adult Books 4 Teens" blog. Nice review in excellent company!

To save the precious eyesight of my readers, the text of the lead-in begins:

"With the holiday season approaching, we present a handful of picks that give a new spin to the definition of family and offer plenty of food for thought."

Read the full review here!

PYLE DOES HOOK

Who knew?

The great American painter and illustrator Howard Pyle must have had a crystal ball. How else could he have envisioned my characters, James Hook and Stella Parrish, for a painting done more than 100 years ago?

So there I was trolling around the interwebs earlier today when I stumbled across this lovely thing. This painting is called "Who Are We That Heaven Should Make of the Old Sea a Fowling Net?" which is a pretty fabulous title right there.

This piece illustrated a short story by James Branch Cabell called "The Second Chance," in Harper's Magazine in 1909. I haven't been able to find out what the story was about, or even if the character was a pirate (Pyle was a famous illustrator of pirate lore).

But judging from the man's outfit in this image, I'm thinking something in the piratical line.  James would love this jacket and lace (although he prefers practical boots over such fussy shoes, especially aboard ship). And the title reference to a "fowling net" suggests someone who has to keep moving before his pursuers close in.

Of course, the lady's gown—also 18th Century—is all wrong for Stella, who comes from 1950. But her untidy auburn hair is just right. And the fact that she's out there on a rocky promontory with the notorious Captain Hook says a lot about her spirit!

Btw, I've been having a great time updating my Pinterest board on the world of Alias  Hook, so check it out!

ROGUES' MARCH

It's steady as she goes on day five of the Here There Be Pirates Blog Hop and Book Giveaway.

Today, meet  J. M Aucoin, commander of our crew of pen-wielding brigands and author of the Jake Hawking cycle of stories. J.M. is giving away his newest release, the story collection Jake Hawking and the Bounty Hunters.

You can read a Q&A with J. M. over at author Helen Hollick's action-packed blog, Of History and Kings. Find out what he has to say about historical vs. fictional pirates, his creation Jake Hawking, a "thinking man's pirate," and his lifelong obsession with The Three Musketeers!

Once again, we have seven swashbuckling authors giving away seven pirate novels to seven lucky winners during the course of the event, September 8 through September 19 (International Talk Like A Pirate Day).

Scroll down to take a peek at the other piratical adventures being offered on our book giveaway. (As for me, I'll be giving away a copy of The Witch From the Sea!) Follow the links to read all about each book and the infamous rogues and roguettes who authored them!

Click here to enter the Giveaway!

 a Rafflecopter giveaway

YET MORE PIRATES!

Two more swashbuckling authors join our merry crew of brigands today as the Here There Be Pirates Blog Hop sails on.

Spread your canvas for Arcadia Prime, the site of author Dan Eldredge, who's hosting a Q&A with author Nick Smith. Nick talks about his rousing historical Buccaneers series, which began with Rogues' Nest.

The second installment, Gentleman of Fortune, is the book Nick is offering in our piratical book giveaway.

Next, head over to the site of nautical author SK Keogh, who's hosting a Q&A with Helen Hollick, author of the Jesamiah Acorne series of seafaring adventures.

Helen talks about the delicate art of combining history, swashbuckling action, and fantasy in her four-part series (with more to come!). The first installment, Sea Witch, is the book Helen will be giving away.

Don't forget, our ongoing Here There Be Pirates event features seven authors of piratical fiction offering seven free books to seven lucky winners.

Follow the link below to enter for a chance to win. You can also earn multiple entries by seeking out the authors' Facebook pages and/or Twitter accounts and "liking" them.

Sign in now, and free loot could be yours! Har!

a Rafflecopter giveaway

THE BLOG (HOP) GOES ON...

The swashbuckling continues on our Here There Be Pirates Blog Hop and Book Giveaway!

Today I'm delighted to be a guest over at Rogue's Nest, the fine Historical Pirate Fiction site captained by author Nick Smith. Now it's my turn to be grilled by the King's men—oops, I mean to participate in the Blog Hop Q&A on writing piratical fiction, history, romance and adventure!

J.M. Aucoin, the admiral of our buccaneer fleet here on the Blog Hop, asked each of us participating authors to describe our ideal pirate flag, then he made a graphic of each one to post with our Q&As. This is the one he designed for me. Pretty cool, huh?

Asked to describe my pirate flag, I wrote:

Pirates like to feature the tools of their trade on their flags (swords, pistols), but I suppose an image of a keyboard wouldn't look very dynamic! (Besides being totally the wrong era.) How about a silhouette of a quill pen with a big, poofy feather. Black flag with a white quill pen. Dripping blood?

I think it came out great!

And speaking of J.M. Aucoin, sail on over to his author blog to read a Q&A with another swashbuckling author on the Blog Hop, SK Keogh. The book she's offering in the giveaway is The Alliance, second installment of her trilogy featuring Jack Mallory, who joins the Sweet Trade in order to settle an old score. 

To recap, our ongoing Here There Be Pirates event features seven authors of piratical fiction offering seven free books to seven lucky winners.

Follow the link below to enter for a chance to win. You can also earn multiple entries by seeking out the authors' Facebook pages and/or Twitter accounts and "liking" them. Sign in now and claim your share of the plunder!

 a Rafflecopter giveaway

ON WRITING PIRATES

Ahoy, me hearties!

It's my pleasure today to host adventure/romance novelist Christine Steendam as part of the ongoing Here There Be Pirates Blog Hop and Book Giveaway.

For those of you who came in late, we have seven swashbuckling authors giving away seven pirate novels to seven lucky winners during the course of the event September 8 through September 19 (International Talk Like A Pirate Day).

Click here to enter the Giveaway!

a Rafflecopter giveaway

And without further ado, enjoy an interview with Christine Steendam on the art of writing pirate fiction!


What made you want to write about pirates in the first place? What is it about them that intrigued you as a writer?

Pirates just scream adventure. There is something incredibly romantic yet dangerous about a man that lives by no rules but his own. As a writer there is a lot of potential there for stories and conflict.

Tell us a little about your book, Heart Like an Ocean, that you’re giving away for this event.
Heart Like an Ocean is an adventure romance novel. Yes, romance… It follows the story of Senona Montez, a young, naïve, upper-class Spanish woman looking for an escape from the prison that is societies’ expectations. Her paths cross with the handsome British privateer, Brant Foxton, and things get very interesting from there.

In reality, pirates were awful people that most of us wouldn’t want to run across if we were sailing a ship, but in our culture they’ve been romanticized so often that it’s almost expected by some folk. Do you have trouble balancing reality with the romanticized aura of the pirate, or do you not worry too much about that when crafting your tales?

I admit, I romanticize pirates. I mean, I do write romance after all, so if my pirates had rotting teeth and were murdering people left, right and center that wouldn’t be very fitting of a romance, now would it? So, I really don’t worry about balancing reality too much… though I do like to get my facts right.

How often do you turn to real-life pirates for inspiration in creating your characters or plot?

I haven’t gotten a lot of inspiration from real-life pirates, but I definitely look towards them for fact-checking. If I want to know if I can get away with female crew members or pirates I turn to the people that lived and were documented as pirates or privateers.

What makes your series (or book) different from other piratical adventures out there? What’s your main goal with your pirate stories?

My stories are not primarily pirate stories. They are romance adventures set within a pirate setting. There is so much more there to explore in the story—both society, personal growth, and the age old question of right from wrong.

Bonus Question: If you had to design a pirate flag for yourself, what would it look like?

Because my pirate ship is called the BlackFox, I’d probably have a fox skull with a cutlass clutched in its teeth.

Author Bio:


Christine Steendam is the Award-Winning author of the Foremost Chronicles and the Ocean Series.

She is a self-proclaimed genre hopper in both her writing and reading, an avid horseback rider, and a cup of coffee is never far from her hand.

Christine makes her home in Manitoba, Canada on a sprawling 15 acre ranch with her husband, sons, and assortment of animals.

Visit Christine's website!
Christine on Facebook
Christine on Twitter

MORE PIRATES

The first author Q&A in the Here There Be Pirates Blog Hop is up and running!

Trim your sails for the blogsite Caffeine and Contemplation, presided over by adventure/romance author Christine Steendam.

Christine is hosting Dan Eldredge, author of the offworld piratical adventure, The Pirates of Alnari.

Surf on over and see what he has to say about writing pirate fiction in a setting other than Planet Earth.

Tomorrow, it will be my pleasure to host a Q&A with Christine, right here on this blog!

So stay tuned...

HERE THERE BE PIRATES

Ahoy, me hearties!

September is pirate month here at the blog. For one thing, International Talk Like A Pirate Day falls on September 19 (so you'll want to brush up on your "Aarrrghs", "Ayes," and "avasts"). And in honor of this year' festivities, you, the Reading Public, have a chance to score some loot just the way we pirates like it—free!

A half dozen other swashbuckling authors have invited me to join them in a voyage of plunder—oops, I mean a Blog Hop and Book Giveaway with the catchy title, Here There Be Pirates. Each of the seven of us will be giving away a copy of one of our pirate novels to seven lucky winners. Free books—what's not to love?

Can Dress like a Pirate Day be far behind?

(I'll be giving away a rare, collectible copy (meaning (ahem) currently out of print) of my very first swashbuckler The Witch From the Sea, a book that's very dear to my heart. (Pirates! History! Romance! No zombies!) I love this book so much, I built it a website of its own!)

Here's a complete list of participating authors and their books:

J. M. Aucoin, Jake Hawking and the Bounty Hunters;  Christine Steendam, Heart Like an Ocean; Lisa Jensen, The Witch From the Sea; SK Keogh, The Alliance; Helen Hollick, Sea Witch; Dan Eldredge, Pirates of Alnari; Nick Smith, Gentlemen of Fortune.

The contest begins tomorrow, Monday, September 8, and runs through Friday, September 19 (Talk Like a Pirate Day).

To enter for a chance to win one of these fine free pirate books, just sign in on the link below. If you're extra techie, you can also earn multiple entries by seeking out the authors' Facebook pages and/or Twitter accounts and "liking" them, which improves your chances of scoring, big-time.

a Rafflecopter giveaway

(Full disclosure: I personally do not Tweet, but if you are so inclined to "like" my Alias Hook page on Facebook, that counts too.)

We bloggers will also take turns hosting Q&As of a piratical nature with each other for the duration of the Blog Hop. I will update the info here as each new Q&A post goes up.

So get ready to set sail for swashbuckling adventure! Here's your chance to win some genuine pirate loot with firing a single shot!