It's Ok To Be Weird

I very rarely read non-fiction. But I made an exception for Felicia Day and her book You're Never Weird on the Internet (almost). I first noticed Felicia Day in season 7 of Buffy the Vampire Slayer as the character Vi: a geeky, potential slayer who ends up surviving the final battle to live on in the comic books. Now, she is most widely known in some circles as the creator of the YouTube channel Geek & Sundry and the web series, The Guild.

Get it! So good!

Her book is written in a somewhat linear fashion. It does progress through her life, but chapters/years backtrack to give more detail about a different subject. For example, a chapter discusses her love of acting and performing, starting when she was about 7 years old all the way through trying to succeed in Hollywood through small roles here & there and making herself over into someone who looked more hireable. It ends with the mention of her discovering World of Warcraft, while the next (titled 'Quirky Addiction = Still an Addiction') has an introductory blurb of “how my obssessive personality steered me into a twelve-hour-a-day gaming addiction and an alt-life as a level 60 warlock named Codex” and starts with her detailing her anal retentive tendencies from childhood.

She was homeschooled until the age of 16 when her violin teacher managed to help her gain a scholarship to the University of Texas. There she double-majored in violin and math. While at UT, she dove into her studies and worked hard to achieve a 4.0 GPA, at one point despite the advice of a professor. It was for a math course called Group Theory, which is, according to day “legendary” for its difficulty, and he felt that she grasped it well enough that her free time could be better spent experiencing life rather than trying to drill concepts she would never use again. In the end, Day disregarded his advice, getting that coveted perfect GPA. However, once she arrived in Hollywood and began trying for acting and other jobs, she discovered that the rest of the world doesn't always care about academic success, or any succes she'd had in small community theater productions. It was one thing that brought her down at first, because her academic life was one fueled by the desire for success and high performance.

Along with her own progression, the book charts the progress of computers and the Internet, waxing humorously nostalgic about the old dial-up days when one of the first service providers charged by the minute. (She & her brother once ran up a $400 phone bill trying to get tips for the online game, Ultima.) There is also a great story of when her mom took Felicia & her brother on a road trip so she could meet some of her online buddies in person when she was fifteen.

Though Joss Whedon wrote the introduction, there's no talk of what it was like to be a potential Slayer in season 7 of Buffy the Vampire Slayer or what it has been like to be part of Supernatural. She does not speak much of the mainstream projects that brought her to the public eye. Rather, she talks about her own personal struggles to achieve her own niche in the world and create her dream project, a webseries called The Guild – and later, Geek & Sundry.

She speaks openly of that she's always been anxious, has a desire for perfection, and control as well as depression, that drove her life during some of this time. Eventually, she suffered from physical problems – hair falling out, an acid reflux problem normally seen in middle-aged men, and other health issues that forced her to seek help for both mental and physical well-being. Along with that came one of the harder things that we all have to learn, being able to say no out of self-care.

There is also a chapter where she weighs in about Gamergate – the scandal/hashtag/controversy that swept through the gaming community last year. That chapter in particular is a very sobering read, as she recounts getting a text from a friend telling her to close the comments on her Tumblr account, because someone had just published her home address. The anxiety and fear that Day experienced is tangible and I truly felt for her situation. Thankfully, nothing terrible happened to Day as a result of the breech of privacy.

One of the highlights in the book is an anecdote about shopping with her dad, where he questioned what she was doing with The Guild, because at that time, nobody was making web series – hers was one of the first. As he was asking Day about her choices, an employee of the store politely asked if he could take a photo with her, saying he & his roommate were big fans. This incident illustrated to her dad that, while he might not understand what she was doing, she was obviously doing it well.

I picked up my book at a signing and while there was no talk or Q&A, she high-fived me as I came through over our mutual love of the Lumberjanes comic.

I found that I identified quite a bit with Ms. Day, particularly with regard to academic achievement and the feeling of disillusionment that comes when one realizes that most people in the non-academic world really don't care about your GPA. In the end, her message is clear – do what you love, love what you love, and it's totally okay to be weird.

Mandi & I meeting Felicia. We normally look better than this. It was
a million degrees in the store. In August.

*This piece received editing assistance from the lovely & talented Jess Standifird.

In Memoriam, Michelle MillerAllen

Yesterday, I felt nostalgic and wanted to share my recent writing successes with a mentor I had in high school. I looked up her production company, shot off an email. Then I clicked on their link for news and learned something that rocked my foundation.

She had passed away in April of this year.

Back in 1994, I was a junior in high school and, among other things, was part of the gifted program. We were told someone local was interested in mentoring a student and I ended up with the opportunity. Then I met Michelle Miller. She was the author of at least one locally published novel as well as a playwright. The idea was to turn a short story I'd written into a novel. That never ended up happening, but she did teach me some useful things. Like, know your characters - write a biography or at least an outline of what they're all like and who they are. That I should write even if I had no goal just write for the sake of writing. She gave me a book on writing, Writing Down the Bones, that I still have to plow through because, well, I was a teenager, and it was sort of dry. (I'm honestly still not sure how I was able to pass considering the stated goal was never accomplished.)

We ended up continuing our meetings through the summer and into the next year because we'd become friends. It felt, looking back, almost like a big sister/little sister kind of relationship. We'd still talk about writing, but we also talked about life. She taught me many things...
about bagels & lox
the joy of blueberry bagels with cream cheese
espresso drinks.
crazy indie art
craft fairs
that heartbreak can (and should!) be viewed as "a good learning experience"
decent restaurant seafood
how amazing a small group of artists can be together
the importance of being independent and not taking crap from anyone
to be brave enough to buy (and wear) crazy purple boots
about playing 3-way chess
about having confidence to be who you are

There are more things that I can't quite put a name or description to, but suffice to say, I feel my life is much better and richer for having known her. My husband and I went back to New Mexico in the late '90s and attended her wedding. We continued to correspond into the early 2000s, but sometime after her husband and partner lost a battle with cancer, she moved to Scotland in 2005. According to an item I found yesterday, she settled in nicely and began working towards improving the environment in her new home.

She was a wonderful, vibrant, fiercely independent woman with a kind heart and fabulous sense of humor. If you're so inclined, her books are currently listed on Amazon and Hunger in First Person Singular is definitely worth a read.

Fare the well, Michelle. Here's hoping you found light, love, and peace on the other side!

Serenity: Leaves on the Wind

Over the years, we've been given glimpses of the Serenity crew through the medium of comics. (Most have been set post-Firefly/pre-Serenity.) Ever since a one shot released on Free Comic Book Day in 2012 set post-Serenity that showed a pregnant Zoe, I've been dying for more tales. Earlier this year, Dark Horse Comics granted my wish with the publication of the first issue of Serenity: Leaves on the Wind.

The story picks up a short time after the events of the film and opens with Zoe about to give birth as they're trying to stay under the radar and hide from the Alliance. River is in the pilot's seat now, and as a nice nod, Wash's dinosaurs still adorn the console. Things go wrong and Zoe needs care that Simon is not equipped to handle, so they travel to an outpost with better med facilities, only to have the Alliance show up. Zoe insists that they leave her, so that her child will be safe, telling him "I can take care of myself." The plot turns then to figuring out how to rescue Zoe and along the way, see some familiar faces. We also get a taste of the program that River was part of before Simon rescued her, and it ain't pretty. 

Along the way, we also learn that a movement has sprung up that calls itself the New Resistance. (When we first see Jayne in the story, he's been tracked down by one of their members in hopes of finding Mal.) They've co-opted the Independent's flag as part of their symbol and rally around Malcolm Reynolds as their hero. 

Each of the characters gets time to shine, in some small way, and certain 'shippers will find some great stuff in these pages. 

The story is by Zack Whedon, with art by Georges Jeanty, a name familiar to some from his work on Buffy Season 8. Cover art is by Dan Dos Santos, and Joss Whedon is listed as an executive producer. Zack really captured the voice & tone of the characters, obviously he is a fan of his brother's work and paid attention. He gives Jayne a bit of dialogue that cracked me up, because it's a line that only Jayne could deliver! Jeanty's style may not be for everyone, but I enjoy it. (I also might be a teeny bit biased because 4 years ago I saw him at Phoenix Comicon and he geeked out with me about the Buffyverse for about half an hour. And he signed my stuff...and was super cool.) One of my favorite images is near the end of issue 6. It has no characters, just Serenity in flight, with clouds at her back, and a single green leaf in the foreground, drifting. 

So, fellow Browncoats, if you've had a yearnin' for the story of what happened after Serenity, do yourself a favor and pick up this series. It's all done now, so you can read it all in one go. I picked them up as they were released, but after seeing that issues 1 and 2 both ended on cliffhangers, decided to save myself some heartache by waiting until the run was finished. Sadly, there don't seem to be plans for more right now, but that could always change...and it was left wide open to continue. I'll leave you with an image of my favorite cover, issue 6. Stay shiny and keep flyin'...

Night Angel Trilogy

To start off with reviews, etc, I thought I would post a few words about a series I read last year. Brent Weeks is the author of The Night Angel Trilogy (Way of Shadows, Shadow's Edge, and Beyond the Shadows). It's an ambitious debut, with all three books coming in at over 600 pages a piece. They were recommended to us by a friend of mine, who called them "solid sword & sorcery." 

All three definitely fit into the sword & sorcery niche of the fantasy genre. They tell the story of Kylar, who starts book one named Azoth, a street kid who just wants a way out of the slums. He sees his opportunity in the form of the city's best wetboy, Durzo Blint. Wetboys are those who kill for money, and are able to use Talent (basically, personal magic) in order to assist them in being very silent and efficient. He manages to become an apprentice, but he never stops thinking about his two friends, Jarl and Elene, who were left behind. Durzo builds an identity for Kylar, who then infiltrates into high society. The twists & turns abound in this one, with some great characters, such as Momma K, the city's Mistress of Pleasures who also helps run the city's Underworld. The biggest issue I had with Way of Shadows was the pining. My husband coined the term "sword emo" for this one. It seems that everyone pines for someone and at times, it's very distracting. The only thing that saves it, is the writing. In this well-crafted story, the shit hits the fan towards the end of book one, leading us right into Shadow's Edge. 

In book two, Kylar has reunited with Elene and they've taken in a child named Uly. Due to the events at the end of book one, they've left their home in the country of Cenaria and have moved. Kylar has decided to give up killing in order to be with Elene, who doesn't approve of that lifestyle. He has troubles however, that culminate when he gets an unexpected visit from an old friend...who is killed in the kitchen while talking with him. Kylar then takes up his old grays (the uniform of the wetboy) and sets off after the killer. The killer meanwhile, kidnaps the child and also heads off in the same direction, Cenaria. Shadow's Edge introduces a few more characters and plot twists, and really is my favorite of the series. 

The issue with reviewing a trilogy comes in when trying to sum up this one without giving too much away. Suffice to say, enough happens to require a third book, Beyond the Shadows. Book three gave the impression that Weeks turned in a fine, huge manuscript that was perfect. An editor then said, "this is too long" so he trimmed it down and some of the book comes off as disjointed. There are also some elements that lend the reader to say 'seriously?' It seemed as though there were too many plot threads to keep going smoothly and he really could have (and should have) stretched this to four books.

On the whole, it was a great debut. The storytelling style made me think he was trying to channel George R.R. Martin at times, but couldn't quite get the hang of it.  Even though I didn't care for book three, I would gladly give his future writings a try.