Color Me Lilac

Hello again. Whoa, two posts in a month, and within 8 days of each other--must be a record for me, I say with tongue firmly planted in side of cheek.

The title of this blog has very little to do with anything, except that lilac, orchid, and deep violet are my favorite colors. They've always been my colors. I notice that this spring, our lilacs have been in blossom going on 3 weeks--that's a record, as far as I've ever made notice--and believe me, I watch nature. Usually, rain comes and rusts them out, and they die. I've been able to have several bouquets of them in the house, my office, brighten it up (of course, the walls are painted my favorite color, as well), and give off it's perfume--one you can't find in any bottle.

I have been busy, as I've last reported, editing for the last time, my book Spell of the Black Unicorn for Infinity. The book is essentially done. I merely need to make sure what I send them is absolutely as unblemished as my eyes can distinguish. I've gone through Black Unicorn several times in this last draft. Correcting, or changing it to my liking. The editing is a slow process. You can't just read it over once, and be done with it, once you think you have your final draft. You go through it as many times as you can, until you can find no more mistakes--you hope. And for me, I have to mess with lines, or take out commas I feel aren't needed. Maybe rearrange a line, here or there. I'm a writer, I guess that's my problem. I need to just edit this thing, but I want to mess with it. Sort of like a scab, I can't leave it be.

Besides editing, I've been writing another book--I've renamed it, but I'm not going to reveal it here. It's in it's very first draft. And I'm just half way through it. Still working on the plotting. Plotting a novel is about the most difficult thing you can do in the writing process. But plot you must. You also have to have a sense of your characters. Until you do, and know why they do the things they do (motives), you can't really move on.

Speaking of plotting, I've recently been able to view an excellent show which aired in the early '90's called "Forever Knight"(thanks to a friend who let me borrow the disks). Premise: Nicholas Knight is a vampire who wants to redeem himself, pay his debt to society--as the opening lines go. He plays a vampire who lives in the human world as a homicide detective in Toronto. This idea, in the 90's, was rather fresh. New. But a lot of people may come away from seeing a few of these shows and say, well, someone did this again, called it Angel. Well, my friends, you're right in that respect. Writer of Angel, Joss Whedon probably did see Forever Knight and was inspired to do his own version. Whatever. But if you watch both shows, you'll see that although Angel was very inventive, and entertaining, as was his Buffy the Vampire Slayer series, Forever Knight is much more sophisticated, plot-wise. I think the writers of Forever Knight was able to put together some excellent shows, at the same time, create realistic, characters that you watch interact with each other. The actors, Geraint Wyn Davies (Knight), Nigel Bennett (LaCroix), Deborah Duchene, and John Kapelos, all do excellent jobs pulling off their characters. Nigel Bennett plays the most evil LaCroix, who sired Knight 800 years ago, and will not let him forget it, no matter how much Nick tries to separate himself from LaCroix, he never is able to. Deborah Duchene, who plays the very sexy, and sometimes dark, Janette, seems to have been born for her part. Not to forget Catherine Disher who plays Natalie, the coroner, and the only living human in Toronto who knows what Knight is (and is trying to help him turn human/get back his soul), does an excellent job in her roll, as does John Kapelos as Knight's partner, Schanke--who hates when Knight takes off in a split second, and doesn't know he's a vampire--gives his roll 110%.

Aside from enjoying the actors as they do their rolls, the plotting is tight, somehow you are pulled in by Knight's plight, and his ever persistent battle over his demons, those inside and outside--namely LaCroix.

To date, I've viewed all of first season, and part of second. The second season sees LaCroix come back as a night-time radio talk host. He's just as fiendish as always, but the writer has been able to throw some interesting twists in. I absolutely loved "Stranger Than Fiction" in which Knight becomes romantically involved--one of the few shows that has him become romantically involved with a character--with a novelist who writes vampire fiction, and she's way too close to the truth about them. This one ends to my satisfaction, and I won't give it away, but writers, Phil Bedard & Larry Lalonde don't take the easy route, which one expects. The ending is simple, yet moving. LaCroix couldn't be more disappointed in the outcome. Other episodes have been just as well done, in every respect. (My friend, John, tells me the third season "smokes".)

There were only three seasons. You wonder why they take shows like this off and put idiotic-non-written shows like Idol, or Dancing with the Stars on. I call it the I-don't-want-to-use-my-brain syndrome. Well, I guess it's a sign of our times. No one wants to think any more, producers don't want to pay writers to actually write something brilliant, interesting, intriguing, or have any emotional outcomes any more. However, I haven't been watching much TV anymore, since Buffy was taken off. Maybe I'm missing something? I have to check out Moonlight, as yet. I didn't even know it was on, since it's on a channel I don't regularly view, as I can't get it in. (Yeah, I'm still using an antenna--don't get me started on that!)

Well, the sun is out, today. But it's cold in my northern part of Illinois. Perhaps in June things will begin to heat up, but I'm hoping for a coolish summer. People will complain. But I'm not going to. I don't like living in air conditioning. People who like it hot are kidding themselves. They jump in and out of air conditioned cars, offices and houses. If they actually had to deal with the heat and humidity, they wouldn't really like it all that much.

And don't get me started on global warming. You don't think something is happening to our atmosphere? Glaciers and polar ice caps are melting as I write this. I'm just glad I won't be around when they all do, and everything is under the ocean again--at least I hope I'm not, since I'm not a vampire.