Technology: Or why I love my iphone too much
March 22, 2010
Technology:
is it making your writing easier or standing in the way of your creative side?
By Rebecca Cantrell
A few years ago I got an iphone. My friends without smart phones mock me for my addiction. I use the calendar, check my email, find out where I am when I’m on tour, find restaurants that deliver in strange cities, and take pictures. Heck, I even use it to make and receive phone calls!
I love my iphone so much, I wrote a novel on it. Well, I didn’t actually thumb it in but…OK, here’s where I fess up. I’m writing another series as Bekka Black. The first one is called iDrakula and it’s a cell phone novel. It’s a retelling of Bram Stoker’s Dracula using only text messages, emails, web searches, and a 3-5 cell phone movie. It’ll be delivered on multiple platforms, but I’m not allowed to say which ones yet. Without technology, it would be unthinkable.
For the Hannah Vogel books I use the Internet to find pictures. There are so many amazing black and white photos of Germany in the 1930s. And with my computer (and sometimes just my trusty iphone) I can tap into all of it. My next novel, A Night of Long Knives, opens with a zeppelin jacking. Someone posted pictures of them as a baby on the Graf Zeppelin. They had pictures of their cabin, the control room, the gondola, everything. It was a fantastic resource.
Of course it all takes up waaaay to much time. Or, maybe it doesn’t. Maybe that down time I spend screwing around on the internet is really a way for me to recharge my creative batteries…does anybody buy that?
Favorite Superhero?
March 9, 2010
My favorite superhero?
The Tick. Hands down. For those of you who aren’t familiar with him, The Tick was a cartoon that ran on Saturday mornings on Fox in the 90s. Even though I was a grownup by then (I owned my own car, house, and cat), I still got up at the ungodly hour of nine (or maybe it was ten) to watch it. Later, I would have a child and never sleep in past seven for ten years and counting. But back then getting up at nine (or ten) on a weekend was a big deal.
Du-dwee-du-du-du-dwee-dou. The theme song still plays in my head.
The Tick is nigh invulnerable. He wears a giant blue suit with antenna on his head that cannot be chainsawed off. And his sidekick is a former accountant named Arthur who found a supersuit at a garage sale and flies around like a moth (but everyone calls him a bunny). Arthur worries about their damage deposit when the Molemen tunnel in through the basement and trash the apartment. He does complex math problems in his head. And he does his own taxes.
Together they battle evildoers. Nobody is ever killed, although Thrackazog does get sent back to Dimension X via a process that sounds fairly unpleasant. But that’s what you get if you try to conquer earth by cloning The Tick from his mucus.
Why do I love The Tick? Because he’s gentle. Nobody is killed or even hurt. The Tick protects puppies (OK, it was a capybara, but how was he to know?), babies (OK, it was the evil Mr. Mental), and citizens everywhere. Why else? Because he’s funny. Where else can you get a line like this one from The Terror to his son (who is doing evil deeds to spend time with his father): “I want you to do something bad. Not badly.”
I just don’t think we hear enough adverb jokes in superhero shows…
Hope to see you all at Left Coast Crime!