Friday Hangovers - Gwenda Bond

Inspired by Stranger Than Fiction, Janni Simner asks what advice we could give fictional characters to help them stay alive.
The portraits collection of Balliol College.
Portrait of another Gwenda, with whom this rendering makes me feel simpatico.
Nerd catch phrases! Say them all! Amaze your friends! Be loved by strangers! (Via Cecil.)
Also at The Beat, Heidi MacDonald with the most sensible post I’ve seen yet about the Minx line. (Personally, I don’t have a problem with the name — it’s a cool word like every every word that ends with X, and I think of it as similar to when we took back chick, girl, or broad. Next up: making lady cool. Is it possible?)
Justine on why your book is never your own.
Janis Cooke Newman on her Mary writing process and the magic of white cakes. Someday, the day when I finally get a beach vacation and two weeks to do nothing at all, that day I’m going to start this book. Sadly, not in the foreseeable future. (Via Ed.)
Apparently girls who like science fiction are ugly, or so it’s been offered. (Not that post, but the train wreck it’s linking to.) See also: Aetiology’s excellent response. (I considered linking to some blogs by hot girls that I happen to know read — and write — science fiction, but there are toooooo many to choose from. Not to mention, the entire thing is stupid.)

Darice

December 15, 2006 at 10:14 am

I am such a complete and total geek that I looked for Lord Peter Wimsey’s portrait among the Balliol crew… and found it. Ha! Stranger than fiction, indeed.

Graham

December 16, 2006 at 1:33 pm

As a former student of Balliol, I should note that our annual College Record carries an occasional feature on fictional Balliol characters. My favorite was from some early C20 comic novel – if not by Wodehouse then by someone like that – in which a man dressed in a gorilla suit at a party was revealed to be from Balliol and therefore a better class of gorilla…