Just a quick congratulations to the newest class of graduates from the Vermont College of Fine Arts' MFA in Writing for Children and YA program, one Super Secret Society of Quirk and Quill (shhhhh). There are some future *stars* of the field in this group (Varian Johnson, Jess Leader and Rachel Wilson, to name but three!).
And if you'd like a peek at what the residency's like, faculty member and spectacular poet Julie Larios did a great job racing to keep up with daily reports.
Best early birthday present ever? Dana, aka D.E. Rasso, from the late, lamented Number One Hit Song has a new blog. Raise a glass in celebration if you're a sentient being and go add her to your feed reader (or bookmark, if you're hardcore old school).
Escaped llamas named Felicity and Prism–I love this story:
Two llamas escaped from a farm near the Louisville Zoo early Friday, causing police and animal services to track them through the surrounding neighborhoods.
One llama, named Felicity, made it pretty far, eventually getting stopped on Harvard Drive near Bardstown Road in the Douglass Loop. A second one, Prism, was located on the west side of Newburg Road, not far from the farm where she lives.
Nefarious beer bottle activity suspected as the cause, even.
I usually skim the Washington Post capsule reviews on DVD releases to prioritize new stuff into my Netflix queue. Imagine my surprise to see a science fiction movie I'd never even heard of, Push, being released on DVD this week and having gotten a recommendation.
Perhaps I enjoyed this so much because it's completely my kind of story (involving several of my bulletproof kinks, as it were*). The kind with interesting world-building and lots of cool powers and fighty fights and it's set in Hong Kong. And, in fact, it feels like a Hong Kong action movie in all the good ways. Dakota Fanning is a little revelation in this one. Most science fiction movies are really bad, if you haven't noticed, and this one isn't.
Checking out the Rotten Tomatoes (22 percent fresh, ouch!), the complaints about this seem to be that people didn't get it, felt it was too convoluted to follow, etc. Some said it was silly, but I'd go with fun. And we wonder why smarter science fiction movies don't get made, or don't get much of a sell. Anyway, we liked it a whole bunch. And the concept would make a great young adult series too.
*dystopian, secret one-name sinister organization, awesome and evocatively named powers, fights that have brains behind their choreography
Updated: Charlie Jane likes it too–so there!
Some of you who've been reading this blog so long you recall its previous homes on blogspot and journalscape might also remember a great number of "Glove Monster" posts during a certain time period. I find it hard to mourn such a problematic personality, but I certainly mourn the kid who gave us some great music, and then grew up too damaged and famous to quite be a whole person.
R.I.P., kid.
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