Crash Davis is exactly the kind of man to keep a tattered copy of "Gravity's Rainbow" in his locker.

After I read this conversation, I read a new Spider-Man comic I picked up yesterday. In it, Peter Parker (Spider-Man, for those who might not know) was going through a box of things that belonged to his dead father, who was a big science genius. Among the papers and journals was a copy of "Gravity's Rainbow." I did a big double-take.

heh. How cool is that?

Question, though: I can't do the timing on that in my head. If Spiderman premiered in 1962, and "GR" came out sometime in the early seventies (I remember there was a huge fuss because it won the Pulitzer and the wankers on the committee overturned the judge's decision because they couldn't understand a word of it, and there was no Pulitzer for literature that year) - well, wait. Timing? When did his father die?

Well, the Spider-Man I'm reading is a title called "Ultimate Spider-Man," which is basically a re-working of the entire story -- starting with Peter getting bitten by the spider -- but updated and in a modern setting. It's a genetically altered spider instead of a radioactive one, etc.

Of course, that problem is that the comic paints Peter's aunt and uncle who take him in as old hippies, but they don't really count the flashback chronology well enough, because that would put the height of hippie-dom at about 1993?

There's a little hand-waving going on w/r/t the timeline, methinks.

There's a little hand-waving going on w/r/t the timeline, methinks.

In comics? I'm shocked!

Hey, guys. Need some help.

Y'all know I'm a ficcer. My family doesn't know that I'm a ficcer, but they do know I'm deeply involved in my "online writing group", and after three years of this I'm rather disinclined to out myself to them. It's all too complicated and my sister (who already is a little hurt I won't share my writing with her) just doesn't understand the whole obsession focus on television shows.

At any rate, so yeah, they know I write but not what. The problem I've run into is my sister has an old college friend who is a novelist (2 written, I gather) but who can't manage to sell anything. My sister mentioned to this friend (we'll call her J) that I am involved with online writing groups and get a lot of support and editing help from the communities I'm involved in.

So J wants in. She wants to know where I'm doing all this and shit like that.

So, 2 problems: (a) I'm not going to out myself as a ficcer to J if I'm not going to tell my sister. (b) I don't know where the mainstream original-fiction-writing online communities are.

Anyone got any advice? What do I tell this woman?

Consuela, give her my email and point her at my website. Tell her you get online editing support from me - hell, if your conscience bothers you, send me something and I'll support it and that clears conscience.

I actually DO edit online for people, and I do have a meatspace writing group (six regulars, here in the City).

And it may get her off your back, and since I've got mainstream cred or whatever, you won't have to tell them diddly if you don't want to.

psssst, for David:

Of course, The Who totally steal that show. At the height of their powers, fucking around and absolutely certain that they're the best rock and roll band on earth. And they're right.

remind me to tell you about the Who, the not very bright POTUS, and the near-firefight with the federales in the basement of the Sheraton Palace Hotel in San Francisco in the mid-seventies....

Deb, you're a queen among women. Mwah.

I do feel bad about misrepresenting myself. Hell, I'd be happy to read J's work myself, since I've worked with several people (including at least one Buffista) on original novels. But I don't have anything to share with J to prove my ability, and none of the online communities I'm active in do original fiction -- except this one. And here there's too much overlap with the fic.

Like I said, babe, send her to me. Because I can make it nice and clear that "I don't discuss other writers' work without their permission, and Consuela prefers not."

Boy, can I sound like snot on toast, or what?

Oh, I don't need snotty. I'm all in favor of supporting people, I just don't have much to offer her. Hell, I don't even know what she writes. If it turns out to be Oprah victim-of-the-week stuff, I really won't be able to help her. (Besides, what if she's awful? eeeps)

Although it's odd -- I've made amazing connections through the online communities I'm in. I'm 2 degrees away from half a dozen marvelous fantasy novelists via the online fannish community. Heee. And my sister-in-law went to college with Elizabeth McCracken, author of The Giant's House. Now if I only had the drive to use these connections... (okay, and actually write something worth publishing).

I do have one friend with three vampire thrillers in the can, that I really need to poke a bit about polishing them up and sending them off. She's amazingly talented and these things are just... sitting there. They need to be read by someone other than me.

... and on that note, I'm off to do real work. But I'm bringing an unfinished original thing with me to work on when the discussion of the geology of the central O'ahu plateau gets too dry.