Well, today is already annoying, and 11 of the 22 emails currently in my inbox are notifications of delayed shipments. Marking up the boards and taking more things off them. I suspect today may turn into a “fuck this thing and that thing and fuck this thing in particular” day. Back into the newsletter today, and an eight-pager I need to figure out. Deferring SPEKTRMODULE for a few days, just because energy is limited and I need to put it where it’ll do the most good right now.
MP: What are the fun challenges that have come up while writing Castlevania?
WE: Mostly the challenge of Netflix saying “have a third season” after I killed Dracula…
Pulling today’s listening down off the shelves. Inbox 21. Have to start the newsletter today. Also need to get into SPEKTRMODULE 58 at some point. Marking up the boards and trying to shake myself into functionality. Today is likely to be a day with a lot of moving parts, so I’m just going to get into it.
Light day, which was just as well. Just a lot of messaging.
Set a time for a press interview about CV3.
Checked in with manager about a deal caught in the lockdown.
Quick CV4 design notes
Started breaking down the story for an eight-page short for DC.
Incepted Kevin Kolde into thinking he’s gone mad
Shouted at Declan Shalvey for a while
Checked in with manager about two other things
(I talk to my manager a lot)
Rewatched MARGIN CALL, because JC Chandor is an excellent screenwriter
Signed off on a promotion idea generated at NX
And did some thinking.
I leave you with something to watch: a short film adapting Borges’ DEATH AND THE COMPASS, which I was reminded of when I tripped over a cheap DVD copy of the later adaptation by Alex Cox. This one stars the incomparable Nigel Hawthorne. G’night.
Live right now on Panel Syndicate – 30 pages, pay what you want. Here’s a preview.
I’ve read it. It’s very good, and completely beautiful. Career-best work from Marcos, which is saying something, and astonishing colour work by Muntsa Vicente.
Finished reading William Gibson’s AGENCY I’d been saving it. I mean, it took Bill six years to write it, it’ll be a while before there’s another, so I didn’t want to use it up on its week of release.
And god damn. It reads like the wind. The sheer pace of the thing is astonishing. If nothing else, it’s a unique masterclass in writing highly accelerated fiction that is still rich in texture and character. There’s even a fun little pulpy side to it that you used to get from techno-thriller series, seeing old characters and things pop up and reconnect, but with prose that is several orders of magnitude better sculpted.
The bit is very simple. Someone with the bullshit buzzword rep of being an “app whisperer” is given what turns out to be the UI front end of an actual AI, which is of course impossible, and which you very quickly start to suspect is made out of a dead person. These aren’t spoilers, Gibson gets you there in five minutes. By a quarter of the way in, a plan has been formulated to get her out of the bind that bonding with the AI has dropped her in. And, for the rest of the book, you get to see it assemble, in its vast and amusing complexity — an AI essentially using humans as software agents and tracked parcels in transit. It’s an amazing and delightful construction.
You will need to read THE PERIPHERAL first. That’s non-negotiable. AGENCY is very much a straight sequel, and I think most people would be left too far out at sea if they started here. Luckily for you, it’s an excellent book, so if you haven’t read it, treat yourself, and then get AGENCY.
(Stealing Deb Chachra’s photo for this post, hi Deb!)
AGENCY, William Gibson (UK) (US)
also: THE PERIPHERAL (UK) (US)
Apologies if you saw the false transmission earlier. Weathershot swears it can post to WordPress. it can’t.
I slept in today, still trying to get past the exhaustion crash. Inbox 15, but, at this point, most of that is notifications for delayed parcel deliveries.
YESTERDAY:
Was a slow day, because exhausted still. Not much done. It may amuse me to append a work log to statuses, so I could start with yesterday, a very light day.
Read out the final of BATMAN’S GRAVE 7.
Netflix call to get 28-day data on CASTLEVANIA Season 3. (The terms “very good,” “unusual” and “super impressive” were used.)
Two projects I was attached to got passed on. Happens all the time. If I continue this, you’ll see exactly how many bodies are in my trail of dead, and how it gets longer every day.
Made notes on an illustrated book idea.
Did a few tweaks on PROJECT VERSAILLES rough notes.
(If you’re a reader of my newsletter, you’ll be used to my codenaming projects I can’t openly discuss yet. I take the name of a town, city or place that has some slim association with the project. It can be very random. THE BATMAN’S GRAVE, for example, was PROJECT TRICORNER, Tricorner being a district in the fictional map of Gotham City formulated and formalised by Eliot R Brown.)
Talked with management and legal team briefly.
Pointed out to Lordess Foudre that she was doing crimes on the internet again.
I kept a written log of my daily work across February, and it was an interesting window for me into what I’d previously considered “slow” or “empty” days. I’m working against a few decades of muscle-memory that says a day without actually writing scripts is a bad or zero day, because I’m not yet used to the shift in my career that means sometimes I email or phone for a living. Maybe I’ll revisit this at closedown and see how the day went.
“An eremitic composition for strings, piano and electronics, exploring atmospheric phenomena of the 13th century, as documented by the Augustinian canonry.”
A remarkable 37-minute journey.