Mortal Coils Re-Read
I finished re-reading MORTAL COILS this morning. It’s always a dangerous thing to re-read your stuff. You can never be entirely objective—or free of self-loathing. I still like it, though.
Oh sure, I see all the flaws and cracks, but it holds together, and it’s still the kind of book I wish I had when I started reading fantasy. I also get to see all the things I’m setting up for the next book and the rest of the series...which is fun, too.
Note To Self: Next time do not listen to the audio book version of LORD OF LIGHT by Roger Zelazny on the commute to work while doing this. Comparison to this awesome 1968 Hugo-winning work is never an ego-enhancing thing.
Now onto the final edit pass of ALL THAT LIVES MUST DIE to see how it all fits together!
Labels: All That Lives Must Die, Mortal Coils
posted by Eric Nylund at 8:24 PM
9 Comments:
Yeah, be careful with those Zelazny works. Honestly, I have to be very cautious as to who I follow his work with when I re-read it. Because otherwise enjoyable works become a bit pale under direct comparison.
Zelazny was definitely masterful at writing his images, and leaving the edges undefined so that your imagination has room to work.
And I especially don't look at any of my own writing after reading Lord of Light, or Creatures of Light and Darkness, or even the lovely puff-piece of A Night in the Lonesome October.
It burns like excellence. That said, looking forward to what follows Mortal Coils!
That's like, to use an RPG situation, reading, say, the Library scene in the Amber novels and then trying to write turns for the ADRPG game that you run.
Yours just seems to be a pale distant shadow of the original.
Lord of Light was always my favorite Zelazny novel. It was one of his favorites, too. (So he said in the late '80s, anyway.)
I was reading MORTAL COILS today after my math test, and something I read just some how cracked me up.
Fiona can't where jewerly, because of one of those rules her grandma made. And she wheres a rubber band that held veggies together. And she feels like rebel wearing it.
That just cracked me up.
It's a very good book so far.
I so cannot wait for Lives/Dies. And you're right about reading anything critically acclaimed, really. I was working on something recently and then I re-read American Gods and couldn't type a sentence for two weeks without feeling like I was terrible. Oh well.
Btw, I was just wondering, what did you ever think of your netbook?
When I read something really good, like MORTAL COILS, I can still type, already knowing I'm a terrible writer getting better every day and every page. I just try to use good detail like what happened in the story, not copying exactically what is printed. Like if they say, ..."the ocean sparkled in the bright and warm sun light, glistening and shinning in my eyes." Mine. ..."I saw the blackness of the pond. Dark and blunt and looking angrier then ever in all times i've seen that blotch."
Little different.
Why can't books be release earlier, it hurts my head waiting that long, ALL THAT LIVES MUST DIE is being released next year and I can't wait that long with school days being as long as they are. I was surprised that I made it through to see MORTAL COILS come out without driving myself mad.
Good book by the way.
DD—post after next, I’ll update on my netbook. Short version—thumbs up!
Dakoda-why does it take at least a year to get a novel published? Short answer is that it takes that long to edit, copyedit, get cover art, and market the thing. Long answer will be covered in a future post (and will reveal what I just said is mostly lies).
read Mortal Coils a few months ago... Love it !!! Waiting patiently for the next.
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