shadowkat | (no subject)

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1. Every new TV pilot in the works

Hmmm...outside of the fact that I don't think we need any more television shows at the moment, and wow that's a lot of them..I got tired and gave up mid-read -- the following ones leaped out at me:

*Triangle
What if the Bermuda Triangle was not a watery grave in the middle of the ocean, but a land lost in time that has trapped travelers over the course of human history? When a family is shipwrecked in this strange land, they must band together with a group of like-minded inhabitants — from throughout history — to survive and somehow find a way home.

Jumped out at me -- because it sounds like a remake of Fantastic Journey which was this weird sci-fi series that aired on NBC from February - June 1977.

The series concerns a family and their associates who charter a boat out into the Caribbean for a scientific expedition. After an encounter in the area of the Bermuda Triangle with an unnatural green cloud, the group find themselves shipwrecked on a mysterious uncharted island from which they are unable to escape.

Anyone else remember it? Probably not. My parents were into wildly obscure television series in the 1970s and 80s. As a result, I got used to series I loved being cancelled very quickly.

Also...

Considering how low in the ratings Crazy Ex-Girlfriend has been there's a lot of series that seem to be based on the same "Musical Themed" concept.

And there's...a musical themed spin-off of Riverdale entitled Katy Keene, about Broadway hopefuls in NY. (I wonder if it will be as dark as Riverdale?)

They also have one about a small town in New Hampshire that discovers and invaluable resource and immediately declares itself a new country (I'm assuming succeeding from both New Hampshire and the US? Called "The Republic of Sarah".) First of all, my suspension of disbelief leap-frogged out the window, because I'm sorry, small town's can't succeed from the US that easily except in the minds of crazy-ass television writers, apparently. Other than that it could be entertaining, I'd just have to tell the part of my brain that doesn't buy it -- to shut up.

And...

Evil
A series about the battle between science and religion, EVIL focuses on a skeptical female clinical psychologist who joins a priest-in-training and a blue-collar contractor as they investigate supposed miracles, demonic possessions, and other extraordinary occurrences to see if there’s a scientific explanation or if something truly supernatural is at work.
By: Robert King & Michelle King, Liz Glotzer

So the X-Files meets the Exorcist? They need a new title.

Next
A propulsive, fact-based thriller grounded in the latest A.I. research, neXt features a brilliant but paranoid former tech CEO who joins a Homeland Cybersecurity Agent and her team to stop the world’s first artificial intelligence crisis: the emergence of a rogue A.I. with the ability to continuously improve itself. Marrying pulse-pounding action with a layered examination of how technology is invading our lives and transforming us in ways we don’t yet understand, the series also presents us with a villain like we’ve never seen before, one whose greatest weapon against us is ourselves.

I've no clue what this about. My mind shut-down halfway through the description.

The Hypnotist’s Love Story
After a string of failed romances, successful hypnotherapist Ellen is optimistic about her current boyfriend. But then he reveals a disturbing truth: a stalker ex-girlfriend (Heathern Graham) has been following him for years. Ellen finds herself intrigued — and oddly thrilled by the stalker, entirely unaware that they’ve already met. Stars Heather Graham as Sasha, Liza Lapira as Julia.
By: Heather Graham, Katie Wech, Liane Moriarty

So..the best-selling Aussie writer is jumping into television writing now?
(By the way, I like her much better than Jo Jo Moyes, who I can't read, and Jodi Picoult.) My mother read this book. I read What Alice Forgot and The Husband's Secret, which I enjoyed but the plot didn't work -- the ending was off on both.

The Lost Boys
Welcome to sunny seaside Santa Carla, home to a beautiful boardwalk, all the cotton candy you can eat… and a secret underworld of vampires. After the sudden death of their father, two brothers move to Santa Carla with their mother, who hopes to start anew in the town where she grew up. But the brothers find themselves drawn deeper and deeper into the seductive world of Santa Carla’s eternally beautiful and youthful undead. Based on the feature film from Warner Bros. Pictures.
By: Heather Mitchell, Rob Thomas, Dan Etheridge, Mike Karz, Bill Bindley, Rebecca Franko

The original movie I think heavily inspired the writers of Buffy. It could be good. Depends on casting and writing. The original was fantastic -- because of Keifer Sutherland. He was good in that role -- it may be his best role.

Zoey’s Extraordinary Playlist
An innovative musical dramedy about a whip-smart but socially awkward girl in her late 20s who is suddenly able to hear the innermost thoughts of people around her as songs and even big musical numbers that they perform just for her. With this new ability at her disposal, she is able to use her “gift” to not only help herself understand people in her life, but also to help others around her.
By: Austin Winsberg, Paul Feig, Jessie Henderson

Reminds me of Crazy Ex-Girlfriend but not as innovative or satiric.

2. I'm with oursin, can't find a common thread in Good Reads 200 Most Difficult Novels List either. For a bit, I thought it was the books you want to impress others that you read list...that is until Stephen King's Gunslinger and Gone with the Wind popped up. I can't really imagine bragging about reading either. Or Atlas Shrugged for that matter.

Good Reads is admittedly diverse in age, gender, demographics, nationality, pretty much everything. And I'm guessing they probably polled people on what their most difficult book was and tallied the points? (shrugs) People do define reading difficulty differently. Not everyone defines it in regards to the writer's style, sometimes it's the subject matter, or in the case of Little Women having seen one too many adaptations...and thinking, eh, bored now.

Sometimes I struggle to finish a book because the subject matter doesn't engage me or the style puts me off or the story irritates or annoys me to such an extent that I want to burn the book in effigy. I mean there are other reasons why I couldn't finish a book or get through it or found it difficult -- outside of just an incomphrensible writing style that would require a degree in linguistics to figure out (I'm looking at you Foucaul't Pendalum, Finnegan's Wake and well anything by Gaddis, really).

But...

IT is admittedly an odd list.

We have Little Women and...well Gone with the Wind, Ulyssess, Finnegan's Wake, House of Leaves, Atlas Shrugged, next to Stephen King's Gunslinger, Moby Dick, Jane Eyre,
and Little Bee.

While I can understand the stream of consciousness writers being there -- and they all are, without exception, I do wonder about some of the fantasy literary genre and children's novels.

Gone with the Wind and Atlas Shrugged -- I'd have put on it. Couldn't get through either. Made it about 200 pages into Gone before giving up, and 800 or so into Atlas. I recommend skipping Atlas and reading Anthem instead, it's shorter and not as aggravating. Gone? I recommend watching the movie instead -- shorter and more entertaining, also weirdly, not quite as disturbing or racist. (Weirdly, because the movie is both of those things. There's a reason the networks don't show it every Easter like they used to. I remember it being televised once a year around Easter in the 1970s-1990s. It has not aged well.)

There's an awful lot of Neil Gaiman -- I'm guessing someone on Good Reads finds Neil Gaiman's style hard to read? Also Ken Kessey -- which actually I sort of agree with it.

Lots of Russian writers -- because people suck at translating them, I'm guessing? Also a lot of German writers -- same problem.

3. It snowed then it sleeted, then it rained. Snow will be gone by tomorrow -- I hope, otherwise it's a slushy mess to walk through to and from various trains. Days like these, I envy people who drive. I much rather drive in the crap them walk in it...although definitely feel safer doing the walking. And on Thursday it will be 56 degrees again. Meanwhile Seattle got 10 inches of snow. And there are polar bears invading a Russian Fishing Village.

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Nobody in Britain will be able to take Triangle seriously, because of a notoriously disastrous show of that name in the 80s. It was an attempt at a glamorous soap opera set on a North Sea ferry, except that "glamour" and "North Sea ferry" are concepts that will never work in combination.

LOL!

I'm thinking a name change? It is just the pilots...so a lot can change. Although I'll be surprised if Triangle gets picked up -- sort of been there done that, and not all that successfully. The last attempt for US last five months.

They seem to have a total problem with Dostoijewskij (german spelling, to lazy to look up the English). Poor kitten, I always thought he read like bubble gum, long but easy, like a soap opera or something. Also poor Virginia Woolf.

Have to give them a point on Victor Hugo. Love him, but he really is tangent man. I'll never forget when he drops, at the culmination point of Les Mis (Valjean flees through the Paris sewers with injured Marius) nontheless, something like 7 chapters about the paris sewer system. Must have been his thesis or something, it's complete with introduction and even future outlook.

Also Jonathan Strange?!? Seems to me it is just long books that put them off.

Edited 2019-02-13 20:40 (UTC)

Seems to me it is just long books that put them off.

No. Neverwhere is also on the list, as is Stardust, Notes from the Underground Man, and Little Bee -- all of which are rather short in length.

Also, there are other reasons people may have issues with Jonathan Strange -- 1) footnotes (academics and lawyers adore them, everyone else...not so much), 2) antiquated Victorian writing style...which often makes me feel like I'm slogging through the mental equivalent of quicksand, 3) the hard back book is impossible to commute with, 4) if you don't like the characters...

I didn't make it through it, and I read all of Dorothy Dunnett, Sound & the Fury, Ulysess...and Clarissa.

Do you mean Fyodor Dostoyevsky? Interesting there's a German spelling? I saw this as the Russian spelling. (I don't think there is an English spelling for it. Because that's not English. Where's catcuswatcher, when I need him? He'd know if it was the Russian spelling, he's my Russian expert.)

Anyhow, yeah, I agree -- but again I don't think it's about writing style. I think it has a lot to do with subject matter. For example? Gone with the Wind is easy to read from a style perspective, so too is Atlas, Shrugged, but the story not so much. So too is Little Women, but if you aren't into the story...it can feel like hell.

Dosevtosvky - (okay, it's admittedly been over 30 years since I read him, so I may be remembering it wrong), if memory served, usually was writing about being in a prison in Siberia as a political prisoner?...Light-reading, it's not. Depressing, very. (Actually all of Russian literature appears to be depressing for some reason -- maybe it's the climate?)

Also very surrealistic in places. I mean if you are into political discourse and philosophical ramblings -- it's bubblegum, if you aren't -- it's pain and misery. I loved Kafka on the Shore, also loved Dostevosky when I read it, but I'm not sure I could make it through either right now -- I have to keep track of too many things, and have a noisy commute and am struggling to keep my anxieties at bay (cough*TRump*cough). But when I was intellectually bored and unemployed -- I tore through it and thought it was amazing.

Edited 2019-02-14 03:47 (UTC)

Do you mean Fyodor Dostoyevsky? Interesting there's a German spelling? I saw this as the Russian spelling.

The russian spelling is cyrrilic and translated differently in every language to replicate the russian phonetics: You can run through the languages on Wikipedia and see: https://fr.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fiodor_Dosto%C3%AFevski

Even in German alone, there are different versions. Much like him, to confuse everybody with names. :)

if memory served, usually was writing about being in a prison in Siberia as a political prisoner?

He might have written something about being a prisoner in Siberia but if so, I have not read it. Crime and Punishment has a prison sentence of course but it is about straightforward murder, nothing political. He writes a lot about moral conundrums and a lot of his books read a bit like Jane Austen, with very observant and spot on characterizations (even if romance is usually only one aspect in his books). He sometimes is also very funny. He also wrote about his own gambling addiction. I really like him, even though, yes, sure, it takes time to read his books and since I am trying to combine a full-time job in academia and a kid, time is not really something I have. That's why I am sometimes really glad about all the stuff I read in my twenties.

I hope nobody gets put off by that list. There are some damn good books there and I did not even get down to Neil Gaiman.

Edited 2019-02-14 07:45 (UTC)

Ah. Sigh. I'm surrounded by Russians, hear Russian on a daily basis and see it every day ...some of the posters in our building are also in Russian. You'd think I'd pick it up by osmosis. But apparently not.

Shows how much an ear I have for languages.

Anyhow, I think I've confused FD with the guy who wrote Notes from the Undergound Man and The Idiot, which I did read and are also on the list. These are relatively short, albeit depressing novels.

I haven't read FD. Just haven't gotten around to it. And right now, really not in the mood. That's another thing about books? You have to be in the right headspace or emotional place to read fictional novels. If not? It can feel like mental quicksand, regardless of how easy to read the book actually is.

Which makes me wonder if that's how people chose the books on the list -- they weren't in the right mental/emotional head-space to read it. It was either forced or assigned to them via a course, or a book club. And they felt they had to read it. As a result, they struggled to get through it.

I hope nobody gets put off by that list. There are some damn good books there and I did not even get down to Neil Gaiman.

So do I. Although, the list doesn't say they are bad books, just difficult books.

Anyhow, I think I've confused FD with the guy who wrote Notes from the Undergound Man and The Idiot, which I did read and are also on the list. These are relatively short, albeit depressing novels.

No,no confusion, that is the one, he just wrote a lot of different things. I never read Notes from the Underground. I did read The Idiot though. That one I found pretty amazing and I really liked the way Nastassja was written, even if it is all very tragic.

I wonder how easily I could get through it, the way I read these days. With reading so much scientific literature at work and so many children's books at home, I tend to stick to comic books and oddly non-fiction books at the moment. I wish I could get back into a more imaginative headspace.

I wonder how easily I could get through it, the way I read these days. With reading so much scientific literature at work and so many children's books at home, I tend to stick to comic books and oddly non-fiction books at the moment. I wish I could get back into a more imaginative headspace.

Been wondering much the same thing myself. My time for pleasure reading is so limited. And I basically read and write a lot of dense material for work -- construction contracts, engineering and environmental technical specifications, legal memorandum and documents, etc. Part of it -- is my reading time is basically limited to a noisy commute or before bed. And my job requires so much of my mental space that when I read, I want something that I can just escape into for a bit.

Man, I loved Fantastic Journey! For all of the what, three episodes it lasted? :D

Ah, someone else! I adored it too -- it was on longer than that, but they kept switching time slots -- we had hunt it down. I think it was shot in two parts, or they changed the set-up mid-way through. It started out as being a family sci-fi drama than mid-way through became something else entirely. Ike Eisneman played this kid who got separated from his family in the mists (they apparently got him) while their son went on a journey with these other four disparate characters.
I remember being really annoyed that it got cancelled before they finished the story.

I remember hearing about the Lost Boys pitch a couple of years ago, only back then it sounded far more interesting to me when the idea seemed to be that each season would be following the same vampires over a different decade. That seems to have now been changed to just a remake of the movie instead

Cheaper to make and easier to write -- also the anti-hero trend is fading. People want heroes right now.

The Girl With the Dragon Tattoo is difficult? And, apparently, The Sun Also Rises. *laughs*

Maybe they've conflated emotional difficulty with reading difficulty? Strange, though.

Maybe they've conflated emotional difficulty with reading difficulty? Strange, though.

I think so. Because it's not just writing style -- I mean come on, Stephen King?
You can skim read Stephen King and get the gist.

I'm also wondering about the "boredom" factor. I do know people, mainly mathematicians and engineers who struggle with reading novels. They think literally, a fictional novel that is pure metaphor...is beyond them.
My cousin who is a nuclear physicist often asked his mother to explain fictional books to him. It made no sense to him. He could see an advanced mathematical equation in his head -- but he can't understand what is going on in a book like The Great Gatsby or Jane Eyre. I've an old college roommate who finds reading rather boring, prefers podcasts and television. Also, if memory serves? There isn't much plot in Sun Also Rises? I'm trying to remember the plot. I did read it -- but I read it in the 1980s. Early 80s. So all I remember of it is the running of the bulls..which may have been in the television adaptation.

The Sun Also Rises is very symbolic (lots of symbols for impotence, love, virility and castration). Seemingly nothing happens in the book. It's all oblique. Conversations are never about what's actually being discussed. LOL. I can totally see a very Cartesian mind going WTF?

Ah, yep. Similar to The Great Gatsby -- which I had to explain to a friend years ago. She just didn't get metaphors or anything that wasn't literally spelled out. Had the same difficulty with the film Howard's End. While I think like that -- so for me, easy read.

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