Lisa Hendrix

Yesterday I received an email from a new fan who had discovered Runaway Bay on her bookshelf (she’s not sure how it got there) and enjoyed it.  I answered, of course, and we traded a couple of rounds of email.  Then, yesterday afternoon, she sent me this:

This is Abigail.  Here’s what her mother had to say:

I know this looks like a staged photo but what makes it so great is that it absolutely is not. I had your book on the table and she picked it up. I thought it was rather serendipitous that the same day I correspond with you my daughter gives me this unexpected opportunity for a great photo. 

Now you have photographic proof that your writing appeals to all ages. I think I will keep her away from the love scenes for as long as I can though. I promise to stop crowding your email, this pic was just too cute to keep to myself. 

Okay, I know she should be reading Pat the Bunny, but I can’t help grinning like a fool.  Thanks to her mom, Brooke, for giving me permission to post.

I don’t know how it came up today, but I was thinking about how eyes get described in romance novels.  They’re seldom plain blue or grey.  They’re azure, or cornflower or stone or pewter.  So my brain went off on a tangent (as it often does), and I googled eye colors.  Not much, other than articles on genetics, like this one from Discover. But then I hit Images, and there they were.  So I collected some example photos of unusual eye colors and hereby present them for your perusal.  Yep, there really are people with eyes the color of a tropical lagoon, old terracotta, or a cadet’s jacket.

(bottom photo credit — Discover Magazine online)

Okay, so I resisted.

I have adored Pierce Brosnan since his Remington Steele days. I knew he was meant to be Bond from the instant I saw him, and I celebrated when he was signed and mourned when he had to give up the role to Timothy Dalton because other Steele fans wanted a nice, tidy (and ultimately flat) wrap up to the series. However, when I saw what they did to those Bond scripts, I was actually glad Brosnan didn’t get stuck with the politically correct, safe-sex Bond of the late 80s. Face it, no one could have made those into Bond classics and my boy would’ve been dipped in the stink.

After a time, things spun back around and there sat Pierce in the wings, devastating in a tux, and all ready to make the role his own. Hot damn. I looked forward to a scrumptiously long run of PB as JB.

So when the Broccolis that Be cut his run short and announced that blond Daniel Craig would play Bond in the remake of Casino Royale, I once more mourned. More than that, I boycotted. Refused to contemplate even the remotest possibility he could be a good Bond. (I mean, really, a blond!?) Never saw the movie in the theater (one of the few I didn’t see on the big screen). But my hubby got a copy of Casino Royale for his birthday this week, and he wanted to watch it with me this afternoon. I adore my husband even more than I do Pierce, so I watched.

I was wrong.

Part of it was the script, fully true to the spirit of Sir Ian Fleming’s books (unlike the gimmick-bloated scripts that have been the trademark of the series). It always helps when the script is right, and this one is right in so many ways. But part of it was Daniel Craig: Rugged. Dangerous. Tender. With eyes that have seen too much. Bond to his very soul.

I still adore Pierce. Shoot, how could I give him up when I even used him as the model for my hero in To Marry an Irish Rogue. I even had my agent send him a copy, hoping his production company would option it for him to do. I will most definitely go to Mama Mia when it opens July 18.

But Daniel Craig is Bond. James Bond.

I’m late to the party, but boy, am I happy to be here.

How about you? Who’s your favorite Bond? What about your favorite Bond movie? Answer in comments — I’ll tabulate answers and post them at a later date.

Those may not be the first two question I ask myself when I start writing, but they’re right up there. I HAVE to know his name and appearance — hero first, almost always. Until I get them right, I cannot truly begin. Names are a huge thing for me. I can’t use a placeholder name to start out; too much baggage attaches to it, and then when I try to switch to the “real” name, I find I’m writing about a completely different person.

The title of the book is much the same, though it can wait a little while. I do have to put a good name to it sometime before I hit the end of Act I, however–usually before I complete the proposal–and I tend to obsess until I come up with something I like. I’ve had to change a couple of titles after I turned the manuscripts in, though, and strangely, it didn’t bother me like a character name change does. All I did was obsess again until my editor and I agreed to something.

As for appearance, that’s more general but just as critical. Really, a blond hero is different from a raven-haired one, and if you add a streak of silver to the raven, well you have someone entirely new. I’m not one of those people who does a collage, but I do clip images on the internet and save them. Dozens of them (more on that in another post).

What brought this up is that I got my cover art for Immortal Warrior a few days ago. It’s gorgeous, all hero all the way. Unfortunately, it’s also preliminary, so I can’t share it yet — and I did ask. Though the cover model doesn’t look anything like who I pictured while I was writing, he’s a perfectly wonderful stand in. In fact, he has replaced my original model in my mind and heart. I’ve asked for his name and will share it when I can post the cover. This boy has a chest…omigod.

So while we’re waiting, I thought you might like to see what Ivo looked like while I was writing him. Turns out, he was a dead ringer for the juicy, tortured, wonderful Captain Etienne Navarre from Ladyhawke (aka Rutger Hauer)–except he wore grey.

Sigh,

I followed a link from BoingBoing today and discovered the wonderful blog for PingMag, “The Tokyo based magazine about Design and Making Things.” They cover all sorts of traditional and non-traditional Japanese crafts, and how they integrate their design sense into today’s world. This specific post, Imitating Nature, about (of all things) food containers brought back happy memories of the 7 months I lived in Japan about 20 years ago.

As a participant in the first year of the Japan Exchange and Teaching Program (JET), I helped teach English at Kessennuma Nishi Koko (Kessennuma West High School) in Miyagi Prefecture. On weekends, I traveled as much as I could around northern Japan, and the beautiful bentos (lunch boxes) sold at the train stations–each station offers its own specialty and its own presentation–and the souvenir foods I carried home to my office mates always delighted me. Finding this post at PingMag was like taking a short trip back.

The JET Program, by the way, was one of the best things I ever did. I treasure every memory and heartily recommend it to anyone who has a desire to see Japan from the inside.

Lisa

…Romantic Movies and Molten Chocolate Cake.

Not everyone wants to spend Valentine’s evening in an overpriced restaurant. Some of us like to curl up next to the person we love and enjoy some of life’s sweeter pleasures.

Here are a few of my suggestions for romantic movies to watch tonight, and a link to a great recipe.

An Affair to Remember — Don’t we all want someone like Cary Grant to fall in love with us?

Sabrina (the Harrison Ford/Julia Ormond remake). — When he tells her father he doesn’t deserve her, but “I need her. And I don’t need anything,” my heart melts. And the music…just lovely. Make sure you watch the Sting video of “In the Moonlight” after the credits.

Shall We Dance — This movie does it for me on so many levels, but especially the relationship between Richard Gere’s character and his wife. Probably something to do with being married to a man who doesn’t dance–not even in the kitchen.

Robin and Marian — Bittersweet tale of the legendary lovers in their golden years.

The African Queen — Crusty riverboat captain and prim, old-maid missionary. Humphrey Bogart and Katharine Hepburn. Mosquitos and leeches. Sigh.

Breakfast at Tiffany’s — The first time I walked into the Main Reading Room of the Public Library on Fifth Avenue in NYC, I got all verklempt. I even looked up “Varjak, Paul” in the card file, hoping they had a dummy card in there just for people like me. Moon River.

Now, pick one (or two), make individual Molten Chocolate Cakes from this recipe that originally appeared in Bon Appetit magazine, and settle in with your significant other for an evening of romance.

Come to think of it, this would make a pretty fine evening even without the significant other.

Lisa

Remember those dioramas we used to do as kids?

Well, one of my favorite diversions Boing-Boing (”A directory of wonderful things”), has an article today on Lori Nix, an artist who has taken the diorama idea to a level beyond imagining. She builds, then photographs, table-top worlds of incredible detail and beauty. I’m giving you a link, here, to her website, going to a page where I think some of her most compelling images are, but be sure to click on the other links on her sidebar.

You may never look at your kids’ homework projects the same way. You may never look at the world the same way.

Lisa

UPDATE: 29 Apr 2008 –

Wired Mag has a wonderful article on Lori Nix, “Nature Conquers Micropolis in Dioramas Photographed to Look Real.”  Worth checking out–although beware the photos.  Due to some error at Wired, they’ve mixed in pix from another article on “tilt Shifting,” a technique that strives to make the real world look like a model—precisely the reverse of Nix’s work.

http://www.wired.com/culture/art/multimedia/2008/04/pl_arts

I found a piece by Steve Martin at the Smithsonian Magazine website today. Even though the title is Being Funny, it’s not really about being funny. It’s about professionalism, finding your voice, being true to yourself, hard work, and a myriad other things a writer needs to make part of his or her soul.

And about being funny.

Be sure to watch the video that’s linked at the top of the article (Martin’s breakthrough Tonight Show performance). Just be sure you don’t have a mouth full of coffee. I nearly sprayed my keyboard.

Lisa

My favorite technology blog, LifeHacker: tips and downloads for getting things done, had a great post today linking to 10 *free* online writing courses.

The original article from Education Portal tells you how to find courses from poetry to technical writing, from top-notch schools like MIT, the UK’s Open University, and UCLA.

I’m going off to download the screenwriting course, right now.

Lisa

They’re good kids. Really they are. I love them very, very much. They’re even old enough I don’t have to pay attention to them every minute.

But it snowed Sunday night, enough that the district cancelled school yesterday, so they were home all day. Wanting to talk. Wanting to eat. Wanting to play video games. Wanting to *breathe*. I don’t know about other writers, but I have issues with people who breathe while I’m writing, or at least when I’m starting a project. Until my characters manifest fully and are so clear in my head that they refuse to go away until the story’s done, the presence of other people in the same vicinity rips me out of the zone (Twilight Zone, Writing Zone, whatever). I need not just privacy, but solitude.

So, you say, that was yesterday. I have my solitude back today. Why am I bitching?

Because it’s snowing again. Big, floofy flakes right out of the last scene of White Christmas. Gorgeous. I should be smiling. Instead, I’m thinking that if it keeps up, they might cancel school again tomorrow.

Sigh.

Lisa

UPDATE! (Weds, 30 Jan 08) — Yep. They’ve closed the schools, and in the nastiest possible way. At 7am when I checked, there was only a 2 hour delayed start. Then at 8am, one of the kids’ friends called to say it had changed to a full closure. That makes 4 days off in the last 8. (A holiday and an inservice day last week, and 2 snow days this week. So far).

Sigh