more snow! and guess what I'm reading......

Guess what I am reading? If you guessed something to do with Veronica Mars, you'd be right! Neptune Noir, edited by Rob Thomas, the creator, writer, and producer of Veronica Mars. It is a collection of essays written by people who love the show, in various capacities (psychologists, teachers, writers, and fans of the show), and includes an introduction by Rob Thomas. His introduction is worth the price of the book, for he writes of how he broke into Hollywood TV land initially with great success, and then had a period of 5 years when nothing sold, nothing was picked up, and he had to write here and there for other shows before Veronica Mars was made.
What I find so interesting and food for thought is that Rob initially was a high school teacher and teen novelist, writing several books for teenagers before breaking into television with Cupid (a very short-run but delightful tv series some time ago). He describes how he initially had the idea about a teen detective, "a boy who becomes ostracized by his peers when his sheriff father botches a murder investigation of one of his classmates." The idea was sold as a book idea, but he didn't write it then, and eventually, over time, the idea morphed into a teen girl, and the boy became her father. Thus the roots of Veronica Mars is in a novel, and I can't help thinking that this is one of the things that underlays how good the show is. Of course, the story arcs, characters, and dialogues are all a result of the creative people who worked on the show from 2004-2007, not Thomas himself, but he oversaw each season and wrote some of the episodes, as well as produced the three seasons. I can't help but think that that novelist's sense of drama and character development is a large part of the success of Veronica Mars. And in case you hadn't guessed or heard, Veronica Mars is very noir, including Veronica's voice-overs as part of the narrative in each show, her comments on what she is doing providing clues to herself as well as the people around her. It is very Chandler-esque, and it succeeds wonderfully, even though we don't commonly associate females with the tough loner/outsider role that characterizes the hero/PI of noir mysteries. Veronica is a loner and outsider, and the series shows how she became that way, and yet, she is still capable of making friends and of loving, and the show is filled with humour and wry sarcasm and most of all Veronica's indefatigable sense of survival. She doesn't give up, she finds a way to go on. And she wants to make sense of the world around her, she wants to understand why. This I very much relate to - I've been accused of asking too many questions by people around me! It's not meant to be an invasion of privacy (for Veronica it is, but she is a PI whereas I am not!), I just want to understand why people do what they do. I want to know what motivates people.
So.....when I showed my husband that I had bought another book yesterday, his face fell until I pointed out I was reading again! and yes, I am still obsessed with VM.......first season finally arrived, so I am rewatching to see everything I missed the first time I saw it, especially now that I know how it all ends. In terms of continuity and referencing to other episodes, this is one of the best shows I've seen for doing it.
I'll write a final conclusion when I'm done the book, but meantime it is very enjoyable and gives a sense of how much thought other people have put into why they love it so much.


Well, we had our second snowfall in three days today. Between 25 -30 cm fell today. After freezing rain and 5 cm of snow on Monday, we have now reached a milestone: WE ARE AT THE NUMBER 2 POSITION FOR TOTAL SNOWFALL IN A SEASON!!!!! Yes, I had to capitalize that........not since 1971 have we seen this much snowfall! We still have a way to go to catch up - about 90 cm of snow. My thinking is, if we have to do this much shovelling, then we might as well go all the way and try to break the record! so bring it on! there is still three weeks of March to go......right, now you get the idea of what we talk about in the winter here in Canada....the cold and the snow! Has anyone noticed the daylight lasting longer??? I have, and I am so thrilled to leave work at 5 pm and it's still sunny out! (when the sun shines, that is)..... I no longer feel like a vampire!!!

Kidnapped by Veronica Mars

I'm back! For those of my regular Gentle Readers, I have been missing in action for a week.....but a word of explanation is in order. Two words. Veronica Mars. A U.S tv show, that was aired for the last three years, and sadly cancelled last May.
Yes, me, who can count on one hand the tv shows I watch regularly, was CAPTURED by this wonderful teen mystery/drama three weeks ago when I was home with a virus. I couldn't read, and needed something to let me rest in front of the tv mindlessly because I was too tired from the virus to do anything. I had heard friends talking about the show over the past year. So, I picked up season one on DVD from our local video store.......and from the opening episode, I was HOOKED. I watched the whole season in 3 days, late into the night, as soon as the kids were gone to school and daycare, any moment i had I was watching. Then came Season Two, as the virus spread to my glands and I had another week at home. By this time I was dreaming about Veronica, Logan, Lilly, the bus crash, the murder, Cassidy, Wallace. I would wake up and think Veronica and Logan HAVE to get together, and start wondering how the show would do it. Last week I watched Season 3....finished on Monday.....and then I had a day off from watching, where I went online to read about the show....then back to V.M. again on Thursday, this time to take it slower, to watch each episode carefully. Yes, I am hooked!
It is like the very best books - Veronica Mars has interesting stories, wonderful characters and setting, and witty dialogue. It's smart and topical without a hint of preachiness, the acting is superb, and best of all, it's like a modern Nancy Drew, with just a hint of Twin Peaks - a comment often seen in other reviews - it is good.
I can't rave about it enough, mostly because this show has everything - romance, mystery, death, desire, bad boys and good boys, friendships, alienation, set in the fictional town of Neptune California (where it NEVER snows! Ok, my secret is out, I need sunshine so badly that I'm watching a California based show!!). It's intense, and the characters are realistic, and it avoids formula anything for the most part; even with solving the episode mysteries, each relates to the greater story arc for the season. Characters move forward, and storylines connect. This is really storytelling at its best, and so for those of us who read, I can't recommend it enough as an example of really good - the best kind, of tv that can be done. And it's funny, and warm, too, with Veronica's relationship with her dad Keith, as well as her friends and boyfriends, at the heart of the show. I simply love it. I've ordered Season 1, and as soon as it arrives, I will be starting all over again. And I really wish Veronica Mars hadn't been cancelled!! The morning after I finished Season 3, I woke up feeling such a great loss that there won't be any more Veronica and Logan, no more Wallace, no more Neptune.

I have to explain also that there was a death in my family on Feb 17 and as is usual for me, I withdraw while I cope with the emotions. It was a distant part of my family, but someone connected intimately with my core family - my stepmother's mother passed away, and there are intense emotions and conflicts with this part of my family. So, I have been coping as best I can, while seeing my own beloved sisters (it was their grandmother who died) and attending the funeral.

Normally I would read to cope with loss, but Veronica Mars has been totally unexpected, and i have given myself over completely to absorbing this tv show. And one of the best things I am learning is watching the story develop, and applying that knowledge to my own writing. What do I like best about this tv show? Why? Are these qualities in my own writing? what writing moves me? There are the occasional flaws with Veronica Mars, too - but not many - and these also I examine.

So I have not abandoned my challenges, I am just behind! And still have not located Ulysses, so I will have to read Dubliners instead, for my February birthday month.

I am not quite ready yet to read - I am working my way through The Canadian Settler's Handbook, and have about a quarter of it left to read.

So, in lieu of any memes for the past few weeks that I have missed (and there are about 4 that I really want to do!), here is my question for my Gentle Readers: Have you ever been captured by a tv show or movie series? and why? And are there any books or writers that give you the same experience?

For myself, for books, I would have to say:
- the best of Stephen King - The Shining, It, are two of my favourites - and his new one is getting raves so it's now added to my birthday list! I have stayed up nights reading him, not able to put the books down, and have had times when parts of the books have haunted me long after reading it. The Shining is one of my all-time horror novels. It is one that scares me so much that I have to have someone around me, to be able to read it. Is this great writing, or what? And he does dialogue like no one else can.
- Gorky Park - Martin Cruz Smith - one of the best mysteries ever written. This is a book I've given to other people. And it's set in Russia, which at the time (mid 1980's) was still unknown territory. Setting, dialogue, characters, this is unputdownable.
-Anne of Green Gables series - as a child, I read the whole set - all 8 books - over and over again. I am still the only person I know who read Rilla of Ingleside and Rainbow Valley, the last two in the set. The first three, Anne of Green Gables, Anne of Avonlea and Anne of the Island, were and are permanent books that went everywhere with me in my multitude of moves. Anne and her red hair, and Gilbert the love of her life, the wonderful Matthew and Marilla. This was my first exposure to small-town Canadian life, and still remains among the best for capturing Canada at the turn of the century.
- The Lord of the Rings. Once I start these, I cannot put them down! I have read these at least, at least, 5 times. And the Silmarillion at least 3. I am so counting down to when I can start reading The Hobbit to my children. This is among the standard-bearers of modern fantasy, and has a rhythm of storytelling that echoes the Norse myths it is based on. My only complaint has always been the lack of strong female characters, but since I love Aragorn and Frodo and Faramir, and Sam best of all, and Rivendell, and the evil of Mordor is so well-depicted, it is still the standard to beat, for me. And, I still stay up late in the night to read just one more chapter....
- Sorcery & Cecilia, or the Enchanted Chocolate Pot, by Caroline Stevermer and Patricia Wrede,
- Bellwether - Connie Willis
- Doomsday Book - Connie Willis
- Black and Blue - Ian Rankin
- In the Garden of Iden - Kage Baker
- Robin Hobb's Assassin trilogy
- Summon the Keeper - Tanya Huff
- Anne Frank, the Diary of a Young Girl
These are books that I have given copies to other people to read, that I have re-read, and still enjoy. It's not my permanent nor exhaustive list - my shelves are all double-rowed and piled in front with more books, so it's the list that first comes to mind when I think of books I can't put down. Each of the above books have powerful images (for me) that are now part of me, that the book evokes in me. I can't put them down, when I read them. And that for me is the very best way to read, and why last year was a disappointment because I didn't find a book that did that for me. So, here's hoping that in amongst my challenges I find an unputdownable book for this year! It is as rare as the very best of tv shows. It's actually nice to be able to say there have been things on TV that I love, that I have fallen in love with.

And, IT'S MARCH 1 today!!!! Hurray!!! 19 days to spring......I am ignoring the 10 +cm of snow that fell over night last night, after having the two coldest days and nights of the winter so far.....spring is nearer!!

Oh, and to finish my own quiz: tv series I can't live without, that I have bought the dvd set and do watch again and again:
- the new Dr Who from BBC in the UK
-Battlestar Galactica (the new version from the US)
-X-files
-Buffy
-Firefly
-Veronica Mars
-Six Feet Under
-the Office (British and US versions)
-Original Star Trek (when the price drops)
-Babylon 5
-Twin Peaks
- House Season 1&2
- Lost Season 1

Looking at the list, I see that it is made up of science fiction mostly. Interesting. I wonder if it is the ideas that science fiction presents - speculation, what if? - or just that I like space travel and would give anything for us to be able to travel in space! - that makes it better than sitcom tv? I have watched Friends, Frasier (Frasier was a must-see for years), but I don't need to own the seasons - I don't need to watch them every few years or so. I will have to think awhile on this list. Maybe there is something I should be including in my own writing that I have missed....though I have an idea for a space opera/station story, which is currently big in the SF world, I would always make it less science and more people oriented, like Babylon 5 was. And how does Jane Austen fit into any of this?? H-m-m-m, a space station story with witty dialogue and romance between the rich and poor! Anyway, food for thought on this snowy March day. I hope you are enjoying whatever you are doing, today.