Bev Vincent

Ann and Nancy Wilson serenaded us to sleep last night.

The Woodlands Pavilion is three miles away from us and on nights like last night, with low cloud cover, the sound travels. At first my wife thought we were hearing Led Zeppelin, but it was Jason Bonham doing his stuff. Then Heart came on. I could make out “Magic Man” quite clearly. It was almost like they were in the back yard. Not quite, but almost. Apparently Bonham joined them for “Stairway to Heaven.” I saw them at the Pavilion back in the 90s. It was probably pretty soggy on the hill last night, though—we had heavy rain for a few hours before the concert started.

I received a copy of the second edition of The Stephen King Illustrated Companion last night. What’s that, you say? A second edition? Yes, as opposed to a second printing, which this book already had. Earlier this year, I revised the existing text in a couple of places (the chapter on The Shining and the chapter on The Dark Tower), wrote a new chapter (“Changing the Past Isn’t As Easy As You Might Think”) and updated the conclusion. The changes to The Shining chapter are minor (a look forward to the sequel), and The Dark Tower chapter now makes note of The Wind Through the Keyhole. The new Chapter 13 is about projects that have their origins in the 1970s that were completed recently: Under the Dome and 11/22/63, along with some discussion of Doctor Sleep. The conclusion now mentions Joyland and looks forward to Mister Mercedes, and I updated the sidebar about Ghost Brothers of Darkland County.

It comes out on November 5, but Barnes & Noble has it listed for sale already. One other major change with this edition is that the removable documents have been, well, removed. Some are omitted completely and others are reproduced flat on the page. No little envelopes. Makes a great Christmas gift!

I’ve been letting my new short story percolate. Not on purpose, though. Needs must. I received the page proofs for another short story that will appear in a 2014 anthology that has not yet been announced, so I can’t say more except I’m really excited about this one. It’s one of those really pro anthologies. You know, the rare kind where there is a content editor, a copyeditor and a proofreader. Just like a real book! Stay tuned: I should be able to announce it in a few weeks.

I also had to format and edit a 7000-word document that a group of us are going to shop around for publication. And this morning I wrote my Storytellers Unplugged essay for this Saturday. And, of course, I had to spend some time fawning over the new copy of The Stephen King Illustrated Companion.

Watched the second episode of Broadchurch. I like it a lot. It feels a bit like The Killing.

It’s only going to be 97° tomorrow. What a relief.

I’m a thousand words into the new story I wrote about last time. Yesterday, while on the elliptical, I managed to sketch out the bones of the plot, so I now know where it’s all going. That’s not the normal way for me. I usually start each day’s writing unsure where I’m heading. Of course there’s always a possibility that I’ll discover something different as I write, but in this case I don’t think so. The mental plot seems perfect for the story I want to tell. The question remains how well I’ll be able to capture in words what I want to say. As I tweeted this morning, “I do my best writing when I’m nowhere near a pen or a keyboard. If only I could set down on paper what my mind’s eye sees so vividly.”

I’m fascinated by the similarities and differences between The Bridge and it’s Scandinavian predecessor Bron. For example, the bit with the wallet played out almost exactly the same in both, with only slight differences in the chronology. The bit with the iron, too, except for the desert scene. The story of the shoplifter who seeks refuge in the other country, though, has a much different trajectory. In Bron, the runaway ends up staying with the guy for a few days. He has no bad intentions toward her. Also, Saga’s sister committed suicide, whereas Sonya’s sister was killed by someone else, or so it seems.

I’m taking part in the next Horror Writers Association Roundtable this Sunday evening at 8 pm Eastern/7 pm Central. The theme is “the continuing impact of Stephen King.” Rocky Wood, Michael Collings and I will talk among ourselves for the first thirty minutes. Between 8:30 and 9:30 Eastern, we will respond to anything the audience wants to ask or comment upon. Drop by and see what it’s all about, if you have time. See more about the process here: http://www.horror.org/blog/horror-roundtable/

I found this on my front porch on Saturday. Inside, two boxes containing the signature pages for the PS Publishing 30th Anniversary Edition of Pet Sematary, for which I wrote the afterword. Ramsey Campbell, who wrote the forward, has already sign them. After me, they go to the two artists. Guess what I’m doing this evening? I like the blue bag. It looks like something Santa Smurf would use.

I posted three book reviews this weekend: Hit Me by Lawrence Block, Save Yourself by Kelly Braffet and The Truth by Michael Palin. I also managed last week to get my message board back up and running again. I was afraid for a while that I was going to lose six weeks’ worth of posts, but I don’t think I lost anything at all thanks to my ISP’s regular backup protocol.

The Revised & Updated second edition of The Illustrated Stephen King Trivia Book, edited by Brian Freeman and me, will ship in August. Cemetery Dance is still taking pre-orders.

I watched Drinking Buddies via OnDemand this weekend. It stars Olivia Wilde and Ron Livingston (who always reminds me of the guy from Early Edition). I didn’t know much about it going in—I thought it might end up being the “beer” version of Sideways, but there wasn’t much about beer in the film, beyond the amount the characters consumed. Apparently much of the dialog is improvised. The film is about two couples, one of which consists of Wilde and Livingston. The other couple has a woman who wants to talk about marriage and a guy who doesn’t, though he claims he will think about it. The guy and Wilde’s character are coworkers at the brewery and they are buddies, but after a double-date weekend at a cabin, things shift. All four characters seem to want something different, but none of them are sure how to go about it. It’s filled with the kind of honest awkwardness of young people trying to figure out relationships. It has funny moments and painful ones.

David Morrell recommended The Bridge, a new FX series set in El Paso and Juarez, based on the Danish series Bron. It opens with the discovery of a body in the middle of the bridge between the two countries (made me think of Bon Cop, Bad Cop, the Canadian film about a homicide where the victim is found on the Quebec / Ontario border). Because of the location and the nature of the murder victim(s), a joint task force is formed. Representing El Paso homicide is a cop played by Diane Kruger, whose character happens to have Asperger syndrome (although that isn’t spelled out). On the Mexican side, Demian Bichir’s world-weary cop, who has just had a vasectomy (only to discover that his wife is pregnant again). He was the druglord in Weeds. Also in the cast, Ted Levine (Monk, Silence of the Lambs) as Kruger’s character’s boss and father figure, and Annabeth Gish. A serial killer is trying to get people to take note of the number of murders in Juarez that go unsolved and uninvestigated. Three episodes in, and so far so good.

Series three of Luther took no hostages. There is a stunning development in the middle of the four episode run, and the return of a much-loved sociopath near the end. No word on whether there’ll be a fourth series or if they’ll spin off, either to a motion picture or an Alice-centric series.

This week’s The Killing was quite intense. The final moments reminded me of the bad death of Eduard Delacroix. Only one more episode left to go. At first I wasn’t all that sold on the season, but it’s been getting better. Dexter has been taking some interesting turns, too. After tearing everything apart, it looks like things are starting to come back together, a bit.

My message board is hosed at the moment. It stopped responding at all on Monday. The browser just showed the wait icon and eventually it timed out. So I contacted my ISP support. The first thing they did “got it working” again while simultaneously rolling back the clock to 2009. I do have a backup from about six weeks ago, but I think the interim posts will be lost. I wish it was easier to migrate to another board while preserving the history, but this one is not an easy one to port to a more reliable system. I’ll have to give it some thought.

I went to see Pacific Rim last night. Good film. Exhilarating. Lots of big robots fighting big monsters. After a while those scenes got a little mind-numbing. What good does throwing a monster into the water do? Demonstrably nothing, yet they do it again and again. The “rules” of how to defeat a kaiju seemed a little vague. Why wait until the last moment to whip out this massive sword that works when bashing the monsters in the face doesn’t?

At least there were some good substories interwoven to break up the fight scenes and a touch of (overplayed) comic relief, though I did like the final scene with Ron Perlman. A little bit of characterization goes a long way. I thought they’d do more with the 3D, but it was mostly quite subtle. The starfield at the beginning was impressive, but I didn’t really notice it after that.

The cast was good, consisting mostly of “that guy who plays” actors. People you’re more likely to recognize from previous roles instead of their names. The guy who plays Jax on Sons of Anarchy (as well as the guy who plays Clay). The guy who played Stringer Bell on The Wire. The guy who played Owen on Torchwood. The guy who plays Mike on Homeland. The guy who was Mack on The Unit. I was especially taken with Mana Yashida, who plays the young Mako in a flashback sequence.

I’m not sure what the future holds for the film. I went to see it at a 5:30 pm showing and I was the only one in the theater at 5:10. It was only playing in one of the 20 or so screens in our community. More people did come along eventually, but it seems to be fading fast in the theaters and this is a film you definitely want to see on the big screen. I went by myself because I thought this was a film my wife wouldn’t like, but in retrospect I think she might have enjoyed it.

Last month at World Horror, several people asked me if I was going to NECON. I was non-committal at best. It’s by far my favorite convention, but I couldn’t see going to two within just a few weeks. I missed NECON last year and had resigned myself to missing NECON 33 as well.

As the time drew closer, though, I began to debate with myself over going. I’d just about have myself convinced and then I’d have second thoughts. Back and forth I went. Finally, I decided to see what airfare to Providence would cost this close to the convention. I discovered, to my delight, that I had enough frequent flier miles to pay for the trip, so it only cost $85 for the plane ticket. I asked my wife what she thought, she said I should go, and that decided it. I went. And boy am I glad I did.

I wonder how many people make up the NECON extended family. Attendance caps out at 200 per year, but a lot of the same people have been going for years. Decades, in some cases. Most people, once they go the first time, are hooked. A few don’t get the concept of NECON, which is almost an anti-convention in a sense, and never come back again, but they’re rare, I think.

My late decision messed up my schedule a bit, so I didn’t have time to write something new for Storytellers Unplugged this month. Instead I recycled a 2007 essay called Why go to conventions? that seemed appropriate, both in its timing and subject matter.

I got into Providence on Thursday afternoon, rented a car and drove down to the convention center. Our annual tradition is to have dinner at Jacky’s Galaxie, a Chinese restaurant in Bristol, RI. Our group was smaller this year, but it was still a lot of fun, and everything everyone does is fodder for jokes the rest of the weekend.

Because of the heat and humidity on Friday morning, they decided to swap out bowling for miniature golf (can’t have all those writers dying from heat stroke). The last time there was bowling (two years ago), I played with Dan Foley and Rick Hautala…and won the gold medal. My only NECON olympics medal ever. I almost went again, but part of me wanted to preserve the memory of playing with Rick, who was the subject of a memorial on Thursday evening. That was the last time I saw him.

Instead, I joined up with Brian Keene, Mary SanGiovanni, Dave Thomas and Rio Youers for a pilgrimage to Lovecraft’s grave. It was hot as blazes, but we had a great time, took lots of pictures, prepared gags for future use. The grave (pictured) is quite small. Hard to read in the direct light. It has his name and dates and, at the bottom, “I am Providence.” There’s also a monument in front of it that has his parents’ names along with his. People have put coins (mostly American, but I saw a Rand coin and a Canadian quarter) on top of the headstone, and, for reasons I don’t grok, have left business cards. We stopped off at a bar near the waterfront for lunch. A great outing, and the day was only half over.

I went to a couple of panels in the afternoon, then eight of us went out to dinner on the waterfront. My meal was delivered much later than everyone else’s, but I didn’t mind because I was having such a good time talking to people. Apparently they had cooked the wrong kind of salmon or something like that. Jack Haringa was amazed that I didn’t complain more or demand that the meal be taken off the check. Then he remembered that I’m Canadian and said, “I’ll bet you even apologized to the waitress!” We had ice cream after, eating fast to keep ahead of the melting desert on the boardwalk. Then it was back to the convention for the toastmaster’s speech (Rio Youers) and the NECON update (Mike Myers). Fifteen minutes into the program we were already 90 minutes behind schedule, but that’s NECON.

It was a bittersweet meeting, with recent losses and illnesses. Everything seemed fraught with emotion, but that was primarily because NECON is family, something that was reiterated over the weekend at just about every opportunity. Coming to this convention is like going to a family reunion. For many people, it’s probably better than going to a family reunion. There were a lot of voices breaking and tears shed this year. It’s that kind of a group and show.

After the autograph session, the party went on until the wee small hours, in the courtyard or the bar area or out front. A person could just drift from conversation to conversation to conversation. I had such a good time talking to Hank Wagner that I forgot to have anything to drink. Good times.

Saturday evening was the infamous game show (which set a record for brevity this year) and the roast (which did not). Before those started, though, the NECON Whores serenaded Papa Necon, Bob Booth, in their inimitable fashion. The NECON Whores started with Beth Massie and her sister many years ago. This year there must have been 20 or more in the chorale. Bob was beaming as each one in turn did something mildly lascivious to him. There was the ritual shaving of Rio Youers’ head (not a NECON tradition, but it could turn into one, I suppose). Linda Addison was the roast victim (after a clever bit of sleight of hand involving Jose Nieto). Then it was more conversation and saugies in the courtyard. I enjoyed chatting with guest of honor Kealan Patrick Burke, who I’d never met before to the best of my knowledge. There are always new friends to be made in addition to the old gang.

Sooner than expected, it was over. I had a 9:30 a.m. flight on Sunday, so I had to sneak off quite early. No one was stirring when I checked out and headed out to the parking lot. I had said most of my goodbyes the night before (a few hours earlier, in fact), but I know I’ll see almost everyone again, next July. I’m exhausted and scrambling to catch up, but I wouldn’t have missed it for anything.

We finally got some rain yesterday. For much of the weekend, we’d hear rumbles of thunder in the distance but the storms always managed to avoid us until last night when we got a few good showers, and more this morning. They’ve been a long time coming and are welcome indeed.

I think it’s amusing that when we heard a lot of birds making a racket outside our house the other morning, my wife immediately thought of my father, who enjoyed feeding and watching birds, and I thought of Alfred Hitchcock.

I have to say that I don’t care much for the new chapter of the original Angry Birds. The game play is completely different. I guess it’s the same as their companion game, Bad Piggies. That doesn’t mean I’m not determined to 3-star the level, but it’s not nearly as much fun as the classic playing mode.

Did my first bit of serious furniture repair this weekend. My daughter has a favorite chair that had the bottom  let go so the springs were dangling from it and it had lost all support. I don’t really understand out that little piece of canvas held the springs in place. I bought a 2′ x 3′ sheet of 1/8″ plywood, traced out the shape of the bottom of the chair, resuscitated my old jigsaw and made a new bottom that should hold the whole thing together. Quite pleased with myself. Only one blister from putting in the screws. Those springs are strong.

Still working to clear my desk of obligations and not quite seeing the end of the tunnel yet. This weekend I posted three new book reviews: The Year of the Ladybird by Graham Joyce, Let Me Go by Chelsea Cain and Light of the World by James Lee Burke. I started reading The Cuckoo’s Calling by Robert Galbraith (aka JK Rowling) and am quite enjoying it. I like it more than her previous book, The Casual Vacancy.

We watched a feel-good film called 33 Postcards on the weekend. It’s a Chinese/Australian collaboration starring Guy Pearce. It’s about this guy who’s been sponsoring an orphan in China for over a decade, spinning tales about what his life is like. By the hugest of coincidences, the orphanage choir is invited to go to Sydney where the girl, now 16, wanders off by herself and manages not to get hopelessly lost or in big trouble, only to find out that the guy has been in prison all these years, serving time for manslaughter. By the most preposterous of coincidences, he’s due for parole right about now, too. OK, so it lacks credibility, but it was a cute movie dotted by scenes of prison shankings.

Had a relaxing four-day weekend mostly away from technology. It was warm, but nice enough that we could sit out on the back deck. A little bit of a breeze would have been appreciated, but you can’t have everything. One good thing about this drought that we’re in is that there were no mosquitoes at all. We had the citronella candles burning on Sunday just in case, but I think we could have done without them.

I read The Year of the Ladybird by Graham Joyce over the weekend. Ladybirds, for those of us on this side of the Atlantic, are ladybugs. The book recently acquired a US publisher, so it’s only available via the import market at the moment and it will reportedly have a different title over here to acknowledge the difference between English and English. The first thing that struck me was the general similarity in concept to Joyland. A man remembers an incident from his youth in the 1970s during a memorable summer when he (a) joined the circus on the American coast or (b) worked at a summer camp on the British coast. Both are coming of age novels, and both have love and intrigue and ghosts, but the similarities end there, by which I meant they aren’t clones of each other. Joyce has a story to tell that is significantly different from King’s, but they have a wonderful sense of nostalgia and wonder in common. Highly recommended.

To “cleanse my palate” before tackling a gritty crime novel, I’m reading Stranger Than Fiction: The Life and Times of Split Enz, written by band member Mike Chunn. I discovered Split Enz when their True Colors album came out, famous for having laser etchings on the disk. I became a big fan of the group and the various other efforts by the Finn brothers, including, of course, Crowded House. I find memoirs like this fascinating because they so often reveal how little planning went into things that happened. They were determined, they had talent, and good things happened for them. Bad things, too.

We watched The Impossible on Saturday, starring Naomi Watts and Ewan McGregor as the parents of three kids, vacationing in Thailand when the 2004 tsunami struck and washed them all away. It’s based on the real-life experience of a Spanish family and hews fairly close to their experiences. The tsunami scenes are stunning. It’s hard to believe that it was all done with miniatures or in a water tank. I’m not exactly sure why Watts was Oscar nominated—she’s good, but she spends a lot of the film in a coma. The real standout is the young actor who plays the oldest son, who was just twelve (though the actor was at least a few years older than that).