Short Story Saturday - Abyssus Abyssum Invocat, by Genevieve Valentine

The first time I heard of Genevieve Valentine, I was looking at books by Catherynne Valente and happened to see Valentine's Mechanique: A Tale of the Circus Tresaulti.

It's a book I need to re-read, because it's been too long since I first read it. Mechanique is a story about a circus troupe made up of completely and partially mechanical performers. The circus travels the world, trying to avoid the war that seems to be going on everywhere, and performing wherever there are people to watch and pay. As they do, there is a battle going on between two of the troupe's best performers, and the clash of war within and war without is an inevitability I tensely waited for as I read. Genevieve Valentine slowly reveals one detail after another about the performers and their pasts, creating a beautiful story that reads like a circus show of one astounding feat after another.

I've decided to start my Short Story Saturday series off with Valentine's short story "Abyssus Abyssum Invocat." It's a story about a mermaid and a boy and the way two people's souls call to each other. Valentine evokes a feeling of poetry and old-world storytelling, and she tells a story that is romantic, tragic, and strange. She puts words together beautifully, and I'll be thinking about her story for a long time. Because it's such a short story, I can't tell you much more without giving away the whole thing, so if you're interested in what I've already said, you should click on the title and go read it. :)

Book Review: The Night Circus by Erin Morgenstern

The Night Circus is purely magical. Opening its covers is like stepping into a dream from which you will never want to wake; every element of the story is almost painfully beautiful. If I were dropped on a desert island with only a single box of books, this book would be in that box.

The Night Circus is the story of Celia and Marco, a girl and a boy chosen and trained by two different magicians to compete in a game of illusion and strength. The game commences when they are adults, and it is played in a dream-like circus that travels the world. One illusionist travels with the circus while the other plays from afar. They fall in love, neither of them realizing that the game will only end when one of them dies. The circus impacts more and more lives the longer it goes on, and not always in a good way. Alongside the interplay of Celia and Marco is the story of Bailey, a boy fascinated by the circus who will play an integral role in the story as the two story lines merge.

Erin Morgenstern's book is wonderful. The setting is enchanting, story is interesting, and the prose is beautiful. The characters could have been developed further, since I feel like the defining characteristics of the main characters were quite similar (one of their major features is that they are all obsessed with books), but that is really the only criticism I have of this book. I can't wait to see what she writes next!

Book Review: Girl Genius by Kaja and Phil Foglio

I have to confess an addiction to Pat Rothfuss's blog. He is a spectacular writer, and his blog is well written and funny. At any rate, after reading his recent post about Girl Genius, I proceeded to the Girl Genious website and spent the next week immersed in the comic every spare minute I had. Literally. There were times when I opened up my laptop to read just half of a page. :) I am desperately sad that I've read everything there is for now, and I'm going a little crazy in a corner of my mind that the story is not yet finished.

I cannot say anything about Girl Genious that Pat didn't say, except that, when I have $22 that's not immediately due to pay some bill or another, I'll be buying that first book, and I won't be sending it to Pat to take him up on his guarantee!

Chicks with Sticks Continued...

I'm still working from The Chicks with Sticks, but I skipped the knit clutch pattern because (I'm sorry, chicks) it's one of the very few projects in the book I wasn't enthusiastic about, and I don't even use all the handbags I have.

I moved on to the Dirty Girl Washcloths, which I was excited about because they use purl stitch as well as knit, and the patterns are simple but cool (as well as useful!). I finished the first washcloth and knitted about 15 rows of the second when I realized that my stitches were twisted because I had been wrapping the yarn clockwise instead of counter clockwise. So I tore it all out and started over. Last night, I got to the point where I was when I started over, and it looks so good!

I can't wait to try out the basket weave stitch and then use these stitches on other, bigger projects. I'm sad because the book is due back to the library on Thursday, and someone else has already reserved it. I guess I'll just have to make a purchase this week. :)

The Chicks with Sticks Guide to Knitting, and My Camera Woes

My lack of a camera is getting more annoying than a shirt that keeps riding up to your waist. I want to take my broken camera to Best Buy tonight, but I don't know if I'll have time. We're trying to get the house clean and put together for my partner's parents to come over (they're arriving tomorrow and staying with us for 10 days), and that so far has meant a whole lot of work and not much time for anything else. If my warranty doesn't cover it, I want to get a new camera, but new camaras cost money, an item which I am lacking in any quantity.

I recently borrowed The Chicks with Sticks Guide to Knitting from the library, and I'm so excited about it! I already crochet, but knitting is just so much more versatile, and all my favorite patterns are knit. I have to admit to having been intimidated by knitting, but The Chicks with Sticks goes through everything in a fun lesson-like format. Each lesson has a project or two at the end, and most of the projects are super-cute things that I'd love to make. So far, I love the book, although their instructions for casting on seem to be missing a step, and I had to look for an online tutorial to show me how to do it. I might actually buy my own copy, since you can only keep a library book for so long.

The first project in the book is a simple fringed scarf; it's supposed to be knit using a worsted-weight wool yarn and a sparkly lace-weight yarn, but after discovering how lacking JoAnn is in the yarn variety department (next time, I'm going to the little yarn store downtown), I decided to knit mine with only one chunky Lion Brand yarn. It's called Charlotte Blue:

See, this is where the camera trouble comes in; I want to show you how far I've gotten in just a few episodes of Top Chef and Gossip Girl, but all I can do is provide stock photos of my yarn. :( I knit while my partner watches TV, and I'm pretty happy with how quickly it's going. (In a side note, I should admit that there's a deeply-hidden part of me that loves shows like Gossip Girl, even though the rest of me knows I should be ashamed of said love. This last month is the first time I've had TV (other than DVDs) in three years, which makes it even more addictive. :))

Book Review: The Magician's Elephant, by Kate DiCamillo

I hope that your holiday weekend was wonderful and relaxing, or at least busy with things you wanted to be doing!

I was busy, but happily. One of the things I did over the weekend was read The Magician's Elephant, by Kate DiCamillo, illustrated by Yoko Tanaka.

I loved this book. It is the story of an orphaned boy who lives with a soldier who fought beside his father. The boy is told by a fortuneteller that his sister lives, and in order to find her, he must follow the elephant. That same night, a magician conjurs an elephant, which falls right through the ceiling of the theater he is performing in.

The Magician's Elephant is a story about magic, and what is possible when you believe. Kate DiCamillo does not need flowery language; her writing is beautiful without pretension. The voice she uses throughout the book is simple, funny, and touching, and she does it all deftly. Yoko Tanaka's illustrations are perfect for the story. All of the illustrations are in black and white, and they capture the magical tone of the story. This story has had me asking, What if? Why not? Could it be? ever since I put it down.

First Custom Piece: The Deer Skin Journal

A couple of months ago, a friend of mine asked me if I could make a journal out of deer skin. “Why not?” I said, thinking it would be similar to leather, but thinner and maybe more supple. When I looked inside the bag she gave me several weeks later, I found myself to be holding a bag full of the scraps of home-cured, fur-still-on deer skin that were left after the hunter had made a vest out of the skin.

I’ve spent the time since then looking at other books, journals, etc., trying to get an idea of what to do with the mismatched scraps. On Sunday, I finally bucked down, pulled out the scraps and some bits of matching leather I already had, measured it, turned it upside-down, wrapped it around a text block, photographed it, and generally brainstormed. What came out of it was a rather attractive and original journal that perfectly fit one of the ~5”x7” text blocks I had already put together.

I used two pieces of the skin that matched fairly well, one for the front and one for the back, and then used a piece of supple light brown leather for the spine.

I sewed the headbands by hand, which I’ve decided is one of my favorite things about binding, and it’s especially cool because it’ll keep this journal strongly together.

The paper I used for the end pages and flyleaves is the same map paper I used to make my friend’s journal for Christmas. I do love it, but it’s a little too weak for the job of end pages, really. It folds and buckles, but that's actually kind of cool too because it makes the paper look even older.

I’m really pleased with the way the journal turned out in the end. Just a couple of final touch-ups to make sure that fur is going to stay where I put it, and it’ll be ready for its role as wedding gift to the hunter groom. :)