Meet My Sci-Fi Planet

I'm working on two books that focus on History, but the footnotes can be hellish, so I edit bits of my Sci-Fi story, too.
In my fourth book, I have an appendix with maps of my different continents. The main map of the planet originally had the continents in white and a somewhat blue ocean...
Yesterday, I decided to have some more fun and I worked to make the "planet" look real.
Thanks to this lovely site, I could do this (the stars are from Guille Pozzi on Unsplash):

A Jane Austen Question

Dear friends and lovely readers,

I've got a question from the Éditions Aikyō team: we're working on our version of Jane Austen's first edition of Sense&Sensibility and we're thinking about two possibilities.

One with every difference (punctuation and edits) between the first edition and the most recent editions:

Or one with just the edit differences:

Could you tell us which version you prefer?

I'm very tempted to send the full version with all the differences to the printer (aka my cousin Chris) so you can see how the text evolved from the first edition to the ones we have now, but it's nicer to ask you...

So???

Book News & Other Nuttiness

We're still working on launching our publishing company. Everything's slow, but things are taking shape - we think (and hope!).

I'm slowly working on editing the text of the first publication of Sense and Sensibility. It's fascinating to see what was changed in the following publication.

I'm trying to find the best way to show the differences between the two versions; I "fear" it's between classical footnotes and a different colour to show what changed. Basically I'll have to print tests...

I'm also working on checking my translation of Salomé, but I'm not going to rush because I want to be proud of that work, and poor Wilde deserves a decent translation of his work (I could hire a necromancer to have a lil' chat with both Douglas and Ross to tell them what I think of their "work" - Wilde must have been heartbroken to allow Douglas's translation to be printed... with whatever amount of correction Wilde did to the "text").

Speaking of Wilde, Cousin Chris is writing the bilingual introduction for our edition of Salomé (no massive discoveries like for our Shakespeare, but interesting facts...).

We're working on Racine's Phedre et Hippolyte. This time, we don't know if we want the original fonts and spelling and a more modern one, or just the version from 1677.

I'm also working on a comedy (Merlin, that's *hard*!!!). 

I know I mentioned this somewhere in my blog, but I need the title to work on my stories, and the one I have for this play is a tad nutty. I keep thinking, 'It's for a comedy, why not have a barmy title?'...

I've just read quite a weird "review", as a reader was telling one of our authors to not portray old people in "bed". There's nothing graphic in the story, but the person was disgusted by the idea of an old man, and an old woman making love.

Merlin! That happens in real life, and I fail to understand why that person thinks that it's more disgusting to picture old people making love than younger bipeds doing it. 

Good grief! Having fun in bed happens - and if it happens after 70... Lucky bipeds!

It was demented to read something almost ordering the author to not do that again in the future. Of course, it was an anonymous review, so the author could not answer and kindly tell that person that:

A) No one is forcing "it" to read any story, and closing a browser, or a book, is always an option.

B) Writers will write whatever they want. You can read it, or not.

[Once upon a time, drunk on positive feedback, I added a chapter to a short story I had written, and... I still regret adding that chapter. The story is still good, but not as good as in its first form. That was quite a lesson.]

Editing News

Now that we've sent our edition of Shakespeare's Sonnets and A Lover's Complaint to be officially registered, and that our work on editing Oscar Wilde's Salomé (the original French edition, and a new translation in English by yours truly - the introduction is being written by Cousin Editor-in-chief) is nearing completion, we've made a discovery: we love editing the books that we loved reading.

We're still working on our own stories or works, but it's properly exhilarating and possibly addictive to go back to the original texts, edit and dust them off (or even make discoveries), and then share them with you, dear Readers.

The day we had the idea to publish our favourite works, we came up with this list:

William Shakespeare: Sonnets - Much Ado About Nothing

Oscar Wilde: Salomé (we decided to translate it into proper English when we read how it's been treated by Douglas)

Jane Austen: Sense and Sensibility

Jean Racine: Phèdre

Charles Dickens: A Christmas Carol

We have now added:

The Forme of Cury

Edmond Rostand: Cyrano de Bergerac (a request from my aunt)

Even if it was a lot of work, editing Shakespeare gave us access to fonts that can mimic the ligatures used in the early years of printing.

Last night, in order to do something soothing after dealing with the infuriating banker, we had a look at the first edition of Racine's Phèdre et Hippolyte, and we discovered that he wrote an introduction, and that the text of the royal privilege allowing him to print the play was printed there, as well.

We're not planning to make a facsimile of it, but we started thinking that it'd be different, unusual, original to publish a version of the text as it was first printed. Perhaps it's quite a niche, but we really think it could be a different kind of edition.

De is plotting more short stories (focussing on friendship this time).

Chris is still formatting her PhD.

I've got two Muff&Sherly stories ready to be edited (and the next novel is whispering in my ear). I've been thinking about my Sordid Fairy Tales, and my Victorian spy plot, too.

We're quite busy.

Now, if only we could find a banker with a brain and get this e-bookstore started... 

PS: if there are books that you'd like us to edit, you're more than welcome to make suggestions.

That Spy Novel

My plot bunnies tend to be twisted (no surprise here).

Perhaps I decided that the action of An Honourable Spy should take place in the Victorian era because there are so many possibilities or perhaps because it would allow the plot to have some freedom and not be corseted by the current ways of spying (fewer computers, more ciphers and snitches).

I've got in my head all the background info for all my main characters, now, I just need to have a historical timeline, facts, and a plausible plot against Victoria (or other people).

I've decided that the action of my story is going to take place in 1887 and 1888 (plenty to do then!).

When I just blogged about my plot bunnies, I typed: 'An Honourable Spy (a [pseudo-]Victorian piece of nuttiness inspired by History, and too many spy novels)'. The second part was meant to give a general description, but... do you think that it might be fun to keep that in the full description of the book?

Meet Our 'Babies' [Book 1]

Since our company's website is only on Xampp for the moment, I'll use this blog to make you meet our books.

I've got photos of the one that was posted today (my cousin's M. St., which she'd promised to publish years ago):

I'll take pictures of the others as soon as I can (yes, I know, it was silly not to take pics of our 'babies' before we mailed them to Godmother National Library).

That 'White Rabbit' Feeling (A Dru Update with Some Book News)

Everything's mad (in my life), my dears.

There's not enough hours in a day for everything.

One more title for Éditions Aikyō was just sent to be registered (one of my cousin's this time).

I'm still growling on a regular basis, but I'm really recycling most growls into my Sci-Fi plots. Novel #3 has just exploded, because of a controversial piece of clothing that's presented as "liberating" when the bottom line I see is that some have been brainwashed to believe it was necessary to look "modest" (I've created a kingdom where I'm going to use the news to feed the bunnies).

I'm currently writing two novels: Muff&Sherly 3, & An Honourable Spy (a [pseudo-]Victorian piece of nuttiness inspired by History, and too many spy novels), and reading three: Se una notte d'inverno un viaggiatore by Italo Calvino, La coartada de Antínoo by Manuel Franscico Reina, and this beauty:

Chi va piano, va sano...

... Chi va sano, va lontano.

Mother probably thinks that my passion for languages is a kind of weird addiction (and she may well have a point).

A few years ago, as I was writing some fiction, I started learning Russian by accident: one of my characters was Russian; I didn't want the three words I needed him to say in his native language to be ridiculous, and so I started investigating how the Russian language works. I'd always said that I wouldn't start Russian because of the many declension, but I found the culture fascinating, and I grew quite attached to that Russian character, and... there you go; one more language.

[Incidentally, when I can travel normally (right now, my right ear could explode if I were to take a plane), I will go to Ukraine. Kiev... be ready for me!... And I promise to learn basic Ukrainian, at the very least.]

I've been learning Romance and Germanic languages mostly.

In college, I learnt bits of ancient Egyptian.

When I (briefly) converted to Protestantism, my awesome minister taught us biblical Hebrew, which I loved.

I've tried to learn Arabic, but that was really tough to do all alone, but that gave me a taste for non-European languages, and that was how I started to learn Mandarin. [Of course, I'm that kind of weird. Are you even surprised?]

I cowardly stopped rather fast because the exercises were killing my throat. A friend, who's got an MA in Mandarin, told me that it was a very good sign, that my vocal chords were learning to pronounce the tones in Chinese... I stopped nonetheless because that was really painful.

However... learning how to write in Chinese prepared me for my great swap: the day I started learning Japanese. Without that detour in Chinese, Japanese kanji would have been much, much, much harder to start.

My last real holiday (a few centuries ago!) was in Japan. I could shop there, and chat with a few people (in Japanese, yes). When I watch telly, whether it's the news or series, I understand the big picture, and I can write (a few programmes help me type in Japanese, and they come with very handy dictionaries).

My current big problem is... reading Japanese.

I could be happy with what I can do, and with the tiny bits I can read, but I want more, and so I've decided to start doing the one thing that has helped me with improving my knowledge of other languages: grabbing a book, a dictionary, and fight with literature.

Now that I've seen the drama 妻は、くノ一 (Tsuma wa, kunoichi; My Wife Is a Ninja), I'd like to try to read the books by  風野 真知雄 (Machio Kazeno). 

[I'm still looking for an online store that wouldn't have shipping options from hell. Suggestions welcome, by the way]

Since I need a lot of training, I grabbed a book that I already own, and I started this (on a photocopy!!!): 

Wish me luck?

(And buy me aspirin for Christmas? ô.O)