Not much to report lately, except that I’ve taken a short break from the novel to work on a short story rewrite request that I received from a market I’ve been trying to crack for years.

I watched Dr. Horrible’s Sing-along Blog and The Dark Knight on the weekend. Both were excellent, though I felt the ending of TDK was a bit more satisfying. TDK has been reviewed on many other blogs, so I probably won’t be posting a full review here. I will say that I liked the movie a lot and feel it’s a good companion piece to Batman Begins. I liked that although TDK is a Batman movie, and Batman is in it, he is but one of many players. I was surprised, in a good way, by how much screentime the supporting cast received. With its view of the inner workings of organized crime, the mayor’s and district attorney’s offices, it really gave the film a feeling of an epic crime story. Like Heat if it took place in Gotham City.

Here are some other things I liked (possible spoilers):

1. Using the same director/actors/crew/etc. gave the film a definitely feeling of And now the second chapter of Batman…. Even the way they saved the title and credits until the end of the film.

2. I liked that even though they explained Batman’s origins in Batman Begins, they didn’t immediately jump ahead to the current, more established version in this movie. I’m guessing TDK takes place between six months to a year after the events in BB, and it shows in the fact that Scarecrow is still running around (a nice little cameo by Cillian Murphy), and Batman is still wearing his Version 1.0 armor, driving the Tumbler, etc.

3. The Bat-Pod. Our theatre was packed with people who had some serious Batman fever. The moment the Bat-Pod came shooting out of the wreck of the Tumbler, people were applauding! They applauded again later when Gordon turned out to be alive, and then saved Batman’s life. (Great line from the Joker, too, holding a knife over an unconscious Batman: “Can you give me just one minute?”)

4. Heath Ledger as The Joker. What else needs to be said? Everything about his performance was great. Great intro (that opening laugh, the disappearing pencil, “I’m not crazy. I’m *not* crazy”), great make-up, great upside down conversation with Batman at the end. “You won’t kill me out of some misplaced sense of self-righteousness, and I won’t kill you because… you’re just too much fun.”

5. The ending. Even though Batman has a working relationship with Commissioner Gordon and the Gotham police, I’ve never really thought of him as a superhero in the strictest sense. I liked Gordon explaining to his son at the end of the film why Batman is running away: “Because we’ll have to chase him.” Then going on to explain the difference between a “hero” and a “dark knight.” I wasn’t expecting it, and it was nice touch, showing that after all the hell the Joker raised things will not be going back to normal any time soon in Gotham City.

Sure, it’s a dark ending, but then it is The Dark Knight.

• Currently reading: The Dain Curse, by Dashiell Hammett

On this day in 1945, the U.S. detonated the very first atom bomb.

This may not seem writing-related, but it actually does have some bearing on my novel, which I’m really due to talk about sometime on this website.

Until then, Happy Nuke Day!

After reading John Hughes’ “Vacation ‘58″ in the new issue of Zoetrope: All-Story, I decided to re-watch the movie it spawned. Who can forget classic family moments like this one:

COUSIN VICKI: I’m going steady. And I french kiss.

AUDREY: So? Everybody does that.

COUSIN VICKI: Yeah, but Daddy says I’m the best at it.

Snap!

Yes, that John Hughes. The Breakfast Club, Sixteen Candles, Planes Trains & Automobiles, Uncle Buck, and yes, ugh, Home Alone.

It’s been a long time since we’ve seen a new John Hughes movie, and while I don’t know what he’s been doing with all of his time, I can tell you he has a short story called “Vacation ‘58″ in the latest issue of Zoetrope: All-Story. It’s not a new story, but rather a reprint that originally appeared in National Lampoon, and was purchased on publication by Warner Bros. and turned into the first of the Vacation movies. Hughes wrote the screenplay, although he had never even seen one before, and the rest, as they say, is history.

The story has a pretty funny opening line: “If Dad hadn’t shot Walt Disney in the leg, it would have been our best vacation ever!”

This issue of Zoetrope has a couple of other excellent stories — “The Invisibles,” by Marissa Perry, and “A Small Haunting,” by Shaena Lambert. Check it out.

• Currently reading: Forty Words for Sorrow, by Giles Blunt

Just received word that my Cape Breton ghost story, “Leaves Brown,” has been accepted for the new Ash-Tree Press anthology Shades of Darkness.

Over the years Ash-Tree has put out a number of excellent anthologies, like Acquainted With The Night and At Ease With The Dead, and I’m very excited to have one of my stories in their next collection.

The issue of Spin featuring a reprint of “The Tattletail” is now available. This is my first reprint and my first appearance in a foreign market. The cover is pretty neat, too.

I haven’t received my contributors’ copies yet, but the site has the table of contents listed. My entry says: Tad ja valepeikko Ian Rogers, suom. Hanna Sund.

I’m guessing “suom.” means “translated,” and that Hanna Sund is the one who did the work. As for the title, Tad is the name of the boy in the story, and “ja valepeikko” means “and” something. The Finnish-English dictionary I found online couldn’t translated “valepeikko,” but I’m guessing it’s Finnish for “demon” or some variation on “tattletail,” which of course was my own take on “tattletale.”

Either way it’s pretty cool to see one of my stories published in another language.

Update: My friend Steve contacted me on Facebook and told me the following:

Hey Ian, “Suomi” is “Finnish” (the language), so suom probably means (as you guessed) “made finnish by.”

So valepeikko means lying troll or pseudotroll (and I’m sure may have other intricate understandings in Finnish that an online dictionary can’t answer).

“Tad and the Lying Troll.” I like it! Thanks, Steve!

• Currently reading: The Body Snatchers, by Jack Finney

Kat and I watched The Ruins tonight and mostly enjoyed it. It’s a bit strange actually because while the plot was very similar to the movie, the various things that happen to the characters in the book still happen, but to different characters. Not sure why they decided to swap those things around, but it didn’t really affect our enjoyment of the movie, it was just a bit weird.

We had to watch the movie early, and eat dinner early, because the family is swooping in for the big baby fest that is taking place this weekend. It’s a short visit, because Kat’s brother and his wife are actually here for a wedding, or something. I really dig being an uncle, but a baby is a baby and I’ll get my fill after about twenty minutes. Give the kid four or five years to start talking and developing a personality and then I’ll actually be interested. Until then, she’s a conversation piece, a goad for the rest of the sibs to start gestating, and a reminder to Kat and me that even if we don’t have kids, we’ll more than get our fill from the rest of the brood. Still, she’s a cute kid and I’m looking forward to seeing her.

I mentioned once that friends of Kathryn’s parents made me a bbq apron, since they know that I don’t wander far from the grill during the summer months. Since we bought a new one recently, and since the strike and the sick cat have pretty much squashed any plans we had to go away this summer, it’s getting a lot of use these days. Anyway, I know you’re all dying to see the apron, so here’s a pic:

Not much to report on the writing front, but I do have a couple of interesting links to share.

Why Sarah Langan Writes Horror

Tom English talks about editing the mammoth Books Gone Bad anthology

This weekend I’m planning to upload a bunch of new photos to my photography website. If you haven’t checked it out yet, you might want to swing by onemoreshadow.com and check it out.

I was home sick today, not so ill that I was passed out completely, but I did get a chance to find out that most of the flicks shown on Drive-In Classics around 8am shouldn’t really be viewed at such an early hour. This morning’s effort was something called Search and Destroy, and it’s claim to mediocrity is that it was one of the very first Vietnam vet movies. In this one, someone is killing the members of an old army platoon and one guy is being blamed for it… until he too is hunted. Chilling stuff, but I’d much rather have watched Faster Pussycat! Kill! Kill!

The day continued quietly until I made the mistake of checking my e-mail, something I’ve been able to do less frequently now that I’m working on my novel. I got one from Google saying they were going to remove my website from their listings if I didn’t do something about all the spam on my website. Bah? I said. I went and checked the link they specified, looked deep into the not-at-all-interesting source code, and found that I was indeed host to some sort of spam infection.

I’m not sure if it’s because I hadn’t upgraded to a newer version of Wordpress in awhile or if it was something on my webhosting end, but after some slightly panicked running around, I was able to confirm that it was indeed my blog infected and nothing else, and that the bot or the worm or whatever wasn’t in my database files. So I upgraded my Wordpress, uploaded my backup copy of the “Blackwood” skin that makes the site look all dark and Blair Witchy, and now everything seems to be clean and Viagra-ad free. No, it doesn’t exactly make me Batman, but then again, I don’t know a lot of other authors with websites who could fix something like this themselves. Usually they have to go to…. well, someone like me. Batman.

I spent the rest of the day watching movies, Glengarry Glen Ross and Casino, and starting a new book, one I’ve been meaning to read for awhile. It’s called Pontypool Changes Everything, and I can think of three good reasons why you should all read it.

1. It’s one of those truly rare creatures: a Canadian genre novel that looks like a literary novel that looks like a genre novel. Confused? Wait till you read the book.

2. It’s being made into a movie, Pontypool, by Bruce McDonald.

3. It takes place in Pontypool, Ontario, which is about thirty minutes from where I live, and it’s about a zombie-virus spread through the English language. Come on! Now that’s a twist on all the zombie crap that actually sounds interesting!

Speaking of groovy books, my wife finished reading The Ruins yesterday, and means we can now watch the movie, which just came out on DVD. I remember it got pretty good reviews when it was in the theatre, so I’m looking forward to seeing it. I’ve also got Jumper, Vantage Point, and Batman: Gotham Knight to watch.

In other news, I received an e-mail from an editor telling me that one of my stories has made it to the final reading pool or level or whatever. I mention this only because it’s the third or fourth such notice I’ve received in the last month or two. I’m a bit torn as to whether or not I like knowing this much about the selection process. I can understand why the editors want to tell you, especially if you’ve been wanting a long time for a response. It’s nice to know you made it far even if you didn’t make a sale. But on the other hand it’s a bit of a tease, a dangling of the steak only to pull it away. Of course, I know the editors aren’t doing it deliberately, and all things considered I’d probably rather know that I came close than be left in the dark as to whether or not they like my stuff. I guess I can take some satisfaction in knowing that the mags that have sent these notices are ones that have rejected me without fanfare in the past. So I guess that means I’m doing something right.

I also forgot to mention that I uploaded the new issue of ChiZine last week. Once again, the writers deserve all the credit for the stories and poems, but let’s face it, without webslingers like me, their work would be fragmenting on their hard drives! Fragmenting, I tell you! Fraggggmenting! Cue that evil laughter, would you, Thor?

On the subject of websites, I redesigned my splash page on the weekend, sticking with my monochrome woods theme which I dig quite a bit.

In family news, my parents are off to Nova Scotia, Dave and Ronna and my niece Lauryn are in town, and my brother-in-law Stephen severed his Achilles tendon playing baseball. Not stretched, not torn — severed. Apparently he was in quite a bit of pain, and was already whisked into surgery by the time we heard about it. He’s doing much better now, thanks in large part to the drugs having not yet worn off. He’ll be in a cast for some time, can’t put weight on the foot for the first two weeks, and all kinds of other gruelling and no doubt annoying limitations for the next year or so. It really sucks for them because within the next couple of months they are moving to a new farm and having a baby. I’m not sure if that’s just bad luck or the Bermuda Triangle of country living. I’ll be sure to let you know, and take some pictures.

• Currently reading: Pontypool Changes Everything, by Tony Burgess