The Girdle of Melian

hotos, and more photos! But first, two exciting projects: Blood Kiss , a vampire film noir by Michael Reaves, starring Neil Gaiman and Amber Benson, is now seeking funding! Here are the stars, as sketched by Tom Mandrake, plus the evocative poster for the film: Back the Blood Kiss Kickstarter here ! The other project happily involves writing. Actually - finally, a proper ROW80 update ! - I've started typing up my new short story (it's called Where's There's Life , and it all starts when the main character inherits a library card for the library at Alexandria), so I haven't been a complete slacker. This week, though, I'll be writing something different: A new Writers' Houseparty is starting on the Compuserve Books and Writers' Community ! Houseparties are a great way to thrust your characters out of their familiar worlds and learn things about them that you may not have known before. Writing for a houseparty is just like writing your

owel Day on Saturday! I'm organizing a book fair at work this week and happened to see a copy of The Hitchihker's Guide to the Galaxy . I've only ever read a borrowed copy before! So I picked it up, and will reread it on Saturday, towel in hand. Actually, to be perfectly honest, I'm only rereading it so I can finally get Neil Gaiman's Don't Panic! ... I've been reading a lot, which is wonderful, but still procrastinating like there's a thousand tomorrows on the editing front (hello, ROW80 goals falling by the wayside). Author Joe Hill has a morning To Do List of 5 Items . The same five items every morning: Write 1000 words, "read a poem, take my Paxil, gobble down a New York Times article, walk the dog." I like the idea of reading a poem a day, as well as the New York Times (I don't currently have a dog or a prescription). Writing 1000 words would be fun! But what I really need to do is EDIT that many words. Sigh. Back