This is where I should be posting an introduction for new LJ friends, but we all know that it never ends well in my case. My attorney informs me that I can't talk about anything until the statute of limitations on attempting to destroy Christmas by zombifying Santa Claus runs out. Seriously, who even knew that they had laws about that kind of thing, right? Oh, and I also definitely do not have a zombie virus in my freezer and those rampaging, man-eating cloned land clams you heard about were not raised by me in a lab because I really like chowder. Trufax.

I had to give up on my army of zombies because the zombies who moved in across the street pointed out that having zombies slaves was living-ist. So I set them all loose in the yard with the man-eating land clams. I can tell you that zombie chowder is still delicious right up to the point where you have to get your stomach pumped. Live and learn.

So, the upshot is that I've been pretty busy trying to recruit a new human army of doom and trying to clean up the mess from that whole clam and zombie fiasco. Finally, I just had to open up the gates and set them free to roam like science intended. I'm sure it will work out just fine and definitely won't bite me in the ass any time soon.

What with the re-opening of the evil lab and all, I decided to take some time off from singing. The reason I closed up the lab in the first place was that I simply could not keep up with the endless demands of my personal army (why I let them form a union, I will never know), the siren call of evil science and all the damn rehearsals they make you attend because audiences don't appreciate it when you make up opera on the fly. Oh well, at least I got a portrait of myself to hang in my evil office of evil and redundancy. I'm going to try to make an icon of this thing but it's kind of too big to scan.

I am allergic to work. It's a tragic medical condition that is extremely rare which is why you don't know about it. If I have to do any work, I get hives... all over my internal organs... which is why you can't see them but they are totally there. My singing career is handled by the magic career pixies, Pinky and Perky. I keep them in a jar and whenever I think things are looking slow, I give the jar a good hard shake. I think I may have overdone it last time, because I've had back to back gigs for the past five years or so and I have a full teaching studio, six days a week because I literally ran out of time for my pet students and had to add an extra day.

My students are amazing, so amazing that next year's Honors recital is going to be decided by putting them all in an arena, Hunger Games style, for my own amusement. My students are hardcore singers, so they all agreed that this sounded completely sane and more fair than most of the auditions they do.

It looks like time to head back into the evil lair, with my beloved Hell Hound, Angel von Teufelhund by my side. You see, it's slightly windy and Angel finds this upsetting. In fact, Angel finds most things upsetting, including butterflies, rainbows and walks on the beach. At the moment, she curled up in a corner, contemplating the destruction of innocents and moping because the air is out to get her. At this rate, I will never find time to work on my increasingly convoluted and terribly written book. Peace out.

So, Star Wars Episode One... where in all of Faeryland do I even start on this thing? This movie was already hyped beyond belief before Lucas even started writing it. After Return of the Jedi, Lucas was hinting around about more Star Wars movies, but he had more important projects to work on. Like Willow and Howard the Duck, because Oberon knows these are stories that needed to be told... yanno, I actually promised myself that I was going to try to take this seriously and not just rag on Lucas, but I can't seem to help myself.

Okay, so by the time Episode One was released, there were truckloads of Star Wars novels and comics and visual guides out there. If none of them told a prequel story, then I'm willing to bet that fanfic authors were happy to fill in those gaps. I'm sure someone wrote the adventures of Yoda, Obi Wan and probably Anakin as well. By the time Lucas started writing, he couldn't help pissing off some fans no matter what he wrote, even if it was really really good. We all had our own ideas about Star Wars, and nearly 25 years to obsess over them. I remember when they announced that the film was being made and I honestly couldn't begin to imagine what the story would be like because there were so many potential ways it could have gone. Ultimately, Lucas decided to use the prequels as an excuse to remake the original three Star Wars movies, and that, in my opinion, is the real problem. These aren't new stories. These are old stories, only this time Luke gets the girl and then turns evil and falls into some lava.

And the effects are all digital because making Star Wars was such a pain in the ass that this time Lucas decided to film everything on sound stages so he would never have to deal with the challenges of filming on location.

The problem with Episode One is that it can't quite be Star Wars. There are simply too many limiting factors. We can't have a fight against an evil Empire, because it has to be set during the Republic when things are great. So, Lucas had to come up with an excuse for why a smaller, ill-equipped group of good guys would need to fight with a larger and better equipped force. Star Wars established that the Death Star was a new thing that took time to create, so we have to think of something else that can be blown up by a plucky kid from Tattooine in a small fighter craft. Darth Vader doesn't exist yet, so we need some other Sith Lord that can kill a wise Jedi master in a lightsaber duel. Let's not forget that we all need a princess of some sort to be rescued from the bad guys and we'll have to find a kid from Tattooine who dreams of something beyond his life in the middle of nowhere and a good looking male character who snarks a bit and some comic relief and... you see where I'm going with this right? The end result is a great big mess of a story that never quite works.

Honestly, it's exhausting to try to think about just how much is wrong with Episode One. All the same, I still don't entirely hate it. Of the three prequel films, it's the one I find the most watchable. It's the only one that I will put on when it comes on cable, which is actually how I ended up watching all three movies over the weekend. I got drawn in by the first one and then figured I might as well sit through all three. The thing is, if we take Episode One on its own, ignoring the additional things we learn in the next two films, it kind of makes sense.

Okay, so the Republic is more like a confederacy or a big United Nations with teeth. We know they have some rules that everyone has to follow (no slaves allowed) and they can levy taxes because the title crawl tells us that the Trade Federation is pissed about new taxes. So, the trade guys want to make some sort of point about the taxes, and somehow they get hooked up with Palpatine (look, we all know it's Palpatine because we know who the emperor is and who plays him from the other movies, so there's no point in calling this a mystery) who tells them to blockade Naboo. Naboo is some planet on the ass end of the galaxy that doesn't have an army and their leader is a 14-year-old girl who doesn't have a clue what she's doing because she's 14. This kind of makes sense. The blockade will force the Senate to take action.

Needless to say, Palpatine is evil and doesn't actually give a crap about the Trade Federation or their problems. He figures that they're morons and he's going to use this situation to manipulate Queen Amidala into asking for a vote of "no confidence" in the Chancellor when he refuses to declare open war on the Trade Federation. You see, wars kind of suck, so chances are that the Chancellor is going to send a fact-finding mission or seek some peaceful solution to the blockade. Besides, the whole thing sounds pretty insane anyway, and Naboo doesn't look like planet in desperate need of supplies. Now, if it was Tattooine, things would be different. That planet is a freakin' desert. They need stuff.

So, the blockade gets set up and the Chancellor sends a couple of Jedi Knights to have a chat with the Trade Federation. The Federation guys take this to mean that they are about to get their asses kicked because if that wasn't the plan, why not send negotiators or senators instead of warriors who carry lightsabers at all times? Palpatine says to kill the Jedi immediately, which tips off the Jedi that something is up. So they manage to escape. They rescue the queen but they get held up on their way to Coruscant when some part gets damaged. So, they stop on Tattooine where they meet a boy who dreams of being a pilot and develops a crush on the queen the minute he sees her. They get the part and take the boy with them to train him as a Jedi. Oh crap... this is Star Wars. This movie is freaking Star Wars.

But hey, we all liked Star Wars, right? So maybe it's really not all that bad. The basic plot would sort of work. Some of the events are re-ordered a bit, so it isn't a total rehash. We know that the Senate isn't going to fix the blockade, so everyone goes back to Naboo. Meanwhile, Palpatine has a Sith Lord on the case to deal with the two Jedi Knights. They get to Naboo and the queen leads a small group into the throne room while the two Jedi fight with the Sith Lord and the wise mentor is killed while the boy from Tattooine somehow flies his fighter into a small space where he manages to shoot a thing that blows up a thing that effectively curtails the enemy's power and then we have a victory ceremony. We liked all that stuff in Star Wars, didn't we?

Well, things were different in Star Wars. For one thing, they didn't take nearly so long...

To be continued...

I've said before that a great painting tells you something about both the subject and the artist that you wouldn't have otherwise seen. Similarly, a great performance of a song brings out something in the song and in the singer that is completely individual and cannot be replicated by anyone else. Well, there's something I left out. Here it is- a great painting not only reveals insight into both subject and painter but it also provokes a response on the part of the person viewing it. A great performance of a song or a symphony or a play, not only brings out nuances in the performers and the material but it brings the audience into the equation as well.

But here's the thing, we don't get to choose how the audience will participate in the art that we put out there. We cannot dictate their feelings. We don't get to choose whether they cast us as the villain or the hero in their imagination or if they imagine being us or being connected to us or even replacing us entirely, so that they can recreate our story in their own image. This is what it is to be a creator... but if you burn to express and create, this is exactly what you hope to achieve.

Recently, I watched the Star Wars Prequels on cable. I figured that I might as well, since I've been meaning to revisit them for some time and there they were in front of me. With commercials, the films all clocked in at three and a half hours, but since I lack the patience to sit in front of the television for two or more solid hours, the commercial breaks were actually helpful. Every commercial is a chance to throw in another load of laundry, or grab another project to work on.

I loved Star Wars. I wouldn't even be watching the stupid prequels if I hadn't seen and loved Star Wars. I'm not alone in that. Lots of people love Star Wars, but I want you to remember my first point. My Star Wars is colored by the way I, as an audience member, interpret and interact with it. My Star Wars and your Star Wars are probably different and that's a good thing.

If we're going to talk about why I don't like the Star Wars Prequels (and why I don't like the majority of recent entertainment franchises) then I think it might be useful to start with why I loved Star Wars. As far as I see it, Star Wars is about a kid from nowhere who manages to pretty much save the world because he wants to do the right thing, dreams of having an impact in the world and is willing to risk his own life and safety in order to do the right thing and make a difference. Luke is a fundamentally admirable person, the kind of person we should want to be. His success is something we can all aspire to.

And if Luke hadn't been a good person, he'd be dead. He removes the restraining bolt from R2D2 because he wants to hear Princess Leia's plea for help, clearly meaning to do something about it if can. That sets off the plot. If not for that action, Luke would have stayed home, and the Stormtroopers would have found him and killed him along with his Aunt and Uncle before taking R2 and the plans. The end. As far as we know, a Jedi Knight isn't some weird monk with no feelings, he's a warrior who uses a spiritual force that binds everyone together and that everyone can theoretically tap into. The philosophy seems to be about not being caught up in hate and negativity, even when you think you have cause for it, as opposed not caring about anyone and sitting on your ass in the temple.

As a bonus, I love the world building in Star Wars. It looks like the kind of broken down world where people actually live. Stuff is scuffed and smudged. Even better yet, it doesn't have any hint of being anyone's creepy sex fantasy. Everyone wears clothes. There's no sex beyond a pretty tame kiss for luck, but it's still romantic. The princess even has stuff to do beyond getting rescued and acts like an adult, rather than a giggling teen. Princess Leia comes across as a woman who has already seen some heavy shit go down and, like Luke, she is putting herself at risk in order to do something about it.

If you can't tell, I hate that we seem to be in age of glorifying the lazy and worthless. I see too many movies and read too many books where the message is "Oh just sit on your lazy worthless ass until it turns out that you're the chosen one. Fuck those people who try and scheme and work for stuff, they're all jerks. The right thing to do is nothing. Good people are people who don't try, they just get stuff handed to them just because they deserve it for existing and agreeing with me." My Little Purple Peeps, every blond cheerleader I ever met has spent years busting her ass in gymnastics and dance, and some of them had to spend their allowance on hair bleach. People who accomplish great things do so because they are making an effort, taking risks and working hard. I support your right to sit on your ass and do nothing, but don't expect a goddamned medal for it. Good luck with magic fixing everything for you. Hope it works out.

My biggest problem with the prequel films is that they try to connect themselves to Star Wars on a superficial level, but they completely lose sight of themes and greater concepts. It looks like Star Wars, but it isn't Star Wars. I think we'd all much rather have had movies that didn't look like Star Wars, but felt more like Star Wars. Still, I do understand why some things turned out the way they did. I can imagine Lucas being concerned about presenting movies that didn't have close enough ties to the original films and fans complaining that the new characters weren't as cool as the ones they loved.

The thing is, Lucas did have characters that we knew and loved and who would appear in the prequels. We had Anakin Skywalker/Darth Vader, Obi Wan Kenobi, Yoda and Palpatine. That's actually more than enough characters to provide a connection. We even had one character in that group who is a good guy and will remain a good guy and who will be handing off the good guy torch to a new bunch of good guys in Star Wars. I can understand that Lucas really wanted to write the story of Anakin's fall from grace, but damn is that a hard one to pull off. How are you going to get an audience to relate to a protagonist who is a bad guy? We know he's a bad guy. We know he's going to do horrible things. We've seen him do them. Even a great writer would be hard pressed to make us relate to that guy, but it's so far beyond Lucas and this genre that we're pretty much screwed before we start.

The prequel films are saddled with a story that no one can relate to, not unless you're a homicidal murderer. Still, we might still have entertaining movies with cool action scenes and we know we like Obi Wan and Yoda, so let's see how this all plays out, shall we?

Remember how the preface mentioned that our narrator was haunted? I'm going to assume that we're going to be hearing about it in this chapter.

Several days have passed and Abbey isn't sleeping well. She tells us that school is beginning in two weeks, so that means we're in August, right? So, why all the gloomy weather? I've lived on the east coast and August is usually so hot you can't stand it, crazy humid and when it does rain, it feels like being in a lukewarm shower instead of being all cold and icky. Is Sleepy Hollow in some kind of magical warp field where it's always November or something?

It seems that the nightmares are a new thing. So, she hasn't been haunted before? She thinks that she sees a shape (hi Edward Cullen, I see that you're stalking with love!) and she's getting freaked. This is actually a pretty normal response, so good for our heroine. She goes about some of her normal tasks and thinks about how Kirsten is missing from these activities. Okay, we're getting somewhere, this actually works. She calls Kirsten's phone and leaves a message. After my aunt passed away, we found a message from her on the answering machine. Even though it was old and kind of weird to hear it every time we had to check old messages, no one could bear to delete it. It stayed there until the machine broke down. This is how real grieving works. I wish we had started the book here.

Then we get another scene of Abbey bitching to her mom about all the untrue rumors circulating about Abbey's friend. I realize that teens bitch and a grieving person is going to be crankier than usual, but it still comes across as whining. Again, it's been only two months. Shouldn't you be more concerned that everyone has written off Kristen as dead when she might be locked in a shed and pregnant with some crazed sex maniac's baby?

And yes, I am going to harp on this missing girl thing because it's a major problem. The fact that she is missing actually has next to no plot relevance. We could have begun with the discovery of her body because our heroine never sets off to find her friend or uncover the mystery. She just calmly accepts that Kristen is gone and gets on with her life. Given the circumstances, her behavior comes across as callous, rather than as an attempt to accept things and cope.

Abbey's mom takes her out to a new herb store and we start to learn about Abbey's hobby. She creates custom perfumes. This is actually something that people complain about on the Amazon.com reviews, but it's actually one of the things I like about the book. Granted, there's a lot of time devoted to perfume with no payoff. Abbey isn't going to brew a potion to save the day or identify poison plants. Still, I do like that the author is trying to make her more of a complete person than the usual Bella Swan. Abbey has a non-boy-related activity and some long-term goals for her life. This should raise the stakes when we reach the inevitable decision to go with the supernatural love interest instead of pursuing her own plans.

Working on a perfume for Kristen helps calm Abbey and she is able to sleep through the night at last. Sadly, this has nothing to do with anything as far as I can tell. Kirsten's ghost does not factor into the story nor does anything else that might be mollified by perfume or someone thinking about the deceased.

This morning, there was a story in the news about a teen girl who has been missing for two months. After two months, only 45 people showed up to volunteer in the search for clues, as opposed to when she first went missing and they had more people than they could use. So, here in real life, 45 total strangers still care enough about a missing girl to volunteer in the continuing search. There is still hope that the girl could be alive, despite the discovery of her clothes and personal items, which makes it pretty clear that she didn't run away on her own. No one has written this girl off, and they aren't giving up because it's easier to say "Whatever, let's just say she's dead so I can get along with MY life!"

That being said, let's delve back into The Hollow.

Abigail has had plenty of time to change her clothes and join the rest of the town at Kirsten's funeral. Since this is Sleepy Hollow, there's a painting of the Headless Horseman in the church instead of that boring Bible nonsense. The explanation is that it is to show the virtues of looking ahead to the Lord when the Devil rides up behind to offer temptation. This makes no sense at all, and it doesn't need to be here, because it isn't a plot point. Basically, it's the author trying to sledgehammer the setting. We're not even two whole pages into chapter two. There is plenty of time to describe the setting. Stop dropping anvils on us.

The funeral is over before page three, and everyone heads to the graveyard to bury that empty coffin. Abigail opts not to share any words about her best friend ever because this is a fake funeral. Umm how about "OMG Kirsten could be someone's sex slave right now, why aren't we still looking for her????" No, Abigail isn't concerned about her friend's welfare. She's just annoyed that there isn't a body in that coffin. We're going to run into this a lot with Abigail, peeps. She gripes inwardly but never actually says or does anything about it because that might cause inconvenience to herself.

One boy stops to leave a flower on the empty coffin. In true Bella Swan style, Abigail can't remember his name. This just comes off as being snotty or flat out mean, you guys. This is a small town. If this kid is her own age, she should know his name. Chances are, she's been in school with him for quite some time. This isn't a person she would have only just met. Also, our heroine is pissed that people who didn't know Kirsten well showed up for the funeral. Well, why wouldn't she be? In Abigail's head, people who were close to Kristen don't give two craps about what happened to her, so she'd naturally assume that everyone is equally devoid of decency. Did I mention that 45 strangers came out to spend the day combing a field to search for clues about a girl who has been missing for two months? Thank Oberon we all live in this world rather than Sleepy Hollow.

And now the funeral is over. So much for Kirsten.

Abigail stays on to wallow in her own self-pity. Why does no one care about her angst? While she ponders Kirsten's red coffin (note- this isn't a plot point and red will not mean anything), she sees a mysterious boy watching her. She decides to go and talk to him, because when she's all alone and sees someone stalking her, she figures the best thing to do is to get nice and close to them. Personally, I hightail it out of there, because psycho killers actually have a habit of sticking around to relive their crimes, but that's just me. This is probably why I don't have a vampire boyfriend.

Abbey calls her mom to say she'll walk her emo ass home, but her mom suggests that she might want to show up at the post-funeral gathering for her friend. Abbey is irritated that she might be expected to care for someone other than herself, but her mom insists. Of course, instead of pointing out that this is to show support for Kirsten's family, her mom's reason is that the party is being catered. Oh those adults and their misplaced priorities.

At the party, Abbey runs into the boy, whose name turns out to be Ben. As usual, she's annoyed that she might be expected to care about someone other than herself. Damn those other humans and their feelings! Alone again, she has a flashback to her friend trying to dye her red hair black and getting terrible results. Abbey is such a good friend that she offers to get red highlights because when you try to dye red hair black, it totally comes out like black hair with red highlights and not like some weird, mottled camouflage. Incidentally, when you use drugstore black dye, it usually comes out black at first. The dye starts to wash out and fade over time, and that when you start getting weird effects. The more you know.

The mysterious boy turns up at Kirsten's house. Okay, this actually is an appropriate time for Abbey to talk with him. If he acts all bizarre, she can get an adult to help her. The boy is surprised that she's talking to him. Then he reveals that he didn't know Kristen or her brother. He's there because of Abbey. Instead of being really creeped out by this stalker, Abbey decides it's fine because he's a hottie. Yes, I'm serious. She starts telling him little details about herself and Kristen because she magically knows that Kristen isn't tied up in his basement. I mean, think about this, isn't it creepy? It's like a serial killer selecting his next victim, all the while gloating about how clever he is.

Once again, Abbey's mom stops the conversation by checking up on her daughter like a mom should. Damn those moms and their caring that gets in the way of hanging around possibly serial killing hotties! Abigail says goodbye to Kirsten's mom in a show of almost caring but not then laments that she'll never see the hot boy again. Oh you'll see him Abbey, you'll see him when he stuffs you into several trash bags.

Before we get into this, I should mention that I didn't hate this book when I first read it. It wasn't until I got through books two and three that I ended up thinking this whole series just plain sucks. There are still some nice things. I don't hate the writing. I probably wouldn't hate our heroine so much if she hadn't proven to be such a lousy person in later books. For the love of Oberon, we have to demand better books. Now, on to the plot...

Our narrator is attending the "viewing" of her missing friend's coffin. Her friend has been gone for 68 days now, which means that she's good and dead now. Guys, I have never had to deal with a missing relative and I hope I never have to, but aren't these people jumping the gun a bit? The narrator points out that it's weird to have a "viewing" with no body, so our author knows that this is nuts so... why write this? Why not have a memorial? Or a prayer gathering? The viewing isn't actually a plot point, it's just a chance for our heroine to snark about how tacky the funeral home is.

We have to stop and talk about snark for a moment. In Heathers, we saw the teen protagonists snarking about their friends' funerals. It was meant to show us just how vicious and nasty this teen culture really was. In the mean girl world, no cruelty is off-limits and a dead person is a perfect target because they can't fight back. The thing is, no one likes a mean girl. The whole point of Heathers was to show mean girl antics taken to a ridiculous over-extreme. Hate your friends? Kill them. Hate your school? Blow it up.

Now, I could accept a narrator who is snarking in order to avoid her own feelings of loss and survivor's guilt. However, if the author wants to portray that, then we need to see some grief and guilt. Unfortunately, all we're getting in The Hollow is a heroine who thinks the funeral home is tacky and doesn't feel like sticking around. We never get anything to suggest that she is convinced that her friend isn't dead or that she's angry that the search has been given up. Nope. Her friend is gone and that's that. Damn those dead friends and their boring ass memorials.

As soon as she has the chance, our heroine heads out of the funeral home, annoyed that her parents want to stick around and talk to people. Fuck those people and their grief. Why would someone at a memorial service want to share their memories of the deceased or try to find some meaning in the loss or maybe an explanation for why this happened? Some people.

Our heroine sits outside, where she overhears a couple of guests talking. They are both teachers, complaining about students throwing eggs and so forth. They suggest that the deceased, Kristen, must have been doing drugs. This is the first time we hear the name of the missing girl. Seriously. We've had descriptions of the funeral home and these two random teachers that we will never meet again, and now, eight pages in, we finally get the name of the missing girl.

So, remember our preface? Didn't it say that rumors were that Kristen had committed suicide? How did we get from suicide to drugs? Does it seem likely that people would assume this girl was on drugs just because she was a teen? This is a white, middle class girl who got good grades. Wouldn't people be more likely to think that she was kidnapped? Come to think of it, why hasn't the possibility that she was abducted been explored? Wouldn't that be the first thing people thought about when she disappeared? Do kids never run away in this community? I'd think that abduction or a runaway would still be on the table at this point, unless they had a giant puddle of her blood or something. What is wrong with these people????

The narrator tells us that Kristen would not have done drugs because her brother died of an overdose. Look, I don't think that you have to experience everything you write about. I can understand Lucia just fine without going insane and killing someone. However, I think we need to have a chat about drug overdoses. People seem to think that you can just pop off and overdose on drugs. Can it happen? Yes, but in general you don't go from zero to meth addict in a day. I have friends who overdosed. Some of them more than once. They're all dead. Why? because the majority of people don't go from happy family to overdose. There are a lot of steps in between. There's a lot of messed up shit. The brother who overdosed will play no role whatsoever in this book, other than to give us a reason to assume Kristen would not do drugs. I don't need a reason why she wouldn't do drugs. The narrator is her best friend. If they were best friends, then I am willing to trust that she'd have known whether her friend was on drugs or not. This drug thing has no payoff and makes no sense. It should not be in here, other than to make our heroine look good by comparing her with people who are being even more rude and inconsiderate than she is. This whole scene did not need to be here.

Our narrator's mother calls her back in, which gives us a chance to find out that her name is "Abigail." I'm giving props on the choice of a normal name rather than Stella Bella Friggen' Gorgeous McSexy.

The funeral is the next day. Abigail heads off on her own because her mom might want to talk with her or something. What is wrong with these people? A teen disappears and they all say "Meh, she's probably just dead or something." If one of my friends disappeared now, never mind when I was a teen, my mom would still freak the hell out and activate a GPS on my ass at all times. Hell, I'd probably be fine with it too because I'd really rather not be dragged off and murdered. Nor do I want to accidentally die with no one knowing where the hell I got to or what happened. Why isn't Abigail the slightest bit upset by her friend's disappearance? I get that denial and being pissed off is part of grief, but she doesn't ever talk about not believing her friend is dead. It's just oh well she's gone, why does no one respect MY ANGST???

So, it turns out that the only cemetery in Sleepy Hollow, yes we're in that Sleepy Hollow, guys, is a short walk from Abigail's house. It turns out that she hangs out here a lot. She sits down in an iron chair by a grave and starts talking to the person buried there. For the first time, she mentions that it would be easier to know that her friend really was dead would be easier to deal with... wait, WHAT THE HELL? It's been two months. How do you know that she's dead? What if she's alive? What if she was kidnapped and is being held somewhere which, by the way, has actually happened to more than one teen girl. It's been all over the news. Those girls survived to tell the tale. Don't you even want to consider the possibility that your friend is still alive? I mean, it's like this narrator already knows that plot of the story, so she's aware that her friend won't actually matter at all. She's just an excuse to go to funerals.

Abigail has some feelings, which we can take to be 100% selfish feelings because Kristen has inconvenienced her by being missing. Stupid missing friends. Then it starts to rain, so Abigail decides to go home. Oh poo, now she's going to be all wet. Because that's her biggest problem right now, guys. She already knows that she doesn't have to worry about her friend being tied up in anyone's torture dungeon and that her parents aren't calling the cops right now because holy crap teen girls are going missing!!!!!

Also, you know how our chapter title is "Last Words"? I may have missed something but I'm not seeing anything here that connects with that. Yeah, this is not looking good, but I'm sure we'll start caring soon. On the plus side, some of the descriptions of the scenery are pretty good. I just wish it was being delivered at a better pace.

In the preface to The Hollow, our unnamed first person narrator tells us that people are saying that someone we don't know yet killed herself. The narrator is sick of hearing this rumor. Meanwhile, people are asking the narrator is he or she knows what happened over and over. The narrator does not know, but claims he or she has been haunted ever since...

Hold on, haunted ever since what precisely? Haunted ever since people started asking you question? That's what the grammar is telling me. I'm going to assume that the author means to say that the narrator was haunted ever since the possible suicide? The thing is, we really don't know. This is set up to be a teaser blurb, something to get us interested in the story. It doesn't really tell us a story, it tells us about a story.

So, here's what we know. People say that someone committed suicide, but the narrator claims these are only rumors. So, we can assume that something bad happened to someone at some point and the narrator is haunted by it.

Okay, so this is going to be a book either about a mystery that the narrator must solve in order to put an end to these terrible rumors that are haunted him or her or the narrator is being haunted by something connected to a bad thing that happened which might or might not have been a suicide. Good to know.

So, I guess we'll see how this all plays out as we read along with The Hollow.

I think I need a fascinator with a pirate ship on it. I'm almost certain of it. How have I gone on for so long without sticking a boat, with sails and everything, to my head?

At the moment, I am busy and stressed with piles of tasks in front of me and no energy to do any of them. I also know that, at some point, the grief from Kim's death is going to hit me. Kim passed away while I was rehearsing Pirates. I still haven't cried. I've almost started once or twice, but I know that once I start, it will be a while before I stop. Also, when I start, my mom will start in as well. It won't be pretty. We've all been pretending it isn't so because we have shit that needs to get done. There's a price to be paid for that. When I break down, it will be epic. For the time being, I'm just not sleeping well and I'm cranky as fuck all.

I'm gearing up towards a massive purge of clutter and unhealthy attachments. Once that's done, I will clean everything until it sparkles. Then I will rearrange all the furniture. Last, I will think about what new things will go into the empty spaces that are left.

And I will cry a bit.

And then I will patiently explain the importance of social cues to all the people who have been jumping up and down, begging me for my time, then acting all snippy and rejected when I can't attend to the thing they want me to do because they want it now, wah! Hey, I'm happy to do favors when I can, but the important part of this is equation is "when I can." I really can't right now. I've had some heavy shit to deal with this year. My dad has been in and out of the hospital three times now- back, knee and pacemaker. My mom's best friend, and a very close family friend, passed away after a sudden illness that left us all in shock. Do I want to go out and blow off steam? Absolutely! We've all turned into total party animals around here. It's what we do. A wake is always better than a funeral, after all, but it doesn't mean I'm happy.

Speaking of grief, let's talk about The Hollow trilogy. In order to give myself many different things to talk about, in an effort to avoid my life and stave off boredom which can lead to thinking which could lead to thoughts and Oberon knows I don't want any of those just now, I will attempt to dissect this thing chapter by chapter. This will be a pain with the first book because nothing much happens in it. Luckily, we have books two and three, and my god what messes those turned out to be. There's tons of material there. We could wank for days. Months. Years!

I'll also attempt to getting back to posting 25 things, since we have quite a few together and probably some story time under the friendslock.

Sometimes, I forget that when I actually have the time and energy to be social, I am actually popular. Let's face it, I've been doing back to back gigs for the past four years or more. I've barely had enough time to squeeze in auditions much less devote time to updating my arias. No one can do it all, and that means I don't get out as much as I'd like.

So, I intentionally decided to take some time off to rework my audition package because it's time to commit to being a dramatic coloratura instead of falling back on soubrette stuff because I already know it well and have little time to get anything else learned and polished. Coloraturas are numerous, which means that sloppy won't cut it, no matter how great your voice is or how many high notes you sing. Better to get called back or hired with a polished Despina than blown off with messy Fiordiligi. That's how I see it, anyway. The problem is that my last Adele was a bitch to sing and never felt quite right. The Fledermaus before that, I was singing Rosalinda, which was new for me, but it felt pretty good. This time around, I covered Rosalinda's part at orchestra rehearsals when our Rosa was ill, and going back and forth between the two roles made it really obvious which was the comfortable fit and which wasn't.

I can't say that I won't get hired for soubrette roles or that I won't take them if offered. I can only say that I'm no longer marketing myself in that rep. So, I have to give up my lucrative sitting at home and doing nothing career strategy (no, I'm not kidding, if I refuse to sing for people, they will chase me down the street and beg) because I need to reintroduce myself in different rep. I've humbled my pride enough to join yaptracker because they often have auditions listed before they go up on company websites and I'll be dragging myself all over creation to sing for anyone who'll hear me.

I have the opportunity to go to Disneyland to attend their costumed event in October, but I can't say I'll go until I finish up spring auditions. The biggie is a Merry Widow that I'd love to do. I covered the role for the company years ago and it was the gig that led to my first big run of lead roles and professional gigs so I think we can say that, even as a baby soprano, I was damned good in that part. My voice has always been considerably fuller than people assume. I've learned from experience that if you sing stuff that's too light, your singing never goes anywhere. You need roles where your voice can bloom, and Hanna was the first of those roles for me. I still remember almost all of the music and I want the chance to perform this one on stage.

But if I have a professional offer, then I'll be doing that instead. This is how being a professional works. I was actually called back for Hanna the last time the company did the show, but I had to turn down the callback because I was offered a Frasquita with a nice, fat paycheck. Needs must, you know. So, we'll see what happens. The hardest would be an offer of Valencienne because I love parts of the role and I love the show, but I also know that it probably isn't what I need on my resume right now, and hey... Disneyland in October, celebrating my very favorite holiday and the most important time of my entire year.

So, we'll see what happens. It's pretty much win for me all the way around.

So, I liked The Hunger Games overall but if I was going to nitpick something it would be....

( Here there be spoilers... )