Exhausting All Your Options
Long ago in my disaffected youth, I found great solace in the music of The Wallflowers. Fronted by singer-songwriter Jakob Dylan, this alt-rock band rose… Read More »Exhausting All Your Options
Long ago in my disaffected youth, I found great solace in the music of The Wallflowers. Fronted by singer-songwriter Jakob Dylan, this alt-rock band rose… Read More »Exhausting All Your Options
There’s an unspoken rule that fictional detectives have to be eccentric. I suppose we can blame that one on Sir Arthur Conan Doyle and his… Read More »Eccentric and Itching to Solve a Grand Mystery
Here’s what I don’t understand. If someone majorly screws up, why does anyone trust that same someone to correct the massive error? You may be as… Read More »The Man to Trust When the World Falls Apart
The perfect pupil for a mentor/pupil relationship, if literary tradition is any indication, fits the following template: Male Well-meaning “Ordinary” looks And it doesn’t hurt… Read More »The Right Template for the Job
I can’t, off the top of my head, think of any mentor characters who go from place to place looking for a pupil. Most mentors… Read More »How to Recruit a Proper Pupil
Sometimes the Mentor-Pupil relationship comes across more as trolling than education. Don’t get me wrong: I loves me some character manipulation. There should always be a… Read More »The Three Sworn Duties of an Epic Mentor
I’ll admit it. I tried the helmet on Prissy. It would have required me to alter her bangs, and that cute little barrette would have… Read More »A Small Matter of Priorities
Cheerleaders are pretty dang strong. They have to be to accomplish all of the lifts and flips and back handsprings and whatnot. Plus there’s all… Read More »Cheerleader vs. Psycho: A Battle of the Sexes
Let’s talk about sexism in literature, shall we? *cracks open ginormous Can O’Worms* When was the last time we had a series about a brave,… Read More »Sexism in Literary Paradigms: A Heroine’s Lament
Ah, the One-Dimensional Villain, those Snidely Whiplash clones that populate the Grand Imaginarium where all fictional characters live together. They are mean and evil because… Read More »Villain Is as Villain Does