Update! - Perdition Catch my Soul - Part 7

Just a quick entry to pimp my new chapter of Perdition Catch my Soul, namely Part 7.

It's an alternate S7 that splits off subtly in "Beneath you" when Xander (instead of Buffy) follows Spike into the church. Written from Xander's POV (because I wanted to practice his voice), the story is slash, but very close to canon. It's rated NC-17 on my site and R at ffnet. Since it's not graphic and not PWP the rating is based on naughty language more than anything else.

The title is a line from Shakespeare's "Othello" (in case anyone is wondering). And since the story is also about jealousy (on an almost subliminal level, because Xander lives in denial), I smuggled a few more quotes into the story.

If I had to characterise my currents WIPs, I'd have to say that writing "Perdition" is fun, "Let's Talk about Sex" is hard work and "Things Present - Things Past" is stress (because of reader expectations and the necessity to keep continuity intact), but when it comes to reading them, it's different. Then LTAS is fun, "Perdition" is hard work and TPTP is a bit of both.

Four Feathers

A big hurrah for Mr. Estepheia. He's always a nice man, but today particularly so. I felt crappy this morning, so he took the kids to kindergarten, came home from work early, at lunchtime, did stuff in the garden, then picked up the kids, took the eldest to her gymnastics class, came home, kept them out of my hair so I could nap, and when I got up and found out that the movie Four Feathers would be shown for the last time today at the local cinma, he said to me, "off you go then!" Lucky me!

As for Four Feathers: it was an old-fashioned adventure movie with lots of costumes, battle scenes, great acting and old-fashioned themes. Meaning I loved it but most other people probably didn't. Heath Ledger is a very talented young man who can pull off being dashing, brave, sad, afraid, suffering, rash, mad... plus he doesn't look silly in historic costumes (which endears him to me a lot).

Other men who don't look silly in ethnic or historic costume: Sean Connery, Alan Rickman, Johnny Depp, Mel Gibson, Gabriel Byrne

Men who DO look silly in period wear: David Boreanaz, Charlie Sheen (and most of the other musketeers, except of course Kiefer Sutherland), Leonardo di Caprio. (Naturally, neither list is complete)

Anyway, Four Feathers was pretty brutal stuff. Years and years ago I saw a movie based on the same novel and that was already pretty tough, but this version... naked bodies lying in the desert, their heads cut off and dogs licking at them; horrible living conditions in the Mahdi's prison. - No wonder the film didn't do well in movie theatres. Personally, I liked it, but I liked Braveheart, Patriot, Zulu and Henry V - all films with wholesale slaughter in it.

Four Feathers is also interesting because it depicts an interesting era, the Victorian age. While I doubt that a young officer and his would-be fiancé would kiss that often and in front of a friend the film still managed to convey a certain far away air. It's like watching Sense and Sensibilty - you like the characters but secretly you think that everybody in those days must have been insane to act the way they do.