Busy, Busy, Busy

First, book news! Martian Lit has announced Watching People Burn, my fictional account of the Bath school disaster. It has also announced my novel, Nira / Sussa, which took over a decade to write. Both couldn't mean more to me. Here are their covers:

Second, Martian Lit published the second chapter of my The Many Lives of Yelena Moulin today, accompanied by art by Doug Smock (see image at right). It's punchy sci-fi, where every chapter has a twist or a mind-bending idea of some sort.

Finally, my second article on Frank Miller's Holy Terror is up on Sequart. It focuses on the introductory sequence as a key to understanding the text.

Thanks for reading! And please, if you like anything, consider sharing them through social networking sites. Many thanks!

Julian Darius Defends Frank Miller

Today on Sequart, I have a piece going up in which I defend -- and try to explain -- Frank Miller.

This isn't something I've chosen to do lightly. My politics and Miller's seem to be rather diametrically opposed. Fervently so, at this trying time in American history. But having said that, I continue to find Miller's work -- including Holy Terror -- tremendously vital. And I think that it's being judged in ways that ignore his own stated intentions, not to mention a good century of rules about what constitutes appropriate artistic criticism.

I struggled very much with the piece, and I ended up cutting thousands upon thousands of words, in which I found myself going off about politics, because that wasn't my intent nor my thesis. It's hard, because I'm so conflicted: I admire Miller's boldness and artwork, yet I'm disgusted by his politics. But surely, there must be a place in criticism for such conflicted responses. And surely, there must be some place for Bold... however offensive and repugnant.

In Martian Lit news, today marks the first non-Julian Darius post, the excellent poem "En France" by David W. Pritchard, with art by Mingagraphy.