Author: Tim Scheidler

Supergirl: The other day, I saved an old man who hated superheroes. I was carrying him out of a burning building and not hurrying because there were a lot of us and I couldn’t X-ray vision anyone else inside. And this old man piped up all about how he was sorry to say it, but he just couldn’t stand superheroes. I thought it was an odd thing to tell the person dangling you three stories up, but sure, whatever, sometimes the primary colors are a lot for me too. So I asked him why, and he went into this whole speech about how things were classier in the good old days,

This week, Galadriel.

Galadriel: It is the time in Lothlorien when we honor love. At least, it is that time inasmuch as it is ever any specific time in Lothlorien, as time is something of which we of the wood think little. Seasons change and the world runs by about the eaves of Lorien, yet ever it is our desire to forget that so long has passed from long-ago days. At least, that’s what I told Celeborn this week when he mentioned I’d forgotten our anniversary. He got all shirty, as usual, and I had to go on about how I’d lost myself in reminiscences of a long-lost time when I wore a rich hauberk and carried a sword.

This week, Ron from Harry Potter.

Ron: You know, it occurred to me this week that the basilisk was moving through the plumbing back in second year. Yet to hear Harry tell it, the basilisk was a bloody great snake big as a house or whatnot. So either the pipes in this school are just enormous or Harry was misremembering. Come to think of it, nobody’s ever around for the end of the adventures except Harry, most times, so no one’s there to tell him he’s seeing things or forgetting stuff.

Peter Pan: I like having mothers, but they’re always trying to make me grow up. Well, almost always. Sophie’s my mother now. She’s Wendy’s daughter, or daughter’s daughter, or daughter’s daughter’s niece. Or something. Anyway, mothers keep trying to make you grow up and be a man, so I expected Sophie would too, and I told her I wasn’t about to grow up and get a beard and work in a bank. But then she kept agreeing with me. “No,” she said, “it’s actually a really bad time to be a grown-up. The houses are really expensive and the wages are really low and my mom says the American dream is dead.”

This week, Drizzt Do’Urden of Dungeons and Dragons fame.

Drizzt: I learned some deeply troubling news this week. While attending the annual Brooding Drow with Swords Meeting (can’t think why people keep snickering when I use the acronym), I found myself unexpectedly one of the very few dark elf warriors remaining. Why, for many years one could scarcely swing a +2 defending scimitar without hitting at least three somber but noble members of my race. I have often reflected that my own modest example must have inspired others, and it has been a source of no small pride to me.

This week, Red Sonja.

Red Sonja: It is so damn cold. The kind of cold where you can step outside just for a moment and the snot starts freezing in your nose. Limping by on coin from a troll contract a while back, though I had a job convincing the burgomaster that I was me. Like he expected me to walk out of a blizzard in a chain-mail loincloth. Had to drop the rucksack right there in the square and dig the damn thing out before he’d believe me. Should have taken that caravan job with Conan a while back.

This week, I’m reviving a mothballed tradition that helps us out occasionally in lean times – the return of the character update.

Ayesha: Week 149,986. Still waiting eternally in holy Kor for my lost love Kallikrates to be reborn and find his way to me, yadda yadda. One of my priestesses asked me recently why it was that Kallikrates hadn’t been reborn yet, and where his spirit was in the meantime. I was forced to admit that spirits don’t actually wait in penalty boxes and Kallikrates is reborn someplace. He’s just not quite right yet.

Marion: I finished M. A. Carrick’s The Liar’s Knot, and enjoyed every minute of it. I sent off interview questions to the two writers who comprise that author, and look forward to providing that interview and a giveaway in the near future. I finished up Louise Erdrich’s The Sentence, a nice bit of metafiction about Tookie, who works in a bookstore owned by a writer named Louise. Tookie is haunted by a ghost of Flora, an annoying regular customer, who is now haunting it (she didn’t die there,

Kat: Today I’ll finish Stars Above, a story collection in Marissa Meyer’s LUNAR CHRONICLES. I’m also reading The Best of Walter Jon Williams, which is impressive. I am quite far behind with my reviews and will try to catch up soon.

Marion: Just starting M.A. Carrick’s The Liar’s Knot, and really looking forward to sinking into it! Before that I read Walking Where We Live,

Kat: My daughter and I finished Marissa Meyer’s final LUNAR CHRONICLES novel, Winter, and now we’re reading a collection of prequel stories for that series. I finally finished Poul Anderson’s The Boat of a Million Years. I’m not sure what I’m going to read next but I have more than 50 audiobooks loaded onto my phone (most are review copies!), so there are many choices!

Bill: I remain buried under student papers, but did manage to finish M.A.