The Fredösphere

My friend John loaned me His Majesty's Dragon, an alternate history wherein the Napoleonic wars are fought using dragons as well as armies and frigates.  It's a lot of fun, and I recommend it.  The dragons are intelligent and can speak, so great opportunities arise for fascinating human-dragon relationships.  Author Naomi Novik exhibits a woman's keen eye for such relationships.  Beyond that, I noticed a tendency for the narrative to follow a simple cycle:

1.  The main character has a conversation.
2.  The main character spends time alone, ruminating on the meaning of that conversation.
3.  Back to #1.

To me, the effect of this is to feminize the male characters.  I certainly don't spend that much time analyzing relationships.  On the other hand, maybe those men out there who are politically and socially more adept than I (there are a few of those, I believe) do spend the time.  In any event, I wouldn't even consider this a flaw in the book; just something I noticed as being unusual in the nerdy, introverted world of speculative fiction.

The wifeösphere and I enjoyed watching Anatomy of a Murder over the weekend.  I'm a sucker for any courtroom drama, but I found Duke Ellington's music incongruous.  The wifeösphere found Jimmy Stewart's folksy, rural manner unconvincing.  I, who find Stewart usually insufferable for just that reason, didn't mind him here.  I almost, almost understood why so many people find him simpatico.  The best part of the movie (for us Michiganians) is its Upper Peninsula setting.  I wonder if any other state boasts a hinterland so starkly divided from the "mainland" both geographically and psychologically.

I must not fail to mention the ultimate yooper movie, Escanaba in da Moonlight.