Book Rec - Enola Holmes Mystery Stories by Nancy Springer

I picked up the first of this series by Nancy Springer due to good reviews and it's great fun. The prose style is a perfect match between a modern novel in its pacing and the Holmes canon for it's particular word choices. While stories give nods to Holmes canon (that long time fans might spy) the mysteries are NEW, not pastiches of previous work.

What I like about these books, the main character Enola, younger sister of Mycroft and Sherlock is always her own person, and while she's inherited the brilliant mind of a Holmes, she's still only fourteen, and along with that comes some personal insecurities - not least that her mother abandons her, and while she adores her older brother Sherlock, (whom she's only met twice as a young girl) she doesn't know him as a person, and is torn between trusting him and fearing him.

She does know that she won't be sent away to boarding school and be molded into Victorian ideals of what a genteel young woman should be, so she strikes out on her own to a)discover what has happened to her mother and b) discover how she can use her talents to become the independent woman she wants to be.

And its all quite plausible, the mysteries, the way Enola solves them (not without taking wrong turns - she never acquires superpowers) the tone and content of the books never preach as they give excellent period detail of what Victorian life in London at the time was, from the lives of the gentry, down to the poorest wretches of the slums. Sherlock Holmes, Doctor Watson and Mycroft Holmes all appear in perfect character, which won't disappoint canon fans (the writer is herself a fan)

Enola never reads as a dreaded Mary Sue, I admire her desire to not disguise herself as a boy (not only because that is what Sherlock and Mycroft expect) but to be both a woman and a detective, she takes both misery and pride in that her name spelled backwards means 'Alone'

So give these books a try, you won't regret it.
(aside, I'm not a Mary Russell fan - these are better.)

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benandmartin 

Tim Hetherington and Chris Hondros die in Libya

Oscar-nominated British documentary-maker Tim Hetherington, 40, co-creator of the Sundance-winning documentary Restrepo, was killed covering fighting between Muammar Gaddafi's forces and the opposition.

Chris Hondros, 41, a US Pulitzer nominee who works for Getty Images, was also killed. His work has appeared in magazines and newspapers around the world. His awards include World Press Photo honours and the Robert Capa Gold Medal, one of the highest prizes in war photography.

Godspeed my brothers.

http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2011/apr/21/photojournalists-tim-hetherington-chris-hondros?intcmp=239
http://www.foreignpolicy.com/articles/2011/04/20/a_life_less_ordinary_the_photographs_of_chris_hondros
http://globalspin.blogs.time.com/2011/04/20/in-memoriam-chris-hondros/?hpt=C1
http://www.guardian.co.uk/media/gallery/2011/apr/21/war-reporting-libya

Infidel - photos from Afghanistan by Tim Hetherington

Renowed British photographer who has died today in Libya put together this amazing photo exhibit, (along with a book and film) of US soldiers while sleeping (the film is nominated for an Oscar)

"In America, soldiers are used by the right wing as a symbol of patriotic duty, but the truth is they are all individuals," he concludes. "And the Left want a moral condemnation of the war. What I say is that if we have a full understanding of what the soldiers can and can't do out there, it is a good starting point for peace-building. The heart of the war machine is in fact taking a group of young men and putting them on the side of a mountain. We need to understand that experience. Certainly if we have any hope of properly reintegrating them into society."

see online gallery here:
http://www.independent.co.uk/arts-entertainment/art/features/combat-fatigue-tim-hetheringtons-intimate-portraits-of-us-soldiers-at-rest-reveal-the-other-side-of-afghanistan-2073877.html?action=Gallery

I must walk this earth like some forgotten soldier

So maybe this is my 'Watson' song

Lyrics:
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Community Mods Heads Up!

Do you maintain an LJ community? If so, please read this
LiveJournal recently added a new "Spam Protection" feature to every community and turned it on by default without telling community maintainers. The new feature automatically screens and hides comments that contain links to any website not on a secret whitelist, without any e-mail notification to either the original poster or to community maintainers.
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Just some pics of Ben and adorable funny moments

(If you've got a sharp eye you can see Ben sharing personal space with co-star Martin Freeman and the Tenth Doctor David Tennant)

*sigh*

Hopefully tomorrow I can get going on my Sherlock/Hobbit fic, or draw, I haven't been very creative the last few days.

I DO HAVE MY DVD OF SHERLOCK BACK, so I will probably watch the commentaries, just to hear Martin and Ben tease each other, and of course, Mark and Stephen - ah, this reminds me, I should get Mark Gatiss' books from the library.

I don't want to go to bed yet. Maybe I will listen to Cabin Pressure eps or Ben's Casanova.

Spouse was thinking of doing my Sherlock/John PG fic 'The Fundamental Things Apply' as a podfic, as he's got a wonderful voice (still has the British boarding school accent) and he does the most amazing Gollum by the way, but he says that Benedict's voice doesn't have much modulation/accent to it, (?) hmm. He'll just have to listen to Ben more, but I can tell him he doesn't have to copy Ben's voice,

spouse's Sherlock is going to sound like David Bowie. And there's singing in my fic too, spouse likes that.