Interview with an Assassin

Today I had the chance to explore deeper into the mind of one of my characters.

W.S. Gager's reporter-with-an-attitude Mitch Malone decided to press his luck and put professional hitman Robert I Prescott in the spot. Now, who would do such a thing on purpose? :-)

http://wsgager.blogspot.com/2012/04/mitch-malone-mondays-j-h-bograns-robert.html

News: blog post and freebie!

I have two news to share today.

1. I was invited to write a blog post for Chris Redding's blog. I decided to explore about our relationship as authors with our own characters: here's the link:

http://chrisredddingauthor.blogspot....character.html

2. My story The Assassin's Mistress is enjoying a free day promotion at Amazon, so take advantage of this and get your copy today:
http://www.amazon.com/dp/B007BOC0OW

So you can understand why I'm so thrilled today :-)

The Wrath of Titans and Gemma’s continuous on-screen deaths.

After some debate, we settled to see Wrath of Titans in 2D. However, I conceded the point it’d be the version dubbed in Spanish to please my children.

Dark times are coming; the Gods are dying because people have stopped praying to them. The now widower Perseus has open road to woo fighting Queen Andromeda. Of course, he must first rescue his father from the prison in the underworld, save his son from certain death at the hands of Ares, and destroy his grandfather Kronos. I suppose Ancient Greeks really know how to hold a grudge and keep it all in the family.

However, the Wrath of Titans offers no memorable scenes. The action scenes aren’t as annoying as the ones in Transformers. But a lot of them happen in dark places that, combined with the close-angle of the camera, make it really hard to keep track of who is winning.

Not all is bad, hidden under the special effects is a tale of forgiveness and redemption. Also, it ends with the possibility of a third installment. Liam Neeson is superb as Zeus, as with any role he plays. Ralph Fiennes plays a good Hades, this time looking less like Voldemort with a nose. Sam Worthington looks weird with long hair, but makes a decent job.

All in all, it is an entertaining movie.

Oh, and before I forget, the metallic Bubo makes another cameo, this time even longer than the first time.

The title of the post refers to Gemma Arterton’s characters. I know she’s made plenty of other movies, but if we notice the most prominent ones we find a pattern to be worried about. In Quantum of Solace, agent Strawberry Fields tries to bring rogue agent James Bond back into the saddle, only to suffer a terrible death: asphyxiation by oil. In Prince of Persia, Queen Tamina falls into a pit. Thankfully the sands of time work in her favor and she gets a reprieve. In Clash of Titans, Io dies at the hands of Calibos while Perseus watches in impotence. Thank God—literally—Zeus felt pity for his son and brought back Io to accompany Perseus. I was looking forward to watching her again, but I only got a glimpse at her gravestone; which, by the way, was written in English instead of ancient Greek.

At least, the absence of Gemma Arterton did not ruin the movie as much as Rachel Weiss’ absence from The Mummy franchise did.

Trivia Bit: Andromeda is now played by Rosamund Pike, another former Bond-girl. So that makes two of them becoming female leads in the Titan’s franchise.

The Assassin's Mistress

I’m proud to announce today the release of a short store through Kindle and Smashwords.

The main character is an anti-hero, a professional hitman. An assassin second to none, but no, he’s not the man with the Golden Gun.

James Bond reference aside, the tale of Robert I Prescott is a sad one until he met Chantal while vacationing in a ski resort. It’s a random encounter that led to deception, passion, and murder.

Now check the cover:

The Little Ebook Cover Factory did this for this one.

Now, to celebrate this launch, Jenny Milchman invited me to her blog to share a very special moment on her series Made it Moment. At first it was hard to come up with a moment that I could say “Yes, I made it!” But then when I thought of my previous releases a moment in particular came forward.

Here are the direct links:

Amazon:

http://www.amazon.com/dp/B007BOC0OW

Smashwords

http://www.smashwords.com/books/view/134997

Revisiting Episode 1, except this time wearing glasses

Last night I took my youngest kid to see Star Wars Episode 1. Or should I say I used him as an excuse to see the movie again, but in 3D. Well, it was the first time he saw it in a movie theater.

The oldest boys have already grown out of the franchise and the youngest is only one who still likes it. When he was four or five years old, I set “starwars” as the password for my sons’ Windows account. Since he wasn’t exactly reading then, every time he wanted to play with the computer, he’d bring the DVD box to see the title and then type the password matching the letters one by one. Needles to say, it was a big event for him.

I remember the movie garnered really bad reviews when it was first released in 1999, hardcore fans in particular were really disappointed. Now it is different and people has gotten used to it. The new generation even likes it.

Now about this 3D version, for a change, George Lucas refrained himself from adding, expanding and/or changing the movie. I was afraid he’d digitally superimpose Hayden Christensen’s face over Jake Lloyd.

So, the movie was pretty much as I remember it, although the pod race scene felt a bit longer. Maybe George did play a little bit with it, after all.

On the other hand, I think the flick has aged really well. The story is still entertaining even if it kills a few sacred cows (what’s with the midi-chlorians?) and introduced some of the most hateful characters (Jar Jar Binks stubbornly survived all 3 episodes, go figure.)

Getting re-acquainted with Qui-Gon Jinn was nice treat. He’s my favorite old-republic Jedi. It was a shame he didn’t last more than this entry, although by Episode 3 were learn he discovered a way back even if we couldn’t seen him.

Spoiler Alert (just in case there is still somebody left in the planet who has not seen it):

Near the end of the duel scene, Darth Maul has the higher ground. How come Obi-Wan was able to beat him? In Episode III when the situation is reversed, Anakin jumps up as a near-complete individual only to land a crippled. Why did the same trick worked fro Obi Wan but not for Anakin? Somehow I think the only reason is because the screenplay said so.

I leave you with this picture that is meant to be an angry Darth Vader. Why he is angry or why do I relate it to this movie is beyond me. :-)