Malinda Lo riffs off a Kate Elliott post, talking about being a woman writer and still having to actively check your manuscripts to make sure the female characters are not being screwed over. I do this too! Did I accidentally kill off all the women in my book? Oh, crap. Rewrite!

NK Jemisin talks about why her editor, Devi Pillai of Orbit Books, should be considered for the Hugo race – she had me at ‘Paradol Protectorate’!

A lovely article about cosplaying the TARDIS, bringing steampunk into her design, and just how female the TARDIS is anyway. The cosplay/crossplay phenomenon as a feminist statement is something I never fail to find interesting, and the fannish craft evident in this post is awesome. I say this as someone who is planning to make two birthday cakes next week – a TARDIS and a Time Vortex.

Speaking of which, 3D TARDIS cookies are the best use I can think of for 3D printers…

The Guardian looks at the outpourings of mancrush inspired by the return of Thierry Henry to the Arsenal and questions why football is so institutionally anti-gay when, quite frankly, even the straightest of fannish football blokes are set all aflutter by certain men in certain shorts, scoring certain goals. It’s actually a slightly more serious article than I suggest here, and worth reading.

Some more criticism of Lego Friends (AKA Lego for girls) – in the Australian as well as over on the Mary Sue. Both articles are worth looking at for the extra dimension they add to this story – it really isn’t as simple as ‘Lego researched the hell out of this and gave girls exactly what they want’.

Sarah Rees Brennan answers a question about the current popularity of love triangles with – what else? A historical overview of love triangles.

Meanwhile Karen Healey takes on the popularity of the bromance and asks why the female equivalent (SROMANCE!) is so rare. Also she convinces me that I personally need to watch Josie and the Pussycats.

An interview with the new producer of Doctor Who, Caroline Skinner, with particular focus on her other hit TV show, ghost story The Fades.

Lee Battersby on his recent sale to Angry Robot, and the long road to get there.

The Boxcutters crew are trying to crowdsource a trip to the SXSW Interactive festival in Austin, Texas.

A post about why it is that celebrities fit their jeans better than anyone else – and no, it actually isn’t about being a size zero…

Also, Verity Lambert has always been a feminist hero of mine – a 28 year old woman who was the youngest producer, and only female drama producer, at the BBC, and was given this bizarre white elephant of a TV show to run back in 1063, she not only made a success of Doctor Who (she approved the first Dalek script against advice from others, sealing the show’s early triumph of ratings and pop culture madness), but went on to have a long and substantial career elsewhere. She was Head of Drama at ITV when they were producing The Sweeney, Minder, Rumpole of the Bailey and the Naked Civil Servant, she produced John Cleese’s feature Clockwise during a brief film production interlude, and finally set up her own independent production company, Cinema Verity, which was responsible for one of my favourite obscure TV shows, Class Act (starring Joanna Lumley, John Bowe and Nadine Garner). She also moonlighted freelance producing work with the BBC, such as Jonathan Creek, another old favourite of mine.

I was extra delighted to learn recently that she was also a devoted Gooner, when Alan Davies reminisced about being at a particular game with her, on his Arsenal podcast The Tuesday Club. Female Arsenal fans are far more of a minority than female Doctor Who fans have ever been, so I grabbed this piece of information with great joy.

Ahem, got a bit sidetracked there. I’d never seen her interviewed before, at least while so young, and this one is very cool, with the added bonus of several Doctor actors bickering amiably together.

First I woke up to a mad flurry of Twitter action that proved Arsenal had actually (for once) put its money where its mouth was and BOUGHT REAL PLAYERS in the eleventh hour of the transfer period. So yes, being slaughtered by Man U was good for something. We have a defensive line again, and a real grown up midfielder with experience rather than potential!

Dizzy, I tell you.

Then I hit the 70,000 word mark on my Nancy Napoleon novel. It’s not finished yet, but lurching into the final act, and oh boy. Giant monsters, bitchy goddesses and pretty boys covered in blood. I must get this novel finished while I’m still in love with it!

But the big feature of the day has been my first real chance to play with the new household toy. My honey decided what he wanted for Father’s Day was a Kindle, and he’s been happily buying & reading books on it for the last two days (father’s day came early, obviously).

Now, I was what you would call a Kindlecynic. When it comes to the Mighty Empire of Amazon, I’ve been backing away slowly, and doing my best to support the less enormous booksellers in our industry. For the most part, I succeeded in this, except for my recent Audible addiction. But I have to admit, the Kindle is pretty awesome. It’s so much lighter than the iPad, and so comfortable to read! I was finally able to get hold of Lucy March/Lani Diane Rich’s The Fortune Quilt, a book I’ve been wanting since I first started listening to back episodes of the podcast Will Write for Wine. I’ve picked up the e-book of Nick Mamatas’ Starve Better, which I have been eyeing off for weeks. I’ve also stocked up on Octavia Butler, the complete works of Mary Shelley and a bunch of other SF and urban fantasy titles – plus my wish list is growing substantially!

I was excited to see when I searched for Nicola Griffith that her Ammonite is available as a pre-order from Gollancz later this month – SF Gateway ahoy!

Oh and, ahem, worth mentioning that my first two Creature Court novels, Power and Majesty & Shattered City, are both available through the Kindle (though I assume only to Australian & NZ readers) and they are looking a bit lonely for lack of reviews. So much so that my honey took pity on me and wrote one himself, which is equal measures of embarrassing and adorable. I’m coming down on the side of adorable. I have so many fantastic reviews over at GoodReads, so it feels churlish to ask, but I would be supremely grateful if any of you with Kindle/Amazon accounts who’ve read the books could post a review up there, or cut and paste you have already written over at GoodReads. THANK YOU!

From a practical point of view I’ve noticed only a few niggles – like the books don’t disappear from the wishlist when you buy them, and the ‘books recommended for you’ are full of unavailable titles. For the most part, it’s a smooooth reading experience, and the clarity of the screen is almost scary. (John Steinbeck is staring at me right now and I can see every bristle of his moustache!)

So yes, my cynicism has been hurled under the carpet and thoroughly stomped on. Excuse me, but I’ve done my writing for the day, and there’s a skinny pretend book waiting for me to read it. Wheeee!

Sean the Blogonaut has joined the Galactic Chat team with a great podcast interview with urban fantasy veteran author Kelley Armstrong.

Saundra Mitchell has a great response to the continuing meme about there being a YA-for-boys crisis: The Problem is Not the Books.

Yarn Harlot beautifully captures the feeling of having a new book out. (via @jumbledwords)

Sapphire, author of Push (which became the film Precious) discusses the racism she has encountered in the arts/publishing world and the expectations people often have about black authors.

I got such a kick about this story of hundreds of lovers across Italy mimicking a romantic novel by putting padlocks on bridges, and how the authorities see it as a major vandalism issue.

A lovely art post which takes the iconic images of Disney Princesses, but makes their costumes more historically accurate. (Via @angriest)

After months of depression and misery surrounding Arsenal, we qualified for the Champions League! Hell yes!

Smart Bitches made me aware of this film about the Victorian medical treatments for hysteria, which looks like the best kind of British historical comedy gold, and features my beloved Sheridan Smith, among many others:

When Zeft first started teaching Kaia and I about Premier League football, and the new team we had pledged to support, the first story she told us was the story of Cesc, her favourite player. How he had come from Barcelona to play for Arsenal as a young teenager, and was now one of the best creative midfielders in the world. Even before I knew what a midfielder was, I knew that Cesc was an exceptional one. He had been our youngest ever player on the first team, and youngest goalscorer. He was ours.

In my first year as Arsenal fans, I saw the developing legend of Cesc for myself. I learned to watch the games and to understand them, and it was pretty damn evident that Cesc stepping on to the pitch made a difference, to everyone’s game. Also, he was adorable. Then Arsene Wenger took the captain’s armband off the badly-behaving William Gallas, and Kaia and I shared Zeft’s utter glee that it was presented to Cesc – at only 21 years old, though he was a five year veteran of the team. He was our captain now!

The way football works, and I don’t just mean the media and reportage, but in fandom itself, it’s all about the narrative beats. The story practically told itself: with our new young captain and a new lease of life, we’d regroup our strength and win something, right? Only we didn’t. Cesc was struck down with a knee injury for four months, and the season ended with us barely hanging on to our place in the top four. It was the same story every year – periods of hope that this would be the year that our young, hungry team would fulfil their potential, then injuries and disappointment and a lack of silverware.

Meanwhile, a different story started competing to have Cesc in the middle of it. Barcelona wanted their player back. From their point of view, Arsenal was the big bad team who had swept away their talented youngster. Regardless of his new position as captain, and his long term contract, they mounted a media campaign every summer, telling the world how much they wanted Cesc back. His would be teammates, his family, and even local politicians got into the act. The story of how much Cesc wanted to be back in his old home team was publicly discussed by everyone except the man himself, who was doing his best to respect the team that actually paid his wages.

The longer Arsenal went without winning anything, the harder it was to hold on to our talented wonder boy captain. But at the same time, the idea of letting him go home without having won something as Arsenal captain was just as painful. Each transfer period came and went, and we held on to him (just) because of that promise, because everyone wanted the story of Cesc and Arsenal to end with a triumphant climax, not a whimper.

(except, of course, we told ourselves, if we actually won something, well, he wouldn’t leave after all, would he?)

Last summer, he won the World Cup. He literally kicked the goal that won the final match for Spain. His charming colleagues forced a Barca shirt over his head during the celebrations, just to let the world know who he really belonged to. He almost left then, but our manager Arsene told him, no. We still need you. Give us one more year. So Cesc stayed, for one more year, one last chance. And you know what? We still didn’t win anything.

This was the worst summer. The rumour mill was at its fieriest, and everyone knew he was leaving. But Barcelona stuck to their plan to get him home at the least possible expense to themselves, so they opened negotiations with an insultingly low offer. It dragged on, week after week. Finally, reluctantly, Arsenal let him go on the eve of the new season, for a fraction of what they could have got selling a player of his quality (and with so many years still on contract) on the open market. Cesc went home, and broke our hearts.

There’s nothing more depressing than a story that trails off, none of its threads leading to anything. The season has started, and regardless of how obvious it might have been that he was really going this time, there’s still an aura of shock around our team, and our fans. It’s hard to look forward when we’re still waiting for a narrative pay off that will never come.

And, to be frank, it doesn’t help that the other Cesc story, the one about the wonder boy who left home to play in the Premier League and finally returned to wear Barcelona’s colours alongside his childhood friends, has a brilliant ending. He’s going to win trophies with that team, and become the legendary player that we always knew he was. He gets to be the hero of their story.

Someday, maybe, we can be happy for him. But I for one am not quite evolved enough to let it happen yet. I’m a football fan, after all, as well as being a writer. Neither of us are keen on the idea of waking up to discover that our protagonist is off plotting up a dream in someone else’s novel.

Meanwhile, thanks to a combination of the ‘women’s football’ RSS feed from the Guardian and the presence of at least 4 Arsenal players, I’ve been paying a lot more attention to the England team, which is amusing to me because when the England men’s team plays anything I normally spend most of my time muttering at them with very narrowed eyes. I kind of love the video diaries the team have been releasing, if only to listen to their cute accents, though sadly they didn’t win their match either. (1-1)

Moving aside from sport now, here’s an extra plug for Marianne de Pierres’ new project, cowpunk webcomic Peacemaker. Check out the first issue now for a measly 99¢ – much though I disapprove of people pricing whole novels at 99¢, I think it’s exciting for shorter pieces, and as an Australian it’s rather nice to actually get the 99¢ price for once (yes, iTunes with your $1.19, I’m looking at you, you know what the Australian dollar is actually worth, right?). I believe later issues will be priced higher, so now’s your chance to find out if you like Peacemaker!

Speaking of awesome Australian women (and fictional heroes) here’s a great interview with Anna Torv from Fringe.

I have been so impressed with Torv’s performance throughout the third season of Fringe, playing two versions of the same character, and managing to make both utterly compelling rather than falling into the Spock’s beard style of parallel world characterisation. Speaking of Spock’s beard, the episode which required Torv to channel Leonard Nimoy for a whole episode was amazing. Kudos to the show for the subtle and powerful writing, too. Having loved Fringe in spite of itself in season one, and gone through such excitement when season two was so very good from beginning to end, I’m somewhat beside myself that Fringe is now some of the most exciting and interesting SF TV in years, and mark it as a coup that my honey now watches it with me. It’s gone from a show I considered a guilty pleasure to one that so many of my friends respect, like and get excited by. So hooray for the excellent cast, whoa for the spectacular final episode, and woohoo for season 4 on the horizon. I’m glad to hear that Torv’s performance is being heralded (finally!) but I really really hope John Noble gets the Emmy or the GG – his Walter Bishop has always been exceptional to watch, and it feels like every time the rest of the cast rise to his challenge, he just gets better.

Some shorter links now, I promise!

Forbidden Planet asks, Are you a misogynist?

Kate Beaton makes a very good (and hilarious) point about ‘strong female characters‘ through comic art.

Ben Peek writes about the small world view of speculative fiction in the 21st century.

From Meanland, the death of the book and other utopian fantasies (via @vodkanlime)

The Women of Solaris.

Two from Tor.com re-reading Joanna Russ (in order) starting with The Adventures of Alyx and Greg van Eekhout & Carrie Vaughn talk about YA, middle grade fiction and how The Kids Are All Right.

And in closing, Pixar finally have a female protagonist. The film looks awesome and I love the title so very much.

I’d got the days mixed up, as often happens when you’re in a country half a day ahead of your football team, and didn’t realise until I got up this morning that the game was on right now. I could only really keep half an eye on it as I got the girls ready for their day.

It didn’t really matter. It’s Barca, after all – the best we could hope for was not humiliating ourselves, and getting out of the Champions League nice and early so we could concentrate on that other trophy, the one that maybe, MAYBE this year, we might have a chance at.

I found a feed briefly and saw a rather dull ten minutes of the game before it crapped out on me, so I didn’t bother. Twitter kept me informed. Like when they got their first goal…

And then, just as I was leaving for the school run, we got a goal, and a second, in quick succession. Twitter again kept me informed. By the time Raeli was at school, I knew we’d won! It didn’t properly sink in until tonight, when I got to watch the whole game, and saw how utterly splendid it all was. The fast footwork, the great hair, the happy hugging boys, the sheer joy of the crowd. The goals. I enjoyed watching it so much. And hooray, we’re officially at the point where SBS thinks it’s worthwhile to show Arsenal Champions League games live… the second leg will be screened as it’s played. Might have to arrange not to be doing the school run that day…

It’s the first leg. Chances are very likely that we’ll be thoroughly spanked at Camp Nou. But I think we can all live with that. This game was still glorious. I’m so happy for Arshavin, proving himself after a patchy season. I’m a little stunned at how great it is to have a really really good goalkeeper (I had such a soft spot for Almunia but… yeah, time to go, mate). I’m bouncing at getting to see Van Persie, Walcott, Wilshere and Cesc in such great form. And – not going to lie – I’m breathing a huge sigh of relief that no one got broken.

Seriously. Our boys are made of glass. Last time we played this leg against Barca, Cesc accidentally fractured his leg while shooting a penalty. These things happen to us all the time.

This afternoon, Raeli informed me over icecream at the pancake train (on an actual train) that she was thinking of switching allegiance to Chelsea. This is something she regularly says, knowing it will drive me INSANE. She only knows Chelsea exists because it’s Daddy’s team – a team he chose to follow on the grounds that this would drive me INSANE.

I smiled beatifically at my dearest darling and told her that it was her choice, but I wasn’t buying her a Chelsea shirt.

She then suggested she might switch back to being a Gooner Girl when she was seven. I was very restrained in not telling her that until she did, Jem was officially my favourite child.

My Dad (who reads this blog and likes to drop anecdotes from it into conversation when I least expect it, Hi Dad!) tried to get her to change to Manchester United on the grounds that this is the team that everyone should follow. I challenged this assertion by proving he didn’t know the names of any of the current players. Even the really famous ones.

Even  godiyeva does better than that, and she only follows Manchester United in order to drive me INSANE! Should it worry me how many of my nearest and dearest deliberately take (or pretend) an interest in football teams other than mine in order to freak me out?

Still, at least it keeps them off the streets.

In my defence, she totally dressed herself.

Then I swung by to vote before going home. No sausage sizzle! Either I was ripped off or it was over well before 2pm which seems a bit lacking in forethought. Sadly this proved to be an omen for how the rest of the election was going to go.

The family had breakfast for dinner and settled down to watch the election results unfold. Towards the end, the only thing that would have made me happier was if they had cut back to Kerry O’Brien and Stephen Smith and they were in their pyjamas, having a pillow fight.

I was glad to see how well the Greens did in the Senate, but otherwise the whole thing was extremely demoralising. Oh, the stress and lack of closure!

At least Arsenal came to the party by giving us a 6-0 win over Blackpool. Happymaking

Today there was more work. See how you haven’t been missing much by me not blogging about my daily activities? WORK IS DULL TO HEAR ABOUT. Five more days and my structural edit is done, done, dusted, leaving me a few days to plan, shop and prepare for Worldcon. I think maybe I need a new coat. We’re going to be tramming all over the place and mine has bits falling off it constantly.

I will post my Worldcon schedule separately. I’m excited about lots of the items (though unfortunately wasn’t able to make the ones I was programmed for on Thursday) and especially that we are doing a “live” Galactic Suburbia episode on Friday morning.

Unless, you know, you follow a regular team!

For Arsenal supporters, the next few weeks are critical. We’re watching the slow, painful process of our boys making their way back into regular training, sporting bruises, groin strains and emotional scars, and knowing our boys a few of the ones who spent their holidays at the beach will have been accidentally decapitated while sunbaking. Yes, they’re that fragile.

But just because the season is several weeks away doesn’t mean there isn’t a rollercoaster of melodramatic angst, heartbreak, romance and hope to keep us all riveted to our laptops.

We thought the biggest stress this summer break was going to be whether or not our beloved leader (in Arsene we Trust… mostly… ish… as long as he buys some freaking players) actually caved and admitted to the world that none of our goalkeepers are any good. Almunia, our No. 1, had a catastrophic lack of form last season, matched only by the screaming panic attacks we witnessed whenever his backup, Fabianski, took the job on. By the end of it every Arsenal fan was begging for random people off the street to be put in goal.

So yes, we were expecting a summer of nailbiting. Would Arsene buy a new goalie? Would he not? Would we be stuck with a twelve-year-old in the position and honestly, could that be worse? But instead, another drama swept into the foreground, and we stopped biting our nails and started chewing our hands off instead.

Cesc. Our adored boy captain, the one and only, the baby-faced hero of the team, and the BEST HOLDING MIDFIELDER IN THE KNOWN UNIVERSE. Otherwise known to the rest of you as that chap who passed Iniesta the ball so he could kick the goal that won the World Cup. Since the beginning of the summer, the papers have been full of the news. Cesc wants to leave Arsenal. Cesc wants to go home to Barcelona, to the team we always knew he would return to… one day. But not this summer. Not at 23, with only a season and a half wearing our captain’s band, having spent a significant chunk of that time out on injury. Not with four years left on his contract.

But what Barcelona wants, Barcelona gets. After weeks of blatant tapping up through the media (in which we heard from Cesc’s dad, his mates and just about every Barcelona player how much he wants to join their team, though the man himself had not spoken publicly about it, Barca finally made a financial offer. An insulting offer. An offer which did not in any way compensate for Arsenal losing their captain, a player nurtured by them for six years, who still has so many years left on contract. Arsenal said no, and oh by the way? Don’t bother negotiating, he is NOT FOR SALE AT ALL.

We cheered, but oh there was a sickening feeling in our stomach, and sure enough, it hasn’t stopped. What Barca wants, Barca gets. The World Cup has come to an end and we still don’t know if our captain is coming back this season. He dedicated the Spain win to our team, and we don’t know if that was a sign of loyalty or a farewell gesture. Through it all, Cesc has stayed classy, and the rest of them have… not. Because yeah, that funny joke where two Barca players forced their team shirt over him in front of the cameras during the final World Cup celebration? Not actually funny, especially when you can see how one of them held his hands so he couldn’t take the damn thing off. And yeah, though things are looking hopeful, we still don’t know how this one’s going to end.

The Arsenal angst doesn’t end there. What about poor old Robin Van Persie, whose World Cup dreams were smashed by that final game between Spain and the Netherlands, and who barely even got the ball passed to him? I don’t know about the rest of you, but I’m just grateful he got out of it with his limbs unbroken. And the quote about how Cesc’s first thought on winning the World Cup was going to comfort his Arsenal teammate? Awwww. You know there was cuddling.

Then there’s Theo Walcott, whose dreams were dashed before the World Cup even started when he was left out of the England team in a shock move, right at the last minute. Of course, considering how badly the English team bombed out (wayyy too many roosters in that henhouse) he probably ended up looking better than the rest of them, but I doubt Theo sees it that way. And don’t get me started on Andrey Arshavin, whose heart was broken a year ago when Russia didn’t make it in at all, and subsequently lost his playing mojo. Come back to us, Andrey. We need our little pocket rocket back in action!

Thank goodness for Nicky B, who can always be relied on for the comic relief or feel good factor. The lanky lad once known for his pink books, crashing sports cars and dropping his daks in public has knocked up his Danish baroness, and they are getting married! Everyone, awwww.

Will our boys return to Arsenal with their hearts, souls and hamstrings intact? Will new boys Chamakh and Koscielny fit in with the gang as well as the awesome assassin-faced Vermaelen, last season’s hit signing? Will Eboue continue to hide the belongings of the other players in the change rooms? Will Diaby lose the facial hair? Will Denilson be able to grow some? Will Alex Dmitri SONG Billong get to stay in midfield, or be pushed back into defence again? Most importantly of all, what will Nasri and Rosicky do with their hair this season?

And people wonder why I don’t bother watching Bold and the Beautiful any more…