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Here’s Part II of my exploration of sacrifice in pop-culture. If you haven’t read it yet, be sure to read Part I.

Warning: SPOILERS FOLLOW.

Whedon-verse: Buffy, Angel and Firefly

Joss Whedon seems almost as gung-ho about sacrifice as J.K. Rowling. In Buffy the Vampire Slayer, its spin-off Angel, and Firefly, most of the characters–if not all–at some point sacrifice their happiness, their loves, and ever their lives in the pursuit of the three big S’s– Slaying, Saving The World and Surviving. Most of the time, these sacrifices are selfless and truly heroic, but Whedon goes out of his way to occasionally subvert the trope as well.

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Happy Monday, everyone! I don’t know about everyone else, but we’re having some gorgeous Spring weather here in London, and I couldn’t be happier!

I finally got to the theater to see The Hunger Games. I read Suzanne Collins’ epic trilogy in the space of a single week last year, and was blown away by her lush descriptions, heart-racing pace, and heart-breaking characters. While I had a few issues with the movie adaptation, overall I felt the director remained faithful to the book in all the right ways.

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…and that’s a whole lotta lady.

In the interest of honesty, I will freely admit that I wasn’t going to post today. I have had three very frustrating days of attempted ideation that have resulted in zero new material. Zilch. Nada. My notebook looks a bit like something filched from a madman–crossed out lines and character names interspersed with scrawled timelines stuck between strange words and phrases like “neo-futuristic wasteland” and “grape jelly” and “dungeon time-shift.”

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Oh, I have been a bad, bad bloggerina. I am aware of this. Self-flagellation starts…now.

I can only blame my lack of regular writing on the cock-eyed monster I call editing. Editing is like…cleaning the house, or weeding the garden, or trimming your hair regularly. That is, absolutely necessary, but hardly an enjoyable task. As a writer, you have to make time for sweeping the dust out of the corners of your plot, pulling out the weeds of stale dialogue and sloppy description, and snipping off those scraggly loose ends that make the rest of a healthy story look like poop.

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