Points of interest on a Thursday

[truepenny]

Point the first: I would like to remind those of you commenting on the Red Seas Under Red Skies post that Scott is a friend of mind. I am not, nor would ever dream of, asking you to censor your opinions, but I am asking that you remember that this author, like me, is a real person and deserves the courtesy of being discussed as such. Also, it's entirely possible that he will read what you say about him and his books.

---

Point the second: in a nutshell, why I changed my name when I got married:

HowManyOfMe.com

There are 7,803 people with the name Sarah Smith in the U.S.A. How many have your name?

HowManyOfMe.com

There are 8 people with my name in the U.S.A. How many have your name?

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Point the third: I don't talk about politics on this blog, and that's going to continue, but for the record, the fact that I share a given name with that particular VP candidate makes me cringe.

Comments

[dionysus1999.livejournal.com]

Luckily there are plenty of cool Sarah's like you and my wife to offset the governor of Alaska.

[nancylebov.livejournal.com]

You have my permission to cut or eliminate this if you think it's too offensive.

I liked the first book so much I was really looking forward to the second. Ezri's convenient death left me feeling so ill I'm dubious about reading the third, but I'll probably give in to temptation.

This being said, I don't think Scott Lynch is an awful person for getting caught up in genre conventions. Aside from anything else, he's keeping so many plates in the air that I can see wanting to not add more complications.

And there were some things I liked very much about Red Sails. I enjoyed the learning to be a pirate stuff. There was a very fine "oh shit!" moment when the man who actually knew how captain a ship died. And the bandit on the cliff scene was wonderful.

[truepenny.livejournal.com]

I just said I wasn't asking anyone to censor their opinions.

[aranel.livejournal.com]

I'm just glad she spells it with the h. If she had been Sara, I imagine it would have inspired a rash of h-less misspellings. I usually specify "with h" anyway, but sometimes I forget.

[renatus.livejournal.com]

*headscratch* Er, misspelling? Sara is a cognate of Sarah, which is a little different than the dropping-a-letter or changing-a-perfectly-good-i-to-a-y that's popular in English-speaking countries.

[truepenny.livejournal.com]

Yes, but if you happen to spell your name with an "h" and someone, as for example a furnace repair person, spells it without the "h" on their invoice, that is a misspelling of your personal name. Which, believe me, happens a lot.

[aranel.livejournal.com]

This is what I meant.

[truepenny.livejournal.com]

Yeah. I had a teacher in junior high, who had me in one class or another for THREE YEARS, and every damn time she wrote my name, she spelled it without the h.

[auriaephiala.livejournal.com]

I can understand misspelling an unusual name, but a common name (where both variations are common)? That's just annoying.

I have learned NEVER to underestimate how people can mispronounce or misspell one's name.

[themadfish.livejournal.com]

I have a bit of an unusual name(when I say 'a bit' I mean there's 1 or fewer with both my first and last name, and 1,527 or fewer with my first), and someone once mispronounced it into 'yaoi.' My first name is Yileen. I have no idea how that happened.

[renatus.livejournal.com]

Ah, well, yes, that's quite different.

[mrissa.livejournal.com]

I didn't know your real given name was Jackass! I can see why you use the middle one.

[callunav.livejournal.com]

The first person I ever knew who I knew had changed her name independent of marriage or other such event, just because she wanted to - as I ended up doing, myself, a few years later - changed her name from Deb Smith to Deb Rowan. Wide-eyed and newly curious freshman that I was, I asked, "Did your parents mind?" She gave me a pitying look. "When your name is Smith, they don't mind."

[swan-tower.livejournal.com]

I apologize if I'm one of the ones you feel was being discourteous in that comment thread.

I do always bear in mind that the author may (and in the age of Google Alerts, probably will) read what I'm saying. And it occurs to me that I may have stated more strongly than I meant to my personal hypothesis behind the element I was critiquing; if there's one thing that annoys the snot out of me, it's reviewers assuming they know why a particular flaw ended up in my work. Since they're 0 for however many so far.

<bites tongue to avoid naming examples>

So anyway. Apologies if I got too strident.

[girlpunksamurai.livejournal.com]

Don't worry, you're not alone in that particular woe

I share a name with Laura Bush -_-

.....


yeaaahhhhh...>.> I'm still in therapy for it

[ken-schneyer.livejournal.com]

Gotcha beat, and I didn't even need to change my name:

How many have your name? (http://howmanyofme.com)

People often seem to forget that there's a real person inside that writer / actor / director / yes, politician. I gave an LJ friend a private dressing-down when he expressed glee that a sixteen-year-old film actress was looking "rather plain." With three younger sisters and a teenage daughter, I can only imagine what the poor girl's going through.

[girlpunksamurai.livejournal.com]

How many have your name? (http://howmanyofme.com)

;.;

[ashnistrike.livejournal.com]

...for the record, the fact that I share a given name with that particular VP candidate makes me cringe.

Yeah. Me too. Just adds insult to injury, somehow.

-Nameseeker

[truepenny.livejournal.com]

I know about the Sarah Monette in Wisconsin, although I have not met her. I think mostly what it means is everyone and their dog names their child (puppy?) Sarah.

And, as of yesterday, yes, I am on facebook.