The Watchman, and also On Fiction

I may have mentioned in the past that for a long time, whenever I tried to focus on how I pictured Vimes in my head, I'd end up with Bruce Willis, which really wasn't what I was going for. Well, I watched Unbreakable for the first time in a while last night, and noticed that the number of the train that derails at the beginning ... is 177. That, unless I am much mistaken, is Vimes' badge number. And Bruce Willis' character in the movie is, in a way, a watchman, and very good at spotting when Something Is Up (though admittedly in a different manner than Vimes just relying on being 'a suspicious bastard') ... and ... yeah. So I thought ... has Mr Shyamalan read any Discworld books? And would he please make Thud! if ever it is to be made? Even though it'd be a bit of a stretch to set it in Philadelphia.

So, continuing, in the manner of someone reading out interesting things from the newspaper to anyone seated nearby who might be interested ...

I found this in May's issue of Locus, a trade magazine for publishers of SciFi/Fantasy. It's Garth Nix, talking about characteristics of age-based genres in literature. Under 'Children's Novel' is the following:

It will be told in a prose style that does not break the reader out of the story, nor seek attention at the expense of the story. The text will not gladden the hearts of semioticians with regular halts every few pages to admire the author's coruscatingly brilliant sentence construction; or to puzzle through the author's obtuse but remarkable vocabulary.

I wonder if he's ever read Wicked... I mean, obviously, that's not even trying to be a children's book, but if you omit all the 'not's from that paragraph, you've got pretty much everything I dislike about Gregory Maguire's writing style.

Simple pleasures for simple minds, hmm hm hmmm...