(no subject)

[slemslempike]

GOSH I'm not sure about this at all:

Kingscote Spring Term.

GGBP are publishing a "fill-in"/fanfic novel as part of Antonia Forest's Marlow books, set following Run Away Home. I am not at all sure about it. If it were news of a long multi-chapter Marlow fic, I'd be utterly delighted, but it being a published novel is a different thing for me. I have come up with a LIST of reasons why, when I enjoy reading Chalet fill-ins, I'm uneasy about a Kingscote book. (I'm still going to buy and read it when it comes out.)

• There are loads of the Chalet school books, and they are all quite similar to one another. So writers of fill-ins can slip into the universe quite easily, while it's much more difficult with Antonia Forest, whose world is much more dense and varied. Another novel amongst 59 others can slip in, while another after 10 originals stands out more. We've had so much of the Chalet world that as a reader I know roughly how EBD would address most situations. With Antonia Forest, it's much less clear-cut, and more surprising, so I think it will be hard for the author not to seem OOC.



• Antonia Forest was a very good writer. EBD was a good story teller, but her writing is very imitable. I can read the EBD fill-ins quite happily (well, most of them) without being taken out of the world. It's going to be much more difficult to achieve that with AF-fic. I've often found longer length faithful fics to be a little hard for me to take, as they didn't quite get the voice and I didn't trust them to be telling me the story of these characters. Unreasonable, perhaps.



• When GGBP started publishing Chalet fill-ins I didn't know about fanfiction really, and hadn't started to discover online fandom. Whereas now I read fic online, and have started to resent the idea of paying for it, when the best fic I've ever read is available for free. Which seems rather mean of me. On the one hand, it's part of liking fandom specifically. I've seen fanfic being referred to as like a gift relationship. On the other hand, why shouldn't I support women's work (and most fanfic is) financially?



• It's not written by Ankaret. Which isn't exactly fair of me, because most of Ankaret's fics (especially the longer ones) aren't meant to be straight fanfic of the GGBP kind, and this is a very different kettle of fish. But while I don't think it's appropriate for Jareth the Goblin King to pop up in this novel, Term of Duty is so much the right voice that I can't really imagine it being equalled.

Actually, having now written down my objections to the idea, I'm rather looking forward to it. It won't be AF, and I might not find it to my liking, but it'll be interesting to see what someone else has thought about what might happen after Run Away Home. GGBP says it'll be published in July/August this year, but my experience of their previous publishing schedules leads me to scepticism.

Does anyone know the author? I'm not asking for any online IDs to be outed or anything, or even if she has them - just I don't know the name or if she's written anything else, and I'd be interested to know if anyone has come across her before.

Comments

[morganmuffle]

I don't know her at all but discussion on the CBB leads me to believe that this fill-in started as a fanfic somewhere and everyone encouraged her to send it to GGB. Some people are very excited by it (I haven't read enough AF to have an opinion in either direction)

[slemslempike.livejournal.com]

Interesting. I wonder where it was, it doesn't match the description of anything I've read of AF-fic, and I hadn't realised that I was missing some places to look. Perhaps I have become complacent!

[ankaret.livejournal.com]

Looks as if it was on the Middles' Common Room.

[slemslempike.livejournal.com]

Ah, I see! I may have a look in the wayback machine when I'm not at work, not to try and get around paying (I'll still be buying), but to see what the style's like from the first entry or so. Assuming that they actually archived it.

[the_antichris.livejournal.com]

MCR is where that Chalet/Marlows crossover was, right? I enjoyed that fic, but I'm going to guess that 'good for the MCR' is not the same as 'good for Trennels'. /snob

[rosathome.livejournal.com]

I am about to be very catty.

I clicked through that link and was initially very excited at the idea of potential new source of Marlow fic. The first sentence of the first story I clicked on had a reference to 'Commander Marlowe'. Which does not precisely inspire me with confidence that it is a forum of wildly discerning readers.

[coughingbear]

Oh. Oh. Oh.

I am Very Dubious.

Partly because it's not written by ankaret, as you say, and I think partly because I'd always thought Spring Term was the real title Forest would have used for the next book. Which may be something I have completely and utterly made up. Also, I find some of the EBD fill-ins pretty unconvincing, and agree with you that Forest is much much harder to do.

Tig Thomas as editor is a bit reassuring, though.

[slemslempike.livejournal.com]

I didn't know that about Spring Term - rings a vague bell now you've said it though. If it is her title, then I think that's really quite off to be using it, especially as AF did have a plot for what that was going to be.

[nineveh-uk.livejournal.com]

I would rather they republished the school novels so I could read them again.

[ankaret.livejournal.com]

Do they have the rights to them? If so, it seems a bit odd to be trying to sell a fill-in while simultaneously deciding not to sell the books that would create a market for said fill-in.

[slemslempike.livejournal.com]

I suspect that they don't. Also, I think Autumn Term is still in print from Faber. (Which doesn't help matters much for the harder to find books.)

[antisoppist.livejournal.com]

They don't.

This is where I feel guilty for having hardbacks as well as my childhood paperbacks of three of them isn't it?

[coughingbear]

Well, if you feel guilty I will have to as well. *And* I have GGB copies of all the ones they did publish. My excuse is that I need copies that I'm prepared to let my goddaughter read.

[antisoppist.livejournal.com]

So do I. Possibly three copies of Thuggery is a little excessive.

But when Son decided to take all the books Daughter was reading and hide them from her under piles of grass cuttings in the garden and no-one noticed and it rained and one of them was my childhood copy of The Swish of the Curtain, you feel you need spares.

[coughingbear]

Oh, ow. Spares are essential. (My hardback Forests are definitely clean hands and no biscuits.)

I share your uncertainties

[jinty]

and am also buying it anyway. Oh well.

Re: I share your uncertainties

[slemslempike.livejournal.com]

People on the forum where it was initially posted seem very enthusiastic, which is a good sign! I'm looking forward to finding out.

[ankaret.livejournal.com]

You and coughingbear are very lovely!

I think I will wait and see what other people make of it before I buy it. I'm not massively fond of the GGBP Chalet fill-ins, though I can see that they're very faithful to EBD's style.

[coughingbear]

It's funny, I was just thinking about why I don't feel much urge to read EBD fill-ins/fanfic, and concluding that there are so many Chalet books I don't need fic to provide me with something to fit a Chalet mood, and that I can make Chalet stories up in my head very easily. Even as a person who barely writes fic, I produced several chapters of 'Cecilia at the Chalet School' when I was still at school myself. Also aspects of the books that don't annoy me much from EBD (or at least which I discount against the aspects I love) I somehow find much more irritating from someone who is not her, and doesn't have the particular history and personality which produced the books in the first place. (Does that make any sense?)

I find fics like your Chalet/Marlows crossover much more fun, because they're answering questions which EBD couldn't have answered. And I don't think anyone captures Forest's voice as well as you do, or takes the characters so much on their own terms.

[nineveh-uk.livejournal.com]

because they're answering questions which EBD couldn't have answered

Your comment resonates with me as to why I don't really read much Chalet fic or have interest in the fill-ins (but love TCG Grow Up) - this isn't a world where I desire more of the same, but where I enjoy the exploration of what the original can't/doesn't do.

[coughingbear]

TCG Grow Up was great fun, I agree. Some canons just need subverting...

[ankaret.livejournal.com]

Yes, that makes sense! I find I can cope much better with people being described as 'trim and trig' or with boring chapters about Sales or visits to the dentist if I know it's organic rather than bolted on.

Also, I find there's a sort of Unthreatening Valley that official sequels fall into, in that if you're EBD, you can have a character rescued from a house of ill repute or orphaned by her father's attempts to build a rocket in his back yard, and if you're writing fanfic you can do any damn thing you like and your readers will put up with, whereas if you're writing an official sequel there seems to be a sort of unspoken pressure not to do anything too out of the ordinary.

I wish Sally Hawkins all the luck in the world, but I have to admit it comes with a large side order of 'rather you than me'.

[rosathome.livejournal.com]

You and me both on the 'rather you than me'.

[gair.livejournal.com]

Oh, 'unthreatening valley' is perfect. I never need to (figure out why I don't want to) read another official sequel again.

And gerald and I both had the same 'What is the point if it is not by ankaret'? reaction, btw.

[coughingbear]

The Unthreatening Valley is a very good description! I suppose for the fill-ins in particular, you also can't have anything so interesting it would be referred to in later stories, which sets the bar rather low when Con's Daniel mistake keeps resurfacing. But EBD as you say is not short of unlikely thrills.