I rented Sci Fi Channel's "Children of Dune" from Netflix and watched the first part last night. My review will be posted on the City of Kik main site as soon as I've finished watching. It is a faithful adaptation, like Sci Fi Channel's "Dune" adaptation of a few years ago. It made me think of why, all of a sudden, fantasy and science fiction is being done right. Peter Jackson's "The Lord of the Rings" film trilogy is, of course, the shining example. But, Sci Fi's adaptations of Dune, the new Battlestar Galactica, the X-Men movies all show that there is a growing understanding that the genre is more than wild costumes and crazy makeup. While I don't know the specific backgrounds of those behind these projects, I do suspect that we are seeing the work of the first generation that grew up with reading fantasy. I was born in 1968 (wow, that looks really long ago in print). And while Tolkien was popular it was all that was out there. It wasn't until Terry Brooks' Shannara series, and Donaldson's "Chronicles of Thomas Covenant" were published that the current genre of fantasy took off. So those frustrated by what we saw as children and teenagers -- the animated "Lord of the Rings" and David Lynch's "Dune" -- finally have gotten their shot at doing it right. Of course, the strides in special effects and the advent of different outlets: cable and dvd, have made it easier to put such epic works on the big and small screen.

Now that the City of Kik website is complete, I can focus again on my writing. The site was a pretty massive undertaking, and I'm no web programmer, so to put the entire site together - artwork and all (thanks to Nick for lots of content) was pretty time consuming. But, I'm proud of how it looks and am now ready to take on some of the projects that have fallen by the wayside...including Rootlands. But today I'm going to work on a project that has had many false starts over the years...a multi-volume saga that I will refer to as "Through Chaos." I'm attempting to write more freestyle. My mind tends to work in a linear fashion, but a writer friend has turned me onto jumping around more, not having to write everything chronologically. I'm really just starting with this, but already I'm feeling the lifting of the roadblocks I inevitably hit. I'll let you all know how I'm doing in a few days. Wish me luck!