Back of the Envelope

Sluggy Freelance — Torg and Aylee run into each other, and Torg tries to convince Aylee to come home with him when the portal opens tomorrow. Aylee, despite feeling neglected, believes that she is home with her people. Torg's argument is primarily that her people are trying to eat his people, so maybe her loyalty is misplaced

Day by Day — So, Sam's pregnant with twins. Zed's not the only one unwilling to share need to know information. Skye helps with a Zed voodoo doll. While over in Iraq, Jan meets military hijinks continue.

Scary Go Round — Shelley's world saving dream team is breaking up and going their separate ways. Not all of them are leaving however. Captain Ernest has convinced Moon and Desmond to join him in his next adventure, and Esther and the Boy are getting back together. On the other hand, Shelley and Amy seem to have forgotten about Erin--not just her situation, but that she ever existed--who is now trapped in Hell with Bob.

Dominic Deegan — Gregory convinces Snowsong that in trying to destroy the town of Barthis, she's become the thing she hates the most. Of course, when she realizes this, instead of turning over a new leaf, she despairs, and tries to force him to kill her, thus becoming what he hates: a murderer. Super Greg has other ideas.

College Roomies from Hell!!! — Dave finally gets around to zapping werewolf Joe, and they take him in for questioning. For some reason, werecoyote Roger wasn't a whole lot of help against him.

Schlock Mercenary — The Doc comes up with a way to get paid three times, by replacing Xinchub's body with a clone. Tagon is so happy that he accidentally kisses her, and has to apologize to the Reverend. Kevyn comes up with the idea independently a bit later, but learns that he should get out of the lab more.

Welcome to the seventy-fifth Storyblogging Carnival. There weren't many entries this time around, possibly due to the summer doldrums. Still, we have four stories this time, including one of my own. Enjoy.

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Sage of Wales Writes...
by Andrew Ian Dodge of Dodgeblogium
A 317 word brief story rated PG-13.

The sage is inspired by song.

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Thag Not Talk Much!
by Mark Rayner of The Skwib
A 450 word brief story rated PG-13.

The continuing prehistoric saga of Thag. In this episode, Thag unveils his cave art that he's painted for the Drunka Grunka tribe, and they wonder why he won't talk about it.

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Abort! Abort! Abort!
by Elvis D of 365Fiction
A 1,160 word short story rated R.

A paparazzo's tale.

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The Hunter of Shades
by Donald S. Crankshaw at Resident Aliens
A 5,307 word short story rated PG-13.

Searching for the dark things which are killing his people, the Hunter finds something unexpected.

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This concludes the seventy-fifth Storyblogging Carnival.

If you'd like to take part in a future carnival, please contact me. I am also looking for hosts. Other carnivals can be found here.

The Storyblogging Carnival can be found at The Truth Laid Bear's ÜberCarnival.

Spoiler alert! There are spoilers to Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows in this post, including to some of what appears in the epilogue, but they really aren't too bad.

Over at the Corner, John Podhoretz believes that J.K. Rowling will be writing a new Harry Potter book sometime in the future. Although that may be a bit misleading--his contention is that she'll write another book in the same world, even if it's not actually about Harry. John Hood suggests it may be a prequel. I'm not so sure about that. A large part of Harry Potter has been the revelations from the past, the truth about the years when James, Lily, Sirius, and Snape were in school, and about when Hagrid and Tom Riddle were in school, and even about Dumbledore's misspent youth. The bottom line is that, even if there are still a lot of blanks, we have a lot of information about the pasts of all the significant characters. There's just not much need for a prequel. If there is one, I'd rather have Lily's or Snape's perspective, rather than, say, James's or Sirius's. And the period between their Hogwarts years and Voldemort's first encounter with Harry would be more interesting than their school years.

Anyway, I think there's a better chance for a sequel than a prequel. The epilogue of Deathly Hallows already introduces us to the likely cast of characters we'd see in it. Of course, there's no clear antagonist there, but that doesn't mean one can't be found. And did anyone else notice that Deathly Hallows takes place in 1997? That nineteen years later in the epilogue lines up with nine years from now, which makes it ten years from the time Rowling would have finished writing Hallows. Ten years is about the time you'd expect it to take before an author returned to their old world... just a thought.

Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows is the seventh and final Harry Potter book, and as such, it is bound to disappoint people. What series, having built up such a following, can possibly live up to everyone's expectations in the final book? There were numerous things I was disappointed in myself. Despite that, I enjoyed the book overall, and if you've read all the others, it's simply impossible not to read the final one. I will not attempt to make this a spoiler-free review. There will be minor ones from this point on. I'll hide the big ones at the end, but there will be small ones throughout.

First, lest anyone has any doubts, this really is the final Harry Potter book. It finishes up everything: it ties up the loose ends, answers all the mysteries that have been dangling since Book 1 (Snape's motivations and Dumbledore's reasons for trusting him being the big one), and closes out with a satisfying finality. Rowling could write more books in this world, certainly, but Harry Potter's story is complete.

It's not too much of a spoiler to reveal that this book takes place away from Hogwarts, as Harry said that he would not be returning to Hogwarts for his final year as a student at the end of the last book. Instead, he spends it wandering around the countryside, looking for Horcruxes. Without the school as the backdrop, a lot of things don't work as well as they could. Harry and his friends spend the whole year wandering, and that means that weeks go by when there's nothing happening. At school, weeks where not much happens are at least filled with classes, but out in the middle of nowhere, nothing means nothing, and I find it hard to imagine that they couldn't come up with something to do.

Another negative is the tendency Rowling has to infodump. This has always been an issue in the Harry Potter books: that final chapter where Dumbledore explains everything, after a whole book of tantalizing hints that you can be sure mean exactly the opposite of they appear to mean. This time around, with the final book and a lot left to explain, there are a lot more infodumps, and a lot less misleading tantalizing hints. Now I like getting information, but I couldn't help feeling that maybe this could have been spread out better.

Boring stretches and infodumps took up way too much of this book, but there were exciting moments too. And those mostly worked out pretty well. Each time a Horcrux was retrieved or destroyed, the account was engaging and entertaining. Unfortunately, the final showdown didn't match the caliber of these exciting interludes.

Now, on to the big spoilers:


As I said, overall I liked it, but it could have been better.

Sluggy Freelance — Torg goes running off to find whether Aylee climbed out of her old body. Aylee, meanwhile, is feeling neglected by her alien host, who's barely interested in her any longer, but sends her out to kill a lone human approaching on an airbike--Torg.

Day by Day — Jan's guard decides to play translator to the military. Jan's meeting lots of tough women in the military, and finding them to be proud and motivated. Back home, though, all anyone can talk about is defeat.

Scary Go Round — Amy and Ryan are fighting over Erin's fate. Going to hell can't be good for a girl. Nevertheless, Shelley decides to host a party for her friends who helped her save the world. The Boy and Esther need to decide where their relationship stands after brainwashing.

Dominic Deegan — Gregory goes Super to go fight with Snowsong. It would be a lot more dramatic if he didn't look so stupid.

College Roomies from Hell!!! — Dave's tasked to be backup, but an aborted phone call from Blue to Marsha's phone has him trying to get in touch with her, unaware that Margaret's fighting for her life against a werewolf Joe.

Schlock Mercenary — The only thing better than getting paid twice to steal Xinchub's body is getting paid three times. The only problem is that the third payer wants Xinchub's body protected, and it's going to be difficult to keep all three customers happy.

I'll be hosting the next Storyblogging Carnival, the seventy-fifth, here at Back of the Envelope. If you use your blog to share your fiction, then the Storyblogging Carnival is your opportunity. Here we host any and all forms of storytelling in blog format. If you're curious about what this looks like, have a look at some examples of previous storyblogging carnivals. This next carnival will be going up July 30th.

If you'd like to participate, please e-mail your story submissions to me at dscrank-at-alum-dot-mit-dot-edu (or post in my comments), including the following information:

• Name of your blog
• URL of your blog
• Title of the story
• URL for the blog entry where the story is posted
• (OPTIONAL) Author's name
• (OPTIONAL) A suggested rating for adult content (G, PG, PG-13, R)
• A word count
• A short blurb describing the story

The post may be of any age, from a week old to years old. The submission deadline is 11:59 PM Eastern time on Saturday, July 28th. More detailed information follows (same as always):

1. The story or excerpt submitted must be posted on-line as a blog entry, and while fiction is preferred, non-fiction storytelling is acceptable.
2. The story can be any length, but the Carnival will list them in order of length, from shortest to longest, and include a word count for each one.
3. You may either send a complete story, a story in progress, or a lengthy excerpt. You should indicate the word count for both the excerpt and the complete story in the submission, and you should say how the reader can find more of the story in the post itself.
4. If the story spans multiple posts, each post should contain a link to the beginning of the story, and a link to the next post. You may submit the whole story, the first post, or, if you've previously submitted earlier posts to the Carnival, the next post which you have not submitted. Please indicate the length of the entire story, as well as the portion which you are submitting.
5. The host has sole discretion to decide whether the story will be included or not, or whether to indicate that the story has pornographic or graphically violent content. The ratings for the story will be decided by the host. I expect I'll be pretty lenient on that sort of thing, but I have some limits, and others may draw the line elsewhere. Aside from noting potentially offensive content, while I may say nice things about stories I like, I won't be panning anyone's work. I expect other hosts to be similarly polite.
6. The story may be the blogger's own or posted with permission, but if it is not his own work he should gain permission from the author before submitting to the Carnival.

If you'd like to be added to the e-mail list, please let me know. Finally, I appreciate folks promoting the carnival on their own blogs, and I'm always looking for bloggers willing to host future carnivals.

Sluggy Freelance — So Schlock's made a deal with Hereti-corp. And Riff thinks Aylee's the one to worry about. Speaking of whom, Aylee's made contant with the hive-king in charge of the alien ghouls invading Earth. She's not completely won over by his charms, but he helps her anyway, sacrificing drones to give her rebirth... as a much smaller alien.

Day by Day — Jan's continually surprised by the military, while they're continually surprised by the media. Maybe someday they'll get over their surprise with each other, but that'd be a lot less fun. A very pregnant Sam and Zed cover the local politics angle.

Scary Go Round — Surprisingly, the good guys find a way to reverse the flow of the portal by annulling Erin's marriage to Bob, who's sucked into Hell. Unfortunately, Erin's sucked in too. After this depressing turn of events, it's good to see Amy returned without any fuss, although her attempts to cheer Shelley up don't do much good.

Dominic Deegan — Just when it looks like Snowsong's about to recover, along comes the police, to get her upset again. When they claim that Snowsong's fellow cultists killed themselves, she takes offense, and goes to destroy the town. Gregory shows up, but he's not doing such a good job at calming her down. Fortunately, his abilities seem to be on the mend.

College Roomies from Hell!!! — Dave and Roger are conspiring to ditch Margaret, but it's not working. Margaret's still planning the raid on Joe, but she's a bit concerned that he's better armed than they are. Dave offers to interrogate him himself, but no one takes him very seriously. He's still taking a back-up role.

Schlock Mercenary — The crew celebrates Xinchub's death. Boy, are they happy! The Reverend has to explain the glee to the oldest member of their company, who's 12 million or so. While he's doing that, Tagon and Kevyn independently accept the job of desecrating Xinchub's corpse. Some people might think it a conflict to accept the job from two different people, but from Tagon's view point, the only thing better than getting paid to desecrate Xinchub's corpse, is getting paid twice to do it.

...and embarrassed. Joe Carter at the Evangelical Outpost has put up a list of the Top 100 Christian blogs, and he's put Back of the Envelope at number 27. I wouldn't have. Back of the Envelope probably wouldn't have made the list at all if I'd done it, not out of modesty, but simply because I haven't been posting enough to maintain that sort of position. For the past year, I've been doing mostly maintenance posts. I've been keeping up with the Storyblogging Carnival, and, when I'm not too lazy, the Weekly Webcomic Update, but when it comes to blogging about current events and theology and philosophy, you'll find that there's not much here recently. Not that I haven't done so in the past, and there are even a couple of interesting posts in the past couple of months, if you're willing to scroll halfway down the front page: my comments on Ezekiel 1 or my thoughts on reproductive cloning. (The fact that anything two months old is still on the front page tells you all you need to know about the frequency of my blogging these days.) Still, if you're interested in seeing what Joe might have been thinking of when he added me to the list, check out my archives, especially the categories of Christianity, Why I Believe in God, or the Religious Debate.

Mark Rayner has the latest Storyblogging Carnival posted at The Skwib. Eleven stories this time, with a breakfast theme.

Mark Rayner will be hosting the next Storyblogging Carnival, the seventy-fourth, at The Skwib. I'll link to Andrew's announcement post as soon as I see it. Meanwhile, if you use your blog to share your fiction, then the Storyblogging Carnival is your opportunity. Here we host any and all forms of storytelling in blog format. If you're curious about what this looks like, have a look at some examples of previous storyblogging carnivals. This next carnival will be going up June 18th. If you'd like to participate, please e-mail your story submissions to me at author-at-markarayner-dot-com, including the following information:

• Name of your blog
• URL of your blog
• Title of the story
• URL for the blog entry where the story is posted
• (OPTIONAL) Author's name
• (OPTIONAL) A suggested rating for adult content (G, PG, PG-13, R)
• A word count
• A short blurb describing the story

The post may be of any age, from a week old to years old. The submission deadline is 11:59 PM Eastern time on Saturday, July 14th.

Blogger and Storyblogging Carnival participant, Lyn Perry, has started a new e-zine for Christian speculative fiction, called Residential Aliens. I contributed one of my own stories, one which I've never published anywhere else, including this blog, so you may want to check it out there. It's called "The Hunter of Shades."

Sluggy Freelance — So we're back in Sluggy Prime, and Riff's made Bun-bun an offer on the explosives, but at a lot less than Bun-bun wants. He accepts anyway, although not without bludgeoning Riff. Meanwhile, Schlock narrowly escapes both the government and Kusari.

Day by Day — Jan is in for some surprises when she meets the real military. Sam's complaining about the Republicans' stand on immigration, while the Democrats are their own worst enemy. So, pretty much business as usual.

Scary Go Round — Shelley interrupts Bob's and Erin's wedding, but ends up killing the wrong devil. The devil succeeds in completing the marriage, and the demons begin to pour into the world while he kills Braun. Fortunately, the leprechaun's ready to take him on.

Dominic Deegan — Snowsong's ticked at Gregory's article, and she goes on a rampage, attacking "Beardman." Dominic's sends Quilt in to negotiate, but he doesn't gets an icy reception.

College Roomies from Hell!!! — After the morning workout, it's time for class. Dover's apparently fonder of Dave more than he likes him.

Schlock Mercenary — It's time to train a new demolitions chief. It's too bad that the only candidate is completely crazy. On the other hand, Tagon gets some good news when he learns Xinchub is dead.

Welcome to the seventy-third Storyblogging Carnival. Enjoy.

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The Mouse Killer
by Jeremiah Lewis of Fringe
A 50 word brief story rated PG.

About a cat who behaves much like a person.

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The Return
by Jeremiah Lewis of Fringe
A 50 word brief story rated PG.

Fallen angels seek a laborious, but poetic return to Heaven.

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Conscience
by Jeremiah Lewis of Fringe
A 50 word brief story rated PG.

Conscience as a skin condition.

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Rogue Signals
by Jeremiah Lewis of Fringe
A 50 word brief story rated PG.

In the future, containment is the only option, even at the expense of beauty.

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A Lamb on the Lam
by Madeleine Begun Kane of Mad Kane's Humor Blog
A 100 word brief story rated PG.

News story in limerick form.

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The Turtle and the Rabbit
by Phil at Phil for Humanity
A 212 word brief story rated G.

A fable about reverse discrimination.

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Necklace
by Jolanda Dubbeldam at Reason and Rhyme
A 346 word brief story rated G.

A caring woman is angry at an uncaring man who caused her to fire a family man.

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The Monkey’s Tail, as Told by Marcel Duchamp the Day After Charles Lindbergh Landed at Le Bourget Field
by Mark Rayner of The Skwib
A 500 word brief story rated PG.

The last Dadaist pursues his absurd desire to have a tail.

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How Potter Ends...
by Andrew Ian Dodge of Dodgeblogium
A 520 word brief story rated PG-13.

A vision of how the Harry Potter series might end.

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Uprising
by Elvis D of 365fiction
A 1,553 word short story rated R.

Home robots keep the peace--sorta.

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Chain
by Elvis D of 365fiction
A 1,882 word short story rated PG-13.

The story of a misplaced cigarette.

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Generations
by Elvis D of 365fiction
A 1,917 word short story rated PG-13.

A young man discovers his grandfather's secrets.

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Tales from the Riverbank
by Riversider of Save the Ribble
A 2,000 word short story rated PG.

In this humorous tale, two friends kayak their way down the river Ribble, then ride the tide back home again.

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This concludes the seventy-first Storyblogging Carnival.

If you'd like to take part in a future carnival, please contact me. I am also looking for hosts. Other carnivals can be found here.

The Storyblogging Carnival can be found at The Truth Laid Bear's ÜberCarnival.