Elijah David

I mentioned last month that I'd picked up knitting and crocheting again after a long break, and I wanted to share the projects that have stemmed from that renewed interest. First up, some fingerless gloves/arm warmers in the style of Gandalf. I made these to go with the wizard hat I mentioned in last month's post. They turned out well (and I even had someone pay me to make a pair for them). Here's the full outfit (with different long-sleeved shirts underneath to try out the effect of the greys). The staff is an actual walking stick I trimmed and tidied up from a hickory branch that fell in our yard a couple years back. I really like the effect of the hat with the gloves and the staff. I need more opportunities to wear this outfit. This picture also includes my Remus Lupin scarf that fits in well with the grey theme. A few years back, I misread the song title "I want a Hippopotamus for Christmas" as "I want a Hippogriff for Christmas...

Welcome to the first Top 10 Tuesday of 2017! This week's topic is good wizards. (Note: I'm using wizard in the same way I do in the Albion books -- a general term for magic user of any gender.) This was a surprisingly difficult list to draft. But without further ado, and in no particular order, here are my Top 10 Good Wizards: Moiraine Damodred Moiraine may not be the strongest or the wisest of the magic-users in Robert Jordan's 15-book epic The Wheel of Time , but she is one of the best. She guides our young heroes on their journeys, even seemingly from beyond the grave. She doesn't brook nonsense and chooses to serve the world rather than herself by finding, guiding, and protecting the Dragon Reborn instead of remaining at court. She doesn't even hesitate to take on the Forsaken, even at risk of her own life. Despite a books-long absence, Moiraine remains my absolute favorite character from this series. Gandalf/Olorin The Grey Pilgrim. The White Ri...

Current Reads: Midnight's Children by Salman Rushdie (for class)                              After the King edited by Martin H. Greenberg                              Walking with Frodo by Sarah Arthur Current Writing Projects: SOMEDAY , various short stories Once again, my classes are inspiring me to put thoughts down on the page. Magical realism - what is it? What makes it different from fantasy? How do you know if something is or isn't magical realism? Furthermore, how does one write magical realism? These are some of the questions I have been mulling over this semester, both because of class and because of my own curiosity. Before this semester, I held the opinion that magical realism was just another way of saying fantasy, only written either a) in another language (as Terry Pratchett claims) or b) in a fashion atypical ...