Sketchy Sunday 2

In the first half of the week I couldn't settle down to any one sketch and ended up being unhappy with all of them. But I am madly proud of my Cinderella sketch on Thursday, especially the frog and the mice - I managed to get the proportions just right. The coach too, wow, it turned out so much better than I expected when I started. For Friday's drawing, I did want to have her head tilted up and back and also to show her cloak rippling in the wind. I haven't succeeded in either of those but I am pretty happy with the picture as it stands.

I've decided that as the spaces for Saturday and Sunday are so small, I'll just do one big sketch/doodle that uses both spaces. I'll try to draw on a Saturday and then that leaves Sunday free to scan and share. In case you're wondering, for this weekend's sketch, the third little person from the left on the athletic track is supposed to be bent over getting their breath back; I just couldn't get the perspective right. Also the cat - ugh - I've been trying to draw the perfect sitting cat for ages but I can never get the profile of shoulder blades, front legs and haunches right >:/ I do like my shoelace guy, though. I thought the hands would give me problems but they turned out pretty simple really.

Hothouse Flower by Margot Berwin (2009)

It begins with a list of the Nine Plants of Desire. I don't know if that's a real thing or not and the book promptly undermines it by claiming there's a tenth plant which, conveniently, has no name. But the way they're written about is beautiful, enticing.

Each chapter begins with a short paragraph about either a plant or an animal, which acts in place of the usual Chapter 1, 2 etc., and mixes gardening manual advice with more touchy-feely/New-Age-y stuff. The book is much the same. There is a lot about plant magic, spirit animals and "finding yourself", which is intriguing and well-written in the slightly dreamy way that seems to be the staple of the literary novel. Don't get me wrong, I enjoyed it, but more for the atmosphere and the writer's obvious enthusiasm for tropical plants (I always like learning about other people's interests).

My big problem was the dialogue. Take this for an example: a guy starts ranting that nature is useless and dying out and how machines are "the new nature" and we need to "align" ourselves with them. Seriously, who talks like that? In the middle of a party? Everybody is so busy being deep and meaningful that the conversations turn into lectures, and not-very-interesting ones at that. Oh, and our heroine's rampant sex drive is annoying.

So yeah, it was a nice way to pass the time, but I won't seek out anything else by this author and won't re-read this one, which is my usual reaction to literary novels (if they don't bore me outright).