Weekend Adventures

This has been an interesting weekend.

First, Friday night I had my book launch at The King's English! It was great. We had a good turnout, and the people at the bookstore were so kind and helpful. I talked a little bit about Arts and Thefts, which was an interesting experience since it's a sequel. With Under Locker and Key, I could talk about my journey as a writer and how this whole idea came to be.

With Arts and Thefts, all that seemed important, but less important since this book was the next installment as well as something new. So I touched on the story of the series and my journey as a writer, but I mostly focused on what made this new book different and my experience writing it, on its own.

Like, how I almost wrote Arts and Thefts from's Becca's point of view, but decided that this series is really Jeremy's story. And how it's a mystery instead of a heist story, though it still maintains a high level of general thiefy-ness through the book. Such as when Jeremy crawls through some air ducts to avoid police.

But I digress. You want more, read the book.

Saturday afternoon I went with a couple friends, my brother, my sister, and her friend, up to Sandy's Hale Center Theater to see their production of the stage musical The Hunchback of Notre Dame. As I've posted about, I've seen this one before. I saw it when it was down south at the Tuacahn. But since it was going to be performed again, so close to home, I decided to see it again with the same friend I saw it with before, as well as my sibs and some other lovers of the play.

And holy cow, it was good.

The singing was good (although I'm easily impressed in that respect) and the acting was very well done. But the stage.

THE STAGE!

 
Hale Theatre performances are in the round, which is always cool because no matter where you sit, you'll have a good view. But this theatre was moved and updated, so here's what they have to work with:

- A round stage that can spin, split into segments, and RAISE AND LOWER about 15 feet
- Screens around the outside of the theatre above the audience that can display anything
- Smoke and pyrotechnic effects
- Seemingly endless space in the ceiling to hold dangling props and scenery

So, this means that they could hang the bells and chandeliers over the stage, and that they could raise parts of the stage to create the bell towers, and lower other parts to create the contrast of height. They could spin the stage to allow more frenetic motion with the actors. They could put up the translations of the Latin lyrics on the screens, and use them to surround the audience in stained glass, turning the theatre into Notre Dame, during "God Help the Outcasts."

And the song "Hellfire"? Oh, man. The screens burned with fire, the stage was raised and lowered to create depths churning with chanting monks and orange smoke, the lighting, the movement...I was gobsmacked. I kid you not, the power in the performance and the staging was such that my jaw actually dropped and I felt a thrill of terror during this villain song.

So, if you're in Utah and looking for a good piece of musical theatre, The Hunchback of Notre Dame is playing through the end of March. Highly recommend.

One thing that made the weekend so interesting is that I was doing a lot of driving, up to Salt Lake City Friday and to Sandy on Saturday, and there was a winter storm in the forecast. I was blessed, though, because it didn't hit until late Saturday night, after I'd finished up everything for the day. It was bad Sunday morning.

But, in true Utah fashion, the weather is warm enough today for me to be outside without a jacket and all that snow is melting like crazy.

Busy weekend. And now it's over, and I can go back to grading, writing, reading, and training for the marathon.

I'll keep you posted. Until then, I hope your weekends are full of fun and adventure!