The Time Traveling Lounge

Tocotin said:

1. ....You can say a lot about waking up alive in the coffin but yawn-inducing it ain't.

2. If it works for your story, who cares? Go for it. Be forceful and proud of the devices you use and the story will be better for it.

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Exactly. Things get even more bonkers:
1) Good news - the coffin is not underground yet.
2) Bad news - there's a bunch of dynamite in the coffin with her, and it's sweating and unstable.

Cue theme music:
https://music.youtube.com/watch?v=5ingbmHKF_8&feature=share

Umm yeah I need to write this - but first I need to post something for the challenges....

CWatts said:

Quick question - does it count as the dreaded Waking Up Opening if your character wakes up (alive) in a coffin?

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No, but it counts for a different kind of dread! There's something so specifically creepy about being buried alive. I'm still traumatized by that Buffy episode where she has to dig her way out of the grave.

autumnleaf said:

No, but it counts for a different kind of dread! There's something so specifically creepy about being buried alive. I'm still traumatized by that Buffy episode where she has to dig her way out of the grave.

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Yes, it's terrifying. Also the Bride getting buried alive in Kill Bill, shot from her POV.

As much as it shows up in pop culture, being buried alive apparently it was even more of a trope in the 19th century (what all with being a legit concern and actual bell-ringing coffin devices sold). So yeah I can lampshade it in-universe.

I've recently started following "Ask a Mortician" on YouTube. It's mostly about the modern funeral industry, but she's got some great historically-based ones like "The Trial of the Corpse Pope" and "Medieval Zombies". I'm really enjoying her delivery as well as her subjects!

autumnleaf said:

I've recently started following "Ask a Mortician" on YouTube. It's mostly about the modern funeral industry, but she's got some great historically-based ones like "The Trial of the Corpse Pope" and "Medieval Zombies". I'm really enjoying her delivery as well as her subjects!

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Cool, I'll have to check that out. Any chance there's one about Victorian/Wild West undertakers?

What all with recent events, I'm imagining an alternative history of the past century or so where Prohibition never happened, but the 18th Amendment repealed the 2nd. Pretty sure this has been written at some point.

CWatts said:

Cool, I'll have to check that out. Any chance there's one about Victorian/Wild West undertakers?

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She does have a few about the Victorians. There's one about mourning jewelry (there was a fashion for getting a piece of your loved-one's hair in a brooch or ring) and another about about whether the Victorian photographers propped up corpses into standing poses for photos (that one's a myth). Also, in one of her talks on embalming, she mentions that it became popular during the American Civil War (so soldiers' bodies could be transported long distances) and that it used to use arsenic!

All the videos are here (but warning, it's a major time suck):
https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCi5iiEyLwSLvlqnMi02u5gQ

I'm new to AW (but not to writing, and not to a love of all things history and historical fiction). Or to a love of the time vampire that is Ask a Mortician.

autumnleaf said:

I've recently started following "Ask a Mortician" on YouTube. It's mostly about the modern funeral industry, but she's got some great historically-based ones like "The Trial of the Corpse Pope" and "Medieval Zombies". I'm really enjoying her delivery as well as her subjects!

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Love her channel. Fascinating stuff.

RoseDG said:

I'm new to AW (but not to writing, and not to a love of all things history and historical fiction). Or to a love of the time vampire that is Ask a Mortician.

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What era are you writing about?

Last week's Ask a Mortician was about the Salem Witch Trials!

autumnleaf said:

What era are you writing about?

Last week's Ask a Mortician was about the Salem Witch Trials!

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I have one book set in an alternate 1936 where the Russian Revolution never got off the ground.

I'm also doing a straight historical based in 1922 in Napa, California.

I liked the episode about the haunted house mannequin that turned out to be a real corpse.

autumnleaf said:

What era are you writing about?

Last week's Ask a Mortician was about the Salem Witch Trials!

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Woohoo, I found fellow Deathlings. I enjoyed her recent Iconic Corpse video, and yes the mannequin that turned out to be a real corpse was pretty interesting too. I enjoyed the Salem Witch Trials episode. I'm not writing about the Salem Witch Trials, but I am writing about a (fictional) witchcraft case twenty years earlier.

RoseDG said:

I have one book set in an alternate 1936 where the Russian Revolution never got off the ground.

I'm also doing a straight historical based in 1922 in Napa, California.

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Ooh, alternate history! I'm currently reading ​The Man in the High Castle.

Quentin Nokov said:

Woohoo, I found fellow Deathlings. I enjoyed her recent Iconic Corpse video, and yes the mannequin that turned out to be a real corpse was pretty interesting too. I enjoyed the Salem Witch Trials episode. I'm not writing about the Salem Witch Trials, but I am writing about a (fictional) witchcraft case twenty years earlier.

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Have you read her new book, From Here to Eternity: Traveling the World to Find the Good Death? It's on my ever-expanding to-read shelf.

autumnleaf said:

Ooh, alternate history! I'm currently reading ​The Man in the High Castle.

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Good book, though I like the show better. I prefer alt history that doesn't dwell on theory of multiple universes and alternate reality, etc, and just tells the story of what might have happened without mysticism, etc. But that's my taste, personally.

autumnleaf said:

Have you read her new book, From Here to Eternity: Traveling the World to Find the Good Death? It's on my ever-expanding to-read shelf.

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Yes, I received it in the mail just this week.

I'll have to check out The Man in the High Castle; I like alternate history, too.

Am I the only one who listens to period appropriate music when writing?

No -- I have a stash of baroque playlists, & a couple of Pandora stations, I turn on when I want to get in the 17th century mood. Nothing like a bit of Rameau or Scarlatti to set the scene.

No, you aren't. I do need to research more 19th century popular music, but I tend to listen to folk. For my Civil War/Reconstruction novel I'm listening to a lot of Rhiannon Giddens, especially her Freedom Highway album.

I would, but the music from the period I write in can be way too schmalzy or distracting. (1930s-1940s). I compromise by listening to electro swing sometimes. And weirdly enough, THE song that reminds me of my main characters is a disco song. The Bee Gees, no less.

See, I listen to '40s stuff even when I'm NOT writing. Though I'm writing 1920's at the moment, haha. I don't think I could write to classical or baroque, though -- good thing I don't write that "far back."

Atlantic12 said:

I would, but the music from the period I write in can be way too schmalzy or distracting. (1930s-1940s). I compromise by listening to electro swing sometimes. And weirdly enough, THE song that reminds me of my main characters is a disco song. The Bee Gees, no less.

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Ha! There's something about stuff from the 70s - THE song for my main characters is by Fleetwood Mac.

Then again, the theme song for another of my Gilded Age characters is the very 21st century "I Was a Teenaged Anarchist" by Against Me!

Sometimes I do. There are a lot of good Civil War-era songs (I have a few CD's of Civil War music). Not so much WW1, at least IMO. Mostly, though, I listen to classical--Mozart, Haydn, Bach, Vivaldi. It's kind of background music. It doesn't distract me.

angeliz2k said:

Sometimes I do. There are a lot of good Civil War-era songs (I have a few CD's of Civil War music). Not so much WW1, at least IMO.

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I'd be glad for any recommendations. I have the Cold Mountain soundtrack but that's mostly because it's Jack White.

I listen to classical as well to write. I try to avoid lyrics in English when I'm actually writing, but movie scores and Dead Can Dance are also in the rotation. It's whatever fits to emotion of the scene.