Costumes

Okay, anybody who knows me know I love this dressing up stuff. It's probably because I spend most of my life wearing jeans and t-shirts, sitting behind this keyboard. But anyway. All the recent stuff about authors wearing costumes at the RWA Literacy Signing (See Vivi Anna for pictures) made me think. What would I wear?

(Because yes, it is all about me. If you want to know my opinion on the authors in question, then it's this: Marianne Mancusi and Liz Maverick looked really cute and I wish I had legs like that. Sherrilyn Kenyon has sold more books than most of the other authors there combined, so I guess she can wear what the hell she likes. She'd certainly be easy to pick out of a crowd in that hat. So long as the swan wasn't real, I've got no problem with it. As the guy in Garden State said, "Don't make fun of my hobbies, man, I don't make fun of you for being an asshole.")

So, anyway. I actually posited this idea at an RNA gathering a few years ago (inspired, I think, by Kate Allan's book launch for The Lady Soldier, a story set in the Napoleonic Wars. While the author wore ordinary clothes, she had soldiers from a local historical recreation society in full regalia, explaining their costumes and weapons to the guests). Wouldn't it be fun, I thought, if authors came to one of the conference dinners or parties, dressed as one of their own characters? For the contemporary authors, of course, this is a lot easier than for the historicals, or the paranormals. Probably less fun though.

So, I was thinking. The problem with my characters is that they necessarily spend a lot of their time with their kit off. and when they're dressed, it tends to be in mostly ordinary clothes. I could dress up as Masika, but I'd need a ton of fake tan and a black wig. I have the clothes, though, and it might be fun to get someone to draw her tattoo on my back.

I could dress up like Magda in her cute little pink suit and pearls, but then I'd just look like I was...well, wearing a suit and pearls. Lily? Ordinary clothes. Aura? Usually naked, and I don't have the budget for Manolos.

Chica, ordinary clothes. Sofie, suit and heels. Paige. Naked, except from when she's wearing a burqa, and I don't reckon that's the right tone here at all. Chloe? Well, I could wear a Sirens of TI shirt, I suppose.

Maria has a long red sequinned dress, but I'm afraid I'm all out of those. Even Daisy, the heroine of my newest book, wears ordinary clothes when she's not nekkid.

Damn. So, on the Sundown front, I'm not getting very far. Aha! But what about Almost Human? I could dress up like Chance! Sure, because she spends most of the book either naked (see, I told you) or wearing sumptuous velvet gowns. There is one scene where she has the stockings and basque, but you know, I don't think I have the legs for that. At the end she wears leathers and armour. We're back to the Masika look again, although this time with the advantage of me having more accurate colouring.

Of course, there's always Sophie. Who dresses like me most of the time. Lemme see...there's always the red silk ballgown from I, Spy?. Or the Lara Croft outfit from Ugley Business. Or the rock-chick get-up from A is for Apple.

Which brings us back to the leather jeans again...