WMF Photo Contest Part IX: Around the World

Heya folks, Amanda here.

[This is Pat. I’m here too, but today, I’m orange.]

As Pat’s mentioned before, I have been helping him sort through all of these photo contest blogs. It’s mind blowing how many photos you guys sent in, so it’s taken kind of a long time.

That said, a lot of the photo contest blogs have been about 97% done for a while. We grouped things into categories together. We sorted them out. We bickered a bit over who the winners and honorable mentions should be. We got photos into the photostreams so blogs wouldn’t have 80 pictures in them.

Pat’s been part of all these steps. He’s been the ultimate decider. And the blogs have been getting posted up. But, y’know, still kinda slowly.

Ultimately, the problem is that Pat’s more than slightly obsessed with getting things perfect. You know this is the case in his books, where he needs everything to be 100%. What you might not realize is this: for him, even posting a blog that’s only 97% feels wrong to him.

[This is true. The pursuit of perfection is kinda like a sickness.]

With his books, this leads to good books. But with blogs… it mostly leads to long delays.

[Yeah. True. Or it leads to me not writing blogs at all, dreading the amount of time they’ll take to finish.]

Here’s the problem. Pat told me that it was my job to make sure we got the photo contest finished.

So the other day, I say to him: “If we don’t get the photo contest finished, we’re not going to be able to fit in the other thing you want to do before the Mid-Season fundraiser at the beginning of June.”

Pat says, “Yeah. I was wondering. How would you feel about finishing up a couple of the blogs yourself? They’re pretty much done already. They just need final spit and polish. And I know I’m slowing down the process at this point.”

“I would love that,” I said.

“I would kinda love that too,” he said.

For reference, I went to double check, and the submissions for the photo contest were all due on May 15, 2011. On Friday, we will have had these photos for four years.

[I hereby declare that we will finish this photo contest by May 15th of this year. Even if it kills us.]

[And by “We” I mean Amanda. And by “us” I mean me. Because Amanda will kill me.]

So yeah. Let’s get this ball rolling, shall we? Don’t worry. I don’t doubt Pat will jump in and give you a bit of his own color commentary here and there.

[Way ahead of you.]

* * *

Today we bring you Part IX of the long delayed photo contest.

Previous parts are here:

Lots of people surrounded Wise Man’s Fear with other beloved books from their libraries.

Or reading other books.

[The glasses are a nice touch here.]

This one features El Contador de Historias as Sim, La Cultura, Todo lo que Hay que Saber as Wil, and WMF as Kvothe, all having at drink at the Eolian.

A surprising number of people had Wise Man’s Fear fighting other books to the death.

This was a somewhat common motif in the previous photo contest, too. I’m not sure what makes Pat’s books fight other books so much, but they sure seem to win a lot.

Winner: Epic Struggle

[I just wanted to claim credit for “Epic Struggle.” That’s mine. I came up with that.]

This one had great attention to detail. The blood spilling out is words. The books have hands, and WMF got wounded in battle, but not enough to prevent its coup de grâce.

This was a reference to Pat’s blog about blurbing Brandon Sanderson’s The Way of Kings, particularly the quote “Sanderson’s books are so good that he’s starting to piss me off.”

Also Winner: Playing With Yourself.

[I’d like to *not* take credit for “Playing With Yourself.” But I have to. Because I came up with it.]

Our other winner, though, really took advantage of Pat’s obsession with Catan:

They managed to get one of the cool ARC copies of Name of the Wind into the picture, and as a first edition/first printing of NOTW as well.

We’ve got a photostream of all of the other books hanging out with books, if you want to check them out.

Books Around the World.

For the contest, a lot of people took Wise Man’s Fear to cool and exciting places. Fantastic places. Far-off, exotic locales….

And Urbana. Normally Urbana is not considered an exotic locale, but this dedicated fan gave us the entire photo journey of the Travels of Mr. Book.

This was only the first picture, but if you want to see the complete set, you can check out the Travels of Mr. Book over on the photo stream.

Apparently this is a shop for jewelery in Ulm, Germany. The Sparrow is the emblem of Ulm.

[In Ulm, um Ulm, um Ulm herum.]

This was taken at the Neuschwanstein Castle in Bavaria, which the tourist-board calls the Fairytale-Castle and the person who submitted the photo calls “neo-gothic tastlessness.”

Even so, it made for a sweet photo.

The book made it to some classic spots too, like the Colosseum.

Or overlooking the Mediterranean Sea.

Seattle….

[Cool skyline.]

Or Cologne, Germany.

On our recent trip to Germany, I saw this very cathedral. And I think this copy of WMF looks pretty cool with his sunglasses….

[Is that the Cathedral I pointed at and said, “I’ve gotta get me one of those?”]

Yup. I violently rolled my eyes at you.

This fan couldn’t get their hands on a copy of WMF, and so made their own based on bootlegged copies of DVDs and books found in the area.

[I remember I didn’t get this joke at first, but when we followed up with them, they explained that bootlegged DVDs tend to have ridiculously bad cover translations.]

In the intervening years, WMF has been translated into both traditional and simplified Chinese, and they’re both beautiful, for reference.

Other folks just found beautiful or picturesque places to take the book, including places that looked like waystones.

[I think this one might actually *be* an old waystone. As in an old Roman stone that marked a road? Is that something that really existed, or did I just make it up in my head?]

[No. Nope nope nope. I’m not going to look it up. Not going to lose two hours researching it. I’m learning to let go and let some blogs be only 97%…]

Peek.

And on that note…

Winner: Greystones.

These look like perfect waystones to sit and read beneath. Just be wary on night with a full moon…

[Actually *pushes us glasses* it’s the night with no moon that people are supposed to fear.]

Is it okay if we just fix it and I don’t have to snark back at you because I’m actually legitimately embarrassed that I messed that up?

[No. Everyone will bear witness to your shame. That’s what happens when you settle for 97%.]

We have a photostream of all of the other exotic or interesting locales, so take the time to check them out, because there were a lot.

* * *

Congrats to all the winners, and sorry for the nearly-four-year delay.

Subbing in for this blog was really fun, and Pat and I are going to work hard to get all of the rest of the photo contest blogs up this week.

[Do. Or do not. There is no try.]

I’ll probably take over at least one more. Y’know, just to be sure.

Amanda

[This was a surprising amount of fun for me, too. Make sure to stay tuned to the blog this week, because there’s going to be a new blog pretty much every day.]

[pat]