You'll never see an offer like this EVER AGAIN, so call NOW! Don't miss your one and only chance to join the ranks of the extreme nerds, who make silly Harry Potter blog posts in their spare time. :)
Monday, January 3, 2011
Day 3: Your Favorite Series
I reckon you'd have to be barking mad not to know immediately what goes in this category.
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You'll never see an offer like this EVER AGAIN, so call NOW! Don't miss your one and only chance to join the ranks of the extreme nerds, who make silly Harry Potter blog posts in their spare time. :)
You'll never see an offer like this EVER AGAIN, so call NOW! Don't miss your one and only chance to join the ranks of the extreme nerds, who make silly Harry Potter blog posts in their spare time. :)
Sunday, January 2, 2011
Day 2: A book that you've read more than three times.
Here's where I talk about what's probably my favorite book next to the Harry Potters (which I sort of lump together into the number-one spot) - The Time Traveler's Wife by Audrey Niffeneger. I know a lot of people who didn't care for this book because:
a.) It's really confusing for the first 3-4 chapters until you hit a rhythm with it. The author tries to make it less confusing by telling you the date and the ages of the characters at the beginning of each section, but it's still a brain-bender until you get a decent way in.
b.) There are a few cases where the sex gets a bit descriptive. (Hey, it's a romance).
c.) It's a romance.
Now here's where I counter-argue those points and convince you that this book is one of the best things ever (because it is).
a.) True, there may have been a way for the author to clarify what Henry's time-travel actually means. Sort of map it out, in a sense, earlier on in the book. But I think she wants you to have to figure it out, and I think that's important. The characters don't really get it, either, until a few chapters into the story; therefore, neither does the reader. She's very careful about only revealing things to us that both Clare and Henry understand - actually, there are times when Henry understands something that Clare doesn't, and the readers are left in the dark until Clare catches on as well (and vice-versa). Because the two of them share the story's narrative, it really helps to drive home the idea that both of them - and, in a sense, their relationship - are the main character. Not one or the other.
b.) If you don't feel the emotions that the characters feel, you can't care about what happens to them. I think it makes their relationship more human, because the settings and situations are so surreal. Also, it's a romance. Not a trashy one, but still a romance.
c.) This is one of the few books that's ever made me sob uncontrollably. Like, cry-like-your-boyfriend-just-broke-up-with-you cry. And I'm always amazed when that happens. In the midst of my crying, I sort of start to chuckle at myself. Here's me, sitting at the end of my bed, splashing salt water all over a book and making the pages wrinkle, for people and situations that only feel like they existed but never truly did. It takes honest-to-goodness talent to be able to do that to someone. I don't exactly know what is it that makes people able to get so emotionally invested in this book - I think it might be how she gives you enough time to really know the characters inside and out, but there has to be more to it than that. Regardless, this book has everything you could want in a story. It has fear, suspense, love, trauma, family - though it's classified as a romance, it's a lot more than that. And if you're reading this, and you're one of the people who stopped reading the book after chapter 3 because it confused you, pick it up again. I promsie you it's worth it. (And don't watch the movie first. It's not a horrible adaptation, but as usual, it just doesn't do the text justice).
This book is awesome. Case closed. I'm right. :)
The Time-Traveler's Wife - Google Books
a.) It's really confusing for the first 3-4 chapters until you hit a rhythm with it. The author tries to make it less confusing by telling you the date and the ages of the characters at the beginning of each section, but it's still a brain-bender until you get a decent way in.
b.) There are a few cases where the sex gets a bit descriptive. (Hey, it's a romance).
c.) It's a romance.
Now here's where I counter-argue those points and convince you that this book is one of the best things ever (because it is).
a.) True, there may have been a way for the author to clarify what Henry's time-travel actually means. Sort of map it out, in a sense, earlier on in the book. But I think she wants you to have to figure it out, and I think that's important. The characters don't really get it, either, until a few chapters into the story; therefore, neither does the reader. She's very careful about only revealing things to us that both Clare and Henry understand - actually, there are times when Henry understands something that Clare doesn't, and the readers are left in the dark until Clare catches on as well (and vice-versa). Because the two of them share the story's narrative, it really helps to drive home the idea that both of them - and, in a sense, their relationship - are the main character. Not one or the other.
b.) If you don't feel the emotions that the characters feel, you can't care about what happens to them. I think it makes their relationship more human, because the settings and situations are so surreal. Also, it's a romance. Not a trashy one, but still a romance.
c.) This is one of the few books that's ever made me sob uncontrollably. Like, cry-like-your-boyfriend-just-broke-up-with-you cry. And I'm always amazed when that happens. In the midst of my crying, I sort of start to chuckle at myself. Here's me, sitting at the end of my bed, splashing salt water all over a book and making the pages wrinkle, for people and situations that only feel like they existed but never truly did. It takes honest-to-goodness talent to be able to do that to someone. I don't exactly know what is it that makes people able to get so emotionally invested in this book - I think it might be how she gives you enough time to really know the characters inside and out, but there has to be more to it than that. Regardless, this book has everything you could want in a story. It has fear, suspense, love, trauma, family - though it's classified as a romance, it's a lot more than that. And if you're reading this, and you're one of the people who stopped reading the book after chapter 3 because it confused you, pick it up again. I promsie you it's worth it. (And don't watch the movie first. It's not a horrible adaptation, but as usual, it just doesn't do the text justice).
This book is awesome. Case closed. I'm right. :)
The Time-Traveler's Wife - Google Books
Saturday, January 1, 2011
30 Days of Spasmodic Imagery
Welcome to the new year! Same place, same oddball, different slice of history.
Because I usually have trouble motivating myself to get through the first three-ish months of the calendar year (Pittsburgh is just so dark and gray around this time. It's depressing), I was poking around the lovely world-wide web for something to occupy my time with (aside from school and work and such). I found this little situation on Tumblr that people call "30 Days of Books." (I also found 30 Days of Harry Potter, which I could probably run all the way to Russia with, but I figure that caters to a significantly slimmer audience). :) So for the next thirty days, you'll be getting daily updates from me about bookishness. Because that's the kind of person you're dealing with here. My apologies.
Disclaimer: I feel like you might expect a Fiction Writing Major to have really literary and intelligent interests and things to say about her reading material. And while I've definitely been exposed to some really excellent literary bits this past semester, a lot of my favorites are still along the lines of popular fiction. So. You know. You'll live, I'm sure.
Day 01: Best Book You Read Last Year
Immediately I'm reminded of the fact that I don't read enough, I don't read NEW things enough, and I don't keep a good enough record of what I've read. When I get time to read, I usually turn to Harry. Remind me to expand my horizons this year.
Okay. So I didn't read Freedom by Jonathan Franzen. SORRY.
Actually, just over Winter Break, I read a book called Room by Emma Donoghue that I sort of wish I had written first. It was one of those things that makes me sort of euphoric to be reading such an awesome story, but also pissed because it's just the sort of formula I've been searching for in my own stuff and someone else got it perfectly, absolutely right. (Not to say I could write something at this time in my life that would hit the NYTimes Bestseller List). But it's got the characters - they're flawed, of course, and their situation isn't exactly idyllic, but they're so real I still kind of want to be them. Or at least know them. It's got the emotion - it blurs the lines between happiness and fear, something we almost always see in black-and-white. It's got psychology and politics and family. Oh, and the whole thing is narrated through the eyes of a child (difficult to pull of in and of itself) who is held captive with his mother in an 11x11-foot room.
The woman's got skills.
It's not exactly a straightforward, effortless read. But such is life.
Room - Google Books
Because I usually have trouble motivating myself to get through the first three-ish months of the calendar year (Pittsburgh is just so dark and gray around this time. It's depressing), I was poking around the lovely world-wide web for something to occupy my time with (aside from school and work and such). I found this little situation on Tumblr that people call "30 Days of Books." (I also found 30 Days of Harry Potter, which I could probably run all the way to Russia with, but I figure that caters to a significantly slimmer audience). :) So for the next thirty days, you'll be getting daily updates from me about bookishness. Because that's the kind of person you're dealing with here. My apologies.
Disclaimer: I feel like you might expect a Fiction Writing Major to have really literary and intelligent interests and things to say about her reading material. And while I've definitely been exposed to some really excellent literary bits this past semester, a lot of my favorites are still along the lines of popular fiction. So. You know. You'll live, I'm sure.
Day 01: Best Book You Read Last Year
Immediately I'm reminded of the fact that I don't read enough, I don't read NEW things enough, and I don't keep a good enough record of what I've read. When I get time to read, I usually turn to Harry. Remind me to expand my horizons this year.
Okay. So I didn't read Freedom by Jonathan Franzen. SORRY.
Actually, just over Winter Break, I read a book called Room by Emma Donoghue that I sort of wish I had written first. It was one of those things that makes me sort of euphoric to be reading such an awesome story, but also pissed because it's just the sort of formula I've been searching for in my own stuff and someone else got it perfectly, absolutely right. (Not to say I could write something at this time in my life that would hit the NYTimes Bestseller List). But it's got the characters - they're flawed, of course, and their situation isn't exactly idyllic, but they're so real I still kind of want to be them. Or at least know them. It's got the emotion - it blurs the lines between happiness and fear, something we almost always see in black-and-white. It's got psychology and politics and family. Oh, and the whole thing is narrated through the eyes of a child (difficult to pull of in and of itself) who is held captive with his mother in an 11x11-foot room.
The woman's got skills.
It's not exactly a straightforward, effortless read. But such is life.
Room - Google Books
Monday, December 6, 2010
To make sense of it all.
To the left:
I have one of those big car-washing sponges, shaped like a figure-8 with the holes filled in. I'm holding it next to your ear and soaking up the things that come trickling out of your brain. Slowly but surely, the sponge gets saturated and I wring it out into a bathtub. Pretty soon, the bathtub is full. So I start to fill an empty swimming pool instead. Sponge by sponge. Squeeze by squeeze.
How far can I go?
Will your thoughts need an entire swimming pool to contain them? Something the size of one of the great lakes, maybe?
Could you fill up the basins and the trenches in the ocean?
And would it take you your entire life to do so, or maybe just a week or two?
To the right:
It doesn't matter.
If you flood the earth with thoughts about clothing catalogues, self-obsession, materialism, doubt, negativity - all you're doing is ruining the place. If you can fill a bathtub with thoughts about ways to be happy and ways to spread happy, of love and family and friendship, then you're going to end up taking the most wonderful bath anyone's ever had.
Sink or swim; regardless, you've still got to worry about what it is you're soaking in.
I have one of those big car-washing sponges, shaped like a figure-8 with the holes filled in. I'm holding it next to your ear and soaking up the things that come trickling out of your brain. Slowly but surely, the sponge gets saturated and I wring it out into a bathtub. Pretty soon, the bathtub is full. So I start to fill an empty swimming pool instead. Sponge by sponge. Squeeze by squeeze.
How far can I go?
Will your thoughts need an entire swimming pool to contain them? Something the size of one of the great lakes, maybe?
Could you fill up the basins and the trenches in the ocean?
And would it take you your entire life to do so, or maybe just a week or two?
To the right:
It doesn't matter.
If you flood the earth with thoughts about clothing catalogues, self-obsession, materialism, doubt, negativity - all you're doing is ruining the place. If you can fill a bathtub with thoughts about ways to be happy and ways to spread happy, of love and family and friendship, then you're going to end up taking the most wonderful bath anyone's ever had.
Sink or swim; regardless, you've still got to worry about what it is you're soaking in.
Tuesday, November 30, 2010
Run fast for your mother.
I like knowing that however inconveniently timed their presence, I can still be inspired by the little things. It makes me feel like maybe I haven't gotten too old yet. Even if twenty is creeping up on me like some sort of enticing, colorful plague. There's still some kind of six-year-old Megan in my brain, watching Gullah Gullah island and somersalting through the house.
- Your friendly neighborhood fortune cookie
Tuesday, November 16, 2010
Every Little Thing The Reflex Does.
If you seat a child who has recently returned from fat camp at the dining room table and fill it with cupcakes, bags of chips, and those bagged pastries you can buy at the gas station, his poor, deprived little mouth is going to suck them down faster than the speed of light. It doesn't matter that he spent his entire summer running six miles per week or learning various forms of self-control when it comes to over-indulgence. If you push him just far enough, all of the controlling he learned to do with his mind will sink swiftly into his stomach. And he'll feel bad afterwards. But during? While he's swimming in a sea of the snacks he's fantasized about for four months? He'll feel oh. So. Good.
Gluttony comes in many forms. Obviously food, sex, drugs, and the like are most addressed by society because they're the most popular outlets. But there are a few secret, underground gluttons who prefer to remain less apparent. They skulk around the vast, dusty shelves of libraries, digging for spare change in gutters so they can pay their overdue fines. They avoid bookstores because most of their debts can be traced back to an overly enthusiastic trip to Borders. The bookworms. The readers. Those whose relatives buy them the latest bestseller for Christmas without even asking first. They may not be outwardly harming themselves with their gluttony, but trust me. The bookworm is just as dangerous a glutton as any. And most of them were born this way - there's nothing they can do about it.
As one of the aforementioned cursed-at-birth bookworms, I experience the side-effects of my gluttony much the same way the kid with the smorgasbord of snacks would. When I find a book that captures my imagination to the degree that part of my mind is thinking about the characters and their desires while the book is closed and on my bookshelf, I have no choice but to give it my utmost attention. I cancel plans. I close the door to my room and don't bother talking to anyone. I neglect the cleanliness of my carpet, my laundry, my e-mail, any form of regular eating schedule - the only place I go is to class, and even then I bring the book along because it makes me feel better. If I get too bored or stressed while I'm there, the characters will be right there next to me. It's like having a friend in my backpack. And it feels oh. So. Good.
On the other hand, similar to the fat kid, I suck that story down at the speed of light. After about 24 to 36 hours of the inexplicably wonderful comfort of being curled up on my comforter with a book that practically stabs me with its demand to be read, it is gone. The last page flutters closed along a few more filler pages in the back of the binding, and then the back cover slips between my fingers and the book closes itself to me. And I can't get back in, because it's not the same anymore. If I open it back up right away, the characters will be too tired to tell me their story quite as well. I have to let them rest.
The next phase is what I like to call the aftermath. It's when I spend the next 2 to 3 days sulking, inwardly pissed that I finished the book so quickly, but not having an adequate way to outwardly express this bizarrely fantastic frustration. I want to slip back into the book's world - I want to feel what the book feels, I want to teleport and cast spells and fall in love and watch people die. But I can't get back in, no matter how hard I try. Sometimes I even open another book, hoping it will sweep me away on some new adventure so I can get over the old one. But the new book is just a rebound. It just makes me miss the old one all the more, and I usually throw it aside and glare at it for trying to replace something so epic.
This is the trigger to my current aftermath, and even Harry Potter couldn't heal my separation anxiety. I might write a review soon, but for the time being I just want to bask in how good I felt while I was reading it. As a writing major, I get sucked up in the battle between literary fiction and the sort of fiction that normal people who aren't hipsters or college kids or angsty white writer men read. This one reminded me why reading is important, and why I don't care about securing a space in the VIP literary fiction lounge. It also reminded me why I write.
Read slowly, friends.
Gluttony comes in many forms. Obviously food, sex, drugs, and the like are most addressed by society because they're the most popular outlets. But there are a few secret, underground gluttons who prefer to remain less apparent. They skulk around the vast, dusty shelves of libraries, digging for spare change in gutters so they can pay their overdue fines. They avoid bookstores because most of their debts can be traced back to an overly enthusiastic trip to Borders. The bookworms. The readers. Those whose relatives buy them the latest bestseller for Christmas without even asking first. They may not be outwardly harming themselves with their gluttony, but trust me. The bookworm is just as dangerous a glutton as any. And most of them were born this way - there's nothing they can do about it.
As one of the aforementioned cursed-at-birth bookworms, I experience the side-effects of my gluttony much the same way the kid with the smorgasbord of snacks would. When I find a book that captures my imagination to the degree that part of my mind is thinking about the characters and their desires while the book is closed and on my bookshelf, I have no choice but to give it my utmost attention. I cancel plans. I close the door to my room and don't bother talking to anyone. I neglect the cleanliness of my carpet, my laundry, my e-mail, any form of regular eating schedule - the only place I go is to class, and even then I bring the book along because it makes me feel better. If I get too bored or stressed while I'm there, the characters will be right there next to me. It's like having a friend in my backpack. And it feels oh. So. Good.
On the other hand, similar to the fat kid, I suck that story down at the speed of light. After about 24 to 36 hours of the inexplicably wonderful comfort of being curled up on my comforter with a book that practically stabs me with its demand to be read, it is gone. The last page flutters closed along a few more filler pages in the back of the binding, and then the back cover slips between my fingers and the book closes itself to me. And I can't get back in, because it's not the same anymore. If I open it back up right away, the characters will be too tired to tell me their story quite as well. I have to let them rest.
The next phase is what I like to call the aftermath. It's when I spend the next 2 to 3 days sulking, inwardly pissed that I finished the book so quickly, but not having an adequate way to outwardly express this bizarrely fantastic frustration. I want to slip back into the book's world - I want to feel what the book feels, I want to teleport and cast spells and fall in love and watch people die. But I can't get back in, no matter how hard I try. Sometimes I even open another book, hoping it will sweep me away on some new adventure so I can get over the old one. But the new book is just a rebound. It just makes me miss the old one all the more, and I usually throw it aside and glare at it for trying to replace something so epic.
This is the trigger to my current aftermath, and even Harry Potter couldn't heal my separation anxiety. I might write a review soon, but for the time being I just want to bask in how good I felt while I was reading it. As a writing major, I get sucked up in the battle between literary fiction and the sort of fiction that normal people who aren't hipsters or college kids or angsty white writer men read. This one reminded me why reading is important, and why I don't care about securing a space in the VIP literary fiction lounge. It also reminded me why I write.
Read slowly, friends.
Wednesday, October 6, 2010
Fish, trees, and Louis Armstrong.
Occasionally random patterns of thought will barge their way into my mind dressed up like they're going to the premiere of Gene Kelly's first feature film. They announce themselves lavishly, then make themselves comfortable on the cushier parts of my brain. They talk animatedly and make a lot of noise. They drink Cosmopolitans. Louis Armstrong blows music through a trumpet in the dimly lit corner. And while they're hanging out in there, it's impossible for me to fall asleep at night. They're just too damn loud.
A significant amount of the time, I welcome their presence in there. It's kind of flattering that they choose to come back so much - my brain must be a nice, comfortable venue. And they're interesting company - usually they talk about things I never would've come up with on my own. I enjoy what they have to say and even agree with it most of the time.
Last night, however, they arrived just as I was on the brink of sleep after a particularly exhausting day, with their trumpeting and their drinking and all. And as nice as they are, I really wasn't in the mood for them at that particular moment in time. I actually said out loud to my semi-darkened bedroom, "Go invade someone else's brain tonight, you guys. I'm tired." They didn't seem to hear me, but I think the chilly air that filled my room got a good chuckle out of my soliloquy. It probably thought I was crazy.
The even more obnoxious part about their completely unannounced, inconveniently timed party was that the conversation didn't even make sense. They must have been drinking before they even got there, which is a little trashy, if truth be told. (They usually have more class than that). All they kept saying was, "Did you ever think about how ridiculously awesome the world is?"
I flatly told them no, I hadn't, and I didn't really think this was a good time to start. They giggled and kept repeating that same phrase, louder and louder until I couldn't distinguish their shouts from the buses charging past my window. "THE WORLD IS SO COOL, THOUGH!! ISN'T IT!?"
"I don't really know what the crap you're talking about," I finally had to reply in the best imitation of a furiously angry person I could muster in my particular state of consciousness.
So they said, "Oh! We'll show you." And they pulled out a projection screen and a teeny little brain-sized version of Chaz, my darling MacBook, and they proceeded to play me a slide show. If you were in my room at that moment in time, I bet you could have seen the colors from the projection screen reflecting out of my eyes and making little rainbows on my ceiling. Stepford Wives-style. Granted, these aren't the exact images they had, but they'll give you a pretty solid idea:
A significant amount of the time, I welcome their presence in there. It's kind of flattering that they choose to come back so much - my brain must be a nice, comfortable venue. And they're interesting company - usually they talk about things I never would've come up with on my own. I enjoy what they have to say and even agree with it most of the time.
Last night, however, they arrived just as I was on the brink of sleep after a particularly exhausting day, with their trumpeting and their drinking and all. And as nice as they are, I really wasn't in the mood for them at that particular moment in time. I actually said out loud to my semi-darkened bedroom, "Go invade someone else's brain tonight, you guys. I'm tired." They didn't seem to hear me, but I think the chilly air that filled my room got a good chuckle out of my soliloquy. It probably thought I was crazy.
The even more obnoxious part about their completely unannounced, inconveniently timed party was that the conversation didn't even make sense. They must have been drinking before they even got there, which is a little trashy, if truth be told. (They usually have more class than that). All they kept saying was, "Did you ever think about how ridiculously awesome the world is?"
I flatly told them no, I hadn't, and I didn't really think this was a good time to start. They giggled and kept repeating that same phrase, louder and louder until I couldn't distinguish their shouts from the buses charging past my window. "THE WORLD IS SO COOL, THOUGH!! ISN'T IT!?"
"I don't really know what the crap you're talking about," I finally had to reply in the best imitation of a furiously angry person I could muster in my particular state of consciousness.
So they said, "Oh! We'll show you." And they pulled out a projection screen and a teeny little brain-sized version of Chaz, my darling MacBook, and they proceeded to play me a slide show. If you were in my room at that moment in time, I bet you could have seen the colors from the projection screen reflecting out of my eyes and making little rainbows on my ceiling. Stepford Wives-style. Granted, these aren't the exact images they had, but they'll give you a pretty solid idea:
(Credit for the last photo goes to Marilyn Harris, but as for the others, I found them on StumbleUpon and saved them to my computer because they looked cool. So if you have any idea who took them, feel free to let me know). :)
Once the slideshow ended, the partygoers packed up their stuff and left me at peace. But their words rang in my head, and I couldn't think of a better way to put things. I still can't, which is why I turned to pictures. (As much as I love words, sometimes they just don't work).
Honestly, though, THINK about it. Just take a second or two next time you're outside and look around you. Trees survive a bajillion times longer than we do, and they don't even move. They find food right where they are, and it's enough to satisfy them for their whole lives. And the atmosphere - it's just freaking hanging out up there, holding everything in. It's doing all kinds of stuff for you even when you can't see it. And there's these huge, massive bodies of water - so massive we can't even comprehend them. There's another entire universe and way of life in there - we all coexist in the same area of space, but we really don't know anything about each other because they can't survive out here and we can't survive in there. And there are deserts, and big huge chunks of ice, and...fish! And here we are, worried about degrees and programs and jobs and internships, when the whole world is always out there just being awesome. And we never even think about it. The world is really just SO cool.
And don't even get me started on the moon and stars and stuff.
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