Liebster Blog Award (also a list of my favorite authors)

So I get back from a doctor's appointment in the Big City a hundred miles away, feeling exhausted due to lack of sleep, getting vaccinated for meningitis, and traveling in a car for two hundred miles before two, and what do I find waiting for me? A blog award nomination.

Hi, Liam. I am distracted from my woes now.
 

“The Liebster Award is for bloggers with fewer than 200 followers. Award winners share 11 facts about themselves, answer the 11 questions asked by the blogger who tagged them, come up with 11 of their own questions and tag 11 more bloggers with the award.”

I give fair warning that I'm only nominating one other person for the award, because all the blogs I follow that are eligible have already been nominated, and I want to avoid redundancies. And it's still all ones in the number, it's just one less one. One one one. That word no longer means anything. Also, I'm going to use the facts sections to air out all my reading habits and recommend all my current favorite books. Because they need to be known.

IN ANY CASE. Eleven facts about myself.

1. My arm sort of hurts, guys. It's just all sore and achy and not good. It hurt to pick up my cat. To be fair, the cat weighs nearly seventeen pounds, but still. Not cool.
2. I have finished my third Neal Stephenson novel of the month. That's twenty five hundred pages. 2500. That's a lot, and all of it's complex number-stuff, philosophical musings, baroque (or as he'd spell it, Barock) plot twists, meta-history, future-history, meta-sideways-multiverse history, or financial stuff. He created proofs for some of his work in Anathem. That's dedication. I feel accomplished just finishing the novels.
3. My mind is being simultaneously blown and reconstructed by my required summer reading, How To Read Literature Like A Professor. It's exactly what it sounds like, only occasionally funny. It's making me think on my summer break, and that only ever leads to strange and scary connections, like realizing the whole Shakespearean tragedy aspect of Shades of Grey, by Jasper Fforde. It's like Romeo and Juliet turned inside out, because the people are idiot, but they actually go about trying to fix things instead of just sobbing about it before they kill themselves in angst. It was cool once I got it.
4. On the same topic, more or less, my mind works in stories. So do yours' (Hi, you two faithful readers). But not just yours. Everyone's does. This was pointed out to me for the first time in Science of Discworld II: The Globe, and it's stuck in my mind ever since. As soon as I have time, I'm going to write a whole post on it, I swear.
5. And segueing into the topic of books by Terry Pratchett, I'm halfway through The Fifth Elephant right now, and I'm noticing that his books have a more or less infinite reread value. They're still funny, even the fourth time you read them, and you notice new harmonics every time. I only just noticed that the 'clacks,' which are a cross between semaphore towers and telegraph lines, rhymes with 'fax,' which is how it gets used half the time. He did that on purpose. It's always on purpose, with Pratchett.
6. I only have two three more authors to rave about, so hold on, I'll give you some actual facts soon. Neil Gaiman is possible the best author I have ever read, barring the other authors mentioned in this post. He turns everything into a dream. His stories operate on dream logic, but a special kind that holds together like a spiderweb beaded with dew, intact even once morning comes. I love it I love it I love it. *ahem* Moving on.
7. Two! Douglas Adams had the same kind of dream-logic thing going on, only instead of spiderwebs and myth and horror holding it all together, it's humor. He turned towels and a perfectly innocent number into things that will forever be a kind of shibboleth among myself and all the others who've read and loved his work. Also, I can't talk about cars in Britain in the 1980's without laughing anymore. Which is a topic that comes up more often than you'd think. (Three times. I've had that conversation three times.)
8. Last one! Go read Tamora Pierce's stuff. Start with the Song of the Lioness quartet and work your way chronologically through the rest of her Tortall series, and never ever regret it. Her books have the absolute best characterizations, twistiest plots, wittiest dialogue and amazing battle scenes ever. They get better as they go, up until her Beka Cooper prequels, which kept me up reading until two AM, which isn't something I do except for the writers on this list. I would be a completely different person if I hadn't gotten a hold of her books at the age of nine and reread them roughly once a year since.
9. I feel like I sort of copped out for the previous seven facts, so here's a real fact: I'm more or less addicted to being weird in public. Not weird like disgusting, but weird as in breaking social norms. Wearing ankle-length coats and high heels to go to the book store. Wearing an evening gown out shopping. Organizing impromptu a capella concerts in the park with my choir friends. Talking completely seriously about the next Hunting of the Snipe on public transport with my punk rock friend. It's pretty cool.
10. I'm also in danger of becoming addicted to performances. There's nothing like the rush of taking a bow in front of a standing ovation, be it for a concert or a musical. If I could earn a living doing nothing but perform, I'd gladly give a kidney. I've got two of those, it can't hurt.
11. There's both a model dragon and a model TIE fighter hanging from my ceiling. Science fiction/fantasy, distilled down to two images that pop up when the classification is mentioned, and hanging from the roof over my head. I like it.

Finished!

Wait, now I need to answer actual questions. Huh.

1. What is the best book you ever read containing the concept of time travel, and what made it so good?  Was it the time travel or something else?
1. The best book concerning time travel would probably be the Thursday Next series, just all of it, by Jasper Fforde. If I had to choose one, it would be First Among Sequels, because that is the book in which time travel plays the largest part. And the time travel is amazing, but that's not what's so good. It's the huge meta-fictional basis of the thing, in which no fiction is safe and the book will reference itself without mercy. I have never suffered from a fit of giggles so badly as when I was reading Fforde, except maybe when I read Adams or Pratchett.
2. What is the longest and strangest sounding word you can think of on short notice?  (No Googling.)
1. Sesquipedalian.  Because it means what it is and sounds like what squid feels like. Don't ask me to explain that, because I really can't.
3. What are three expressions you commonly use that originated in Shakespeare?  (You can Google for this if you need to, I suppose.)
1. "A horse, a horse, my kingdom for a horse!"
2. "To be, or not to be, that is the question!"
3.  "Alas, poor Yorick! I knew him, Horatio; a fellow of infinite jest."
4. What is your opinion on the theory that people brush their teeth in opposite rotation directions based on the hemisphere they live in?  (Bonus points if you reference the Coriolis Effect– even more if you actually know what it is.)
1. I think it's completely stupid, to be honest. The Coriolis Effect doesn't work like that. It's more a thing dependent on the person's brain. I, for example, don't brush in a rotation. I just go back and forth or up and down. The curve in reference to a rotation frame doesn't have anything at all to do with this.
5. What type of humor do you appreciate most in fiction: humorous dialogue, funny descriptions, funny character histories, satire in the narrative, etc….?  Add your own if you wish.
1. All of it. Just... all of it. Satire and funny descriptions have a special place in my heart, because they are something Pratchett excels at, but I've been sent into fits of giggling by all the things mentioned. It just has to be witty.
6. What’s your favorite key on the keyboard?  (You know you have one.  Don’t even try to bluff it out.)
1. E above middle C or B flat above middle C. It might be alarming that I didn't have to think about that.
2. EDIT: I have been informed that Liam meant the thing I'm typing on, not the instrument. His reaction? "Only a musician." Very true, and I'll own up to that completely. SO THE REAL ANSWER: My favorite would probably be the Tab key. I don't know why. It just is.
7. What’s your least favorite key on the keyboard?  [Insert above parenthetical here.]
1.  I dislike the highest C and the three keys below the last C, because my piano these are the keys that can never again be tuned properly without restringing the whole piano. So I don't like them.
2. EDIT: See above. SO THE REAL ANSWER: I have a thing against the little Microsoft key that my current computer has. It's pointless. It has one function only. It's boring. It doesn't even type a little Microsoft symbol. They could have programmed in a shortcut with as little work and less wasted plastic. /rant.
8. If you could shoot one historical personage, who?  (Excluding anyone who has been assassinated already.  Duh.)
1. Hitler would be the obvious answer, but I'm going to go with the guy who assassinated Duke Ferdinand. Wait, no, check that, take out Lee Harvey Oswald, or at the very least Sirhan Sirhan. All preferably before the assassinations that would make them famous.
9. If you could shoot one fictional character– even to spite someone who will shoot them later in the book, and whether or not there is a weapon that can actually shoot in their time period or setting– who?  (No restrictions, except that you cannot describe the death in all its gory detail.)
1.  I'd shoot Mr. de Mauve, from Shades of Grey, because he ruined a perfectly good bittersweet ending with a petty bribe and made it an awful lot more bitter. Idiot. He is the only character towards which I really harbor a death wish against, in all of fiction. The rest get what they have coming toward them.
10. As we reach the penultimate question, what springs into your head when you hear “penultimate”?  The ultimate pen, translated badly from French (where, as everyone knows, all the words are in the wrong order)?  A penalty mate– a friend who is only stuck with you when you do something really really bad?  Something else?  (The only restriction is that you cannot say the actual definition of the word.)
1. "This is space. It's sometimes called the final frontier. (Except that of course you can't have a final frontier, because there'd be nothing for it to be a frontier to, but as frontiers go, it's pretty penultimate...)." Because Terry Pratchett is my favorite of all favorite things.
11. If you could capture a single creature out of any myth created by man at least a hundred years before the present year, which would you choose?  (Do not go into detail.  I’m not giving writing prompts; I’m giving questions for you to answer.  If you want to take these as writing prompts, do so by all means– I will claim royalties.  Oh, and do not say you’d catch a unicorn.  Just don’t.)
1.  I would probably capture either one of the little men that people kept sighting in the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries, or the creator of the Voynich manuscript. Technically the second one isn't necessarily a creature of myth, but since we don't know who it was, I'm declaring it legal.

One more thing to go.

1. What is your favorite television show?
2. How many books do you read in a month, on average?
3. Can you roll your tongue?
4. What's your favorite song?
5. What would you do, if you knew that nothing you did in the next hour would have no negative repercussions?
6. If you were suddenly placed in the movie 'The Birds,' what would you do to survive?
7. Do you think dragons are awesome or merely tired cliches? Why?
8. Where would you go, if you could go anywhere in the world (or out of it)?
9. Pirates or ninjas?
10. If given the choice, would you prefer to live forever with no guarantee of bodily health, or have  eternal youth, but no guarantee of living forever?
11. What is your favorite historical person?

La Stranezza, I nominate you. I'm pretty sure that's a safe bet. Go forth and answer questions!



Now to go write legitimate things.

Review: Angelmaker, by Nick Harkaway

Nick Harkaway has been one of my favorite authors since I first read The Gone-Away World a while back. I own that book, even, which should be an indicator of how much I love it, because I only buy books I adore lest I completely fill my room.

I'm about two series away from this.

Its cover is pink fuzzy stuff with neon green lettering and I loved it. Then I went to go read everything else by Harkaway. But much to my despair, I found out that The Gone-Away World was the only thing he'd written. Ever. He was in the process of writing a new book, though, called Angelmaker. So I put that on my mental 'Read As Soon As Available' list, and went on with my life.

Fast forward two years. In the meantime, I've reread Gone-Away at least twice, and completely forgotten to check if Angelmaker was published. (spoiler: it was) When I found out, I immediately geeked out, put it on hold at the library, and waited. For two weeks. Popular books, is Angelmaker. 

But I finally - finally - read it this last weekend. I'd say I read it all in one day, because it was that good, but that's a lie. I stayed up until 4 AM the next day to finish it, because it was that good, and that long. It was freaking amazing.

I glee'd about the last novel I reviewed, too, which may give you the impression that every novel I read I adore. That's not true at all. *cough 61 Nails cough* But Harkaway did something incredible with Angelmaker that made my head spin. He took tropes and turned them completely inside-out, then filled them with clockwork bees. No lie.

So. The first trope he made his minion: That of Those Two Bad Guys. Yes, there is a pair of bad guys. One is even tall and skinny and the other is short and fat. But they are not bosom buddies. They do not necessarily stick together. One even defects to the side of, for the sake of simplicity, what I'll call 'good,' and leaves the other out to dry. 

Then there's that of the White Sheep. Jack, the main character, is living a completely normal life, partly because he hopes it will atone for his father's former King of the Gangsters lifestyle. It doesn't work out, and it fails in the most spectacular way possible. It is, in fact, an Epic Fail. And I love it.

There's the Cloak and Dagger espionage bit. Edie, another main character, was one of England's most important female spies, and she was James Bond before he existed. Now, however, she's a 90-year-old woman who's decided to set off the supposed Doomsday machine that her lover from WWII made, because she figures the world can't get much worse.

Also, there are clockwork bees of TRUTH. And an underground criminal society! And a Prince-cum-Serial-Killer-cum-God-Wannabe. It's amazing.


I don't really have any issues with this book. Maybe a little less obscurity towards the beginning, but keeping those details hidden makes the end of the book a dozen times cooler. So, maybe not. Angelmaker has officially become one of my favorite books. *nodnod*

Review: The Long Earth

My attitude going into this novel was basically one of glee mixed with mild apprehension. Pterry (Pratchett) is one of my favorite authors on the entire planet, bar none, but the last collaboration he did was in the eighties, and The Long Earth was't billed as his normal snarky work. Plus, it wasn't a Discworld novel. (Protip: you should really, really read the Discworld novels. Start with The Truth.) On the other hand, the last collaboration he did was Good Omens, which is the closest I've ever seen to a genuinely perfect book. He's also the creative force behind the Science of Discworld books, which are far less tacky then they sound and taught me more about the actual theories and hypotheses behind human evolution and development than all the science classes I've ever had, put together. It's safe to say my expectations were high.

Then I actually read the book and my mind. It was blown.

The basic idea behind the story is that the multiverse is a real thing, and ten or so years into the future, humanity suddenly gains the ability to 'step' from our Earth (Datum Earth) to next-door Earths, up and down the line (East and West are the arbitrary terms used) with the assistance of a machine called the 'stepper'. It gives the world a new dimension - hence the term and the title 'Long Earth'. The rest of the story basically explores the effects the suddenly infinite amount of space has on humanity, with the main plot being told from the view of natural stepper, Joshua Valiente, who doesn't need the machine to step. There are enough subplots and sideplots that my count got muddied up, because they interweave seamlessly. There is no wasted ink - it's safe to say that whenever a character or device or trait is mentioned, it's going to come in handy later on, although usually in a completely different manner than you'd expect.

Part of what makes it so good is that it feels realistic. You read about the Earth-Firsters, the people who want to ban stepping, and you think, yeah, that would happen. You read about the Australian Aborigines gone walkabout, leaving the planet for their new ever-ever, and it's real. Nothing feels contrived; there are no Dickensian Deus ex Machinas appearing to wrap it up. When good things happen, they don't feel forced, and when bad things happen, they feel realistically tragic. The book feels natural, almost more like an artfully written historical account than a novel. 

In that respect, the book reminds me of Makers, by Cory Doctorow, albeit with some steampunk influences. Really, it feels like a cross between Makers and the Foglios' Girl Genius series. Because while it is more scientific than sparky, there is still <spoiler> an airship run by and embodying a sentient A.I. </spoiler> and it is awesome.

I have one minor complaint, though. The ending, while suitably dramatic, almost feels a little abrupt. After the shattering discovery, there's just the dramatic phone call and a slam to black. It would make an amazing movie ending, with a huge orchestral score being played over the credits and the authors' names in white on a black screen, but in a novel the effect is lost a little. It feels slightly arbitrary. This might be an effect of the organic feel of the novel. There's more story left, I know it! I want to find out what happens in the aftermath of the shattering discovery! There's a sequel hook there, dammit, and I want to read the sequel now!

... I've taken a deep breath, I'm better now. The book is really, really good. Like, I-might-reread-it-this-afternoon-good, an honor that only my absolute favorite books have gotten. Because it's really really good. Read it. 

Excuses and SUGAAAR.

I've been away for a bit (yeah, sorry about that), but it was for, if not a good purpose, at least an explainable one. Rehearsals started for Mame, my current off-Broadway summer show, and also, I got The Long Earth. (squeeeeeeeeeeeeee)

So that's taken up most of my time for the past couple days. But never fear! Tomorrow a review of The Long Earth shall be put up, because now that I've said it will, it will hang over my consciousness until I actually write it. It shall hang like a doomy cloud of doom. Doooooom.

The reason it isn't being written now is because I'm on a bit of an adrenalin-and-sugar high, because my SAT scores just got in and I'm celebrating with an abundance of reese's cups. :D Nothing I wrote right now would be as coherent as I'd want a review of a Terry Pratchett novel to be, so I'm going to hold off until after the sugar crash.

 Wheeeeeeeeeeeee!

A Little Night Music

Screnzy update - 52k and counting. They've yet to leave the prison. So, so much is going to get cut. I can't quite believe there's only four days left at this point.




I participated in February Album Writing Month, AKA FAWM, two months ago. I won, finishing 14 and one half songs in twenty-nine days. I'm relatively happy with three of my songs, and wish, a little, that I could pretend the other recordings didn't exist. All of the recordings I made are here. The whole experience, however, was amazing. One of my songs was even featured on the nightly FAWMcast, a radio-show produced during the month, and that's incredible. The entire idea of these monthly challenges - FAWM, NaNoWriMo, Screnzy - is an awesome concept. For one month, people from everywhere get together and start doing something they love to do, knowing there are other people there to help them, who are going through the exact same difficult and amazing challenge. It's a month-long run-on sentence incredible jam session of people having fun and being creative.

Screnzy is my third such jam-session this year, and part of me keeps screaming, "Why are you doing this? You don't get enough sleep as it is, and you need sleep to have a working memory so you don't forget all the things you actually need to do! Like homework! You're shooting yourself in the foot!" The thing is, that part of me is the same thing that told me I shouldn't audition for my first choir, because they'd kick me out while laughing at me. If I'd listened to that part of me, I'd be a sad, music-less girl without a clue what I wanted to do. So I didn't listen to it for Screnzy, and suddenly I've got more words than I had for NaNo down in a Word file on my hard drive. (That reminds me - I should really save it to the cloud soon.) I've got a working novel in progress, waiting for me to finish it. By the time I do, I'll be able to say, "You know that novel everyone wants to write? I've written two." I've pushed myself to do something that seems impossible, but I did it. Knowing that I can do this, with nothing but a semi-arbitrary deadline and a computer, is a huge rush. I can look at that Word file and think, "That's right, I did that."

I did do that. I am doing that. I intend to keep doing that. I might just set myself another deadline for next month, and see if I can write another story, or write another album. Practice might make perfect, but it's the practice that's the fun part. I am practicing, and it's the coolest thing on the planet.

Books Are Weird

Screnzy update: At 50,000 words, definitely going to run out of month. Super-Screnzy, go!



So I borrowed a collection of essays from my English teacher yesterday, and I read an amazing essay, Never Do That To A Book. If you don't trust my links, as some may not, then just know it's on the treatment of books. Fadiman, the author, identifies two kind of book lovers- the courtly lovers and the carnal lovers. Courtly lovers are more like book collectors, who consider the book itself, the physical object, to be sacrosanct. Carnal lovers are about the content, and feel free to abuse the physical book however. Case in point: courtly lovers will use bookmarks, and very carefully at that, while carnal lovers will crack the spine, dog-ear a page, write comments in the margins, etc. Both Fadiman and myself are firmly in the carnal category.

But the essay got me thinking. What exactly matters when we're talking about something like books? Is it what's contained in the pages, or is it the pages themselves? People who like e-readers are obviously more interested in the information than the feel of having a book in their hands. Which category of bibliophile would they fall into? Are they courtly lovers, who like the e-book format because they never need worry about damaging the holy vessel of knowledge?? Or are they carnal lovers, who don't care about the vessel, simply caring for the information contained within?

Personally, I prefer books. My room is full of them - they fill my bookcase and have overflowed onto the floor. I like searching through my stack of reference books for a bit of obscure knowledge. If I have a book on a subject, I prefer to search through it before I go to the internet. I like having the physical objects, to use and abuse as I wish.

I don't really remember what the point of this was. I'm mostly just saying that books are a weird concept, I guess. Are they the mass of paper and ink, or are they the 75,000 to 100,000 words that make up the typical novel?

If anyone actually reads this, which do you like better? Paper copies or electronic?

Catching up and the Internet in Book Form

So it's day thirteen, and as predicted I forgot about this blog. I'm up to 24,024 words, which is pretty cool. The story is still the same general shape, but the details are becoming wildly different - the dude who betrayed them went from being one of their number to a stalker dude following his ex-fiancee. Creeper. Also, the protagonist became a ditz and then grew out of it, which is, while nice from a character development point of view, is highly confusing from the typer's point of view. Break has been my savior* - if it weren't for the fact that I can sleep in, I'd be utterly dead from procrastinating on my writing until nine at night. 2000 words a day is hard if you don't have the willpower to sit down and do it. If it weren't for the end-of-April deadline, I'd never finish it. That's what the deadline is for, though: giving a set end-time to those who'd otherwise never write.

 Friday the thirteenth! Woo!

So I've recently started reading jPod, a novel by Douglas Coupland, and I'm pretty sure it's the first book I've every read that accurately shows what life would be like if reality was like the internet. Coupland is a villain in his own book, and the protagonist's girlfriend builds a hug machine. Yes. Read it.



*I spelled this 'saviour' and spent several minutes trying to figure out why spell-check wasn't letting it through. Silly American spellings.

Break and Books

I'm caught up yesterday, and I seem to be keeping up today. I just hope I'll have time to write again tonight. Spring break starts tomorrow, so I'll probably manage pretty well over the next week. I hope.

I learned exactly how much of a book nerd I am today. My two addictions - sweet caffeinated beverages and antique books - went to war today. I chose the book, and I completely stand behind this choice. A French collection of folk sayings is far more useful than a caramel mocha.

Epigraphs and Meat Monsters

So my internet connection died yesterday before I could post. Reached my word count, although a lot of it is probably going to get cut. Too much straw woman morality, too little actual story. But I hit 2000 words! I don't think I have anywhere near enough background put in yet. Maybe an epigraph at the start of each chapter, giving little bits of history?

I'm not cursed. Or it wore off. Which is much appreciated - death by bleeding out through the nose is not one of my priorities.

In other news, I just got the book John Dies At The End, by David Wong, and I'm loving it. I'm only on page 43, but it already has that weird and slightly disturbing humor that I love. The whole thing reminds me of a cross between a gory Slenderman blog and Wong's articles on Cracked.com. And there's a meat-monster that's killed by a televangelist over the phone. Very dramatic for page thirty-something. I am filled with slightly disgusted glee. ^^

Link of the Day: John Dies At The End. Read it. Now.