February in Review

Ant Farm by Simon Rich. A re-read. I read this when I was taking a comedy class in DC in hopes it would inspire me. It did then, and did this time around too. Just a bunch of short, funny essays and clips of dialogue or random ideas.

Free-Range Chickens by Simon Rich. Another re-read, same story (and linkback) as above. This book was just as funny reading it a second time. It's a lot like Ant Farm, style-wise. Both made me laugh out loud and were read in a matter of hours.

The Legacy of Eden by Nelle Davy. Reviewed here, along with a Q&A from the author.

The Writing Life by Annie Dillard. Reviewed here.

Lovesick by Spencer Seidel. Reviewed here, along with an excerpt from the first chapter and Q&A with the author.

Code for Failure by Ryan W. Bradley. As Ryan says in his acknowledgments, this book is "a story about a screw-up gas station attendant written by a former screw-up gas station attendant." The book is a quick read, broken into short sections that will keep you saying "Just one more chapter, just one more" before you can attempt to put it down. It's a novel, but most pieces could stand alone as short stories; I felt like I was reading a collection that just happened to come together into a story arc at the end. Parts are crass, parts are funny, parts are punch-you-in-the-gut honest. It's a book about a college drop-out assessing the state of his life and what could possibly come next, but it's too easy to forget the narrator's age and apply his questions to your own situation. It's an entertaining book, yes, but it's also much deeper than that.
I'm going to be hosting a "Truth or Dare" session and book giveaway
March 20th to celebrate the release of Ryan's book, so stay tuned!

There Is No Dog by Meg Rosoff. The premise of the book is that God is a hormonal teenage boy - sounds interesting, right? There were a few funny lines, and a handful that made you stop and think about why things are the way they are, but overall this book fell short. There were a lot of extraneous characters that could have brought about a major climax at the end, but instead everything just came unraveled.

On Becoming a Novelist by John Gardner. Reviewed here.

American Dervish by Ayad Akhtar. Hayat is a boy who falls in love with his mother's best friend, Mina, through pictures he sees and stories he hears. When Mina comes to live with his family, she teaches Hayat about the Quran. As time passes, Hayat becomes more involved with Mina and her life, often overstepping his bounds. The book had a lot of verses from the Quran, as well as background information regarding the Muslims' way of life. It provided a good backdrop to the story for those who don't know much about the religion, but it is also not crucial - the story is still incredibly powerful even skimming those sections.

Elizabeth and Hazel: Two Women of Little Rock by David Margolick. A very informative book about the central figures in the most famous photo of the Little Rock Nine. Beginning with the two fifteen-year-old girls getting ready for school on September 4, 1957, the book follows them through that day and the rocky years of integration that followed. Their stories are told individually, regardless of how intertwined their lives actually were, which sets a good tone for the book.
     When Hazel publicly apologized to Elizabeth in 1997, the press jumped all over it, both praising and criticizing the move, without realizing Hazel had actually privately apologized to Elizabeth back in 1963. The two women had forged a friendship, but the press succeeded in planting doubts in the mind of each. Though the book doesn't have a happy ending, it effectively tells the story behind the story of the photograph. There was a lot of potential for emotion here, which I was looking forward to (How do you live knowing you're immortalized in a famous photo, yelling racist slurs at another person? How do you grow past that and apologize and move on?), the book is very straight-forward and factual.

The Underside of Joy by Seré Prince Halverson. READ THIS BOOK. My mom recommended it to me after she finished. When I asked if it was good, she cited the sentence: "And Annie and Zach would zoom out the door each morning on their ever-growing limbs, each taking giant leaps along the ever-shortening path of their childhood." This book is full of such lines - unique ways the author thought to describe ordinary occurrences and ideas. The story itself was interesting and well-done, but the words made this book a joy (no pun intended) to read. It is Seré Prince Halverson's first novel, and I'm eagerly awaiting more from her.

On Becoming a Novelist

My second book about writing is John Gardner's On Becoming a Novelist.

This book has been gathering dust on my shelf for two years; it was required for an MFA workshop I signed up for and promptly dropped when I found a comedy writing class at another school. It's always been one of those books I'll get to someday, but when Jennifer (almost done with the aforementioned MFA program!) said the Gardner books were most helpful for her, I decided now was the perfect time to tackle one.

Something I really loved about this book was how Gardner encourages honestly - he doesn't glorify the writing life, nor does he make you feel bad if you can't stick it out.

        "The worst that can happen to the writer who tries and fails ... is that he
        will discover that, for him, writing is not the best place to seek joy and
        satisfaction. More people fail at becoming successful businessmen
        than fail at becoming artists."

I've been stuck in a strange writer's block limbo; I'm getting ideas for stories, essays, and sketches, but when I sit down and put the pencil to the paper, the sentences don't flow. I have limited views in my head of characters or things that should happen, but that's as far as it goes. I feel like I've lost my ability to spin a simple thing into a full blown story, and it's a little alarming. I'm not even close to quitting writing, but it's still nice to read encouragement that isn't pushy.

Workshops and education are given their own section. I found it refreshing that Gardner didn't hail MFA programs as the answer, despite his background in the academic sector. He's good at showing the pros and cons to everything he brings up, putting information out there for the reader to interpret and decide what is best for themselves.
+ "Nothing is sillier than the creative writing teacher's dictum 'Write about what you
     know.' … Preliminary good advice might be: Write as if you were a movie camera."
+ "What [the beginner] does not need is a teacher who imposes his own solution,
     like an algebra teacher who tells you the answer without showing how he got
     there, because it is process that the young writer must learn."

Gardner writes for the "young writer" or "beginning writer," but he also addresses getting published, getting an agent, and interpreting feedback from editors, lumped together in a section appropriately titled Publication and Survival. The section after that? Faith. And in that section was exactly what I needed to read, after explaining my writer's block up there:
        "The writer suffering writer's block can think of good plots and characters, or
        anyway he can think of good starts, which is all a healthy writer needs, but he
        can't persuade himself that they're worth writing down or developing. It's all
        been done before, he tells himself. And if he does, by a supreme effort, get down
        a few sentences, he finds the sentences disgustingly bad."

Does he have a solution? Well...

        "If children can build sand castles without getting sand castle block, and if
        ministers can pray over the sick without getting holiness block, the writer
        who enjoys his work and takes measured pride in it should never be troubled
        by writer's block. But alas, nothing's simple. … Give the general oddity
        of writers, no wonder there are no sure cures."

No. No he doesn't.

It's funny I thought Annie Dillard's The Writing Life would have more generalized writing tips/feedback/whatever, but seemed to discount short stories as pointless and imply novels were all that was worth writing… yet here is a book titled On Becoming a Novelist, and Gardner is taking time to address issues with short stories and even poetry. Doing so didn't make the book feel like it was tackling too much, either - it was all well-balanced and informative regardless of what you're writing. "The real message is, write in any way that works for you: write in a tuxedo or in the shower with a raincoat or in a cave deep in the woods."

Dirty Laundry

I've always loved making small spaces cozy little hideaways from the real world, and that's exactly what I have in the studio, which I call my Treehouse. It's been a month now, and I'm used to living the "little" life - I don't forget what I have stocked up for later, because I only buy what I need now, plus it's not like there's a lot of room to lose anything, so I can easily find what I have. It also means I'm good at using things for multiple purposes: the dining table is also my writing desk; my computer monitor is also the TV; the closet is also my laundry room.

Having a washer and dryer in your closet is better than I thought it would be.
+ I don't need a hamper, because I just toss my dirty clothes in the washer until it's full enough to start a load.
+ When the laundry's done, I have no excuse to put off hanging up my clothes, because I'm already in the closet.
+ They're out of the way, tucked back in my closet, which is past the bathroom. Which means I have two doors I can close to muffle the noise they make.

"Noise?" you ask. "Washers and dryers don't make that much noise."

These do, my friend. These do, and I have proof:

Lovesick

Isn't "Lovesick" a great blog title for the day after a sickeningly sweet Valentine's day? Even better - this post isn't about flowers or candy or relationships...well, ok, it's about relationships a little bit. Twisted relationships that author Spencer Seidel created in his book, yup, you got it - Lovesick.

I was contacted by Meryl L. Moss Media Relations to participate in a blog tour for the upcoming release Lovesick. The tour includes a variety of blogs posting a scavenger hunt - excerpts from the first chapter. I have one to share, and be sure to check out the other links to see what you think of the book!

From Chapter 1:
Chad wasn’t the first student to give her the eye. She was attractive, so it happened frequently. But the Little Bugger was the creepiest in recent memory, and despite her rather cold approach to him—she had a Ph.D. in clinical psychology, after all—she understood that her discomfort wasn’t some high-level cognitive function at work. This was visceral, atavistic. Plain fear. Good old man-woman stuff that she’d tried so hard to explain and understand over the last ten years.

She tried to focus on the words in her book, but her mind kept returning to her car, parked in the dark outside, far from the building that night because she’d been running late. She was in for a long walk alone in the dark.

A half an hour of distracted reading later, the stirrings of the students indicated to Lisa that class was over.

- - -

I was also given the chance to host a Q&A with the author, Spencer Seidel.
1. What are your current projects?
I’m now working on a horror novel, or what you might call a supernatural thriller. It’s not gory, just creepy. It’s a bit of a departure for me, but I’ve been wanting to do it for a while. I’m not quite ready to reveal the plot or title, but I am excited about the project.

2. Name one entity that you feel supported you outside of family members.
Oh, I have to give this one to all of my online friends, new and old. I’ve reconnected with some old friends from high school and college because of my last book, Dead of Wynter, and they’ve all just been wonderful, genuine fans. And many of the people I’ve met on Twitter and Facebook have gone out of their way to support what I’m doing. I love them for it.

3. If you had to do it all over again, would you change anything in your latest book?
Of course! I never feel that a book is perfect or complete. I could edit and revise forever. But I really do like Lovesick and my characters and believe in them, so I have to stand behind it as is.

4. Do you recall how your interest in writing originated?
After reading Charlie and the Chocolate Factory by Roald Dahl and The Phantom Tollbooth by Norton Juster about six times each as a kid (and more again as an adult), I knew that writing was something I wanted to do.

5. Is there anything you find particularly challenging in your writing?
The most challenging thing about being a writer for me is keeping the faith that it’s something worth doing. It’s awfully easy to get carried away by the doom-and-gloomers in the industry, or with the ego-maniacal folks in the industry you run into occasionally who don’t seem to realize that we’re all in this together. It’s a tough, tough business, and sometimes it’s hard for me to separate that from craft.

My Review:
Lovesick starts off by introducing the reader to Paul, a teenage boy who is found crouched over his best friend Lee's body, covered in blood and holding a weapon. Seems like an open and shut case, right? It's not. Paul claims to have amnesia and not remember what he saw at the crime scene, but never stops proclaiming his innocence. Psychologist Lisa Boyers is brought on board to interview Paul about that night, and she begins unraveling secrets about the victim, Lee, and his girlfriend, Wendy, who is missing. A love triangle is uncovered, which is just as delightfully dramatic as you'd expect a teenage relationship to be. But there are more secrets in this book, including some of Lisa's own. The last hundred pages or so will keep your heart pounding in suspense until you discover the whole truth. The story is mostly told through Paul's flashbacks as Lisa interviews him, but there is enough present action to keep you reading to see how the case will be solved, as well as what pans out with the present-time mystery.

*Disclaimer: I received this book for free and was given the excerpt and Q&A material, but the review is my own and is, as always, completely honest.

the Legacy of Eden

I was contacted by Meryl L. Moss Media Relations to participate in a blog tour for the upcoming book The Legacy of Eden. The tour includes a variety of blogs posting a scavenger hunt - excerpts from the first chapter. Check out some links and see what you think of the book! I was given the chance to host a Q&A with the author, Nelle Davy.

1. As a child, what did you want to be when you grew up?
This – and only this. Well once I thought about acting and being a neurosurgeon but they were brief interludes of madness.

2. Do you have any tips for readers who are looking to become published authors?
Be prepared for rejection and perseverance. Those are the only 2 things guaranteed on the journey to being published. I faced sooo many rejections and I worked in publishing. It is really tough – but it is worth it.

3. Are you working on anything else at the moment, and if so can you tell us?
Yes I have just finished the first draft to my second novel which is set in 1963 Louisiana during the civil rights movement and the friendship between a white child and the black son of her family maid.

4. Can you tell us something about yourself that not a lot of your readers know?
I could probably be a make up artist or a baker. I am the kind of person in either shop where people actively come up to me and ask my advice on products. I once took this woman around Superdrug (a beauty shop in the UK) testing liquid eyeliners on her. The staff were not amused but she got the right one for her I can tell you.

5. Do you have any quirks that come out while you are writing?
I argue with myself – my husband actually laughs at me because I look like a mad woman having conversations with myself about what this character did or should do...or should not.

My Review:
The Legacy of Eden had a good premise - a collection of family secrets spanning three generations. The reader meets Meredith, the narrator, as she finds out that her family farm will be sold since the last relative living on the land has died. She had to leave her new home of New York City to go back to her childhood home in Iowa. To get closure on this task, she has to talk with her two older sisters and face all of the secrets she's been trying to outrun for seventeen years.
     There was a lot of potential here, but the true story was bogged down in a lot of details. Scenes that seemed minor were stretched out over pages, then years were glossed over. There were a lot of characters due to the extended family, and I found it hard to keep them straight because sometimes they were referred to by name, and sometimes they would be "grandmother," or "my uncle," etc. The ending totally lost me, and I had to re-read the last page several times before I thought I understood what happened. I'm still not too sure. I think the story could be severely edited to pack more punch, so the secrets (which seemed tame, by fiction standards) stand out more, instead of getting lost in a wordy narrative. I read this book while juggling a lot of others, so it might be easier to follow if you sit down and read it more or less straight through.

*Disclaimer: I received this book for free and was given the Q&A material, but the review is my own and is, as always, completely honest.

The Writing Life

One of my ongoing 101 in 1001 goals is to read a book on the craft of writing every month. That's 34 months. 34 books. I have just a small bookshelf of writing books so if you have any recommendations, please share!

I almost missed this one - I started the project on January 11th, but forgot about this task, so I read this book yesterday. Technically still within the "month" deadline.

The Writing Life by Annie Dillard.
I'm not sure how I feel about this book, overall. There were sections that inspired me, sections that discouraged me, and sections that I skimmed.

Let's start with the downers.
On drafts: Dillard wrote about this a lot, but the word "delusions" stuck out to me in the following. "Several delusions weaken the writer's resolve to throw away work. If he has read his pages too often, those pages will have a necessary quality, the ring of the inevitable, like poetry known by heart."
     I personally like keeping old drafts of stories, either in hard copy or as differently labeled files on my computer. It doesn't mean I'm fixated on certain lines, but it can be nice to go back, when I'm stuck, and read an earlier version of a story. Sometimes I remember what I wanted the true purpose to be. Sometimes I find a character trait that had gotten lost in edits, but is necessary to make things work. And sometimes I find a sentence that makes me pause and think "I wrote that?!" and provides the burst of confidence I need to finish the story. I don't think there's anything wrong with keeping old pieces of writing.

On forms: "It is more prudent to struggle with the outcome of only one form - that of a long work - than to struggle with the many forms of a collection." It was discouraging to read that Dillard was only addressing the writing of a book. "It is no less difficult to write sentences in a recipe than sentences in Moby-Dick. So you might as well write Moby-Dick."
     I think there's merit in any form of writing, and different people are better at different types. I love reading novels, but I write short stories. It's just how I like to write, and I don't think I need to stretch something out into a book when it can be succinctly told in a story.

But on to the good stuff.
Something simple that I needed to read: "How we spend our days is, of course, how we spend our lives. What we do with this hour, and that one, is what we are doing."

Something I could relate to: [After a day of nothing but coffee] "There was a tiny range within which coffee was effective, short of which it was useless, and beyond which, fatal. ... I heated a bowl of soup which I ate blinded by coffee and nicotine, unremembering. I returned to the papers and enclosed a paragraph in parentheses; it meant that tomorrow I would delete the few sentences I wrote today. Too many days of this, I thought, too many days of this."

Something that makes me look at paper differently: "Who will teach me to write? a reader wanted to know.
     The page, the page, that eternal blankness, the blankness of eternity which you cover slowly, ... that page will teach you to write."

I might have a different outlook on this book if I knew the author, but I've never read anything by Annie Dillard before. I have another of her books on my shelf, so I'll soon find out if this is her real writing style or not. I'm torn on if I'll revisit this book again... I tend to not like books/stories/articles that glorify writing like it's the most heavenly of art forms, and not everyone can do it, etc.

Guest Post - Garret Tour Tuesday with Callie Leuck

Sometimes, I like to write fiction. Sometimes I end up writing non-fiction, and sometimes I (attempt to) write comedy. Ideas come to me randomly, when I'm going about my day working or driving or sitting around being silly with my friends. But my writing happens in one place, and Callie Leuck asked me about that place.

Here is my answer.
Be sure to read back over other people's writing spaces - it's fascinating to me to learn about where/when people write. Thanks Callie for starting the Garret Tour series, and thanks for featuring me!

January in Review

Lightning People by Christopher Bollen. This novel encompasses loves lost and current, relationships with family and friends, conspiracy theories, heredity, lightning strikes and the little ways our lives all intertwine. A blurb on the back of the book compared it to The Great Gatsby - a pronouncement that still kind of makes me scoff. I found myself caring about the characters' lives despite none of them being clearly defined as likable. Bollen has a way of hinting at what's to come, but when you get to the scene and think a certain thing will happen, he mixes it up on you. It's never a hokey "Ha, you thought this would happen but you were wrong!" but more of a "No, this is going to happen instead." It's very well-done and I found myself holding my breath in suspense through several sections. The beginning might be a little confusing because the narrative is told from the point of view of five characters, but it is worth sticking with.

Light from a Distant Star by Mary McGarry Morris. With the main story arc being a murder committed in a personal residence and the true killer's identity being mistaken, this book had a lot of potential, but failed to deliver. The narrator was unlikable, but not in an interesting or quirky way, just boring. Every scene that could have been climactic was reduced to mere sentences presented matter-of-factly, while minor side stories were given too many pages, then left unfinished at the novel's end.

Jump Book by Philippe Halsman. Halsman was a noted portrait photographer who asked his subjects to jump for him before he finished a session. The result is a book of wonderful images featuring various authors, celebrities, and political figures in midair. There are a few pages of text outlining "jumpology," the way Halsman analyzed his subjects' arm and leg positions to learn about their personalities. The book is mostly a picture book, but the text is worth reading. My favorite jumpers were Capt. Edward Steichen, Dean Martin and Jerry Lewis, Salvador Dali, and Anthony Perkins.

The Orchard by Theresa Weir. A touching memoir about how a woman met her husband and married him in a whirlwind, then spent the rest of their lives learning about each other. The book's setting and, honestly, main character is the apple orchard where Adrian Curtis (Weir's husband) was born and raised, and worked his entire life. Though Weir addresses some aspects of farming and pesticides, it is not hard to follow and doesn't take over the book. The most overwhelming aspect of the book is the emotion - not that it is excessive. Weir is very skilled in taking the reader along with her, from the first glimpse of her husband-to-be onward, including glimpses back into her troubled childhood.

A Stolen Life by Jaycee Dugard. An amazing book. Jaycee tells the story from the day of her kidnapping up to her struggle to adjusting to real life, interspersed with memories of her childhood. It's told very matter-of-factly, not necessarily without emotion, but without pity. Jaycee doesn't want to be seen as a victim or a hero - she's just sharing her story because it's all she knew, and all she could do was live each day as it came to her. Still, it's very inspiring, especially when she shares optimistic journal entries she wrote when she was thirteen, then ones she wrote when she and her daughters were much older. It's a fascinating look at how someone can be trapped for so long, then exposed to the real world and not want to be in it. Jaycee says that she never wanted to go back to her captivity, but with the media in her face, she pretty much felt like she was still being kept from having her own life. Very sobering book.

The Fault in Our Stars by John Green. My first John Green book, though I'd heard a lot about him. I was a little wary, because often such popular authors/books/movies don't live up to the hype. In this case, he exceeded my expectations. After two pages I was hooked, staying up all night to finish the book. There were so many things I thought might happen, but I didn't want to wait and let my imagination run wild - I had to know what was going to happen. The characters are so realistic I knew them, I was in their world. The book is well-written and easy to read quickly, but it's worth savoring. Never have I read a book that can make me cry (without being overly sentimental) and then make me laugh hysterically through my tears just a sentence later. Highly recommended.

Lunatics by Dave Barry and Alan Zweibel. This book comes with an advisory: "Dave Barry and Alan Zweibel have both written books for children. This is definitely not one of them." It's not, but I love that such a nonsensical book was written for adults. The whole plot line is just silly - everything happens by chance, is misinterpreted, and then leads to something else crazy happening. It's delightful. I laughed out loud at least once a chapter, and most chapters were just a couple of pages. If you want to read something fun that will make you think a little and laugh a lot, this is your book. And the laughs aren't limited to the text itself: a blurb on the back reads "Reading Alan Zweibel makes me laugh out loud. And yet it is not a particularly funny name." - Eric Idle; and the page that dedicates the book to the authors' wives, "who, if we had discussed the idea with them ahead of time, would definitely have discouraged us."

Will Grayson, Will Grayson by John Green and David Levithan. Two very different boys, both named Will Grayson, are telling their separate life stories. Then, completely by chance, they meet and become tangled with the same people. Their relationships are all affected and the whole thing inspires a high school musical, which sounds so funny and, yes, fabulous, that I wish I could hear it. The ending wasn't what I was expecting, even though now I'm not really sure what I was expecting. It just didn't sit right with me, and kind of left the whole book lacking as I looked back, despite my enjoying it as I read it.

An Abundance of Katherines by John Green. I wanted to like this book because it was based on the perfect framework - a road trip. However, the trip stops abruptly and so does the action. I've noticed a pattern in John Green books - the supporting characters are always more realistic and interesting than the main character narrating the story. Colin was passive and whiny so I didn't care too much about what happened to him.

Letters From a Nut by Ted L. Nancy. A re-read. I read this book when it first came out - my brother and I laughed over it like it was the funniest thing in the world. And it damn near is. "Ted" writes letters to companies, casinos, and celebrities with the most off-the-wall comments and requests. Very often the replies are just as funny as the original letters.

A Grown-Up Kind of Pretty by Joshilyn Jackson. Big had a baby when she was fifteen; her daughter, Liza, had a baby when she was fifteen. When Liza's daughter, Mosey, turns fifteen, both her mother and grandmother are on edge. They're expecting the worst, but what happens is nothing they were prepared for. A mystery unravels when bones are found under Liza's favorite willow tree. The book is told from the points of view of Big, Liza, and Mosey, and each character has a distinct voice. I loved this book, but I'm biased - Jackson is one of my top three favorite authors, and my all-time favorite female writer. (We're friends.)