Slave and academic frustration

Robert Silverberg is fast becoming one of my favorite sci-fi authors. I've read his book "The World Inside" and it is a really fabulous look at what could potentially happen to humanity. It's a bit like "Brave New World" in some ways, and it does all of the things science fiction should do -it entertains and it makes the reader examine his or her own life in comparison to an imagined future.

"Unfamiliar Territory" is a book of short stories by Robert Silverberg which does essentially the same thing. His writing style is learned without being unnecessarily erudite or scholarly, and he occasionally throws in some humor to lighten the dark path down which he thinks we're heading. He examines a lot of our social mores through the use of poetry, music and sex; in the futures Silverberg imagines, sexual mores are much more communal than they are now, and our own writing is often in a form that has become incomprehensible and limited. People are trapped by their own inaction, by the societies they created or help sustain, and by some connection they feel to the way things are now.

He's a really fascinating writer, and I would advise anyone with even a passing interest in sci-fi to check him out.



Academically, I've just begun reading the book "Slave: My True Story" by Mende Nazer. I'm only about 30 pages in, but so far I'm enjoying it. The writing is simple, but descriptive, and it makes the reader think about how privileged we are in Western society as compared to most other parts of the world. Mende spent her childhood (before she was abducted into slavery) growing up in Sudan, where she spent several hours a day helping gather firewood and cooking or finding food for her family. Her tribe did not have access to clothing for most of her life before her abduction, and when the rains failed to come, people starved.

As far as the book itself goes, I am enjoying it. I would probably not have picked it up if I wasn't taking the class I'm reading it in, so I give the class points for that.

However, allow me a moment to complain about the class itself. Writers out there will be able to identify with the things I'm about to say. I am a junior in college. When I signed up for an upper-level writing class (Women and Writing is the name of it), I was anticipating learning about the ways women have written, the history of women and writing, feminist writings, women in writing...stuff like that.

Instead, what I got was a teacher whose specialty is African writing and chose (seemingly at random) books by 3 women from either Africa or the Middle East. I have no problem with that. What I have a problem with is the total disconnect between a class on women and writing and the class I'm taking, which is about books that just sort of happen to have been written by women.

On top of that, apparently my teacher is under the impression that no one in the class has an intellect above that of a 4th grader. She has us drawing posters and doing fill-in-the-blank poetry. My first piece of writing was 4 pages long, double spaced, and she claimed I had written "a novel!" and asked that I try to be more brief.

That, by the way, is the only critique I have received. In 4 weeks of class, approximately 2 dozen pieces of writing/drawing/filling-in-of-blanks, I have not received a single constructive comment that could in any way improve my writing.

In addition to that, my professor frequently makes ridiculous spelling and grammatical errors on her instruction sheets, which I find insulting -she's a writing professor, she should know better -and she is one of the most disorganized teachers I have ever had. She's had to revise the syllabus once already because she can't keep things in order.

As a woman, and a writer (primarily a writer), I am beyond fed up. I am sitting in this class knowing that if I write something I wouldn't be embarrassed to share with a critique group, it will be considered to be too long. So my only other option is to write something so short that it is in essence undeveloped. I'm okay with writing flash fiction pieces, but we're supposed to be working on memoir writing. How are 1-2 page (double spaced, mind you) pieces of writing supposed to contribute to my ability to write memoir?

No. I am stagnating. I feel like I'm losing my talent as a creative writer, not improving it. The class is a waste of my time, and the time of everyone else in it.

Has anyone else had an experience like this?

Lynne Truss and Shakespeare

I am currently reading Lynne Truss's book "Talk to the Hand" and it is every bit as good as "Eats, Shoots & Leaves" -although I did catch a grammatical mistake in it that made me cringe. For someone who wrote a book about grammar, that did kind of bum me out.

However, Truss's humor is every bit as sharp and to the point as it was in ES&L, and that's its saving grave. TttH is about 'The Utter Bloody Rudeness of the World Today, or Six Good Reasons to Stay Home and Bolt the Door" (its subtitle). I am all for staying home and bolting the door normally, simply because I am antisocial and prefer my own company to the company of most other people. Thanks to Truss, I now have excuses to stay in.

She makes good points. So far, I'm only about halfway through the book, but I find myself nodding sadly at each point she makes, and chuckling ruefully at her jokes.

What has happened to politeness? Where are the people who say please, thank you, sorry and generally act as though they are aware that they are sharing public space with other human beings? Perhaps it's because I live on a college campus, but it seems to me that politeness is in short supply -short enough that I actually remember it when someone holds a door for me, or thanks me when I hold it for them, or does something genuinely kind, whether it's for me or not. I think it's sad that something that was once called 'common courtesy' is now so uncommon as to be noteworthy.

Truss places a lot of blame on the technological age, and I find it hard to disagree with her. The internet has made us solipsistic and shallow, directed more by the choices we are offered than the choices we make. That's a problem.

During my reading of TttH, I make it a point to turn off my computer for a little longer each day and actually do something. I tried it yesterday and found myself at a loss. What was I to do without the internet to distract me? I read. I wrote a little for pleasure. I savored a cup of coffee instead of sipping at it distractedly and burning my lips in the process. I relaxed.

And it was really quite nice. It forced me to get my work done more quickly and more efficiently, and believe you me, there is nothing wrong with that. Obviously I have no intention of dissociating myself from the internet completely (my job is on the internet, after all), but I think taking more frequent breaks -and even days off -will do me a world of good. It would do us all a world of good.



As far as academic reading goes, the only book worth commenting on at the moment is Shakespeare's "As You Like It." I like it as it is. It's funny. I'm only 3 acts in, but I am definitely enjoying it. What are your thoughts on it, reader?

I'll be watching the Kenneth Branagh film in class come Wednesday (and am I ever happy about that -my mom and I both have a thing for KB, if I'm not mistaken), so I'll report on that as well once I've read it.



That's it for this week. :) Next weekend I'll probably have more to write about, but we'll see! Stop back and check.

Scheduling

I like making lists and schedules. It helps me think and accomplish whatever it is I need to get finished. However, I haven't really put in a time slot for blogging -shame on me, I know.

So here's the deal. I am busy. I am really, really obscenely busy. My first week of winter quarter wore me out to the point that I was crawling into bed by 10 almost every night. I'm taking 5 classes as well as writing 4-10 articles every day in an attempt to pay off my tuition (it's not as bad as it sounds, but I'm still busy). Blogging has fallen to the bottom of my list of priorities.

However, that also sucks. I enjoy blogging, even if I get very few readers or comments. It's a nice outlet. It's more creative than most of the other writing that I do, and it's a way for me to connect with other readers.

Therefore, while I was washing my dishes, I made a decision. Instead of updating 5 times a week like I can (but rarely do) in the summer and my less busy times, I am going to update once, maybe twice a week. It will probably be on the weekends, since I have more free time Friday-Sunday.

In addition, I am refining the focus of the blog. I'm not just going to blithely talk about whatever I feel like regarding books and publishing and coffee, I'm going to blithely talk about those things in a more specific way.

College involves a lot of reading. What I will offer you here is a critique of the things I am reading both personally and academically. I will also update you on my caffeine addiction (which is currently telling me I need some coffee, like, NOW).

I'll be giving you overviews, snapshots, reviews and quotes from whatever books I happen to be reading for pleasure, as well as the books I am being instructed to read by people who are older and (presumably) more knowledgeable than I. That remains to be seen in at least 2 of my classes, but be that as it may, I still have to read what they assign.

Check in next week for the first installment of the newly improved Reading Corner.

Lorem Ipsum Books or, Why Indie Bookstores Aren't Always as Great as You Think

Wait, what?
Image: the internet.

I love indie bookstores. Locally owned stores, like my dad's store Galaxy CDs, are awesome. The best bookstore in Ohio is located in my hometown (I'm not just saying that because I like the place, either -Ohio Magazine declared it to be so, and obviously, OM knows all).

That being said, being an indie store does not excuse poor customer service or a badly run store.

A friend of mine on Twitter -someone who introduces me to lots of lovely contests and people -recommended the store in question today: Lorem Ipsum Books. They're located in Cambridge and trying to move. The rent on their place is too high, etc. I can sympathize with that, since I worked in a great locally owned bookstore that closed because it was horribly mismanaged, the rent was too high and no one ever bought any books (with myself and my family as the possible exceptions to that rule).

The difference between Gallant's Books & More (where I worked) and Lorem Ipsum Books (aside from the latter having a website) is that when a customer couldn't find something or we didn't have it in, we'd make sure that they got it.

Lorem Ipsum, as I said, was trying to move. They had a sale wherein you could buy $10 coupons and redeem them for any books up to $20. That, my friends, is what I call a good deal. I bit, and bought one of the coupons.

Here's my beef with Lorem Ipsum. Their website is awful. It's relatively easy to navigate, but it's plain, unattractive and does not aid the reader in finding books.

When I first got on to find a book to use my newly purchased coupon on, I tried using the search feature. It's bad. Even with specific information, not once did it turn up the book I had wanted. Even when I entered an author's name, it used a keyword search and pulled up books by authors whose names were similar to the one I had searched for. To find a book, I eventually had to go through each category (pages and pages and pages in each one), scanning each title as I went by.

I could write an entire post about what an awful that experience that was and how it relates to selling books, but suffice it to say that I found a book I wanted. It was about Frank Lloyd Wright. If you hang out with me more than once, odds are, he'll come up. I like him a lot. The book was about $15. Huzzah!

I placed the order, and put the whole thing in the back of my mind -but each time I received a package in the mail, I hoped against hope that the book would be there.

Then, I got an email. A nice email, don't get me wrong, but not an email I wanted. It was telling me that the book I had ordered could not be located, and they were sorry, would I like to choose two books for my trouble?

Sorrowfully, angrily, I began picking my way through the categories again before I found two somethings I wanted. It took me an hour and a half to find two books. Two books I wasn't totally pleased with, but could accept nonetheless. As the days passed, I became more excited about receiving these books.

I love Dr. Who, so the Dr. Who Technical Manual was satisfying to my geeky side. I've loved the movie Coraline for ages, and as an avid Gaiman fan, I was really (if I may say it: reallyreallyreally) excited about that particular book. A technical manual is good mostly for geeking out over, conversing about and putting aside. But a Gaiman book is one I'll get out over and over again and just absolutely fall in love with every time.

Well, the mail came today.
The Dr. Who Technical Manual was in it. And yeah, sure, it's almost as cool as I thought it would be. Shorter than I expected, but still cool.
And Coraline? The book I had pinned all of my already-disappointed-hopes on?
Yeah. It wasn't there.

What I got instead is a massive, slightly musty smelling copy of the screenplay for Beowulf. Apparently Gaiman helped write it. His picture is on the book.

That's all well and good and whatnot, but it's not what I ordered. I'm not going to read a screenplay...that's why they make the movie. This book holds zero interest for me (plus, it smells bad).

Here's the point for today, kids. Indie bookstores rock, but they're not going to stay in business if this is the way they operate. I shop at the Stately Raven here in town frequently -I like supporting local businesses, and the people in the SR are always really nice. The selection isn't superb, but it's a nice enough store. I don't mind spending my money there.

What I mind, and mind very much, is spending money that I really shouldn't have spent on a bookstore in which I have no real personal investment and then getting screwed. Twice.

That's not cool. That's a problem. That's a problem for me (since now I'll probably go buy a copy of Coraline to soothe my irritation), and it's a problem for Lorem Ipsum Books -if they're this sloppy with all of their customers...well, no wonder they couldn't pay their rent.

'American Gods'

I read a lot of blogs. In fact, I think I spend too much time reading other blogs and neglect my own. Sorry. In other news, new colors! Get excited.

Before I get to the promised review, there was something I wanted to discuss: why we read.
Recently, a teacher in Kansas had to rewrite her curriculum because a bunch of (stupid) parents complained. I think this is ridiculous, but it led me down a different sort of thought process.

The books the teacher had initially chosen were defended because they were books that not only get teens interested in reading, they also help them make sense of their lives (the books were, by and large, about teens in real-life situations). I thought that was an interesting concept -reading to find sense in life. Life is a pretty senseless thing, I think. We have to give meaning to our lives, and no one else can do that for us. Books can definitely help, though, I agree with this teacher.

Books give us a sounding board for our own lives. They let us compare ourselves to other people without envy, malice or pride -characters in books are what they are, and we can read stuff into them until the cows turn blue, but they're not real people. We don't have to be afraid of hurting their feelings when we say that we hate one character for whatever reason, or love a character for another.

We can place ourselves in a spectrum of lives and situations and make an assessment about what we might or might not do, what our reactions would be, whether or not we would ever have gotten into such a situation -and so on, etc. into infinity.

Books help us make sense of ourselves, and it's hard to know the world if you don't know yourself first.

But books serve another purpose -in the above, I'm mostly talking about fiction and novels. They entertain us, but they also educate us about ourselves. However, there are also books that purport to educate us and make us raise our own mental standards, and there are books that serve to entertain us without making much of a social or personal message.

And sometimes escapism is just escapism.

Book review:

In brief, 'American Gods' is rocking my socks off (and I'm not even wearing any socks). It is awesome. I have come to expect this from Gaiman, and rightfully so.

I'm not done with the book yet, so it will be a day or so before I can give a full report, but allow me to ramble a bit now.

The characters in this book will not get out of my head. I've been thinking about Mr. Wednesday all day (I'll try not to give away any spoilers), and I still can't decide whether I hate him, love him and, either way, I don't know if I want him to survive the story. He's a rascal, but he's also kind of sad, and I love how he's unfolding and yet becoming more confusing as the story develops.

Same for Shadow -Shadow is a great character, and I think he's fascinating. He's a relatively passive character: he found a course and he's sticking to it, come hell or high water (and probably both), but he's also a compelling moral study. There's a lot of back story that's still coming to light, so I'm enjoying watching everything come together.

I can't get over the plot, either -I have long wanted to write a short story about what happens to the old gods, the discarded and forgotten gods. Gaiman got there first, and he did a much better job than I could ever hope to. It doesn't mean I won't write something of my own someday, but 'American Gods' is more than satisfying right now.

One last thing about Gaiman before I sign off for the evening: the man knows how to write a good sex scene. The thing I don't like about romance novels/erotica/whatever is that sex generally does not move the plot forward in any way other than that it's just a bunch of inevitable bawdy, lewd, overly descriptive scenes filled with vapid purple prose (and for some people, that's fine -I'm just not one of them). What I admire about Gaiman is that he can make a scene erotic and sensually charged, but it still serves the plot in a big way. His sex scenes reveal something about the characters that you didn't know, but needed to, and they're still...well, sexy, while the plot goes chugging right along. Big points for that.

I am a terrible person

Jonah saw one in New Orleans that said "Blessings be poppin', and Satan can't stop it"
Image credit: internet.

I haven't updated in forever. My dad guilt tripped me about it earlier today, so here you go; an update!

I changed my mind about what I wanted for Christmas. The Sony e-reader is a lovely, slick little thing...but this is so much better: The enTourage eDGe.

No, I don't know why they chose to capitalize random letters, and yes, I think that's stupid. However, the e-reader-meets-netbook combo is just too delicious and juicy to resist. I have to wait until February until I can drool all over it, but I think it will be worth the wait. Santa loves me enough to make an extra trip to my house.

In other news, font jokes are hilarious. Font jokes that are also parodies of Lady Gaga's 'Poker Face' are gut-busting.

That's really all I have for right now...a lame update, I know. Next time, I'll have read a book and I'll give you a review about it. Scout's honor. Not that I'm a scout, but you know. Whatever.

Writing

Wow. I have been writing a ton these past few days (at least it feels like it to me), just not on here.

I am so tired of staring at my computer screen today...I'm thinking about taking the rest of the night to just read and "write" write, like, in a notebook and stuff. Crazy, I know.

I just keep thinking about all the stuff I'll miss on Twitter and I get a little panicky. :P

More when I have something interesting to say!