Are there any books or topics that should not be published? What are they? Why?
No.
I support free speech and freedom of the press and that means even things I don't agree with. Every idea deserves to be heard. And then you can reject it, argue against it, and shoot it down. But you have to at least hear it first.
Sunday, July 29, 2018
Saturday, July 28, 2018
Book Meme - Day 28
What are you reading right now? What are it's strengths and weaknesses?
As usual, I'm reading several books at the moment:
The Name of the Wind. This is one of my favorites. I got the Tenth Anniversary edition for Christmas, and I'm finally reading it now. It has a bunch of new illustrations and some bonus material at the end. I love a lot of things about this book: the use of language, the world building, the magic system, the characters, the way it talks about music and poverty and the quest of knowledge. The dichotomy of the hero and villain and how it's mostly a matter of perspective. The way rumors turn to myths and legends. I wish there were more female characters. And that the hardcover wasn't so heavy. It's hard to read in bed at night.
Discount Armageddon: The first in one of Seanan McGuire's many, many urban fantasy series. And possibly my favorite of hers. This is a fun adventure that's bringing back a lot of the things I liked about Buffy (the heroine has a quick wit, a strong family, and a desire to have a life outside of monster hunting that she's struggling to balance with the monster hunting). McGuire has matured as a writer since the early Toby Daye books (which I also want to revisit - apparently I quit that series just before it got good). I dunno, I'm barely 100 pages into this book, but so far I'm loving it. I'll probably have more to say when I'm finished.
A Hat Full of Sky: One of Pratchett's Discworld books, the second about Tiffany Aching. This is a great young adult story about growing up and taking responsibility. It could be more diverse, as could all of Discworld. But I love it for being about a practical young girl who wants to help people.
As usual, I'm reading several books at the moment:
The Name of the Wind. This is one of my favorites. I got the Tenth Anniversary edition for Christmas, and I'm finally reading it now. It has a bunch of new illustrations and some bonus material at the end. I love a lot of things about this book: the use of language, the world building, the magic system, the characters, the way it talks about music and poverty and the quest of knowledge. The dichotomy of the hero and villain and how it's mostly a matter of perspective. The way rumors turn to myths and legends. I wish there were more female characters. And that the hardcover wasn't so heavy. It's hard to read in bed at night.
Discount Armageddon: The first in one of Seanan McGuire's many, many urban fantasy series. And possibly my favorite of hers. This is a fun adventure that's bringing back a lot of the things I liked about Buffy (the heroine has a quick wit, a strong family, and a desire to have a life outside of monster hunting that she's struggling to balance with the monster hunting). McGuire has matured as a writer since the early Toby Daye books (which I also want to revisit - apparently I quit that series just before it got good). I dunno, I'm barely 100 pages into this book, but so far I'm loving it. I'll probably have more to say when I'm finished.
A Hat Full of Sky: One of Pratchett's Discworld books, the second about Tiffany Aching. This is a great young adult story about growing up and taking responsibility. It could be more diverse, as could all of Discworld. But I love it for being about a practical young girl who wants to help people.
Friday, July 27, 2018
Book Meme - Day 27
Describe your ideal book club
There would be an emphasis on SFF. Maybe that's all we'd read. I know most of the history of this genre, I'm familiar with it's tropes. I think there are a lot of exciting things happening there right now, and I'd love to discuss it with other people familiar with the genre.
All the members would be well-read and politically engaged. I want to talk about how books do or don't reflect the larger world, and I don't want those conversations to be a bunch of 101 lessons. I want the discussion to be on a higher level.
There would be a set meeting time, once a month. Roughly six people would show up each month, a mix of people who are there every month and people who only come occasionally.
There would be wine and snacks and it would be close enough to my house that I could walk home.
It would not fizzle out after 3 or 6 months.
There would be an emphasis on SFF. Maybe that's all we'd read. I know most of the history of this genre, I'm familiar with it's tropes. I think there are a lot of exciting things happening there right now, and I'd love to discuss it with other people familiar with the genre.
All the members would be well-read and politically engaged. I want to talk about how books do or don't reflect the larger world, and I don't want those conversations to be a bunch of 101 lessons. I want the discussion to be on a higher level.
There would be a set meeting time, once a month. Roughly six people would show up each month, a mix of people who are there every month and people who only come occasionally.
There would be wine and snacks and it would be close enough to my house that I could walk home.
It would not fizzle out after 3 or 6 months.
Thursday, July 26, 2018
Book Meme - Day 26
Do you return your library books on time? What do you think your answer means about other aspects of your life?
I don't check out books from the library because I get too anxious about not finishing them before they're due. This is ridiculous. I believe library loans typically last 2 weeks, and I usually finish a book in 3-4 days. A week if it's really long. But I always worry that it'll take longer, and then I'll have to return it unfinished. Or renew it and then someone who was waiting to read it will have to wait even longer. I stopped going to the library years ago, because it was causing me too much stress.
I think this demonstrates rather well that I will spend money to avoid a stressful situation if at all possible. I'm lucky I'm rich. If I weren't, my anxiety disorder would be a much bigger presence in my life. As it is, I can avoid most things that cause me stress and manage my anxiety without medicine.
I don't check out books from the library because I get too anxious about not finishing them before they're due. This is ridiculous. I believe library loans typically last 2 weeks, and I usually finish a book in 3-4 days. A week if it's really long. But I always worry that it'll take longer, and then I'll have to return it unfinished. Or renew it and then someone who was waiting to read it will have to wait even longer. I stopped going to the library years ago, because it was causing me too much stress.
I think this demonstrates rather well that I will spend money to avoid a stressful situation if at all possible. I'm lucky I'm rich. If I weren't, my anxiety disorder would be a much bigger presence in my life. As it is, I can avoid most things that cause me stress and manage my anxiety without medicine.
Wednesday, July 25, 2018
Book Meme - Day 25
Have you ever pulled an all-nighter to finish a book? Which was it? What made it so compelling?
I have twice stayed up all night (or at least way, way too late) to finish a book.
The first time was Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets when I was twelve. It was summer, so it's not like I had to wake up and do anything the next morning, which helped with the staying up all night aspect. I had initially intended to read the series a chapter at a time with my mom and brother. That conviction evaporated the second I cracked the cover. As many people can attest, JK Rowling created a truly magical world. And it sucked me in.
I probably would have repeated this feat when the fourth book came out, but I received it in the morning and spent all day reading. I don't know if I finished it or just fell asleep - either way, I didn't stay up too late with that one. And after that I had responsibilities that made staying up all night a less appealing prospect.
The second (and last) time I stayed up all night with a book was when my friend loaned me Wizard's First Rule, the first in Terry Goodkind's The Sword of Truth series. This time was more egregious because I actually had a test the next day at school (albeit, a state-sponsored standardized test, so I wasn't taking it too seriously). But right as I was preparing to go to bed, Richard was kidnapped and spent the next 200 pages in captivity. I simply couldn't put the book down and sleep until I knew he was safe. By the time he escaped I was so close to the end of the book that I just went ahead and finished it.
I have twice stayed up all night (or at least way, way too late) to finish a book.
The first time was Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets when I was twelve. It was summer, so it's not like I had to wake up and do anything the next morning, which helped with the staying up all night aspect. I had initially intended to read the series a chapter at a time with my mom and brother. That conviction evaporated the second I cracked the cover. As many people can attest, JK Rowling created a truly magical world. And it sucked me in.
I probably would have repeated this feat when the fourth book came out, but I received it in the morning and spent all day reading. I don't know if I finished it or just fell asleep - either way, I didn't stay up too late with that one. And after that I had responsibilities that made staying up all night a less appealing prospect.
The second (and last) time I stayed up all night with a book was when my friend loaned me Wizard's First Rule, the first in Terry Goodkind's The Sword of Truth series. This time was more egregious because I actually had a test the next day at school (albeit, a state-sponsored standardized test, so I wasn't taking it too seriously). But right as I was preparing to go to bed, Richard was kidnapped and spent the next 200 pages in captivity. I simply couldn't put the book down and sleep until I knew he was safe. By the time he escaped I was so close to the end of the book that I just went ahead and finished it.
Tuesday, July 24, 2018
Book Meme - Day 24
Who was your first literary crush or character you wanted to be friends with? What drew you to them?
I'm not sure I've ever really had a crush on a literary character. My early exposure to vampires like Lestat certainly informed what I find attractive (without having much bearing on my real life). And I remember loving Renzo Leoni from A Thread of Grace in a way that made me wish he were real. But when I was first reading the Sookie Stackhouse novels and a friend at the time enthused about my meeting a character because he was "so hot" I was a little confused. I'm not great at visualizing book characters (or settings) unless there's a lot of detail, and there wasn't much in this case.
I guess there's a difference between thinking "I want Katniss to choose Peeta" and "I would choose Peeta". Even when I was writing fanfic, my self-insert wish fulfillment was reserved for TV characters. They loomed a bit larger in my imagination. (For me Lestat was initially an extension of Spike.)
But man did I want to be a member of the baby-sitters club. I could never fully map myself onto any single character. I had Mary-Anne's shyness, Stacey's math abilities, and Jessi's love of dance. I was an amalgam of all of them, and therefore sure that I would fit right in with them. I also loved the structure of their friendship - the frequent (though brief) meetings and the shared interest of babysitting.
My friends and I talked about starting a babysitters club of our own, but it wasn't meant to be. We couldn't meet regularly, and I could never quite figure out how to get my CPR certification that would make me hire-able to people outside my family. But I always had those books and the friends in them that I could revisit time and time again, until I finally outgrew them.
I'm not sure I've ever really had a crush on a literary character. My early exposure to vampires like Lestat certainly informed what I find attractive (without having much bearing on my real life). And I remember loving Renzo Leoni from A Thread of Grace in a way that made me wish he were real. But when I was first reading the Sookie Stackhouse novels and a friend at the time enthused about my meeting a character because he was "so hot" I was a little confused. I'm not great at visualizing book characters (or settings) unless there's a lot of detail, and there wasn't much in this case.
I guess there's a difference between thinking "I want Katniss to choose Peeta" and "I would choose Peeta". Even when I was writing fanfic, my self-insert wish fulfillment was reserved for TV characters. They loomed a bit larger in my imagination. (For me Lestat was initially an extension of Spike.)
But man did I want to be a member of the baby-sitters club. I could never fully map myself onto any single character. I had Mary-Anne's shyness, Stacey's math abilities, and Jessi's love of dance. I was an amalgam of all of them, and therefore sure that I would fit right in with them. I also loved the structure of their friendship - the frequent (though brief) meetings and the shared interest of babysitting.
My friends and I talked about starting a babysitters club of our own, but it wasn't meant to be. We couldn't meet regularly, and I could never quite figure out how to get my CPR certification that would make me hire-able to people outside my family. But I always had those books and the friends in them that I could revisit time and time again, until I finally outgrew them.
Monday, July 23, 2018
Book Meme - Day 23
Describe how your bookshelf is organized. Why do you organize it this way? What other organization methods might you consider?
For the most part I have my books organized by genre and then further into subgenre. Within subgenres I mostly go by feeling. I put books next to each other if they're similar enough or if they both evoked the same feeling in me.
So, for example, I've got a couple of book cases of fantasy books. I have a couple of shelves devoted to series (Discworld and The Wheel of Time). I have a shelf for urban fantasy, one for portal fantasy, one for epic fantasy, one for chosen one tales, etc. The urban fantasy shelf shades from the more realistic (magical realism, a la The Particular Sadness of Lemon Cake) to the more fantastical (The Dresden Files). The Magicians sits next to The Chronicles of Narnia because the former is a direct reaction to the latter. Sometimes books might belong to multiple sub-categories, and they just get put on whichever shelf has more room.
I have a non-fiction book case with pop science and history books and memoirs. I have a couple of shelves devoted to science fiction, broken further into dystopian fiction, space adventures, and time travel. Actually, I had to put time travel next to WWII, because I own a surprising number of time travel books about WWII. Or possibly WWII books with an element of time travel. Again, sometimes it isn't so easy to categorize a book.
Years ago I attempted to organize all of my books alphabetically by author then title (keeping series in order). It lasted less than a week because I couldn't find anything.
Conversely, a few months ago I put together a rainbow bookcase, expecting to take a picture and then put everything back where it went. But I ended up really liking the rainbow bookcase (it's actually two bookcases, next to each other). It's fun to look at. It's surprisingly easy to find books because I actually have a pretty good visual memory (this might be related to the fact that I was always better at geometry than algebra and physics fell apart for me when we started treating time as a dimension - I need to be able to turn word problems into pictures).
The thing I really like about my rainbow bookcases is that it provides a neat snapshot of who I am as a reader. I've got everything jammed in together. Memoirs next to young adult and fantasy next to physics text books. The individual books in each series are scattered all over the place. I love the contained chaos of it, possibly because it feels like it reflects what my life is like right now.
The only thing I don't like about the rainbow book case is that I can't apply it to my entire collection. It represents roughly a quarter of the books I own. Most of my books have either solid black or solid white spines. Or they have colorful spines that can't be easily called blue or green. And so those books are still being shelved according to my gut feeling genre system.
Honestly, the whole thing is a bit of a mess. But it works because I know exactly where every one of my books are. And that's the whole point of organizing your collection.
For the most part I have my books organized by genre and then further into subgenre. Within subgenres I mostly go by feeling. I put books next to each other if they're similar enough or if they both evoked the same feeling in me.
So, for example, I've got a couple of book cases of fantasy books. I have a couple of shelves devoted to series (Discworld and The Wheel of Time). I have a shelf for urban fantasy, one for portal fantasy, one for epic fantasy, one for chosen one tales, etc. The urban fantasy shelf shades from the more realistic (magical realism, a la The Particular Sadness of Lemon Cake) to the more fantastical (The Dresden Files). The Magicians sits next to The Chronicles of Narnia because the former is a direct reaction to the latter. Sometimes books might belong to multiple sub-categories, and they just get put on whichever shelf has more room.
I have a non-fiction book case with pop science and history books and memoirs. I have a couple of shelves devoted to science fiction, broken further into dystopian fiction, space adventures, and time travel. Actually, I had to put time travel next to WWII, because I own a surprising number of time travel books about WWII. Or possibly WWII books with an element of time travel. Again, sometimes it isn't so easy to categorize a book.
Years ago I attempted to organize all of my books alphabetically by author then title (keeping series in order). It lasted less than a week because I couldn't find anything.
Conversely, a few months ago I put together a rainbow bookcase, expecting to take a picture and then put everything back where it went. But I ended up really liking the rainbow bookcase (it's actually two bookcases, next to each other). It's fun to look at. It's surprisingly easy to find books because I actually have a pretty good visual memory (this might be related to the fact that I was always better at geometry than algebra and physics fell apart for me when we started treating time as a dimension - I need to be able to turn word problems into pictures).
The thing I really like about my rainbow bookcases is that it provides a neat snapshot of who I am as a reader. I've got everything jammed in together. Memoirs next to young adult and fantasy next to physics text books. The individual books in each series are scattered all over the place. I love the contained chaos of it, possibly because it feels like it reflects what my life is like right now.
The only thing I don't like about the rainbow book case is that I can't apply it to my entire collection. It represents roughly a quarter of the books I own. Most of my books have either solid black or solid white spines. Or they have colorful spines that can't be easily called blue or green. And so those books are still being shelved according to my gut feeling genre system.
Honestly, the whole thing is a bit of a mess. But it works because I know exactly where every one of my books are. And that's the whole point of organizing your collection.
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