Another book review

Soulless by Gail Carriger

My rating: 3 of 5 stars


I'll admit, I was a little disappointed when I started reading Soulless, but it really does pick up after the first few chapters. Her way of writing throws you for a loop at first, but stick with it and you'll get used to it in a way that doesn't translate into boredom.



I'll call this book charming, quaint, dirty, and completely satisfying. Alexia Tarabotti's adventures (or misadventures, as the case usually is) do not fail to keep you reading. I will be reading the next two books in this trilogy like devouring candy.



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L-O-V-E

When I was driving home from work today, I thought about someone that I was formerly obsessed with who is no longer in my life now. I wondered, What could I have done to prevent that situation? The truth is: Nothing.

When someone tells you they love you, and then if and when you come to the same realization only to find their love for you was only passing fancy, what happens? Obsession.

I couldn't fathom it. How could this have been someone that I thought would always be in my life, no matter what happened? And how could he just suddenly not feel the same, and then disappear out of my life?

I've come to realize that we were on two wavelengths: he went after me purely out of curiosity and unconcerned as to the damage he might incur to our friendship, and I went after him thinking he would be my soul mate and the risk would be worth it. I was really foolish and naive. I opened myself up to someone I deemed worthy, and I was wrong. I never thought I was a "I can fix him" kind of girl, but that was another symptom of the obsession. I hope I know better now. I don't think it's a misplaced hope, but life's road stretches out before me, and I know there's more mistakes to be made and lessons to learn. I hope I don't have to learn that one again.

A very conscious decision

Hello again, all.

I have removed my Nanowrimo word counter from this page, because I have decided not to do Nanowrimo this year. I am still absolutely in support of everyone that attempts the monumental undertaking of writing a novel in one month's time, but I know that I will not be able to do it this year.

A couple of reasons:

1) It's time to get serious about this religion business. Not because I am a serious person, not because my particular religion is so solemn, but because of my attitude towards it. I have been a practicing Pagan since eighteen years old, with quotes around the "practicing" part. I feel very much I've been talking the talk and not walking the walk, and I'm focused on changing that. And yes, Nano is only for the month of November, but Nano is to the detriment of everything else I want to continue to do throughout this month.

2) The boy has not read my successful attempt at Nano yet. He started, but hasn't finished, and that successful attempt happened two years ago. Since he was the motivating factor for my completion of Nano, and since he was inspiration for one of the characters, I feel very unmotivated about this whole Nano endeavor knowing that he hasn't read my successful novel. I know that that shouldn't be the point of Nano, but I still feel the lack of motivation.

3) Any writing I do this month will very much be of the nonfiction variety, mostly having to do with my burgeoning attempts at codifying my beliefs into words. Nano is decidedly all about fiction pursuits.

Please, if anyone reads this, do not be dissuaded by my lack of motivation if you're thinking about attempting NaNoWriMo. There is no feeling quite like winning Nano.

For more info on NaNoWriMo, go to nanowrimo.org.

Book of Shadows

Book of Shadows: A Modern Woman's Journey into the Wisdom of Witchcraft and the Magic of the Goddess by Phyllis Curott

My rating: 5 of 5 stars


On second reading of this book, I realized that my life now is mirroring the author's, with the whole "Persephone's descent into the Underworld" theme. All that glitters most certainly is not gold, and the thing of true value in this world are our spirits.

An amazing book, and highly recommended for those people still seeking out their own form of spirituality.



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unfounded fears of a tarot reader, strangeness, and other stuff

The Tarot of the Boroughs launch party went fabulously well, and though I only got to do short readings for four people, the night was most certainly not wasted! And my boyfriend bought the Tarot of the Boroughs deck, so I was both proud and pleased.

It always amuses me the types of people that are attracted to readers of any kind. There really are some weirdos out there, and I certainly wasn't spared from that at the launch party, because one of them sat at my table. He was a very strange guy that gave off that "not quite there" vibe. But, since he sat at my table, I had to read for him. I think the reading went fine and I was accurate, but I wouldn't know since I never remember what I say to people during readings; the info's for them and not for me, that's why I don't retain it. Dave (my boyfriend) told me later on that the strange guy had spoken to him earlier, asking him the reason why he had attended the event, and Dave had pointed over to me at my table and said, "My girlfriend's doing readings." So, in a way, I sort of had a bouncer for the event. But sure enough, as soon as Dave wasn't in the room, said strange guy (who had been hovering around my table) went ahead and sat down.

I suppose there's various levels of weirdness. I consider myself a little strange, as well as most of the people I get along with. A little weird is a good thing, I feel. And then there are the people that give off that strange vibe that have what I like to call "crazy eye". You've seen it before, I'm sure. Try looking for it the next time you see a mugshot of a cult leader or something like that. I swear that this guy I read for had it. I would have preferred walking over hot coals than read for him. I felt my spirit pulling back away from the table, and just wanted to crawl into a small part of myself and stay there. So I read for him, and I remember him nodding, and leaning in to hear what I had to say, but leaning in toward me too much. Very uncomfortable!

Other than that, it was a great event and I had a good time.

Confessions of a Nervous Tarot Reader

I figured it's more appropriate to post this on my personal blog more so than my tarot blog. Tarot blog = trying to give off the appearance of a "professional". Personal blog = somehow okay to admit that sometimes I'm scared shitless of giving strangers readings.

I will be doing my tarot thing at the Tarot of the Boroughs launch party tomorrow from 8-9:30pm at the Bowery Poetry Club. For more information, go to my tarot blog (tarotspell.blogspot.com).

And now for the whining, "I suck" portion of my post. I am very nervous about reading at this event, because I will be reading with the deck Tarot of the Boroughs, which I just received on Monday. I will be bringing my default deck (The Llewellyn Tarot) with me as a backup. However, since this is the launch party for TOB, the emphasis is on the new deck. My thoughts run as follows: "I'm nervous; what if I'm not accurate?; I shouldn't be using my default deck as a crutch; etc."

No more time to think about it. Might as well not be nervous, because I already said I'd do it! ARgh!

American Gods

American Gods by Neil Gaiman

My rating: 5 of 5 stars


I'm not going to litter this review with spoilers... suffice it to say, though it is written by Gaiman, I can understand why fans of his might not have liked this book. Its themes are vast, deep, and sometimes overwhelming. I'll need to process this one for the rest of my lifetime, but I thoroughly enjoyed reading it.

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awfully long time between posts

It's my own fault for not writing in so long. Something always comes up that I deem more important than my writing, when really it is the most important thing to me. It's what keeps me sane most of the time... so I shouldn't be at all surprised that I've been flying off the handle more and more lately, since I don't have my "writing safety valve" in place.

I am angry at myself. I implemented an exercise and diet program for myself, and have let it go when I was doing so well. I had been working out at least three times a week for 45 minutes each time for over a month. I think it's been about three weeks since I worked out. I'm disappointed in myself. Typical Aries: all bluster and fire and drive at the start of something, and then fizzles out after a while, or gets easily bored with the whole thing.

Maybe the Universe has been trying to send out signals to me lately, and I've been stubbornly refusing to see them. I haven't had an e-mail request for a tarot reading in a very long time (not since March/April). This is not counting people I know and/or work with. I swapped readings recently, and my reading said that I'm going about things the wrong way... or perhaps not the wrong way, but a roundabout way. I use tarot cards to access my intuition, when maybe I should be cutting out the middleman (the cards) and just read for someone. This is a very scary thing for me. I always have anxiety about that. I've taken classes in intuition before at the Open Center (yes, there are classes in psychic development if you know where to look), and I asked a few people to be my guinea pigs when doing readings w/o cards. Was I accurate? Yes. Did it take a while for my predictions to be verified? Yes. It's that kind of waiting that I can't stand! I'm all about the instant gratification (another Aries trait). When I should just be happy that I'm of service to people, I'm not... it's never enough.

Idiots being idiots again

One little tweet from Neil Gaiman, and I found out about this. Can all this madness please stop? I feel like this is just a page out of the haters-being-haters playbook. JK Rowling wrote an incredibly satisfying seven-book series that captured the imaginations of both children AND adults, and I don't think I'm exaggerating that she is one of the reasons that being a bookworm is "cool" again.

Now then. I'm going to use a quote from the article that absolutely sums up the crux of what I feel on the subject. "Non-writers think it’s the ideas, rather than the execution, that make a book. They’ve got that backward." It is one thing to get an idea. Ideas are easy things. Everyone has ideas. However, they're slippery little suckers. Because putting your ideas to paper and having them make sense is the most difficult part. It's part of the reason that keeps me employed as a copy editor. It's a big reason why I hit road blocks in my writing, such as the very common "writer's block". It's not a lack of ideas... it's being at a loss as to how to go about getting the idea to the page and have it come off as how you imagined it in your head.

If I was a stupid person willing to sue for plagiarism, here is one of my own ideas that I have turned my pen to, and the corresponding work/tv show/movie/book/etc. that I would sue (but I wouldn't, because damnit, the execution is the key and not the idea!):

My work: Aphrodite's Daughter (about a matchmaker that finds out she's the unwitting daughter of Aphrodite)
Corresponding work that I feel (and others have felt) are similar to my work:
• Valentine (American TV series... albeit quite short-lived)
• Percy Jackson and the Olympians (book series and soon-to-be movie series... in which a boy realizes he's Poseidon's son... I think, I haven't read the books yet, but my friend's son has)
• Should I also sue all greek and roman myths as well, for using a pantheon as a basis for my story, or should I be sued for using them?
• Should Neil Gaiman (author of American Gods and Anansi Boys) in turn sue me, because I used the idea of someone being a child of a god (Anansi Boys) in my work?

Let's be clear here in where the ideas came from (in case anyone tries for the "I read or saw something else and then wrote" defense). Valentine came out over a year after I wrote Aphrodite's Daughter, and all I did was see it on the TV, laugh, and call up my friend Lorraine and say "Do you recognize this idea from somewhere else?" Percy Jackson and the Olympians, I had no idea existed until this fall when my friend's son was describing the latest book to me after he had finished reading it. And for good measure, I wrote Aphrodite's Daughter perhaps a year before I read Anansi Boys.

In short, I feel like this case against JK Rowling is equivalent to someone suing McDonald's for burning themselves for their coffee being too hot. Sadly, we've seen how THOSE lawsuits went. I just pray and hope that THIS lawsuit is seen for the disgusting money-grubbing ploy that it is.

*dismounts high-horse and goes back to bed*

hidden delights

I am in love with leafcutter designs. I now own a block stamp and tags, touting "home grown" on them, a call to get back to handmade... just make something! Create!

Once I find my ink pad in all of my mess, I'm going to stamp "home grown" on the back of this (Yes, I made it):


Squeeness. And I'm taking a vacation day from my dayjob and going to Philly with Jackie to attend a trade show and buy more pretty things for the store. So excited.

quickie

My macbook is half naked. What I mean by this is that I have a hard case surrounding my macbook, and right now it's going bottomless. Sans pants. I was having some problems with it developing "condensation" in between the hard case and the actual computer case, leaving wetness in between, around where the screw for opening the battery is. I'm testing out leaving off the bottom so it doesn't have the chance to form this "condensation". I brought it to the Apple store a couple of days ago, and the genius there said there was nothing wrong with it, so I'm trying not to worry.

Anyway, looking forward to a few things in my life right now, and none of them includes work. I am looking forward to attending a trade show for the store tomorrow and finding some goodies, going to my favorite restaurant afterward, and then next weekend attending another tarot workshop, this time focused on love readings. It also falls on my friend's birthday, who is also attending the tarot workshop.

Since I am still in my jammies, I think it's high time I get out of them, hop in the shower, and actually start my day at 4p.m.! Gosh, I love Saturdays.

Waiting for Inspiration to Strike

Here I sit over at the boyfriend's house, using my macbook to try to write. It's not working. Instead of writing, I've been playing games on pogo.com, while watching the Ravens/Patriots game. That game has since ended (with the Patriots losing! Yay!), and now I'm on to watching the Packers/Cardinals game. I'm not rooting for either team. So now the Jets move on to play the Chargers next Sunday, which will be interesting.

Tomorrow I will be ice-skating with the Temple of Craft ladies at Bryant Park. Either that or drinking at Bryant Park and watching everyone else skate. Problem with that though is that I've been asked to teach everyone to skate backward (since I know how to). Since I haven't gone ice-skating in over ten years, I probably will be falling all over the ice like a rookie.

My battery like is at 23 minutes left, so I'm going to finish this up and turn my macbook off. I have accomplished nothing this weekend. And frankly, I'm unconcerned by that!