A Mighty Fine Life

So I guess sometimes I don't actually post for a couple of weeks at a time. Whoops? But fun and exciting things have been happening lately. By which I mean...

+ VACATION, WOO! I treated myself to one! On Thursday I flew down to Georgia to visit second_batgirl and spent a long weekend with her. It was, as you can imagine, awesome. Mostly we just hung out, but we did also go visit the World of Coke. It was ridicumazing. I bought an adorable tiny keychain with a smiling Coke bottle on it. (This should surprise no one. COKE MAKES ME SMILE, OKAY?)

+ BASEBALL! So how 'bout them Yankees, huh?

+ FANDOM! hsmbigbang began posting today, hooray! And a few days ago, I received the mix for my fic and it is brilliant. ♥

+ WRITING! I've been doing some. It's pretty cool. Hopefully I will have a revised manuscript by the end of the year. We shall see, anyway.

+ READING! Been doing that, too! Justine Larbalestier's "Liar" is fantastic, you guys. It is a psychological thriller, which in this case mostly means "total mindfuck."

+ HEAT! They turned it on in my building last night. This is exciting, because I haaaaaaate being cold. Even if the radiator is ungodly loud and rattly; I'll take that over being cold any day. (It also makes the air very, very dry; I have a bowl of water sitting right next to it tonight to hopefully help combat that until I can get a proper humidifier.)

+ FANDOM AGAIN! So, uh, I think I'm going to the premier of I Kissed a Vampire tomorrow, because it's free, and, y'know, Lucas Grabeel will be there. So it seems like the sort of thing I should go to. (I missed the premier of Free Style with Corbin while I was in Georgia, alas. But hey, HSM boys, if you want to keep hosting free events in NY, be my guest!)

So yesterday, one of my favorite authors (Justine Larbalestier) did a giveaway on twitter, with copies of her first book, a non-fiction about gender in scifi. That is a thing in which I am just the teensy, tiniest bit interested (you may have noticed) and ... I won! Otherwise this probably would not be "things that are awesome" news. But it's probably the only give away/random draw/whatever that I've ever won, so it's extra-awesome.

Also extra-awesome: along with the book (which arrived super-fast), she sent me a promo pamphlet for her upcoming novel "Liar." Which looks like it is going to be RIDICULOUSLY GOOD. I have to wait until October for the book, though (whiiine).

But still. I am a happy fangirl. Hooray!

In less awesome news, there is a conference at work this week. Sigh. But whatever. Today was only ten and a half hours of work; that's not so bad in the grand scheme of things (by which I mean compared to AIDS2008, which was 14-15 hours days).

Actually, wemblee gave me Burmudez for Chanukah a year or two ago; it fell apart a little bit in the end, but was 95% really good. Definitely one I'd recommend to most of the people on my friendslist.

Whew! The crazy bookathon weekend is over. If you didn't follow along as it happened, you can see all the various gathered bits and pieces with the Book Challenge tag at AV. My vital stats:

Books Read: 8
Pages Read: 2,306
Hours Read: 26:41

Not as overpowering as some folks', but not bad, if I do say so myself.

And now a meme from falco_conlon.

01. Anyone who looks at this entry is invited to post this meme and their current wallpaper at their LiveJournal.
02. Explain in five sentences why you're using that wallpaper.
03. Don't change your wallpaper before doing this. The point is to see what you had on.

( Hint: he's curly-haired and super dreamy. )

In case you missed it on one of my three other blogs or on poisonivory 's journal, Jess and I are doing the 48 Hour Book Challenge. For charity! Specifically, this weekend we'll be reading as much YA as we can, and live-blogging over at AV; we are asking for people to sponsor us for a dollar or two per book. Proceeds will all go to Room to Read. It's gonna be awesome.

Of course, this necessitates books, and possibly I ran out and bought a couple, leaving me those PLUS what I've already got lying around. Ah ha ha... ha. Help me decide which to read (first)!

Poll #1410742 Help me pick books!
Open to: All, detailed results viewable to: All, participants: 14

Which book should I read (first?)

Reading-related, but sad: David Eddings died. I can't even say how formative his novels were to me, both as I became a fantasy fan and as I started writing. I'm not much for epic fantasy at this point, but those were some damn fun reading, and I think he will be greatly missed. :(((

And to cheer everyone up after that, have some pictures of Corbin looking like an adult (read: hot). Click to embiggen. There is stubble and chest hair.







*swoon* I think I need a mint julep and a lie down.

And on that lecherous note, I am off to bed.

I have been thinking about rereading Almost Like Being In Love (by Steve Kluger) for the last few days, and just realized why that was. Basically, because of falling back into HSM fandom. And I wanted to write quick book rec before I forget again:

Almost Like Being In Love is the story of Travis, a neurotic, nerdy, flaming theater boy; and Craig, the school's shining golden-boy jock, recently accepted into Harvard. They meet while doing stage crew for, yes, their high school musical, and fall madly in love. They have one semester and one summer together before going to college on opposite coasts and breaking up. Twenty years later, Travis realizes he's never loved anyone like he loved Craig, and he wants some closure, so he begins a madcap cross-country quest to find Craig and find out if there's still anything there.

(Hint: there is. You can see while I think this might appeal to some of you.)

It's a super quick read; it's in the epistolary format, which I don't usually go for, but it works really well here. This is really light and fluffy and fun; if you are sad (especially if you are sad about prop 8, as everyone should be) it is worth picking up, because it will absolutely make you smile.

Writing-wise, this has been a crazy productive week for me. (Word count will be posted at temira as usual tonight.) Here's what I've written online of late:

- Another Situation at the feminist nerd blog, about what happened when poisonivory and I went to a baseball game and I got very angry at some ill-behaved fans.

- Old School Review: The Protector of the Small Quartet (First Test, Page, Squire, Lady Knight), because my dad (yeah, he has an LJ: loondave4824445) mailed them to me weeks ago and I felt I should actually read them. Too lazy to read they review? They scored four cupcakes.

I also just finished rereading the first two books in he Unicorn Chronicles, because second_batgirl gave me the third book for my birthday! Now that I remember what happened in the first two, I can read the new one. I also recently finished Eight Men Out, because I am still building up my nerdy baseball knowledge. It was pretty awesome.

ETA: I seem to be Twittering the VMAs. Here.

So in the time I was basically computerless:

1) I (finally) went to the dentist. I have four cavities, which will be filled over the next month or so. On the one hand, this sucks. On the other hand, considering I've had no dental care at all for two and a half years and I thought I was going to need a root canal or something, it's not that bad. I didn't especially like the dentist I saw, but the convenience of his office being in the same building where I work can't really be beat.

2) Tuesday evening was feminist SF book club! We read an Ursula LeGuin collection, which I thought was very good, even if it isn't what I, personally, would pick up for fun. Last time I went, the discussion was kind of meh; this time it was great and smart and full of people thinking about things and disagreeing politely and generally being awesome. I'm so pleased, let me tell you. (And afterwords, a coworker [who also is part of the club] and I went out for ice cream. Well, sorbet on my part. But it was fun times.)

3) Yesterday, harriet_vane and I finally went and saw some apartments with our realtor, who is a very nice guy. Knock on wood, we found one we loooooove, and so began the process of nabbing it. Such things can always fall through, so I'm trying not to have my hopes up too high, but it would be so fantastic.

4) Work has been work. To make up for the time I've been off getting my teeth cleaned and trying to find a place to live, I stayed crazy late a couple nights and came in early, too. Which sucked and was pretty exhausting. Ah, well. Sadly, it's just going to get crazier; between the big-ass conference at the beginning of August and the week I'm taking off for the move, it is going to be super stressful and annoying. Groan.

5) July 4th! Pretty much my favorite non-present-giving holiday, because I looooove fireworks. poisonivory is coming out to play, and she and harriet_vane and I are hopefully going to go see the giant show. Hooray! Also: long weekend! Double hooray!

6) I read Suzanne Brockmann's Hot Target, and you should too! You know, if you like WWII (or WWII movies), trashy romance, trashy gay romance, hot Navy SEALs, and -- especially -- dreamy gay-in-denial actors with substance abuse problems and daddy issues. (And who doesn't?)

7) I have a Twitter, if you are a person who likes to follow those. It's mostly mundane stuff and complaining about work, though.

8) I have written jack shit. I know I should just get back to work, but I had such momentum built up in my projects that now that Teh Novel has been wiped I'm just exhausted and having trouble forcing myself to get started. Maybe this weekend. We'll see.

My reading list, while not "out of control" in a real way (how can reading be out of control? Reading is fun-damental!), currently a bit lengthier and more eclectic than usual. ( Here's what I've got. )

Oh, incidentally, after I'd bought Alcatraz but before I'd read it, I saw an offer from TOR (a fantasy publisher) to sign up for free e-books, which I took them up on! Because Sanderson was listed as one of the writers offering a new novel for download. I am no longer planning to take them up on that.

For those who might be curious what it looks like when I really and truly get my hate on for a book, please see my review of Alcatraz Smedly Versus the Evil Librarian. A book I picked up expecting to enjoy, and ended up truly loathing. A lot.

David Eddings burnt his office down. Mostly, though, I'm sad to hear about Leigh. I was so happily surprised when she started getting credit for co-writing. I wish them the best of luck.

Jess and I finally got around to reviewing the Sisters Grimm! It was the series that kind of sparked the site, so it's about time. Anyway, it's over here and has the longest URL ever.

In non-YA news, I also read Lance's biography, Out of Sync. It was interesting, and very readable; it was also written at about a sixth grade reading level. Oh, Lance. Oh, bus school. It was kind of disappointing, though, because it's clear from reading he was trying not to name names or give out dirt on anyone else (except maybe Pearlman, who fucking deserves it), so even the section where, you know, Justin broke up the band and blamed Lance for it is very much, "And then I was sad, but I got over it, and still love Justin and am so proud of his success!" Almost word for word.

The best section is the last third, which covers space camp, the band breakup, and being outed. It's the only section with actual emotion. The outing story was actually quite compelling and I was worried his grandma wouldn't love him anymore. (She does!)

Overall, I wish someone had taught Lance how show-don't-tell works; there are virtually no illustrations or anecdotes in it, just straight narrative. It's entertaining and fun, but a bit flat. But then again...it's Lance! He tried to go into space! He's awesome! I super enjoyed it; it's just clear that Lance (or his ghostwriter) is not a professional writer.

And speaking of books, I haven't written a single word for Nano yet today. Whoops.

Off to bed after a tiring weekend, but before I go, a review of The Sea of Trolls is up at Active Voice. [Summary: Based on Norse mythology. Very well written. Good and bad gender representations. Four cupcakes.]

I have been seriously lazing about updating Active Voice (while poisonivory has been kicking ass and putting up new reviews once a week), but I finally actually did something! A fairly massive review (which doesn't even cover everything I wanted to say) of the Underland Chronicles: clicky!

[ETA: Also, I just signed up for PaperBackSwap finally, and have already ordered two of the three AI Gang books. I have been looking for them for years!!! Now if only they had the third...Oh, and obviously, I posted, like, 30 books.]

poisonivory and I finally finished our review of HP7! It's over at Active Voice.

...was really good.

The HP release was fun, crowded, and crazy. I enjoy that while waiting for your numbers to be called in line, everyone gets to be best friends.

First four-ish chapters read; can't keep my eyes open much longer. When did I turn a million years old?

Pluggity plug plug: scifantasybooks.

What? I was bored. Should be good times.

For those of you on my flist who a) will probably see me in person in the next weekish, and b) are interested in YA/kids lit, I collected a bunch of coupons from Borders. "20% off1 regular price Kids or YA Book (when you spend $10 or more, Borders Rewards members only)". I can't imagine anyone does, but hey, if anyone wants a coupon, let me know.

Or, you know, if anyone has any books they need me to pick up with my discount before it expires when I'm done with the store (omgsoexcited), let me know.

In other news, I'm meeting the boy's folks tomorrow. Hopefully, this will go well.

So a week or so ago, poisonivory loaned me the book Fly By Night by Frances Hardinge. It is truly fantastic (YA, semi-fantasy/alternate reality historical) and I highly recommended it to everyone who likes books. Since one of the main points of the book is that books, sort of in genral, are awesome.

( Premise, some thoughts )

You'll be able to recognize it pretty easily in bookstores; it's got a banner across the front that says "BANNED".