Book Reviews In 15 Seconds Apiece

I'm having one of those mornings where it's hard to get started (maybe because it's only 8:30 on a Sunday and I shouldn't be starting yet).  I'm not enthused about writing or going to the gym yet... about the only thing I think I could be truly enthused about right now is a big belgian waffle and some chai, and even that would involve getting out of bed. Luckily, I have a built-in excuse in that I *need* to do a blog update.  But since I'm not quite awake yet to be duly coherent or witty (ha)... I give you:

Books reviews in 15 seconds apiece!

First of all, John Green's Paper Towns. Read it yesterday.  Brilliant. Hilarious. The characters are so funny and real and alive. You must read this.

From the Amazon page: Quentin Jacobsen, 17, has been in love with his next-door neighbor, Margo Roth Spiegelman, for his entire life. A leader at their Central Florida high school, she has carefully cultivated her badass image. Quentin is one of the smart kids. His parents are therapists and he is, above all things, "goddamned well adjusted." He takes a rare risk when Margo appears at his window in the middle of the night. They drive around righting wrongs via her brilliant, elaborate pranks. Then she runs away (again). He slowly uncovers the depth of her unhappiness and the vast differences between the real and imagined Margo.

Maureen Johnson's Devilish. YA - quite possibly the most bedeviling, quirky, funny YA I've read since I finished The Rise of Renegade X. Unique characters and a great sense of humor in the voice - and a huge page-turner.

Again, from the Amazon page: Tiny senior-class genius/spitfire Jane Jarvis is seriously out of place in St. Teresa's Preparatory School for Girls in Providence, RI. Although she considers herself to be above the school's traditions, she wants to help her clueless best friend, Ally, obtain a good freshman sister at the annual Big-Little ceremony. Alas, when Ally forcefully vomits in front of the entire student body, she needs more than Jane's help. After a brief period of avoiding her schoolmates, all of a sudden she's cool, gorgeously attired, confident, and sophisticated. Well, everyone knows that high school is hell, so it makes semi-sense that demons abound, and Ally has sold her soul to one. Jane is determined to save her. Odd things start happening, from giant hailstorms to self-igniting textbooks, and Jane sadly bids farewell to her family and throws herself into mortal–and immortal–danger.

Katherine Center's Get Lucky; well, if you're a regular reader, you might already know I have a little author-crush on Katherine Center since reading Everyone Is Beautiful. She does it again with Get Lucky, which is everything chick lit should be at its finest: a flawed but lovable MC, the perfect love interest gone all too wrong, and some crazy self-wrought trouble - all wrapped up in a lot of humor. The characters are sympathetic and even the crazy things that MC Sarah Harper does are fully believable.

From Amazon: Sometimes the worst thing to happen turns out to be the best and vice versa. Sarah Harper does the unthinkable and forwards an inappropriate e-mail to the entire company, losing her job in advertising. Luckily she planned to go home to Houston to spend time with her sister Mackie and her husband. Unfortunately, on the plane, she sits next to Everett, the high-school boyfriend she unceremoniously dumped. After Sarah realizes how gorgeous and successful he is, Everett ruins the moment by making a snarky comment. Capriciousness takes over Sarah’s life as she decides to help Mackie with her infertility problem by becoming a surrogate. Sarah perceives this as a bonding time for the sisters, but things do not work out as planned, and Sarah finally recognizes that the loss of her mother at a young age had major effects on her life, her attitude toward love, and maybe even her luck.

Still debating what to do for my 200 Follower Contest - I have a few ideas, but nothing jumping up and down screaming I AM BRILLIANT LIKE THE NOVELS YOU JUST REVIEWED (yes, that's how much I love these three books). I'm debating giving copies away to you guys. If you have a neat idea for a contest - or just something you really want to get for free - let me know in the comments. And what have you read lately that you've found brilliant?

Wednesday Weekly: Um, Miracles Much?

Last week:
The Goddess of Vengeance Wore Pink Galoshes...12,685 words.

This week?
The Goddess of Vengeance Wore Pink Galoshes...27,755 words.

For a grand total of 15,070 new words this week.

Um, miracles much?

I also read. A lot. I'm not allowed to bring a computer to my job for security reasons, but I also don't have a whole lot to do most of the time. It's a weird job for this week and half of next, but I'm not complaining, as I'm being reasonably well-paid to keep an eye on things, take some notes and read novels!

So,  this week's reads:

Some serious love for some of the books I read this week - Katherine Centers' Get Lucky: A Novel, Lesley Kagan's Land of a Hundred Wonders, Sarah Dessen's  Lock and Key and Maureen Johnson's Devilish were all impossible to put down. Which explains why I read while I was at work, then read during my lunch break, then came back to my hotel and read on the treadmill. Yes, you can do that if you're a very dedicated bookworm concerned about your jean size as I am - not running, but putting the treadmill at something like a 10-12% incline and walking at 3-3.5 MPH will burn a lot of calories while you read. I'm trying to be a fit geek, here. So far this year, I've read 59 books - not bad for a girl with a day job!

Hopefully, I'll get some reviews up later this week, because I have to gush about some of my faves. :)

I feel good this week. I love writing. I love my story. I love books - love to escape into someone else's world like I'd almost forgotten, as a grown-up who no longer usually gets to read multiple books in one day. I'm driving to work and back in my red Chevy Cobalt rental, rocking out to the Glee soundtrack (three CD's worth) and feeling just on top of the world for no good reason. I'm not even yelling at other drivers, even the guy who braked suddenly and caused me to brake and send my Arby's curly fries flying on to the floor, which caused me to wonder who was sneaking Xanax into my yogurt. But no. I'm pretty sure it's just the magic of the written word. (Also, I've become 200% cheesier than I was before, which is quite a feat).

Writing is full of ups and downs, and I know this won't last. But I'm going to enjoy it while it does.

Guinevere in Threes/More Bloggy Goodness

Lynn of Type a Little Faster tagged me, and now here is Guinevere in Threes.

Three names I go by:
1. Guinevere. Although no one calls me Guinevere except store associates and my mother.
2. Guin. Pronounced "Gwen", just not spelled that way. Someone tried to tell me Guin is a different pronunciation. I'm generally the only Guin in the room, therefore, I consider myself the authority on how to pronounce it.
3. Mrs. MJ'sLastName.  I consider myself a pretty staunch feminist, but I took my husband's last name. Why? Because it's pretty. My maiden name was pretty much Ethnicowski, and while I was proud to be Ethnicowski, MJ's nice Anglo-Saxon last sounds better with my unusual first name. One of them had to go - signing Guinevere Ethnicowski wore out the writing muscles I need for my fiction.

I don't care if you call me Ms. or Mrs., although the latter makes me look around for my mother-in-law.

Three jobs I've had:
1. Selling Avon, mostly Mark, in college. This was really just to get free make-up.
2. Substitute teaching.
3. Being a Marine.
(The first two are a bit of a stretch honestly given how much I did of both - the Marine Corps paid for my college and then has been my only real job)

Three places I've been and loved:
1. New Zealand. Auckland, Christchurch, it's all lovely. I can't wait to go back, but there's so much I want to show MJ there I don't know where to start.
2. Germany. I've been to Berlin, Munich and Garmisch and love them all. I'd consider going expat for a few years to either Germany or New Zealand.
3. San Diego, CA. I lived here for two years and I love it - still miss San Diego like crazy!

Three movies I love:
1. Black Snake Moan. For being about love of the non-romantic/non-parent variety, which is truly a rarity in Hollywood.
2.  True Romance. The best thing Tarantino was involved with, before he was caught up in his own hype (Big ugh to Hostel and the Grindhouse series).
3. Star Wars. I am un-apologetically dorky about Star Wars.


Three TV shows I can't miss:
1. Glee
2. Fringe
3. Chuck
Those are the only three shows I go out of my way to watch (Bones and The Office also used to be contenders, but have lost a lot of ground as they sometimes seem stale now)

Three books I recently read and loved:
1. Nation by Terry Pratchett
2. Love and Other Impossible Pursuits by Ayelet Waldman
3. Hotel on the Corner of Bitter and Sweet by Jamie Ford

Three things I'm really, really looking forward to:
1. Fourth of July weekend/my return home from this trip/my birthday (all the same weekend!)
2. Finishing the rough draft of The Goddess of Vengeance Wore Pink Galoshes
3. Our big trip next spring to England and Ireland, if MJ and I can get enough clarity in our work schedules to actually book it one of these days.

It's always hard to pick bloggers out of our neat little community here, but here's my three:
1. Old Kitty
2. Jacki
3. Jen
I'd love to learn more about any of you, so please feel free to consider this passed to you if you're interested! :)
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Also, since I have a lot of non-writing related stuff I want to, well, write (let's not get caught up in the semantic of that), I've another blog started for everything else: fashion, food, finances, life.  Cats will make an appearance on both blogs, of course, cats being the awesomest.  I just don't want to bog this blog down with too many non-writing related pieces, but please visit my other blog too:
La Dolce Vita, La Vita Dura
(The Good Life, The Hard Life - because I don't believe those two things are always mutually exclusive)

I have a post up on there now about my adventures in Augusta yesterday, writing up a storm, visiting the art museum, and going to the movies by myself. With my very own crap photography to boot! :)

Letter to my Husband

Hey handsome,

You know how I said I'd save all the extra per diem I didn't spend on this business trip for our furniture fund? Actually, I was kidding.

You see, I wrote six thousand words yesterday. And when a girl writes 6,000 words of her novel before noon, what's she going to do the rest of the day?

That's right. Shop.

Today, I expect to be even more productive. And you know what that comes with being more productive? My credit card bill.

Don't you wish you read my blog? ;)

Love ya,
Guinevere

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I can't actually post this in good conscious without saying that we have an equal, feminist household where MJ could care less about me going out shopping to entertain myself of an afternoon. I'm a smart chica who spends within reason, works hard for her money and can do what she likes with it once the bills are paid. But that's not funny, is it?

I do think he should read my blog, though. :p

Voice in writing, voice in life; please, no Madonna spoken here.

I'm currently reading Larger Than Life by Adele Parks, a British author, after which I am taking a break from all things English. Well, except the blogs I read. You guys are safe.

It's nothing against the UK, which sounds lovely, and which I'm hoping to visit next spring, actually.  The problem is my voice. I'm an American girl, writing American characters, and that means they have to sound, well, American. And not like Americans who watch too much BBC, either.

British-sounding syntax and word choices have been intruding themselves into my writing. Sometimes I catch myself squinting at whatever Lauren just said and asking myself, "Really? Would she really say it like that?" Then I re-write, taking out the "posh" that accidentally slipped in or the not-quite-right-for-New-England syntax. I don't know if it's my choice in TV and movie viewing, my reading material or perhaps just a genetic predisposition to being an Anglophile (how did you think I ended up named Guinevere, after all?).

Even MJ has noticed, off the page.  Cut to driving in the car, yelling at each other about politics as we like to even though we agree on everything (Our arguments are purely recreational):

"Well, that's bloody likely, isn't it?"

Concerned look from my darling. "I think you should limit your intake of Doctor Who."

Very well. I will stick to using the All-American F-bomb from now on when ranting about the BP disaster (I don't curse much, really; only when talking about politics, my job, extended family, buying a new car, Windows, texting, gyno visits, dentist visits, drivers when I am a pedestrian, drivers when I am riding my bike, and drivers when I am driving. Hardly at all).  Honestly, I'm not sure we can go to London on our vacay. I'd probably come home sounding like Madonna, and God only knows what my characters would be saying.

But... even though I do intend to strike all things English strictly from my writing and speech until I've, you know, been and might have reason to set a story there -- I can say loo, can't I? Going to the loo sounds about eighteen times more appealing than toilet. Just one more way the Brits keep it classy.

Wednesday (Erm, Thursday) Weekly

I haven't done this in a while...

The Goddess of Vengeance Wore Pink Galoshes...12,685 words.

I should be really productive with The Goddess this weekend, as I'm in Georgia for the month (boo!) and don't have MJ to entertain me. That's not a boo for Georgia, just a boo for being away from home for so long. On the positive side, I figure this month can be like my very own NaNo.

Of course, when I travel I read a lot, and this was a great week for that! I finished Birthright by A. Roger Ekrich (very interesting history of a boy born in Ireland to nobility, then transported to America by his usurping uncle when his father died, who ultimately inspired Robert Louis Stevenson's Kidnapped). And in the novel domain, I finally finished Nation by Terry Pratchett (the book had unfortunately been lost in my gym bag for a few days... shh... don't tell the library that it may smell slightly of gym now). On the plane and yesterday, I read Ayelet Waldman's Love and Other Impossible Pursuits (great fiction) and Caro Peacock's A Dangerous Affair (a mystery set in Victorian England).

Not to sound like a complete cheerleader, but I loved all these books. I'm going to have to make a bookstore trip this weekend, though... I expect to end up with some down time at work (interminably boring, attendance mandatory... my favorite).  I've been working my way through all the recommendations I had last time, and I think I've hit them all now... Sookie Stackhouse, Hex Hall, Nation, etc... so tell me. What are you guys reading? And what should I be reading?

How's the writing going for you guys, too?

Summer Novels, My Kitty Boys and My Hair!

 My big goal is to finish The Goddess of Vengeance Wore Pink Galoshes this summer.  I know a few of us are trying to write novels this summer, and I thought it might be fun to keep up on each other's progress and encourage each other in this ambitious endeavor!

If you're interested, let me know in the comments what you're writing and what your goal is (mine is to finish before Labor Day, and I have about 70-80k to write to get there!)  I'll have the challenge posted in my sidebar, so we can check in on each other's blogs throughout the summer. I'd love it if you posted too, and you're welcome to use my little badge or make one of your own.  And, of course, if you have any other ideas for how to help each other out through the challenge, please post them below!
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Another set of prospective kitty parents visited Buster and Bonzai today. It went very well - although there was an unfortunate moment when I was trying to hold Bonzai (our very shy kitty) and he freaked. I now have some unfortunate deep scratches on my arm from him using it as a launchpad... oh well. These new folks seem so nice though, and found our kitties very cute, sweet and fluffy. So hopefully these boys will have a new home come July!

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Last but not least,  pics of my new haircut as promised... although bear in mind, this is with me washing and styling it, and I'm a lazy styler. If it takes more than 5 minutes, it's not happening. So it doesn't look quite like it did fresh from the salon... I quite like it though. It's OK if I just let it air dry to my natural waves or I can straighten it after with the iron. I might still go with the short cut from my style post at some point, but I like the bangs and layers a lot too.

Yes, I was sitting on my front step taking photos of myself for the light. Pretty sure the neighbors think I'm someone's narcissistic teenager, not the homeowner. Because who does that? (Bloggers, that's who!)

Summer Resolutions

Inspired by Kelle Hampton's lovely post (not a "writing" blogger, but I've mentioned my addiction to mommy blogs before), I thought I'd write today about summer resolutions.  Softer and gentler than New Year's resolutions, summer resolutions should be like a puffy dandelion - easy come, easy go in a warm breeze.

So these are my summer resolutions:

• I'll do yoga and go on long runs. When I want to.
• I'll spend weekend mornings at Starbucks, drinking decadent coffee-related beverages with extra whip and working away on The Goddess of Vengeance Wore Pink Galoshes.
• My mountain bike will make it out of the garage at least once a week.
• Homemade ice cream will be made, and consumed, regularly.
• Travel for work is a given, but I'll make the most of it. I'll do tourist-y stuff and explore local coffee houses for new writing spaces, rather than staying in my dimly lit hotel room to work. I'll go to the movies by myself for the first time ever.
• I'll make it to the beach at least once, instead of just griping about how much I miss California, where it was a regular destination.
• I will meet with other writers. Some time. Somehow.
• My toenails will not resemble some kind of horror-movie villain. I will get a pedicure once a month.
• I'll make some kind of art - play around with my point-and-shoot or my old beloved charcoals and see what happens. 

What are your summer resolutions?

The Hypnotist and the Giant Tots

Today was a surprisingly fun day at work, work aside. Every once in a while we have a "safety stand down", which is oddly reminiscent of some kind of high school assembly, only with grown-ups who are paid to be there. We have to leave our desks, turn off our Blackberries, and sit in an auditorium - where the air conditioning often seems to fail - to be reminded Not To Die. Not to die from drinking too much alcohol, not to die on a boat, not to die in a car (I'd turn this into a Doctor Seuss poem if I were even less irreverent or more poetic -- either one). With Memorial Day and 4th of July coming up, it was time for another lesson on How Not To Be Completely Stupid And Waste Your Life.

The Powers Who Be do their best to make this experience entertaining, though, and so today's presentation included a hypnotist.

And whoa. I believed that hypnosis was real, to some extent; I think our brains can be manipulated. Otherwise, no one would buy iPads or Tiffany engagement rings. But it's one thing to appreciate a technical possibility and another thing to see it in real life.

 The hypnotist pulled about sixteen people from the audience, hypnotized them, and then put them to sleep by saying "Sleep" or shaking their hands, either way. 

Then things got crazy. First, he told them all to think back to when they were four years old, drawing them back through high school, middle school, fifth grade, fourth grade... to age four. He said that when they woke up, they'd be four years old. And when they all sat up in their chairs, one 30-year-old guy was already rocking back and forth in the infamous pee-pee dance.

It wasn't the fact that they followed orders, donning costumes and trick-or-treating amongst the crowd, that surprised me. That seemed par for the course.  What surprised me was the actual regression, like the boy - erm, man - who got up from his seat to go steal the Jason mask away from another subject, the adults skipping around and yelling "Trick or treat!" in high pitched voices, or the grown man and woman who bumped elbows while raising their hands and then began to catfight, swiping each other's hands.


One thing that I appreciated about the hypnotist's regression of those subjects, though, was that he told them, "You remember the toys you played with, the TV shows you liked, your bedroom. You remember all the happy things from being four years old, and only the happy things. You're four years old again, and you're happy." Because when he first started to take them back to childhood, I was nervous for them... some people don't have childhoods they need to return to.

Don't you wish that every child could just be four years old with only happy things to remember?

What's your outlining style?

Since I didn't have the most current copy of The Goddess of Vengeance Work Pink Galoshes on my computer this past week to work on, I've been focused on outlining. I'm using a combination method, outlining a few chapters ahead, but still letting things develop. So far, I like this method a lot, as someone who tends to write by the seat of her pants rather than according to a strict timeline -- it's good to know what comes next, even though I don't feel the urge to know the exact events of chapter eighteen yet.

My outline is flippin' long, though. Right now I think every page of my outline is about 10-15 pages of fiction; my outline is more of a synopsis (and a detailed synopsis, at that; not the kind of thing any agent would want to wade through!).

I've read and been intrigued by several different outlining styles, like the snowflake method and  chapter outlines or chapter summaries. For right now, though, what I'm doing seems to be working for me, even though this long outline is less efficient than some other methods (I've even found myself starting to outline Bodie's Men, when flashes of inspiration come to me, which I think is going be my 2010 NaNo project).  We'll see what outlining method I settle into when I've written ten novels - part of being a writer is experimentation, in my book. :p

The one thing I'm sold on? Outlining somehow, anyhow. I'm so much faster writing now, but I'm also enjoying my writing time more.  It's harder for me to get road blocked when I know what happens next and how my character is getting to that next pivotal scene!

Do you "pre-write", assembling your outline before you touch fingers to keyboard, make it up as you go along, or outline-as-you-go like me? If you do outline, what's your preferred method, or are you still deciding?