reading is awesome – Lena Corazon

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Celebrating Valentine’s Day with ALL The Books

Original image courtesy of varbenov / kozzi.com

“A reader lives a thousand lives before he dies. The man who never reads lives only one.” — George R. R. Martin

“A book is proof that humans are capable of working magic.” — Carl Sagan

“Books are the mirrors of the soul.” — Virginia Woolf

Since Valentine’s Day is all about love, I thought that this would be the perfect time to declare my lifelong passion and commitment to the best partner a girl could ever have: books.

As I like to say, lovers come and go, but books are forever. If I tried, I could probably measure my life in books, for they are at the center of my earliest memories. They’ve built up my soul like so many Tetris blocks, bits and pieces shaping my imagination and my heart. Their lives and the worlds continue to swirl about in my head–echoes of story and tale that comfort, heal, and teach, even as they entertain.

So this Valentine’s Day, I will be curling up with a bottle of wine and one of the dozens of books that have been clamoring for my attention. There will be classical music, and my favorite fuzzy blanket. If I am lucky, my cat may even show up and keep me company–the best sort of solo date night, in my opinion.

To celebrate this lifelong love affair, I’m sharing a handful of books that I fell in love with during my last book binge, when I managed to plow through eight books in seven days. I was full beyond belief by the end of it, but ohhhhh, it was a delicious feast while it lasted.

Here are my early favorites of 2013:

THE RUTH VALLEY MISSING by Amber Medina West
[Amazon | Goodreads]
Genre: Mystery
Synopsis:
Jameson Quinn trades in the crime, pollution, and drama of the big city for the quiet serenity of Ruth Valley. When a young man goes missing, Jameson starts to suspect that something sinister may be happening beneath the small town’s veneer of perfection.
Why It’s Awesome:
SO many reasons. Jameson is a wonderful protagonist, and someone I pretty much want to be BFFs with. She’s snarky, spunky, and intelligent, with the courage to go digging after the town’s secrets even when it becomes clear that doing so could come at the cost of her personal safety. And let’s not forget the fantastically snappy dialogue, or the well-paced plot, or the setting itself — Ruth Valley really is the perfect tiny town, but Amber West does a fantastic job in highlighting the ways that small communities can seem creepy.

With 33 five star reviews on Amazon, I am clearly not the only one who fell in love with this book. So go out and get it! You won’t be disappointed.

THE OUROBOROS CYCLE, BOOK ONE by G.D. Falksen
[Amazon]
Genre: Horror/Fantasy
Synopsis:
Babette Varanus is the scion of a wealthy 19th century French family, but she has little in common with her peers. After her grandfather’s enemies turn her world upside down, she finds herself pursuing a path that leads into the unknown, complete with vampires, mysteries, and all sors of dark secrets.
Why It’s Awesome:
In many ways, the tone of the novel reminds me of old 19th century horror novels in the vein of Bram Stoker’s DRACULA, while still managing to be original. This is an amazingly creative twist on the vampire/werewolf genre, and one that features a truly badass protagonist. Babette Varanus is not only resilient and resourceful, but the sort of woman who learns how to create her own future. As a side-note, I highly recommend checking out G.D. Falksen’s accompanying Pinterest board for this book. It is gorgeous, sumptuous, and absolutely magical.

ONLY HUMAN by Chris Reher
[Amazon | Goodreads]
Genre: Science Fiction
Synopsis:
Captain Nova Whiteside is promoted to elite Vanguard status in the Commonwealth army, and paired with Major Tychon, her straight-laced Delphian commanding officer. The two are forced to grapple with their differences when a crazed, power-hungry rebel leader gets his hands on a weapon that could destroy the universe.
Why It’s Awesome:
I love sci-fi, but I don’t tend to read a lot of it. ONLY HUMAN was a wonderful surprise. Not only did Chris Reher deliver a great adventure with a deeply satisfying romance subplot, but she also gives us a great example of world-building done right. Every character feels three-dimensional and real, and the array of alien cultures and planets are vivid and lifelike. There is plenty of action, adventure, and romance to be had here.

RUN ROSIE RUN by C.C. MacKenzie
[Amazon | Goodreads]
Genre: Contemporary Romance
Synopsis:
Rosie Gordon has everything she wants in life, but she can’t rid herself of the lifelong crush she’s had on her best friend’s brother, Alexander Ludlow. But when unrequited love turns into something more, will it be too much for her to handle?
Why It’s Awesome:
Okay, first up is a confession: I’ve read everything that C.C. MacKenzie has written. I know, I know, I say that like it’s a bad thing, but it really isn’t, because she is my new go-to author for steamy romance. What I love about her work is that she is brilliant when it comes to zeroing in on the transition between lust and love. It’s that moment of capitulation, when her hero and heroine finally decide to give in to their feelings and one another, that she does so well, and this book is no exception.

RUN ROSIE RUN can be read on its own, but it is Book 3 in the Ludlow Hall series. Book 1, RECKLESS NIGHTS IN ROME, is free on Amazon. Pick up a copy. You can thank me later.

ACROSS A MOONLIT SEA by Marsha Canham
[Amazon | Goodreads]
Genre: Historical Romance
Synopsis:
Simon Dante, an aristocrat and infamous privateer who is one of Queen Elizabeth’s most successful “sea haws,” meets his match in the beautiful but fierce Isabeau Spence, who serves on her father’s merchant ship. As sexual tension boils over between them, they find themselves caught up in the threat of war between England and Spain.
Why It’s Awesome:
I actually don’t know where to start, because this book blew me away. Marsha Canham’s use of historical detail is nothing short of amazing, the romance and tension between Simon Dante and Beau Spence is delicious, and her writing is exquisite. The book is an exercise in “show vs. tell”; her descriptions are vivid and, simply put, gorgeous. For example:

Their leader, the fifth Marquis of Moncada, was a rotund strut of a man with a face like a boil of dough stretched too thin over spidery red veins. He had small, dark eyes set so close together, they seemed to touch at the bridge, and he had made a feeble attempt to hide a weak chin under an abram beard trimmed to a perfect point.

Ack! I love it!

If you like action, adventure, and a good bodice-ripping historical romance, give it a read. And, y’know, the Kindle version is currently free on Amazon, so grab it while you can.

Have you read anything lately that’s made your list of new favorites? Share them in the comments!

ROW80: Are We Ready for Some Beyonce?! Er, Football?

February 2, 2013 / Lena Corazon / 9 Comments

Gotta love “Hey Arnold” in Niners’ colors. (Photo Credit: Lena Corazon)

Happy Superbowl Sunday, ROW80 friends! I’ve gotta say, it’s a very, very good time to be a San Franciscan. I feel like practically everyone has been decked out in 49ers gear for the last couple of weeks, and the anticipation for today’s big game has increased to epic proportions. Even my favorite tea shop has gotten into the spirit!

To be honest, I’m more excited for the halftime show than anything else (a Destiny’s Child reunion?!?! I have been waiting AGES for this), but I’ll be spending the day with my besties at San Francisco’s first-ever gay bar in the Castro, which is sure to be an absolute blast.

With that, here’s my check-in for the week:

DAY JOB:
The dissertation has taken most of my energy this week, with lots of time spent reading the two books I mentioned in my last check-in, trying to learn a whole new subfield (sociology of religion and organizational culture), and getting started at archives #3 and #4 (the Sisters of Notre Dame de Namur and the Daughters of Charity). Needless to say, my head feels full to bursting, but I’m making progress, and that’s what counts. For next week:

Finish Ann Butler’s Across God’s Frontiers.
Read and take notes on 10 journal articles; continue to figure out which concepts are applicable to the dissertation.
Type up handwritten notes; figure out best way to annotate and code data.

WRITING:
Nothing to see here. Move along.

SOCIAL MEDIA:
Erm, not much to see here, either. I played on Facebook and Twitter and G+ a little, but that doesn’t precisely fulfill any of my goals. So… yeah. Gotta do better next week.

SELF-CARE:
Okay, I skipped last week’s check-in because I ended up giving myself a few self-care days, which basically involved devouring 7 novels in 7 days. Yeah, it was amazing, and at some point I will write about the effects of my reading binge/review the highlights of said binge. Seriously, though, it was probably the best thing I’ve done for myself in a while.

So that’s it for me this week! Short and sweet for once. 😛 For those of you who are watching ~~the Beyonce concert~~ the big game, enjoy! And for those of you who aren’t, have a lovely rest of the weekend, and a great start to the week! Don’t forget to check on the rest of our ROWing folk here.

ROW80: When One Email Equals Success

January 13, 2013 / Lena Corazon / 13 Comments

I need a little bit of this in my life.

My morning began with a freakout.

Well, no, that’s not entirely true. My morning actually began with a wonderfully incandescent moment where I turned on the radio and heard the sweet, gentle sounds of of Ralph Vaughn Williams’ exquisite “Serenade to Strings.” It was when the piece was finished that I found myself falling into panic mode.

The problem: I’ve spent the last three weeks telling myself to email my dissertation advisor to tell her all the things I’ve learned in the course of my research over the last three months. The longer I wait, the more panicked I get. But every time I sit down to write the darn email, I freeze up. Why? Because everything I write sounds less than perfect.

It’s the curse of the overachiever, this need to be hyper-critical and always in control. Judging from the comments on my last couple of posts, many of you can relate. It’s perhaps the ultimate irony that all of our attempts to be perfect leave us frustrated and dissatisfied, ready to throw in the towel and just be done with life.

Little by little, moment by moment, I am trying to undo these nasty habits.

What would happen if I trusted in my talents and abilities? If I was confident that my advisor won’t judge me if I send along a few underdeveloped ideas? If I trusted that brainstorming + a little work will yield the theoretical framework that my project currently lacks?

I’d work faster, I’d be more creative, and I’d be so. much. happier.

My friend Chad Carver may have said it best in his latest blog post:

In fact, our imperfect humanness is what makes us great artists because the interesting people are those whose character are coloured with most, or all, of the hues of the human condition. They are, as a result of their layers of virtue and vice, capable of wide thinking, and profound creativity. So, embrace your imperfection.

“Embrace your imperfection.” That’s an awesome sort of battle cry, isn’t it?

-oOo-

Here’s what I’ve accomplished in this first week Round 1:

DAY JOB:
I finished preliminary research at 2 out of 6 sites, continued to work through my notes, finally emailed my committee, and read 80 pages of Coburn & Smith’s Spirited Lives: How Nuns Shaped Catholic Culture and American Life, 1836-1920, which looks to be really useful for my work. For next week:

Type up notes from my last round of data collection.
Schedule meetings at 2 more convent archives.
Finish Spirited Lives and start Across God’s Frontiers: Catholic Sisters in the American West, 1850-1920.

WRITING:
I sort of ditched last week’s plan and revisited my August CampNaNoWriMo novel, STRANGE BEDFELLOWS. It is in surprisingly good shape, possibly because it has more of a plot than any of my other WIPs (plots are useful things, did you all know that?), but I don’t necessarily know that I want to make that my major project for the year. However, I did write a couple of poems: “muse” and “drought“. For next week:

More poetry.
Reread TELL ME NO LIES (for real this time) and make the Ultimate Editing Battle Plan.

SOCIAL MEDIA:
I made my rounds to the allotted number of blogs this past week, answered all my comments, and spent a little time on Twitter. I didn’t write my 2 non-ROW80 posts, which tells me that I really need to write them over the weekend. For next week:

2 non-ROW80 posts
Continue visiting blogs/leaving comments/responding to comments

SELF-CARE:
Confession time: I have been avoiding books for the last few weeks because I know without a doubt that once I start, I will never be able to stop reading. I will become a tired, haggard, zombie-like shell of a person because I will stay up all night devouring books, and I won’t get anything else done.

But! I marshaled a little self-control and took the plunge into the world of books. I read THE RUTH VALLEY MISSING by the wonderful Amber West (seriously amazing book; review forthcoming), along with the latest novella in Lindsay Buroker’s EMPEROR’S EDGE series, BENEATH THE SURFACE (also fantastic). For next week:

More reading.
More journaling.

How has the first week of Round 1 treated everyone else? Have you hit the ground running, or are you slowly building up momentum?

Be sure to swing by and visit this week’s ROWers to offer them lots of encouragement and word love!

ROW80: Respite, Interrupted

September 16, 2012 / Lena Corazon / 20 Comments

In my last update I celebrated the vanquishing of my to-do list, and declared my plan to be completely sloth-like and lazy for the rest of September. That goal was thrown off by paper edits, unexpected social time, and a few emotional twists and turns (nothing terrible, just draining), but I did get a chance to just unwind Friday night and all day Saturday. I snagged a copy of season 1 of CSI from Target for ten bucks, and have been happily binging on all my favorite episodes, not to mention reliving my old high school fantasies of becoming a forensic profiler. 😛

Better yet, I finished season 3 of Supernatural, read CC MacKenzie’s steamy and delicious RECKLESS NIGHTS IN ROME, finished Lindsay Buroker’s latest novel in the Emperor’s Edge Universe, BLOOD AND BETRAYAL, and am half-way through Lois McMaster Bujold‘s THE HALLOWED HUNT, the third book in her Chalion series. There is nothing like reading and devouring fun television shows to restore my peace of mind.

Here’s how the rest of the week has gone:

Day Job: Edits to my papers have been completed, the mini-proposal for my “little conversation” has been sent off to my committee, and I have all of my paperwork in order (I hope). Once Monday’s meeting is through, I have a list of books I’d like to read for research purposes, but I plan on waiting until I’ve put a decent dent in my Kindle TBR list.

Writing: Managed about 3k or so in the last few days, but nothing approaching Fast Draft status. Little bitty ideas for edits to my CampNaNo novel have been swirling around as well, though I haven’t really had a chance to do much about them. I’m postponing most writing-related things to next week, or maybe the week after, as I have house guests slated to arrive next weekend.

Exercise: Mom and I walked 4 days this week, for a total of 19 miles. I think this is the first time I’ve managed to make my exercise goal since this round started, so whoo!

Social Media: The latter half of the week has been pretty quiet in terms of Facebook and Twitter, though I have been trying to visit 2 or 3 blogs each day.

Even though I’ve only had a couple of days to relax, I feel vastly improved. Sunday and Monday are going to be somewhat taxing, between the drive down to Santa Barbara and my “little conversation,” but all of these things are pretty minor compared to the last couple of months worth of work (and stress, and anxiety, and all those other yucky things).

How’s the end of the round treating everyone else? Have you managed to accomplish all of your goals, or will you be deferring a few to the next round? Don’t forget to pop by and catch up with everyone else.

ROW80: Sunny Days Are Here!

April 29, 2012 / Lena Corazon / 10 Comments

Happy Sunday, folks! The sun is shining in my part of California, and that always leaves me feeling upbeat and excited. I feel like I’ve got a lot to look forward to. My parents will be in town for a couple of nights at the end of the week, as they’ll be moving my sister out of her apartment in LA for the summer. And I’m getting my 1st tattoo on Friday! I’m filled with all sorts of nervous anticipation (mostly about the pain, ugh), but I really can’t wait.

Before I get to my goals, I want to take a minute to hand out the fantabulous Sunshine award. I posted my response to the requisite 10 questions on Friday (you can find them here). I’m passing it on to the following bloggers:

Now, onto the check-in!

Day Job: The dissertation reading continues. Some days, the reading is hampered by anxiety: I am all too aware that my time in Santa Barbara, and therefore the time I have to figure out my research topic, is rapidly dwindling. I’ll hopefully be meeting with my committee members in the week to come. Their insights and suggestions are always valuable, and hopefully they’ll give me some ideas for wrangling my many ideas into something that makes sense.

Writing: Another slow week with writing. Most of the brainstorming I’ve been doing has taken place during undergrad lectures — lots of scrawled scribbles in the margins of my notebook. I really wanted to treat the first few weeks of this round like my own personal NaNoWriMo, and boy, am I failing miserably. I suppose the goal for the coming week will be the same as last week: to figure out exactly what I am capable of achieving in terms of fiction.

Slightly off-topic, I shared 7 random facts about my writing on Friday. For those of you who expressed an interest in Pierce, I will have you know that it has gone completely to his head, and he is almost too smug to bear at the moment. He would like me to thank you all, as he thinks that maybe now he’ll get bumped up in the in-progress queue (and he is quite compelling, so perhaps he will succeed in convincing me). And, yes, I realize how completely crazy this makes me sound, which is why I’m glad that I am not the only writer who admits to having conversations with make-believe characters.

Exercise: I’m still holding strong here, with 4 workout days this week. I wake up each morning looking forward to my walk, though I think my enthusiasm has been improved by the sunny weather and the fact that my clothes are fitting better. 😀

Social Media: I was only able to write 1 blog post last week, but I have 2 scheduled for the week to come. I’m getting back into the groove to blog reading, which has been so much fun. I think I made it to 12 ROWers last Sunday, and another 8 or 9 blogs during the week.

Finally, for fun, I thought I’d include a bit about what I’m watching and reading this week:

Films: I saw The Five-Year Engagement on Friday, starring Emily Blunt and Jason Segal on Friday, and it was absolutely brilliant… if you ignore the fact that it basically sums up my biggest fears about my professional life in academia: having to relocate somewhere very cold, dealing with “trailing spouse” syndrome, etc.

Outside of all that, I totally recommend the movie. There are lots of awesome shots of San Francisco (enough to make me crazy homesick, and very happy that I’m moving back in 2 months), many moments of hilarity, and a great ending.

Fiction: I finished His Good Opinion, Nancy Kelley’s lovely retelling of Pride and Prejudice from Mr. Darcy’s perspective. For those of you who ever wondered why Darcy falls for Elizabeth, and what’s going on in his head that leads him to make such a lovely transformation by the end of the novel, you should definitely check it out.

Non-Fiction: I’m working my way through Beyond Slavery: Overcoming Its Religious and Sexual Legacies for the course I’m taking on gender and religion. The book is a collection of wide-ranging essays that

examine why Roman Catholicism and other branches of Christianity, Judaism, and Islam accepted slavery for so many centuries, and they consider how slavery shaped gender and sexual ethics in these three religious traditions. They also consider how Jews, Christians, and Muslims can draw upon the compassionate values of their traditions to overcome the lingering effects of slavery.

The essays are incredibly thought-provoking and fascinating, and raise lots of important implications for modern-day issues like marriage, employment and labor, the criminal justice system, welfare, and many other social institutions.

So that’s my life at the moment! Be sure to swing by and cheer on the other ROWers this week.

How are things going for the rest of you? Anything fun to look forward to in the weeks to come?

ROW80: Down the Rabbit Hole of Academe

April 22, 2012 / Lena Corazon / 17 Comments

As the title of this ROW80 check-in attests, this last week has been all about the day job and not much else. I spent my weekend doing lots of reading, lots of thinking, lots of note-taking, and in my downtime, lots of videogaming (I am simultaneously replaying Mass Effect 2 and Mass Effect 3, which really deserves a blog post all its own). Here’s how things played out:

Day Job: I’m all caught up with the work that piled up while I was sick, which is great. Better yet, I’ve embarked on all of the reading and thinking work associated with the dissertation. There’s now a lot of information in my head; I’ve spent the weekend reading a ridiculous array of books and articles. I can now tell you about the early modern period and the construction of the English “Christian gentleman,” the ways in which modern-day upper class white men in France and the United States conceptualize social status and morality, and the importance of French phenomenology in current feminist thought.

I am not only shocked that my brain hasn’t yet exploded, but that it seems to be hungry for more. We’ll see how long this productive mood lasts, but cross your fingers that it continues indefinitely, because I have so friggin’ much to do in the next 6 weeks. In the meantime, there will be lots of tea-drinking (as tea is essential for the production of scholarly knowledge, lol) and lots of thinking.

Writing: I wrote roughly 800 words this week, not nearly what I wanted to get done. My class schedule this quarter conflicts with the #ROW80 writing sprints 3 out of 5 days in the week, which means I am going to have to figure out where I can fit writing into my (semi-) daily routine. I am coming to the conclusion, however, that the day job is going to have to be my priority during this round. Not sure how/if that translates into changing my writing goals, but we’ll see.

Exercise: I worked out 5 days in the past week, which is absolutely fantastic. The daily walk/at-home Pilates session is starting to become a habit that I look forward to. My clothes are fitting slightly better, which is also a good thing.

Social Media: This is another fail, along with the writing this week. This is actually my first time touching my laptop in 3 or 4 days, which is crazy for me. So, yet again, I’ve got something to work on in the week to come.

-oOo-

So that’s my life right now: lots of books, and lots of unwinding through escapist fantasy of Mass Effect-land. Hopefully there will be more writing in the week to come, but in the meantime, I am retreating back into my wee rabbit hole. 😛

How’s everyone else doing?

ROW80: It’s Business Time

January 15, 2012 / Lena Corazon / 43 Comments

It’s my 3rd check-in for ROW80, and I seem to be making some progress with my goals! I’m still not completing everything that I’ve pledged to do, but this week was another strange, rather jumbled one. I spent all of Tuesday traveling (that 5.5 hour drive is no joke), Wednesday unpacking and prepping for class, and Thursday and Friday recovering.

One surprise that happened is that I had to drop the one class I was going to take, as it overlapped my TA-ship by 50 minutes and I wasn’t able to get permission to leave early. That means that I will now only be going to campus Wednesday nights for class, and 2 hours Tuesday mornings for office hours. I now have a lot of free time on my hands, and that makes buckling down to a regular routine all the more imperative. Starting this week, it will be Serious Business Time, and I will hold myself to my goals.

Here’s my week in review:

Writing: I’ve decided that for this round, I want to accomplish 2 things with writing: (1) finish a rough draft of TELL ME NO LIES and (2) figure out how PATH TO THE PEACOCK THRONE ends (I want to be able to finish my draft of PPT during Round 2). My goal is to rewrite and edit the first 4 scenes of TMNL, and I got started with that through the ROW80 wordsprints on Thursday and Friday. I wrote 1486 words on Thursday and 1631 words on Friday, which isn’t too shabby at all. I also spent a couple of hours brainstorming and reading more of THE BARBARY COAST for research purposes.

Day Job: I finished the first draft of my thesis last Sunday, and gave my advisor a hard copy on Wednesday, despite technology’s attempts to thwart my efforts (I had to deal with not one, but two, on-campus printers running out of paper, along with a paper jam and other ridiculousness). She’s promised to have it back to me ASAP, so I have more editing in my future (although she tells me that she thinks the changes will most likely be minimal).

I actually have a full plate when it comes to school, including brainstorming dissertation topics, working on a conference paper proposal, and preparing a grant proposal. I’m also a research assistant for my advisor, and so I need to set aside time to do some work for her. Not taking classes is actually a blessing in disguise, provided I can buckle down and get things done. In the week to come, my focus will be on my research assistantship and dissertation brainstorming.

Social Time: I’ve been really good at this! Monday I had a ‘farewell dinner’ of sorts with one of my high school besties, Tuesday I went to a ‘welcome back to town’ late-night happy hour with a couple of grad school friends, and this morning I had a brunch/work/shopping outing. I’m really proud of myself, though, because I invited a few friends out for drinks at my favorite bar tonight. Given that I rarely initiate things (I have been burned in the past by people who say they will come out and instead flake), this is progress.

Exercise: There’s been incremental improvement here. I went for a 2.5 mile walk on Wednesday, and a 4 mile walk on Thursday. I had wanted to throw in a couple of days of at-home Pilates, but going to bed late and not getting enough sleep meant that when I woke up Friday and Saturday, I was less than inclined to work out. The goals for next week: go to bed by midnight, wake up by 7:30, do some form of physical activity at 8 am.

50/50 Challenge: I finished three absolutely wonderful books: HER OWN DEVICES by Shelly Adina, STEAM & SORCERY by Cindy Spencer Pape, and HER DARK BARON by fellow ROWer, Nadja Notariani.

I also got started with a little movie-watching: The Peacemaker starring George Clooney and Nicole Kidman (meh), Peter Pan starring Jason Isaacs and Jeremy Sumpter (cutesy, a little cheesy, but Jason Isaacs is really hot), and The Warrior’s Way, which is this absolutely amazing collision of ‘East-meets-West’ — it’s about a disgraced Asian assassin who flees to a tumble-down Wild West town to escape his vengeful clan, and ends up learning about love and life and things beyond murdering people. It’s bloody and gore-filled in a sort of comic book way, but I loved it. Geoffrey Rush has a small role as a drunken former outlaw.

-oOo-

Is everyone else getting down to business time, or are you flailing about like me? To encourage everyone pursuing Serious Business, I leave you with the New Zealand duo, Flight of the Conchords. Their song, “Business Time,” might be one of my favorites. 😀

*insert requisite ‘put-down-beverages’ warning*

ROW80: A Much-Needed Pause

October 16, 2011 / Lena Corazon / 22 Comments

It’s been a bit of a rocky week, with vestiges of that yucky migraine lingering until Thursday night and lots of work to get out of the way. However, I think I’ve cleared a major hurdle (for the moment), so I’ve been celebrating with a bit of downtime.

The Successes:

I read books 3, 4, and 5 of Karen Marie Moning’s FEVER series between Thursday and Friday night, which is probably a record reading binge for me. A huge thank you to everyone who recommended the series, because wow. It is epic and wonderful and amazing, and I am so glad I read it. Now I am going to sit on pins and needles like the rest of Moning’s fans to see what the upcoming films are going to look like. If they mess up Barrons, I am going to pitch a major fit.

I had a movie marathon last night. I was planning on doing some writing and stuff, but instead I curled up on the couch and watched a couple of old favorites. I started with The Inheritance, a made-for-TV movie based on an early Louisa May Alcott novel, followed it up with The Princess Bride (so. darn. awesome), and then finished with Love’s Kitchen, which I hadn’t heard of until Netflix pushed it on my radar. It has a shockingly low rating on imdb, but I really, really loved it. The film involves food and cooking and people falling in love (three of my favorite things), and stars real-life married couple Dougray Scott (who I have had a huge crush on since he did Ever After) and Claire Forlani. It was definitely the feel-good movie that I needed.

Outlining my NaNo project is coming along. I’ve started using the corkboard function in Scrivener, where I can lay out 3×5 cards to organize my ideas. I’m not exactly working in a linear fashion, so I have Act 2 laid out, with short summaries for each scene, but little else decided beyond that. Over the next two weeks I’ll be brainstorming so that I can hopefully be ready to roll by November 1st.

I finally finished the draft of the latest chapter of my MA thesis. It’s rough, and there are holes in it that will need to be filled in, but the hardest work (I think) has been done. I didn’t realize until I emailed it to my advisor exactly how stressed out finishing this chapter has made me feel, but I do feel like I have had a huge weight lifted from my shoulders. I can’t slack off too badly — I have lots more edits to tackle, along with a couple shorter sections to write — but I am going to step away from the project for the next few days and catch up on my writing.

Places to Pick Up the Slack:

I only worked out 3 days this past week, instead of 4 like I had hoped, so I’ll need to make up for it in the days to come.

Fun Stuff to Check Out:

As I’ve mentioned before, Em and I both decided to tackle NaNoWriMo this year. For an extra bit of fun, and because there seem to be quite a few first time WriMos out there, we decided to create a support blog of sorts, where everyone can pop in once a week and share the challenges and successes that they’re facing during November. We should be launching sometime this week, so keep your eyes peeled!

The photo contest finalists from our ROW80 twitter party have been posted over at Jenny Hansen’s blog. Swing by and cast your vote — there are some awesome shots.

All in all, it’s been a pretty good week. How’s everyone else doing, mid-way through October? Don’t forget to visit the other ROWers checking in today!

ROW80: The First Week

October 8, 2011 / Lena Corazon / 56 Comments

Week 1 of ROW80, and the second full week of my fall quarter, is complete! For me, the past seven days has been a crash course in organization, scheduling, and trying my darndest to work at my various projects and responsibilities consistently. Reviewing everything that I managed to do (and those few things that fell by the wayside), I’d say that I’ve done mostly well in reaching my goals.

Writing. I pledged to spend 8-10 hours on WIP-related tasks, and judging from my count, I managed to reach 8 hours. A couple of those were spent struggling through an idea I had for a novella, and the rest with brainstorming and plotting for NaNoWriMo. I also had a chance to write a short flash fiction piece for the “Ghouls Galore” writing challenge I’ve decided to tackle for October. It’s a fun challenge — 4 creepy ghouls over 4 weeks. My first piece is “The Fourth Floor,” about a haunted mansion, one very angry poltergeist, and two high school students who are in way over their heads.

Thesis: I had a really hard time digging into the thesis this week. I originally projected that I would work on it for about 8 hours, and I think I managed to squeeze in maybe 5 or 6. My attention span has been virtually non-existent, though, and I can’t really handle more than 1 hour of work at a time. However, I think I should have the draft of this chapter finished by Sunday night. It’s far from perfect, but I really need to have feedback on it before I go any further. Cross your fingers that I can score a meeting with my advisor in the next week or so!

Exercise: I had hoped to work out 4 or 5 days this week, and I successfully got on my glider 4 times. My clothes are starting to fit better, and I’ve been able to liberate a few items out of my “too small to fit right now” pile, so this is a plus. Now I just have to maintain my momentum, and not fall by the wayside like I always seem to do.

Random things that I’ve learned:

Reading dense theory takes a sickening amount of time, especially when I’m trying to absorb material and take notes. I can speed-read an academic chapter (roughly 45-50 pages long) in two hours; I need over three hours if I want to do a good job of understanding things.
On the other hand, reading fun novels takes no time at all! In two days I have read the first two novels in Karen Marie Moning’s Fever series, and I am holding myself back from devouring the last three. I made a major library run the other day, and have Cherie Priest’s Boneshaker in queue, as well as Deborah Harkness’s A Discovery of Witches.
I seem to be evolving into a disgustingly cheerful morning person — not sure how I have managed this, but I am grateful.

So, yeah, overall I’d say that I’m off to a decent start. I’ll be recalibrating things as I go (for example, do I need to spend 8 hours each week on the thesis, or can I do what I need to do with fewer hours?), but for the moment, I think tackling time targets is working well for me.

As a side note, I just want to add that I’m really grateful that I have friends in town who force me to go out and have a social life. I’ve had my nose to the grindstone for the entire week, trying to juggle everything, and I probably would work straight through the weekend if I didn’t have people forcing me to leave the house. Tonight I was persuaded to go out for dinner, and tomorrow I’ll be back to the weekly ritual of church with one of my friends. Then I will get to spend the afternoon at the movies with another buddy of mine. We are going to see Real Steel, and I will have 2 hours to fangirl squeal over the magnificence that is Hugh Jackman. Granted, I still have a research abstract to write, and thesis edits to do, and roughly 150 pages more theory to read, but I suppose having some relaxation time is important as well. 😀

How’s the first week gone for everyone else? Any need to tweak goals yet, or are things progressing swimmingly for the moment?

ETA: I would totally love to have a ROWbuddy for this round! I have no specific requirements, but it would be grand to have someone about for general encouragement, and maybe to do some writing sprints, especially as NaNoWriMo approaches. I am in the Pacific time zone (U.S. west coast); Twitter and email are my favorite modes of communication.

Things I Love Tuesday: Hot Men of Literature

September 13, 2011 / Lena Corazon / 15 Comments

For this week’s Things I Love Tuesday, I turn my attention to the hotties of the literary world. You see, this is another vice of mine: falling in love with fictional characters. Over the years, I’ve fallen for countless characters, like Atticus Finch from To Kill a Mockingbird, Laurie from Little Women, all of Georgette Heyer’s heroes, Austen’s men… the list goes on and on. However, these lucky guys are the top five who managed to make the cut:

5. Mr. Rochester, from Jane Eyre by Charlotte Bronte

Timothy Dalton and Zelah Clarke from the 1983 production of "Jane Eyre"

In Mills and Boon’s recent survey of the 100 most romantic heroes of all time, Edward Fairfax Rochester topped the list. I must admit, I also love him with a passion. There’s something about a mercurial, sardonic, arrogant guy that never fails to make my pulse beat a bit faster, especially when his vulnerabilities are exposed.

Rochester, however, is a man plagued by demons, many of his own creation. He’s self-destructive, he can be a bit cruel, and while I always feel sorry for all the hardships he endured, I can’t excuse a man who resorts to locking his wife in the attic, regardless of how psychotic she may have been. If it wasn’t for this character flaw, he would rank higher on my list.

Michael Fassbender and Mia Wasikowska in "Jane Eyre," 2011

However, I will grant him many brownie points for the transformation that he undergoes by the end of the novel. He is humbled in body, soul, and mind, and becomes the sort of man who is deserving of someone as strong and staunch in her convictions as Jane. (I am always so impressed that Jane had the mental and moral fortitude to withstand all of Rochester’s advances, despite how much she loved him, but that is a topic for a future post.)

4. Adam Black, The Immortal Highlander by Karen Marie Moning

Cover art for Karen Marie Moning's "The Immortal Highlander"

No list of literary hotties would be complete without an appearance by a Scottish highlander, and my list has two. The first, Adam Black, isn’t a highlander, per se. Rather, he’s one of the immortal Fae who has the misfortune to anger the queen of the Seelie Court. As punishment, he is stripped of his otherworldly powers, sent to the mortal world, and rendered invisible. However, he meets a young lawyer, Gabrielle O’Callaghan, who was born with the gift to see his kind. Together, they work to stop a plot that threatens both Fae and humankind.

Adam Black is the ultimate bad boy: he broods, he smolders, he oozes sensuality. He sports black leather pants like a rock star, is uber-muscled and chiseled, and yet harbors a heart of gold (and feelings!) beneath all of his male bravado.

Finally, I feel that I have a duty to inform you all that Adam Black has his own official twitter account. My mind, it is boggled.

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Lena Corazon

Flights of Fancy