September Catch-Up

First of all, a new layout/design! The orgiami animals are from a textile I saw in Ikea that I may still go back for. I can't sew (ah, well, I can, but badly), but...I know people who can, and that's what matters! There were other animals, too, including a bison/buffalo.

So, school has started, and I'm now a second-year Fiction student. I submitted the first part ("chapter" would be an overstatement) of a novel to workshop already (was unlucky enough to be up at bat first), and I was really surprised by the positive response to the weird, magical element in those pages, and questions/suggestions of how I could tease that into the other sections. It was hugely encouraging, and one of the reasons why is because the scenes of strangeness were parts I had written on an inspired whim. The rest of it was more or less forced. So it was interesting to see that people definitely responded more to the part where there was more heart and blood going to it, I guess.

Other school news: Teaching two classes is hard. And that's all I have to say on that, haha.

I'm reading Lisel and Po by Lauren Oliver for fun (and for Figment), and Falling Man by Don DeLillo for class.

But I also have The Night Circus and The Shadow of the Wind on my nightstand. Too many books! I think those are next on my reading list, though...or maybe Divergent, which a friend characterized as "Hunger Games-enjoyment level." Which is huge.

Spring Break Reading

I'm back in NYC for Spring Break! And unfortunately, I missed out on most of the Teen Author Festival because my school chose to push back spring break this year. SUPER.

But all is not lost! For one thing, I visited my sister at Princeton and got a lot of writing done in various libraries. I finally made some progress on a new story I'm working on, which I was inspired to write after reading Versailles by Kathryn Davis earlier this year. It was assigned reading in one of my classes during the week we studied idiosyncratic narrators. The voice of Marie Antoinette was definitely distinctive and a joy to read, but what was really memorable to me was just the language in describing the palace. Really beautiful, like light shot through a glass house - but not without substance. So I wanted to see if I could create that kind of quality with this piece. We'll see!

The second thing is, I'm staying with two friends from college, one of whom is working in publishing. And I raid her bookshelf every time I come here. Like, I literally raid it, and I haul a ton of books back home at the end of the week. This time, I packed light and came with a backpack. So far, I've read:

Mistress of Rome by Kate Quinn. Effing addictive, I stayed up until 3 AM reading it. Told from the points of view of several different characters, it's heavy on dialogue (maybe a little too much so) and keeps the punches coming with the plot.

Abandon by Meg Cabot (April 26, 2011). I won't say too much about it here because I just wrote a review for it, but the teaser reads: She knows what it's like to die. Now Death wants her back. Sounds morbid? Well, according to the back, it's the myth of Persephone, darkly reimagined. So of course I had to read it. Dark retelling? Check. Greek mythology inspiration? Check.

Falling Under by Gwen Hayes. I just started reading this tonight, and so far, I'm captivated by the narrator's voice (so much is already revealed about her, and I'm on, like...page 7). Not to mention the spectacle of a burning man falling through the sky and crash landing in her yard.

Also, on Saturday I went to Ayza, this chocolate and wine bar near K-town (and got a free glass of sangria for liking their Facebook page!) - SO DELICIOUS. If it hadn't been so dark, I would've taken better pictures of the appetizers. We had: angry chicken lollipops, white truffle pizza, roasted French brie crouton, prosiutto di parma (with figs!) tartine, and twenty-layer crème brûlée cake. I'm going to go again before I leave.