For years my mother alleged that this did not happen and that I was being fanciful.
(more…)Tag: personal rambling
Review: Carter Beats the Devil
Making an effort to post a review every Friday!
Carter Beats The Devil by Glen David Gold
On a personal note: I received this book from a friend in 2019 who then died suddenly three days later. So a lot rode on this book for me, that I had to enjoy it, or it needed to strike the right chord for me, and part of me considered never reading it at all. In 2020, finding myself with suddenly considerably more free time at home, I made an effort to start going back and rereading all of the books, watching all of the shows that had been recommended to me by Eric that I never got around to. I saved this for last.
The good news is that I adore this book.
It is not only for me a very niche subject which I truly enjoy—I know a lot about stage magicians, shut up—but it’s presented in a very charming, intelligent way where you truly come to care for the characters and feel engaged with them. I like historical fiction, ad a rule, but I often feel very cringe with it—this book escapes that. At no point when mentioning historical figures do I find myself flinching at their presentation, instead there is a casual familiarity that becomes very genuine. I adored this book.
But I clearly also have a bias about this book and it means something different for me than it probably does anyone else, and it’s a kind reminder of Death of the Author having it’s merits—that something once it’s put out into the world truly can take on separate meanings of its own and different significances.
But regardless, I think you would like this book, too.
That casually genuine quality to Gold’s writing is spectacular, like being taken into confidences, and I can’t speak enough to how genuinely likeable the characters are. As you follow their progression through conflicts, there is almost a schizophrenic phenomenon of feeling compelled by the pacing and telling of the story and this nearly tongue-in-cheek quality of floating above it, knowing where it’s going by seeing the references to storytelling of the time. I felt it was very respectful to its influences. I adore it.
Alo!
hello and welcome.
I’ve recently gone through and gutted this blog (which was specific to one writing project I was working on), deleting *hundreds* of posts that were mostly me rambling about long-gone story ideas, uncredited art I had saved for inspiration pictures, and the many posts discussing the amount of tired that I am.
From here out, this blog will be the following:
Occasional free short stories and poems
Updates on the publishing process and projects
Friday book reviews!
***On a quick hiatus 2022 for travel
kloveyoubye!
–dmd
update
(In the outline I only specified for one more chapter …)
(also I don’t actually make outlines, so it just says ‘write scout stuff’)
(like it’s not gonna just be filler or whatever, but I….uh… I don’t know what I’m doing.)
siblings
Mary and I just had a conversation where she asked me how I liked a book, I told her she’d never leant me the book, reminded her that she was actively holding the book while discussing it, and that I live two hours away from her and we are on phones. She proceeded to hysterically wheeze ‘YA KNOW,’ and other Mary idioms before she described not knowing how to sigh without screaming anymore.
I want to bottle her essence and use anxiety as a perfume.
cigarette breaks
So, instead of working like a normal person, I have started taking ‘cigarette breaks’ at work where I write 1,300 word character reflections. Initially these were literally cigarette breaks where characters like Marc, who smokes, would ponder something over a cigarette. Or characters who don’t smoke, like Mikka, would bum a cigarette/make some comment on smoking. This serves:
- my desire to describe bodily functions (har har)
- my mental health maintenance
- my need for structured writing time
Today, however, took a turn. Because instead of writing my cigarette break, I wrote a character death. I had kind of woke up thinking about it and so when a meeting got cancelled, there it was. It was not the cigarette break I had been intending to write…I was gonna write about New Years in Alba….and it’s going to take some revisions, but…yeah.
Normally I save writing character deaths for when I am alone and can throw myself around and figure out blocking. But this one was….kinda sweet? I couldn’t do staging so it had to be hushed, kind of intimate.
…I should probably not get in the habit of seriously writing while at work.
Ro is an icon
She just understand what a scene needs.
Aliactast 
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