The Garret

Packing for BEA (BookExpo America)! Why am I incapable of packing except in the wee hours? Sigh. snowqueenofhoth and mousapelli have talked me out of bringing four pairs of shoes. Mostly.

In what's-Fiona-reading-these-days: The Scorpio Races by Maggie Stiefvater (her werewolves-with-science series wasn't quite my cup of tea, but this is different).

How do I explain my feelings for this book?

You know what moment when you’ve been thinking maybe you’re finally too old for horse stories, and then you find out you’re not?

Oh, my heart.

O neglected Internets, I have acquired permission to attend BEA (BookExpo America)! BRING ON THE FANGIRLS AND THE INFAMOUS KARAOKE. Will I see you there?

...

The other day I was standing at the information desk with my tiniest, most adorable colleague (henceforth known as t.m.a.c.) and this young twentysomething dude was walking past us on his way out.

DUDE: *espies Hunger Games display on infodesk*
DUDE: Oh, the Hunger Games! Oh my god, do you know what they’re doing to them?
FIONA & t.m.a.c.: ...
DUDE: Well, when I first read them, they were, you know, apocalyptic—-really dark, you know?
FIONA & t.m.a.c.: *nod*
DUDE: And now they’re marketing them to tweens! Making them seem all fluffy, when--it’s dark stuff! Really dark!
FIONA & t.m.a.c.: ...
DUDE: Tweens!
DUDE: *leaves in a fit of indignation at this injustice to his beloved, dark books and this deception practiced upon sweet, innocent youth*
FIONA & t.m.a.c.: ...
FIONA & t.m.a.c.: Does he know they’re published by Scholastic?

People are funny.

O poetry month, wherefore art thou so soon ended? Here is my favorite translation of one of my favorite poems by Anna Akhmatova. I suspect it is not the most accurate version--some of the word choices are downright puzzling--but I am particularly fond of the last stanza as rendered by this translator.

A log bridge blackened and twisted.
The burdocks stand as high as a man.
The thick nettle forests sing that
the scythe will not flash through them.
In the evening over the lake a sigh is heard,
rough moss has crawled over the walls.

There I was
twenty-one.
The black, stifling honey
was sweet to the lips.

The twigs tore
my white silk dress,
the nightingale sang unceasingly
on the crooked pine.

At a given call
he came out of hiding,
like a wild wood-spirit,
but more tender than a sister.

Run over the plain,
swim across the river,
then afterwards,
I will not say leave me.

(1917. Tr. Richard McKane. p. 56, Anna Akhmatova: Selected Poems. London: Oxford University Press, 1969. Originally published in Anno Domini.)

I cleaned out my closet today, which led to the cleaning of other parts of my room in a fit of unreasonable productivity. Dust flew! Empty Nutella containers were discovered! Towering stacks of books toppled and were re-built!

Three hours later, it all looks exactly the same as it did before, except that slightly different parts of the floor are now visible. XD

Happy to report romance writers meet'n'greet *hic* complete *hic* success!

Now, *hic* ramen! ♥

I have only one thing to say after two weeks of silence, and that thing is

CODE NAME VERITY.

I haven't cried this much, been this emotionally involved, since Plain Kate.

More later.

Happy Leap Year! *obligatory Pirates of Penzance subject line* I have been tired lately but last night I put ALL THE EGGS in the stir-fry and I woke up this morning feeling super genki.

...

I’ve been reading The Woman in White, inspired by sarahtales’s series of Gothic novel posts, and I have to say it’s pretty hilarious. Being a Gothic novel, there’s a lot about houses and manors. In addition to thinking, with increasing dissatisfaction, about my own apartment (which is not helped by realtors tramping in at every hour, often without warning), I’ve been thinking about The Perilous Gard as a Gothic novel.

TPG is set a bit earlier than many Gothic novels, in Tudor days rather than Victorian, but now it makes a lot of sense to think of it this way, in terms of Good and Bad Houses. Our Heroine is sent away from one cold, unhappy house to another cold, unhappy (though more luxurious) house. She then spends a lot of time underground in a labyrinthine network of caves, and she and Our Hero keep their sanity by talking about their dream house and arguing about renovations. (Shut up, carpentry is adorable in the dark.)

I’m not really sure what this says about TPG but I think it’s interesting. There are quite a lot of Gothic elements actually: the houses, of course; the mysterious master of the manor; the sinister and/or terrified servants; the dead wife; the family secret(s); the mysterious female figure with odd, uncanny powers. Is there more? I don’t actually know all that much about Gothic novels.

The grumpy (or tormented, whatever) love interest and incessant bickering are just icing on the cake, I guess. (I just typed that as “tortmented”. CAKE!)

Actually TPG has another thing in common with The Woman in White, which is the pair of sisters: one is pretty and innocent and stupid, and one is less pretty and quite smart and inclined toward things like logic and sleuthing. Only, as Kate laments in TPG, the wrong one is sent off to a dark and dismal fate… okay, it’s not that dismal, it’s just a big house in the middle of nowhere… really, there is no need to embellish… kindly get a grip!

I suspect Kate and Marian Halcombe would be excellent friends. Hurrah for sensible ladies!

O flist, I turn to you for help and advice!

cadragongirl and I, being friends and roommates, have occasionally been known to sit down and share a meal together. When that meal is a dinner that we have cooked ourselves, on the rare occasion that our schedules match, we like to watch dramas and things as we eat. Now, back in the day when I didn't have crazy hours, we could watch a drama episode. Now-in-the-present, we don't really have time for a full hour-or-45-minute-long episode.

But! we said to each other. Anime episodes are only 22 minutes long! We should watch some more anime!

Then we realized that neither of us knows enough about anime to actually pick a good one. We have watched (and loved):

- Ranma 1/2
- Skip Beat
- Ouran High School Host Club
- Yamato Nadeshiko Shichi Henge/Perfect Girl Evolution/The Wallflower
- Special A

Each of us has individually watched a few more, but those are the ones subjected to communal viewing.

We started and sort of gave up on Fruits Basket, Seirei no Moribito, and Hikaru no Go as not quite fitting both our anime moods at the time. (Yes, we've also seen Avatar. Not just the bee's knees, my friends, but all the joints below the hip belonging to the bee.)

So I turn to you, O flist. What do you recommend?

At the airport on the way to CA! Why is it that I can never actually sit down to write except when at an airport where there’s literally nothing else to do except walk around carrying luggage and eating fried food?

I have, for the first time, been confronted with a backscatter scanner and requested to opt-out. I had heard horror stories, but these two ladies were very courteous and professional. Much appreciated.

Lalalalala. Typetypetype. I mean there’s always people-watching, but I get enough of that already. And I want to save my book for the flight. It’s an ARC of Froi of the Exiles by Melina Marchetta, sequel to Finnikin of the Rock, and I’m enjoying it, but I had to make a paper cover because I was embarrassed to be carrying it around. Seriously, that much soulful guyliner just does not say “street cred”.

…

( A Day in Pompeii )

…

Okay, I’ve finished my yogurt and I’m going to find some more food. Just not the greasy noodles.

Maybe it’s the California-like weather, but these days I feel better. Instead of looking up at the snowless blue sky and cursing it and going to hide like a troll in my cave, I feel good.

This probably has more to do with the fact that we have all survived the holidays and now maybe there will be time to get things done. I’m starting to think about things I put away last fall. Maybe this will be a good year.

I’ve created a dreamwidth account, in case things with LJ get too ridiculous (seriously, why is EVERYBODY trying to make the internet uglier? I never knew how much I loved Verdana until it was gone) and maybe I’ll have the energy to do something with it.

I hope to post more, too, about books and dramas and things I’m thinking.