The Wayfaring Wordhack

With all the net probs we've been having, I completely forgot to share this.  Better World Books is running a Thanksgiving promo (10% off a purchase of $40+ and 15% off $75 or more). To get the 10% reduction, you need to type "stuffing" in the coupon field, and for the 15% it is "turkey."  In the mail I received, it said the offer was good this week. I'm hoping it means today, too. I bought 11 yesty, and I got the discount... But tomorrow...probably not going to fly.

They ship* FOR FREE in the States and $3.97/book internationally.

BUY BOOKS! I want the industry thriving for purely selfish reasons. ;)

* I'd like to support bricks-and-mortar stores--and I do for French books--but for English, I have to buy off the net. That being the case, I'd much rather my money goes toward the causes the BWB supports rather than the monster corporations that I won't name here.  Maybe you feel the same.

I've been meaning to post about my current reading , but I've been busy, uh, reading. Still, I will delay no more!

Herein you will find no reviews, just a summary of what I've been up to; I'll leave reviews to the likes of tatterpunk  who can do them justice.

First off, I've been concentrating on nonfiction, researching for The Bitter River. I've only begun to scratch the surface of what I'll need to  write this book.  One aspect of the story deals with ancient Mesopotamia, and amidst the narrative--which takes place in what is modern-day Iraq, set in the early 1800's*--there are letters, diary entries, and sundry other texts from 300ish AD (perhaps earlier) to the mid and late 1700's and the story's present day. Naturally, then, I have to read up on the epistolary form for those time periods so that I can master voices and give versimiltude to the correspondence. Among myriad other subjects, I also have to find maps of the area at different times in history to have the correct place names; I have to find out who controlled what and the political situations at the time(s), not to mention find out what daily life was like.

For the daily life in Mesopotamia, I have three books, the first of which I'm reading now, titled, surprisingly, Everyday Life in Ancient Mesopotamia. It is a collection of articles on subjects such as the origin of the Sumerians; love and sexual mores in ancient Babylon; women's rights (or lack thereof, unless she was in possession of some powerful womanly wiles); how the Assyrians viewed magic and religion; and discussions about three popular myths: the Assyrian flood, the Sumerian tales of Gilgamesh, and the Semitic invention of sin.

I'm three-fourths of the way in, and so far, I find the book interesting in general and maddeningly vague in the specifics I was hoping to discover. This is not a criticism of the book, however, rather an acknowledgement and reinforcement of what I've garnered about certain subjects from Internet sources. It also shows that the field is wide open and I can twist certain legends to my liking. The canon I was hoping to find rooted in Mesopotamian history is actually a Hellenistic invention, so I've either got to abandon that angle, rework it, or pretend that today's historians and Assyriologists are just not in possession of something my characters shall find. This being fiction, I'll likely take option three, but I want to hold off on making a decision because another angle may occur to me. I already have a semi-inkling of what the different angle could be.

Another huge area I have to cover is archaeology in the 1800s. Luckily, at a local library, I found a most interesting and useful book, La Conquête de l'Assyrie, 1840-1860, (The Conquest of Assyria: Excavations in an Antique Land). Nuria checked this book out for me twice last year, but both times I didn't get around to reading it, which is why I never moved it off my "currently reading" list on Goodreads. But it's the reason I got my own library card on Grande Terre. It follows, among others personages, Austen Henry Layard and Paul-Emile Botta in their unearthing of Nineveh and is so interesting and just so right in terms of what I need that I entertained the idea of getting the book for myself in English...until I saw the price on B&N. Ouch.

But all is not nonfiction and research; I'm also reading, Notre-Dame de Paris, by Victor Hugo. I've never picked it up in English, nor did I see the Disney version, only glimpses of certain scenes. I'm only a hundred or so pages in, but the Disney Quasimodo? What a joke compared to the picture Hugo paints of him. I've read a dozen or so books in French of late, but Hugo is another level, and for my French, the going is slow. Maybe once I get past the descriptions of Paris-of-the-Past and return to the characters, things will speed up. Having lived in Paris for several years, though, I find those passages fascinating, and I wish I had brought my street map of the city here to Mayotte, so I could trace what he is talking about and compare it to what still exists. It's interesting to see his view of medieval-to-rennaisance Paris contrasted with the Paris he knew in turn contrasted with the Paris I know.

I'm also reading a friend's ms ::waves at pjthompson ::** and have a short to crit (I received the file with no worries, footlingagain ), so I'm a busy little worm these days. So much better than being in a book drought. And the reading deluge shall continue for I'm soon due to receive jpsorrow 's Throne trilogy and frostokovich 's Shadowbridge duo!

And writing about reading has taken up my morning. Alas, there are chores to do...
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*I'm still waffling about this date; it all depends on how brilliant and advanced (and lucky)  I want my characters to be.

**I'm over the halfway mark, and I've just passed what I read before. I'm finally going to find out what happens! Woot!

I may have been contraried in attaining some of my goals, especially those that pertain to constancy, but I have succeeded in marking one thing off my master to-do list for 2008: read three books in French. I've completed 2.75 3 fiction books and one nonfiction (research for The Bitter River).

The fiction is a series of a fantasy novels, Le Secret de Ji, loaned to me by mana_trini's team leader and consists of four books. There's a follow-up of five novels, Les Enfants de Ji, for me to read after that, as well as a trilogy, La Moïra, from a different author. So no worries about running out of reading material for a few more weeks.

I've already learned a few expressions and the spelling of some words that I was unsure about before, so I guess the reading is paying off like I hoped and is teaching more about my second language.

Now, if only I could cram more Spanish into my brain.

I've not been around much of late and after *ahem* administering cyber knuckles-raps for the same scarcity in others, I thought I would excuse myself before once more making my retreat. I have recently rediscovered the joy of libraries and have checked out five tomes to help me in my research for my current WiP. Unfortunately, they are all in French. If I want to read them before the return date, I've got to get busy. And wouldn't you know, the books that are the most useful are in the reference section. Looks like I'll be spending a few days researching sur place. 

While I still have many kinks to iron out, the story idea is starting to gel, and I'm getting a feel for the world and plot. footlingagainI may take you up on your research offer after I decide on a few major things. Thanks for thinking of me. rabiagaleare you still up to forwarding some books from Amazon? Have you decided on a couple for yourself?

Knock, knock

~Who's there?

The postman with a box of books.  

And that's no joke.  The lovely, altruistic frigg sent me books, books, books! I am indeed the most spoiled of friends.

Dans le village: Busy, busy, busy. We haven’t officially put the house on the market, but we’ve had two real estate agents come to give us estimates, and one agency is bringing potential buyers by this evening. This means that we have Julien has been doing a lot of cleaning. He has also started packing away our winter things to put in storage. I haven’t helped out much in the house, but I have been working on getting the courtyard in order. Last summer we planted a wall garden and the plants are just starting to show their potential. I really hope whoever buys the house will take care of it. All of my irises are in bloom, as well as some other purple flowers that I don’t know the name of. The lilac bush is divinely fragrant and the climbing rose is covered in buds. I just wish some of them were in flower now to add some more charm to the courtyard.

I know it is completely psychological but I’m going to bake some brownies today on my lunch break so that the house smells yummy and inviting. My house is charming except the ground floor, where the dining room and kitchen are. The dining room has brick red tiles, lavender-gray and rose paint and a dark red marble fireplace—-no, *we* are not responsible for that—-and it is a bit somber because the windows and door face east. The kitchen is miniscule.

Thursday, I told the boss that we are moving, and his response? Ca m’arrange pas du tout. Sorry, boss. He acted a bit like I’m betraying him because I’m leaving my part-time, minimum wage job to follow my husband. When I started this job, it was only supposed to be for a duration of 4 months (they asked if we had plans of leaving; since I didn’t have plans that would come into effect in the next four months, I said “no”). I’m now going on my eleventh month and I stuck with them when they were only giving me 14hrs/wk. My job is very cushy, hours and pay notwithstanding (I don’t have to do much; it gives me time to read and write; and it is 3 minutes by foot from my house), so it is not like I mean to complain, but they haven’t exactly done things to gain my undying loyalty. (Frex, last year, before the opening, they asked me to clean the gallery after the workmen left; it was a mess and took me sixteen hours—including working on a public holiday. They didn’t pay me for it. Not a cent. And of the ten paychecks I’ve received only TWO of them have been error free where they didn’t accidentally forget to pay me for a dozen or so hours.) Anyhow, didn’t mean to rant about all that. Just wanted to say how funny I found it that they feel they have the right to be angry with me and treat me like I’m leaving them in the lurch when I have a perfectly legitimate reason for quitting.

Last night I drove down to the river to gather some rocks for my wall garden, and I had the car windows down and the radio on. The air was perfumed with lilacs, wisteria, fruit trees, and all manner of flowers and flowering bushes, not to mention the lovely fragrance of freshly-cut grass. The sun was setting behind Sancerre and the sandy beaches of the Loire and the rocky hillsides of the vineyards were tinted dusky rose. Down by the river, I saw a male pheasant, just strutting through a field, proud as you please. He didn’t fly off so I stopped the car and got out to watch him. Horses in the pasture on the other side of the dirt track whickered and trotted over for a petting session.

I am going to miss this place. I won’t regret leaving; I’m not that kind of person. But I will always have that nostalgic twist of “remember when?”

Dans le pays des mots et des idées: I have not been writing. I don’t even know how long it has been since I last wrote fresh material. I feel disconnected and uninspired and have felt so for a long time. In order to get back into things, I’m rereading. Since I’ve been doing other things on the side, I’m only up to chapter twelve. I’ve found things that I really like, things that I forgot I wrote, things that need work. However, I’m not stopping. I did allow myself to open a doc where I can say “c12 pg3 smooth such and such,” but I’m not editing as I go.

Since this book is my first, I don’t know that I will ever be completely satisfied with it. I’ve learned so much in the course of writing it and realize that there is a lot more to learn that may be impossible to do in this book because of its set tone, structure, etc. Having other ideas and the desire to try something new makes me itch to just put this one aside and get started on something else. I don’t mean short stories. I mean another novel, with novel-sized ideas and themes. Nevertheless, I *need* to have something finished. I need to have that completion. And I’m not *that* far from the end (60-70K isn’t a big deal, right?).

Les livres: I’ve been doing a bit of reading these past two weeks. I’ve read Ann Hood’s Creating Character Emotions, which I most emphatically do NOT recommend. I also read Frey’s How to Write a Damn Good Novel II, and I feel so-so about it. I did find the part about premises to be interesting because it showed me another way to think. I did get to lining out the premise in TTD but only after the fourth draft. I would like to start my next project with the premise first. Fictionwise, I’ve reread all the Chronicles of Narnia (except The Silver Chair, which I read about six weeks ago). I also read McKillip’s In the Forest of Serre (ItFoS). I liked it, but it was an eye-opener to me concerning a rich style. I have (had?) trouble grasping people’s comments before when they said I was giving the reader too many gems, or as raecarson put it in a recent post, writing too frequently at a level ten. After reading ItFoS, I can understand why the reader appreciates direct prose and I would even go as far as to say needs direct prose and images in order to have time to prose and enter into the story. I’m still not decided on whether or not enjoying an intricate, imagery-heavy story is a matter of mood.... I’ve also read Austen’s Pride and Prejudice. I was amazed to note that, especially in the first part, she has almost zero setting. I wonder if I had not read so many other books of this period and seen so many movies, if the lack of detail would have bothered me. As it was, I had enough knowledge to draw my own fairly accurate picture of these places and people in this time period.

I still have seven other Austen books to read, John Gardner’s Grendel, A Handmaiden’s Tale, and on the HTW front, Swain’s Techniques of a Selling Writer. I think I’m finished with HTW books unless someone I trust can recommend a fabulous one that doesn’t rehash what all the others say.

Okay, lunch break time...