A Note:

6/2/13

I once told myself: IF I am accepted into grad school, this blog would no longer be updated. As it turns out, in April, I received news of my acceptance for the Fall 2013 semester, where I will attain a Master's degree of Science in Nutrition.

Running a blog, as many of you may already know, is a demanding side job once the excitement wears off. And once I fell out of the blogging community's loop (have you SEEN how many blogs there are now? Wow!), it was like the kiss of death. Despite my best efforts, I couldn't get into a blogging routine once this happened due to the disconnect I felt from the community.

So I took a break. I struggled with the loss and with missing my blog. And then I realized I didn't have to run Book Faery to still be a book reviewer; I could read my books and post reviews online. I'm still a book review blogger, just not in the traditional sense.

I'll still be online. You can chat with me on Twitter, where I'll be posting links to my reviews and talking books. I'll also be posting links to nutrition articles. And if you'd like to connect with me where I guarantee I will post reviews, just add me as a friend on Goodreads.

So that's all, folks! It's been a fun and amazing journey, and I thank you all for listening to my thoughts about books. I hope we all can keep in touch elsewhere :)

Tori

Friday, July 9, 2010

Where do you stand?

My final was yesterday, and I didn't write the most... eloquent of essays for it.  The identifications--which required me to either describe passages in full detail, or words--were a nightmare also due to my Professor picking the most obscure of quotes.  I think the rest of the class felt the same way, if the the looks of pure panic/whispers of "Oh shit, I don't know any of this!" is anything to go by.  But the past is the past, and I can't really do anything about it.  Luckily, it only counted for 10% of my grade.

Now I'm FREE for the rest of the summer!  And I'm going with a different approach to today's post yes I don't have any book reviews to post, I'm sorry.  If you're a writer, you might find this more interesting.  As for everyone else?  Well, apply this to essays and/or blog posts you may have written, if you've never done any creative writing.


So while I was sitting on the train yesterday, I began to mull over my WIP (you can read more about this on my writing blog).  This novel has been an ongoing process for me, but one aspect has remained constant, and this applies to everything I write: essays, short stories, a quick scene, an ~80k novel... It is also my question for you all today.

Do you ever feel a certain disconnect with your work?

I know, it sounds weird.  How can you feel disconnected from your writing when it's coming straight from your head?  Let me explain.  Usually, books have the ability to absorb the reader into its world.  Usually, said reader will forget everything around them--assuming it's a good story--and one can even imagine themselves as the hero or heroine.  But what about the weaver of such a tale?  Do the writers get absorbed with their work also--don't confuse this with the writing process, I'm referring to when you sit down and read what you've written--or do the story, characters, and overall writing process inevitably interrupt this in some way?

For me, whenever I try to read something I've written, I'm always (even if it's unconsciously) trying to improve the work in some way.  I can temporarily become absorbed as I try to picture the imagery I describe... but for the most part?  I'm conscious of what I write, and that somehow interrupts my reading experience.  Maybe it'll be different if I ever get a book I write in published form.

Is this the same for the rest of you, or is it easy to let go and simply enjoy what you've written?

6 comments:

  1. Congrats on being done for the summer! By the time it's close to the end, everyone just stops caring for the most part. My last class for the summer was last night and I turned in my craptastic paper. Grades are due by Tuesday so I'll know my fate by then hahah!

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  2. Yep. I totally know how you feel. I'm constantly thinking "Is this sentence right? Have I already said this before/too much? What could I do to make it better?"

    I think it's normal, but when I read I turn my mind off, for the most part, and just enjoy the story. I'm pretty sure other writers are the same way. It's too hard to go back and read what you wrote once it's "finished". You'll just want to change it. :)

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  3. Whenever I read my own writing I constantly think, "Oh, there's typo #7292893829282990172537," and "There goes another grammatical error," and it's usually stuff that would be easy to ignore in someone else's work :(

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  4. Thank you! Now I have to sit down and finish the rough draft now that I'm not busy ;) Hey you ended the same day as me! I find out my grade sometime next week too >.<

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    Ugh even when I'm writing, I'll become way too self conscious about sentence structure! I'll write a sentence describing the way something looks, and then a paragraph later, I'll start worrying that another sentence sounds way too much like the one above. It's ridiculous lol.

    I can't turn my mind off. I've tried. I think I'm too much of a perfectionist.

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    I feel you. I feel like if anyone ever wanted to torture information out of me, all they'd have to do is make me edit my own work for the rest of my life... or something.

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  5. If I write something and then go back and read it say, days later, I am extremely critical. I usually end up wanting to erase it all and start over.

    However, there are some things I've written months ago, and when I go back and read them, it's almost I don't even remember writing it. That's not to say I like it though, I rarely like anything I write.

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  6. I do both, but I guess it depends on who is going to see it. If it is a WIP that my writing group is going to critique, believe me I agonize over it. But I do also find that when I'm having the most fun is when the most creative things come to me.

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