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The Anti-Social Typist

~ Opinions and shameless self-promotion from behind the keyboard.

The Anti-Social Typist

Monthly Archives: November 2013

NaNoWriMo 2013 Update…

25 Monday Nov 2013

Posted by Irreverent in Musings and Rants

≈ 2 Comments

Tags

2013 nanowrimo, nano, winner, writing

I WON!!!!!

 

Of course I did.

Before I continue, we shall pause for the requisite eye roll.

Done? Good, me too. Now let’s have an extra one for the WTFery of the Nano graphics this year. Seriously, did you see ’em? It’s a nod to our humble digital beginnings, and a total FAIL. In selecting my lovely blog image, I had to choose between crap, crappy, and sweet Jesus were the graphics people on crack? PacMan 1980 was better than this crap! Pfft, I feel cheated…no slick Nano Winner gloat banner to plaster all over Facebook so my friends get to eye roll right along with us. Continue reading →

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Book Review: Stone Mattress by Margaret Atwood

16 Saturday Nov 2013

Posted by Irreverent in About Writing, Book Reviews

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book review, Margaret Atwood, Stone Mattress

 

Yay! \o/

My faith in the short story genre has been renewed, and not a moment too soon. After reading all the stories in the Best American Short Stories 2012 for a course, I was beginning to think my dismay and cynicism for this genre was becoming pathological.

Not so! This is an absolutely wonderful, and amazing story! A wickedly decadent journey where the reader gets to indulge in the guilty pleasures of watching a cold calculating plot for revenge unfold with clever precision. In creating a main character like Verna, it’s extremely easy to slip into stereotypes, tropes, and eye rolling cliche. However, there isn’t so much as a hint of any literary faux pas, on the contrary, this story shines as an example of how literature can be impressive, brilliant and thoroughly enjoyable. Ms. Atwood does a masterful job of stripping away the feminine mystique and replacing it with compelling complexity. She lets the mask of normality slip bit by bit, slowly hinting at Verna’s broken past, callousness, and questionable moral compass, so that when we get a taste of the depth of narcissicm and sociopathy, it’s a confirmation of a suspicion not a shock that feels jarring or unearned.

Wow, I could go on and on about this one, but I don’t want to write too many spoilers. Trust me, seek this one out. It’s a short story but one that makes me wish it had been a full length novel.

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NaNoWriMo 2013. Yes folks…it’s that time again…

01 Friday Nov 2013

Posted by Irreverent in Musings and Rants

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crazy, insanity, nanowrimo, novel writing month, social networking overload, who cares

Before ya’ll roll your eyes at stumbling on yet another blog mentioning this overhyped annual event, know that The Cheeky One has already done it for you…often.

Now, just so we’re clear, I AM participating again this year under the pen name xastasia (don’t ask, no logic, no point) so please feel free to buddy me if you’re attempting the craziness. However, make no mistake, I think a lot of the hoopla surrounding National Novel Writing Month is ridiculous. No one can escape the cult of Nano…NO ONE! Not even me…believe me, I’ve tried…for years…yes, it’s sad.

However, despite the lovely Nano website banner urging otherwise, I shall resist delusions of grandeur. I am quite happy to acknowledge the world DOES NOT need my novel and nobody will perish sans my Magnum Opus…no matter how good I may think it is.

For the past few weeks, my Facebook and twitter feeds have been plastered with enough November Novel writing insanity to make the Candy Crush developers green with envy. Oh don’t get me wrong, I’m the last person to begrudge anyone finding writing inspiration, and I get a kick out of it every year, but the disproportionate focus on the agony of worry over not making projected word counts versus actually writing…well…it just seems to me that a pretty vocal majority are missing the point. Continue reading →

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Melanie Parkinson

Melanie Parkinson

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