janie_tangerine | back to normal... hopefully? (Reply)

1. So yesterday LJ didn't let me answer to any comment if my answer was longer than five lines in the comment box. *facepalm* Dear LJ, are you letting me catch up at some point? Thanks, me. My icon represents what I'd like to do if I could meet those hackers, though tbh I'm also using it because it's gorgeous.

2. Porn battle started. I've been spending the last three hours writing random ASOIAF fills just to see if I have a handle on the characters. I feel like I'm doing something wrong because they lack rolling heads and utter angst, though a couple I've been eyeing are good for angstfesting. Right now I have a couple for both my main ships, let's see if this evening I like them enough to post them.. ~~also why the heck I'm eyeing Theon/Robb prompts, I DON'T EVEN SHIP THAT~~

3. Let's give that meme a boost.

1. 1984, George Orwell: if you've been around here enough you probably have enough of me ranting about all the reasons why this is my favorite book and will never not be, but here we go. I honestly think it should be obligatory reading in schools, mostly because it gives you the Best Message That Could Ever Give You: use your head or someone else will do it for you and then you'll have cameras inside your house and you won't be able to do anything you want. What I like about it is that it's not total wacky sci-fi - it might have been written in 1949 but if you look at what my PM says and then read that book you get shudders for a while. It starts from common premises - just take a wrong turn and we could totally end up like that. For myself, I know that reading it changed my attitude towards a lot of things. It's also depressing as hell and brings shit to the extreme consequences, but that's the point - if you don't see shit plausibly taken to extreme consequences, you don't get how bad it can possibly get. There's also a reason why I drop it as a birthday gift whenever I can. And maybe if people read it, they'd stop watching Big Brother and make my life a whole damn easier.

2. The Three Musketeers, Alexandre Dumas: or, the other end of the specter. I devoured that thing like a few others. It's totally the right balance of fun and angst, and I kind of love that the writing itself is ironic half of the time - it's just delightful. I love everyone, minor characters included, I love the good guys, I love the bad guys (Richelieu has to be one of the best villains ever - I rarely found a better fictional villain), I love the totally unrealistic romances, I love the swordfights, I love the minor characters and it's such a riot, I adore it. I also love that it's not a -uber serious- thing - (thought in Twenty Years Later it was a lot more obvious). And dammit, I love that it has blocks of four pages of dialogue where people talk about random shit that an editor today would have cut mercilessly. The style is also so delightful I could just bask in it forever, which is why it'd be the book I'd bring on the famous island if I have to choose one - it's not just unrepentant angst. It's fun, dammit. And it's also set in my favorite place in the world, what the hell do you want more. (I also have fond memories of high school times when me and my best friend would rant about d'Artagnan's hometown and how he'd have really made a great sheep-herder, but they're best left alone.)

3. The Grapes of Wrath, John Steinbeck: or, we're back on the angst wagon. Okay, seriously. I'll admit I only searched it out because of The Ghost of Tom Joad of Springsteen fame, but then I realized it was a very smart idea. First: I have a thing for stories where you focus on a few people against the great picture, and it happened that I really like how Steinbeck writes. Add that I have a serious thing for Depression-related anything (movies, books, you pick) and I was sold. It's pretty harsh, but I like that it has its lighter moments as well (even if not so many, in retrospective). I was very fond of the entire Joad family and I also appreciated how among the rest it was also about someone taking conscience of the situation around them (I have a type, apparently). But probably what sealed it is that talk between Tom Joad and his mom at the end that was also quoted in the Springsteen song and that's quoted up there under the header - I cried when I read that bit, I cried at it when I saw the movie, and it's imo one of the best things ever written, period. And if everyone had some Tom Joad in them the world would probably be a better place, I guess. Also I really liked the non-narrative bits in there - there was a chapter about how banks work that imo hasn't aged at all.

4. Different Seasons, Stephen King: or, I thought that saying Dark Tower was cheating because it's seven books and anyway I got into King because of this one, so this one it is. Now, for good or bad, SK is probably my main literary inspiration or something like that, mostly because it's the single author I've read more books from. And while DT has had a more, uhm, direct impact on yours truly, for me Different Season is the best thing he has written, period. I think it's because he's great at novellas (also, the shorter the story is, the higher is the chance that he doesn't fuck up the ending XD) and because he had some seriously amazing character work here, but that's really some of his best work. Shawshank Redemption brought tears to my eyes more than once and is an outstanding piece of writing, Apt Pupil is miles creepier than any not Randall Flagg related supernatural thing he ever came up with (the genius was going with the old Nazi - that's pretty much the most horrific you can be), The Breathing Method was a lovely, lovely short tale. And then there's The Body which will never not be my favorite short story. I read it at fourteen, so I wasn't much older than the protagonists, and it gutted me in the good way like a few other things have. I've rarely read someone getting a twelve-year-old so well, and when I got at the end I had a weep fest because I was having some serious case of empathy with everyone in there (also because I kinda always wanted to be like the protagonist and I wrote random weirdass stories too). Not to mention, straight into the top five best friendship tales ever (also Chris Chambers = role model. Trufax). So I'm just gonna go with Different Seasons, also because it shows you that SK isn't just good at horror shit and he's actually good, but believe me it was hard picking one.

Runner-ups: Chabon's Amazing Adventures of Kavalier & Clay aka Most Gorgeous Prose of the Last Ten Years If Not More, Emily Bronte's Wuthering Heights, obviously the DT, and Atwood's Oryx and Crake. Damn, four aren't enough.

4. I didn't need a reminder of how awesome Misha Collins is, but this is so great that I can't even. That man has no right to be real. Stop ruining men for me, Misha. Except.. no, keep on doing it. I'll get over it and I can bask in your awesomeness.

5. Sometime this week I will upload the Bon Jovi concert pics. And Slash's concert pics (or: at least Janie scored two good ones this month).

6. Sirens ends today. Hear me weeping. Also, I decided I'm watching GoT while at my grandmother's in the second part of the month - I'll be internet-less and bored out of my mind, so at least I'll be entertained.

7. That stated, I'll go ponder on my fills and answering the backload of comments that I had to ignore for the entire week courtesy of Russian hackers. *glares and waves*