May 2011
1 post
Hey friends. I have another humour/writing tumblr you can follow, if you’d like. It’s called #carolineproblems, and it’s all short stories about my life.
Just a heads-up: I’ll be deleting this tumblr later in the week, so now’s your chance to follow me on my new blog. It’s funnayyy, I promise.
January 2011
3 posts
6 tags
Updates
Hi guys! Again, if you haven’t made the switch to my new blog, I urge you to! Do it do it do it do it. Please and thank you.
Also, please check out my most recent Suite101 articles - I’ve written about Rachel Bilson’s style, vintage shopping, beginning/maintaining an exercise program, eating more vegetables, and doing your hair like Kate Middleton.
Thank you for your continued...
9 tags
hey guys! you can check out my second Suite101 article here, and, as always, remember to check out my new blog!
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heyo friends! I hope your Christmases have been lovely and your 2011s have been going swimmingly thus far.
If you haven’t currently updated to my new blog, I recommend you do so.
Additionally, I’m now doing freelance writing for Suite101 - you can view my profile and my first article here. I know I’ve spent the last 3 weeks pretty obsessed with Kate Middleton’s hair, and...
December 2010
1 post
hey followers! did you know that I have a new blog? And that I review books, snark on magazines, and talk about prejudices within genres?
yeah, sounds pretty wicked to me too. you should probably check it out now, just sayin’.
October 2010
1 post
blog move/change!
Hello everyone. This Tumblr thing’s been fun, but it ultimately wasn’t for me. If you so choose, you can head on over to my new blog, which will include more book reviews, more musing about writing, and writing about other things, which I didn’t really include on this blog.
Please follow me on my new blog adventure! I have good feelings about this one.
September 2010
1 post
“Writing is a form of personal freedom. It frees us from the mass identity we see...”
– Don DeLillo (via krishab) (via libraryland) (via booklover, -kbc) (via teachingliteracy) (via ilovereadingandwriting) (via rodwen)
August 2010
4 posts
2 tags
an excerpt
the following is an excerpt from a story I’m writing. let me know what you think!
I ran a finger over the yellowing edge of The Portable Dorothy Parker and sighed. Despite my fit of ecstasy over these books earlier that week, as I stood in the library high on my own intellectual pretensions, I felt oddly deflated. When I flipped these books over, hoping for a description of the story...
“People without hope not only don’t write novels, but what is more to the point,...”
– Flannery O’Connor (via junkbondtrader) (via keremmermutlu) (via booklover)
30 tags
she's baaaaaaaaaaaack.
I have abandoned you all, I know.
I know. I know. I have no excuses. My time was eaten up by work and friends and running and sleeping and reading and writing…and, life, frankly. And, then, I went on vacation, and traversed the wilds of both Canada’s East Coast and forested cottage country.
What’s prompted me to return to you? Several things, but two in particular.
When my hit count last...
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Daydreams
Do you ever think about what you would do if you were a professional, full-time writer? What your daily routine would be? I do.
I would wake up around 6 to exercise (run/lift weights) for an hour. I would shower, dress, and be eating breakfast by 7:30. From 7:30 - 8:00 I would plan the work I wanted to accomplish that day.
I would write from 8:00 am - 12:00, at which point I would break for...
July 2010
27 posts
15 tags
Requiem for a Teen
5 minutes ago, I finished Megan McCafferty’s Perfect Fifths, the final installment to her Jessica Darling series.
I was 16, desperate and miserable, when I stumbled upon McCafferty’s (and Jessica’s) debut, Sloppy Firsts, in the adult section of my public library. I had a brief flashback to reading a dog-eared copy of YM years earlier (YM was my first teen-magazine love, and I...
“What’s the most resilient parasite? An Idea. A single idea from the human mind...”
– Cobb, Inception (via Untemplater) (via bridgettelizabeth) (via nathanielstuart) (via booklover)
all I really want
is to read Harry Potter while lying in the bath and eating banana bread.
sadly, my bathtub is dirty and grungy because my roommates shave their legs in it, and I have no banana bread.
good thing I’ll always have Harry Potter.
greetings!
hello all.
sorry that I’ve been MIA from the blog for a while. I’ve been tired. I’ve been busy. I must admit that some of the joy of writing this blog has been lost. I’ve been using time to write entries when I would rather be writing.
that being said, here’s what I’ve been up to:
1. I finished The Bishop’s Man. Blah.
2. I have resolved to finish a...
attention, all!
It is very likely that the blog will shortly be moving to Blogspot. What say you?
Another Reply For fluida:
fuckyeahsummerreading:
While I completely agree that Everything Is Illuminated is a wonderful book, if you’re looking to step away from Foer for a bit then I would suggest reading The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-Time by Mark Haddon. The Perks of Being a Wallflower by Stephan Chbosky may also be up your alley. Even if you want to take a break from Foer, definitely, definitely put...
“You are the only one of you… Don’t worry about being original. Yes, everything’s...”
– Alexander Chee quoting Annie Dillard (via rodwen)
today, getting my blood sugar levels tested
Me: Wait, is this, like, a needle? Is it going to hurt?
Nurse: Little diabetic children have to do this multiple times a day until their fingers are all painful and bruised and bloody and then they have to move onto their toes!
Me: Um...
Outlining
notwritenow:
Sucks asssssss. But I realize it must be done.
This “plot” business just isn’t my thing.
“This ‘plot’ business” is sadly not my thing either. All of my outlines are massive fails. In grade 12, my teacher’s feedback on a short story was: “You use interesting and evocative description, but there is fundamentally no plot…”
Le sigh.
16 tags
more tuesdays, more confessions
As I’ve said before, Tuesdays are rough. I always try to wake up with a sunny disposition, ready for the day ahead, but things always seem to go wrong on Tuesdays. So far, the following fails have occured:
I was tossing and turning all night long (thanks, indecently hot weather!), and did not feel at all refreshed when my alarm went off at 6:30 this morning.
Because I dragged my ass...
18 tags
Canada Reads!: Zoe Whittall's Holding Still For As...
When I grabbed Whittall’s book off the shelf during my most recent library adventure, I had no idea that she was Canadian. Luckily for me, she is.
Whittall’s novel feels very Canadian. I’m not sure how to describe this feeling. It’s not through idiotic stereotypes - beavers, the winter, maple syrup, et cetera. It might be through recognizing various locations? It’s...
6 tags
How to Become A Writer; or, Have You Earned This... →
As much as I love this article, I hate it at the same time. How depressing can you possibly be??
ETA: apparently, this link does not work. It’s really good, definitely worth reading, so just google “How to Become A Writer, Or Have you Earned This Cliche?” and it’s the first link.
“We’re talking about poetry. How can you describe poetry like American Bandstand?...”
– Mr. Keating, Dead Poets Society (1989) (via whiskyandwhimsy) (via fuckyeahdeadpoetssociety)
The Worst Opening Sentence of 2010
aletdownsquid:
The Bulwer-Lytton award is given every year for the worst first sentence of a novel.
Congrats to Molly Ringle for crafting this awesomely bad opening.
For the first month of Ricardo and Felicity’s affair, they greeted one another at every stolen rendezvous with a kiss — a lengthy, ravenous kiss, Ricardo lapping and sucking at Felicity’s mouth as if she were a giant...
13 tags
The Tricky Implications of Liking Taylor Swift
I like Taylor Swift, and I’m not ashamed to admit it.
Yeah, I know. I know. Taylor Swift? But my first-year roommate was obsessed with Love Story, and so we used to sit on our beds and just howl out the lyrics while watching the video over and over again. We even did that (in the dark) for earth hour (her laptop was unplugged). What can I say? Bonding is weird.
After that introduction, I...
13 tags
Chris Bohjalian's Skeletons At The Feast
I don’t know what’s up with me, but I must have caught the Chris Bohjalian bug or something. The last time I was at the library, Skeletons At The Feast was one of the few books by an author I recognized. In fact, I was actively seeking another Bohjalian, even though I wasn’t crazy about The Double Bind (I mean, I liked it, but I didn’t love it).
So, I came away with...
Faber Publishing Offers Weekend Writing... →
IwantIwantIwantIwantIwantIwantIWANT!
5 tags
Libraries get a mall makeover →
librarianista:
infoneer-pulse:
Like trucker hats and last week’s version of the iPhone, libraries have an image problem. Wait, did you say libraries? Those places with the passed out homeless people and the twenty-year-old editions of the “World Book”? You mean, people actually still go to them? Combine the public reticence to hobnob with vagrants with the imminent obsolescence of books...
8 tags
The Double Bind by Chris Bohjalian
The Double Bind chronicles the story of Laurel Estabrook, who, after being nearly-raped while biking out in rural Vermont, begins volunteering at a local homeless shelter. Her volunteer work soon translates into a job, and, while working at the homeless shelter, she comes across a box of photographs left behind after a resident dies. Convinced that there is more to the photographer, Bobbie...
5 tags
Canada Reads!
So, in honour of my beloved country’s 143rd year of existence (in 7 years we’ll be 150! Or, as my mother put it, when I’m 76, Canada will be 200. Um.), I’m officially devoting July 2010 to celebrating Canadian literature, because there’s a lot of really good stuff out there that, in my experience, often does not really register with readers from other countries (UK,...
12 tags
Futile Literary Adventures Continue Apace
I can’t even really remember what happened in The Fountainhead, but I talk about it like I do.
The only reason I started reading Sylvia Plath’s poetry was because Rory Gilmore did.
I feel like all I have been doing in my spare time this summer is reading, and, yet, I have only read 16 books. What?
I’m a speed-reader and a book re-reader. As a child, I speed-read and re-read...
1 tag
big ups to my new followers, intergalacticfishwit, keahnicole, frescophonics, justanotherbi, cresciteundo, and fernandococello!
p.s. the rest of you - I love you too.
6 tags
GPS: Global Poetry System →
So cool!! Thanks to Gala Darling for the link!
9 tags
How to Give Good Feedback, Part II.
This is the hard part.
It’ll happen to you, just you wait, because it happens to everyone. Sooner or later, you will write a bad poem.
I know. I know.
It’ll happen. In fact, most of what you’ve written, especially if you’ve never shown it to anybody ever and keep it locked up in a box under your bed, is probably bad.
Sorry. Someone had to be the one to say it....
True Confessions, Part II.
When I’m at the library (or the grocery store, or the drugstore, or any other place that requires me to carry things), I always carry my books with my left hand. I’m right-handed, and have notoriously weak arms; my left arm is especially weak. Every little bit counts, right?
Frequently, when faced with a classic book, I choose the fluffy one instead.
I carry around my journal all the...
June 2010
66 posts
hello all. it’s canada day tomorrow, and so I have a long weekend. as such, I will be spending it where all canadians should, at the cottage, reading, writing, and repeating.
enjoy canada day and independence day!
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2 tags
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On Naming Your Characters: 1 Part How-To, 1 Part...
It’s hard, right? Hard as hell. At least, it is for me, and I can never quite figure out why. As a child, I kept endless lists of names that I liked, names I was one day going to bestow upon my future 6 children (note: I no longer aspire to have 6 children); but, when it comes to naming characters, I spend HOURS trying to craft the perfect name. And, what’s even worse, is that I often...
12 tags
9 tags
True Confessions
Last night I broke my own library rules. Yes, yes, I did. Well, they’re not “rules”, per se. Guidelines, if you will.
Remember how I revealed that I’m a little OCD when it comes to the library? What with the relentless lists and checking up on reviews of the book in question?
Well, I threw caution to the wind last night, and went on a totally crazy book spree. I took out...
5 tags
6 tags
“Let me tell you something about Tom Riddle. We were teacher and student in...”
– (via warmgun) (via herestothefuture) (via okayjokesover)
Genius.
(via dmmwit)
pure genius.
(via textbook)
AHHH so amazing, I love it. harry potter + mean girls = loooove.
morninggloria:
My laundry’s so lusty. It’s all “do me.” and I’m like, “I can’t; that’s an abomination in the eyes of the Lord” and the laundry’s all “it’ll just be our little secret baby” and I’m all “SILENCE YOU FOUL TEMPTRESS.”
my life in a nutshell?
8 tags
How to Give Good Feedback, Part I
One of the most important elements of writing, in my opinion, is receiving feedback from fellow writers. I think that learning to self-critique (more on that another time) is incredibly important, and being able to honestly assess your own work is the most important thing you can do. However, removing yourself from your own work and having someone else take a look at it is a great way to improve...
5 tags
The New Yorker's 20 Under 40 Writers List →
What do you all think?
P.S. Wasn’t Dan on Gossip Girl supposed to have somehow been featured on this? hahahahahaaa
5 tags
“If we citizens do not support our artists, then we sacrifice our imagination on...”
– Yann Martel (Life of Pi) (via theplagiarist) (via mustanggina) (via booklover)