Your Guide to Terrible Goodreads Comments

So, you'd like to write a terrible comment on Goodreads. Well, you're in luck! For years, I have been a contentious critic on that very site, and have written some its the most popularly unpopular reviews. I have received comments so terrible, so nonsensical, so patently self-loathing, so incoherent that they were most likely written by a super-intelligent dog who escaped from a science lab and has decided to take his revenge on humanity for making him the only creature trapped in the throes of an existential crisis despite the fact that he can reach his own groin with his tongue. 

At least for the rest of us, we can imagine that there is some wonderful thing that, if we were capable of it, would erase all self-doubt and disappointment--only he is cursed with the awareness that, despite having experienced the ultimate act of narcissistic pleasure, the hollow feeling remains. I have also received much worse comments, which could only have been the result of concentrated, multilayered human stupidity, but those are the rare ones--the vast majority of bad comments are made up of some combination of the following list.

I'm Back

Doré - Angelica Meets the Hermit

It's been more than a year I've been away--which is a lot of time to think things over, to sit and stew, to write numerous drafts of reviews and posts that just end up sitting in the vault, unread. At first it was nice to be away, to have a break--it was like graduation all over again: suddenly, no one's waiting for me to write papers, nor am I waiting for a response. It's peaceful, but there's still that itch in the back of the mind, the old voice, the old habit, continuing on no matter how you ignore it.

I do want to thank all the people who have supported me, all along--even without any response from me, the comments keep rolling in, the friend requests show up fresh in my inbox each day, and the (mostly) kind and supportive messages are as numerous as ever. It reminds me that I have not only a responsibility to myself, but also to my work, to the conversations I've started that are still going on out there--but it turns out you can't just come back from nowhere, not that easily, and especially not when the reason you left hasn't gotten any better.

Style Guide for 'You Know Fulwell'

Some of my beta readers have requested a style guide outlining the choices I have made about the book's grammar, syntax, and spelling. If you, as a reader, find this whole list to be confusing, then feel free to ignore it and just give me notes on other things. Also don't hesitate to message me with any specific questions about usage, and I will update this document with any clarifications, corrections, or other new information.

British usage and spelling and usage should be maintained throughout ('rumour, not 'rumor'; 'complexion', not 'complection'; 'realise', not 'realize'; &c.). A full list appears at the end of this post.

So, I've Written a Novel

Pasternak's 'The Throes of Creation'

Six months.
 
Six months since my last blog entry, my last review, my last Goodreads comment. When I write it out like that, it seems like a long time, a solid chunk of the past to set behind me. I hoped it might be long enough for me to get some clarity, but the concerns I laid out in my last blog post have not been resolved, just swept under the rug. Regardless, it's high time I moved forward with my writing and my reviews. As I explain in this post, I'll continue posting reviews on both GR and Booklikes, as well as responding to personal messages at both sites, as well as at hapaxgr@gmail.com.

So, what have I been doing for six months? Traveling the country, visiting friends and family, recording music, taking long walks in the woods, going to concerts, enjoying the Spring weather, reading, playing games, practicing survival techniques--everything and nothing. I have done a little editing on my manuscript, here and there, but my book has actually been in a finished form for some time now. Now I'm finally ready for the next step: a call to beta readers. So, for all of you who have been asking over the past few years when you'll be able to actually read my book, here we go.

Amazon, Goodreads, and Me

In the past couple months, I've only responded to a handful of the comments that daily fill my Goodreads updates. Sometimes, I just take a vacation from Goodreads for a bit--perhaps I'm not in the mood, or I'm busy with other things--such as my first novel, the last chapter of which I finished about a week ago (expect a post on that when I finish my first editing pass). But this time, I didn't come back to GR after a few days and catch up, like I normally do. Instead, I stayed away, and though part of the reason for that was my book, another reason was the censorship debacle that's been plaguing the site recently.

If you haven't read Ceridwen's take on the whole matter, you should, because it's much more thorough than mine, and well-considered. She is the chronicler of our struggle, the bard who went through the battlefield and made note of whose heads had been lopped off. I also love the fact that she's now moving past that. It's certainly not her responsibility, and so I thank her for the good work she's done. There will be links to her articles at the end of this post.

Suggested Readings in Comics

Art by Duncan Fegredo

Growing up as I did amongst actors, singers, painters, potters, mimes, sword-swallowers, tightrope walkers, heavy metal musicians, master craftsmen, and all and sundry sorts of outcast and weird, I developed into a rather unusual child. 'Loud' is not a strong enough descriptor, 'frantic' too subtle a word, 'dramatic' a gross understatement. It drove my teachers mad--they yelled, they chastised--in first grade, my student report said that I would 'never amount to anything'. The only thing that didn't seem to get me in trouble was drawing, because when I was drawing, I was quiet. So I drew. When adults asked what I wanted to be when I grew up, I said I was going to 'draw comic books'.

I loved comics as a child--well, I loved the pictures. I'd flip through, taking inspiration for my little sketches of minotaurs, heroes, robots, dinosaurs, snake women--the usual. I never really had two issues in order, so reading comics always felt like walking into a movie halfway through. In college, I found self-contained graphic novels, and actually started enjoying comics for the story. By sheer happenstance, the first comics I read ended up being some of the best ever written. As some of my friends have pointed out, this has given me extremely high expectations for what comics can and should be--the only person who is harder to please is my old college roommate, who has only read the top 10% of stuff I passed on to him.

Writing Strong Women, Part V: Where are the Strong Women?

Kate Beaton's 'Strong Female Characters'

Last time, we talked about the relationship between a woman and society--but there is also an odd relationship between the idea of the 'strong woman' and society: despite the fact that she's discussed so often these days, nothing seems to change about how women are portrayed--or at least, not for the better. As pointed out in great articles like A Plague of Strong Female Characters, Why Strong Female Characters are Bad for Women, and I Hate Strong Female Characters, as well as Kate Beaton's comics on the subject, 'Strong Female Character' has just come to mean emotionally damaged, commitment-phobic, laconic, and gun-toting.

Usually she'll have a rape backstory, too--and if she doesn't have one to begin with, a later writer will add one. It's really just another way to do 'damsel in distress', but with a female hero: in the standard formula, the bad guy shows up, steals the girlfriend, and then the male hero has to get revenge and save the girl; for a so-called 'strong woman', the villain steals the 'innocent girl inside her', and so she must go on a quest and get that part of herself back, by killing him. A lot of writers seem to think the natural state for a woman is frilly and sweet, but that a quick application of sex crime is all it takes to make her a violent buttkicker. Even Joss Wheedon, much lauded for how he deals with female characters, couldn't resist making the entire background for mystical female power in Buffy The Vampire Slayer into an extended rape origin story.