written media vs. written media

[minxy]

Yanno, flist, I seem to be going through a strange phase, fannishly. RL is distracting with all it's goodness, and I'm finding myself with less time for long fics--even when I bookmark them with alacrity and great enthusiasm. I went to bed early last night with this amazing desire to hold a book rather than my laptop while I read, and I picked up Imaro again, only to fuss at reading another fight when I wasn't terribly in the mood.

rydra_wong is reading 50books_poc, the marvelous brain-child of carenejeans. The goal is to read 50 books by an author of color in time for next year's IBARW. It's all self-moderated, but people are telling about the books they've read and it's inspiring.

greensilver asked us to talk about things of yay, and when I went to go look up Madeleine L'Engle's A Wrinkle in Time (I was only coming up with the later two books in the series for some reason), Powell's (www.powells.com is awesome) told me they had a first edition in stock.

Which is now *my* first edition, because it was fairly inexpensive. I've bought a few of these over the years when I see them and I can afford them; this seems to be my only requirement. If I see it, I know the book and love it, and can afford the first edition, chances are I've clicked 'add to cart' before I finish blinking. It's just a non-question. Kinda like those couple I have that are autographed, because Powell's does that a lot. If I really want to read the book and there's an autographed version? Mine.

I have love for books.

But, you know, the last time I read a book? It was probably on a plane or something where I was separated from the internets for a while.

I miss it. I miss paper and print and the weight of a book too good to put down even though you're exhausted and having to prop the cover on the other pillow and blink a bit too often as you read. And my failure to actually read much really hasn't stopped me from buying books, oddly, so I have this backlog of fascinating, awesome looking books--but because I can't see the header and word count, it's hard to compare and contrast to fanfic when I'm deciding what to read on any given day.

So, I think I'm going to slow down on fanfic reading for a while and focus on books, just a bit. I've started Imaro, which is based on African cultures I've walked in and spoken with, I've sat in the cattle-dung huts and watched the men in their bright red plaid play a game of stones I know as Mombasa and they know as something completely different. I still yearn for the author to describe the layout of the temporary villages, the smell of straw and cattle, to explain why he is dressing his protagonist in animal skins rather than the bright woven fabrics and beads the Maasai I met favored. I am trying to forgive him for focusing on describing his protagonists prowess in battle, though, instead of the sensory memories that I have (after all, he's a boy, the author.)

After that, I'm going to read After Dark by Haruki Murakami, and a host of other books what I've hoarded without reading lately.

I think, just for fun, I'm going to follow rydra_wong and carenejeans and sign up for 50books_poc, and watch and see how much I need to shift my perspective to spend a reasonable percentage of my reading time on authors of color. I have that kick-ass list from ibarw, After Dark and Imaro are both from that list. So, I shall include links over to 50books_poc whenever I post a short synopsis. You'll hear about it if I read an incredible book, though, I'm sure.

Next post will be a recs post of recent fannishness, though. First things first: clear out the to-rec folder. Then sit down and read a book.

I do solemnly swear to write my reel_sg1 fic, though. I just have to decide if it's Cameron/Teal'c or Jack/Daniel or some completely different pairing (in this case used in a mostly gen/friendshippy sense as the movie is actiony) just to shock you all. Maybe.... Teal'c and DANIEL? Would your heads explode?