I'm reading some early George R.R. Martin short stories in Dreamsongs: Volume 1.

Most of them are pretty good. It was funny to read his REALLY early works (as in, written while in high school) that were only published in comic fanzines. He was such a huge dork!

Holy crap... Monkey See ran a convo as part of their new "I will if you will" book club. They are talking Twilight. [link]

My favorite part?

It's just this wildly florid prose that's wielded with the subtlety and repetition of a jackhammer, all in the service of a story that's going nowhere being told by a girl who seems to be fighting me for the gold medal in a not-liking-her contest.

Also, in comments, I love this one:

Every time I hear someone make the "at least people/children are reading!" argument, I wonder if they say "at least they're getting exercise!" when they see people running from the cops.

Just because activities are generally beneficial/virtuous/what have you doesn't mean that every application of them is worth defending.

There is crack on the pages, though. Because I liked book one when I read it, yet this shit is absolutely true, and, because I've read a book before, I spent the entire second and a great deal of the third one going "Wait...I've read this before.(Like last week when you finished the other one, genius) but I was blinded by the WMD on the pages. But i also got there just ahead of much of the hype machine so I skimmed looking for dirty bits and was thwarted.(I used that in Cupid fanfic so it was worth it.) The fourth one is still a top contender for Grossest Thing I've Ever Tried to Read(and you know what I usually read, but I totally had that Seven, "Life is Too Short For Me To Know This Much About Your Issues" feeling about it, despite the blood not being spilled in anger or the negligible body count. I can't explain it, but I'm a tough reader with lots of books under my mental belt, and I still felt...kind of violated by that. The thought of Meyer selling that to bright-eyed fangirls who haven't been metaphor-wrangling as long as I have really pissed me off at the time, and I guess I'm still not over it. That was the closest I've come in a long time to deciding that a work of fiction was Not Okay, and I'm fucked up enough to be both a feminist and an Ellroy fan, but that sick little panty-sniffer is not trying to take YA by storm is he?

In the way every dark cloud having a sparkly lining, if Meyer hadn't written her craptastic books we'd never have gotten these:

[link]

[link]

Post-apoc retelling of Persuasion sold yesterday. It's by Killer Unicorn Girl.

Kill. Me. Now.

sigh ... I got a coupon from Barnes & Noble in email - the subject line promised 40% off. So I eagerly opened the message, had to scroll past all kinds of stuff, and found ut that the coupon WAS for 40% off ... on anything from their Twilight Collection.

Okay, I've finished Justine Larbalestier's Liar. Anyone else read it?

I don't know what to think.

Hm, that sounds like something I'd like. I heart unreliable narrators.

Just curious...Anybody a fan of Katherine Anne Porter?