Novelling: Fun for Masochists

Dear Reader (hey, I'm writing a letter to you for once. How 'bout that),
I'm a lit buff. I love Orwell, Doyle, Dickinson, Salinger, Green, and Bill Shakespeare himself. I read good books like some people have sex: voraciously, passionately, and often. But there is one wordcraft I find myself losing sleep over more often than not, and that is novelling.
So let's say you're me and you're in sixth grade and you fancy yourself the lovechild of Douglass Adams and Harper Lee and you decide that you're going to write a book.
A science fiction book.
About dystopian societies and mutated children and addictions and torture.
Because after all you ARE a literary prodigy and you CAN pull off a completely different, completely screwed-over world at age twelve.
Fast-forward four years. You're still slaving over this goddamn, untitled "book". If an outsider looked at your Google history, they would call the police. You know more things about drugs and alcohol abuse than most adults. Your vocabulary is pitted with profanity from writing it for years and you daydream about the same two characters, both of which aged along with you and became more and more sullied with time.
You really, really want to slap your twelve-year-old self for tying you to this heap of shit you used to call your "Great American Novel". You haven't learned anything except how strip a car and cure a hangover (and you don't even drink). Your life has become one continual spiral of rewrites and plot holes.
I know you're thinking "But Corinne! Why don't you just give up the stupid thing?"
But I can't. Buried deep under all that animosity and hatred I feel for my novel, a tiny spark of the love and discovery I first felt for the idea still lingers. Stupid spark, not letting me enjoy the remainder of my life.
But anyway, my dear Reader, if you ever want to "make a difference" and write a novel, DON'T. You'll thank me later.
Love,
Corinne

P.S. I've also written two other novels (for NaNoWriMo, check it out (www.nanowrimo.com)) and they didn't give me nearly as much grief... maybe because I did them in a month each and then tucked them away into folders.
P.P.S. If you really MUST write (or die), write some stupid fluff about a "normal" high school girl who falls in love with a hot monster. I hear publishers are loving those now.
P.P.P.S. Sorry for all the rants. I'm just passionate lately.

RANT OF ANGER

Dear Homophobes (inlcuding all you dumbass twelve-year-olds who're so 'well-versed in varying sexualities'),
Today, my little sister was conversing with a girl with whom she is doing a play. The other girl brought up the sexuality of the director and commented on it as 'weird'. My sister (God love her), defended the director, stating that he couldn't help what he was born with. The other girl then commented "He could change."
Do you see what you're doing to our youth? My God, I really hate you people. Saying that about any other group could be considered a negative hasty generalization, but with homophobes I think I'm entitled.
There are some kind, beautiful gay, lesbian, bisexual, and transgender people out there, some of which I happen to know and love. And if you want to predispose yourself against them... you may be one. Just a thought.
Love,
Corinne

Readers: Sorry for all the rants. I'm just rarely pleased with the opinions of the jackanapes I call my peers. If you hate rants, tell me. Though I probably won't stop... so maybe you should keep your hatred to yourself.

Oedipus vs. Ke$ha

I'm an oldies and obscure music fiend. Marina and the Diamonds, Ludo, Elizabeth and the Catapult, Ben Folds (who isn't really that obscure... but I love him), Regina Spektor (her song Oedipus has been playing on repeat for three hours), MIKA, anyone who takes a little digging to find, as well as the Beatles, Simon and Garfunkel, Lionel Richie, and Led Zeppelin. But I draw the line at the music of NOW.
I may sound like a prude, but having the future leaders of the world (AKA our delusional youth)(Sorry kids) listen to music in which Ke-dollar sign-ha eats her boyfriends and partakes in binge drinking doesn't really sound like a good plan. Currently I've been wondering what happened to quality music that didn't involve drunken blackout sex and Katy Perry wanting to see (pea)cocks.
But anyway, letters. I've actually written Ke$ha a couple letters on my old letter-writing medium, Facebook, one pertaining to her destruction of her New Year's Resolution (not to be a douchebag) just by saying it on national television, and the other pertaining to the repugnant song Cannibal my lovely friend Devon obligated me to listen to (wait... shit, is to a preposition? I can't end a sentence that long on a preposition! Screw it, I'm not well read enough to correct it)
But anyway, I thought I'd put my two Ke$ha letters on here as a kind of peek into my previous letters. And if you're a Ke$ha fan... sorry, I guess.

Letter #1:
Ke$ha,
I could bitch about your failed New Year's Resolution, but then again, I said I was going to eat healthier while eating a burger, so I guess we're all just hypocrites. You continue to be a douchebag and I'll eat my fries and we'll pretend to try again next year.
Cordially,
Corinne
P.S. I still don't like you. No hard feelings.




Letter #2:
Dear Ke$ha,
I didn't think anyone could possibly besmirch the name of Jeffrey Dahmer any further than he already has... congratulations, you proved me wrong.
Corinne
P.S. Good for you, teaching our future leaders their serial killers. Your mother must be so proud.


Disclaimer: If you know any good music of NOW, tell me! I'm always on the lookout! Also, I don't condone Jeffrey Dahmer's cannabalistic and necrophilic actions. Just making sure we were clear.

Who Needs Letters?

I write letters. Tiny, three sentence letters to people who will hopefully never read them. I wasn't very clear on that in my introductory post, and I apologize if you were expecting me to hipster-angst about Starbucks' new logo or something of that nature. Your money will be refunded at the door.
But anyway, back to letters. I love them, both the typeface alphabet and the actual paragraph-beginning-with-Dear-Soandso. I love the simplicity of handwritten text and the musk of good paper. I love crisp neat lines and swirly signatures.
Maybe I should have been born in the 50s... because now messages are quick, scrawled out on keyboards without the promise of that sweet paper smell at all. And while I also adore this two dimensional wonderland we call the Internet, my desire for more letters is agonizing.
Thus, a reason. I write letters because I want to connect to the people I'll never send them too. I want to insult them, change them, advise them, and help them without ever doing a thing.
Picture gotten? Okay.

I've actually been meaning to write a short letter to Japan for a day or so. They've been through a ton these past few days and I've been sending all the good thoughts and karma I can. So here's to you, Japan.

Dear Japan,
I'm really impressed by you guys. My country is going crazy over the earthquake and resulting tsunami and resulting potential nuclear meltdown and you all have handled this disaster in a calm fashion that the rest of the world should learn from. I am contributing to relief efforts and wish you the best of luck.
Corinne

God that was difficult.