Today is the first day of my summer break, and as far as breaks go, it’s the purest I’ve had since high school. I’m teaching one class (online, for ten weeks), and I’ve got a new class to prep for fall, and I’ve got some freelance work, and I have some pretty intense writing goals, and I’ve got a book review due, and I’m helping out with the social media at the Lit Pub, but really, I’ve got nothing to do.

Someone asked me the other day how I do it all. I said I don’t feel as if I do. I stopped reading for Hayden’s Ferry Review because I couldn’t keep up, though I still suspect someone else could have. The main thing, though, is that I just do. There’s something to be done, and no one else will do my work for me. So I do it.

I have a lot of goals. They’re goals I’d never considered before the last few years—and there are some goals that I did have that I no longer feel drawn to. I thought I’d be married now, probably with a child, but I don’t mourn that loss. Instead, I wonder how I would make time for me with those things on my plate. I want to dedicate myself to my writing, to being published. I love teaching. I’m working on building myself a network, and I still take time for myself. I’ve stopped feeling selfish about this, for there’s no one I’m taking from, and I’ve spent too many years trying to make other people happy without realizing that the people I should be worrying about are the same ones who simply want me to be happy, my own way.

I’ve had a hard time adjusting to my new apartment (I’ve been here twenty-nine nights now), but while I miss my parents, and my sister, and the three dogs, and while I haven’t slept a whole night in almost a month, I’ve come to realize that I’m happy. Not because of the move, but despite it. These past few months have been perhaps the best of my life—and it’s because of me, of what I’ve worked to achieve, and what I have become. I see people post online about how wonderful their god has been to them, and I wonder why they don’t see that happiness and success and achievement can be tied to ourselves. I am lucky—I would never say otherwise in this world—but that hasn’t been enough for me. I want more, more, more more more. Not things—I don’t want a yacht or a five-bedroom house or a fancy sports car. No, I want to make a difference. I want to write things that touch people, and I want to teach in ways that my students remember. I want to help others make a difference. And I believe I am doing these things.

My grandmother died back in February, and I’ve had friends become acquaintances, become memories, often with little warning. I’ve lost things I never took time to appreciate until it was too late. I’ve made mistakes, and, even when I haven’t, some things have been pulled away. But that’s life, and unlike myself of eight, ten years ago, I accept this. I’m spouting off cliches here, but their overuse doesn’t stop them from being true sometimes. Like now.

Things are good.

Team Katniss, all the way.

Let’s just get this out of the way: I loved this movie. I’ve seen it three times already. I’d go see it again in a heartbeat. I just love it. Okay. On with the review.

Also. Yes. There are spoilers here.

First, Jennifer Lawrence nailed Katniss. I was never really concerned about this casting choice (or about any casting choice, really), but she absolutely exceeded my expectations. What I was concerned with was the transition from first person point of view to film, since so much of what happens in the book happens in Katniss’ head. In the book, we are told how Katniss feels betrayed by Peeta when he teams up with the careers, but in the movie we see it. Same with her relationship with her mother. She hits all the nuances of this character, everything from fear (in the tube) to physical pain (the tracker jackers) to anger (the berries) to emotional pain (Rue). In the scene with her and the game makers, she transitions effortlessly from nervousness, to disbelief (at herself), to determination, to pride, to disbelief (at the game makers), to anger. Even had everything else about this movie been weak, Jennifer Lawrence alone would have made it worth watching.

The other actors all impressed me as well. Stanley Tucci was particularly wonderful as Caesar Flickerman. Wes Bentley (and the writers) made me feel sympathy for Seneca Crane, and I understood his character as a naive but ambitious young man. Elizabeth Banks was Effie, and she had some wonderful lines. Woody Harrelson played Haymitch differently than in the book, but I think it works, and I’m looking forward to see where he takes the character next. Donald Sutherland played a believable and complex villain, and I liked the glimpses we got of him during this first movie. Lenny Kravitz was perhaps the weakest for me (his timing of some lines seemed a bit off), but I still think he gave a great Cinna.

As for the child actors, not a one of them stands out to me as being weak. Willow Shields, even while most of her lines involved crying or screaming, made her character into something more than an upset child. Amandla Stenberg was just so damn cute and adorable that sometimes I stopped noticing her acting, but when I watched specifically for it on my second viewing, I was impressed. I also liked the bit of lightness she brought to the scenes in the arena (and training). Alexander Ludwig was another actor (along with the writers) who made me feel sympathy for his character—I liked seeing Cato as more than just possibly unhinged, and his final monologue was great. Isabelle Fuhrman played an intense and, frankly, scary Clove. She probably impressed me the most out of the younger actors and actresses. Foxface, Glimmer, Thresh—really, I’ve got nothing negative to say.

Now on to Peeta and Gale, though just briefly. Liam Hemsworth only appears briefly, but his closeness to Katniss is established early. The few shots of him during the games did a lot of work to establish what’s coming in the next movie. I don’t have too much to say about him, though, because we saw so little of him. Peeta though… Some people have not been impressed by Josh Hutcherson, but I contend that the issue they have is in fact with the character, not the actor. Peeta is not an alpha male. He expresses weakness, he expresses emotion. He’s vulnerable, emotionally and physically. He’s unsure and lacks confidence in himself, and Hutcherson showed me all of this. Peeta is just a quiet character, especially in this first book. If you still disagree, try this exercise: swap the genders of Katniss and Peeta. Does it feel more natural to have a weak girl? If so, then I propose that you should actually be more impressed with Hutcherson, because he portrays something so (sadly) nontraditional.

This was the most true book-to-movie adaptation I’ve ever seen, but there were still changes to the plot (obviously). However I found them all to be in service of the story. I liked the limited time spent in the cave (I was afraid it would be overdone, and instead I found myself wanting a bit more), and I loved the behind the scene shots in the capital. The juxtaposition of the revelry in the capital (and the lack of empathy from the game makers) with the brutality of the games (and especially the scene added from District 11) worked very well for me.

My main complaint about the movie stems from a few of the effects. The fire didn’t quite work for me in the parade (or during the interview), but I attribute that to lack of budget and expect these types of things to be better in the next movie. That said, the makeup, the costumes, the setting—that all really did work. I also really enjoyed the way they handled violence. I know keeping the PG13 rating was hugely important to them, but it worked for me, too, for there to not be gratuitous violence. The brutality was there to be sure, but it wasn’t overdone.

In some ways, though, the movie’s faithfulness to its source material was a bit problematic for me, at least during my first viewing. It was so true, I pretty much always knew what was coming next, and when something was different, it startled me. I also found myself comparing the book and the movie to a huge extent during the midnight showing. The second two times I saw it I was able to take the movie on its own terms. That isn’t to say I didn’t enjoy it the first night, just that it was different.

Still, the movie left me wanting more, which I actually think is a good thing. I want to leave still wanting it, and I certainly don’t want to walk out feeling like it could have been a half hour shorter. If this director and cast stay together (and if Suzanne Collins keeps helping with the scripts), I have every confidence that this will be a fantastic set of movies.

So book or movie? To me that’s the wrong question to be asking, and it sort of always has been. Yes, I generally enjoy books to movies, but that’s because the different medium does allow for different things. And in movies I always feel like I’m missing some of the complexities. But I also feel it’s unfair to think less of a movie because the book worked better. The book probably worked better because the story was meant to be told as a book. The movie is meant to be a movie, and only one based on a book. So that said, I loved them both, and I’m sure I’ll read the book a dozen more times, and probably see the movie (on DVD) that many times as well. They’re different, and I expect that going in.

My rating: 5/5

I’m finally back and (mostly) decompressed from AWP, which means I’m ready to start harnessing the energy and motivation I acquired while at the conference. Most of that energy comes from guilt, and from seeing so many successful people (and wanting to be like them). I figure it’s still good though, no matter where it comes from.

But I realized something at this year’s conference, something that I think I’ve slowly been figuring out over the last year or so: I’m good at writing.

It feels odd to say that considering that the reason I started this whole MFA-business in the first place was because I knew I was good at writing. Before graduate school, I’d never once done substantial revisions on any piece of writing, be it creative or academic. My idea of revision was rereading my work, deleting extraneous commas, and changing a few of the more awkward wordings. There was only one time in all of my pre-graduate school years that I got below a B on a paper, and I was so offended by my grade that I dropped the class rather than have to figure out what I’d done wrong. But even considering that one time, I never had to pay the price for not improving my work. I got 4.0s on papers I wrote, start to finish, two hours before they were due. Even my graduate school writing sample was a rough draft.

That began to change in graduate school, of course, but in a lot of ways, it was too late. Rather than learning the value of hard work, I’d learned over many years that the good thing to do was to give only 50-80% of my effort to any given project. That way, in the event that I did fail (and for me, failing has usually meant anything that is less than perfect; seriously, ask me about the time I got grounded for getting a B+ in math), I had the ready-made excuse of having not given everything I had. That way my problem could always be defined as lack of effort rather than lack of talent.

But writing is turning out to be different. You see, I am good at it, and I’m good without trying too hard. But good isn’t enough. Good doesn’t get you to the level I want to be at. Good won’t get you a book published, won’t win you any prizes or contests. Luck might, but not being good. You have to be great. And to be great, you have to work.

People ask me sometimes how it feels to do something I love. I tell them I don’t love writing but that I love having written, that I love the power of a good story, that I love creating a good story, or a good character. These people are usually shocked to hear this attitude, but I don’t see why they should be. When writing is such a huge part of your life, when it’s another job—one that never ends—it’s hard as hell. And at least so far, it hasn’t gotten easier. Oh, I get better at it, but it’s still not any easier. It’s hard work.

And I’m finally ready to work. I’m ready to stop making excuses about why I haven’t written in two days, ten days, three weeks. I’m ready to take a chance for once in my life, to risk giving everything I have and still not being enough. But I want more than I have, and I’ll never get it sitting here talking about someday. This starts now. Wish me luck.

The AWP conference started yesterday, and the last twenty-four hours have been a whirlwind. For those who don’t know, AWP is an annual writing conference, with panels and a huge bookfair (think hundreds of tables to visit). This year there are (I believe) seven thousand writers in town for the three days of the conference.

So far it’s been good. I’ve bought more books than I probably should have (and will most likely acquire a few more before the conference ends on Saturday), and I’ve met and reconnected with some truly awesome people.

It’s also been stressful. I’ve done one previous AWP conference (2010 in Denver), and in the two years since, I apparently forgot how crazy, busy, and overwhelming it is. More than all the people and booths, however, what exhausts me is the constant need to push my introverted qualities away and pretend like I have more extroverted ones than I do. It’s a performance for me, and when that needs to go on all day, it becomes more than a bit wearing.

The problem (or, perhaps, just one of them) is that I don’t find myself very interesting, and while I genuinely like many (most? all?) of the people I meet, I can’t get rid of this lingering self-doubt that tells me they find me horribly boring. I don’t worry that people actively dislike me, but rather that, once I walk away, they don’t think of me again.

I don’t know what to say in groups. I don’t follow group dynamics. I alternate between not knowing what to say and so saying nothing and not knowing what to say and so saying the first thing that comes to mind until I’m babbling. I smile a lot, and nod when I don’t necessarily understand. I ask questions, but often struggle with articulating them. I do this even with people I know fairly well.

Usually, I prefer sitting at home to going out. I prefer solitude to groups, even when I’m feeling lonely. The one real exception is my immediate family, and they don’t understand why I’m not as comfortable with others as I am with them.

Yesterday, I found myself in conversation with someone I’d been really looking forward to seeing, but it was a group conversation, and I mostly just stood there mute. The girls on either side of me talked freely, jumped into the conversation in a way that felt natural, unplanned. Close to interruption, but in an intimate rather than rude way. I walked away from this group feeling dejected. There wasn’t any reason I should have been given a one-on-one conversational moment, but I still felt cheated for not receiving one (because, you know, I didn’t ask for one).

In my hotel room hours later, I lay staring at the dark ceiling, and realized my disappointment stemmed from wanting to feel special, important, and from the fact that I have a hard time feeling special or important of my own right. Usually those feelings only come from external forces. I think this is why I often miss school so much—I received these types of confidence boosts without having to seek them out: a good workshop, a good grade on a paper, a verbal compliment during a thesis meeting. Now, I’m floundering. Except at twenty-seven, it’s not supposed to be like that, and so I perform—or try to.

Like in my writing, I excel when given a specific task. I do perfectly well sitting behind a booth talking about a literary journal, or in front of a classroom when following a lesson plan. I feel comfortable when someone points out the flaw in my writing that I should fix, but I still struggle with finding the flaw myself. I still struggle with knowing what to do in non-scripted encounters. On the whole, the issues with my writing are improving faster than those with my personality. I suppose I should consider that a good thing.

Reads parts I and II.

August

August was a bit of a whirlwind for me. I went through two weeks of training at MSU and spent my time at the State trying to finish up a massive copyright project, as well as learning how to use the new item bank system (which, in my opinion, will help quantity of test questions rather than quality, but I digress). Missy moved out this month, and I helped with that. My mom was just getting worse with her back, so at the end of the month it was pretty much just me and my dad handling anything involving lifting or pulling. As a final aside-type note, I think it was right at the beginning of this month when I saw Harry Potter in the theaters for the last time, when my sister and I went back for our final repeat showing.

Mistborn: The Hero of Ages, by Brandon Sanderson
This was another reread for me, and while I remembered some very big general things about how the series ended, it was exciting to watch it all unfold again. I was shocked by how little time the two main characters (Vin and Elend, to me) spent together in this book, and this made me rather sad. Still, this books deviates from so many archetypes in the fantasy genre, and it was great to re-experience that.

The Sea of Monsters, by Rick Riordan
Considering that I’m someone who tends to enjoy retellings and reimaginings (and I love work that incorporates myth), I wasn’t sure I’d enjoy this series, but I was excited to start this second book in the Percy Jackson series. I especially liked how the book worked more with Annabeth’s character.

A Visit from the Goon Squad, by Jennifer Egan
I really enjoyed this book, but I wouldn’t quite go so far as to say I loved it. I struggled with the large cast of characters at times, because I felt that the limited page space each got wasn’t enough to fully develop them in my mind. That said, this was still a very good book, and I would recommend it, especially if you’re interested in ways books break (or attempt to break) out of the traditional bonds holding them.

The Titans Curse, by Rick Riordan
I know I enjoyed this book, but right now I’m having a bit of a hard time distinguishing it from those that came before and after it in the series. I do remember, however, that this was a quick read for me.

September

It was either the end of August or the beginning of September when they offered me a second class at MSU and I gave my notice at the State, just under a year after starting. Classes started at MSU, and while I was exceedingly nervous, I found that I took to it rather well—and that I enjoyed it even more than I thought I would. I did deal with some disrespect issues this month, however, stemming from students who thought I looked too young. The 15th was my birthday, though I didn’t do anything exciting. I taught until seven then came home to a nice dinner. I’ve decided that the number one thing I dislike about getting older is how people think your birthday is less and less important each year. I love my birthday. Maybe it was self-birthday-love that kept me from reading too much this month, though maybe it was the teaching.

Dealing with Dragons, by Patricia C. Wrede
I reread this series this year as part of my Day Zero goal of revisiting books from my childhood, and while these were more my sister’s childhood than mine, they still worked. What I like about this series is the strong female character (I did find, of course, some problematic gender issues on a reread, but on the whole it’s good) and, of course, the dragons. Good book for children, or adults who haven’t lost their inner children.

Searching for Dragons, by Patricia C. Wrede
I have to say that the first book in this series is definitely my favorite, and after reading this second book, I decided that is due to POV. The first book is told from Cimorene’s POV while this second one is told from her eventual husband’s, and Cimorene loses so much when you lose her POV.

Calling on Dragons, by Patricia C. Wrede
Some of the POV issues are bettered in this third book because—hey—what can be better than talking (and, of course, sassy) cats?

October

October was a good but busy month. I was settling into my job at MSU (and loving it more by the day), and toward the end of the month I found out I was renewed for the spring semester. Not much happened outside of work this month (but I did have a ton of grading).

Awake, by Dorianne Laux
This book marks the second book of poetry I’ve ever read (I’m trying to read more) and, like the Kwasny collection, I feel that my reviewing the book does it a disservice. I think one of the things I find most off-putting in poetry is the sexuality behind much of it. I have a hard time seeing the difference between art and smut (though that doesn’t feel like the right word). None of that is specific to this collection—I’m really not trying to say anything negative about Laux here, especially since I actually did enjoy some of these poems.

People of the Book, by Geraldine Brooks
This was the first and only book selected for our family book club (long story; don’t ask). The premise intrigued me (the stories of the people who owned the book over a handful of centuries), and the execution was good, but I think that, while this type of book would have sucked me in a few years ago (considering a wrote a book with a similar structure), I just no longer like the stories that introduce characters and then drop them a chapter later, never to be heard from again. Also, the author seemed to feel the need to put some sort of sexual plot in each section, and the sex often seemed to function as a stand-in for character building, making the writing feel a bit lazy and the characters a bit one-dimensional.

Talking to Dragons, by Patricia C. Wrede
The final book in this series (if you don’t count the collection of short stories the author also wrote but that I couldn’t get in to). Not too much to say except that it was a bit too predictable, even considering the genre and audience. Still, enjoyable if for no other reason than it wraps up these characters’ stories.

In My Father’s House, by Ann Rinaldi
A YA historical fiction novel, this was my favorite book as a child. I loved Rinaldi and most of her books, but this one just sucked me in. I was nervous about the reread, though, about how it would sit with me now that I’m such a different person. I was especially concerned about my growing social views and awareness. And on the one hand, there were things that jumped out at me that I glossed over before (for instance, to write about whites in the south in the pre-Civil War era, those whites had to treat their slaves very well or they aren’t seen as sympathetic and the white audience feels uncomfortable), but on the whole, I still enjoyed the book.

The Battle of the Labyrinth, by Rick Riordan
Another of the Percy Jackson books. By this point in the series, I mostly kept reading because I wanted to see the series through. I didn’t love these books, but they were enjoyable, with the right mix of formula and surprise.

The Last Olympian, by Rick Riordan
The final book in the series, this one actually worked a bit better for me than the ones that came before it, though I suppose that’s often the case with series. While I liked the ending, I also felt that the author left a lot open (for a new series), and that was a little frustrating, to finish the series and realize there’s still more coming. There were things I wanted to know, relationships I wanted to see develop, but I’m not sure I want to invest in a second series.

November

I began November with the idea that I’d try National Novel Writing Month. I started out strong, despite all the world I was balancing, but then a few books came out I wanted to read, and two video games came out I wanted to play, and I came down with some sort of sickness, so I let the story go. I tried fantasy this year, wanting something different and fun, and while what I produced was crap, I think there are some seeds there that I could come back to later, if I ever chose. Beyond NaNo, the month continued to be good. The holidays were laid back but with good food, and I had winter break to look forward to.

The Alloy of Law, by Brandon Sanderson
This book takes place in the Mistborn universe, but a few hundred years later. Technology has finally started advancing, giving the book a fantasy-Western feel. I don’t normally like Westerns, but this book worked for me. I didn’t enjoy it as much as the Mistborn trilogy, but I did still tear through it. It goes without saying when it’s Brandon Sanderson, but the book was surprising and I’m anxious to see what happens next to the characters.

Inheritance, by Christopher Paolini
I’m not really sure what to say about this. I’m horribly glad that Arya and Eragon didn’t end up together (though I wasn’t a fan of the little bit the book did allow between them), but I didn’t like this book. The pacing felt wrong. The final confrontation was so short, to the point where I was sure something else had to happen…but then it didn’t. Nasuada, though, really pissed me off. I think the reader is supposed to go with her on her decision to control mages, but it seems like such a horrible decision to me. I wonder, too, if Paolini is planning on writing more in this world, because there were some things that seemed open for that. The one part I did love, though, was the section from Saphira’s POV. Very cool.

Q Road, by Bonnie Jo Campbell
I picked this up at my local bookstore for three reasons. First, she has blurbed another book I loved, and so I recognized her name. Second, she’s a Michigan author who employs place heavily in her writing, something I never do. Third, the book was signed. I’m so glad I picked it up. The characters were engaging and sympathetic and complex and flawed. The setting often seemed like its own character. I also loved how the entire book took place over the course of one day (with some flashbacks), because I love the idea of telling stories condensed in time.

Road Song, by Natalie Kusz
This is a memoir written by one of my professors at EWU, and while I had every intention of reading this book (and all the other books my professors wrote) before going to grad school, I find I still haven’t gotten around to some of them. My mom, however, had read this one, and she loved it, so I picked it up. What I loved most about this book is the how Kusz asks for no pity or and little sympathy from her readers. That’s not to say that I never did feel sympathy for the characters, but her main purpose was clearly to tell her story in an honest way, and as a reader I really appreciated it. I couldn’t relate to the lives lived by her family members, but I could relate to their characters, even while she showed them as so different and original. These are things I struggle with in my nonfiction, so it’s nice to have this book as a model.

Four for a Quarter, by Michael Martone
I’m not going to say a lot about this book, since I reviewed it for the Collagist (forthcoming in May 2012). What I will say, though, is that this book is original and that it asks a lot from its readers. If you like to read the work of an author who plays with things (form, language, etc.) this is a book for you.

December

December was a bit of a strange month. It started with a whirwind’s pace but then, after I turned in the final grades, there was nothing for me to do. It was the first time in months that I hadn’t done anything for work, and it made me realize that I need to get better at managing my time. It’s not that I didn’t get things done during the fall, it’s just that I spread them out to the point where I was doing something for work every single day. So I took the second half of this month to relax. I submitted some stories for publication. I finished some books I’d been working on for a long time. I even took a day to play some soccer. The holidays were nice, too, full of good food and family. I also made (and helped consume) twelve dozen cookies. I didn’t really get out much this month, but what I really wanted (and needed) was just some quiet time to myself, and that’s exactly what I got to finish up my year.

Behemoth, by Scott Westerfeld
The second book in this steampunk trilogy, I enjoyed this one more than the second—due, I think, to my new understanding of the genre. I like the direction this story is moving, and while I think I know how it’s going to end, I can’t yet see how we’re going to get there, so that’s exciting.

Room, by Emma Donoghue
Emma Donoghue came recommended to me by an old high school friend who now works at the local bookstore. It’s perhaps the best recommendation I’ve ever gotten in my life. This book was fantastic. I would pick it up at night, planning to read one chapter, but two hours later, I’d be one hundred pages in. It just sucked me in and held me fast. You must read this book.

New Spring, by Robert Jordan
The prequel (one of three intended but the only one ever written) to the Wheel of Time, this book was a reread for me. The final book in the Wheel of Time comes out later this year (most likely), and so I had ideas of rereading the whole series and decided to do a chronological read instead of a publishing order lead (I think New Spring came out after book 10 in the series). Not much to say about it except that it’s a fun, fast read, and that I love seeing so many of my favorite characters in a new and younger light.

And that’s it for now. I’ll do one final post detailing my favorite reads of the year, my stats, and my goals for 2012 (which I’m already behind at).

For fun, and because I’ve been spending a lot of time lately thinking about all the places I’ve been these last few years.

1. “Into the Airwaves,” by Jack’s Mannequin. Makes me think of sitting on the floor in my first apartment watching someone try to fix my computer. I’ve always been drawn to the evocative quality of his first album. One song on it has inspired two (totally different) short stories, though at least for the moment, this one brings back the strongest memory—though I’m not entirely convinced the memory is real the same way it is in my head.

2. “All These Things that I’ve Done,” by The Killers. I love this song, and this song brings back lots of small happy moments (more impressions really), but it also brings back one very sad one. My second party while I was in Spokane, I helped pick a song, then turned down an invitation, and had one hell of a bad night.

3. Wicked, by Gregory Maguire. I’ve read this book a few times, and I loved it. In graduate school, however, in front of the professor I most respected and wanted to impress, I named this as the best book in the past twenty years—not because I thought it was a great answer, but because it was the only work of literary quality I’d read from the past twenty years. Since then, I’ve made a real effort to keep up with modern literature. I’m rereading this book now, and I’m hoping that it’s sparkle doesn’t dim for me, but so far it’s only good, not great.

4. Cold days, when the heating vents turn on in the morning. Our dog Jack used to love when the vents came on, and he’d run over and curl up over top of the vent. That in turn always reminded me of when I was a little girl and would do the same thing while my dad got my breakfast (Cheerios with brown sugar) ready for me.

5. Morrill Hall. I once spent a fall afternoon wandering around campus with a camera and a friend, and he took some cool pictures of me on the steps of Morrill Hall. Art, beauty, friendship—and now I hear they’re going to tear the building down.

6. Girls to the Rescue, by Bruce Lansky. I’m not even sure I still own a copy of this book of fairy tales (all of which have the females as heroines rather than damsels in distress), but I still think of it from time to time—and whenever I hear the word persnickety. I took this book to an MSU football game once, and it poured, and I tucked myself completely under my poncho and ate a bag on M&Ms while I read this book.

7. My senior year varsity soccer sweatshirt. And it’s not for the reasons you might think. I left this sweatshirt at the home of this guy I liked (though to this day I can’t tell you what I saw in him beyond someone else to help keep me as down on myself as possible), and after I finally broke away from his abusive attitude, I gave up on ever getting it back. And then one day it was left at my work for me. Then, a few months later, a friend of mine mentioned this guy in the context of having seen my ex-boyfriend, and I flipped out. I still can’t look at the sweatshirt, and I swear it still smells a bit like that house, but I’ve hidden it away against the day that it brings the good memories of soccer success again.

8. Long stretches of highway vanishing into the horizon. While I was in Spokane, feeling so very alone, I used to think that if I only had the guts, I could take the highway all the way home.

Read part I here.

April

April was not a good month, but I’ll start with the good things. I started my new position with the State, and I took a trip to Florida to visit my cousin, Erin. We spent a few days at Disney World, and we went to the beach and the zoo. But my last full day there, I got a phone call from my parents telling me that my dog, Jack, had died. My parents found him dead in his bed in the morning. Then, at the end of the month, my dad needed surgery for cancer that had been diagnosed earlier in the year. The bright light at the end of the tunnel, however, was that we brought home a new dog, Molly. My dad wasn’t ready for a new dog, but we asked him while he was…um…slightly out of it in the hospital. So that’s how we got Molly.

Suicide, by Edouard Levé
I read a review copy of this book, and you can find my review online here, so I’ll be succinct. Loved the book. Also, this was another book I read in translation this year (from the original French).

Cross My Heart and Hope to Spy, by Ally Carter
This is the second book in the Gallagher Girls series, and I brought it with me to Florida as my fun read. This book did suffer from a bit of the sophomore book syndrome (did I just coin a new phrase?), but it was still fun and exciting, and I liked getting to know Cammie and her friends even better.

My Happy Life, by Lydia Millet
I’d read one of Millet’s short story collections in 2010 and really enjoyed it, and so this was the second book I picked up by her. We’d run an interview with her in Willow Springs, and I was really intrigued by the premise behind this book: that of a character who is happy despite all the bad (horrible) things that have happened to her. It’s a quick read, but very captivating, even when you’re unsure whether you really should be enjoying it, because some really awful things happen to the narrator. I’m probably not making a good sell here, but this was yet another fantastic book I read this year.

The Gathering Storm, by Brandon Sanderson and Robert Jordan
This is a reread, and I can’t remember now why I picked this particular book up (you know, out of the dozen or so others in the series; I’ve lost count). It’s got a few flaws from what I think was a bit of a rushed production schedule, but after complaints that the previous five or so books had been slow, this one really picked up the pace, and it was exciting to read it again, knowing what was going to happen.

Don’t Judge a Girl By Her Cover, by Ally Carter
The third book in the Gallagher Girls series, and still good. If I remember correctly, I liked this one a bit more than the second one, but not as much as the first.

May

May was when I made a big decision. It was to the point where I knew I didn’t want to stay at my job forever, and in May I decided that I would go to France in 2012, which meant I had a countdown to get me through the longer days. I started doing a lot of research, and I recommitted myself to learning the language. Other than that, not much happened this month.

Mistborn: The Final Empire, by Brandon Sanderson
This was another reread for me this year (in a year I didn’t do too many rereads). I recommended the series to my dad and my sister, and I felt left out watching them read it. It was amazing to me, too, how much of this I’d forgotten (though I suppose I shouldn’t have been surprised, because I really don’t retain too much on a first read of anything), so it was almost as exciting to reread as it was to go through it the first time.

Only the Good Spy Young, by Ally Carter
The fourth book in the Gallagher Girls series, this one started to feel a bit flatter to me. It was still good, still enjoyable, but I wasn’t quite sure with the direction it was going in. The fifth book comes out later this year, and I will probably try a reread before then, so I’m curious to see what I think then.

The Artist in the Office: How to Survive and Thrive Seven Days a Week, by Summer Pierre
I saw this on a friend’s Goodreads list, and I’d been feeling confined in my cubicle job. All those months at the state made me realize that I am not someone who is cut out for a nine to five desk job. There were a lot of good ideas in this book—and it’s not just geared to the people who have the soul-draining cubicle jobs. I plan on continuing to use these ideas as an outlet for the artsy genes in my body. ‘Cause, you know, writing doesn’t do that…

Island of the Blue Dolphins, by Scott O’Dell
I found this book in one of my boxes and decided to pick it up. I’ve read it before, probably more than once, but it’s probably been fifteen years since I last picked it up (it’s one of my Day Zero goals to reread 10 books from my childhood). I remember really liking this book as a kid but now, despite my love of YA, I found it just okay.

Mistborn: The Well of Ascension, by Brandon Sanderson
The second book in the Mistborn trilogy. This was also a reread, and I enjoyed it just as much the second time as the first time.

June

June saw me really diving into my French and looking for new jobs. We were remodeling at work, and toward the end of the month, I was moved to a hallway desk. Other than work, this was the month when my second book review was published, and not much else happened.

Wintergirls, by Laurie Halse Anderson
After loving Speak, I went back and bought another book by the same author. This one deals with eating disorders, something I’ve never had experience with but know a bit about. This book felt very real, and it was another book that I just tore through. I don’t want to say much more about it (don’t want to give anything away), but the obsessiveness captured in the book felt spot on, and it was nice to see it explored.

Drown, by Junot Diaz
This book came recommended to me by a girl I went to grad school with. I’d read another book by Diaz and thought, why not? All in all, though, I only liked this book, and, to be honest, I was even a bit disappointed. Perhaps that was because I expected so much from it (I adored The Brief and Wondrous Life of Oscar Wao), but these stories didn’t really stick with me much past putting the book down. I’d like to give it another try at some point, but not yet.

Towers of Midnight, by Robert Jordan and Brandon Sanderson
The penultimate book in the Wheel of Time, this was a reread. I won’t say too much about it here because I think I wrote a fair bit about it last year, but it really sets the stage for A Memory of Light, set to be released last this year.

Jacob Wonderbar and the Cosmic Space Kapow, by Nathan Bransford
I bought this book because the author, Nathan Bransford, writes a blog that I just love, and having said that, this book didn’t disappoint. It’s a middle grade novel, which isn’t really my thing, but I found this to be a fun little book—entertaining, the right mix of predictability and surprise for this level, and with intriguing characters. I believe it’s the first in a series, and I’m looking forward to reading any that come out.

July

The best thing that happened in July was getting the interview (and then job) at Michigan State. When I accepted the job, I was also fairly late in the interview process at TechSmith as well, so even before I took the teaching job, I was pretty sure my time at the State was limited. The second best thing that happened this month was the release of Deathly Hallows Part II, which maybe seems pretty silly, but I’ve loved those books and those movies, and it was so strange to see one of them for the last first time. My whole family did a double header (parts one and two starting at nine), and my mom, sister, and I spent half the day waiting in line, enjoying the moment with other fans. The bad news this month was that my mom started to have back pain, though at this point we still thought it would go away. Finally, it was July when I started reading for Hayden’s Ferry Review.

The Nine Senses, by Melissa Kwasny
This book marks the first book of poetry I’ve ever read. I’ve never really understood poetry, but ever since my work on Willow Springs, I’ve been making an effort to learn. As such, I hesitate to give my thoughts on this book, because poetry still isn’t really my thing. The collection came highly recommended to me, but it’s so different than the poetry I read in high school English classes—poetry I wasn’t asked to enjoy but to dissect. I found the collection okay, but I don’t know if I would have finished it had reading poetry not been on my Day Zero list.

The Next Queen of Heaven, by Gregory Maguire
This book is one of the reasons I didn’t finish that many books in June. I really struggled to get through this one. I bought it because I loved Wicked, but I should have known just from reading the back that it wouldn’t be my thing. It’s got that quirkiness problem, and so much just felt overdone. This book really made me wonder, too, if I would still like Wicked on a reread. It’s never a good sign when a book gives you those thoughts.

Shadow’s Edge, by Brent Weeks
This is the second book in a trilogy that my sister enjoyed and recommended to me, though she did have a few things to warn me about. I liked the first book (it’s on last year’s list), but I agreed with my sister about some of the problems. Unfortunately, this book didn’t do much to advance the things I enjoyed and instead did more with all the elements I had problems with—unsympathetic female (and many male) characters, excessive sexual punishment for women, etc. I’ll probably read the third book just to finish the trilogy, but I’m not expecting much at this point.

The Financial Lives of the Poets, by Jess Walter
I’ve met Jess Walter and read his work, and I must say that he never disappoints. I especially love authors who (1) have the courage to write about current events in their fiction (it can date the work, after all) and (2) who can write about big issues and problems in such a way that the work doesn’t become didactic or propaganda. Jess Walter succeeded in both these areas, and I always love studying his work, because those are elements I’d like to introduce to my own writing. This book deals with the economic crisis, and I highly recommend it.

I think I’ll leave it there for now. I’ll start with August next post.

For 2011—a year without school for the first time in twenty-one years—I bumped my goal back up to 52 books and 20,000 pages. I hit the first goal (57 books), but I missed my page goal by quite a bit, for the first time in years (only hit 18,932). This will probably take a series of posts, but I’ll go month by month and then finish up with a general overview of the year. So. Here we go.

January

January found me still working at the State of Michigan, though I mostly kept to myself, especially after they forgot to invite me to the Christmas party (then I got scolded for not making an appearance) and then left me out of the secret santa exchange. This is also the month that I really started reaffirming my commitment to writing. I took some time off after grad school (my advisor wasn’t wrong about there being burnout after twenty-one years of school), but the new year felt like a good time to get back into it, and so I started 100 Days of Writing—a project where I tried to write 100 out of 110 days. The month was good for writing, but even better for reading. I got through nine books.

Cathedral, by Raymond Carver
Carver is hit or miss with me, but this book was mostly miss. The only story I remember from it now, a year later, is the title story, and I’d read that one before. There’s something really beautiful about this idea of these two men sitting there and drawing, but the execution falls flat for me. And now, I suppose the hate mail begins for me.

The Hunger Games, by Suzanne Collins
This was a reread and, to be honest, I only waited a few hours after the ball dropped to restart it. Reading the book in a new year meant I could count it again, and even though I’d only first read it three months before, I couldn’t wait to get back to it. And just like the first time I read it, I loved it. I’ll be reading the book again this year, too, though not until right before the movie comes out in March.

The Particular Sadness of Lemon Cake, by Aimee Bender
We read Aimee Bender in grad school, and I liked her but didn’t love her. I used to love quirkiness in the books I read, but as I matured as a writer, I became more and more suspicious of it. Now I have to see a real reason for it in a story, I have to feel that the story would not function without it—and Bender doesn’t always fit those requirements. But this story worked for me—or, most of it did anyway. The last quarter of the book felt flat, like it made some moves that weren’t quite the right ones. Looking back, though, I couldn’t tell you what the right moves would have been (for me), which makes me think that the problem for me actually stemmed from somewhere earlier in the book, probably with the romantic subplot.

The Diary of a Young Girl, by Anne Frank
I can’t remember why I wanted to reread this book (I feel like something happened that made me seek this book out from one of my boxes, but I can’t remember what). The fact that this is a diary unedited by the author herself makes it hard to evaluate like I do the rest of this list, so I really don’t have much to say about it.

Catching Fire, by Suzanne Collins
The sequel to Hunger Games, this book was also a reread, and still spectacular.

The Gremlins of Grammar, by Toni Boyle and K.D. Sullivan
I read this book at work. It was given to me by a coworker in a stack of books I could read when I ran out of things to do. So I got through this book in a relatively short time. Our tax dollars at work, huh? As far as grammar books go, this one was okay. A bit outdated, and I didn’t agree with all the information, but there was a nice section about word usage that I enjoyed.

Jesus’ Son, by Denis Johnson
This was the year of short story collections for me. What I liked about this collection was its darkness. I always say that it’s the writer’s job to notice and give voice to the ugly rather than to look away like so many people do, and Johnson does this exceptionally well. This wasn’t in my top three story collections of the year, but I still enjoyed it.

Her Fearful Symmetry, by Audrey Niffenegger
I first read The Time Traveler’s Wife years ago and I really enjoyed it, and so while I wasn’t super excited to read this book, I was looking forward to it. That’s sort of how I felt when I finished the  book, too: It was good, but not great. The supernatural elements worked for me, but the way the author used plot twists often had me more focused on figuring those out than enjoying the story. The ending, too, didn’t quite satisfy me.

Mockingjay, by Suzanne Collins
Another reread, and, like the first two books in this trilogy, I loved it. The ending, which many fans found disappointing, felt even more right to me on this second read.

February

Not too much happened this month. I started writing more at work, and kept up the extra writing at home. I also played some soccer, though I think I’d been doing that for a few months at this point. I think the only other interesting thing I did this month was attend a Hard Lessons concert with Marilyn.

Cleopatra: A Life, by Stacy Schiff
This was the first book I went out and bought with my Christmas gift cards. The cover of this book is super eye catching, but what really drew me to the book was the idea of Cleopatra herself. I’ve never felt comfortable with the image of Cleopatra as the cruel seductress, the she-devil, who manipulated and ruined great men. This book sought to specifically refute those myths with extensive research. If I remember correctly (too lazy to go get the book from downstairs), Schiff used sources as close to Cleopatra’s time as possible, and she also explored the various biases present in the sources.

Willow Springs 67, edited by Samuel Ligon
I’m biased, obviously, so you’ll just have to take my word for it that this issue was great—it also happened to be the last issue that I had anything to do with. I really liked the Dawn Raffel shorts, as well as all three of the fiction pieces.

Leviathan, by Scott Westerfeld
It’s hard for me to evaluate this book accurately. This is the first book of steampunk I’ve ever read, and I didn’t know what it was when I started the book (or even that the book was steampunk). Therefore, I spent most of the book thinking that it was set in the future when, in fact, it’s set in the past. Knowing this ahead of time would have helped me understand more of the book and would have probably helped me enjoy it more. That said, I liked the female main character, and I liked the exploration of gender roles in the book.

I’d Tell You I Love You, But Then I’d Have to Kill You, by Ally Carter
This is never a book I’d have picked up by myself, but I read the blog of the agent who sold this book, and I love the blog. So, when I saw the book in the bookstore, I picked it up and gave it a try. Much to my surprise, I loved it and read it almost straight through in one sitting. It’s a boarding school book, which has been done, but what makes this book a lot of fun is where it went out of the mold: an all girls school for spies, the difficulties of living a double life, the decision between wanting to be a normal girl and an exceptional one, etc.

Speak, by Laurie Halse Anderson
I picked this book up from my shelf after a controversy erupted online over darkness in young adult literature. This book was one of those in the line of fire, and I was so angry over people saying that young readers shouldn’t be exposed to difficult themes (such as rape, suicide, self injury, death, violence, etc.), that I picked this book up. I only meant to read a chapter or two, but I stayed up half the night to finish it.

The Elegance of the Hedgehog, by Muriel Barbery
My dad heard about this book (on the radio, I think) and brought it home for me. Apparently Barbery has met with quite a bit of success in France (this is a book in translation), and now she’s having similar success here, if judging by the fact that the book often has the book displayed with the cover facing front. Anyway, that’s an aside. This book was fantastic. I loved the French setting, the interweaving stories of the two main characters—even the ending, which I won’t go into here, because I’m recommending that you all go out and buy this now.

March

March wasn’t much of a fun month. My sister and I watched my parents’ house while they went to Hawaii (and got hit by the tidal wave from the Japanese earthquake). Then, when they got back, we took our toy fox terrier in to get his rabies shot, and he reacted poorly to the shot and needed to be rushed to the vet after he collapsed. He spent the end of the month in this tiny little glass cage at the vets (he needed oxygen). This was also the month, right at the end, where they almost laid me off at my job but then offered me a position in another area where I would be writing for the MEAP test.

How They Were Found, by Matt Bell
Matt Bell is, to put it simply, awesome. We edited him at Willow Springs, and I read a chapbook by him last year. He was even the editor who worked with me on my first published piece of writing (a book review). None of that, however, should be seen as the reason for me raving about this story collection. From the first story (The Cartographer’s Girl) to the final (An Index of How Our Family Was Killed), these stories grab hold of you and don’t let go. And, as an added bonus for people living in Michigan, buy this book and you’ll be supporting a local author.

Percy Jackson and the Lightning Thief, by Rick Riordan
My sister really enjoyed this series, and she’d been recommending it to me for a while. She really likes the mythology aspect of the series, and that’s always something I’ve been interested in as well. The book wasn’t great, but it was good, and original enough to keep my interest. The character of Annabeth was especially intriguing to me.

You Know When the Men Are Gone, by Siobhan Fallon
Another story collection. I kept seeing this title at the bookstore, and I’d recently seen it featured on one of my bookstore mailing lists. The idea behind the collection—the stories take place around the idea of families being split through deployment—really intrigued me. Most take place on the base itself, but the narrowness here is not repeated in the ideas explored during the stories. Each one does something new, and they all shine. This was my favorite collection of the year, and I highly recommend it.

I’ve got less than eleven months left on my Day Zero project, and I’m only a bit over halfway done. So now I ask you, dear reader, to help me out. Here are some goals I still see as possible, with some help.

• go to NYC (who can I visit?)
• learn a new song on guitar (what’s an easy song?)
• go ice skating (who wants to go with me?)
• take a yoga class (who wants to take one with me?)
• go horseback riding (who has a horse?)
• play kickball (who wants to help me start a team for this summer’s league?)
• go sledding (who has a sled?)
• host a wine and cheese party (who wants to come?)
• visit three museums (suggestions?)
• go to a Detroit sporting event (who wants to come? I’m thinking Tigers.)
• go swimming in a lake (who wants to come?)
• play poker at a casino (who wants to come with me?)

So. Any takers?

I sit here on New Year’s Eve, listening to music from ten years ago and debating whether or not I should wear my nice black shoes to my family’s Christmas today. We usually have the Hemond Christmas between Christmas and New Years, but this feels so late. I’ve already moved past the holidays, preparing myself for a new year. There are only a few things I have left to do before the clock strikes midnight tonight, and I’m ready to put this year to bed.

It’s been a year of extremes. We had cancer, back surgery, and Bell’s Palsy just in my immediate family this year. Our dog died. I spent half the year with insomnia so extreme it wasn’t uncommon for me to miss an entire night’s sleep. But I also got a new job at the university, published my second piece of writing, and rejoined the halls of literary journal editing. I started coaching a soccer team of eleven-year-old girls. My sister graduated.

But there are holes, too, in my experience, as there always are: friends who went unseen yet again, plans that fell apart or that never fully formed, possibilities left behind, choices made that so fully exclude others. Things left undone, and there aren’t enough hours left now.

I’m not big on making resolutions; I’ve never understood why the turn of the calendar should be the prompt, but here I am today, using the same coming occurrence to look back, to plan forward.

2012 will be many things. I will complete my first year with Michigan State University. I will turn twenty-eight. I will attend my ten-year high school reunion. And there are other things that I hope for: to become published (fiction this time), to finally move into my own apartment, to be kept on at MSU with a full teaching load, to travel back to France and learn to speak the language well enough to not need English while I’m there.

And now I’m listening to What Sarah Said, and it all feels so appropriate.

Perhaps it’s the weather, or the holidays, or genetics, or one of a thousand other things, but I always get a bit melancholy at this time of year. Reflection can do that I think, and for me, planning can, too. If I did set a resolution this year it might be to become a better planner. Not better at making plans, but better at letting them go, at making new ones, at thinking on my feet when things take a turn.

It’s hard being back in my hometown now, feeling as if I’ve changed so much and yet so much around me is the same. I’d have never guessed, five or ten years ago, that I would be someone uncomfortable with comfort. I remember sitting in the car with a boyfriend once, maybe nine years ago, talking about that awful John Mayer song and debating comfort. But even then I said I wanted something more. It’s funny how even in change, some things stay the same, simply maturing, blossoming.

Now I leave, to go spend a few more hours inside this year. I will try to finish some of those things I’ve left undone: I will deliver my final Christmas gift, I will try to finish reading another book (Rivethead), I will read more story submissions. I will think on all the things I haven’t done: phone calls I haven’t made, things I haven’t said, stories I haven’t finished writing. So much, so much unfinished. Some, I will do in 2012, some I will try to push into the back corner of my closet and forget about, to be packed in boxes and taken with me wherever I go, until I finally forget, or find the courage to do.

May 2012 be a year of many blessings for you. May the stumbling blocks be ones you can climb over, teaching you important lessons as you do so. May there be smiles and laughter. And may we all find the strength to do those difficult things, or to let them go. Happy New Year, everyone.