How to Read Twilight

Stephanie Meyer needs an editor. I contend that a writer gets one free “career” use of the term “smoldering eyes,” but Meyer uses the verb at least five times, just in Twilight. (One of my close associates refers to this as “Cobalt Blue” writing) Don’t get me started on her lazy and tedious obsession with gazes, eyes, and smiles. In a 498-page novel, there are 294 mentions of “eyes,” at least 31 gazes, and 184 mentions of smiling characters.

It’s enough to make an MFA’s eyes fill up with tears, as she collapses sobbing into her unpublished, but smoldering, manuscript.

Of course, my husband and I are reading the book aloud to each other anyway. While individually, our tastes skew to concept sci-fi and literary fiction, our collective taste tends toward middle-brow genre novels featuring vampires, medieval fantasy, or other stuff written for teenagers.

Thanks for the Support

When I decided to write a piece about my decision to have a preventative mastectomy I never imagined it would generate so much response. Over the last few days, I’ve received dozens of emails from readers in similar situations, notes of support from other women who’ve undergone the procedure, and tips about what to have on hand after surgery — a stack of videos, projects, and most importantly, button down pajamas. Friends, relatives, and associates came out of the woodwork to share personal stories about their own, or their families’ struggle with cancer. I feel really well-supported — thanks to everyone for all their notes, comments, and other messages.

Lizzie Flashes: Superlative Exercise

“The Nicest Kid in the Universe,” is a parable about Franky Gorky, the titular child, for although he is the “nicest” kid, “he wasn’t the smartest kid.” Because Gorky isn’t smart, he doesn’t realize that the moon waxes and wanes on its own; he believes that his wishes are responsible for this,  a fact which leads him to run across the street on Christmas morning as his grandmother is parking across the street, and get “rubbed out” by a drunk driver.  The story ends with the introduction of a first person narrator and a moral, as if it has been told to frighten a child into good behavior.

I’m 27 and about to have a double mastectomy

Even though I’m a healthy 27-year-old woman right now, I’m going to have both my breasts removed as a preventative measure because I’m a member of a very exclusive club: Like one out of 1,000 women, I have a genetic mutation that dramatically ups my chance of cancer. My gene — called the BRCA1 gene — gives me a 40 percent to 85 percent lifetime risk of developing breast cancer, and a risk of ovarian cancer that is 30 percent to 70 percent higher than women who do not have this gene, according to the Mayo Clinic.

Ethan Gilsdorf on Gamer Shame

When I spoke to Ethan Gilsdorf about his new book, Fantasy Freaks and Gaming Geeks, we couldn’t seem to get away from the idea of gamer shame. Basically, many gamers feel guilty and ashamed of their obsession with LARP, World of Warcraft, etc.

In my own research on LARP, I’ve encountered a couple cases of gamer shame — a long-time LARPer who hides his hobby from friends he’s known for years, for fear of ridicule; a woman who doesn’t want people at her office to find out about her weekends in the woods, because LARP is hard to explain and at first blush, sounds like a child-like past time; gamers who treat other forms of nerdularity — massive multiplayer online games, Cosplay, and Rennaisance Faires — with ridicule.

Lizzie Flashes: The Neighborhood

My response to last week’s “Restrained Impulse” exercise is below. I have to say, I’m not sure I hewed as close to the exercise as I could have. I wanted to present the story of a gang flunky who couldn’t keep from laughing as a way of replicating Robert Hill Long’s dynamic of a small girl who couldn’t keep from dancing. A flaw in the story, I think, is that my main character doesn’t have a strong relationship with a single person, as Long’s girl does with her father. He also feels a little generic to me

Lizzie Stark