After plodding through a 2000+ pages long fantasy trilogy.
If anyone ever decides to write a fantasy novel, not very long, not a part of a cycle, not filled with heroes walking and talking about walking for so long, just a standalone purebred 300 pages long fantasy with a good story not diluted in pages and pages of nothing happening and real characters that bleed and feel pain when crashing through the window and a definite 'this is it' ending, well if anyone writes such book than let me know cause I'll miss it, buried under a pile of well established fantasy cycle writers populating Waterstone's shelves.
Yes, I still read fantasy trilogies, but I get weary sometimes halfway through.
A theory about hardcore fantasy readers - the genre suggests a well developed need for escapism, so probably they are so shy that when they eventually sneak out to top up on books, they are more than happy to get a brick-like cycle that will allow them not to leave the house for another month. And some authors happily provide more and more of such cycles.
Just to remind all the offended shy fantasy reades - I like to read it too, it's just that I got to the point when I treat any book with 'dragon ', 'mage', 'staff' or 'quest' in their title with suspicion. I don't want another ramblers guide through a land with
unpronouncable name with a group of stereotypical characters engaged in confusing sope-ish personal revelations pn a quest seeking magical staff guarded by a dragon, a 666 pages long book that will end in a cliffhanger, next part available in 2012...
If noone else is going to write a standalone purebred fantasy book soon - I will have to. Just to have something to read.
Sunday 25 October 2009
Friday 7 August 2009
Shades of Scottishness
Four years in Scotland today and I'm quite settled:
- I can read 'Trainspotting' without an English - Scots dictionary
- I don't expect rain to last long but I also don't expect a week without rain.
- I no longer expect instant hot water in a tap.
- I no longer expect just one tap.
- I don’t even turn my head if I hear Polish on the street.
- I can drink neat whisky.
- I rant, skive, get grumpy, get pished and have a blether.
Wonder what the next four years will bring...
- I can read 'Trainspotting' without an English - Scots dictionary
- I don't expect rain to last long but I also don't expect a week without rain.
- I no longer expect instant hot water in a tap.
- I no longer expect just one tap.
- I don’t even turn my head if I hear Polish on the street.
- I can drink neat whisky.
- I rant, skive, get grumpy, get pished and have a blether.
Wonder what the next four years will bring...
Tuesday 7 July 2009
I'm gonna live my life, everyday.
After reading a very unusual fantasy book.
Life is not about being a hero. Life is not about fame, adventures and valiant deeds. Nobody is ever alone no matter how lonely one feels. We are all linked in the intricate gobelin, but it’s the one that shows normal people at their everyday tasks not the one with an adventurer fighting a dragon. We talk and work and sleep and tire from too much and hunger for more and miss what’s lost and love and sing and live. There is magic in everyday, in getting along with people you never thought you will like, in surviving yet another betrayal and carrying on, in looking up from your pointless tolling and finding something worth living for. Like a morning mist shot through with rising sun. Like a smell of a herb garden at noon. Like a lover’s door opened just a crack at night. And the only heroism that matters is reaching for somebody we care for and picking them up from their knees when they fell, too tired to keep walking. Life is all about living, everyday.
Life is not about being a hero. Life is not about fame, adventures and valiant deeds. Nobody is ever alone no matter how lonely one feels. We are all linked in the intricate gobelin, but it’s the one that shows normal people at their everyday tasks not the one with an adventurer fighting a dragon. We talk and work and sleep and tire from too much and hunger for more and miss what’s lost and love and sing and live. There is magic in everyday, in getting along with people you never thought you will like, in surviving yet another betrayal and carrying on, in looking up from your pointless tolling and finding something worth living for. Like a morning mist shot through with rising sun. Like a smell of a herb garden at noon. Like a lover’s door opened just a crack at night. And the only heroism that matters is reaching for somebody we care for and picking them up from their knees when they fell, too tired to keep walking. Life is all about living, everyday.
Friday 1 May 2009
Welcome to my world, she said...
Everything seems to merge these days.
Towns only have visible boundaries on maps. People network online to the point where they become types not individuals. Books quote one another weaving together into subcontextual web.
Gamers want to get lost in their meticulously created characters. Movies come not even in trilogies but in cycles of sequels, prequels and spin-offs. Nowhere is far away. Nobody is ever alone. Nothing is separate from other things. Even milkshakes lose their flavours and end up as a chocolate-banana-strawbery mush.
I feel blurred at the edges...
Towns only have visible boundaries on maps. People network online to the point where they become types not individuals. Books quote one another weaving together into subcontextual web.
Gamers want to get lost in their meticulously created characters. Movies come not even in trilogies but in cycles of sequels, prequels and spin-offs. Nowhere is far away. Nobody is ever alone. Nothing is separate from other things. Even milkshakes lose their flavours and end up as a chocolate-banana-strawbery mush.
I feel blurred at the edges...
Tuesday 3 March 2009
Hey I Oh I'm Still Alive
If you never was the only one to notice a rainbow appear on the grey sky you never lived.
If you never spent your Saturday night on a sofa, watching movies, dozing and thinking "This is great!" you never lived.
If you never worked in McDonald's you never lived.
If you never had a box of chocolates with a bottle of white wine you never lived.
If you never run down the street, late for the bus but with a big grin on your face cause it's snowing you never lived.
If you never cried so hard that you couldn't breathe you never lived.
If you never woke up in the arms of someone you love you never lived.
If you never spent half of the Sunday evening looking for an open corner shop because you're chocolate cravings got out of control you never lived.
If you never tried to talk your escapee indoor cat from under the car you never lived.
(...to be continued)
If you never spent your Saturday night on a sofa, watching movies, dozing and thinking "This is great!" you never lived.
If you never worked in McDonald's you never lived.
If you never had a box of chocolates with a bottle of white wine you never lived.
If you never run down the street, late for the bus but with a big grin on your face cause it's snowing you never lived.
If you never cried so hard that you couldn't breathe you never lived.
If you never woke up in the arms of someone you love you never lived.
If you never spent half of the Sunday evening looking for an open corner shop because you're chocolate cravings got out of control you never lived.
If you never tried to talk your escapee indoor cat from under the car you never lived.
(...to be continued)
Sunday 1 March 2009
How do you like to travel?
After watching a strange and melancholic movie that compared a life to a train journey.
Is it really? How often do we meet weird strangers in our lives, how often do we have a chance to travel to a random place, how often do we fall asleep peacefully listening to a distant whistle of a train carrying us somewhere amazing, in safety? It’s more like a trip on a circular route bus. Same sights, same sounds, same stops, same people, same conversations... it's like getting on number 10 bus on the stop outside your house, greeting well known people, taking the same seat that's already took the shape of your backside, looking at the same views roll at the same pace outside, doing the same things you always do and finally falling asleep just to wake up on the same bus stop outside your house...
So, is there a way to break the routine before monotony kills the last shreds of your dreams already badly ripped by reality?
Change the bus to a car my imaginary reader and drive randomly, recklessly wherever your confused sense of direction takes you, taking all the strange looking hitchhikers with you. Or jump aboard the transsiberian and let it carry you to wherever the tracks go, meandering acres of wasteland between strange, wonderful places you never knew existed. Or get a dog sledge and let your dogs, who surely know where to go to find adventure, mystery and good camping spots, lead you, cracking the whip above their sleek backs just to keep appearances.
Metaphore is such a wondeful exercise in stretching your imagination.
Lett's buy a ticket to anywhere but here.
Is it really? How often do we meet weird strangers in our lives, how often do we have a chance to travel to a random place, how often do we fall asleep peacefully listening to a distant whistle of a train carrying us somewhere amazing, in safety? It’s more like a trip on a circular route bus. Same sights, same sounds, same stops, same people, same conversations... it's like getting on number 10 bus on the stop outside your house, greeting well known people, taking the same seat that's already took the shape of your backside, looking at the same views roll at the same pace outside, doing the same things you always do and finally falling asleep just to wake up on the same bus stop outside your house...
So, is there a way to break the routine before monotony kills the last shreds of your dreams already badly ripped by reality?
Change the bus to a car my imaginary reader and drive randomly, recklessly wherever your confused sense of direction takes you, taking all the strange looking hitchhikers with you. Or jump aboard the transsiberian and let it carry you to wherever the tracks go, meandering acres of wasteland between strange, wonderful places you never knew existed. Or get a dog sledge and let your dogs, who surely know where to go to find adventure, mystery and good camping spots, lead you, cracking the whip above their sleek backs just to keep appearances.
Metaphore is such a wondeful exercise in stretching your imagination.
Lett's buy a ticket to anywhere but here.
Thursday 12 February 2009
Cultural encounters.
After reading 'The Concise Chinese-English Dictionary for Lovers' (great title BTW)
Sometimes I miss being a freshly arrived immigrant who is so busy gathering information about the new country that has no time to worry about what might happen and what would have been. You really don't have time for introspections and any brain power left for deep emotions and feelings. You meet new people in new places using strange words in bizzare contexts, start a new job with its own jargon, have a network of public transport to master to get to work, move in a new house with some solutions that don't make sense cause you're used to them being different in your country andyou have to get used to these new ones, go shopping to find the familiar brands of food and deodorants under different names, try to register at GPs practice, tax office, university... It takes all your attention just to survive in the strange new world populated by people blathering in some vaguely englishlike language.
After a year you get used to the accent, inconprehensibility of bus routes and separate taps for cold and hot water and that's when you start to feel again and think about the future and worry. You get settled and concentrate on having a satisfying job, good social life
and a partner you care about. Emotions hit you again without the protective veil of constant amazement at simple things. You stop to think about yourself as an immigrant.
I understand people, who never get settled, just travel from country to country, year after year. You exchange the feeling of safety, comfort and stability for freedom, exploration and superficility. It sounds alluring sometimes. Other times it sounds scary. But it is a way to live.
Too late for me, I'm already settled, I'm a resident in a cold, rainy, northern land.
Sometimes I miss being a freshly arrived immigrant who is so busy gathering information about the new country that has no time to worry about what might happen and what would have been. You really don't have time for introspections and any brain power left for deep emotions and feelings. You meet new people in new places using strange words in bizzare contexts, start a new job with its own jargon, have a network of public transport to master to get to work, move in a new house with some solutions that don't make sense cause you're used to them being different in your country andyou have to get used to these new ones, go shopping to find the familiar brands of food and deodorants under different names, try to register at GPs practice, tax office, university... It takes all your attention just to survive in the strange new world populated by people blathering in some vaguely englishlike language.
After a year you get used to the accent, inconprehensibility of bus routes and separate taps for cold and hot water and that's when you start to feel again and think about the future and worry. You get settled and concentrate on having a satisfying job, good social life
and a partner you care about. Emotions hit you again without the protective veil of constant amazement at simple things. You stop to think about yourself as an immigrant.
I understand people, who never get settled, just travel from country to country, year after year. You exchange the feeling of safety, comfort and stability for freedom, exploration and superficility. It sounds alluring sometimes. Other times it sounds scary. But it is a way to live.
Too late for me, I'm already settled, I'm a resident in a cold, rainy, northern land.
Saturday 7 February 2009
You watch your whole life pass you by...
Do you have this feeling sometimes as well, imaginary reader? Like you are constantly standing on the sidewalk watching your own life race past you? Like you want to jump in at last but you’re to scared? Like you constantly struggle to catch up with yourself, so you just stop trying and have another lazy evening instead? And you end up thinking – if only I was faster, stronger, more determined I would, could, should, but I’m not. I’m... I’m not sure what I am actually...
We are so busy trying to find out who we are these days that we ignore the simplest fact - you are who you are and there’s not much you can do about it, really. But you are, at the same time, much more then you think you are. Confusing? Well, you don’t usually think about your lazy self too highly, do you? It’s always the If Only...
Close your eyes, take deep breath and try to fit in your own skin. It will itch, it will hurt, it will confuse the hell out of you to find out that deep inside, in the dozing part of your soul, you are faster, stronger and more determined than any imaginary you inhabiting the top layer of the same soul. You are perfectly able to jump in your own lifestream and have some fun before you drown in it.
Optimism is bad for you.
We are so busy trying to find out who we are these days that we ignore the simplest fact - you are who you are and there’s not much you can do about it, really. But you are, at the same time, much more then you think you are. Confusing? Well, you don’t usually think about your lazy self too highly, do you? It’s always the If Only...
Close your eyes, take deep breath and try to fit in your own skin. It will itch, it will hurt, it will confuse the hell out of you to find out that deep inside, in the dozing part of your soul, you are faster, stronger and more determined than any imaginary you inhabiting the top layer of the same soul. You are perfectly able to jump in your own lifestream and have some fun before you drown in it.
Optimism is bad for you.
Thursday 5 February 2009
Unbelievable rant.
Oh the irony of life - it's perceived as wrong to impose your beliefs on others but if you don't follow other people's beliefs they will avoid you.
The choice - be yourlonelyself or groupconformist. Both sound like the names of exotic diseases...
By the way - what's with all the people in GP's waiting rooms always sitting on every third chair from each other? Are beliefs contagious these days or is it just good old paranoia?
The choice - be yourlonelyself or groupconformist. Both sound like the names of exotic diseases...
By the way - what's with all the people in GP's waiting rooms always sitting on every third chair from each other? Are beliefs contagious these days or is it just good old paranoia?
Monday 26 January 2009
Survival instincts.
After reading a book about a boy shooting his high school bullies.
In a conflict between moral and instinctive behaviour, instincs always win. Morals are taught and imposed by society, instincts exist in the depths of our genetic memories. It doesn't have to be a fight for your life, maybe just lifestyle, status in a group, not losing your face in front of strangers. Would you lie to your boss to keep your job? Would you backstab a pal not to be excluded? Would you hit someone who would mock you?
It doesn't matter how full of the sense of right and wrong you think you are, when pushed too far, confronted with potentially threatening situation, scared, angry, depressed we will do anything to survive. Reach deep enough beneath the shiny black and white surface of acquired morals and behold the grey egoistic instinct of self preservation. It helps us deal with basic dangers that appeal to this egoistic basic beast.
Action and reaction. Do and win, ponder and die. Win and feel satisfied, lose and feel bad. Deep inside we are all simple creatures.
How moral is it anyway to impose group morality on everyone, if everybody's sense of right and wrong is slightly different, shaped on the greyness of your individual survival instincts..?
In a conflict between moral and instinctive behaviour, instincs always win. Morals are taught and imposed by society, instincts exist in the depths of our genetic memories. It doesn't have to be a fight for your life, maybe just lifestyle, status in a group, not losing your face in front of strangers. Would you lie to your boss to keep your job? Would you backstab a pal not to be excluded? Would you hit someone who would mock you?
It doesn't matter how full of the sense of right and wrong you think you are, when pushed too far, confronted with potentially threatening situation, scared, angry, depressed we will do anything to survive. Reach deep enough beneath the shiny black and white surface of acquired morals and behold the grey egoistic instinct of self preservation. It helps us deal with basic dangers that appeal to this egoistic basic beast.
Action and reaction. Do and win, ponder and die. Win and feel satisfied, lose and feel bad. Deep inside we are all simple creatures.
How moral is it anyway to impose group morality on everyone, if everybody's sense of right and wrong is slightly different, shaped on the greyness of your individual survival instincts..?
Sunday 11 January 2009
Who wants to live forever?
After watching a teenage vampire movie 'Twilight'.
Well, would it not be great to live forever, not be afraid of the certain uncertanity of death, be strong, fast and make your own morals?
Well... but you would also
I'll pass. And you my imaginary reader..?
Well, would it not be great to live forever, not be afraid of the certain uncertanity of death, be strong, fast and make your own morals?
Well... but you would also
- have no birthdays
- have no favourite local pub cause you would get suspicious looks after 30 years
- have no friends to get happy drunk on their birthdays cause they would all die
- probably wouldn't enjoy alcohol anyway
- or weed
- or sex
- or internet which is mostly about drunk/stoned people getting laid in interesting ways
- get stuck in your late teens (like in a movie) and have to go through the last year of high school over and over again like once wasn't bad enough
- get really pale and unhealthy looking and have to endure jokes about looking like living dead
- get obsessed with Ann Rice books
- be unable to travel abroad (security checks)
- be unable to go to the cinema to see vampire movies (too many clues)
- be unable to taste anything but blood and it's a pretty boring taste
I'll pass. And you my imaginary reader..?
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