I'm back!

So, I haven't updated in ages. Mostly, life has been crazy and I didn't want to stress out... Plus, apparently, planning a wedding takes up all of your free time =)

Anyway, I'm back in Santiago, feeling healthy, and normal (well, as normal as I'll ever be =P), and sane.... and also very very happy =) I don't want to jinx anything, but, coming back from England, everything has just been... Well, PERFECT.

A LOT of good things have been happening this year... and even this month, so I'm choosing to focus on that instead of on the bad things (like my poor fiancé getting intoxicated and in the E.R =(). Some of the good things:

1) The AWESOME trip I won at the ESU English Writing Competition: it not only allowed me to see England and meet a bunch of nice people and see a lot of cool places, it also allowed Mauri and me to have the PERFECT early honey moon in England and Ireland =)

2) The fact that we won Gardner Hamilton's Cost-Price Wedding Photography Contest. Gardner was the photographer at my sister's wedding, and we really wanted him bc he's so amazing, but couldn't afford it (we didn't even consider him bc he was so out of budget), so when I got to be his friend number 1000 on Facebook, it made our, like, year

3) Dave Matthews Band! I've always wanted to go to a DMB concert. It was in my top 5 "concerts I have to go to before I die" list. We couldn't afford VIP tickets, so we were in about the third section. However, due to my shortness and some nice guards, I ended up not only in VIP, but right at the front row, by the stage. Eventually, M. got there too, so it was just perfect =) (Also, right at the concert, I was able to buy the DMB t-shirt that I had saved as "order at some point")

4) Despite the no-work, I've had had some work: doing translations and helping my sis with some stuff... This has helped me to save some money for the wedding and has also allowed me to buy...

5) Pretty clothes!

Actually, the list goes on, but I'll stop it here =)

So anyway, yes, I've been remiss with the updating... But I AM planning on hopefully getting back on track.

In order to reopen the blog, I'm going to start by talking about my favorite thing in the world: Books!

Here are the books I've read since I last updated:

I was hoping to review this at some point, but now I don't know if I will =P

- Clockwork- Phillip Pullman: Scary, scary, dude. Also, the notion that the evil aren't always punished and the good aren't always rewarded, is quite refreshing in YA books.

- Frankenstein- Mary Shelley: Good, but dark and frustrating

- Nineteen-eighty-four – George Orwell: Yes, a classic... Yes, brilliant... But also no, not something you should read when you've been having a not-so-good-for-the-mental-health year

- Persuasion- Jane Austen: I love Jane's subtleties. This book is emotionally stirring without the effect-ism we find in current romance.

- Eat, Pray, Love- Elizabeth Gilbert: Changed my life! This book is the reason for my new-found chillness. I bought it at the airport with the idea that I would throw it away when getting to England, bc it was "So not my style", but it really really is something someone should read when they are overcoming a nervous breakdown :P

- The Poison Eaters- Holly Black: Holly Black is GOD. She knows how to mix wit, folklore, feelings and sex perfectly.

- Confessions of an Ugly Stepsister- Gregory Maguire: It's Maguire. 'Nuff said (ok, more specific: I love his aesthetic, I love how his books keep you surprised at every turn, I love how his characters navigate the gray of morality, etc etc). I told the story to my mom and she really enjoyed it and was all "Oh no!" and "I can't believe you!"

- The Forest of Hands and Teeth- Carrie Ryan: This book is AMAZING. Other than scaring me out of my wits and frustrating me to no end with... well, I won't spoiler. It is very well written, it made me cry, it is real, it has zombies, it has action, it has emotion... It's just an overall great read.

- The Graveyard Book- Neil Gaiman: This book is so cute that even my parents liked it =) (I would read it to them when coming back from the gym). It really is a nice, cheerful book, and a great way to chill after reading something like "1984"

- I also reread Wicked Lovely

Here are the books I bought in England and Ireland:

Dude! Books are so cheap over there! (Or, well, they are so expensive over here =P). Anyway, a lot of them are used. I went into this used bookstore were everything in the very disorderly basement was 1 pound. I got some awesome old editions.

- Peter Pan and other Plays- James M. Barrie: I am currently reading this one

- Peter Pan and Peter Pan in Kensington Gardens – James M. Barrie

- I, Lucifer- Glen Duncan: Has been on my TBR list forever!

- The book of fairy and folk tales of Ireland- W.B Yeats

- The Neverending Story- Michael Ende: Also from my TBR

- The Selected Poems of William Blake

- The Collected Poems of Emily Dickinson

- Ash- Malinda Lo: Will probably be my next read, as it is next in the Rathers Book Club

- Linger- Maggie Stiefvater: Also on my TBR

- Shiver- Maggie Stiefvater: Also on my TBR

- David Copperfield- Charles Dickens: Very pretty old edition

- Le Morte D’Arthur – Sir Thomas Malory: Also a very pretty two-volume edition

Book Gifts:

- I wanna be Your Joey Ramone- Stephanie Kuehnert: My good friend Aine sent me this book, AUTOGRAPHED, along with some other goodies =) It's been on my TBR list for a really really long time, so, Yay! Stephanie was the first (and only =P), author to participate in Razor Thoughts**

The Book of Witches- Tim Dedopulos: My sis Claudia sent me this for my B-day, and I've been reading it slowly. It has a lot of interesting bios from everyone from St. Germain to Willow from BtVS =)

That is all for now! =)

La Loca de La Casa by Rosa Montero

Three words: Read this NOW.

If you love literature, if you have ANYTHING to do with literature: as a reader, as a writer, as an editor, as someone who writes about writers, this book is highly recommended.

Part autobiography, part essay, part fiction, this book has enough twists and turns to get you hooked. I mean, it is not a novel, and yet you can’t put it down until you finish it.



Montero mixes parts of her own story (although you never know what, if anything, of what she is telling you is true), with the biography of great authors like Tolstoi, Stevenson, Marquez, Mary Shelley, Austen, and others, to speak about the act of writing, the act of reading, and the imagination that is necessary to do both things.

I can’t tell you how many times during the book I’ve (literally) cried out “Yes! That happens to me too!” Montero explains to us the passion for reading, she tells us why some writers never get around to writing their best work, she describes the fears of someone with too much imagination, the fickleness of memory, the uncertainty of reality, the difficulty that women authors face—and all of this with enough wit to make Oscar Wilde proud. There is enough food for thought in this short book to feed 10.000 conversations. In fact, you can probably feed a couple hundred on each chapter alone.

It’s hard to put all the wonders of this book into words, so I’m going to list a couple of the things Rosa says:

- Why is it that when a male author writes, everyone assumes he is saying something about humanity, but when a female author writes, everyone assumes she is saying something about women? Rosa complains about those people who believe there is such a thing as “female” literature. Gender is not the only thing that influences how someone writes. For example, she believes she has more in common with a man her age, living in Madrid, and who has lived under Franco, than with a black, South African, 80-year -old woman who has lived through the apartheid.

- Rosa talks about the fear of authors. How, on some days, you feel like everything you are writing is perfect, and then, on other days, you hate all you say and think you should have chosen a different career path. She says that many times authors don’t put their best work on paper: it stays in their head. While in their imagination, the story is perfect, it is the best, most enlightening work ever written. However, once you start putting it down on paper, you know you will screw it up. No matter how much you work, it will never be perfect. The fact that a novelist has to spend the whole afternoon just writing a person leaving a room makes the work clumsy. Suddenly, your lack of talent has tainted your masterpiece—and so, it takes much resolution and character to decide to write your best work.

There is much, much more in this book. I can’t possibly describe its awesomeness. I’ll just have to repeat what I said at the start: read it!!!