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Monday, January 19, 2015

Update on Writing Life

I was driving home from church and realized it had been a long time since I'd just done a blog post updating people on my life and endeavors and what's going on with me. So I looked on my blog and lo and behold, it's been almost a whole year since I did one of those types of posts!

I guess that's because I've been doing pretty much the same thing for the last year. That, and I just have so many other posts about writing and reading and thoughts on life that I'd rather put up. But I know some of my followers follow me because they want to know what's going on with me, specifically.

Well, I'll be honest, a better place to find that info would be on my Facebook . . . but I've also become much less active on there too.

But that's because it's better for me to spend time on writing stuff when I'm at a computer!

Got some new pictures done for a Christmas Present.


Monday, January 12, 2015

Northern Lights, Daemons, and Soul Experiments: The Golden Compass

Is it Evil?



I've resisted reading Philip Pullman's The Golden Compass for years because of everything I've heard about it being "evil." Anti-Catholic, anti-religion, anti-God, anti-whatever. The author is a self-proclaimed atheist who I heard wanted to write a fantasy series that didn't deal with God and spirituality in the same way most fantasies do.

I should have known better than to let the fact that people said a book was "evil" to stop me. After all, most of my favorite books, like Harry Potter, Lord of the RingsThe Hunger Games, and heck, let's throw the Book of Mormon in there, have been considered "evil" by one group or another.

Then in my college YA lit class, we received a template for one of our assignments and the template used The Golden Compass for an example. And I read that in The Golden Compass, people's souls lived on the outside of their body in forms called daemons, and the template posed the question, "But what happens when people try to separate a soul from its body?" The concept blew my mind.

Should I read it? I shouldn't read it. Should I read it? I shouldn't read it. I didn't know if I wanted to support a book that was anti-religion and anti-God.

But I couldn't stop thinking about it. In fact, I dreamed about the book and concept all night, and a few nights thereafter. It sounded right up my alley.

Monday, January 5, 2015

Corny Quotes vs. Wise Quotes

Today's topic comes from my friend Michael. He says:

I like it when books have wise quotes that can apply to life in general. We all know them. Gandalf and Dumbledore have plenty. Have any of you put such quotes in your books? How has it turned out? I could imagine it turning out kind of obvious or corny if not done correctly?

I actually have thought a little about this topic. But I thought about it some more when I saw Michael's post, specifically about how quotes can become corny. I haven't come to a completely sound conclusion about how to write wise quotes the right way, but here are my thoughts so far.