Delirium

What would you do if love was forbidden and the state was deemed an illness requiring cure?

Lauren Oliver weaves a fast paced and exciting tale set in a world where Lena is awaiting her cure. Eagerly, hopefully and with trepidation. To experience love is to suffer from a delirium so great that pain becomes enjoyable, tears are a source of relief and exhilaration is welcome in all forms.

But to be in love is to be unhappy, to be in excruciating pain, to welcome death. The cure prevents all negative recourse from occurring, once cured Lena will be matched up with a suitable male and they will embark on a happy life free of any trauma or unexpected activity.

Lena has seen the horrific results of believing in love firsthand, her mother committed suicide when she was 9 because she suffered from a delirium so great. Thus with 90 days to her birthday, Lena awaits her review by the board and subsequent decisions that will set in motion the rest of her life - then she meets Alex and the idea of 'love' becomes a reality that leads her onto a new path.

Lauren Oliver has created an alternate reality that is incredibly believable. Lena and her foray into a dangerously heightened world will have readers hooked right to its strong ending that leaves so many questions unanswered.

Yes, unanswered. Don't read this book looking for answers, you'll discover some wonderful things, yet the answers found are to questions that were never asked. As for the questions that arise, well, I just hope there is a sequel in the wings.

Brilliant book!

4*s

Releases January 2nd 2011, read an excerpt here.

A New Kind of Curse

It's been a while. Apologies. Applause for returning to me.

I hate technology. Most days with fervour and other days with banal disdain. We're discussing mobiles, laptops and all that goes with and came after these.

I want to go back in time to when we had proper mail, no mobiles, no facebook - no internet. The world seems far too small for the amount of space it occupies. Fifty years ago it was exciting to climb the steps into a plane and travel to a land you knew vague information - now we explore the streets of our destination using google maps, sort through hotels and motels according to their star ratings on the web, work out a precise itinerary by looking up other peoples reviews of what they enjoyed and decide exactly which areas to avoid by reading an evaluation by someone else.

Sure, I see the pros in this: you won't get lost, you won't be afraid, you won't be anywhere you don't want to be. But how much of an experience is a holiday if its planned based on someone else's opinion? You can see where I'm going with this.

I guess the main defence in the mobile phone arena is safety. A mobile ensures access to help or aid if the need arises. But what about the games and apps and extras that are now a status symbol? If you don't have the latest phone or the latest app you just aren't cool enough. Bring out one of the original Nokias and Oh No! A Brick! How could you?! Why should the appearance matter if it allows you to make and receive calls?

But it does. Technology has become a whole new form of measuring your neighbours position in life. How much they earn, how tech savvy they are, how 'in the know' they are? We measure all these by looking at the phone they use to text, to phone, to play a game on, to surf the net on, how big their hard drive is - how much memory their little gadgets have.

Whatever, right? If you're shallow enough to judge then you deserve to be judged. To think the entire issue could have been avoided if technology was left at printing books. That I approve of.

While my reasons seem feeble to you (yes, you in the back) and not as well thought as you (yes, YOU) could have argued them, they form the basis for my general attitude to technology. It's all well and good when explained to me and simplified - it's all a little too extravagant for bits of metal in the general scheme of things.

I'll end this rant here and return to what I do best...

Voldy's Coming

How did I fall behind on posts? Perhaps it was the renovations or the first job or the second job or the essay.. maybe the tiredness of keeping it all up? One of those. All of those.

Things happen in threes I find. The roof leaks, the floors go in and the door is cut to size. They feed off one another to make a story. My essay is in similar waters at the moment. There are sources to be read, ideas to be formulated and words to be written.

Once we get from 'to be' to 'has been' progress is made and people - markers, builders, owners - are happy.

I'm raising a glass and saying my peice before I go away and write till I sneeze.

I'm a poet and I didn't even know it.

The Art of Public Speaking

Lately Ive been wondering about conversation topics. I read something somewhere and it was the general gist that people - friends, acquaintances, family - tend to discuss persons as opposed to ideas. This stems from a human desire to put others down or find fault in another while elevating themselves or those they favour to higher esteem.

I don't think people do it from a personal desire to be superior, it has just become the way we, as people interact with one another, everything has become a competition. I've been paying attention to conversation topics lately. I know my friends hate it when I conduct experiments without them realising, but its been an interesting experience I must say. For all the attempts we make to discuss an idea, or concept, it always comes back to applying them to a person of our acquaintance, or to one another. There isn't anything wrong with it. Well.. depends on who's making that statement.

My experiement wasn't blatant, nor was it directive- I merely observed. As usual, it was brilliant fodder for my mind. I've never been sure if it's trouble I like to create or satisfy a need to try something out and see the results. I suppose my wiring is a little faulty and perhaps some wires are cross-connected.

You will be glad - or dismayed- to know the experiment provided me with a second theory, which shall be shared somewhere further down the track once the relevant experiment has been conducted. What is it you ask? It's underway, whatever it is, and you shall be a lovely addition to the party.

I believe, and correct me if I am wrong, Oscar Wilde once said, "...the only thing worse than being talked about is not being talked about."

Sunshine

Robin McKinley wove a brilliant tale. She had vampires, an ambiguous heroine who till the (complicated) end remains unsure of where she fits in and a plot that conveyed much in its subtleties. I enjoyed it for reasons quite different to the usual vampire story.

The heroine wasn't the main protagonist, sure she existed and we saw things through her eyes but she was a narrator of someone else's story. I like that. Novels interest me largely for their differences - fiction keeps me coming back to it because I find new things to enjoy in each book.

M held a lovely High Tea ceremony in honour of her 23rd birthday today. It was to be held at a mystery location that all the guests (J, J2, M2, M and myself) were to reach by meeting the hostess at Circular Quay and following her lead. I woke up this morning with excitement and and groaning. Excitement due to the celebrations of my best friend's birthday and groaning as I was supposed to paint my front door this morning.

For anyone who wants to know: the painting did not occur as the very keen tradesmen we have hired decided to work bright and early this morning thereby throwing all my painting plans out the door - literally. You cannot paint with dust flying around.

The celebrations looked to be in shadowing light when rain began pattering down on me as I waited at the station. In typical me fashion, either I am early or late: being on time is an art I have yet to perfect.
The girls arrived... and so did the bloody rain. I say bloody because it was much like a vampire novel where blood flows freely and the humans are sporadically placed in between.

M had bought my new umbrella (clear plasticy with a map of the NY subway system - v cool) which promptly broke with the metal rod coming into my hand and the plasticy cap falling sideways. Just my luck. There shall be returning and demanding of another one as this was entirely a transportation fault I think - the rod was a little bent when I received it. Ah well.

So now we began our trek towards our destination: a lovely restaurant specialising in lovely bathrooms and High Tea celebrations overlooking the Sydney Opera House. tres chick. Of course by the time we got there we had braved high scale torrential rain, flooded puddles invading our shoes and the invasion of our underwear's by the zipping drops of rain that demanded entry.

The High Tea itself was lovely. M had ordered miniatures of every kind of snack food they had available: from salmon filled sandwiches to cupcakes, truffles and my new discovery of macaroons! Orgasmically wonderful! Seriously. Delicious. As a bonus M had brought cupcakes shaped like characters from Alice in Wonderland that we all loved far too much to eat.

We had a lovely afternoon full of subtleties that made it so. Four people who didn't know each other well - bar the fifth whose birthday it was - bonded on a calm and cosy level. We created new in-jokes and smiled most if not all of the time. The in-jokes stem largely from the attack of brides we braved, who knew every single bride who married today (this miserable, wet day) would choose to take pictures with her entourage in front of our restaurant? Well, now we do. The main point is, we weren't there for it to be about us, it was for and about M, showing someone who is kind and lovely to everyone all year around a little appreciation for a few hours.

So, Sunshine wasn't the mainstay of our day, that honour goes to raindrops and M. I think for me, for many, many years Sunshine equates to M: she's the best person I know, and she always makes me smile, she's my best friend and I couldn't be luckier. So she fits that description better than anyone else ever could. Happy birthday M!

Great Expectations

Pip grows up believing his benefactor is a statuesque, deteriorating and morbid woman who still wears the wedding dress she was wearing the day she was jilted. My first thought upon reading Miss Havisham's described was how on earth does she go to the loo?

Okay, so it wasn't the most literary or profound thought - but I was sixteen and enjoying Pip's adventures mightily. Readers followa young Pip from his encounter with a convict at the gravesite of his parents and siblings to his wiser, more matured self's self realisation at a middling age. I hated him as a hero, perhaps my first hero-hate experience. Uptil I met Pip, I had always wanted to meet the heroes and heroines of my books so I could stammer and blush, be in awe of their presence and lay bold claim to having met them.

(Yes, I know they were fictional, your pint being?)

Then I came across Pip and the urge to shake him and ask intrusive questions (such as, were you born slow or do you practice it?) was born within me. I suppose I have a lot to thank Pip for. He made me realise that even a character withshades of grey and navy could be interesting and part of a broader story where, while he may not be the all-knowing hero, he need not be a stereotypical bad guy either.

Similarly, I feel this theory must be applied to people. Especially new people you meet as you never know what one is capable of until you have known them for a lengthy period of time. Cue experience at local magazine thus far.

It's been a lovely experience. And I say this not because they may stumble across this blog one day, but because it has genuinely been a soft, shiny and smooth experience thus far. My fellow workers are cordial, kind, friendly and quite helpful. Hoever, it has only been ten days so far and until I've seen them under stress, in angst and under pressure it is perhaps futile to form judgement.

Thus far however, I am in the first third of Pip's experiences: the slow, steady route where new avenues await me and high adventure calls.

Well, as much adventure as I may come across in a publications office.

Read Pip's adventures and drop me a line as to how you like it - or do what one of my friends does and rent the film!

The World Aligns.. for a few minutes atleast.

Im now the new editorial assistant at a local magazine.. there will be official reviews, that people apart from your lovely selves will read; perhaps an interview or two and ofcourse a little rambling because really, what is a good article without high quality rambling.

For anyone who hasn't heard yet, Im in that limbo period with my degree where if I flunk (not get an average of 65%) on the two units I have done this year then no more masters program for me. Ah, drama. The first unit brought in a mere 52% so I had better study, procrastinate less and undertand more in order to get an 80% on this second *all hangs on you unit*

I've found that news always comes in threes. The first was the potential job offer - a spot of bright light in my usual dreary world of renovations  (lets not go there yet), the second was devestating for a family thats atleast one third mine. J lost her grandfather. This sucks. I don't have an elqouent form of expression for this, if you've ever had someone close leave you, Im sure you understand. Sometimes words just don't cut it. I'd like to think he's in a better place getting a kick out of watching the people he loved.

The third peice of news was met with a wary stance and lots of nasty glaring: the renovations will be complete in a week. If I had a doller for every time the builders have voiced those words in the last two weeks, I would have an extra $20 for lunch tomorrow.

Hurrumph.

Now the point of this post, (you were wondering weren't you) is that this blog, is officially open. On the 60th day of renovations, the 1st day of first job being offered and the eleventh hour before a crazy weekend begins, Neptune Review has chosen to arrive.