Review - I Think I Love You - Allison Pearson

I found this book on the shelf at the public library when I was not really looking for anything in particular. I picked it up because I started singing along with the title. Then I realized the title actually was the Partridge Family song, and I was probably meant to sing along with it.

The story is written in two parts. The first is the story of Petra, a 13-year-old girl in South Wales back in 1973 when David Cassidy ruled the pop world. Petra and her friend Sharon set out to win a trip to meet David Cassidy in California. The second part of the book is what happens 30 years later when Petra claims her prize from the magazine and she and Sharon head to Las Vegas to see David's show there.  

Allison Pearson is brilliant at observing. When she writes about the angst of being a teenage girl, it's not with cliches or broad keystrokes. It's by observing the minutest of details, of thoughts and actions that happen in a millisecond and have consequences that continue to reverberate throughout people's lives. Sometimes those tiny details make you cringe with the pain of her character.

Pearson's attention to detail is so acute that she gets every detail right, down to the David Cassidy Love Kit fans could order from 16 Magazine for $2. You don't have to have been a David Cassidy fan to connect with Petra, though. As Paul Simon once sang, "every generation throws a hero up the pop charts". Justin Bieber or David Cassidy, the game remains the same, as do the emotions.

The story is about more than being a fan, of course, it's about friendship and love and missed opportunities and new opportunities. It's also about looking forward and looking back and becoming a better person for it.

I enjoyed this book so much I'm going to find her earlier book, I Don't Know How She Does It, and hope the greatness of this book wasn't a one off.

Early to rise and...

Artist's rendition of the birds

that wake me up every morning.

So a friend asked me to help with a goal-setting/accountability exercise. I decided this would be the perfect time for me to work on some things that I had been trying to make happen in my life.

Every week, I have to check in with her and tell her how I've done the previous week on sticking to my goals. First check in is today.

I decided to keep things simple. I want to make writing a priority in my life, not an afterthought, squeezed in after the million other things I need to do in a day. So my goal is to get up at 6:00 a.m., at least five days a week, and sit at the computer and write. And I've done it. Getting up early is the easy bit, in no small part due to the fact that I have three bedroom windows and my room is flooded with light by six in the morning. And where there's light, there's birds. Thousands of them, singing their hearts out, and tormenting the cat who lets me share his room.

My only problem has been that I still am not going to bed early enough to get my eight hours, or even my seven hours. I keep meaning to get to bed on time, it's just that it hasn't happened yet. But eventually, exhaustion will win out, I'll fall asleep at ten and all will be well.

My Favourite Sidekick

I have been listening to Janet Evanovich audio books during my commute for the last few months. I've read all the Stephanie Plum books, but they're good enough for a reread. The reader, Lorelei King, is great - her portrayal of Lula is priceless. Lula is my favourite sidekick in all of fiction, save maybe Dr. Watson. Only she's funnier. I tried to listen to some of Janet Evanovich's romance novels, but they weren't very good. She really hit her stride with her mysteries.

Fingless gloves

I have been finding that when I sit and write for long periods of time my hands get really cold. Since I am always cold this is hardly a surprise. I am not willing to pay for extra Biofuel to keep the house the three degrees warmer it would require to keep my fingers happyish, so I have come up with another solution: fingerless gloves. I bought them at work, and they are part of a set of two-piece elbow-length gloves. The gloves are meant to be worn underneath elbow-length fingerless (and thumbless) knit tubes. I have removed the glove part, and wear just the outside part, keeping my hands warm and allowing me to type unimpeded. And someone told me I look like Bob Cratchett, which I took as a compliment.

A brief summary of my life this month...

I keep thinking I should update my blog, since I almost never update anything else, but it seems there is never enough interesting stuff to talk about. So I'll update in bullet form to make it less painful for you to read:

- I am in the top three (of 150 teams) in my hockey pool! It's not the usual sort of hockey pool, it's a Fantasy Hockey Hair Pool. No real hockey knowledge required, but a sense of humour definitely is. You get points when your selected players show up in the media without a hockey helmet or a baseball cap on. I'd probably be Number 1 in the pool except one of my players has been out injured, and on the day they announced his return to play, he injured his hand (you know who you are, J. Staal).

- I am attempting to write a 50,000 words of fiction this month. That's 1667 words a day, if you're superstitious about the number 1666.

- I have to replace the tires on Barbie (the Malibu, for those in the know) so have to learn enough about tires not to make a costly mistake.

- I have started yoga. I'm not very good at it, but I've given myself a year to get better before I quit in a huff.

So I hope I haven't wasted your time with this rather dull summing up of my life to date. But if I have, really it's your own fault for having such unexciting friends.

Birthday thoughts and writing and such

So yesterday was a big birthday for me. (If you don't already know how many years I won't bother you with the details:) I had thought at one time I would get all angsty and depressed about it, but then I get all angsty and depressed about everything, so I decided to try something new. I had hoped I would use this birthday as a nudge to get my life more in line with what I want my life to actually be, and... it's happening!
 I'm now into my second month of writing my online story (it's by way of being a non-publishable romance fanfic, too specialized for most tastes but it's terrific practice for me). And I now have 9 official fans, and only one of them is someone I knew previous to starting all this. And in September I'm doing a 'write a novel in a weekend' challenge and am super excited about that - I have designated my birthday money to buy a laptop so I won't have to spend three days writing my novel by hand!

Reading Writing and (not so much) Arithmetic

I have been reading Malcolm Gladwell's Outliers. It is a fascinating look at what makes the most successful people in the world successful. And he talks about the 10,000 hours rule, which in its simplest form just means it takes approximately 10,000 hours of practice at something to become the best in the world at it.
And I realized that I've never thought of having to practice writing stories: I knew how to write, so I figured I just had to get on with actually getting a book written. It's not that I ever thought I didn't have a lot to learn about writing (just the opposite, in fact) but it never occurred to me to practice at it. So, since I do want to be a great writer one day, and have yet to complete a work of any length/consequence despite starting dozens of projects, I now have a new outlook on things. I'm not going to give up on any of the unfinished projects that are close to my heart, but I am taking a step back for a bit and I'm going to focus on practicing.
I have started writing every day, working on something completely unlike anything I've done before, and something that is not destined for novelhood at any point. It is being posted on a fanfiction website (subject chosen by a friend as a special request), and it is completely cheesy and fun. It is quite refreshing to write something without any pressure attached to the writing at all - I have gotten quite excited about it, to the point where I look forward to getting up early so that I can work on it. Love the feeling.