Nenia Campbell's Blog, page 37

So I Was Thinking (and That's Always a Dangerous Thing)

I'd like to write some short stories and then maybe put them up for free.

I will be accepting prompts. I'll write something from one of my existing canons or something new. Whatever you like. :)

What do you guys think? Are you in?

Radio Nenia

10 Songs. :D

1. Afterglow // Wilkinson

2. Feelin' Good // The Pussycat Dolls

3. All I Wanna Do // Sheryl Crow

4. Animal // Ellie Goulding

5. Fever // Cascada

6. Love Me Like That // Michelle Branch & Sheryl Crow

7. Keep Moving // Jessy Lanza

8. Somebody Loves You // Betty Who

9. My Awake // Late Night Alumni

10. Night Like This // LP

Sexual Attractiveness Is Not a Debt; It Does Not Need to Be Paid Back

I've been really into feminist literature lately and it's made me rethink some things that have been happening in my life over the last few years.

One thing that I--and I'm sure many other women--have been told, is that we should "be flattered" when we receive unwanted male (and sometimes female) attention.

I'm reading this great book called BITCHFEST



and it just got into a chapter on rape and society's treatment of it.

This "be flattered" attitude ties into society's tendency to "victim blame." You look a certain way, you must be asking for attention--right?

WRONG.

Yes, it's nice to be found attractive...but having someone finding you attractive doesn't mean you owe them anything. You don't owe them a date, you don't owe them a smile, and you certainly don't have to reciprocate those feelings. Of course, if you do that, you might very well find yourself being called "a bitch."



I quickly learned at a young age that niceness would be construed by certain people as sexual interest. That sometimes, you have to be mean. And that being mean in these situations isn't real "meanness." It's being assertive.

It's saying, "I am not interested, and if you respect that--and me, as a human being with my own thoughts and feelings--you will back the fuck off."

You know society isn't equal when you're forced to choose between "asking for it" and "being a bitch."

Just my thoughts. I've been thinking about this all day and decided to post and see what you folks think. :)

Terrorscape Broke 400 Ratings!!!!

Today my book broke 400 ratings!

I thought that was really awesome.

Thanks for supporting me, guys!

I am so lucky to have readers like you! <3

Interview with Fandom Monthly Magazine + Giveaway!!!

I recently did an interview with the lovely ladies of Fandom Monthly Magazine!

Check it out!



Also--I'm donating e-copies of BLACK BEAST and BLEEDS MY DESIRE for the cause. ♥

Book Bounty: Or, Why I Am not Allowed to Go to Used Bookstores

I went to the bookstore today, and scored a huge haul. (This is why I do not allow myself to go to the bookstore very often. I have an eidetic memory when it comes to book titles, and WANT EVERYTHING.)

So here is what I bought:



Historical murder mystery! And dat cover! -- read! ☆☆☆☆



It's about Hillary Clinton and her friends in college! Girl power!



I'm a sucker for books about academia. And I think this one won a prize of some sort. Also the cover is pretty, and I accidentally let my netgalley galley expire, so...COME TO MAMA.



FSJLDKFJSLDJFLSDJDFSDLKFJSLJFLS ;A



Hey! It's that guy! The one who was famous for writing That Book! You know, the one about the holocaust! The one that made everyone cry?



I hear this one pretty much kicks ass.



Less sure about this one. It's a retelling of The Scarlet Letter, which I did not like. But he's supposed to be super amazing, so maybe I'll fall in love with the story through new eyes.



I hear this author is one of those queered feminism writers, and I am all for supporting that, so here we go! (Is she like Jeanette Winterson?)



Because vampires.

I like vampires.



Now I really have no excuse for NOT starting The Crimson Petal and the White. (Except for the fact that I have no idea where the fuck it is, but we'll worry about that later.)



My friend gave me this book. She didn't like it but she thought I might. And because of the new cover, I had no idea that it was actually a book I've had on my TBR list FOREVER. Friends are awesome like that.



Supposedly it's like LOVELY BONES. I need no further persuading.



I just focused on the words "murder" and "Quentin Tarantino" and zoned out.

This is what happens when I get into what I call The Frenzy.



HAHAHAHAHAHAAHAHA!!!! I LOVE CONSPIRACY STORIES. This one will be sooooo fun. (It's so hard to find this book! But now IT'S MINE!!! MIIIIIINE!!)



Something to cheer me up when I finish reading conspiracy theories about Scientology and biological warfare. (That was what I got last haul--two books about bioweapons and a shitton of feminist propaganda. Lord knows, that bookstore probably thinks I'm some sort of femiterrorist.)



Yay! Art and historical fiction!



This was the first election that I ever voted in, and now it's history! I helped make history!!!! AND NOW I GET TO READ ABOUT IT! OH YES! HOT DIGGITY!



Because I loved Gone with the Wind, and I also own RHETT BUTLER'S PEOPLE, but I heard this one was better. And also, who doesn't love a big bloated behemoth of a book? -- currently reading!



She wrote bodice rippers. I want to see what her regency romance novels are like.



I read and enjoyed GROTESQUE. Something about these Japanese novels is just so addictive. They're like wandering through a dream that suddenly turns into an existential nightmare. LOVE IT.



One of my sadistic readers begged me to review a Glines book because they were sure I'd hate it. HAHAHAA! WHAT IF I LOVE IT, BITCHES? WHAT THEN?

Anyway, I finally saw a copy surface at ye olde used book store, so I figured, what the fuck. It's only $1. People pay a lot more to be professionally tormented, so $1 is pretty cheap, economically speaking.

It looks...interesting. I think this is the first new adult book I'll have ever read in paperback form. :)

So...now here's where I ask you:

WHAT SHOULD I READ FIRST?

CAST YOUR VOTE!

I Am Not Perfect: A Travel Back in Time

I know reviewing as an author has made me a pretty controversial figure on this site. Particularly since I've become (in)famous for tearing apart the books I don't like in the name of jealousy satire.

*cough*

Because I am an author, I can't be trusted. Because us authors are sneaky people who want you to buy our books (*GASP* OH LAND, THE HORROR!).

So, as the logic goes, I must only review books negatively because I am trying to destroy the careers of my competitors. Because this is SPARTA GOODREADS, MO-FOS! TASTE MY BOOT! MUAHAHAHAHAHA!*

*No authors were booted in the writing of this blog post.

But here's the thing. I don't think I'm perfect.

Really, I don't.

I'm not one of those authors who rates her own books, because I don't think that's classy (and me, I'm so classy I shit pearls, you know), but if I did, I would rate them as follows:

Fearscape: ***
Horrorscape: ***
Terrorscape: ***

Cloak and Dagger: ** 1/2
Armed and Dangerous: ***
Locked and Loaded: ** 1/2

Tantalized: * (hahaha--fail, Nenia)

Endgame: ***

Wishing Stars: ****1/2 (I really like this one, & sometimes I despair of writing anything this decent again)

Bleeds My Desire: ***

Black Beast: ****

I like writing, but I'll be the first to admit that I have problems. (No, not problems like that...actually yeah, those too. But that's not what we're discussing right now) My books will never live up to the shiny, unattainable ideal in my head. And then there's the fact that I don't have an editor. Up until recently, I didn't even have a beta. (You can credit Wart for that.) Some people like my descriptive writing style. Others find it unbearably pretentious. It's up to you! That's the beauty of the reading experience.

As a writer, you have two choices when someone writes you a bad review: you can get defensive, or you can laugh. I choose to laugh. "Your books suck!" you say. "I know!" I say back. "Preaching to the choir, buddy! Tell me something I don't know!"

But I'm not a defeatist. I love writing, even if I don't think of myself as particularly good at it. (I don't write for the Pulitzer, obviously. I'm largely inspired by the Point Horror books I read as a teen and the bodice rippers I read now...which, now that I think about it, probably goes a long way towards explaining why my heroes are so f*cked up.)

This is why every positive review I get always comes as a delightful surprise. Someone read my book...and DIDN'T HATE IT? Oh my God, I feel like a kid on Christmas morning! YAYYYY!!! Does a kid have to be a saint to get a present on Christmas morning? No. But they have to at least try. It's the same with writing. You don't have to be the best of the best to get a positive rating, you just have to strike a chord with someone--and write just well enough that somebody finds you entertaining.

And, going back to the whole me-the-author-writing-negative-reviews-of-other-authors thing, that's why I review the way I do. Entertainment. I reviewed on Goodreads for about four years before I began publishing my own work, and I feel like I would be disappointing those who followed me for my reviews if I gave it up cold turkey. I do my best to compartmentalize, and yeah, even if I'm not totally unbiased, I think I come pretty close. There are some writers I don't really like as people who I still gave high ratings because their book was good. And there are some writers who I think are the next best thing to awesomesauce who I gave low ratings because I didn't like their book. If you are an author and reading this, know that the rating I give you is not my evaluation of you as a person. And unless you give me a reason to give up on your books, I'll probably pick up another one to give you another shot at this whole thing--so prove me wrong! :)

You're probably wondering what inspired this post. It was Jenny Trout's latest awesome blog post. It really made me think about my own reviews, and the way people view me as a reviewer who also happens to write books (or vice-versa). (If you haven't read it, you really should. She's pretty much my hero right now. Everything that comes out of her computer is win.)

So--I'm going to open up the floor, I suppose! What do you think about authors who review books? When you rate books, do you take author behavior into account or do you try your best to be impartial? And what would you do for a Klondike bar?

Slate Thinks Adults Should Be Embarrassed for Reading YA

This article is making rounds around the internet right now, inciting various levels of outrage among bloggers. I'm not quite sure what the intent was, putting this out. But I think Sara Benincasa is probably right on the money when she calls it "clickbait" in her excellent rebuttal.

I think that YA can provide some excellent and long-lasting messages, applicable to both young and old. And if people are too stupid to get that you don't have to be a young adult to appreciate a moral or life lesson in a young adult novel, well, that says more about their intelligence than the intelligence of those reading YA lit.

P.S. I still (religiously) read Meg Cabot & L.J. Smith & Vivian Vande Velde.



#UnrepentantYAReader

Fearscape Has Almost 1,000 Ratings!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! :O :O :O

Fearscape is just 179 ratings away from breaking 1,000 ratings!



I can't believe it!

My goal is actually going to happen!

I am so happy.



THANK YOU SO MUCH FOR SUPPORTING ME!

<3 <3 <3 <3 <3 <3 <3

Happy First Day of June!

It's the first day of June, which marks a new chapter of a new month--and also a new sales period! I would just like to quickly take the time to thank EVERYONE who bought one of my books in May. :)

Also, thanks to everyone who:
-liked one of my reviews
-commented me
-shot me a sweet PM
-picked me up when I was down
-read my books
-reviewed my books
-added me as a friend
-became a fan of me on FB
-and pretty much everything else

I've been pretty busy lately, and my notifications are wicked jank, but I just want you to know how much I appreciate having each and every one of you in my life.

I look forward to meeting new friends and readers this month. May we all have excellent book-related adventures together!



Thanks for being you--you're awesome.