E.M. Epps's Blog, page 6

Review: "The Life-Changing Magic of Tidying Up" by Marie Kondo

Thumbs up for The Life-Changing Magic of Tidying Up: The Japanese Art of Decluttering and Organizing by Marie Kondo. Nonfiction/Self-help.

I am generally a pretty tidy person who's good at limiting my possessions to available space, so it was out of curiosity at this book's glowing reviews, rather than any desperate need, that made me request it from the library. Rather to my surprise, after finishing it I rampaged through my closet and storage and managed to find eight boxes of stuff to ditch. I then recommended it to one of my best friends, and she went on a similar rampage. I swear, this thing is like a mind-virus. In a nutshell, Kondo's basic premise is that you should get rid of everything you don't love. The rest of the book is elucidation, technique, and a bit of the history of how she came to her work. Some might be put off by her obsessiveness—though I'd say it's served her, her clients, and now her readers well—or mystified by her animistic philosophy. Don't let that stop you. As my mother said, "the first thing I'm getting rid of is all of my books on organizing." This is the only one you'll ever need. If you've ever felt even somewhat overwhelmed by the amount of stuff that seems to inevitably pile up, get this book.

People often ask me what I recommend, no doubt expecting me to reveal some hitherto secret storage weapon. But I can tell you right now: there is no need to buy dividers or any other gadget. You can solve your storage problems with things you already have in the house. The most common item I use is an empty shoebox. I have tried all kinds of storage product, but have never found any other that is free and still surpasses the shoebox. It gets above average marks for all five of my criteria: size, material, durability, ease of use, and attractiveness. These well-balanced attributes and its versatility are its greatest merits. Shoes come in boxes with cute designs as well. I frequently ask my clients, "Do you have any shoeboxes?" when I visit their homes.

Review: "Supercharge Your Kindle Sales" by Nick Stephenson, et cetera

Supercharge Your Kindle Sales: Simple Strategies to Boost Organic Traffic on Amazon, Sell More Books, and Blow Up Your Author Mailing List by Nick Stephenson.

How to Sell Books by the Truckload on Amazon - Power Pack!: Sell Books by the Truckload & Get Reviews by the Truckload by Penny C. Sansevieri.

How To Get Honest Reviews: 7 Proven Ways to Connect With Readers and Reviewers by Heather Hart and Shelley Hitz.

Goodreads For Authors: How To Use Goodreads To Promote Your Books by Michelle Campbell-Scott.

Nonfiction/marketing.

I sped-read all of these in one day. I won't give them separate reviews, since they all blended together almost immediately. What I took out of this was that keywords were important. Basically, once you've read one or two of these sort of books, you've read them all.

Review: "Write Like the Masters" by William Cane

Thumbs up for Write Like the Masters: Emulating the Best of Hemingway, Faulkner, Salinger, and Others by William Cane. Nonfiction/writing.

This book made me want to read Balzac. And that's an impressive enough accomplishment that I could stop there. But, no, I won't, because in truth I think this is one of the most useful books on style for fiction writers that I've ever read. It smells distinctly of academia (behold footnotes!) yet it's deeply practical. Each chapter discusses the most distinctive writing techniques of a pleasingly wide variety of authors—from Balzac to King by way of Melville and Philip K. Dick—with each short section elucidating a single technique, analyzing examples, and making suggestions about how the technique can be incorporated into modern fiction. There's a great range of stuff here, from "What you can learn from Tarzan" to "Mesmerizing readers with death and destruction," courtesy of Tom Wolfe. It seems inevitable that any writer will find tricks to inspire them.

Looking at [the fifth paragraph of Moby-Dick], one biographer compared Melville's work to the best of poetry. "In the long second sentence, the range of alliterated initial consonant sounds mimics the 'blended noises' of men laboring on the docks...seven pairs and one triplet of alliterated words that perfectly convey the ceaseless repetition of the dockside work...He achieves here a mastery of verbal effects that one expects from only the most accomplished poetry." A modern writer may wonder whether he has the nerve to dare anything quite so bold. Melville has thrown down the gauntlet though few have been the brave souls who have picked it up. Yet the careful use of alliteration appears in some of the most powerful prose works of the twentieth century, including novels by Nabokov, Bradbury and Roth. Often the best use of alliteration, however, is that which readers do not consciously notice.

Favorite reads of 2014

Oh, so belated, this list. But hey, it's done at last.




Conservation of Shadows by Yoon Ha Lee
Math, honor, magic, music, Asian mythology, war, genocide, lexicography, weaponry, time travel, and spaceships....
(full review)




Graceling by Karen Cashore
You can think of Graceling as Tamora Pierce upgraded.
(full review)




The Grapes of Wrath by John Steinbeck
If you have not read it, read it. If you have read it, read it again.
(full review)




The Time Roads by Beth Bernobich
Have I mentioned I like time travel?
(full review)




Vitamin K2 and the Calcium Paradox: How a Little-Known Vitamin Could Save Your Life by Kate Rhéaume-Bleue
Eat the butter, people. Eat the butter.
(full review)




The Western Lit Survival Kit: An Irreverent Guide to the Classics, from Homer to Faulkner by Sandra Newman
If you are considering getting an English Lit degree, why not just memorize this instead?
(full review)




White House Interpreter: The Art of Interpretation by Harry Obst
All about one of the most important jobs that is both desperately important and thoroughly overlooked.
(full review)




Wise Children by Angela Carter
Bawdy, hilarious, sad, gorgeous, crazy, nonlinear, wonderful....
(full review)




Writing on the Wall: Social Media - The First 2,000 Years by Tom Standage.
An unputdownable book of social history.
(full review)




The Zaanics Deceit by Nina Post.
This is The Da Vinci Code for people who like books that are well-written and witty.
(full review)

Review: "Finn Fancy Necromancy" by Randy Henderson

Thumbs up for Finn Fancy Necromancy by Randy Henderson. Fantasy.

Finn Gramaraye, framed for the crime of dark necromancy, has just gotten his body back after having his consciousness exiled to the fey realm for 25 years. Now he has to deal with all sorts of crazy...such as sasquatch mercenaries. Oh, and being a virgin. And not knowing what the Internet is. And, worst of all...HIS FAMILY. Oh no! The goings-on in this debut novel are often played for humor, and I tore through it in two sittings. The jokes—mostly having to do with the fact that Finn's cultural references end in the 1990's—didn't always work for me; but I laughed out loud frequently enough that I riddled my (e)copy with bookmarks and struggled to chose just one passage to show to you. Highly recommended for when you need something quick and funny to clean all of those 900-page fantasy tomes out of your system.

He wasn't the real Elvis, of course. As should be no surprise, the real Elvis was an arcana. He hoped to forge the perfect musical weapon against the Fey, who enjoy human music the way a slug enjoys a salt covered hammer. But the Fey managed to infect him, turning him into a waercreature. Although the resulting change in his metabolism led to tragic consequences for his waistline and his life, even worse is that those infected by the Elvis waerform turn into pale imitations of him when the conditions are right—for some, if they hear an Elvis song; for others, when they enter the dark energy vortex of the Las Vegas area; or, in extreme cases, if they smell peanut butter and banana.

Disclaimer: The author is a friend of a friend of a friend of a friend (I'm not even joking: thank you Internet) and he was kind enough to send me a review copy when I asked for it. It's still an honest review, since I wouldn't have finished it if I didn't like it.

The quoted paragraph has not been checked against a copy of the published book because the book hasn't been published yet.

Palahniuk on why we shouldn't be boring

"All God does is watch us and kill us when we get boring. We must never, ever be boring."
—Chuck Palahniuk, Invisible Monsters

W. Somerset Maugham on substitutes for wit

"She had a pretty gift for quotation, which is a serviceable substitution for wit..."
—W. Somerset Maugham, The Creative Impulse

"Sailor Moon (Vols 1-7)" by Naoko Takeuchi

Thumbs up for Sailor Moon Box Set (Vol. 1-6) (and vol. 7) by Naoko Takeuchi. Manga.

My blasted friend got me hooked on the new anime series, which at the time only had six or seven episodes available, so I was quickly left wanting more. Rather than watching the 1990's anime, which my friend warned me was quite padded, I started reading the manga. And damn, it's fun. If you need to take what you read seriously, then you should stay far away. If you're happy to go along with a moon princess reincarnated as a crybaby schoolgirl who fights evil with her friends who of course all wear very short skirts, it's utterly delightful brain candy. Also, if you manage to not get a crush on Mamo-chan I don't know what to do with you.

"The Sartorialist" by Scott Schuman

Thumbs up for The Sartorialist by Scott Schuman. Photography.

I'm a fan of Scott Schuman's wonderful street fashion photography blog, The Sartorialist, so I was delighted to discover that he has two books as well. Every bit as excellent as his blog; highly recommended.

"Fluent Forever" by Gabriel Wyner

Thumbs up for Fluent Forever: How to Learn Any Language Fast and Never Forget It by Gabriel Wyner.

This book seems so useful I am overwhelmed by it. Ready to learn a language? You want this book. I don't have enough free time and brainspace right now to tackle a project of that size, but when I do, you can bet that this will be what I reach for first.

After I learned German, I thought, "Ach! If I could just go back in time and tell myself a few things, I would have had a much easier time with this language!" I had precisely the same thought after Italian, French, Russian (which I finally learned in 2012), and Hungarian (2013's project), This book is my time machine. If I squint my eyes just right, then you are monolingual me from nine years ago, and I'm creating a time paradox by helping you avoid all of the pitfalls and potholes that led me to make my time machine in the first place. You know how it is.