mark’s Comments (group member since Nov 22, 2010)

mark’s comments from the The Extra Cool Group! (of people Michael is experimenting on) group.

just realized i ignored the parameters of this thread; my apologies, should have read from the beginning first. although in my very slight defense, i posted links to the books themselves, not to my reviews. i think everyone should read all 4 books and skip my reviews! there, now i feel better.

i think i love all of my reviews equally. how do you choose between children? i suppose i should be most proud of the reviews that got the most votes. which would be my review of The Carnivorous Lamb. a mind-bending 5 votes!

in general my votes never get near to cracking double digits, and half the time i think folks are simply being polite or good friends by voting, so in some ways counting votes seems meaningless. votes in general seem somewhat meaningless to me. not that i don't appreciate it, of course. maybe i would feel differently if i received dozens of votes but i rather doubt it.

but if i had to pick a favorite, it may be the nice, simple review for The Temple of Gold, mainly because it felt espcially good to write it and made me recall the book with pleasure. i'm also proud of the fairly personalized reviews of Little, Big and The Twyborn Affair, but because they are so personalized, there is some embarrassment in re-reading them. i guess they may be my favorites not so much because i consider them to be awesome reviews but because they are personally meaningful to me. and those kinds of reviews tend to my favorite kinds of reviews to read overall.

Tressa wrote: "Mark, stay away from those young, cute college grads who pine away over the characters in Jane Austen's books. You won't ever measure up.
..."

the situation has improved since i changed my profile name from Pimp Darcy. that really brought the ladies in; mark monday, not so much.

i know that phil! at least here in GR. he's a fellow movie-lover in the bay area; we've been to many of the same venues. strange serendipity. perhaps one sad day he will delete me as well.

i've had several people de-friend me. i think the majority of them are various cute girls from the 1001 Books group, often recent college grads. my theory is that they respond to the eloquent, prize-winning prose that i occasionally contribute to 1001 Books discussions, become enamored with my manly and passionate posturing, and then quickly realize from my updates and reviews the kind of filth to which they have now become linked. and away they go. up, up, and away! perhaps i am leading people on simply by being a part of the classiness of the 1001 Books group.

Michael wrote: ""What's your favorite sex hat?" (Condoms don't count)

"What's your favorite sex battle cry?" (Must be a word, not something like UUUUNNNNNGGGGGG!)

""What's your favorite sex position to watch tortoises mate in?..."

1. a traditional uzbek celebration hat, of course. they are never allowed to touch the ground, creating many interesting challenges.

2. my social security number

3. any position is a hot position when it comes to tortoises.

at last!

nancy, i guess for me it is just easier to trim folks after i've gotten to know them a little bit. same rules apply everywhere for me. i know that for many, the opposite is true.

aloha, you post so much about yourself in groups, you could add 1,000 monthly To-Reads and never fear deletion from me.

i've come across these names Caris and Ceridwen often on this site. they must be GR all-stars. or royalty! they are certainly lovely names.

i don't mind either 1 or 2. but then i don't mind it when authors shill their product either. however, sometimes i will find a blog so annoying that i feel compelled to write a review of their blog in response to their posted link. this has not usually been favorably received....which is not something i really understand. why post a link to your blog if you're not willing to get some feedback on it?

i much prefer GR to FB, which i'm rarely on, perhaps monthly if that. i think it may just be an ageist reaction to the fact that most of my staff appear to be on it 24/7 (or if not FB, then shopping for expensive sneakers) and most of them are 5-15 years younger than me, or at least act that way. it also may be because i think books are more interesting than actual people and i get bored by life updates. but never by book review updates! when online, i prefer to hear about someone's life in a personal way, in an email or in a group conversation, rather than in an anonymous FB blurb re how they're feeling or what they're thinking or doing at this particular moment in time. i mean really, i could usually care less. shoot me an email or give a ring or send me a text instead. and i particularly hate FB party invites because that usually means i hear about the event after the actual event.

i'll send a friend request to a person whose reviews or whose comments in groups i've enjoyed. i actually get pretty insulted when a friend request is ignored because i'd like to think i don't make them lightly.

i will accept any friend request made of me, although i am also an editor of friends as well. i like having a nice trim list of people whose reviews and/or group comments are ones that i enjoy. i trim folks who end up adding nothing to my life...much like in real life! my only exceptions are the good number of real life friends on my friend list, most of whom don't belong to groups and don't even post reviews, except rarely. i wonder sometimes why they are even on GR. but i could never delete them as GR friends because i am fearful of shaming social repercussions.

i don't mind following people and i don't think it is coming from a creepy place when i only want to follow someone and not friend them. however, on a hypocritical note, i will usually be-friend a person who is following me. it's more mutual that way.

my biggest & pettiest pet peeve are those friends whose updates include hundreds of books marked To-Read and never include any reviews. those friendships don't often last too long.

i use shelves to help my memory. i like to keep track of the various books read in genres like postmodern fiction, queer fiction, guides, Leisure-style horror, ongoing fantasy/scifi series, murder mysteries, and nonfiction personal narratives - mainly because those books sometimes run together in my memory.

not to sound like a literary snob, but i usually don't have much trouble recalling non-genre books so there's no need in general for me to give them their own shelves.

i have a wish list shelf as a buying reminder. i have a shelf for the books of my favorite authors, just because. and i do have a shelf for books or authors who seem to be forgotten. i also have a shelf for books that are symptoms to me of a godlesss world and that function as a warning for the coming apocalypse. take heed!

Nancy wrote: "Thanks for inviting me to this group, Mark. I'm definitely not cool, so I must be one of the lukewarm ones....."

no way, you were definitely within the first wave of Extra Cool Invites. i never got around to those lukewarms.

1) don't really feel that guilty about anything i read. well maybe if it is genuinely badly written. or if it is porn. but still - not too much guilt. i'm much more of a shame person than a guilt person anyway.

2) boxers. some boxer briefs as well, although they make me feel a little sleazy, a little european. boxers are natural and make me feel like a 100% red-blooded american.

what kind of mestizo filipino do you think i am? only ladyboys knit!

quick apologies to all the non-ladyboy knitters out there. also, i am very supportive of ladyboys. love 'em!

damn me straight to hell! it has been far too long since i've visited my homeland.

i posted a bit ago that i write something akin to masturbatory reviews, but i don't think the style of 'masturbatory reviews' that i write is the kind identified by jason above. i do write in a style that i imagine is accessible to readers of reviews. but i don't mean my reviews to be providing any kind of input to the author or to the publisher, as jason mentioned re his own reviews.

now that i think about it, maybe the only truly masturbatory reviews are those that are really personal, almost diary-like, in their instant reaction to the novel, yet not invested in overly clarifying their feelings or expanding their point of view in detail to the public because they are indeed only writing diary-like blurbs and stream-of-conscious ramblings that would not make much sense to anyone besides the writer.

for me, i identified writing my reviews as "the brainiest form of mental masturbation i've come across in years" because, well, i'm really enchanted with my own thought process, including my own writing. now that is a very unflattering thing to say, i'm sure. i don't think i'm amazing or anything, but i do love stringing words together, in emails, in stories, in the paid work i do, and certainly in real life conversations i can talk a person's ear off.

writing and anything that requires some thought, some contemplation, and the creative use of language are activities that relax and satisfy me. again the jacking off parallel springs to mind. writing reviews is just another extension of something i like to do in general, which is to contemplate things and talk. pretty basic and pretty masturbatory when that is both the reason and the end result. a more public form of navel-gazing i suppose.

Michael wrote: "Can I interest you in some Amway products?..."

Have You Heard the Good News? everybody can use some Good News today!

Aloha wrote: "Mark, you are determined to get Brainy, you and me in a room!"

that sounds like the best pyramid scheme ever.

but then you may go to jail, like my dad almost did! pyramid schemes are a bane to the mondays. michael i advise you not to advise this pyramid structure, i am sorta against them, i think.

Brainycat wrote: "Like Ala, I got an invite, and being compulsively clickhappy I joined."

and with this reply, i have now replied to all my invites. i think, maybe. now i don't feel so lonely in Extra Cool Group; that's Extra Awesome!