Celebrate the Small Things 1-3-19

This post is part of Lexa Cain's bloghop, Celebrate the Small Things. Head on over there to join up!

What am I celebrating this week?

Can you believe it's March already?  Where the hell is the year going?

It's been a busy week.  My quiz team won the quiz on Tuesday night after several months of always getting second or third place.  It was a particularly sweet victory because most of our regular team were unable to come, so we managed to win with just the three of us.

On Wednesday I went to a preview of a film and because the kids are old enough to be left alone at night now, my partner came too.  I foresee a whole new future for us where we go out together instead of separately...

Tonight is sing-along Grease, something the ladies in my mothers' group have been doing since ort kids were tiny.  At almost every screening someone in the group gets too drunk and does something silly, but maybe tonight will be the exception...

With all this socializing, my book hasn't had the love and attention it deserves, but it's still there waiting for me to massage it into shape.  Maybe I'll have some time to work on it over the weekend.

What are you celebrating this week?

Books I've Read: Exit Everything

I had to read this book after seeing the title and recognizing it as being the name of one of my favorite songs.

Set in Australia, the book follows three kids who have never really fit in at school.  They don't really know each other despite having been in classes together since they were little kids, but wind up going on a road trip together that changes their lives.  Bound together by their mutual of love of a singular artist, they hit the road without any real direction in mind.  They just want out.  Out of town, out of their lives, just out.

Interestingly, the road trip isn't that exciting.  Not a lot happens except some drinking and one brief act of violence that is diffused far too quickly to feel very perilous.  Yet the way the dynamic between the three characters plays out is interesting.  There's a definite love triangle going on, and more than once the possibility of a threesome is mentioned, although this doesn't actually ever happen.

And these are interesting characters.  They could be more distinctive in their individual voices, but their issues and the problems they are running from are real and feel genuine.  These are people who would definitely drown their sorrows in screeching guitars and blazes of feedback.

If you're looking for a story about outsiders finding a community of their own, this is one of those stories.

But don't just listen to me.

Here's the blurb:

Seth is gay.

Ronnie was born without her left hand.

Harlon is newly homeless.

Acceptance? Friendship? Love?

All three teens are looking for something … they just aren’t sure what that something is.

When the unlikely trio go on a road-trip with only their love of late post-punk guitar legend Rowland S. Howard in common, something happens.

They leave on Friday as strangers, but return home Monday forever changed ... and maybe even a little in love.

But what if the one you’re falling for is in love with another?

The trio are about to discover that love is a strange, fluid thing that comes in many shapes and forms … and most importantly, it does not discriminate.

Weekly Goals 25-2-19

With having re-discovered a story I really like in my hard-drive last week, this week is all about trying to figure out how to fix and finish that story.  I have a pretty good idea about some of it, but there are a few things that are a little hazy in my mind at this stage.

So this week I will write some of the less hazy pieces and hope that they will then clarify the other pieces enough for me to know where I need to go next and what decisions I need to make about other pieces.

I also really should start working on my A-Z posts for Operation Awesome.  I keep thinking I have plenty of time, but March is almost upon us....

What are your goals this week?

Celebrate the Small Things 22-2-19

This post is part of Lexa Cain's bloghop, Celebrate the Small Things. Head on over there to join up!

What am I celebrating this week?

I did some writing and it felt good.  Not as much as I would have liked to do, but it's a start.  Hopefully I'll get a chance to do some more over the weekend, and next week.  I really want to try and finish this book.

It's interesting too...  I don't think when I first started writing it I realized quite how morally tricky this story is.  There's a lot of very gray areas in it, and I'm loving it!  Maybe that's why I stopped working on it.  I couldn't quite reconcile the MC's very black and white thinking with the complexity of some of the relationships. I can't remember now.

It's raining today and is supposed to keep raining all weekend.  It may not sound exciting, but since I think it has only rained once since Christmas, it actually is.  My garden will be very thankful.

I have a busy social weekend planned, which is not entirely ideal when I really want to write, but that's the way things are sometimes.  The writing will always be there waiting for me.  The people I'm going to see may not.  So I'm going to spend time with friends and enjoy their company.

What are you celebrating this week?