Fictional Worlds

Insult
I love you and I always will
but I can't deal with you insulting yourself
at every single turn;
no matter how I try to build you up
you're always tearing yourself down.

It breaks my heart to see
how much you hate yourself
how much you think you're bad
you can't see the good
but I can.

You don't know why I love you
perhaps you never will
but I won't stop loving you.

I hope someday you'll see what I see
see that you're a good person
that you really are handsome
that you really are smart
that you're so much more
than you've ever thought you are.

Please
don't insult yourself anymore
don't call yourself names
realize that every time I say you're a good guy
it's not a lie;
realize that you can be so much more
if only you let yourself.
----------------------------- -------
That's for a dear friend of mine. On another note, both Fictional Worlds and I have had a birthday this month-Fictional Worlds is three years old now and I'm a whole 17 years old. Almost legal-just a hop skip and a jump away, right?

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Posted By: Dianna G - Category: Articles/Ideas/Prompts, Writing Exercises

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Book Review: Woman on the Edge of Time

August 25th 2010 12:39

On my trip out of town I finished the book I've been reading for most of the summer, Woman on the Edge of Time. It's an old book but you can still find it on Amazon if you follow this link.

The back cover reads:

Woman on the Edge of time is the fascinating story of Connie Ramos, a Chicana woman in her mid-thirties, living in New York and labeled insane, committed to a mental institution. But the truth is that Connie is overwhelmingly sane, heroically sane, and tuned into the future.

Connie is able to communicate with the year 2137. Two totally different ways of life are competing. One is beautiful-communal, nonsexist, environmentally pure, open to ritual and magic. The other is a horror-totalitarian, exploitative, rigidly technological.

In Connie's struggle to keep the institution's doctors from forcing her into a brain control operation, we find the timeless struggle between beauty and terror, between good and evil... with an astonishing outcome.

Review

As a Reader:

My history teacher recommended this book during my African History class (which should be called a history of Africans and the Americas or something similar, actually). We were discussing utopia and I said I believed it impossible to please everyone. He showed me this book and told me to take a look at it and the utopian future in it.

I did and all I can say is wow. Connie's honest narration is clear, concise, and simultaneously brutal and loving. The language isn't exactly pretty, and Connie could surely make a sailor blush, but it's real. It's true to her existance-a woman whose grown up all her life in different ghettoes and who lost her only chance to escape them several years before the story. Connie is a good woman who isn't really crazy with anything except love for her family. And she's a woman who's been beaten down by society her entire life, for being poor and being brown and being a woman.

I don't know if I've ever felt so connected to a character, or lived in anyone else's head the way I lived in hers. Though my life has been-and hopefully will be-much easier than hers, I felt her pain with her, and I understood it. I felt how she felt when they called her crazy. When she got angry at her niece's pimp, I was angry with her. When she mourned her lost loves, I mourned with her. When she played the doctors' game to get out of the mental institution, I could have played that game side by side with her.

The future to which she travels is amazing, beautiful, pure. As she was amazed first by the stranger from the future, I was amazed. As she decoded the common language of the future, I decoded it with her. As she stared in awe at everything around her and asked her questions, I asked all the same questions and held all the same amazement. I felt I made the same friends she did. When one of the characters died I almost broke down right along with them.

Long story short-though it's a bit late for that-this book is fantastic. I recommend it to everyone, reader, writer, and most of all to every woman.

As a Writer

As a writer I would like to take my hat off and bow my head to the author of this book, Marge Piercy. As I think about it there's nothing I would have changed.

The voice of the narrative is real, the characters are real, and the story of Connie's present is heartbreakingly true. My favourite line in the entire novel is an intense spoiler, but let's just say there were quite a few times when I had to put the book down and take a few deep breaths.

The ending left something to be desired, but it's not necessarily a bad thing. I closed the book unsure if I was satisfied. Despite that, I do appreciate the ending and I think that it was very classy. As a writer I'm absolutely stunned by what this writer has accomplished. It's been a long time since a book touched my heart like this one has.

I recommend this book absolutely and completely to anyone, especially women of all ages, backgrounds, and colours.

You can buy it on Amazon here.

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Posted By: Dianna G - Category: Writing Exercises, Fiction, Book Review

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Prompt of the Week: Alone

August 24th 2010 12:58

I'm all alone out here
and for the first time
my mind is clear;

all the stress of the city
just fades away
I'm so glad
I got out yesterday.

I've figured things out
though I'm not jumping for joy
I don't like the decisions I've made
but I've gotta do
what I've gotta do
though I'll hate
saying goodbye to you.

Going out there I felt so free. For the first time I was traveling by myself and with my own money and it felt great. I slept on the dock and I didn't mind it. What's better than to be alone on a cool summer night with a beautiful lake? Possibly not getting eaten by the local musquitos, but I don't mind the bites.

Exactly what I needed, that's what I said this trip would be. I left Toronto confused, my only thoughts those of escape, and I returned with certainty in my steps. The path ahead can be seen for miles, though the sharp rocks are sure to cut my feet. I must pause now, take a breath and brace myself for the pain.

And in just a few weeks, I will surely know pain.

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Posted By: Dianna G - Category: Articles/Ideas/Prompts, Poetry, Writing Exercises

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Renewing the Self

August 18th 2010 12:32

I'm sure you're all aware that I live in a city, a 'great urban center' known as Toronto, Ontario. I do love my city dearly, but I tire of it after a while. I get tired of the daily rush, of the TTC, of the people all around me. I get tired of the big buildings and the poisoned lake. I get tired of the drama, and I get tired of the drunks and drug addicts covering the streets with their trouble.

We all get tired of our daily lives from time to time. We fall into ruts, we let life carry us away, and sometimes the stress builds until we're sick not just in mind but in body as well. And we never slow down to help ourselves, to sort through our mental stresses, to enjoy the simple beauty of the world all around us

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Posted By: Dianna G - Category: Articles/Ideas/Prompts, Short Fiction

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Prompt of the Week: Losing You

August 17th 2010 12:07

Photo from: Nathan F's photostream on Flickr

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Posted By: Dianna G - Category: Articles/Ideas/Prompts, Writing Exercises

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Renewing Your Commitment to Reading

August 16th 2010 12:50

Over the last two weeks I've talked about renewing your commitment to writing and what counts as writing time. But-as a wise commentor pointed out last week-reading is just as important to your future as a writer as writing is.

The fact is, one in four people doesn't read any books at all. As a writer, you can't afford to be one of those people, regardless of how busy you are. Just like you need to make time to write, you need to make time to read. For me reading is a lot more flexible-I can't write much by hand and even if I had a laptop it would only travel so far-so it's a lot easier to commit to than writing is. That said, a lot of times I do still fall short

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Posted By: Dianna G - Category: Articles/Ideas/Prompts, Reading Related

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Changes

August 12th 2010 12:14

As I'm sure you can tell, Fictional Worlds has undergone a major facelift over the last couple of days. It all began with me creating a banner-I've made two, including the one you see above-and then I changed the blog's theme to match the banner more

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Posted By: Dianna G - Category: Short Non-Fiction, Articles/Info

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Looking in the Mirror

August 10th 2010 12:30

Looking in the Mirror

For the first time today when I looked in the mirror I liked what I saw. She's strong and I like the fire behind her blue eyes. She's got smooth flowing red hair that's slowly turning blonde, bleached by the sun's rays. She's got long well muscled legs that someday would be great in a martial art. You can tell by her grin that she's a little bit evil, but it's easy enough to look innocent. She could sit there all day and make cute faces; she'd have the whole world kneeling before her by the time she was done. Or maybe not, who knows

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Posted By: Dianna G - Category: Articles/Ideas/Prompts, Short Fiction, Writing Exercises

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What Counts as Writing Time?

August 9th 2010 12:59

When creating and following a writing schedule, you must also decide what to include in your writing time. This will vary greatly depending on the kinds of writing that you do. For a writer of non-fiction or even historical novels, research is so essential to writing that it takes up writing time. For a high fantasy writer, worldbuilding is essential so it takes up writing time. For a blogger, sometimes even things like email are part of 'writing time'.

I have two different kinds of writing time: fiction writing time and blogging time. My fiction writing time is divided into worldbuilding, plot building, editing, and writing various short stories and novels. Blogging time is divided into writing posts, responding to comments, preparing workshops, and brainstorming. I've also started setting aside time for my other website and its blog

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Posted By: Dianna G - Category: Articles/Ideas/Prompts, Writing Exercises

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