Okay, now that that’s over.

Okay folks,

As some of you may know, for the past two years I’ve been pursing my Masters degree in publishing up in New York City.  As of May 20^th 2009, I officially finished!  And of course…that meant I spent the next two months goofing off and going on vacation.

The post-graduation euphoria is settling and so it’s time to stop neglecting this place.  Hopefully a few changes are going to start happening around here now that I have the time and motivation to refocus and reprioritize my life goals.  I’ve got a lot of ideas and I think, finally, I have the time to enact a few of them.

Doh, this time I mean it.

I’m finally back from my month long vacation down south with the family.  I meant to blog over the holidays but I just got too caught up spending time with peeps.  I am back in the city now, and eager to get started on 2009.

Now are you ready for the big news:  I’m employed!  I work in book marketing and I couldn’t be happier.  Three cheers for bread winning folks!

I hope you had a lovely holiday.

/End of Line

~ Darcy

Booking Through Thursday: A bad library memory

Whether you usually read off of your own book pile or from the library shelves NOW, chances are you started off with trips to the library. (There’s no way my parents could otherwise have kept up with my book habit when I was 10.) So … What is your earliest memory of a library? Who took you? Do you have you any funny/odd memories of the library?

I’ve really been in the mood to fill out a book or writing meme lately that isn’t a Top 100 books sort of thing.  I think I’ve just about done all those.  So if you all know of any out there, feel free to tag me with one.  ^_^

Anyway, the question for Booking Through Thursday got my attention.  There are some really beautiful memories being shared with this question.  I’m a bit jealous, as my earliest memory of the library is more or less just plain crappy.  The only library I’d ever been to was our very small school library.  I don’t think there was a public library on St. Croix.  I’d been with my classes before but none of the trips really stood out because time books just didn’t interest me much at the time.  I was in third grade and that was the year I found out that my Grandpa had served in the army during Korea.  This became the most fascinating thing in the world to me because I actually knew someone that had been in a war.  I didn’t even really know what war was, but he had been there.  I wanted to ask him all my questions, but my mom told me I wasn’t allowed.  My Grandpa didn’t want to talk about the war and it was best we just let him be.  So I did exactly what PBS had told me to do in this sort of situation…I went to the library.  Suddenly books were cool for the first time because they could give me answers!

So I’m this little punk kid, maybe 8 at the time.  I went and found two books they had on Korea, one a nonfiction book with a lot of grisly pictures and the other was a fiction novel about the conflict.  I was so proud of myself, cause I was finally going to find my answers…and all on my own too!  Only, when I got up to the check out desk the librarian refused to let me take the books home on the grounds that they were not appropriate for a kid.  I begged but to no avail.  She did not even offer to help me find a book that would be age appropriate.  I was so heartbroken.  I cried straight through recess that day.

Brief Vacation

I’ll be out of town this weekend at my boyfriends until Tuesday.  Actually, I’ll be out of town the next three weekends so posting ought to be light.

Anyway, for curiosities sake here are the books I’m taking with me this weekend:

World War Z by Max Brooks

Flash by L.E. Modesitt

and Artemis Fowl: The Opal Deception by Eoin Colfer

We’ll be stopping by Otakon in Baltimore for one day.  Mayhap I’ll have some updates on the manga industry or some such.  At the very least I might pick up a new series.  I’ve been meaning to get back into manga.  Anyone have some good recomendations?

My Birthday Haul

I had a birthday this week, and as is my custom, I allow my self a mini shopping spree at Borders.  I admit, it helped that I got a 40% off one book coupon in addition to my birthday coupon.  So here is what I picked up:

Artemis Fowl: The Lost Colony by Eoin Colfer
Artemis Fowl: The Time Paradox by Eoin Colfer

I love the Artemis books.  I’ll go into that more when I review them, but for now I’ll just say that I love Artemis for being the persnickety little bastard that he is.  I felt the progression of his character especially in the first three books was fantastic.   The third book had me near tears when he made that certain sacrifice for his dad.  I can’t wait to read Lost Colony.  I must force myself to finish the other three books I’m in the middle of right now though.  The disappointment that was Breaking Dawn has kind of put a dent in the recent reading binge I’ve been on.  Granted it is because of the disappointment that was Breaking Dawn that I bought these two over other books. I believe the first words out of my mouth when I finished (if you don’t count the string of nonsensical curse words I let loose) were “And to think!  I could have been reading Artemis Fowl instead of this crap!”  So thank you, Renesmee?  I guess.

Star Wars Legacy of the Force: Betrayal by Aaron Allston

For nostalgia’s sake and because it has been a long time since I’ve read a Star Wars book, I decided to pick it up.  And hey, one of the Solo twins is in it!  Maybe I’ll actually continue this series.  The Star Wars expanded universe has grown so much since I fell out of the fandom.  I hope this will be a good place to pick it back up again.

Wicked Lovely by Melissa Marr

So, I had sworn I’d take a break from YA fantasy titles for girls for a while, buuuuuut that didn’t happen.  I hadn’t realized that Wicked Lovely was finally in paperback.  I’ve been wanting to read this book since the 2007 Brooklyn Book Festival when I heard Melissa Marr speak for the first time.  I absolutely adore her.  She seems like such a nice woman and one of those authors that is very approachable.  I regretted that I didn’t have the money on hand to buy her book that day, a fact that I still regret.  I saw her again at Comic Con NY as well, to talk about the experience of having one’s work adapted to graphic novel format.  Actually, I don’t believe that was the focus of the panel, but I don’t really remember the other panelists.  I was glad though that an author was there to speak on that process. I attended the Jim Butcher/Dabel Brothers Productions panel for much the same reason.   

Anyway, happy birthday to me!

Not Dead Yet

Anyone reading this will note the rather long time lapse between this and my last post.  I don’t have an excuse for you….I have a BILLION. The first of all being that I have not had one full week yet without company since finals.  

I have not forgotten about this blog.  Things will pick up from here again; I promise.