What is THE VALLEN?

Filched from Wikipedia

In keeping with the updated purpose of this blog, welcome to a behind-the-scenes scoop on my newest novel, THE VALLEN.

What is The Vallen? 

Funny you should ask that, my main character—Essa Finch—asks the very same thing...

So...where to begin talking about THE VALLEN...hmmm...hmmm...

Don't yell at me, I'm an artist - Part II

Sarah Jung, pic filched here

In a prior post, we delved into the romanticization of mental illness and how this rather common aspect of the human condition is particularly romanticized in those people who we call—and who call themselves—artists...

Now, let's delve into oversensitivity. This quora post features a quote from Pearl S. Buck explaining quite well the definition of sensitivity I'm aiming at:

The truly creative mind in any field is no more than this: A human creature born abnormally, inhumanly sensitive. To him... a touch is a blow, a sound is a noise, a misfortune is a tragedy, a joy is an ecstasy, a friend is a lover, a lover is a god, and failure is death. Add to this cruelly delicate organism the overpowering necessity to create, create, create—so that without the creating of music or poetry or books or buildings or something of meaning, his very breath is cut off from him. He must create, must pour out creation. By some strange, unknown, inward urgency he is not really alive unless he is creating.

What is real?

What is real and what is not? What is fiction and what—truth?

In reading, then thinking, over The Last Unicorn by Peter S. Beagle, I am conflicted with these very questions. It's Beagle who's brought them bubbling to the surface. What with his characters in one ethereal dialogue after the next:

"Spells of seeming," the unicorn said...
The magician answered: "[Madame Fortuna's] shabby skill lies in disguise. And even that knack would be beyond her, if it weren't for the eagerness of those gulls, those marks, to believe whatever comes easiest."

What SHOULD my story do?

My story...my story...my story...Dammit! What should my story be doing? Trying to accomplish? Is it one thing or many?

Hmm...

Whether thy masterpiece of a novel, or thy life's story, or thy "Story" on Facebook that exhibits annoying notifications across my (not thy) feed, when we speak of our story—just what the hell are we talking about? What should we be saying? What are we trying to accomplish via telling our story?

Let's get to the bottom of this...

A Word on Too Many Words

Reading over the Goodread comments on Amitav Ghosh’s Sea of Poppies, I somewhat ruined this book for myself. Well, even if shortlisted for the Man Booker award, the first 50 or so pages just rung my attention completely dry—so—it wasn’t just the Goodread comments with spoiler alerts, informing me about the unsatisfactory ending and prompting me to lay this book down before wasting anymore of my time reading another word (I admit I especially searched for those comments to substantiate my own suspicions…), it was all the so many words themselves…