Edit: this was supposed to go up yesterday, but clearly I need to focus more and have more coffee before trying that function (and check to make sure it ran).

I finished Big Magic by Elizabeth Gilbert (of Eat, Pray, Love fame). Over on GoodReads, I gave it three stars, because as far as self-help/pump-you-up  books, it’s ok. I’m not really a believer in the “the muse touched me”, “the universe talked to me”, “I can’t not write” stuff. Especially the latter, and not because I can’t stand double negatives – but because of course you can not write. It’s called not writing, and billions of people do it (or not, as the case may be).

Gilbert is heavy into the touchy-feely thing about being an artist (of any kind), and is also (strangely to me) apparently a fan of telling people just ho hard pursuing your art can be and how you will never make money and how MFAs suck and are unnecessary, pointing out that there has never been a Pulitzer (or maybe Nobel, this is how much it stuck with me) awarded to a writer who had an MFA. Who cares, was my first thought. My second thought was that while I may not have a use for an MFA myself, some people like that, and why shouldn’t they pursue them?

She also loves to drop (famous person) references and their little chats and so forth. My attitude as I rushed through the last hundred pages that when this came up in the last third, I was literally shouting “DON’T CARE!” at my Fire Tablet.

There’s some rah-rah, you can do this material, but I think if you just watch her first TED talk, you’d get the same “you can do your art!” material in less than twenty minutes.

That’s it, the short and sweet (for a change!) of it for this book.  I’m also reading Red Sparrow, but it is so poorly written I’m having a tough time getting past 5% on it. In the meantime, I’m cleansing my reading palate with Virginia Woolf (Mrs. Dalloway) and Mark Greaney (Mission Critical, a continuation of the Gray Man series).

Until next time, peeps: be well.