Author: harmamae
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How to Look Smarter – Maybe
Even a fool who keeps silent is considered wise; when he closes his lips, he is deemed intelligent. – Proverbs 17:28 Sometimes the stupidest things come out of my mouth. Clearly, there are times when it would’ve been better for me to keep my mouth shut. But, being an introvert, I usually have the opposite problem.…
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Secret Admirers Don’t Exist
“I have a secret secret admirer. Not only is her identity a secret—but so is the fact that she admires me.” ― Jarod Kintz, This Book Title is Invisible It’s a bit of an awkward admission to make, but every once in a while, I need to give up on a guy more quickly. I…
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Top 5 Literary Couples
So if I complain about Romeo and Juliet, Twilight, et al., what literary couple do I think worthy of being in the “top five”? Clearly, ones with some sort of strong personality types, and some sort of relationship journey. I don’t necessarily think these couples have to be in “romance books,” because sometimes the best…
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How To Describe Betrayal
“Maybe you can help me pull the knife out of my back. I can’t quite reach it.” – Lily Margolis in Lillies in Moonlight, by Allison Pittman A very subtle way for Lily Margolis to announce her betrayal, isn’t it? I love how this quote characterizes her as hurt, quick-witted and a little over-dramatic, all…
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Let’s Just Blame the Plot on Someone’s Sex Drive
The Problems with Leaving Romance up to “Overwhelming Attraction” You know what I hate? I hate when romantic comedies or romance novels set up a perfectly good antagonistic relationship between two main characters (you know, where they take an instant dislike to each other, like in the beginning of Pride and Prejudice), and then easily…
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A Dilemma – A Thought From Betsy Ray (Quotables)
I decided my ‘Quotables‘ posts will take over for my fiction posts for a little while – I left off posting ‘Quotables’ a few months back because of school pressures, but they’re back now! Fiction will return when I have something new written to post. 🙂 Today is a quote from Betsy Ray, the protagonist…
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The Dangerous Business of Recommending Novels
And the Dangerous Business of Reading Recommendations Someone lends you a book, telling you it’s “fantastic,” “will change your life forever,” or that you “have to read it.” You take and swear you’ll read it. Then it sits on your bookshelf for the next twelve months, while you stare at it and promise yourself you…
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Reactions to an Engagement – ‘Mansfield Park’ fanfiction
No, ‘Jane Austen fanfiction’ is not my new replacement for Why Polly?, but it is for this week. I wrote this quite a while ago, but I held off on posting it so it wouldn’t interrupt Why Polly?. This is a short fanfiction of Mansfield Park, from Mary Crawford’s point-of-view (remember – the girl who…
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Just Write What You Mean
There’s Got to be a Common-Sense Approach to the Language Rules Presciptivists vs. Descriptivists – apparently these are two sides of a lingual battle that involves literary theorists, writers and all-around grammar nazis. The New Yorker magazine (that bastion of literary prestige!) kicked things off by describing an old conflict between those who want to…
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