Banning myself from doll-rooting.

For the time being, at least. Because no matter how much rooting a doll with blue hair makes my heart go zgyuuuun three dolls in three weeks is too much. I'm not picking up a rooting needle until I finish handwriting Chapter Five of my novel. So I took up my Space Pen and wrote six pages tonight. Typed up, that would be more like two and a half. :O

The Space Pen is slightly nicer to work with than my Parker Jotter. I'm still getting ink all over my writing hand (my right hand, because I'm Right-handed, not a cool Leftie) but the ink doesn't skip as much. It feels more comfortable in my hand, but it doesn't have that convenient clip that lets you attach a Parker Jotter to your notebook. So I'm keeping my Space Pen with my two Parker Jotters(Jotter Pink and Jotter Silver) in an old hard glasses case. Maybe I never have to use lousy pens again!

Book reading. Reading some books.

Actually, I'm just continuing to read Gormenghast. I've reached the third book in the trilogy, Titus Alone. There are four books in the series, but the last is incomplete. It's included in the anthology along with some critical essays and I swear it's about two pages long.

I committed the age-old error of reading book reviews before I started the novel. Apparently most people consider Titus Alone to be some kind of travesty because of how different it is from the first two books. I'm only about forty pages into it so far. Over eight-hundred into the entire anthology! I wouldn't call it a travesty, but it's very, very odd. Who would have expected that the third book in a Gothic trilogy would be comic-book sci-fi? I have to admit that I don't like Titus at all as a character. Ever since he "came of age" in Gormenghast he's been a whiny, Hamlet-like anti-hero. Not as likeable to me as Fucshia, Flay, Dr. Prunesquallor or even the Countess Gertrude. Oh well. The premise for this last finished book is interesting enough to keep me reading. We'll see if I'm crying foul by the end!

The only other book I have lying around from the holidays is Thomas Mann's Joseph and His Brothers. I'm really getting hooked on these long books...