Outfit no. 50

Skirt and shirt: F21, belt and coat: wholesale-dress.net, shoes: New Look, glasses: Ray-Ban

I don't normally include my coat in outfit photos, but I've started wearing this one I got ages ago (you may recall it from my first and only haul video), because Lyall peed all over my usual Urban Outfitters coat. I'm worried about washing it, as it could easily get fucked up in the washing machine. I may just Febreze it?? Gahh help I don't even know. In the meantime I shall wear this far less warm coat! And since I haven't featured it in an outfit post yet, here it is. It's definitely photogenic, but so, so not warm. Sadface.

I've been feeling pretty good about life lately. Well, more than I had been. Which is nice. I was feeling a bit bleak for a while, and it wasn't fun. I've just been trying to think more positively, and stop dwelling on all the negative thoughts and worries and whatever ennui dwells in my brain at any given time. I tend to retreat into the darkness of my own mind a lot of the time, so I've just been trying to replace random outbursts of sadness, anger, frustration, and pessimism with more positive thoughts. Every night now, as I fall asleep, I think about everything I'm grateful for, and everything I want to accomplish in the near future. I don't think of it as, "Oh I wish I could accomplish this," but instead, "It's gonna seriously rule when I accomplish this." And sometimes even, "I have already accomplished this and I will revel in the joy of it," even though I haven't actually. There's a cheesy as all hell video/book/thing called The Secret that Greg and I watched on Netflix in a fit of boredom, and according to it, that's what you're meant to do if you want a sports car to appear in your driveway. Pretend you already own the car. Your positive thoughts will make it happen!! They send wavelengths into the air or something and then the things you want just start showing up unexpectedly!

Aside from all of the stupid hokeyness of it, though, is a core message that I think is really important, which is positive thinking. Whether or not a Mercedes shows up in my living room, life is a lot better if I'm not constantly stewing in negative thoughts. Which, admittedly, I often do. So I thought, what can it hurt? Why shouldn't I try thinking about things differently, more optimistically? It's not like being a sad sack was doing anything for me.

So here I am a few days later, feeling a billion times better about life than I was only last week. And I've had two requests for material from agents this week, which is so exciting, and basically I'm realizing how completely useless it is to focus on all the bad things in life. I mean I'm not even close to being super cheerful and peppy, not by even a little bit. But instead of letting myself get angry over tiny things like getting cut off in traffic, or my dog peeing on me, I just let it roll off me and move on. I feel kind of liberated, to be honest.

And that's enough silly inspirational word-vomit for one post! I hope you all have a lovely Wednesday afternoon.

Book Review: Etiquette & Espionage

I said I'd post book reviews here at some point, so I'm doing it! I'm doing it. I finished Etiquette & Espionage recently, and since I'm a huge fan of Gail Carriger, I thought it would be fitting to start with this one. Yay YA steampunk!

The premise of E&E (as I shall now call it) is pretty simple. Sophronia, a girl living in a steampunk Victorian England (do I need to explain what steampunk is? No? Okay), is sent off to what she thinks will be finishing school, but is actually a school for young ladies to learn how to partake in espionage. Among other things... including finishing people. (Meanwhile young boys get sent to a school where they learn how to be evil masterminds.) It seems kind of silly, and admittedly -- it is. But it's so clearly meant to be silly that it's amazing. And since this is an alternate version of English history, it also includes vampires and werewolves! If you've read the Parasol Protectorate series you'll realize that it's set in the same world, years earlier. Which is super fun because there are characters you might recognize from that series.

The plot isn't too complex, and the stakes aren't very high, but Gail Carriger's writing is so full of character that I had a hard time putting it down. Gail has a very Victorian, sort of Jane Austen-y vibe going with her prose, and it's very funny. Some of my favorite moments are in the details. In this world people have mechanicals instead of maids and butlers, and occasionally the mechanicals wear clothing, so often a mechanical would splutter indignantly and emit a jet of air, and its cravat would flutter up into its metal face. Details like that are one of my favorite things to write, so I love finding them in books; they make me so happy!

I don't really know how to review books, it turns out. I don't want to give anything away in terms of the plot, but there's the typical school setting tropes, where the outcast girls band together and become friends, etc. There's also a hint of romance (more in later books?), a werewolf who ties his top hat to his head so even when he changes to wolf form he's still wearing it, sky pirates (officially called "flywaymen"), and various secret societies and steampunk tomfoolery. It's a very quick read, and so much fun all the way through. I'd highly recommend E&E, as well as Gail Carriger's other work, because her writing is so funny and quirky and engaging.

And, if any of you have already read this or other books by Gail Carriger, do you have any recommendations for similar books?

Edited to add: If you want to read a bit more about my love of Gail Carriger, check out my post about the Steampunk Soiree that took place at Foyle's last spring in London! And much thanks to Little, Brown for the complimentary copy of Soulless, which began the love affair.

Outfit no. 49

Skirt and sweatshirt: F21, hat: H&M, shoes: Payless, glasses: Ray-Ban

Nothing particularly exciting about this outfit, aside from -- of course -- the Star Wars sweatshirt. I had planned to wear my velvet skirt with it today, but for some reason it just was not working in my favor, so I had no choice but to fall back on a tried and true friend: the navy circle skirt from Forever21. I'm addicted to it. I won't lie. I'm sorry.

Cool thing about this sweatshirt, though! Months ago I tried it on at Forever21 and really wanted it, but I had very little money at the time so I passed it up. The next time I went shopping I looked for it, but couldn't find it in the store or online. However, when I checked out the sale section over the weekend, there it was for only $9.99! Hurray! So I bought it. Obviously. And now I can show off my geekhood with a mass-produced, fast fashion item from a super popular chain clothing store! I don't know how many layers of irony are involved but I'm sure it's many.

Also I gotta mention -- these tights are the Super Cosy ones from Primark. Fleece-lined. That's right. So, so awesome for especially cold days. Thanks endlessly to Shaun for bringing them back to me from Old Blighty!

Reading List

Since I said I'd start making some posts about the books I've been reading, I thought it would be good to start with my reading list. I always seem to have an endless list of books that I want to read, but lately I've started buying books again, so right now the books I own take precedence. (I also have a huge pile of books living with Lucy back in Wales, most of which I got from Little, Brown when I did an internship there, but I haven't been able to afford shipping them back to the States yet.) So the books pictured aren't the whole reading list, but my goal is to finish these first before moving on to other things!

1. Etiquette & Espionage - Gail Carriger. I've actually finished this one already, but I wanted to include it because I'll be doing a review of it soon, hopefully! Gail Carriger is my favorite author at the moment, and this is the first book in her new YA series. I highly recommend anything written by her; she's amazing!

2. Clockwork Angel - Cassandra Clare. I'm about halfway through this one, but I can't seem to get into it for some unholy reason! I don't understand why, as I LOVED the Mortal Instruments series, but I guess that's how it goes. I'm putting it down for a while and will come back to it later when I'm in a different frame of mind.

3. The Hobbit - J.R.R. Tolkien. My dad read this to me when I was a kid, but I honestly haven't read it since then, at least not that I can recall. I've downloaded an audiobook version of it, so I may not actually read the book, but after seeing the movie I really want to renew my Tolkien love.

4. Mr. Darcy's Dream - Elizabeth Aston. I picked this up at The Book Exchange in Missoula, thanks to a family friend, who used her ridiculous amount of store credit to buy a bunch of us books for Christmas. Thanks Diana! I've been wanting to read more Regency romances lately, as my book is inspired by the genre in a lot of ways, and this one sounded super cute.

5. Beautiful Creatures - Kami Garcia and Margaret Stohl. This one's been on my radar for a while ever since I saw the movie trailer, but I didn't have much desire to read it until my bestie Rose expressed interest. So, since I love reading books with her, I decided to buy the first one and see if I liked it! I'm only about 100 pages in so far, but I'm really enjoying the writing. It's very atmospheric, and clearly the authors are good at writing, which is more than I can say for a lot of popular books these days. It's also a really fat book for YA! Hopefully I'll be reviewing this soon, once I've finished.

6. Valkyrie Rising - Ingrid Paulson. I'm not sure why I bought this, to be honest. I think the author might be represented by one of the agents I queried, and that's where I found out about it? Either way it sounded interesting and different, as it's set in Norway and it's about Valkyries, but I'm about one third of the way through and it's just not grabbing me. I'll certainly finish it, but so far it's kind of forgettable.

7. Shades of Milk and Honey - Mary Robinette Kowal. This is one I've been meaning to read for years. It's a Regency romance with magic, as far as I can tell, which is right up my street. I think I'll really like this one, or I hope I will, so it might be the next one I read after Beautiful Creatures.

8. Sharps - K.J. Parker. To be honest I have no idea what this one is about, beyond fencing and fantasy. I was in Barnes & Noble a while ago and the blurb on the back cover really grabbed me, and since I like books about swordplay (Swordspoint, anyone??), it found its way into my online shopping cart a few days later!

9. A Confusion of Princes - Garth Nix. It's no secret that I love Garth Nix. One of my favorite books of all time is Sabriel, so when I saw this I knew I had to buy it. It has a really crazy premise, and I have no doubt that it's gonna be awesome, so I'll let you know once I've read it if it lived up to my expectations!

If any of you have read these, or want to read them along with me and discuss, please do! I love discussing books. And if you have any recommendations for books you think I might like, comment away! I'm always looking for more books to add to my list of books-I-may-never-actually-read. x

Outfit no. 48

Skirt: F21, Sweater and necklace: H&M, shirt: wholesale-dress.net, shoes: Payless, glasses: Ray-Ban

Feeling pretty good today! I had a low moment after eating half a donut at work (IT WAS FREE! I CAN'T RESIST FREE BAKED GOODS!), but then came home and had delicious, filling, and super low-calorie soup for lunch. So that made up for my slip-up earlier. Or so I keep telling myself. But yay! Friday. I'm gonna start in on my huge stack of books to read, beginning with Beautiful Creatures. And then I shall go see the movie when I'm done, hurray! YA paranormal romances are seriously the best books.

Other than that I don't really have any plans for the weekend. Which is kind of nice, but I hope something social happens, or I at least drag myself out to go shopping tomorrow. I often want to stay home and do nothing, but I have to force myself to go out otherwise I get melancholy. Yes I'm basically the saddest, most ennui-ridden human alive and it is annoying.

I'm in love with my outfit today. I wasn't sure it would work at all, but I kind of think it rules? Maybe it's just me. But I can never find ways to style this really old H&M sweater, or this blouse, and bam I put them together and it was magic. Also if I could I would wear this skirt every single day. It's comfortable, flattering, and the perfect length. I keep hoping Forever21 will stock more in different colors, but they don't! Tragic. Anyone know where to find skater/circle skirts on the cheap? This one's great because it's made of a thicker jersey fabric, so it doesn't cling to my hips like some of my other skirts (which I never wear). The Holy Grail of skirts and I only have one.

Have a lovely weekend everyone! I may do a book post over the weekend if I get bored. I've been meaning to and I just haven't yet. So watch out! I guess. If you want.

Bath Nostalgia

I didn't take outfit photos today but I felt like blogging, and I needed something to make me feel happy. So I thought I'd share some photos from the day I went to Bath with Shaun last year. It was a bit of a last-minute trip, as I was planning to leave England in September and I wanted to see Bath before I left. I'd heard it was beautiful, and I love Jane Austen, so we booked seats on a coach and off we went!

My favorite thing about Bath was the architecture. It really felt like we were in another time. We also had so much fun in the Fashion Museum, which was located in the old Assembly Rooms (where Jane Austen attended balls!), and then went for tea at the Jane Austen Centre. We did a bit of shopping, people watching, and generally relaxed in the touristy atmosphere. We didn't go to the Roman Baths, as tickets were £12 a pop and the line was a mile long, but I think I would have enjoyed the Fashion Museum more anyway!

But I'll stop talking now and let you see the pictures. I loved Bath and I hope I'll be back there again one day.

Outfit no. 47

Dress: H&M, shirt: Primark, boots: Aldo, necklace: gift from a friend, glasses: Ray-Ban

After going through my outfit photos, I realized that I had a concerned/angry furrowed brow in every single one of them. Except the ones where I'm looking down or my hair is in the way. Because you can't see it. 

I'm just having one of those an-agent-rejected-my-manuscript-because-the-protagonist-wasn't-likable-and-I-think-I-should-give-up-on-life kind of days. If you read that whole hyphenated mess then I tip my hat to you.

Gonna work on a new project tonight and stop dwelling on poor Cecily. She may be my baby, but it doesn't mean anybody else will like her (besides Lucy, who is possibly even worse than Cecily, and I say that with the greatest possible amount of love and admiration).