Indie Immersion

A Thin Line Between Love and Lust

~ Tael ~ 2 Comments

A Poly Love Story…

How the hell did I end up reading this one? In fact, I had told myself that in my support of other indies, I would actively avoid taking on erotic Western romance stories, or anything of the like. But he happened to be a Twitter follower who asked me to give a read, and I tend to be soft on my followers. Plus, this one had the whole poly-lover angle going on with it, so here was a twist.

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Surprisingly, I wasn’t bored out of my mind. There were a lot of points in the story where I genuinely wanted to know what was coming next. Then there were points where I went, “For REAL? YEAH, RIGHT!” But I’m not so open-minded as Nicky, who happened to be my favorite character in the book because of her unapologetic, go-getting, straight-forwardness, and her innocence, despite her sexual appetite and awareness. You wonder if shared trinogamy could exist in the real world, outside of the Mormon countryside or Islamic marriage setups, and you question the believability of the unfurling situation. But then you get jolted by some scenes that remind you there’s a structure in place that involves honesty and open communication, like every time Prince stumbles upon a new woman he’s attracted to and fails to let Nicky know his growing interest. She is quick to show her possessiveness and let him have it, which lends an air of “realness” to the situation: there are rules. Sister lovers are permissible, but no one-night stands with bimbos, and no secrets. There’s still such a thing as cheating in this arrangement.

There were also a few points where the vernacular made me chuckle, specifically Miles’ winning line: “I don’t know about cooties, but they fa sho got coochies.” It is absolutely something I could have overheard one of my young cousins say growing up, and I was impressed with how the writer was able to nail that.

I did find a lot of Prince’s poetry and mushy sentiments to be unrealistically sappy (i.e. Carrie’s response to Petrovsky’s amorous behavior in Sex in the City), but the character also openly references his own corniness throughout the book. I would cringe if my boyfriend ever led me into a room lit by candles with a bed covered in rose petals. I AM NOT A ROMANTIC. But the book does a good job of making you think, “This can’t really happen,” and then you realize, even if you would never in your life be down with it, it’s not implausible that others would. Even outside of the fairy-tale version C.E. Long paints for you.

Also, I kind of wanted the assimilation of Nyla to fail. I almost wished she would remain resolute on her feelings toward the situation just to prove that not everyone would be down with this, haha.

I’m bad.

~Tael

The Exiles

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Time for another Indie Immersion! This time it’s The Exiles by E. Leo Foster. It’s a short novel, about 140 pages, but this one seemed to capture exactly what I was looking for in an indie book: something different and uniquely creative without reading like a high school writing assignment. Ever read “Shoplifting from American Apparel” by Tao Lin? I really wanted to like that one, but I found it a very dry read with very little reader connection. The pacing flowed like a robot chanting an abstract grocery list.

For some reason, after reading the book blurb for The Exiles, I expected to read about a society of lawless vagrants who lived on the outskirts of town in a secret location like the Court of Miracles in The Hunchback of Notre Dame. You don’t encounter this; instead, it focuses on one family in particular, and they aren’t even hiding from the world; just hiding secrets. Obviously the title is meant to be metaphoric.

TheExilesTwo main things that stood out to me.

A. The author created characters I didn’t really like, but could still connect with through human emotion. And I believe that’s a great skill.

B. I absolutely loved the smart style of storytelling he chose to use; the choppy flow of the short chapters that led into flashbacks building up to interesting reveals, and the witty, somewhat philosophical lines of #TruthTrebles sprinkled about that blended seamlessly with the storyline. This is a book that makes you think. So much so, that it prompted me to leave an Amazon review, which I can only do if I’m actually impressed or mentally impacted.

Doesn’t look like he used an editor; I came across some typos and grammatical incorrections (yes, I make up words that kind of make sense), but hey, I didn’t hire an editor either, and they weren’t littered throughout to take away from the overall story for me. Real readers aren’t picky. This one’s a winner. Cue the Super Mario RPG battle win music.

~Tael

I’m Feelin’ That

Aside ~ ~ Tael ~ 1 Comment

Immersion. It conjures up the memory of that first dive into the calm of Jolly Roger Bay in Super Mario 64 where the music immediately switches to a deeper, still soothing tempo as you descend into blissful underwater exploration…like diving into a memorable story, yah? ImFeelinThat

Extending exploration from the gaming world to the writing world, it’s not an Indie Author Journey unless you’re supporting other indies! So I randomly searched Twitter, discovered author Chris Stevens, and took a dive into “I’m Feelin That! Stories of Love, Life and Lessons Learned.” I’m not usually one to read short stories by choice, but the cultural aspect, I could connect with. It’s very straight-forward writing making use of slang vernacular, with different POVs to switch things up for a varied range of content. What I liked the most: reading about lifestyles that differ from my own. Story that stuck with me the most? Brothers In Arms.

~Tael