Fiction vs. Reality

Sometimes I pick up a book and wonder why that can't be my life. Sometimes I watch a movie and find myself wishing that I was that girl. Other times I thank my lucky stars that my life is as good as it is, but it doesn't take away from the fact that sometimes fiction is just better than reality.

I have brought out the notes again and have been considering trying at writing my Korean story down once more, not for the first time and probably not for the last. This time around it has been inspired by a friend of mine publishing a book. This friend is not a close one, and is not someone who I would have thought of as an author. She has never shown an interest (as far as I know) in writing a novel, and the fact that she got there before me makes me, well, helluva jealous. But then, she clearly wasn't like me in terms of the procrastinating and struggling to get her story out.

Anyway, now that I am considering writing again, I have been considering a new angle to approach the story from, and that is one of fiction. It would certainly fix a lot of the dilemmas that I have been considering about writing my own story in that it wouldn't affect the privacy of the people that I met and came to be friends with overseas. It would be fiction, and though I might draw from experiences or stories that I had and heard while I was in Korea, it would for the most part just be made up of the things that I wanted to do while I was there. My imagination could run wild and I could have a lot more fun with the writing of it.

Of course, so far it has been difficult. Even drawing from personal experiences and fictionalising them has been difficult. Take for example a part of the first chapter where the heroine of the book is having a fight with her boyfriend at the time because she is leaving. The fight itself never happened in my life, though it is based on a number of conversations that were had with my boyfriend and I before I left as well as the worries that I never voiced, but had in my mind before leaving. After writing that particular section, my emotions were all over the place and when Grant came home from work, I was close to tears because I felt like we'd had a real fight.

I am hoping that it is going to pan out this time. I am hoping that this isn't just going to be another of those fruitless attempts that end up going nowhere and just sitting on my harddrive for years. I have so many of those that I keep looking at and considering picking up again, but I think that my Korean story needs to be told before any other. It is a personal one, and if there is one that I am going to finish, this should be it. If I can't finish this, I have no business writing fiction. At least to my mind.

Anyway, that is all for today. I have wasted far too many words writing up a silly blog about writing. Words that could have been written into my new novel. Alas. Back to the grindstone I go! Wish me luck.

Book with a Suggestive Title

The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo. It sounds like it's supposed to be elusive, mysterious and exotic. The object of having such a title of a book is obviously to perk interest and arouse intrigue.

Except that a girl with a dragon tattoo is hardly intriguing. Isn't a dragon one of the most common tattoos along with hearts, roses and Chinese symbols? There are certainly hundreds of girls out there with dragon tattoos. Wait, hundreds is probably UNDERestimating. Thousands at least. So what makes this girl special and what makes this book special?

Well, not very much to be perfectly honest. At least, not in the case of the book. I will admit that the character of Lisbeth Salander is interesting and, I suppose, special. She is not your typical detective. The main surprise regarding her character, however I didn't find at all surprising. Unfortunately, you would have to read the book to find out what that is. Which I wouldn't stop you from doing.

I am not saying that the book is terrible. What I am trying to say is that it is not the amazing piece of literature that people make it out to be. It is a mystery novel, and for a mystery novel I found it quite difficult to get through. The first half of the book drags quite a lot. It is a description of the lives of Lisbeth Salander, a freelancer working for a security company who tends to dig into peoples lives and is particularly good at it, and Mikael Blomkvist, a journalist who has just been found guilty of libel and is about to spend some time in jail. Salander is hired by a lawyer to run a background check on Blomkvist, as the lawyer's client is interested in hiring him for a special job.

The job is where the story starts to get interesting, and is only really mentioned (aside from the prologue) about a quarter of the way through the novel. And it still takes another quarter for the job to get interesting. Sure, there is a suspicion of murder which draws the reader's attention, but then another quarter of the book is spent detailing a past of the family involved, a past that, while it has interesting moments, is not all that interesting overall, I found.

And then, halfway through, the drama really starts with discoveries of information, heart attacks and Blomkvist finding out about and meeting Salander. From halfway through the book, I struggled to put it down. I really started enjoying the novel and finding it interesting, and it is because of the second half that I am not completely against the reading of it. I would just recommend being prepared to trudge through the dregs to get to the good part.

So overall, the book is only half good. Whether that is good enough to justify the great press would be up to you to decide. I don't think so. Tons of people do. If you've read the book, let me know what you think!