Wow, Maybe I AM a Writer

[nezumiko]

If you lent me the Tamora Pierce book Alanna, speak up. I was pretty sure I'd borrowed it from jbmcdragon but she says no. Did I get it from amethyst73? darksideofstorm has recommended it to me, but she's in the UK and didn't mail it, at least I don't think she did. But JB and Momo both say it must have come from Dark.

Anyway.

I read it on the flights to Nashville. Finished it, too. It was a lot of fun and I quite liked the characters. It was interesting, though, because all along as I read it I was aware that

1. I write better
   
2. My friends write better
   
3. Fallen Leaves is written better

Generally I found the characters engaging and the plot interesting, but the sentence structure simplistic and somewhat annoying, and the pacing stilted and herky-jerky, as if it had been abridged so that none of the connecting material was there, just the main plot points.

Still, I liked it well enough that upon arriving here, when my sister had an errand to a bookstore, I bought book two. I'm giving it a pass despite deficiencies because it is her first book, it's targeted at Young Adult (ie teenage) readers, and it had enough promise that I'm hoping the series gets better as it goes along.

And I realized I haven't read a lot of recently-published fiction. But the stuff I've read in the last two years, I've really liked some, and others I've been painfully aware of the writing not being all that great. And I've put them down in disgust, because I write at least that well. And if that's the case, why am I not finishing my books and getting them published?

Excellent questions. Perhaps I should go get back to work now.