May Daze & The Shire
Added 2025-04-29 22:41:35 +0000 UTCHello, hello friends!
At the risk of my May totally imploding by sharing this, here's everything I currently have planned for streaming and videos!
We'll do our Patreon Double Stream Days on Sunday, May 18th and Monday, May 19th. Times are TBD, though I'll make sure to have them figured out soon so y'all can put them on your calendars! :)
Also -- it's the return of our Crafts & Drafts Book Club!
I had y'all fill out a questionnaire way back at the start of the year, telling me your favorite books, favorite authors, books you most want to read but haven't yet, etc., and I'm here to share the results!
Perhaps no surprise, Jane Austen took the grand prize:
Tolkien also showed multiple times, alongside a lot of disclaimers about how people couldn't choose just one favorite. (So fair. Me neither!)
The same answers held true for people's favorite authors and books that they'd be most willing to re-read.
Overall, I love that people are interested in introducing other forms of media into our Crafts & Drafts Book Club besides sticking solely to nonfiction:
(I mistakenly did a "choose any" instead of "choose one" format for that question, which is why the percentages and everything look so wonky But really almost everyone wanted to include more than just nonfiction & writing craft specific books.)
With that said, for May & June, we'll be reading...drum roll...The Hobbit!
Confession time: I've actually never read The Hobbit before, and though I've long loved the universe of Tolkien, all my knowledge comes strictly from the movies.
So this is very exciting for me. I can't wait to discuss how The Hobbit (and by proxy, LotR) shaped the fantasy genre as a whole, dive in to Tolkien's word choices, and discuss world-building a place people wish they could jump into. In fact! Here's me way back in 2016:
(Pictured in Hobbiton in New Zealand!)
For Crafts & Drafts, I'm thinking we'll continue our fun alternating method of last year, except this time we'll do a fiction book, a writing craft specific book, and then a month or two of lectures or publishing industry-specific articles and research. :)
Alright, more to come later! It's time for me to get back to shuffling the outline of A Basement Brimming with Bodies ever so slightly and also begin corralling all my beta reader feedback (EEEEK).
If I don't get to chat with y'all before the end of the month, I hope you have a PHENOMENAL end of April and that May treats you wonderfully. Happy writing!!
Comments
Just fyi for anyone that's interested: the annotated edition of the Hobbit is great if you want more of a craft insight into the book. May be helpful if you're DNFing. It talks about some of Tolkien's process that developed into The Hobbit. It'll make for interesting discussion if you find yourself stalling out.
Clara Rose Elliott
2025-05-11 17:36:23 +0000 UTCIt'll be fun to reread The Hobbit. I always associate The Hobbit and LOTR with summertime because that's when I first read them so, perfect time of year imo.
Clara Rose Elliott
2025-05-01 19:32:38 +0000 UTCI can totally see that happening. I'm not a fan of it either, especially after reading The Lord of the Rings. The styles are so very different. The latter is so much better with world building, time progression, depth of historical background, nature and weather descriptions etc. I learned so much from it. The former is a book for children in a slightly patronizing style. But it is set in Middle Earth which is why I constantly reread it. :D
Anja Kuemski
2025-04-30 06:52:45 +0000 UTCI'm learning Dutch at the moment and I thought The Hobbit would be a great start for my reading comprehension. But it seems impossible to get a single book for a reasonable price. I could literally only pay 20 € more for a train ticket and go to the Netherlands to get a book from a shop. So the English edition it has to be. :(
Anja Kuemski
2025-04-30 06:48:33 +0000 UTCI'll be honest, I DNFd the Hobbit... but I'll try it again with everyone!
Zara Hoffman
2025-04-30 01:13:28 +0000 UTC
