(no subject)

[decemberthirty]

I have finally finished Tehanu, the last of the Earthsea books. It really is an odd book, an odd end to that series. Lovely, but odd. I can remember how much I struggled to make sense of it back when I was twelve or so. I remember writing a long poem to try and help me figure it out, to help me attempt to sort out what I was feeling. So much of what the book is concerned with is aging, the changes that come with age, the way our relationship with the world changes as we get older, and I really knew nothing about that at twelve. (And how much do I know about it at 25? You are not old yet, Katie.)

I was more critical of the book this time than I think I have ever been, and I'm not sure why that is. Perhaps just my frame of mind. I couldn't help but notice a little stridency creeping in around the edges, and places where LeGuin used a hammer when a feather would have sufficed. I've never felt that way before about this book.

I don't know yet what I'll read next, although I feel fairly strongly that I need to go in a different direction. There's a lot of unread material lying around the house, so I should probably find something in one of those piles. But I have the urge to go to the library or the bookstore, to ply myself with something new...

In other news, perhaps novel-writing is not the best pursuit for someone with as strong a tendency to disappear down the rabbit-hole as mine.