I’ve picked up House of Leaves again, Mark Z. Danielewski’s debut novel and veritable puzzle of a book. I previously abandoned it because, as a horror novel, I was having some trouble sleeping after reading it, but I’ve wanted to read it for years and the new year seems like a good time to conquer my fears.
There’s plenty of discussion around the internet regarding the book, and plenty more people who, I’m sure, have decoded the book’s many coded messages. But I’m a stingy sort who likes to do things on my own, and I thought I’d log some of it here! The first of my challenges was a letter from Appendix II-E, sent to Johnny Truant from his mother; she suspects that the director of the Whalestoe Institute, where she is institutionalized, is intercepting her letters. She is able to send a private letter to Johnny via an attendant, telling him the key to her next letter: take only the first letter of each word, separate those letters into something coherent, and find her true message (the letter itself is pure nonsense). Therefore, it’s no significant discovery on my part, but more of a fun first challenge. Warning that this is a book of psychological horror, and the contents below may be troubling or triggering (esp. for rape victims).
In the music industry, and in the folk genre particular, breakup songs are not exactly uncommon, and for every chart-topping artist crooning over the radio about the throes of love, there are thousands of disconsolate teens pouring over their guitars. For her 2009 Edward EP, England-based singer-songwriter Emma-Lee Moss (stage name Emmy the Great) visits the genre herself; the four included songs are among Emmy’s earliest, though they contain her usual balance of charm and poignancy, more often than not accompanied only by an acoustic strum.
It’s only natural that the first post on my shiny new blog should be about these two, isn’t it?
Let me preface this post by saying that I love Princess Bubblegum and Marceline and Bubbline and Sugarless Gum, all of that — whatever you’d like to call it, I ship it. Hard. I may not be a long-time Adventure Time fan; I have not experienced firsthand the “What Was Missing” controversy, the joy delivered when Sky Witch premiered, and so on. I jumped on-board late, binge-watched my way to this pairing, which washed over me with all its fluffy, tumultuous grace. I was vaguely aware that it was a popular ship as I made my way up to “What Was Missing”; I transcended as I witnessed Marceline’s impromptu, angst-ridden love ballad to Peebles; I immediately rewatched “Go With Me”, eager to see the pair’s first on-screen interaction; I stormed ahead to “Sky Witch”. I filled my tumblr with all the lovely fanart in existence for the couple, bemusing my followers who already taunted me for my FemShep/Liara obsession; I formed headcanons, all of it.