Sarah O'Connor

Hobbies

NotSarahConnorWrites

January 6, 2020

My sister and I were talking recently about hobbies, and how she had read that a lot of millennials don’t have hobbies anymore because they are so focused on their career and likewise that millennials with artistic careers turn their hobbies into work. Arguably doing what you love is a dream job, my goal of being an author will be wonderful one day, but it doesn’t change the fact that then writing, which is a hobby, would be a job if it isn’t already. Most artists I know treat their hobbies like jobs which of course begs the question, if what you love to do is your job then what else do you like to do? Continue reading

Book Review: Tunnel of Bones by Victoria Schwab

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December 31, 2019

“Maybe it’s because everything is spookier at night. It’s why people are afraid of the dark. What you can’t see is always scarier than what you can” (Schwab 19).

I don’t think there’s anything Victoria Schwab can’t do. Adult? Check. Young Adult? Check. Children’s Middle Grade? Double check because Schwab is keeping things ironically alive with Cassidy Blake!

In the second book of the series Cassidy travels with her parents and best ghost friend Jacob to Paris, one of the most beautiful and haunted cities in the world. But after filming in the catacombs a ghost attaches itself to Cassidy and causes chaos and danger to her, her parents, and possibly all of Paris. Will Cassidy and Jacob be able to send the spirit off? Continue reading

New Year, New Decade

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December 31, 2019

I usually write something for New Year’s, whether it’s a resolution to make a blog (no virtual dust here, everything’s clean and tidy…ish) or a review of my year, I come up with something. I considered writing another review for 2019 but didn’t want to repeat myself, and then I thought about resolutions but those can be daunting. And the end of 2019, while very much like every New Year’s Eve is different in that it marks the end of a decade.

It’s not like this is a new thing, but I was sixteen the last time we entered a new decade and aside from it being the time amazing New Year’s Eve party glasses died, I didn’t care about much else. I had turned sixteen literally a few days before and saw that as way more important than the end of a decade and the start of a new one. Continue reading

A Ghost Story – Jesse’s Room

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December 24, 2019

There is an old Victorian tradition of telling ghost stories on Christmas Eve. I don’t fully understand why this was a tradition or the significance of it to Christmas, only that it some of the lyrics in this classic makes more sense knowing this bit of history and even the infamous Christmas classic A Christmas Carol as a ghost story itself brings even more significance to the time it was written.

It’s a tradition that’s slowly coming back, that more people in literary communities are trying to bring back, and I’d like to as well in my own way. Continue reading

HamilTEN Again!

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December 20, 2019

You read that right, WE’RE IN HAMILTEN AGAIN!

I am so excited to bring a shortened version of The End of July, a play I spent all of last year working on with the Feminista playwrighting unit which I’m apart. It started out as a play I wrote in 24 Hours for a contest for my city’s Fringe Festival where it ended up winning first place. But that was in 2016, it took me two more years to develop it further with Feminista and another few months to rewrite it as a submission for HamiLTEN. Continue reading

Book Review: Spinning Silver by Naomi Novik

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December 18, 2019

“Because that’s what the story’s really about: getting out of paying your debts. That’s not how they tell it, but I knew. My father was a moneylender, you see,” (Novik 3).

I adore fairy tales and especially their retellings. I’ve heard of Naomi Novik’s hit Uprooted and plan on reading it at some point, but until then I’ve fallen in love with her retelling of Rumpelstiltskin, though really Spinning Silver only borrows elements from the story and in many ways creates a fairy tale of her own. Continue reading

Surprise!

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December 16, 2019

I don’t expect much, out of life or from people. This isn’t a fantastic way to live one’s life, I definitely wouldn’t advise it, but after years of fickle friendships and disappointment it’s a safer way to live. Not better, just simpler. Maybe it’s with all the bad that’s happened: the sickness, the sadness, that’s made me not hope for much (if any) good or happiness. You aren’t disappointed as much then, and when something good does come along it completely throws you. I’ve gotten overly emotional about someone buying me an iced capp to be nice, I’m very simple and very easily impressed. Continue reading

Expectations

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December 9, 2019

I’ve been thinking a lot, which can be annoying. I’ve also been doing more Tarot readings on myself which is enjoyable until I’m forced to think, which is what the readings are good at. I still enjoy it, but like most people I don’t like being confronted with things I’ve been avoiding thinking about, with things I’d rather keep avoiding.

Recently I’ve been spending my time thinking about relationships. Not really romantic, though I probably should since I’m giving that whole dating app thing a try (I’m very bad at it, it keeps logging me out because I’m not actively using it) but platonic and what people generally think of platonic relationships. Continue reading

What Happens Next

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December 2, 2019

It’s the beginning of December and that means that another NaNoWriMo has come and gone! This year was a successful NaNo (am I the only one who shortens it to NaNo? I know that NaNoWriMo is already abbreviated but I keep abbreviating it further… Oh well!) for a number of reasons, the first being that I reached 50,000 words just after midnight on November 28th making NaNoWriMo 2019 the first year I finished early. Even if it was only by a few days I’m happy with it because I’ve never finished NaNo early. I’m usually just scraping the last 1667 words needed before midnight on November 30th to reach the 50,000 word goal and never look at the story again. Continue reading

Be Safe

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November 28, 2019

Next summer I’m going to Dawson City. A small town, because technically that’s what it is now, far into the Yukon that you can drive to from Whitehorse in about six hours or take a smaller plane from the two in a flight that takes about an hour, which is what I’ll be doing.

Dawson City isn’t on many people’s lists for travel but it’s been on mine for ages. I don’t know when I first heard of Dawson City but I know I heard about it from my dad and his lifelong goal of having the Sourtoe Cocktail, a cocktail which has a real mummified human toe in it that people can drink to the join the club (the toe just has to touch your lip). My dad achieved his goal last year when he visited Dawson in January (I’m told it was very good) and having the drink himself and now it’s my turn, or it will be next year. Continue reading