It’s the first Wednesday of the month and that means it’s time for the monthly blood & ink sacrifice to the shade of William Shakespeare! #authorlife #amwriting

Haha, wait. *Double checks calendar*

No, it’s Insecure Writer’s Support Group day. Sorry. We sacrifice on Saturdays.

The Insecure Writer’s Support Group is all about being real with your struggles and insecurities, without fear or worry. Unburden and know that your online support group is here. We post on the first Wednesday of every month, with a different (optional) question to answer each time. 

To find the blog hop and sign up, go here, and check out the rest of this inspirational group. The co-hosts for the month of March are Mary Aalgaard, Bish Denham, Jennifer Hawes, Diane Burton and Gwen Gardner.

The optional question for March 7th is: How do you celebrate when you achieve a writing goal/finish a story?

And the honest answer is: I’m a junkie. I’m officially addicted to books. In fact, I’d classify myself as a Bookwyrm, the dragonish kind, with a hoard of shiny, sparkly novels. We loves our book hoard, my preciousss. My mom has officially reached the point where she refuses to give me money for my birthday because “it’s like giving a new pipe to a crack addict and where are you going to put any new books?” Instead she gives me giftcards to specific stores that don’t sell books. Which is fine, it’s cool, I just write my own novels and add to the hoard.

The first step is to admit you have a problem. (The second step is to ignore the first.) So the way I reward myself for reaching the milestone “The End” is by getting books. Because it totally makes sense that my recompense for writing a book should be another book or five. At the risk of enabling your own addictions, I will tell you that the two sites I really love for this are the wonderful Thriftbooks.com and the thrifty Bookoutlet.com. They even beat Amazon prices. Too many books? I think what you mean is, not enough bookshelves.

Books are a good addiction to have. People think you’re smart. Carrying them around builds up muscle strength. They’re low risk, except for the paper cuts and accidentally dropping it on your head when you’re trying to read on your back in bed. They expand your mind without the side-effect of your brain going runny and dripping out your nose, always a consideration with the harder drugs. They smell good. And there are plenty of ways that they are useful in your daily life.

 

10 Ways to Use the Books in Your Hoard (Besides Reading)

  1. As a defense mechanism to discourage casual conversation, because you’re clearly not listening.
  2. On the other hand, also start conversations with random strangers on public transportation who have noticed your shiny title and want to compare notes.
  3. Build a castle out of them, complete with library. Only allow other bookwyrms in.
  4. Change your home decor to reflect the book-shui and spend way too much time agonizing about the position of your “most favored favorites” shelf. As opposed to the plain “favorites” and the “pretty good” and the “I’ll get around to reading them” shelves.
  5. Block the door with your book piles, so people have to leave you alone when you’re reading.
  6. Appear learned and wise to the casual observer who sees your home overflowing with knowledge. Stroke your beard and play along.
  7. Make friends with the ghost who adds to your TBR pile when you’re not looking. The presence of a TBR pile just summons a spirit, and that’s how it is. You might as well be buddies.
  8. Take pretty pictures of them for Instagram.
  9. Perfect your engineering skills by creating piles in super random places and preventing them from toppling over.
  10. Listen to the pleas of your tiny books, begging for their friends to be with them. You NEED the entire series! Do you want your poor books to be lonely? They miss the rest of their book family. Look at them, all sad and dejected and orphaned like teensy Oliver Twists. Hear their cries with the ears of your heart, and buy the other books.

 

 

 

featured image via stocksnap.io artist Bonnie Kittle

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