Casey’s Literary Rants

In which I first rant about why I’ve been MIA

So this is the first time I’m posting a rant in two weeks and that’s really depressing*. But there’s a totally good reason for it. Well, not good, but excusable. See, I’ve been sick. Horribly sick. Can’t eat, can’t breathe, can’t do anything but sleep sick. Yeah, I could barely even read. It was AWFUL! (I did attempt to write two different rants during that time, but I was so out of it that the rants suffered greatly and I refused to post them. You don’t have to thank me for that.)

The worst part about being sick and totally losing my mind – I still don’t even know what I had. Seriously. When I first went to the doctor, they thought I had strep or mono. Tested for both and a week later the results came back negative. At that point, I was sicker and the doctor figured that I just caught a virus on top of whatever the heck I already had and promptly stuck me on even more meds. Now a week later, I’m FINALLY starting to feel like myself once again. Hurray! Hence the rant. I didn’t want to take a third week off, especially since my sense of humor is back to normal. Or at least, as normal as it always is.

*It’s extra depressing because I left you guys with a not really ranty rant asking for advice on what e-reader to buy. And you know, that was posted just like a day before the whole Kindle Fire was released, so now I have a whole new e-reader to learn about. Ugh. But, for those of you who did leave me your opinion on which e-reader is best, thank you! I heart you guys! I do have some follow up questions, but I’ve been feeling so bleh that I haven’t written them out yet. I’ll get to them as soon as I can. Or in other words, as soon as I get some free time. Which probably won’t be until this weekend. If then. I need more time in each day.

And now on to my real rant, in which I rant about fan-girling over rock stars and authors

As I just explained the the paragraphs above, I’ve been really sick, blah blah blah, nothing new there. In that first week when I was sick with no voice, having constant coughing fits, probably a fever but definitely hot flashes and cold flashes, I went to a concert. Yep, you read that right. I went to a concert. At a bar. (I might be book smart, but I never claimed to have that much common sense.)

This wasn’t just any old ordinary concert. Oh no, this was a Hinder concert! Eeep! I have been in love with Hinder since I was fourteen years old and heard Lips of an Angel for the first time. There was no freaking way I was going to miss that concert. All throughout high school my friends teased me incessantly over my huge fan-girl crush on Austin Winkler, but I ignored them and guess what. A couple weeks ago I was FEET from him!!!!!

FEET FROM HIM!!!!!!!!!

You heard that? That was me fan-girl screaming all over again. I’ve been doing that a lot in the past couple of weeks.

I won’t go into the gory details of all the crazy, psychotic fan-girl things I did, but even though I didn’t have a voice, I screamed for hours on end. Maybe screamed is too genteel of a word for what I did. I probably sounded like a dying donkey, but it didn’t matter because the music was so loud that no one could hear me.

Anyway, it isn’t only rock stars that make me go gaga. Authors of my favorite books make me scream and rant and rave and pretty much seem like a poster child for for insane asylums. Especially when they do something that involves me. Like for example, when they tell me they love my review of their novel (Julie Kagawa and Darynda Jones have both done that)  or when they comment on my rants (Jenna Black, Joss Ware and Jess Haines all have. Lots of screaming ensued reading those comments). Sometimes authors even follow me on twitter! Eeep! I do have many authors following me, so I won’t list them all out, but I do have to fan-girl for a moment here and scream over the fact that Pamela Clare (Pamela freaking Clare) is now following me on twitter!!

That sound? Yeah, that was me fan-girl screaming again. See, not only does Pamela Clare write amazing novels about journalists (her I-Team series. LOVE that series. I will be ranting about it later.) but she is a journalist herself!  I may have said this a time or five million, but I am currently putting myself through college to become a journalist, so she’s like my Super Idol. And she’s following me on twitter! (She doesn’t auto-follow people back either, which makes it all the more special!) Every once in a while I kind of fan-girl on twitter, telling the author how awesome it is that they’re following me, but I’m still too awed to do that with Pamela Clare.

Other things I’ve done on twitter – I have had conversations with Jana Oliver, Cara Lynn Shultz and Melissa Ecker! (By conversations I mean, we tweeted at least 3 or 4 times back and forth, on a subject not about how awesome their books are. Even though their books are AMAZING.) That’s not even the best thing ever. (Close to it though.) No, the best thing ever was when Shayla Black (yes, THE Shayla Black) #FF’ed and #WW’ed me several times! (Explanation of each below.) My poor little inner fan-girl heart fainted dead away, only to come back moments later screaming like she’s never screamed before.

Alas, those have been my only interactions with authors. I have never met any of my idols in the flesh. (But perhaps that is for the best because this means no one has witnessed me acting like a psychotic fan-girl.) But all that changes next year because next August I’m going to Authors After Dark in New Orleans!!!

Heck YEAH! I’ll be surrounded by amazing authors, tons of other cool people in New Orleans…I don’t know if my inner fan-girl can handle it. I may go into shock and be too awed to do anything the entire time. Or I may completely psycho and start dancing on the tables. That’d actually be somewhat tame, but let’s hope it doesn’t come to that. Ever. I really don’t want to spend the rest of my life in a white padded room.

*For those of you who aren’t on twitter and have no idea what I’m talking about #FF basically stands for Follow Friday and on Fridays you list however many people you follow that you think other people should follow too. #WW is Writer Wednesday, so on Wednesdays you list cool writers that you follow and you think other people should follow too.

P.S. Ever since I went to the concert I’ve been craving to read a book starring a rock star. I don’t mean with some obscure character being in a band like in Spellbound by Cara Lynn Shultz, Emma’s gay boyfriend’s boyfriend is an awesome drummer in a sucky band. I think Juliana Stone has a rock star book forthcoming, but I want to read something now. Do you guys have any good recommendations?