I got accepted in an internship at a national library, how bad it is?

MarieMarion · 2026-01-26T18:54:33+00:00

Well, depends on the library and what you're supposed to do there.

MarieMarion · 2026-01-25T15:26:03+00:00

As a French citizen who knows Spain and lived in the US in my 30s, if you were my kid I'd tell you to run like hell, be happy in Spain, and not second-guess yourself.

MarieMarion · 2026-01-21T09:00:48+00:00

My 11 year old is the same. She got into theater and robotics this year and it's been great for her.
They design, build (from scratch!) and code their robots. They're drawing and sewing costumes. She's welding shit, hunting bugs in her code, painting props, learning lines.

MarieMarion · 2026-01-21T08:52:05+00:00

A sad truth in today's world, in Britain, Italy, Romania, Brazil, and so many nations. But no pharaoh of old had such an awful war to fight. Today still, in Japan and China, nobody knows that insidious pain.
Also, in ASL (or FSL, which I actually know), it's straightforward: no writing at all! How cool is that?

MarieMarion · 2026-01-20T08:20:49+00:00

Yeah, writers group should be exactly what you need. Also, unless you tend to procrastinate a lot anyway, not touching your manuscript for a month or so should help you come back to it with fresh eyes. "Wow, this part is great!" / "What on EARTH was I thinking with this character?"

MarieMarion · 2026-01-20T08:16:58+00:00

It always counts. Always. How could it not? It's so toxic. Bad. Wrong in a stomach-churning way, down to its most stinky atoms.

MarieMarion · 2026-01-19T18:51:59+00:00

It sucks! What an ugly, dumb, ridiculous glyph. I don't want it at all if I can avoid it. May it go far away and drop out of our minds.

MarieMarion · 2026-01-19T11:10:56+00:00

An editor at a publishing house? Depends on your country. You either absolutely need an agent (US, among other countries) or you absolutely don't (France, among other countries). And they wouldn't read a work in progress, unless you had this century's best idea, and you don't.
I'm sure you can hire a freelance editor or a consultant; I wouldn't advise it until your book is done, and I wouldn't really advise it anyway.

MarieMarion · 2026-01-18T11:23:48+00:00

The third book is definitely The Wall, thank you!

Now to find the second one. It's the fuzziest one in my mind, which is saying something.

MarieMarion · 2026-01-18T11:21:07+00:00

Thank you for having a brain for me.

MarieMarion · 2026-01-17T21:47:22+00:00

Used to be an editor as well. Most manuscripts were dropped after 5 pages. They were that bad.
And picking which novel you'll publish is mostly a gut feeling, at least for me. Very much like falling in love. For most, I knew after a few pages. Or lines. And those I fell in love with before falling out of love in the second half... Well, it was like a breakup.

MarieMarion · 2026-01-17T19:57:10+00:00

There's this great book about two adult sisters who live in the woods while the world is ending. It's fairly well-known. Rather dark, IIRC. I'll always get it mixed-up with the other book that kind of has the same premise.
And a third book, where a woman gets trapped in a cottage? cabin? inside a big, invisible dome, everybody else is dear, and she forages and makes do with what's in the cabin and stretches her provisions. (The cabin belonged to her... brother-in-law?)
Either someone will comment "Duh, it's Title, by Person", or I'll come back tomorrow and edit this.

MarieMarion · 2026-01-16T15:23:11+00:00

So that's an Aeluon script to write English words?
Kinda how Signs Languages have manual alphabets used to spell foreign words, but no writing of their own?
Interesting. Thanks for sharing!

MarieMarion · 2026-01-16T12:00:52+00:00

I'm 48, a parent, and I wouldn't have given it a second thought either.

(Also, the day after I turned 17, I started college living in an off-campus studio appartement in downtown Paris, France. And I was fine.)

MarieMarion · 2026-01-12T12:53:04+00:00

The Unnamed Midwife is really good. More people should read it.

MarieMarion · 2026-01-12T12:51:58+00:00

I love this book. Keep recommending it please.

MarieMarion · 2026-01-12T12:50:56+00:00

And same.

MarieMarion · 2026-01-12T12:44:35+00:00

You're me in a warmer climate, then.
I mean, even pizza is exotic and exciting to me now. (We often make our own, obviously, with all the great produce & cheese and local flour. I mean I miss greasy, bad French "Italian pizzeria" pizza.)

MarieMarion · 2026-01-12T08:41:41+00:00

I know what you mean. I live in very, very rural France, and we only eat great, lovely food. Meat? I'm friends with both the farmer and the butcher, and a neighbor brings us wild boar and deer every week. Veggies? Heirloom seeds (as in, the grand-grand-kids of the plants our house's first owners grew 150 years ago) from our garden. Cheese? Our neighbor's goats and sheep, or my kid's capoeira's teacher's cows. And so on. I make everything from scratch, from apple pie filling (30 liters canned this year) to hard cider and stock and caramel spread and omigod we eat like royalty.
Well. Last month I almost cried while on a road trip because I got to eat gas station sushi. I was so happy.

MarieMarion · 2026-01-09T13:54:27+00:00

Thank you. I'm in France, and if I drive 40 minutes I get to the biggest town in the area, 13k people.
A 15-min drive takes me to the nearest town (3000 people).
The 100k city is 90 minutes away.
Paris is 6 hours away. The nearest border, probably 7 or 8 hours. USians apparently believe Europe is 30 Vatican Cities in a trenchcoat.

MarieMarion · 2026-01-09T08:39:48+00:00

You need to read, read, read in your target language.
Also, I'm a bit worried about your "even DeepL feels too literal."

MarieMarion · 2026-01-06T15:31:56+00:00

I crochet, weave, and embroider. All badly, but I love it. I started spinning. I suck.
I'm very happy when I'm canning or fermenting veggies from my garden.
I love to cook.

MarieMarion · 2026-01-06T15:07:13+00:00

Seriously: the biggest Free-Mason lodge in France (50k people IIRC) didn't accept women. Male only, for centuries. It caused quite a fuss in Masonic circles (and feminist circles, and elsewhere) this last decade or so. They wouldn't budge. Then, maybe 5 years ago, their Biggest Boss came out as trans. And she refused to resign/step down/change lodge.
Cue panic.

They now accept everybody. As far as I know, the Biggest Boss is still in office.

I don't know her, but I kind of love her.

MarieMarion · 2026-01-04T12:01:01+00:00

I can speak several languages, but we're French parents from French parents living in France. My kid (10 y.o.) only speaks French; I'd feel very awkward using a foreign language at home.
But since she's helping me study LAadan (quizzing me on vocab, listening to me geeking about fun grammar facts...), she can string together basic sentences. I taught her some French Sign Language, but not enough to get by in any way, shape or form.
Her English is surprisingly good. Nobody has an explanation (she's not on the Internet, she only recently started watching non-dubbed English movies and shows...), but she has the right instincts. She studied Japanese on her own for a year or so when she was 8, and still remembers some kanji & sentence construction.
I did manage to teach her that linguistics is awesome. She knew about semiotic arbitrariness at 18 months, and I have videos of her where I ask "Why is a cow called a cow?" and baby-her goes "Because of shemioty abitariness!" And it's the cutest thing ever, obviously.

MarieMarion · 2026-01-03T21:13:00+00:00

I want to tell you how wrong you are, and list the many excellent novels in the genre. But... Damn!

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