love letters to storytellers: book reviewer lisa

This post was initially sent to newsletter subscribers March 1, 2022.

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I don’t remember when Lisa and I met but I do know where: in the deep blue pixels of Tumblr.com, where nerdy university students like us went to escape the looming deadlines, depressions, and stresses of academic life.

Tumblr is a blogging website where people go to find others who are passionate about the same nerdy things as them (aka fandom) and share about them using things like images, gifsets, graphics, quotes, fanart, basically anything. Lisa and I were no different. I first found Lisa as I was looking for content on my favourite author ever, Melina Marchetta. I’ve always known Lisa as one of the main online evangelists for Melina Marchetta’s work. I was quickly enraptured and caught up in her enthusiasm for Melina Marchetta’s characters, and ecstatic that there was someone out there filled with as much love for her books as I was. Over the years, we connected online at deeper levels as we both graduated from university, got jobs, moved to different social media sites but kept in touch, commenting here or there, always with our love of Melina Marchetta keeping us together.

In real life, Lisa lives and works in Malaysia in procurement, and graduated with a biotechnology engineering degree, finishing undergrad in 2016 and her master’s in 2018, although has been a voracious reader since childhood. Her parents were both readers but she quickly surpassed them in her book consumption. Now, she regularly tears through over a hundred books a year.

One of the main genres Lisa reads is romance, starting with Malay romance in high school before transitioning to mainly English romance. “I love love stories,” Lisa says. “Since I’m single, I want to read about the joy the main characters get when the main characters get together.” Lisa laughs, in her joyful and musical way. “I don’t go on dates or do anything, so that’s where I get excitement in life.”

What really opened the book world to her, though, was getting into YA and Twilight in her first couple years of university. Instead of getting into any sort of health-science related program as she had dreamed, Lisa ended up in biotechnology engineering, her fifth choice of program. Lisa scoured the internet for people interested in Twilight, finding a community of people just like her. “Someone else is as excited as you,” she says, and it’s powerful to “have a community that appreciates the same things you do.” In contrast to her daily life of going to university for a program that she didn’t really hold a passion for, she was able to feel that joy and passion in a community of like-minded people from around the world. “That’s why I immersed myself in the bookish community,” Lisa says, “I felt happy for a change.”

There are endless number of ways to be involved in fandom, but they often are connected to creation; fanart and fanfiction, stories or art based off or inspired by books people love. For Lisa, another Tumblr user inspired her to make graphics, putting together pictures to evoke feeling from a favourite quote of hers from the books she loved (see an example of one she created here). She also got into fancasting her favourite books, choosing models to represent her favourite characters, and it was exciting to see other people use her fancasts. Fandom is a cycle of inspiration, sharing and connecting. “I appreciate a book more through fandom,” Lisa says.

Lisa found a place in the romance book community, which she describes as a welcoming place where you can find all sorts of people; not just book snobs but lawyers, doctors, people from all walks of life and all over the world. The main part of Lisa’s storytelling is the joy she finds in those stories, and being able to share that joy with others. For awhile, she had a romance book review blog with another romance novel aficionado and wants to get back into long-form reviewing. “My Amazon and Goodreads reviews right now are mostly just squealing.” She wants to be one of the stronger voices in the book community, sharing her love and passion, and I can vouch that her excited squealing over books she loves has definitely convinced me to read a book or two. Every author wants an enthusiastic reviewer like Lisa pushing their book.

In contrast to the robotic life of work, go home, sleep, work, in a job that she doesn’t really have a passion for, books and stories are a place where Lisa can find joy. “It’s why I keep coming back to it; books bring me joy. And sharing why I love books brings me joy.”

You can find Lisa sharing (or squealing about) her love of books on Instagram and Goodreads.

updates

I love connecting with people, and one of my favourite ways to connect with people is through art. Being an introvert, I am drawn to deeper conversations over surface-level small talk. Art is an excellent starting point for those deeper conversations. I’ve had conversations with people I barely knew on my philosophy of friendship after they connected with a poem I read.
 
This month, I’ve continued to connect with my illustrator as we work on companion imagery for my work. I’ve loved discussing my work with her and hearing her unique perspective on it, then creating something new together.
 
I’ve also had the privilege this month of connecting with various writer-friends, sitting down over coffee or across time zones on Zoom, to write together. It’s been interesting learning the different ways people write, and through that coming to understand my own writing better. I’ve learned that I like starting from content, then adding structure, while others (like my writer friend Stephen Alff) like to start with structure and then add content.
 
My personality, anxiety, and my human nature often make me focus on finding the “right” way to do things, even as I know logically that there is no "right way" for creative work. I’ve said before how interconnected my writing and mental health journey are, and learning to own your unique, authentic voice is also part of that. I want to be comfortable being wholly myself, in my writing and my life. And, being authentic produces the best writing.
 

I also just received my copy of issue four of little somethings press, which includes a poem I wrote called "recovery" that is actually part of my book. It's an adorable collection of "small writings" by writers from all over the world, and each copy is put together by hand. I loved reading the different takes on the theme of "second chances." If you're interested in buying a copy, they are available to order today, March 1. You can find more information here.

I’m always interested in connecting with people creatively, so please reach out if you’re interested in connecting!

Happy March!
Alyssa