Friday, March 30, 2012

Isaac Marion, the wordsmith


word·smith/ˈwərdˌsmiTH/

Noun:
A skilled user of words.
Synonyms:
ghostwriter


Though I am a lover of words, and do often consort with dictionaries, I would hardly call myself a wordsmith. There are many, many books I love and whose authors I would still not call a wordsmith. The standard definition of wordsmith even leaves a bitter taste in my mouth with it's lack of big-ness (yes, you can definitely add -ness to EVERYTHING. it's allowed) does not seem to convey everything I feel about this word.

Although maybe there is something to the definitions simple finality that makes it work in the end. Regardless, I am officially bestowing the title of Master Wordsmith on one Isaac Marion.

It's no secret I love to read, I devour books that I love in one sitting, most of the time into wee hours of the morning, making for caffeine induced waking hours and often severe bouts of crankiness. I am so not a morning person anyway.

Reading is like driving for me, after about 2 chapters I can usually judge if a book is a RED, YELLOW or GREEN and can then plan accordingly.

RED: I hate this book, I may never finish, mark the page, put it away find something else to read.
YELLOW: It's good, I like it, I want to read it, I will read until I am tired and then slow down, find a safe place to stop and put a book mark in it until the next day, there could be side books to go along with said book (this is a large list, most of my books fall in this category)
GREEN: I love it, I'm in for the long haul, I am not putting it down until I get to the back cover (This is a medium sized list, I love books)

then there is the rare SCENIC OVERLOOK books. The ones that say "wait a minute, back the freaking truck up and pull the hell over NOW". These are the books that you TRY read slowly, with great care, eating them up like the best tiramisu you have ever eaten. Savor every word, because no matter what you do you don't ever want them to end. You want the story to go on forever so you can keep reading sentence after sentence of pure literary joy. These books are few and far between, it's not just that the story was good, it's not just that you loved the characters in some way. It's that the words melted together on the page in such a way that you were mesmerized by sheer vocabulary, by grammar, by the elements of the dictionary put to such good use.

This is how I feel about Isaac Marion, this is how the story of a zombie falling in love captured me in it's embrace for hours.

Warm Bodies by Isaac Marion.

READ IT.


1 comment:

Isaac Marion said...

A friend linked me to this. You make me blush. :-)