I finished a really great book the other day.  I'd love to talk about it, but I don't always feel like I can.  I started to talk about this problem over at SF Novelists: Writers as Readers or Worse (?) Fans.  But, I'm not sure I had enough coffee to get to the heart of the issue, because more than just gushing to y'all about the positives of this book, what I really, REALLY want is a forum in which we could have meaningful dialogue about this book.

Those of you who have met me at various conventions know that there's nothing I like better than a good debate.  I was raised a Unitarian Universalist and I often joke that for me coffee and an intellectual argument is a religious experience.  One of my favorite things about fandom is that it puts me in rooms filled with people who read (and watch and play) the same stuff I do, so the chances are I can find someone to talk to about whatever I've just finished/discovered and that I'm fired up about.  I think most fans understand that you can be critical about the things you love, so they know I mean no disrespect when I note the lack of queer characters on Battlestar Galatica, etc.  I still love the show. I don't have to say that over and over for anyone in the room to believe it.  The fact that I've memorized scenes, etc., shows my devotion.   But, when an author criticizes another writer, it feels different -- even when what you might have to say comes from the fact that you loved the book... got so into it, in fact, that it became IMPORTANT enough to want to argue about it.  

The golden rule doesn't work in this situation, because my skin has been made particularly tough by years of theatre training. No one wants to hear that they suck.  An unfair review still hurts me, but criticism that comes out of love bothers me a whole lot less.  I might still be stung by what someone has to say, but I tend to see that sort of criticism as a challenge (in the most positive sense of that word.)   I don't tend to take that stuff personally.  I defend my work, but I don't transfer my passion to the critic. 

But I know that I'm weird that way.  I've used this blog (or Tate's) a couple of times as a forum to talk about books I loved, though not unconditionally, and I think because all of us authors have "google alert" set to notify us of any mention of our names I may have made some authors cranky with me.  

I know I'm going to sound like an old lady, but in someways I miss the old listserv system.  Even though they were a public forum, I liked the way a person's argument could develop over short replies/posts, and the whole thing felt more like a conversation than a statement of opinion.  I had a lot fewer qualms about being fannish on listservs, because the audience was smaller and the arguments more transitory.

This is a really long way of saying I loved Jo Walton's FARTHING.  You should read it.  Then we should get together for some coffee (or on a panel) and talk about it.