A Postponement

I know. Another blog post with no real content. The world is rich with more than enough of these. However, after my sparse beginnings with nearly a month going by between posts, I wanted to insure everyone that I've gone nowhere.

The bronchitis (the doctor confirmed it's presence on Friday) is still holding on tight. And, since I cannot afford to miss any work this week I am performing light duty with my personal projects.

I do intend to publish the third chapter in the Tolkien Papers sometime this week. This coming chapter, titled "The Choice of the Ring", is probably the best out of the four. It is with this essay that I won first place in the Anges Hyde Writing Contest for the essay section. After reviewing it for this blog I've realised that I am quite proud of this one. I hope that you all will find it equally thought-provoking and enjoyable.

I hope that my praise of Chapter Three does not prepare you for a disappointing Chapter Four. Chapter Four was a lot of fun for me due to the sources I had available. You see I wrote to a few best-selling authors in the Fantasy genre to find out what they thought of Tolkien. And I received letters back from two of them. These two men happen to be among my favorite authors. It is with their novels that I first started venturing into the realms of fantasy fiction. The authors are Terry Brook and R. A. Salvatore. I hope that wets your appetite for the fourth installment. Don't worry, there's plenty to enjoy between now and then.

Also, I wanted to encourage everyone to let me know if you have something to say about your personal writing, a particular genre that you enjoy, or a good book that you are reading or have read recently. I would love to open up some discussions and see what everyone has to say out there. For example, I just finished "Wicked: The Life and Times of the Wicked Witch of the West" by Gregory Maguire. Wikipedia calls this a parallel novel. I think it could also be referred to as fan fiction. At any rate, there are some wonderful themes and topics for discussion in that book. Let me know if you've read it. As my tastes tend to jump around I am also reading "The DaVinci Code", by Dan Brown, and "Guns, Germs, and Steel", by Jared Diamond. The latter book was referred to me by my good friend Jason Heath of Jason Heath's Double Bass Blog. Check him out in the links section for a great variety of articles. Jason has a talent for writing that I'm sure you could all appreciate.

Well, it's time to take my medicine...I mean that literally, you know. I hope to give you more information on writing, and on Tolkien in particular, in the near future. And while I'm working on that, tell your friends and neighbors about me. And if they aren't interested ask them for a list of everyone they know who might be interested. Well, you don't need to go to that extreme...but it would be nice. I'll be typing to you all real soon. In the mean time, enjoy a good book.