On writing: What is going on here?

How did this crazy blog morph into a literature blog? It's supposed to be a blog about poking gentle fun at Mormons, Exmormons, and French people!! Yet it's full of book reviews, and I've got some more book reviews coming up the pike!!!

I wonder if maybe I'm "going through a phase"... ;^)

It's not so much that I like to read books as it is that I like to analyze them. So however much time I spend reading a given book, I usually spend about twice that much time contemplating it and/or giggling at my own running commentary. So maybe my true calling in life is "book reviewer". But if I did it professionally, I'd probably have to read a bunch of boring books I'm not interested in, and I'd probably switch to writing Java programs for fun in my spare time. So I might as well just stick with my current arrangement.

Maybe it's just that I'm a slave to social pressure, like with the Star Trek thing. Don't get me wrong -- I had the best fun in the world producing a cable series with my brother. But left to my own devices I wouldn't normally be all that interested in Star Trek. I know you think I'm just saying that to look like less of a dork, but really I'm admitting to a higher level of dorkiness: Even if I'm not actively fantasizing about living in the Star Trek universe myself, I'm apparently willing to dress up as a Vulcan if all my friends are doing it.

And so it is with blogging, where being surrounded by bloggers is very much like being surrounded by writers. For example here's A New Eric on writing and Cynthia Bagley on writing, plus a bunch of my blog friends have joined Weekly Anamnesis, which seems to be some sort of writing workshop. I would try to get in on it myself except that between my family, my job, and my usual blogging addiction, I really can't justify taking up another writing project...

It's interesting that this gang isn't more competitive. But the way I see it, just because my friends are good writers doesn't mean I can't be too. Actually, in school I learned about various famous authors who were real-life friends with various other famous writers. I've always thought it would be cool to be in on something like that, but figured the probability of just happening to meet a bunch of brilliant people was sadly pretty low. Not anymore, now that we have the Internet!!! :D

I was thinking it might be entertaining to start an additional group blog specifically devoted to writing about writing, fiction/lit pieces that people want feedback on, plus reviews and resources for amateur writers. This would be especially fun since creating new blogs is free -- Yay magical Internet!!! :D

I would lean towards sticking with a general theme of LDS-interest writing just to keep it from being too generic. Of course my inclination would be to try to invite believing/practicing LDS amateur writers to join up as well if we could persuade any to play with us. The idea being that I think pro-mo/anti-mo is kind of a false division for literature. All realistic portrayals of Mormonism will have common elements, whether written by current or post Mos. For general essays (such as our usual exmo blogs) it's logical to link according to point-of-view, but for literature it's better not to require that pieces support a particular orthodoxy.

Since none of us have time to provide double our current blog content, the system could be that when you post something to the common blog on writing, you just post the beginning (a teaser) and then link back to the complete article on your own blog.

Does that sound like a good idea, or am I just saying nonsense?