Month: February 2023

New Books & Novel Discoveries (February 2023)

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Once again, I find myself wracking my brain about what I’ve purchased this month. I could have sworn that some book or other had been preordered a while ago and it arrived earlier this month. Apparently that is not the case, as I’ve picked through the books lying around and found nothing. Nevertheless, it has been another rather big month, though unique at the same time, as I usually don’t buy a lot of one series at once. I guess I kept looking for anything else I might have bought because I wanted more than one thing to talk about.

Enough vague waffling, on to the books!Read More »

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WWW Wednesday – February 22, 2023

Ryan1 Comment
www_wednesdays

WWW Wednesday is a weekly book meme run by Sam over at Taking on a World of Words. Check out her post and others over on her blog!

The Three Ws are:

What are you currently reading?
What did you recently finish reading?
What do you think you’ll read next?

Currently Reading

Springfield ConfidentialSince last week I’ve managed to make a pretty decent start at Springfield Confidential by Mike Reiss, which tells the author’s history and experiences working on The Simpsons for over 30 years. I’m nearly 100 pages in, and I’m really enjoying how light and fun it is to read. If I play my cards right, I should have this book finished up relatively soon. It’s quite something to hear how arduous the process of putting an episode together is, even just as a numbered list of steps. It really hammers home how there is no room for ego in production, as at best only remnants of an original script exist by the time the episode is complete. I’m also learning about fan speculation I was never aware of before, such as one of the writers of the show, John Swartzwelder, not being a real person (he just doesn’t like doing interviews or DVD commentary). I’m not sure I’ll have huge amounts to say each week about this, but I’m looking forward to reading more and more of it.

Recently Finished

Manga Diary of a Male Porn Star 2Over the weekend I took advantage of some unexpected reading time to go through a couple of volumes of manga. The first one was the second volume of Manga Diary of a Male Porn Star by Kaeruno Erefante. I continued to find it to be an amusing read, especially in how it depicts the realities of working in that industry and the less glamorous expectations and pressures put on performers, but the novelty also wore off a bit compared to the first book. I suppose this goes with it being semi-autobiographical rather than focused on plot. At least I’m only borrowing these, so casually keeping up doesn’t feel like a poor investment. I don’t think it helps that it takes a while for a new volume to come out too, with the build up only really leading to more of the same. I’m not sure if it could have been done, but I wonder if this series would have benefited from being put out as one complete work.

Berserk 36I also read through the 36th volume of Berserk by Kentaro Miura. Guts and his compatriots continued to battle the nightmarish tentacles of the sea god, with Guts eventually going into the belly of the beast to try and put an end to things once and for all. It was consistently good, but I’m getting a little fatigued. I’ve had enough of Guts jumping around killing hoards of something or other. I just want their journey to progress now. It was nice to see some growth in Farnese’s abilities, but I’m still hoping this wraps up near the start of the next book. It feels like I’ve been watching a vicious cycle on repeat; the plot needs to move forward more for the core group. At least this promises a definitive end to the threat they’re currently facing. Maybe I will enjoy the actual conclusion of this more than the toil along the way.

Reading Next

Other than cracking open some more Berserk to keep up with my recent commitment to finishing the series by April, I don’t have any other new reading plans. I’m just going to stick with Springfield Confidential on its own for now, rather than my previous thought of it being supplemental to a novel.

Until next time, thank you for reading! Feel free to share your own post down below.

WWW Wednesday – February 15, 2023

RyanLeave a comment
www_wednesdays

WWW Wednesday is a weekly book meme run by Sam over at Taking on a World of Words. Check out her post and others over on her blog!

The Three Ws are:

What are you currently reading?
What did you recently finish reading?
What do you think you’ll read next?

Currently Reading

Nothing! I’m actually between books at the moment. Go me.

Recently Finished

Wolf in White VanI managed to have some good reading time this weekend, and I used it to finish Wolf in White Van by John Darnielle. I’m happy to report that the twist that I was afraid was coming did not in fact happen, so things did not go in a disappointing direction for me. I’m actually finding it a little hard to pin down quite how I feel about the book, though, as I can’t say I was deeply enthralled or in love with it, but it had the more unique effect of altering my state of mind in the wake of finishing it. Perhaps this isn’t that uncommon, but it’s rarer that the feeling isn’t something more joyful. It’s something altogether more poignant. I also feel like I didn’t fully “get” the novel, if you take my meaning. Some things definitely resonated with me, but I found the stream of consciousness a little hard to follow at times. I’m going to need some more time to reflect on it before reviewing.

Paper Girls 3I also won’t have to eat my glasses this week like I threatened myself last week, as I also made to time read the third volume of Paper Girls by Brian K. Vaughn and Cliff Chiang over the weekend. This marks the end of reading through all the volumes of this series that I currently own, so I’m going to pick up more this year so I can get it finished up. As it turns out, I’m halfway through the series now, and I’m feeling especially hooked by this point. I really like the way this story explores time travel, specifically having only one timeline rather than branches. Each member of the core cast has had a good amount of focus by this point too, so I’m pretty invested in all of them. They’re handling themselves pretty well, all things considered, but I love how they still feel like they’re just flying by the seat of their pants. Tentatively, I’d like to commit to finishing this series before the end of the year.

Reading Next

Springfield ConfidentialSpeaking of reading commitments, one I decided to make over the past week was to finish the Berserk series by Kentaro Miura by April, which is when I will post my next blog update about reading challenges. I’m playing at them a lot looser this year and decided I would rather take on goals as they come to me rather than set up a bunch in January that I may be less enthused about come June. Since I’m not in the middle of any novels anymore, I suppose I should have made up my mind exactly what I want to read next, but I have not. So, I guess I’m going to start reading Springfield Confidential by Mike Reiss in the meantime, as that’s been at the top of my mental to-read list for a while now.

Until next time, thank you for reading! Feel free to share your own post down below.

WWW Wednesday – February 8, 2023

Ryan1 Comment
www_wednesdays

WWW Wednesday is a weekly book meme run by Sam over at Taking on a World of Words. Check out her post and others over on her blog!

The Three Ws are:

What are you currently reading?
What did you recently finish reading?
What do you think you’ll read next?

Currently Reading

Wolf in White VanI did not end up posting last week because, due to a deeply unfortunate turn of events that came out of nowhere, I literally did zero reading. Utterly scandalous. So, there didn’t seem to be a point to putting one of these up since nothing had changed. Fortunately for this week, I did manage to read some more of Wolf in White Van by John Darnielle, though I’m still got a bit to go despite how short the novel is. More and more details around the tragic incident with some of the players of Sean’s game are slowly being unearthed, and I’m starting to wonder if he isn’t something of an unreliable narrator. I suppose that shouldn’t come as a surprise, all things considered, but if the story goes in the direction I think it’s going in I believe I will be unhappy with the outcome. We shall see.

Recently Finished

Nothing this week! I am ashamed; I have not been reading comics like I’ve meant to. This could easily change at any time, but look at how that’s worked for me so far.

Reading Next

Paper Girls 3The books I want to read next haven’t really changed, so maybe we’ll be seeing some Paper Girls or Manga Diary of a Male Porn Star or even some Springfield Confidential in the near future. The possibilities are limited and specific. I should have some time this weekend, so let’s just commit to Paper Girls volume three right now, shall we? I’ll eat my glasses if I don’t. Also, I’m not too sure about Springfield Confidential, to be honest. I definitely want to read it soon, but I’m still feeling in the mood for fiction, so I might try to juggle it with something else. What that something else will actually be I cannot say at this time, but I do have a few things in mind.

Until next time, thank you for reading! Feel free to share your own post down below.

New Books & Novel Discoveries (January 2023)

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It seems with the start of the new year that I wanted to make up for the past couple of light months, as I’ve acquired more books than the previous two months combined. I haven’t gone crazy with the purchasing mind you, but it’s notably more all the same. I suppose with the holidays having passed finally, I decided it was time to let go of the holiday restraint and buy a little more for myself again. I hope the new year has treated everybody well and the weather hasn’t been too miserable.

Enough rambling, on to the books!Read More »