Looking Back at 2023 & New Challenges for 2024

I have to say, 2024 sounds a little too serious as a year, doesn’t it? Even in 2023 it felt like we were still in the shadow of 2020, but now it feels a lot more apparent that we’re entering the mid-2020s, which is discomforting. I know this is all subjective, but the march of time has never felt more apparent to me.

Neverminding that digression, with the dramatic change of my working habits and schedule introduced a couple of years ago, it took me a while to adjust my reading habits to a place I could be happy with. As a result, I referred to my reading endeavours in 2022 in last year’s equivalent of this post as a “dud”. I’m happy to report now that I managed to turn that mood around in a year’s time. Let’s have a look at the particulars.Read More »

WWW Wednesday – January 3, 2024

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 at the moment! I’m between books, taking some time to cool off in the new year.


Recently Finished

The Fifth ElephantThough it took until pretty much the eleventh hour, I finished reading The Fifth Elephant by Terry Pratchett during New Years. Though I took time away from the blog to visit family for the holidays, I actually got a fair amount of the book read while I was away, which is uncharacteristic of me. Still, it wasn’t quite enough to stop me from needing to read up until the last minute, but I’m happy I got it done all the same. Though I don’t like it as much as others, my opinion on this novel really turned around, despite taking a little while to get going. Ultimately, I just needed to be a little patient, as the first half of the novel did lay a solid foundation and build toward something really compelling. I love how much he’s able to make this world funny, yet have the funny little details matter beyond just being humour.


Reading Next

The Employees (2)At the moment, I don’t really have a solid plan for what I want to read next. I kept alluding to a book I would maybe squeeze in at the end of the year, and obviously I did not do that. That book was The Employees by Olga Ravn. It’s a short science fiction novella about the crew of a ship, both organic and synthetic alike, becoming fixated on strange objects they take onto their ship. The story is told in employee memos and reports, which sounds like a really interesting format, and it also looks like it won’t take me long to read at all, so I’ll hopefully get through it soon now that I have a clean slate. Other than that, I still want to read All My Friends Are Creeps by Count D. soon, since I’m borrowing it from a friend.

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

New Books & Novel Discoveries (December 2023)

I’d say I was pretty restrained over the holidays and didn’t go crazy buying things for myself; there were even a number of thrift store trips where I managed to reign myself in and not buy any books impulsively. So, all the books I received this month were gifts in one way or another. I’m still wracking my brain wondering if I did buy something, of course, but I’m 95% sure I didn’t.

Enough carrying on, on to the books!Read More »

WWW Wednesday – December 20, 2023

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

The Fifth ElephantThough I had the reading time I expected this week, I only read about another 100 pages in The Fifth Elephant by Terry Pratchett; I was really hoping I would get through more of the book than that, but I was exceptionally sleep-deprived that day, so I only had the capacity for so much. To be honest, I’m not sure how I feel about this outing regardless. At almost 200 pages in, it doesn’t really feel like the story has gotten started, it just feels as if we’re still building up to something. Maybe I will come to better appreciate the slow burn later on, but right now I wish I had a firmer understanding of what’s going on and what’s at stake. So far, the only thing with any real substance is the subplot surrounding Fred Colon serving as acting captain while Vimes and Carrot are gone, resulting in the other members of the Watch forming a police union.


Recently Finished

Paper Girls 6I’m happy to report that over the weekend I finished reading the sixth and final volume of Paper Girls by Brian K. Vaughn and Cliff Chiang. I really enjoyed the way this wrapped up, especially in how it felt a little more subdued. There was plenty of spectacle to be had, but by far the most tension I felt was after their time travel adventure had already been concluded. I was desperate for any and all signs indicating what might be in store for these girls after the conclusion of the book. All in all, it was really bittersweet and ambiguous. I don’t tend to get emotional while I’m reading very often, but this ending definitely had an effect on me. In some ways it rehashed some of the events of the first volume, which I’m happy to say I remembered enough about to spot some differences, but I’m also especially determined to read through the series a second time now to better appreciate it.


Reading Next

All My Friends Are CreepsI think I might read All My Friends Are Creeps by Count D., a poetry collection that a friend of mine let me borrow after I talked to them about how I often struggle with reading poetry. I can already tell it’s poetry I’m going to enjoy, and the art is really appealing to me too. Though it’s a pretty monster-oriented book overall, I’m thinking I’m going to try and count this as a Christmas ghost story of sorts, since I’ve not really committed to anything else for the holiday. I expect that this won’t take me long to finish either.

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

WWW Wednesday – December 13, 2023

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

The Fifth ElephantI’ve made a fair amount more progress in The Fifth Elephant by Terry Pratchett; I’m nearly at 100 pages in, though it still feels like the story is in its preliminary stages. Vimes has finally set out for Uberwald with Sybil and his retinue in tow, but it’s not gone much further than that yet. It seems the city watch back in Ankh-Morpork will still have plenty to do while he’s gone though, as a robbery and a strange murder remain unsolved. I’m curious how it will all tie together with Vimes’s diplomatic mission. Some detail has been given on what the fifth elephant is supposed to be, which seems to be dealing more with it as an idea than something literal, though there does seem to be a suggestion that one actually did exist. I don’t know why, but I assumed the story would be about it more actively, like as an active, existing entity. I’m sure this is a lot more interesting. Knowing more sure does make the cover funnier too.


Recently Finished

The Legend of Zelda Twilight Princess 11Over the weekend I finished the 11th and final volume The Legend of Zelda: Twilight Princess by Akira Himekawa. The final fight against Ganondorf made for some great moments, especially with some more fan service involving the Hero’s Shade, aka the Hero of Time. There was also more attention paid to the romantic angle between Link and Midna without deviating away from the ending of the game, which I also appreciated. A marriage between narrative elements of this and the quest in the game really would be something. I couldn’t help being a little disappointed with this though, as it was really just the final fight and then the story quietly wrapping up. I can’t help but feel it would’ve been more impactful if all of this had been included in volume 10 for a grander finale (and a nice round number of volumes).


Reading Next

I still have plenty of time to finish reading Paper Girls, and I may have time to squeeze in a final small book too, I just want to prioritize The Fifth Elephant before I commit to anything. With the year winding down part of me is fine with just quietly finishing what I’m already working on with reading. We’ll see.

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

WWW Wednesday – December 6, 2023

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

The Fifth ElephantThough I didn’t give myself quite as much time with it as I was hoping, I started The Fifth Elephant by Terry Pratchett on Monday, the next novel in the Discworld series that I need to read. I’m only about 50 pages in, so the story has barely started, but so far this book sees us back with Vimes and the City Watch of Ankh-Morpork. It seems Vimes is going to have to play diplomat more than copper in this book, however, as he is being sent as an ambassador to Uberwald. I’m really excited that Uberwald is a part of this story after being featured so heavily in the previous novel. I don’t expect things to be too referential, but its giving some enjoyable connective tissue between the two.


Recently Finished

Paper Girls 5Over the weekend I read through the penultimate volume of Paper Girls by Brian K. Vaughn and Cliff Chiang. Thankfully, I’m reading it close to the last volume, so I’m having no issues following what’s going on. This volume has us seeing greater and greater signs of all of the elements of the story weaving into each other, which has really got me wanting to do a reread at some time in the near future. I especially have a feeling that reading the beginning of the story will be significantly different the second time around. With the way things are coming together, I can’t help but hope some of these girls are able to change their fates, even though everything points to that being outside of possibility. Hopefully by next week I’ll know how everything pans out.

The Lost WorldOn Monday I finally finished reading through The Lost World by Michael Crichton, which continued to be weaker than the first novel, though the final third of the book had enough action going for it that it was at least fun. I think it’s hilarious that Ian Malcolm ends up with a messed up leg and high on morphine for a significant portion of this novel too. Also, compared to the film, Sarah Harding is really badass in this novel and all around had stronger characterization than the other characters; though the novel isn’t really “about” any one person, I wish it had spared more focus on her. Overall, I think this book’s problem is that the plot was just too weak; this may be a little ungenerous, but I feel Crichton didn’t put much effort into contriving a reason for people to be mucking about on a dinosaur island again.


Reading Next

I’ve gone over my near-future reading plans a lot now, so expect more Paper Girls and Twilight Princess manga soon, maybe by next week. I don’t want to state the last book I might read this year, in case I have to push it to January.

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

New Books & Novel Discoveries (November 2023)

I ended up getting more books than last month, despite my vague attempts to buy less things for myself as Christmas approaches. In fairness, a number of them were orders that arrived later than expected, so perhaps things evened out. Once again, I am struggling with the idea that there is a book or two I’ve forgotten, but I can’t determine what they might be. There was a flurry of trips to the thrift store this past month, which I’ve decided is to blame for this.

Anyway, enough rambling, on to the books!Read More »

WWW Wednesday – November 29, 2023

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

The Lost WorldI’ve managed to put another decent dent into The Lost World by Michael Crichton this past week, which is pretty good considering my track record with it thus far between the big reading days. Honestly, I’m a little taken aback with how much this novel might be back-loaded with action. Last night I realized that I’m two-thirds of the way through, but it doesn’t feel like all that much has happened plot-wise. I have a general idea of where things are going right now thanks to the film adaptation, but it’s so weird that what’s coming happens relatively early in the film but so late in the novel. It’s certainly a much more subdued approach, which isn’t inherently bad, but there’s a listlessness to it all that I’m still finding unfortunate. Also, I’m amused by Crichton retconning the whole “vision based on movement” thing with the T. rexes, though it seems it was all based on developing science, so I appreciate him trying to keep up to date with things too.


Recently Finished

Paper Girls 4Over the weekend I finally read through the fourth volume of Paper Girls by Brian K. Vaughn and Cliff Chiang. I’m disappointed in myself that I’m not remembering key plot points right away when I find myself continuing this series. It’s hard with comics sometimes, as I don’t want to commit to a whole series if I end up not liking it, but if it’s good my reading of it will be so spread out that I don’t feel like I’ll wholly appreciate it. I’m going to make a point of re-reading this series sometime in the near future so that I can better appreciate it as a whole. Nevertheless, I really liked this volume, especially in how it fleshed out the different factions of future peoples embroiled in conflict that the girls are caught between. Their competing philosophies and methods are really interesting.


Reading Next

The Legend of Zelda Twilight Princess 11I’ve got more Paper Girls and the final volume of the Twilight Princess manga on the horizon, and then I will by starting The Fifth Elephant by Terry Pratchett, along with another small book, hopefully. It’s funny that this time of year always has what I’ve got left to read so clear, but I’m a little excited that it’s involving so many this time. I think I will feel very accomplished.

It’s unfortunate that this month I really didn’t post much at all except for these updates, but I am working on an Alien 3 review, which will hopefully go up before next Wednesday. Additional posts should hopefully pick up in December too, if I can weave them between holiday plans effectively enough.

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

WWW Wednesday – November 22, 2023

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

The Lost WorldI got a respectable 100 pages or so further into The Lost World by Michael Crichton with the extended reading time I had available to me earlier in the week. I really need to start putting more time into this book at other points throughout the week though so that I can get it finished up sooner. I’m liking this novel fine, but the dryness of Crichton’s writing style is more apparent here than it was with the first book, which definitely had its own moments with that. I’m honestly finding myself a little bored with it so far, as the characters spend of lot of time lecturing to each other and there isn’t much conflict to speak of at the moment. Hopefully things will pick up as different parties presumably start to clash. There’s a lot of emphasis on the topic of extinction and how the dinosaurs allow them the opportunity to study it as a natural phenomenon, and I’m curious about how this may work into the narrative.


Recently Finished

Shut Up Slow Down Let Go BreatheOver the weekend I made myself read through Shut Up Slow Down Let Go Breathe by Marcus McCann; that sounds a lot more harsh than I mean, though, as I had trouble getting into it as I predicted. This is no fault of the poet, I just have trouble getting into a lot of poetry. I had the same problem reading an Emily Dickinson collection. I was determined to read through the whole thing, however, as it wasn’t very long and I want to push myself outside of my comfort zone at least some of the time. Overall, I enjoyed it well enough. Some of the poems managed to break through and resonate with me too, so I’m glad I was able to take something away from the experience despite how I struggle with the medium. I even took a photo of a couple of pages so I can revisit them.


Reading Next

The Fifth ElephantI’m realizing that there really isn’t a lot of time left in the year, so I’m going to have to make some concrete decisions about what I want to finish before 2024. So, I know that the next full-length novel I want to read is The Fifth Elephant by Terry Pratchett. I may not meet all the goals I set for the remainder of this year, but I want to at least achieve this one (catching up on all the Discworld novels I owned at the time I set the goal). There are some other shorter books I’m going to try to squeeze in too, but I definitely want to make sure I read this one.

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

WWW Wednesday – November 15, 2023

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

ScornI haven’t made any progress in The Lost World by Michael Crichton since last week, though I don’t feel all that bad about this because I actually had more books on the go than normal that took priority over it. I have continued reading Scorn: The Art of the Game by Matthew Pellett, though, and I’m hoping I can get that finished within the next few days too. I’m still enjoying reading it, though I’m finding the Kindle format frustrating; why on earth do some of the sentences overlap with each other? I had to convert the file into a shoddy PDF so I could read what one sentence was saying that had become completely illegible in the app. Otherwise, it’s introducing concepts that I’m really wanting to keep an eye out for in the game when I replay it, now that I have an idea of what to look for.


Recently Finished

The Legend of Zelda Twilight Princess 10Over the weekend I read two graphic novels; the first I finished was the tenth volume of The Legend of Zelda: Twilight Princess by Akira Himekawa. I liked this volume a lot more than the previous one, which I tried to have a positive attitude about, but I couldn’t shake the feeling that it just wasn’t as good as I wanted to feel like it was. I even went back and lowered by Goodreads rating of it, and this isn’t the first time I’ve done that with this series. In this penultimate volume, Link, Midna, and the knights of Hyrule are charging the castle to oust Ganondorf and his horde of monsters. I’ve really enjoyed how this series has given the knights a chance to develop and actually feel useful instead making obligatory appearances that don’t matter or being comic relief. I’m excited to read the final volume, though I’ll have to wait a bit to get my hands on a copy.

on-a-sunbeamI also finally finished On a Sunbeam by Tillie Walden after taking a break from it to read more spooky books last month. I enjoyed this book quite a bit, especially the art. I can’t remember if I mentioned previously, but there’s some really creative art direction with how the buildings and vehicles look. I was especially fond of the ships shaped like giant koi/goldfish, though the cathedral-like space stations were pretty great too. The only thing I found to be a shame was the story got especially interesting with its setting in the latter chapters, but it spent so little time there relative to the book as a whole that it felt like it ended just as it was getting really good. I would love it if Walden spent more time in this world expanding upon some of these ideas only touched upon, but it stands well on its own as a creative backdrop to good a coming-of-age story.


Reading Next

Shut Up Slow Down Let Go BreatheThough I have tentative plans with other books that I own, I am planning to read the poetry collection Shut Up Slow Down Let Go Breathe by Marcus McCann, which I came across recently at the bookstore and then borrowed from my library. I’ve realized that I don’t think I actually want to be buying much poetry, so the library will be the way to go with that going forward. It looks to be pretty short, so hopefully I will be able to get through it fairly quickly (assuming I don’t bounce off it, sometimes I have trouble getting into poems). It seems like its sense of humour will be up my alley, so I’m optimistic.

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