Category: Saturday Miscellany Page 5 of 25

I struggled to find time for pretty much everything this week that wasn’t work, so this list ended up on the shorter side, but I still think you’ll find something you like.

Odds ‘n ends about books and reading that caught my eye this week. You’ve probably seen some/most/all of them, but just in case:
Children’s Publishers on the Role of BookTok
The Case for Paper: Books vs. E-Readers —Psychology Today weighs in on the side of paper.
Fantasy reimagined: Arab and Asian authors are rising globally by embracing their cultures
Literary Awards – What are they and why should you care? – Part 1—Rediscovered Books has started a series on their blog about those foil stickers on books.
Why Are Books Featuring Old Protagonists Trendy Right Now?—Good question, and Corson offers some good answers.
Nick Petrie on the Best Boundary Pushing Novels in Beloved Mystery Series—Petrie talks about some of the novels where authors broke/pushed the rules governing their series (and mentions a couple of unbreakable rules)
The American Cancer Society is running a fundraiser this month, and I figured I’d jump in: I’m Reading Every Day for American Cancer Society – Please Donate!—(I sort of wish I did this under the blog name, instead of my personal profile, oh well)
Shortly after starting that challenge, I saw that Hair Past a Freckle is doing something similar for Sarcoma UK, if you’re in the donating mood.

A Book-ish Related Podcast episode (or two) you might want to give a listen to:
SFF Addicts Ep. 90 Robert Jackson Bennett talks The Tainted Cup, Murder Mysteries & Moretitle—This is a great conversation. And although I wish he’d gotten Rex Stout’s name correct when talking about the inspiration for his detective characters, I love the image of Dr. Doolittle/Henry Higgins writing Nero Wolfe/Archie Goodwin.

To help talk about backlist titles (and just for fun), What Was I Talking About 10 Years Ago Week?
The Life of Martyn Lloyd-Jones – 1899-1981 by Iain H. Murray
Hell Hole by Chris Grabenstein—the mid-point in a series I so wish was ongoing
The Humans by Matt Haig
Mandarin Plaid by S. J. Rozan—I can’t imagine I could write something so pithy today (especially about a Rozan book!)
The Bat by Joe Nesbø
I mentioned the release of The Martian by Andy Weir…I wonder what happened with that one…

This Week’s New Releases that I’m Excited About and/or You’ll Probably See Here Soon:
The Tainted Cup by Robert Jackson Bennett—This murder mystery/fantasy hybrid my first 5-star read of the year as I described a couple of weeks ago. I can’t imagine I won’t be mentioning this a few more times this year, so I’ll just leave it there for now.
Why We Read: On Bookworms, Libraries, and Just One More Page Before Lights Out by Shannon Reed—”A hilarious and incisive exploration of the joys of reading from a teacher, bibliophile, and Thurber Prize Semifinalist.” Looks fun…and what bibliophile doesn’t enjoy reading about others afflicted with the same addiction?
Fourteen Days by many people—”Set in a Lower East Side tenement in the early days of the COVID-19 lockdowns, Fourteen Days is an irresistibly propulsive collaborative novel from the Authors Guild, with an unusual twist: each character in this diverse, eccentric cast of New York neighbors has been secretly written by a different, major literary voice–from Margaret Atwood and Celeste Ng to Tommy Orange and John Grisham.” I don’t know when/if I’ll get around to reading this, but I’m fascinated by the idea.
I’ll Just Be Five More Minutes: And Other Tales from My ADHD Brain by Emily Farris—”A hilariously-honest, heartwarming essay collection about life, love, and discovering you have ADHD at age 35.”
The Price You Pay by Nick Petrie—Peter Ash comes to Lewis’ aid in his latest adventure. This looks great. If only I didn’t have to three books to read to catch up on the series.

(you’re welcome for the earworm)

This week’s miscellany feels like it goes off in a billion directions, hopefully, there’s one or two you want to travel down.

(which isn’t bad for a week where I figured I had maybe 5 links to share)

Odds ‘n ends about books and reading that caught my eye this week. You’ve probably seen some/most/all of them, but just in case:
Bookstores of the Treasure Valley—A nice little “ode to our local bookstores” (although I wish Kuna’s Book Habit had garnered a mention)
Libro.fm vs. Audible—a quick slide presentation comparing the two (fair warning: it’s made by Libro.fm, so you know how the comparison goes. Says the guy who has given subscriptions to the former.). Something to consider, anyway.
Life inside the Fiction Factory: Dan Sinykin on Conglomerate Publishing—a chat about how changes to the publishing industry have also driven changes to the fiction we read…and what they mean for conglomerate publishers and for nonprofit independent publishers that are inventing new ways to publish in the shadows of the giants.”
Am I the (Literary) Assh*le—a fun little post from LitHub
Caps for Sale—B. J. Novak (of all people) has some interesting and good things to say about Children’s books in the midst of a review of a classic and a contemporary sequel.
Along those lines is: The toddler book tolerability index.—another fun LitHub post from this week
A New Direction For Ol’ KRR—K.R.R. Lockhaven talks about his WIP, which has a tone we haven’t seen from him before (at least not much of). Color me intrigued…and a little impatient. 2025?!?
By The Numbers: 1 Year In—James Lloyd Dulin looks at his first year as a self-published author. It’s an honest, frank, and grateful look.
Crime Novelist Michael Connelly on the Role of Jazz in Creating “Bosch”—Jazz played a role? No way…
Big news from little old us…—The latest newsletter from Fahrenheit Press features a series you should look into (and I should finish), some exciting news about that series, and a discussion of the book that they’re publishing next week that I cannot shut up about (ask my family). Read this and order the book now.
Author Chat: Mike Chen (A Quantum Love Story)—I haven’t had the time to dive into this yet, but how could it be anything other than interesting?
On Reviewing Books
How To Ask For A Book Review—this is a handy collection of advice.
My Favorite Fantasy Sequels—Cameron Scaggs has a nice list of temptations, including one book I’ve been meaning to read for ages and a few I should look into
The Most Disturbing Books Ever Written—for people who want the opposite of cozy
Why Do People Expect Libraries to Do It All?—good question
On My Radar: January 2024—Celeste’s monthly post/reminder that I have less than a week to finish the books I wanted to in January (I can squeeze 1500 pages in, along with a full-time job, blogging, spending time with family/dogs—right?). Also, she provided a post I linked to above.
Eco-Fantasy – Magic Can’t Solve Everything
Why I Keep Reading Series I Went Sour On—Peat Long is (again) singing the song of my people

To help talk about backlist titles (and just for fun), What Was I Talking About 10 Years Ago Week?
Wonder by R. J. Palacio
The Love Song of Jonny Valentine by Teddy Wayne
Blackbirds by Chuck Wendig
Teens Don’t Read For Fun Anymore, New Data Says
Four Reasons Why You Should Be Reading Young Adult Fiction
25 YA Novels Everyone — Even Adults — Should Read
I talked about the releases of: Peacemaker by K. A. Stewart, Dirty Magic by Jaye Wells, and the paperback release of the first collection of Indexing by Seanan McGuire.

Lastly, I’d like to say hi and extend a warm welcome to Esther, who followed the blog this week. I hope you enjoy the content and keep coming back.

Short list this week, but plenty of good things to read.

I picked a bad week to start, but I’m trying something new for these posts today, too. We’ll see if it survives until March (and if it does, what it’ll look like)…

Odds ‘n ends about books and reading that caught my eye this week. You’ve probably seen some/most/all of them, but just in case:
Why is March 2024 the Best Month in Years For Books?—a look into book promotion, publishing schedules, and “the existential pain of knowing that you will never get to read even a small percentage of” the books you want to read.
Shelf-absorbed: eight ways to arrange your bookshelves – and what they say about you—fun, but not without it’s problems. (I am not a “try-hard.” Probably.)
Small Press Economies: A Dialogue—If reading this doesn’t make you love those in Small Press/Indie Press Publishing all the more…
MWA Announces 2024 Edgar Award Nominations—here’s a ready-made reading list full of sure-fire winners for you.
YA Isn’t Just for Young Adults—from The Millions.
Out With Book Clubs — In With Book Trades!—Cole Rush has a good alternative to buddy reads, book clubs, etc.
Why Authors Need Cover Reveals—David W nails it. (they’re good for lazy book bloggers, too! Consider this an open invitation)
Seven Science Fiction Novels to Expand (and Blow) Your Mind—a good dose of temptation from John Mauro over at Before We Go Blog.
Books With the Best Beginnings!—A great collection of opening lines from the Organutan Librarian.
Reviews: Subjective or Objective? Can we do both—one would think we could.
Reading: To Track or Not to Track?

To help talk about backlist titles (and just for fun), What Was I Talking About 10 Years Ago Week?
Whoops, this was a bad week to start this feature…I only posted a Saturday Miscellany in the 3rd week in January, 2014. But I’m sticking with this plan so I don’t forget about it…
2014 The Edgar Awards nominees—what a coincidence!
A Snapshot of Reading in America in 2013—I’d look to see if the Pew Research Council has done another one like this, but I think the results would depress me too much
The Top Ten Books People Lie About Reading
I talked about the releases of: The Dead in Their Vaulted Arches by Alan Bradley (this is where I derailed on the series…I just never got around to reading it), He Drank and Saw the Spider by Alex Bledsoe (such a good one!!), Switchblade by Michael Connelly, and The Emperor’s Blades by Brian Staveley
…and that’s it. It was a short Miscellany to follow a quiet week on the blog.

This Week’s New Releases that I’m Excited About and/or You’ll Probably See Here Soon:
Dream Town by Lee Goldberg—Eve Ronin investigates the murder of a Reality TV star.
Emily Wilde’s Map of the Otherlands by Heather Fawcett—Emily’s off to the Australian Alps (and to the fae lands beyond) in this great-looking follow-up. Go read what Witty & Sarcastic Book Club said.
Subculture Vulture: A Memoir in Six Scenes by Moshe Kasher—”A ‘hilarious’ (Dax Shepard), ‘surprisingly emotional trip’ (The Chainsmokers) through deep American subcultures ranging from Burning Man to Alcoholics Anonymous, by the writer and comedian.” After Kasher in the Rye, I’m reading anything vaguely memoir-ish from Kasher.

A quick apology to those who get emailed my posts for littering your inbox with trash earlier today, but I wanted to grab this image.

This Miscellany marks 1,000 days of posting here at The Irresponsible Reader.

Bob laid down the challenge, and I made it. Not always with quality or quantity. But I got it done. There’s part of me that wishes I had something more monumental to mark this occasion, but I think I prefer it being just my regular thing.

Odds ‘n ends about books and reading that caught my eye this week. You’ve probably seen some/most/all of them, but just in case:
Scammy AI-Generated Book Rewrites Are Flooding Amazon
45 Years Ago, One Kids Book Series Taught A Generation How To Make Bad Decisions—a look at the beginnings, end, and rebeginnings of Choose Your Own Adventure books.
11 Books That Prove There’s Nothing Wrong with Self-Publishing —I’m not crazy about the headline, but this is a nice listicle about some of the self-pub success stories
7 great but notoriously hard-to-finish books—I have started 2 of these (multiple times)
An Ode to Acknowledgements: Sarah Wheeler on the Joy of Learning About the Village Behind a Book
Celeste posted her 2023 Book Blog In Review for A Literary Escape. Looks like a pretty good year.
2023 Peaties—other than its description as “fantasyland’s worst awards for characters,” this is a really good and insightful post that should feed your TBRs and make you grin while reading.
Mark Each Year in Books: Thoughts on Reading Traditions
FanFiAddict’s TBRCon2024 is a little more than a week away.
Top 5 Bookish Resolutions for 2024—Books are 42’s resolutions may inspire some for you
Reading Less in 2024—this is really healthy and wise. Good reminder/thoughts from Bec.
Are Reading Goals Worth It?—Worlds Unlike Our Own has some along the same lines.
The Joys of Backlist Books
Cocktails to Pair With Your Favorite Fantasy and Horror Books—Beth Tabler has updated this list from a couple of years back. Some of these look great. (I am too lazy for these usually. My adult-beverage pairing is typically a neat whisky or bottle of beer)

This Week’s New Releases that I’m Excited About and/or You’ll Probably See Here Soon:
Mislaid in Parts Half-Known by Seanan McGuire—A mutli-world adventure that connects several students to the worlds on the other side of their Doors. This is one of the stronger entries in this series, as I talked about recently.
California Bear by Duane Swierczynski—”follows four unlikely vigilantes who pit themselves against the villain behind California’s coldest case when they decide to take justice into their own hands.”
Soundtrack of Silence: Love, Loss, and a Playlist for Life by Matt Hay—A “memoir of a young man who discovered he was going completely deaf just at the moment he’d fallen in love for the first time.”

As great/enjoyable/fulfilling they all may be, after all the days off from work, visiting family/friends, and folderol of the last couple of weeks, I’m looking forward to getting back to routine. A routine that will provide me more opportunities to mess around online and find things for this post, too, he adds feeling this is a bit skimpy this week.

Skimpy it may be, but if you make it to the end of this without adding at least looking into one book for future reading, I’ll be surprised.

Odds ‘n ends about books and reading that caught my eye this week. You’ve probably seen some/most/all of them, but just in case:
In Praise of Reading: How Literature Enables Us to Inhabit New Worlds —I don’t know if I buy this, but I enjoyed musing through the piece
Five for Them, One for Me, with S.A. Cosby—a nice, quick, interview with Cosby
Another week, another batch of Best of 2023 lists. I’m telling you, these are not helping me cut down on my TBR lists:
On Before We Go Blog, we have Nathan’s Top 25 Reads of 2023
Jo Linsdell’s Best Reads of 2023
Top 10 Books I Read In 2023—Steven Writes is done with his categories and goes nice and straightforward here at the end.
My 10 best books of 2023—from Spells and Spaceships
Fan Fi Addict’s David S’ Top 5 Books I Read in 2023
Raven’s Books Of The Year 2023
Peat Long’s Top 10 Books Read in 2023
The damppebbles Top Ten(ish!) of 2023
Bookstr Predictions: Bookish Trends We Think We’ll See in 2024
Trends I Think We’ll See in Book Blogging in 2024—Pages Unbound has another take
Getting on top of my TBR pile: a modest proposal—Mike Finn sets out to exercise an amount of self-will that I’m incapable of. I wish him well.
Top Book Bloggers to Follow in 2024—a good list
Why I Don’t Keep Track of New Book Releases—makes sense to me

This Week’s New Releases that I’m Excited About and/or You’ll Probably See Here Soon:
The Cadillac Job by Stacy Woodson—a car thief on a noble mission with deadly stakes

Lastly, I’d like to say hi and extend a warm welcome to Kal @ Reader Voracious, who followed the blog this week. I hope you enjoy the content and keep coming back.

When going through the posts, etc. I had collected for this week, it felt like this was going to be nothing but a list of lists. Which would’ve been fine, but strange, you know? I did eventually get mostly past the lists to some other things. But I’ll warn you now, if you are looking to keep your TBR from exploding, there are several things I linked to today that you’ll want to avoid.

On the other hand, if you’re wanting it to explode with goodness…

Odds ‘n ends about books and reading that caught my eye this week. You’ve probably seen some/most/all of them, but just in case:
If Not For Libraries: Authors on the Importance of Public Libraries—The New York Public Library put this together earlier this year, and I’m not sure how I missed it until this week.
Five years and 2m copies later, self-published author lands UK book deal—Granted, the overwhelming majority of self-pubbed authors won’t see this kind of success. But doesn’t it make your heart warm to see that some do?
A.I. : In the Age of the Absence of the Author
Why Readers Love Craig Johnson’s Walt Longmire Series —this is a good overview of the series/good intro for those who’ve thought about dipping their toe in.
Before We Go Blog is always a reliable source of good material, but three of the posts the team put up this week caught my eye.
Top Urban Fantasy Series To Get You Hooked on the Genre—I enjoyed (the?) previous version(s?) of this, but this updated one makes me feel positively un-read in the genre.
Top Ten Fantasy Characters That Probably Listen to Taylor Swift—Kudos to them for even coming up with this idea. I’m not a Swiftie (at least not after her second album), but I enjoyed the post
Seven Favorite Cinnamon Rolls in SFF Novels—Is Cinnamon Roll a term I should already be familiar with? Either way, I’m adding it to my vocabulary.
Top 20 Most Recommended Audiobooks of All Time—according to Libro.fm
Another batch of Best of 2023 lists:
Top Five Most Dramatic Twists I Read In 2023—Steven Writes comes up with another good category
10 of My Favorite Reads in 2023—from Pages Unbound’s Krysta
Adam Holcombe provided “A handful of great books, given to you in the form of specialized awards”
FanFiAddict’s A.J. Calvin’s Top 10 Reads of 2023
Favorite Books in 2023—from A Literary Escape
Out of This World SFF’s My Top 10 Reads of 2023!!!
Most Memorable Reads of 2023—from Reading Ladies Book Club
Top 5 Books of 2023—Top 5? As I’m going to demonstrate next week there’s no way I could get things down to 5. My hat’s off to Books are 42 for pulling it off.
Tales from Absurdia’s The Best Books I Read in 2023
Esmay Rosalyne’s Best Surprises of 2023
What Makes a Story Comforting?—another good one from Molly Templeton. I’m also tempted to (somewhat reluctantly) rewatch Grimm.
How to Plan for Your 2024 Reading Challenge —some good advice from NetGalley’s We Are Bookish blog
Backlist Bingo 2024—it’s been a minute since Armed With a Book did a Bingo, this looks fun
Read What You Got—a month-long push to clear up your unread books
The 2024 Booktempter’s TBR Challenge—the last two of these from Runalong the Shelves have proved helpful to me. I’m back for a third go-round.
The Project Backlist Reading Challenge—another good-looking challenge
Bookish Travel: Visiting The 50 US States 2023—what a great idea…
2024 Ultimate Book Blogger / Reader Spreadsheet Template—a great tool for Bloggers and super-organized readers (or those wanting to be)
Quotables: Words that Stuck with me in 2023—I love this annual post (which inspired my monthly posts…that I will get back to!)

This Week’s New Releases that I’m Excited About and/or You’ll Probably See Here Soon:
Sundry Notes of Music: An Almost Memoir by Ian Shane—some of the bigger moments of Shane’s life are described through the filter of important (to him) songs. Humor, love, loss, and a lot of music. I talk a little more indepth about it here.

Lastly, I’d like to say hi and extend a warm welcome to Little Reader, who followed the blog this week. I hope you enjoy the content and keep coming back.

I’m glad you stopped by for this today, but I really want you to read my earlier post of the day, I had more fun with it than I usually do. So take a moment if you haven’t to check out: The Grandcritter’s First Festivus.

With that out of the way, let’s get to the “serious business” of today.

Odds ‘n ends about books and reading that caught my eye this week. You’ve probably seen some/most/all of them, but just in case:
Reading print improves comprehension far more than looking at digital text, say researchers—Not the first time I’ve heard this, but I do find it interesting. Would you all prefer if I started mailing these so you can understand it more?
‘It’s totally unhinged’: is the book world turning against Goodreads?—pretty sure I’ve posted things like this before, too. One of these days, the death knell may truly ring.
Last week, I linked to the first 20 of these, and now we can read The Biggest Literary Stories of the Year: 30 to 11 The 10 Biggest Literary Stories of the Year—(at least according to LitHub). Some interesting things here…many of which I was previously unaware of. That’s how in-tune with the Big News I am.
Before We Go Blog brings Five Recommended Books for Winter Reading—(or other times of the year, too)
Announcing the Picture Prompt Book Bingo Challenge for 2024—It’s like Dixit or Mysterium mixed with a Reading Challenge.
It’s time for some more 2023 Best Of Lists.I agree with a lot of these (and added more than I should to the overburnded TBR)
The Ultimate Best Books of 2023 List—Lit Hub’s Emily Temple compiles results from 62 published lists to list the best of the best.
Top Five Character-Driven Books I Read In 2023—from Steven Writes
Operation 2023: Success! (Or Favorite Books From this Year)—Witty and Sarcastic Bookclub has some real winners (and you’ll never guess the 2nd book on this list!)
Favourite Series of 2023—from Novel Deelights
CrimeReads’ The Best Noir Fiction of 2023
The Best Books I Read in 2023—from Read Betwixt Worlds
Tiny Elf Arcanist Character Awards 2023
CrimeReads’ The Best Traditional Mysteries of 2023
Why Stories About Stories Bugs Me

This Week’s New Releases that I’m Excited About and/or You’ll Probably See Here Soon:
Death in the Dark Woods by Annelise Ryan—should’ve been mentioned here last week. Moving on from lake monsters, cryptozoologist/bookstore owner Morgan Carter looks into Bigfoot.
Down The Well by Veronica King—this just sounds like a ball. Sentient lamp posts? You can never go wrong with lamp posts in fantasy, making them sentient is a heckuva bons.
Grimdwarf: A Magaine of Fantastic Tales edited by JCM Berne—1. It’s free. 2. It’s good. 3. It’s a quick read. 4. It’s good. I have no idea how/if I’ll be talking about this zine regularly, but for now, I’m just going to promote it when I have the opportunity.

(can’t like back to the creator, since I don’t know where it came from)

Late again…but I have a good excuse. I was meeting a prospective/probable new member of the household, a sweet lab/boxer mix. So…this takes a back seat.

Odds ‘n ends about books and reading that caught my eye this week. You’ve probably seen some/most/all of them, but just in case:
On the Difficulty of Giving Books as Gifts
The Most Scathing Book Reviews of 2023—from BookMarks. I’m feeling much better about all my negative reviews.
The best book covers of 2023 are the ones you’ll never see: The most interesting book cover designs are often left on the cutting room floor.
10 Things We Learned in 20 Years of Writing Mysteries—from the writers behind “Cleo Coyle”
Ian [Rankin]’s end of year round-up: 2023
Kevin Hearne also posted a Year-end roundup
FALL BACK TO READING SERIES – Featuring Lee Goldberg—Goldberg shares Non-Fiction and Fiction recommendations
The Biggest Literary Stories of the Year: 50 to 31—(at least according to LitHub)
How about some more Year-End Best Of lists? (in no particular order). Several of my TBR reads are here and not enough things that I have read are, oh and the TBR has been made longer by these, too.
CrimeReads’ The Best Crime Novels of 2023—Some great ones here (and in the Honorable Mentions!)
The 139 Best Book Covers of 2023
My Ten Favourite Reads of 2023—from Grab This Book
FanFiAddict’s The Bookwyrm’s Best Reads of 2023
Also from CrimeReads, The Best Debut Novels of 2023
Also from FanFiAddict, Charlies Top Reads of 2023
Top Five Powerful Books I Read In 2023—Stephen continues his trend of categorizing his lists in the best way
And one more from FanFiAddict, Lord TBR’s Top Reads of 2023
Rethinking the End of Year Book List—What better way to follow those up than with a reconsideration of the idea?
How do You Measure a Year in Reading?—I’ve read this a couple of times now, and will probably do it a couple of more
Maybe the Greatest Fantasy Standalones Ever—Not content with just looking at 2023, Peat Long tackles the Entirety of Human History
Ideas For 2023 Book Gifts—for the second week in a row, I’m starting on the same topic I began on. I’d like to say I’m clever enough to keep this up, but we all know better.

A Book-ish Related Podcast episode (or two) you might want to give a listen to:
Fully Booked Best Middle-Grade Books of 2023 with Zach Weinersmith—before digging into Kirkus Review’s Best Middle Grade books of the year, the episode features a chat with Weinersmith about Bea Wolf, Beowulf, and MG books in general. I really enjoyed this one

I typically like to start these with an introduction of sorts (probably because I read too many recipe blogs and think I need to begin everything with a rambling essay), but I can’t think of anything to say today.

Odds ‘n ends about books and reading that caught my eye this week. You’ve probably seen some/most/all of them, but just in case:
The pages of life keep turning—awwww
My Year in Reading Children’s Books
Rereading My Childhood: Author Timothy C. Baker examines how our childhood reading shapes our memories and the way we see the world.
What better way to follow up three pieces about Children’s Books than with The Enduring Appeal of Murder and Mystery: A Brief History
S.A. Cosby was on The Daily Show this week, which is just cool to see.
#R3COMM3ND3D2023 The After Show Party—a good wrap-up of the series that has been called “the highlight of your bookish year.”
It’s that time of year, “Best Of” List Season. Here are a few that got my attention. I either agree with at least one thing on each of these lists (or added at least one book to my list from them)
The Best Reviewed Fiction of 2023—from Lit Hub’s BookMarks
The Best Fantasy Books of 2023—from Paste magazine (didn’t realize they cared about Fantasy books, but it’s a good list)
The 38 Best Books We Read in 2023: Lit Hub Staffers on the Year’s Best Reading Experiences
FanFi Addict brings us: DB Rook’s Top Reads of 2023
Ed’s Top Reads of 2023
Top 12 Favorite Books of 2023—from John Mauro at Before We Go Blog
My Top 10 Reads of 2023!!!—from Out of This World SFF
The End of All Stories: Bidding a Fond Farewell to The Great C.S. Lewis Reread—I didn’t read this series as faithfully as I could have, but I thought it was a great idea that was frequently executed well (except from when Mikalatos was just wrong in his opinions, obviously).
What’s The Best Book In A Trilogy Edition One – Tolkien, Feist/Wurts, Barker, Eddings, Lackey, De Bodard—I enjoyed the approach to this piece (have only read 2 of these trilogies, but I agree with the rankings). My gut says this conclusion is where I’d land, but I should probably try this myself.
Beginner’s Guide to Fantasy—how to get started—I always enjoy pieces like this. If only for the good recommendations they bring for non-beginners like me and/or reminders of books I haven’t thought of in too long
On Fantasy and Whores—yeah, a Peat Long twofer this week. I’d honestly never thought about this before, and probably should’ve
Let’s start on the same topic we started on with It’s Beginning to Look a Lot like Christmas: Picture Book Edition 2023—they’re all (or mostly all) a bit too old for Grandpappy’s Corner, but not for long. I anticipate adding many of these to my shelves soon.

A Book-ish Related Podcast episode (or two) you might want to give a listen to:
Meet the Writers talked to Kevin Jon Davies about 42: The Wildly Improbable Ideas of Douglas Adams and the man himself
Functional Nerds Episode 604-With Alex Bledsoe—a fun chat about his new short story collection and more
Crime Time FM MATT PHILLIPS In Person With Paul —not only a great talk about A Good Rush of Blood but their discussion about the essence of noir is great.

This Week’s New Releases that I’m Excited About and/or You’ll Probably See Here Soon:
The Mayors of New York by S.J. Rozan—because I needed a fresh reason to not finish my reading plans for 2023, Bill Smith and Lydia Chin hunt for the runaway son of NYC’s mayor.
Murder Crossed Her Mind by Stephen Spotswood—In their latest, Parker and Pentecost are also hunting a mising person in NYC.

You would not believe how many times I’ve tried to get this posted today…I barely do, and I was there for all of them. But, life has interfered (as it so often does). But it’s still Saturday, so I can live with it (the two posts I also planned on scheduling today, on the other hand are going to wait a week or more for attention).

But you didn’t come here for my whinging. You came here for this:

Odds ‘n ends about books and reading that caught my eye this week. You’ve probably seen some/most/all of them, but just in case:
Wisconsin libraries would have to notify parents about the books their kids check out under GOP proposal—I’m not fond of this, but I’m not sure it’s horrible. The other bill talked about in this story, on the other hand…
When Your Own Book Gets Caught Up in the Censorship Wars—a little BTS action
This Is Your Brain on Books
The big idea: should we abolish literary genres?
Webtoons and Webcomics Keep Scrolling into Print
Do You Believe in Magic? On The Timeless Charm of Children’s Books 
It’s getting to be that time of year, isn’t it? Libro.fm’s Top 10 Audiobooks of 2023
S.A. Cosby lists His favorite books of the year—have read a couple of these and have several others sitting on a stack in my office, glaring at me
And looking in the other direction, FFA’s Most Anticipated Reads of 2024
Scaring Myself: The Story Behind How & Why I Wrote CALICO…—Lee Goldberg talks about the background to his latest novel (that I will write about ASAP, but you should read)
The Case for Never Reading the Book Jacket—I thought this was interesting and had planned on putting it here in the first place, and then:
Molly Templeton responded with What Do You Want to Know About a Book Before You Read It?—what are your thoughts?
#R3COMM3ND3D2023 wrapped up this week, so I only have a few more TBR add-ons for you:
…with Donna of Retirement Reflections
…with Rae of Rae Reads
…with Ayo Onatade of Shotsmag Confidential—
…with Sarah Hardy of bytheletterbookreviews
…with Jo of Jo’s Book Blog
Announcing Solstitia: a Fiction Fans Magazine—the brains behind Fiction Fans are launching a zine/litmag. Looking forward to some good reads.
Similarly, JCM Berne is starting up Grimdwarf Magazine—and is worth looking into
Managing my TBR—The Narratess talks about getting her TBR slimmed down. No offense intended, but having read her numbers, I’m feeling better about mine. But still…
Is It Easier to Write Negative Reviews?—Not for me, no. But I can see where Krsyta is coming from.

A Book-ish Related Podcast episode (or two) you might want to give a listen to:
The Joined Up Writing Podcast 204: S.A. Cosby—Cosby chats about All the Sinners Bleed and much more. I love listening to this guy.

This Week’s New Releases that I’m Excited About and/or You’ll Probably See Here Soon:
Robert B. Parker’s Broken Trust by Mike Lupica—Lupica takes up the Spenser torch from Atkins, and is much better than I assumed. (I’d planned on finishing this today, but, life intervened). PI Fans would be smart to pick this up.
Didn’t See That Coming by Jesse Q. Sutanto—okay, a YA take on You’ve Got Mail with gamers and a private school, isn’t really my cuppa. But I really liked Sutanto’s style at first contact. So, I’m going to give this a shot (as I try to work older books into my schedule, too).

Lastly, I’d like to say hi and extend a warm welcome to Taylor @ Taylor Fenner’s Bookish World, who followed the blog this week. I hope you enjoy the content and keep coming back.