Book #57 of 2026: Gregor the Overlander by Suzanne Collins (The Underland Chronicles #1) A pitch-perfect middle-grade portal fantasy, in which our eleven-year-old protagonist stumbles into an underground world via the basement laundry room of his New York City apartment building. There he discovers giant talking animals like cockroaches, spiders, and bats, a strange civilization …
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Book #56 of 2026: The Zoologist’s Guide to the Galaxy: What Animals on Earth Reveal about Aliens – and Ourselves by Arik Kershenbaum I’ve really enjoyed this 2020 nonfiction title, in which an evolutionary biologist provides his informed speculations about the potential nature(s) of extraterrestrial life. He does this by describing a wide sample of …
Movie #17 of 2026: Terminator 2: Judgment Day (1991) It’s rare for a sequel to so thoroughly surpass its predecessor, especially when the original piece is already as terrific as The Terminator (1984). This movie makes it all look easy, however. It nimbly channels the sci-fi action thrills of the first film, while effortlessly expanding …
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Book #55 of 2026: The Dead of Summer by Ryan La Sala (The Dead of Summer #1) I really enjoyed author Ryan La Sala’s previous YA queer horror title Beholder, but this newer release is unfortunately a misfire for me. Although the first chapter sketches some interesting character dynamics — our teenage hero has a …
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Book #54 of 2026: Star Wars: Revenge of the Sith by Matthew Stover Novelizations are often dismissed as weak cash-grabs, but in truth the format is — or at least, can be — an art form like any other. Some adaptations are practically invisible, conveying the action from the screen without embellishment, while others struggle …
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Book #53 of 2026: Love at Second Sight by F. T. Lukens It’s great that today’s young readers have stories like this 2025 YA urban fantasy title, in which queerness is totally normalized. The protagonist is a fifteen-year-old boy with a crush on a male classmate, his best friend uses they/them pronouns and has two …
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Book #52 of 2026: The Hands of the Emperor by Victoria Goddard (Lays of the Hearth-Fire #1) This is my very favorite book, which I’ve now read four times in as many years. (I’m not necessarily committing to maintaining an annual rereading tradition, but I’m not exactly ruling it out, either.) That’s once in my …
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Movie #16 of 2026: The Terminator (1984) This action thriller launched a franchise and helped make household names out of star Arnold Schwarzenegger and director James Cameron, and even on an umpteenth rewatch, it’s very easy to see why. It’s a lean and propulsive feature, wrapping a great sci-fi exterior around a classic horror structure …
Book #51 of 2026: The Infinite Sadness of Small Appliances by Glenn Dixon [Disclaimer: I received a free Advance Reader’s Copy of this title from the publisher Atria Books in a Goodreads Giveaway, in exchange for an honest review.] There will be inevitable comparisons of this upcoming novel to The Brave Little Toaster, which author …
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TV #16 of 2026: Zoey’s Extraordinary Playlist, season 1 I went into this musical dramedy expecting something like Crazy Ex-Girlfriend or Galavant, with catchy original songs functioning to move the plot of every episode along. Instead, it’s more like Glee meets Ally McBeal with a dash of Joan of Arcadia: people singing choreographed cover versions …
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