Book #176 of 2021: The Charnel Prince by Greg Keyes (The Kingdoms of Thorn and Bone #2) Another strong entry in this unfairly-obscure fantasy quartet. I don’t like it quite as much as the previous volume, in part since a couple of the new storylines — Anne’s to some extent, but especially Aspar’s — seem …
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Book #175 of 2021: The Capture by K. A. Applegate (Animorphs #6) The big hook to this sixth Animorphs volume — the premise alluded to on the front cover and plainly stated on the back — doesn’t actually occur until about two-thirds of the way through the text. Spoiler alert: it’s that Jake himself is …
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Book #174 of 2021: Yearbook by Seth Rogen A heartfelt and hilarious memoir from actor Seth Rogen, reflecting on his childhood and Hollywood career thus far. I especially love how he centers his Jewish identity throughout, both in the particulars of a youth spent at bar mitzvah parties and religious summer camps and in his …
Book #173 of 2021: Going Postal by Terry Pratchett (Discworld #33) I generally enjoy the Discworld comic fantasy series, but this entry is perhaps a bit shaggy for my tastes. Although the basic premise of a con artist conscripted into running the failing Ankh-Morpork post office has potential, and that protagonist’s arc is a solid …
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Book #172 of 2021: Four Hundred Souls: A Community History of African America, 1619-2019 edited by Ibram X. Kendi and Keisha N. Blain This is a remarkable and remarkably ambitious project, bringing together eighty prominent African American writers, from Angela Davis to Jamelle Bouie to Isabel Wilkerson, in order to pen a sweeping account of …
Movie #3 of 2021: Serenity (2005) When the show Firefly was canceled — before the planned end of its first season, after airing its episodes all out of order — it left a lot of plotlines open and a lot of strengths on the table. Fans were outraged, and as the series gained further followers …
Book #171 of 2021: City of Bones by Michael Connelly (Harry Bosch #8) I wouldn’t say this Harry Bosch novel is bad per se, but it’s probably my least favorite of the series yet. There’s a lot of attention placed on the reckless rookie cop that the detective is dating, coupled with a brusque rejection …
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TV #51 of 2021: Star Trek: Deep Space Nine, season 3 Although the larger plot is still not quite as serialized as I think it could be, there’s promising movement here with the true nature of the Dominion founders, whose threat is best exemplified in the tense riff on John Carpenter’s The Thing that constitutes …
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Book #170 of 2021: Cool for the Summer by Dahlia Adler Taking its title from the Demi Lovato song about a same-sex fling, this YA novel follows a high school senior who finds that the guy she’s long been crushing on finally seems to like her back — right after she’s spent the summer falling …
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Book #169 of 2021: The Predator by K. A. Applegate (Animorphs #5) The fifth Animorphs novel gets a lot of its impact and forward momentum from a twist reveal near the end, of the sort I’m reluctant to spoil in a review despite the passage of decades. Suffice to say, we learn further details about …
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