TV #13 of 2021: The Good Fight, season 3 This series is still doing the best job of anything I’ve seen on TV at capturing the actual experience of living through the Trump presidency, and even as that era recedes behind us, it remains validating to see these protagonists grappling with the issues of family …
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Book Review: Over the Woodward Wall by A. Deborah Baker
Book #36 of 2021: Over the Woodward Wall by A. Deborah Baker (The Up-and-Under #1) This is a cute children’s fantasy adventure, sort of like a cross between The Phantom Tollbooth and L. Frank Baum’s classic Oz series. It’s also a bit metatextual, as “A. Deborah Baker” is a pen name for the real author …
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Book Review: The Bone Houses by Emily Lloyd-Jones
Book #35 of 2021: The Bone Houses by Emily Lloyd-Jones It’s always neat to see a fantasy story built on Welsh mythology, but the plot to this one is a slower and pretty generic quest narrative, and I haven’t quite found the protagonists interesting enough to justify spending so much of the novel with just …
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TV Review: Fleabag, season 2
TV #12 of 2021: Fleabag, season 2 I’m aware that I’m joining the chorus here, but it’s frankly astonishing how much Fleabag has improved in its sophomore outing — possibly more than any program I’ve seen since Parks and Recreation. Although still relying slightly on cringe humor, now that the protagonist is no longer sabotaging …
Book Review: Moonflower Murders by Anthony Horowitz
Book #34 of 2021: Moonflower Murders by Anthony Horowitz (Susan Ryeland #2) This is another fun postmodern detective story, but it’s a bit too similar to its predecessor Magpie Murders, in a way that rather strains credulity. (The same dead writer knew about a second killer who had escaped justice and placed subtle clues to …
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Book Review: The Last Battle by C. S. Lewis
Book #33 of 2021: The Last Battle by C. S. Lewis (The Chronicles of Narnia #7) What a depressing and offensive conclusion to a generally solid children’s fantasy heptalogy. Author C. S. Lewis has always had his share of mid-twentieth-century hangups, but they are seldom so blatantly awful as here, where traditional feminine interests like …
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Book Review: The Orchard by David Hopen
Book #32 of 2021: The Orchard by David Hopen This novel’s all-Jewish cast helps disguise the familiarity of its tropes, but it’s ultimately a pretty conventional coming-of-age plot, one part Mean Girls (sheltered new kid falls in with the school’s popular crowd of bad influences) and one part The Secret History (scholarly discussion group chases …
Book Review: Wishtree by Katherine Applegate
Book #31 of 2021: Wishtree by Katherine Applegate This is a weird little middle-grade story narrated by a talking tree, detailing its efforts to find a friend for a local girl and encourage the rest of the neighborhood to stand up against the recent xenophobia targeting her family (probably Islamophobia in particular, although that’s not …
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TV Review: Dawson’s Creek, season 1
TV #11 of 2021: Dawson’s Creek, season 1 I think I was too young when this show first aired to watch it then or hold any nostalgic attachment now, and I’m old enough at this point that I still don’t have an easy identification with the teenage protagonists. Both in the age of the cast …
Book Review: When the Tiger Came Down the Mountain by Nghi Vo
Book #30 of 2021: When the Tiger Came Down the Mountain by Nghi Vo (The Singing Hills Cycle #2) Not quite as powerfully moving as the previous novella, but still well above much of the fantasy genre. In this story, returning protagonist Cleric Chih is waylaid on their travels by a pack of hungry tigresses, …
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The Lesser Joke: book reviews and more 