Book #19 of 2019: All the Ever Afters: The Untold Story of Cinderella’s Stepmother by Danielle Teller I have a soft spot for fairy tale retellings, and in theory this novel offers a fine premise: Cinderella is a spoiled brat, her stepmother is a former servant struggling to keep the household solvent, and all the …
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TV Review: Breaking Bad, season 3
TV #6 of 2019: Breaking Bad, season 3 This series has been incredible from its very first scene, but the third season is where it truly hits its stride in terms of plotting and character work. This run of episodes is all about the chess game against Gus Fring and the battle for Jesse Pinkman’s …
Book Review: Men We Reaped by Jesmyn Ward
Book #18 of 2019: Men We Reaped by Jesmyn Ward Unsurprisingly given the power of her novels, author Jesmyn Ward’s presentation of her own early life as a poor black girl in rural Mississippi during the 1980s-90s crack epidemic is equal parts insightful and gut-wrenching. Told mostly as a series of vignettes, this memoir centers …
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TV Review: Lemony Snicket’s A Series of Unfortunate Events, season 3
TV #5 of 2019: Lemony Snicket’s A Series of Unfortunate Events, season 3 I may look back and decide that I’ve judged this season too generously in the moment, but wow: not only does it improve upon the first two outings for this Netflix series — which were already quite strong! — but it also …
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TV Review: Crazy Ex-Girlfriend, season 3
TV #4 of 2019: Crazy Ex-Girlfriend, season 3 Episode by episode this series is as strong and hilarious as ever, but the season-long plots and character arcs seem like they’re getting sloppier as it goes along. Promising ideas fizzle out, people make some fairly major life decisions with little build-up, and the season is just …
TV Review: The Good Place, season 3
TV #3 of 2019: The Good Place, season 3 Three seasons in, this sitcom about the afterlife is still one of the funniest, smartest, and most warm-hearted shows on television. It regularly redefines its own premise and is hard to describe without spoilers (and probably impossible to watch out-of-order), but I love that its exploration …
Book Review: My Year of Rest and Relaxation by Ottessa Moshfegh
Book #17 of 2019: My Year of Rest and Relaxation by Ottessa Moshfegh An excellent yet uncomfortable character study of a woman’s struggle with depression and prescription drug abuse. I’m lucky to have never gone down the route of overmedication myself, but I recognize a lot of the narrator’s thought processes from my own lowest …
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Book Review: The Truths We Hold: An American Journey by Kamala Harris
Book #15 of 2019: The Truths We Hold: An American Journey by Kamala Harris A campaign book is probably never going to be great literature, but this one presents a solid introduction to its author, California Senator Kamala Harris, as she launches her run for the 2020 Democratic presidential nomination. Presumably an extended version of …
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Book Review: Slayer by Kiersten White
Book #16 of 2019: Slayer by Kiersten White (Slayer #1) The last act of this Buffy/Angel spinoff novel is strong enough (and similar enough to the original TV shows) that I’ll probably check out its forthcoming sequel as well, but everything is unfortunately just a little tedious until then. The new gang of sixteen-year-old heroes …
Book Review: Skyward by Brandon Sanderson
Book #14 of 2019: Skyward by Brandon Sanderson (Skyward #1) I mostly enjoy this Young Adult novel about a girl following in her father’s footsteps to join their planet’s defense armada, although I do feel there are some issues with people’s motivations at the very beginning. That’s not a problem I normally experience with either …
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The Lesser Joke: book reviews and more 