Book #170 of 2024: Issola by Steven Brust (Vlad Taltos #9) The back half of this novel is rather good, representing an important step forward for former assassin and current fugitive Vlad Taltos, who’s come out of hiding to help a few friends who’ve been kidnapped by some sort of demigods. It also hinges on …
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Book Review: Mother-Daughter Murder Night by Nina Simon
Book #169 of 2024: Mother-Daughter Murder Night by Nina Simon I saw this book pitched as the Gilmore girls investigating a murder, and that’s honestly a pretty decent shorthand for the character dynamics at play: a small-town fifteen-year-old who discovers the body and is initially considered a suspect, the single mom who had her as …
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Book Review: Clary Sage by Victoria Goddard
Book #168 of 2024: Clary Sage by Victoria Goddard Morrowlea University is an important part of the backstory of author Victoria Goddard’s Greenwing & Dart series, which begins soon after its protagonist Jemis Greenwing graduates and returns home from there. As we learn as those stories unfold, the institution is alone among its peers in …
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Book Review: The Third Gilmore Girl by Kelly Bishop
Book #167 of 2024: The Third Gilmore Girl by Kelly Bishop I knew vaguely that actress Kelly Bishop — most iconic to my generation as the matriarch Emily on the show Gilmore Girls — had been one of the original cast members of the Broadway musical A Chorus Line when she was younger. What I …
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Book Review: Voyage of the Damned by Frances White
Book #166 of 2024: Voyage of the Damned by Frances White I’ve heard this book described as a fantasy-genre version of an Agatha Christie story like And Then There Were None, but I think The Hunger Games might be an even more apt comparison for the steadily-rising body count. While the identity of the murderer(s) …
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Book Review: Grief in the Fourth Dimension by Jennifer Yu
Book #165 of 2024: Grief in the Fourth Dimension by Jennifer Yu Two recently deceased teenagers, who attended the same high school but didn’t really know one another there, now find themselves sharing a room together in the afterlife. The space is an empty void they can populate by wishing for furnishings, but the main …
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Book Review: Doctor Who: Rogue by Kate Herron and Briony Redman
Book #164 of 2024: Doctor Who: Rogue by Kate Herron and Briony Redman Probably the best of the recent Fifteenth Doctor novelizations, as is fitting for being the only one written by the author(s) of the original episode in question. Kate Herron and Briony Redman tell just as thrilling a queer love story for the …
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Book Review: In the Shadow of the Fall by Tobi Ogundiran
Book #163 of 2024: In the Shadow of the Fall by Tobi Ogundiran (Guardian of the Gods #1) An exhilarating new fantasy series debut that pits a novitiate orisha priestess against body-snatching heretics like Doro from Octavia E. Butler’s Wild Seed seeking to destroy her order. I wish the plot structure deviated more from the …
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Book Review: After the Forest by Kell Woods
Book #162 of 2024: After the Forest by Kell Woods I like the idea of following up with Hansel and Gretel (sorry, “Hans” and “Greta”) as young adults, haunted by the trauma of what they experienced as children, but this fantasy novel spends a bit too long getting to the point, which then winds up …
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TV Review: ReBoot ReWind, season 1
TV #45 of 2024: ReBoot ReWind, season 1 In honor of its 30th anniversary, this new eight-part documentary series is a neat look back at the 90s TV show ReBoot, which was the first cartoon to be made with entirely CGI graphics. Drawing on newly-restored footage and interviews with over 50 members of the old …
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