Movie #20 of 2025: Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade (1989) Neither Raiders of the Lost Ark (1981) nor Indiana Jones and the Temple of Doom (1984) ever mentioned that the titular archaeologist’s father was a fellow antiquities scholar, but he fits seamlessly into the plot of this third film in a way that, for …
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Movie #17 of 2025: Raiders of the Lost Ark (1981) There are some movies that I think, if you see them when you’re young enough, you can never hope to be truly objective about their qualities. Such is the case with Raiders of the Lost Ark (retroactively retitled Indiana Jones and the Raiders of the …
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Book #165 of 2025: King Sorrow by Joe Hill A beast of a novel that fully earns its epic scope, proving once and for all that author Joe Hill has escaped from his father Stephen King‘s shadow but will always be indebted to him for the shared family style (as well as a few charming …
Book #123 of 2025: The Redoubtable Pali Avramapul by Victoria Goddard (The Red Company Reformed #2) This is my favorite Victoria Goddard book since The Hands of the Emperor, which was the first one that I ever picked up. That earlier novel is often heralded as a great entry point to the author’s extended Nine …
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Book #101 of 2025: The Hands of the Emperor by Victoria Goddard (Lays of the Hearth-Fire #1) This is currently my very favorite book, which I’ve now read three times in as many years. (I’m not necessarily committing to maintaining an annual reread, but I’m not ruling it out, either.) Like Kip scribbling additions to …
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Movie #5 of 2025: Sinners (2025) Just a phenomenal historical horror piece, and one that takes its sweet time establishing the setting and the characters before finally unveiling the vampiric threat. In fact, I found that initial stage of the film so engrossing that for the first few scenes with the supernatural villains, I resented …
TV #21 of 2025: Andor, season 2 I went into the second and final season of this Star Wars prequel prequel with reservations on two separate fronts. First, the debut run back in 2022 was simply astonishing, representing the franchise at its utter best. Was there any way the followup could possibly match it? It …
Book #77 of 2025: Someone You Can Build a Nest In by John Wiswell One of fantasy’s most truly distinctive protagonists anchors this delightful tale, achieving a tone that’s somewhere between Hell Followed With Us and Killing Eve. Our antiheroine narrator is an inhuman creature who begins her story by describing how she ate her …
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Book #32 of 2025: Blood Over Bright Haven by M. L. Wang This standalone fantasy novel is a total delight, and also probably represents the biggest improvement I’ve ever seen an author display from their debut, which for M. L. Wang was the somewhat forgettable YA title Theonite: Planet Adyn. Her talents have grown considerably …
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Book #25 of 2025: Jonathan Strange & Mr Norrell by Susanna Clarke I first read this fantasy novel soon after its initial 2004 publication, and have found myself drawn back to its wonders at least once a decade since. It is a dense and intricate creation: 782 pages in my hardcover edition, detailing an alternate …
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