A bit light on blogging in the last couple of days – a weekend on the road, plus reading award submissions has slowed down the number of books I can write up here. But anyway…
This is the latest post in a series I started in late 2019, anticipating the twentieth anniversary of my bookblogging at the end of October 2023. Every six-ish days, I’ve been revisiting a month from my recent past, noting work and family developments as well as the books I read in that month. I’ve found it a pleasantly cathartic process, especially in recent circumstances. If you want to look back at previous entries, they are all tagged under bookblog nostalgia.
A fair bit of travel that month, going straight from Sofia…
…to Bratislava:
…with trips to London later in the month and the Netherlands earlier in the month.
Anne had a significant birthday and we swung from the trees in celebration:
Very sadly, we lost our dear friend Andy Carling, and the European Commission spokesman who is now himself a European Commissioner) paid tribute to him.
I read 27 books that month.
Non-fiction: 8 (YTD 25)
Luminescent Threads, edited by Alexandra Pierce and Mimi Mondal
The Road to Middlemarch, by Rebecca Mead
Crash Override: How Gamergate (Nearly) Destroyed My Life, and How We Can Win the Fight Against Online Hate, by Zoe Quinn
No Time to Spare: Thinking About What Matters, by Ursula K. Le Guin
Sleeping with Monsters: Readings and Reactions in Science Fiction and Fantasy, by Liz Bourke
The Cybersecurity Campaign Playbook, European Edition, by Harrison Monsky and the Harvard Kennedy School Belfer Center for Science and International Affairs
The Case for a New WEU: European Defence After Brexit, by Charles Tannock MEP
A Lit Fuse: The Provocative Life of Harlan Ellison, by Nat Segaloff (extract)
Fiction (non-sf): 1 (YTD 14)
Looking For JJ, by Anne Cassidy
sf (non-Who): 14 (YTD 49)
River of Teeth, by Sarah Gailey
Darkness and the Light, by Olaf Stapledon
Donovan’s Brain, by Curt Siodmak
Akata Warrior, by Nnedi Okorafor
Down Among the Sticks and Bones, by Seanan McGuire
Ammonite, by Nicola Griffith
The Stone Sky, by N.K. Jemisin
The Black Tides of Heaven, by JY Yang
Summer in Orcus, by T. Kingfisher
A Skinful of Shadows, by Frances Hardinge
Beyond This Horizon, by Robert A. Heinlein
Mind Over Ship, by David Marusek
In Other Lands, by Sarah Rees Brennan
Second-Stage Lensmen, by E. E. “Doc” Smith (did not finish)
Doctor Who, etc: 3 (YTD 17)
The Day of the Doctor, by Steven Moffat
Twice Upon a Time, by Paul Cornell
Collected Works, ed. Nick Wallace
Comics: 1 (YTD 15)
P.I.G.S., by Cecilia Valagussa
~7,100 pages (YTD ~33,000)
16/27 (YTD 53/121) by non-male writers (Pierce/Mondal, Mead, Quinn, Le Guin, Bourke, Cassidy, Gailey, Okorafor, McGuire, Griffith, Jemisin, Yang, “Kingfisher”, Hardinge, Brennan, Valagussa)
4/27 (YTD 15/121) by PoC (Mondal, Okorafor, Jemisin, Yang)
0/27 (YTD 6/121) reread
I liked most:
- No Time to Spare: Thinking About What Matters, by Ursula K. Le Guin – get it here;
- In Other Lands, by Sarah Rees Brennan – get it here;
- The Road to Middlemarch, by Rebecca Mead – get it here; and
- Crash Override: How Gamergate (Nearly) Destroyed My Life, and How We Can Win the Fight Against Online Hate, by Zoe Quinn – get it here.
On the other hand I completely bounced off Second-Stage Lensmen, by E. E. “Doc” Smith (as usual for that author), but you can get it here.