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.

I started the month at SmofCon in Santa Rosa, California, as previously noted, and went to London twice for work purposes. In the world of politics, the Belgian government collapsed thanks to the dishonesty and opportunism of the N-VA, for whom I don’t think I will ever vote; and sadly, Paddy Ashdown died.

Christmas service in the chapel in the woods:

Decent photo of the whole family on Christmas Day:

I read only 14 books that month.

Non-fiction: 4 (2018 total 50)
Outside In: 160 New Perspectives on 160 Classic Doctor Who Stories by 160 Writers, ed. Robert Smith?
Freddie Mercury: An Illustrated Life, by Mark Blake
Factfulness, by Hans Rosling
The Fate of Rome, by Kyle Harper

Fiction (non-sf): 4 (2018 total 36)
The Amazing Adventures of Kavalier and Clay, by Michael Chabon
Delta of Venus, by Anaïs Nin
The Name of This Book Is Secret, by Pseudonymous Bosch
Finding Time Again, by Marcel Proust

sf (non-Who): 3 (2018 total 108)
Fools, by Pat Cadigan
Destination Moon and Shooting Destination Moon, by Robert A. Heinlein
Perilous Dreams, by Andre Norton

Comics: 3 (2018 total 28)
Saga, vol. 8, by Fiona Staples and Brian K. Vaughan
A Cold Day in Hell, ed. Tom Spilsbury
Ergens Waar Je Niet Wilt Zijn, by Brecht Evens

~4,200 pages (YTD ~71,600)
4/14 (YTD 102/262) by non-male writers (Nin, Cadigan, Norton, Staples)
1/14 (YTD 26/262) by PoC (Staples)

Hugely enjoyed rereading The Amazing Adventures of Kavalier and Clay, which you can get here, and Finding Time Again, which you can get here.

Hugely enjoyed reading Factfulness for the first time; you can get it here.

Totally bounced off Perilous Dreams, which you can get here.

2018 roundup

I read 262 books in 2018, ninth highest of the eighteen years I have been keeping count, so in the middle.

Page count for the year: 71,600 – also ninth highest of the eighteen years I have been keeping count, again in the middle.

Books by non-male writers in 2017: 102/262, 39% – a record high, since exceeded in 2021.

Books by PoC in 2017: 26/262, 10% – another record high, since exceeded in 2019 and 2021.

Most books by a single author: Tove Jansson and Marcel Proust, both with 6.

Science Fiction and Fantasy (excluding Doctor Who)

108 (41%), a comparatively high total, thanks to two new Hugo categories and Retro Hugos as well.

Some very welcome re-reads (Gulliver’s Travels, Snow Crash, Jonathan Hoag, the Moomin books).

My three top sff new reads of 2018:

3) Provenance, by Anne Leckie – not directly connected to her previous books, but a convincing story of politics and truth. Finalist for both BSFA and Hugo Awards, and I voted for it both times, though it did not win either.
2) In Other Lands, by Sarah Rees Brennan – one of the Hugo YA finalists, I thought this was a brilliant look at young wizardry with a bisexual protagonist.
1) The Sudden Appearance of Hope, by Clare North – increasingly one of my favourite authors, here with another tale of someone whose interaction with our world is very different, combined with a sinister Facebook-meets-Social-Credit Big Tech conspiracy.

The one you might not have heard of: Anne Charnock’s novella The Enclave, another BSFA Award finalist, which I thought caught a lot of things about Brexit Britain very well.

The one to skip: Second-Stage Lensmen, by E.E. “Doc” Smith – turgid prose from the depths of the pulp era.

Non-fiction

50 (19%) – very slightly but I think not significantly below average.

Top three non-fiction books of 2018:

equal 2) After Europe by Ivan Krastev, and Europe Reset: New Directions for the EU, by Richard Youngs – two takes on the future of the continent, one more pessimistic, one more optimistic, both thorough and also digestible.
1) The last book I fnished this year, and the best book I read all year: Factfulness, by Hans Rosling – a fantastic guide to what is really going on in the world, and how we can think about it more usefully, based just on facts.

The one you haven’t heard of: Huawei Stories: Pioneers, ed. Tian Tao and Yin Zhifeng – fascinating stories of Chinese engineers encountering strange cultures, like Iceland, Italy and Africa.

The one to skip: Here’s My Card, by Bob Popyk, useless and outdated advice on networking.

Non-sfnal fiction

36 (14%) – lower than any year apart from the previous two and 2021.

Again, some welcome rereads (Proust, Kavalier and Clay). My three top new non-sf fiction books:

3) And The Mountains Echoed, by Khaled Hosseini – a generational tale of Afghanistan and other places which really worked for me.
2) Fingersmith, by Sarah Waters – Waters was my real discovery this year, and Iliked this most of the books by her which I read.
1) Moon Tiger, by Penelope Lively – really blown away by this twentieth-century life story, set mainly in England but with other excursions; I should probably read more by this author.

The one you haven’t heard of: Something Like Normal, by Trish Doller – author is my twin (born the same day and year); this was her first novel, about a young American soldier returning fro the wars and finding it very difficult to fit in.

The one to skip: Five Escape Brexit Island, by Bruno Vincent – not so much a one-joke book as a no-joke book.

Comics

28 (11%) – much the same as the last couple of years.

Top three comics of my year:

3) Saga vol 7, by Fiona Staples and Brian K. Vaughan – I’ve been following the series faithfully since the beginning, and I felt that this installment seemed to pick up a bit more dark energy.
2) My Favorite Thing Is Monsters, by Emil Ferris – was a Hugo finalist; I didn’t think it was actually sf, but I did think it was remarkably good – a story of a little girl in Chicago who discovers more than she really wanted to know about her upstairs neighbour.
1) Weapons of Mass Diplomacy / Quai d’Orsay, by “Abel Lanzac” (Antonin Baudry) and Christophe Blain – brilliant insight into the top levels of diplomacy, which I am recommending to everyone at work.

The one you may not heard of: Ergens Waar Je Niet Wil Zijn / The Wrong Place by Brecht Evens – vivid evocation of two Flemish chaps whose relationship is not exactly what either of them think it is, played out against a background of suburbia, disco and sex.

The one to skip: Dark Satanic Mills, by Marcus Sedgwick – confused near-future English dystopia trying to riff off William Blake and not really succeeding.

Doctor Who (and spinoff) fiction

21 (12%) – a historic low here, basically because I had now read almost all of the Doctor Who books that there are to read.

3) Outside In: 160 New Perspectives on 160 Classic Doctor Who Stories, by 160 Writers, ed. Robert Smith? – much more insightful than the average survey of Doctor Who stories written by a single person or team, includes my brother.
2) A History of the Universe in 100 Objects, by Steve Tribe and James Goss – a gorgeous book looking at internal Who mythology but also drawing linkes bwteen stories in Old and New Who.
1) The Day of the Doctor, by Steven Moffat – the climax of the Moffat era in novel form, telling the story of the anniversary special in an unusual way, incidentally canonicalising the Peter Cushing movies. I hope that future novelisations can aspire to be this good.

The one you may have forgotten about: Time Lord: Create your own adventures in time and space, by Ian Marsh and Peter Darvill-Evans – the 1991 Doctor Who role-playing game.

The one you can skip: The Doctor Who Quiz Book of Dinosaurs, by Michael Holt – an obscure Fifth Doctor era kids spinoff, which contains surprisingly little information about dinosaurs.

Plays

Only four this year. Hamlet, by William Shakespeare, is the best of course, but was not new. You Can’t Take It with You, by Moss Hart and George S. Kaufman, is very entertaining. Everybody Comes to Rick’s, by Murray Burnett and Joan Alison, is not as bad as people say. Those three were all adapted to Oscar-winning films. I completely bounced off Le Mariage de Figaro, by Pierre-Augustin Caron de Beaumarchais.

Poetry

Great to rediscover Virgil’s Æneid, in two different translations, plus Heaney’s Book VI. Unexpected discovery: Glory of Me, an epic poem by MacKinlay Kantor, about demobbed US servicemen from the second world war. (Note also: Now We Are Six Hundred, by James Goss with illustrations by Russell T. Davies.)

Book of the year 2018

One of the last books I read in December, in fact: Factfulness by Hans Rosling. Strongly recommended. You can get it here.

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.

This month started with one of the crazier trips I have done in recent years: a visit to the London office, followed by a Worldcon planning meeting in Heathrow, followed by the congress of the European People’s Party in Helsinki, followed by a conference on civil society in Belgrade, in the margins of which I visited the ancient roman imperial capital of Sremska Mitrovica (Sirmium). I then went to Paris to celebrate the centenary of the Armistice, had another trip to London, and finished the month at SMOFcon in Santa Rosa, California. (I have since discovered that I have distant cousins living there.) I went to not one but two exhibitions about the Peanuts cartoons and their creator, Charles M. Schulz.

Despite all the travel, I read only 12 books that month.

Non-fiction: 1 (YTD 46)
52 Ways of Looking at a Poem, by Ruth Padel

Fiction (non-sf): 6 (YTD 32)
Baptism in Blood, by Jane Haddam
Burr, by Gore Vidal
The Stone Book Quartet, by Alan Garner
The Prisoner and The Fugitive, by Marcel Proust
And the Mountains Echoed, by Khaled Hosseini
All The King’s Men, by Robert Penn Warren

Theatre: 1 (YTD 4)
Hamlet, by William Shakespeare

sf (non-Who): 2 (YTD 105)
Hybrid, by Shaun Hutson
Hardwired, by Walter Jon Williams

Doctor Who, etc: 1 (YTD 32)
Doctor Who: Twelve Angels Weeping: Twelve Stories of the Villains from Doctor Who, by Dave Rudden

Comics: 1 (YTD 25)
Brüsel, by Benoît Peeters and François Schuiten

~5,100 pages (YTD ~67,400)
2/12 (YTD 98/248) by non-male writers (Padel, Haddam)
1/12 (YTD 25/248) by PoC (Hosseini)

The best of these was of course Hamlet, which you can get here; the best new reads were And the Mountains Echoed, by Khaled Hosseini, which you can get here, and The Stone Book Quartet, by Alan Garner, which you can get here. Nothing too awful.

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.

My travel this month was a work trip to London and a Worldcon planning trip to Dublin. At home, we had a nice excursion with the girls. It was impossible to get them both looking at the camera, but at least in this shot they are looking at each other.

My brother visited Brussels, and I persuaded F to come into the city for dinner. As far as I know, we are the only male-line descendants of our great-great-grandfather Nicholas Charles Whyte (1784-1844). He had two younger sons, our great-grandfather’s brothers. One of them never married; the other had four daughters and a son, but the son had no children. Our grandfather was one of nine brothers, but the other eight between them produced only one daughter. Our father had just the one sister. Apart from our own sister, who has kept her birth name, our closest Whyte relatives are descended from brothers of our great-great-grandfather and are therefore at least our fourth cousins.

On the last weekend of the month the local woods had a heitage day, including historical re-enactment of a local court session.

I read only 15 books that month.

Non-fiction: 3 (YTD 45)
Here’s My Card, by Bob Popyk
Seychelles: The Saga of a Small Nation Navigating the Cross-Currents of a Big World, by Sir James R. Mancham
Behind the Sofa: Celebrity Memories of Doctor Who, ed. Steve Berry

Fiction (non-sf): 2 (YTD 26)
Sodom and Gomorrah, by Marcel Proust
Gentleman’s Agreement, by Laura Z. Hobson

sf (non-Who): 6 (YTD 103)
Ringworld, by Larry Niven
The Sound of his Horn, by Sarban
Larque on the Wing, by Nancy Springer
The Cloud Roads, by Martha Wells
Words of Radiance, by Brandon Sanderson
Earth Girl, by Janet Edwards

Doctor Who, etc: 2 (YTD 31)
Doctor Who: The Women Who Lived – Tales for Future Time Lords, by Christel Dee and Simon Guerrier
The Vampire Curse, by Mags Halliday, Kelly Hale and Philip Purser-Hallard

Comics: 2 (YTD 24)
Doctor Who: The Widow’s Curse, ed. Tom Spilsbury
Retour sur Aldébaran, tome 1, by Leo

~5,000 pages (YTD ~62,300)
6/15 (YTD 96/236) by non-male writers (Hobson, Springer, Wells, Edwards, Dee, Halliday/Hale)
1/15 (YTD 24/236) by PoC (Mancham)

My favourite of these was Tiptree winning Larque on the Wing, now much better known for her Enola Homes series; you can get it here. Worst of the month, and I think probably worst of the whole year of 2018, was the vastly out-of-date Here’s My Card by Bob Popyk; you can get it here.

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.

The first weekend of the month saw the Oud-Heverlee dorpfeest, with this spirited rendition of “Billie Jean” by Mechelen band Selene’s Garden:

The following weekend saw the Open Monument Day, when F and I visited Tienen and met up with an old friend and her daughter at the ceremonial opening of the Three Tumuli of Grimde.

I had a work trip to Oxford and London, taking in the Asterix/Goscinny exhibition at the Jewish Museum:

Later in the month, I attended the dedication of Jo Cox Square in central Brussels, named after the murdered MP; both Jeremy Corbyn and his Brexit spokesman, who had been a close friend of Cox’s, were also there.

Finally, and much more happily, Anne and I ended the month with a trip to Riga to celebrate our 25th wedding anniversary.

I read 20 books that month.

Non-fiction: 5 (YTD 42)
Byzantium, by Judith Herrin
Who I Am, by Peter Townshend
About Time vol 8: 2007, Series 3, by Tat Wood and Dorothy Ail
Brewing Justice, by Daniel Jaffee
Riga: Berlitz Pocket Guide, by Martins Zaprauskis

Fiction (non-sf): 2 (YTD 24)
The Lost Weekend, by Charles L. Jackson
The Guermantes Way, by Marcel Proust

Poetry 1 (YTD 4)
Glory For Me, by MacKinlay Kantor

sf (non-Who): 9 (YTD 97)
Finn Family Moomintroll, by Tove Jansson
Moominland Midwinter, by Tove Jansson
Vurt, by Jeff Noon
Moominsummer Madness, by Tove Jansson
The Ginger Star, by Leigh Brackett
Moominpappa at Sea, by Tove Jansson
The Beast Master, by André Norton
Lord of Thunder, by André Norton
Putting Up Roots, by Charles Sheffield

Doctor Who, etc: 2 (YTD 29)
Doctor Who: The Visual Dictionary, by Neil Corry, Jacqueline Rayner, Andrew Darling, Kerrie Dougherty, David John and Simon Beecroft
Missing Adventures, ed. Rebecca Levene

Comics: 1 (YTD 22)
Dark Satanic Mills, by Marcus Sedgwick, Julian Sedgwick, John Higgins and Marc Olivent

~5,200 pages (YTD ~57,300)
11/20 (YTD 90/221) by non-male writers (Herrin, Ail, Jansson x 4, Brackett, Norton x 2, Rayner/Dougherty, Levene)
0/20 (YTD 23/221) by PoC

The best new read of these was About Time vol 8 (get it here); the best rereads were The Guermantes Way (get it here), Moominland Midwinter (get it here) and Finn Family Moomintroll (get it here). I was not impressed by Dark Satanic Mills (get it here).

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.

I spent most of the month on holiday in Northern Ireland. After the first day, the weather improved and we got around a fair bit. F and I visited Aras an Uachtaran.

Anne is a fan of Helen Waddell, and we visited both her grave and her family home, hosted by her great-great-niece.

And caught up with relatives; here I am with the youngest of my first cousins, and watching my godson on the beach.

I had thoughts about walls in Belfast, and on the way home we visited Wroxeter.

With the holiday, I read 29 books that month.

Non-fiction: 7 (YTD 37)
The Politics of Climate Change, by Anthony Giddens
The Life of Our Lord, by Charles Dickens
Huawei Stories: Pioneers, ed. Tian Tao and Yin Zhifeng
Wroxeter Roman City, by Roger H. White
Fair Trade, by Laura T. Reynolds, Douglas L. Murray and John Wilkinson
Women and Power, by Mary Beard
Huawei Stories: Explorers, ed. Tian Tao and Yin Zhifeng

Fiction (non-sf): 3 (YTD 22)
In the Shadow of Young Girls in Flower, by Marcel Proust
The Deer Hunter, by Eric Corder
Moon Tiger, by Penelope Lively

sf (non-Who): 12 (YTD 88)
High-Rise, by J. G. Ballard
“Ill Met in Lankhmar”, by Fritz Leiber
The Region Between, by Harlan Ellison
The Little Stranger, by Sarah Waters
The Way of Kings, by Brandon Sanderson
Anno Dracula – Dracula Cha Cha Cha, by Kim Newman
Missile Gap, by Charles Stross
Rare Unsigned Copy, by Simon Petrie
Welcome to Night Vale, by Joseph Fink and Jeffrey Cranor
The Laertian Gamble, by Robert Sheckley
Comet in Moominland, by Tove Jansson
Snow Crash, by Neal Stephenson

Doctor Who, etc: 6 (YTD 27)
Now We Are Six Hundred, by James Goss, illustrated by Russell T. Davies
Doctor Who Files 7: The Daleks, by Justin Richards
Doctor Who Files 8: The Cybermen, by Justin Richards
Doctor Who Files 12: The TARDIS, by Justin Richards
Time Lord, by Ian Marsh and Peter Darvill-Evans
Nobody’s Children, by Kate Orman, Jonathan Blum and Philip Purser-Hallard

Comics: 1 (YTD 21)
Amoras deel 3: Krimson, by Marc Legendre and Charel Cambré

~5,000 pages (YTD ~52,100)
6/29 (YTD 79/201) by non-male writers (Reynolds, Beard, Lively, Waters, Jansson, Orman – as fas as I know Tian Tao and Yin Zhifeng are men)
2/29 (YTD 23/201) by PoC (Tian/Yin x2)

Three very good ones here, one of which was a reread:

• Moon Tiger by Penelope Lively – get it here;
• Women & Power: A Manifesto by Mary Beard – get it here;
• Snow Crash (reread) by Neal Stephenson – get it here.

You can skip the novelisation of The Deer Hunter, but if curious you can get it here.

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.

The month started with a trip to Sofia, rounding off my work with the Bulgarian EU Presidency; the photographer who was part of our group took a nice set of pictures. I like this one of me.

I got to the Tolkien exhibition in Oxford as well:

And we watched the World Cup Final in France, staying with my sister in Burgundy. France won, with the enthusiastic support of locals. Sometimes you do your best with what you’ve got.

At the start of our summer holiday, F and I went to Comic Con in London where I met with a large number of Doctors.

And finally, our stay in Northern Ireland got off to a typical start.

I read 31 books that month.

Non-fiction: 3 (YTD 30)
The Complete Ice Age, by Brian M. Fagan
The Man Within My Head, by Pico Iyer
The Time Traveller’s Guide to Elizabethan England, by Ian Mortimer

Fiction non-sf): 3 (YTD 19)
The Way By Swann’s, by Marcel Proust
Fingersmith, by Sarah Waters
Maigret Loses His Temper, by Georges Simenon

Poetry: 3 (YTD 3)
The Æneid, by Virgil, translated by John Dryden
The Æneid, by Virgil, translated by Robert Fagles
The Æneid Book VI, by Virgil, translated by Seamus Heaney

sf (non-Who): 15 (YTD 76)
Robot Visions, by Isaac Asimov
Discount Armageddon, by Seanan McGuire
Your Code Name is Jonah, by Edward Packard
Newry Bridge, or Ireland in 1887 (Anonymous)
The Bear and the Nightingale, by Katherine Arden
Anno Mortis, by Rebecca Levene
“Slow Sculpture”, by Theodore Sturgeon
A Natural History of Dragons, by Marie Brennan
An Unkindness of Ghosts, by Rivers Solomon
Under the Pendulum Sun, by Jeannette Ng (extract)
Up Jim River, by Michael Flynn (did not finish)
Wounded Heart, by S.W. Baird
Aztec Century, by Christopher Evans
The Supernatural Enhancements, by Edgar Cantero
The Martian Inca, by Ian Watson

Doctor Who, etc: 3 (YTD 21)
Doctor Who Quiz Book of Dinosaurs, by Michael Holt
Wit, Wisdom and Timey-Wimey Stuff, by Cavan Scott and Mark Wright
The Two Jasons, by Dave Stone

Comics: 4 (YTD 20)
Weapons of Mass Diplomacy, by Abel Lanzac and Christophe Blain
Aliénor, la Légende noire, tome 5, by Arnaud Delalande, Simona Mogavino and Carlos Gomez
Aliénor, la Légende noire, tome 6, by Arnaud Delalande, Simona Mogavino and Carlos Gomez
The Red Virgin and the Vision of Utopia, by Bryan Talbot and Mary Talbot

~7,900 pages (YTD ~47,100)
11/31 (YTD 73/172) by non-male writers (Waters, McGuire, Arden, Levene, Brennan, Solomon, Ng, Baird, Mogavino x2, Talbot)
3/31 (YTD 21/172) by PoC (Iyer, Ng, Solomon)

Top books this month were:

• Fingersmith by Sarah Waters – get it here;
• Weapons of Mass Diplomacy, by “Abel Lanzac” (Antoine Baudry) – get it here;
• The Way by Swann’s, by Marcel Proust (reread) – get it here.

On the other hand I bounced off Up Jim River, by Michael Flynn; you can get it here.

Blogging still a bit slow, after a couple of weekends away; look forward to catching up this weekend.

This is the latest post in a series I started in late 2019, anticipating the twentieth anniversary of my bookblogging which will fall in 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.

Work trips to Dubrovnik, London, Paris, Berlin and Skopje this month. My Dubrovnik conference was enlivened by a Game of Thrones location walk:

Closer to home, I took B out to her neighbourhood just before her birthday:

On the last day of the month, an interesting conversation at the post office:

A nostalgic group shot from the Skopje trip (actually taken by T on the left):

Non-fiction: 2 (YTD 27)
Virgins, Weeders and Queens, by Twigs Way
Brexit and the Future of Ireland: Uniting Ireland & Its People in Peace & Prosperity, by Senator Mark Daly

Fiction non-sf): 2 (YTD 16)
Gemini, by Dorothy Dunnett
Ghana Must Go, by Taiye Selasi
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Theatre: 2 (YTD 3)
Everybody Comes to Rick’s, by Murray Burnett and Joan Alison
Le Mariage de Figaro, by Pierre-Augustin Caron de Beaumarchais

sf (non-Who): 12 (YTD 61)
The Collapsing Empire, by John Scalzi
Raven Stratagem, by Yoon Ha Lee
Penric’s Fox, by Lois McMaster Bujold
Stories of the Raksura vol. 2, by Martha Wells
Six Wakes, by Mur Lafferty
Introduction to the Stormlight Archive for Hugo Voters, by Brandon Sanderson
The Art of Starving, by Sam J. Miller
Dark Matter, by Blake Crouch
City of Stairs, by Robert Jackson Bennett
Politically Correct Bedtime Stories, by James Finn Garner
Moominvalley in November, by Tove Jansson
Heroine Complex, by Sarah Kuhn

Doctor Who, etc: 1 (YTD 18)
Old Friends, by Jonathan Clements, Marc Platt and Pete Kempshall

Comics: 1 (YTD 16)
Rose de Paris, by Gilles Schlesser and Eric Puech

~6,200 pages (YTD ~39,200)
9/20 (YTD 62/141) by non-male writers (Way, Dunnett, Selasi, Alison, Bujold, Wells, Lafferty, Jansson, Kuhn)
3/20 (YTD 18/141) by PoC (Selasi, Lee, Kuhn)
0/20 (YTD 6/141) reread

I gave no less than five of these top ranking for the month:

• Virgins, Weeders and Queens, by my old friend Twigs Way – get it here;
• Penric’s Fox, by Lois McMaster Bujold – get it here;
• Gemini, by Dorothy Dunnett – get it here;
• Six Wakes, by Mur Lafferty – get it here; and
• City of Stairs, by Robert Jackson Bennett – get it here.

On the other hand I was thoroughly unimpressed by Senator Mark Daly’s report on Brexit and the Future of Ireland.

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.

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.

We had a fantastic family trip to (North) Macedonia over Easter weekend:

There we saw the albino peacock of Sveti Naum.

It was a busy month. I also saw Gillian Anderson at FACTS in Gent:

I met Senator George Mitchell, the broker of the Nothern Ireland peace process, in Oxford:

Went to Albania again, with my colleague E:

And also went to Dublin for a Worldcon planning weekend, arriving on my birthday (oddly enough, I am doing exactly the same this coming weekend, but not arriving on my birthday which is in April).

I read 22 books that month.

Non-fiction: 1 (YTD 17)
The God Instinct, by Jesse Bering

Fiction (non-sf): 2 (YTD 13)
Mrs Miniver, by Jan Struther
Something Like Normal, by Trish Doller

sf (non-Who): 7 (YTD 35)
New York 2140, by Kim Stanley Robinson
La Belle Sauvage, by Philip Pullman
Spirit by Gwyneth Jones
The Unpleasant Profession of Jonathan Hoag, by Robert A. Heinlein
All Systems Red, by Martha Wells
Islandia, by Austen Tappan Wright
Binti: Home, by Nnedi Okorafor

Doctor Who, etc: 4 (YTD 14)
Doctor Who: The Official Annual 2010
Genius Loci, by Ben Aaronovitch
Rose, by Russell T. Davies
The Christmas Invasion, by Jenny T. Colgan

Comics: 8 (YTD 14)
The Case of Charles Dexter Ward, by H.P. Lovecraft and Ian Culbard
Torchwood: Rift War, by Ian Edgington et al.
Black Bolt, Volume 1: Hard Time, written by Saladin Ahmed, illustrated by Christian Ward, lettered by Clayton Cowles
Monstress, Volume 2: The Blood, written by Marjorie M. Liu, illustrated by Sana Takeda
Saga, Volume 7, written by Brian K. Vaughan, illustrated by Fiona Staples
Bitch Planet, Volume 2: President Bitch, written by Kelly Sue DeConnick, illustrated by Valentine De Landro and Taki Soma, colored by Kelly Fitzpatrick, lettered by Clayton Cowles
Paper Girls, Volume 3, written by Brian K. Vaughan, illustrated by Cliff Chiang, colored by Matthew Wilson, lettered by Jared Fletcher
My Favorite Thing is Monsters, written and illustrated by Emil Ferris

~6,000 pages (YTD ~25,900)
10/22 (YTD 37/94) by women (Struther, Doller, Jones, Wells, Okorafor, Colgan, Liu/Takeda, Staples, DeConinck, Ferris))
5/22 (YTD 11/94) by PoC (Okorafor, Ahmed, Liu/Takeda, Staples, Chiang)

I read three great comics that month: Saga vol 7, which you can get here, Paper Girls vol 3, which you can get here, and My Favourite Thing is Monsters, which you can get here.

This is the latest post in a series I started in late 2019, anticipating the twentieth anniversary of my bookblogging which will fall in 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.

As usual a busy month, with two work trips to London and one to Albania; I finished the month in Skopje, on my first ever non-work trip to North Macedonia, dining with my family and my friend Stevo Pendarovski (who is in a different job now). To my delight, when boarding my plane home from Tirana, I saw the planet Mercury for the first time in my life.

They also have public art in Tirana, as my colleague M and I discovered.

I read 25 books that month.

Non-fiction: 8 (YTD 16)
An Outline of the History of Pharmacy in Ireland, by William D. Moore M.B.
A History of the Universe in 100 Objects, by Steve Tribe and James Goss
Iain M. Banks, by Paul Kincaid
So, Anyway…, by John Cleese
The Road to Somewhere, by David Goodhart
After Europe, by Ivan Krastev
Free Radical, by Vince Cable
No Going Back to Moldova, by Anna Robertson

Fiction (non-sf): 3 (YTD 11)
The Bean Trees, by Barbara Kingsolver
Julian, by Gore Vidal
How Green Was My Valley, by Richard Llewellyn

sf (non-Who): 9 (YTD 28)
Provenance, by Ann Leckie
Planesrunner by Ian McDonald
Uncanny Valley, by Greg Egan
The Enclave, by Anne Charnock
“Time Considered as a Helix of Semi-Precious Stones”, by Samuel R. Delany
The Murders of Molly Southbourne, by Tade Thompson
Gulliver’s Travels, by Jonathan Swift
The Man Who Spoke Snakish, by Andrus Kivirähk
Jade City, by Fonda Lee

Doctor Who, etc: 4 (YTD 10)
Doctor Who Storybook 2009, ed. Clayton Hickman
Something Changed, ed. Simon Guerrier
The Missy Chronicles, by James Goss, Cavan Scott, Paul Magrs, Peter Anghelides, Jacqueline Rayner and Richard Dinnick
The Legends of River Song, by Jenny T. Colgan, Jacqueline Rayner, Steve Lyons, Guy Adams and Andrew Lane

Comics: 1 (YTD 6)
Apostata 07: Niets meer dan een wolk by Ken Broeders

~6,400 pages (YTD ~19,900)
7/25 (YTD 27/72) by women (Robertson, Kingsolver, Leckie, Charnock, Lee, Rayner, Colgan/Rayner)
3/25 (YTD 6/72) by PoC (Delany, Thompson, Lee)

I gave five books five stars on LibraryThing that month, so I will report them and not the ones I didn’t like. They were:

• Gulliver’s Travels (a re-read of course); get it here
• Doctor Who: A History Of The Universe In 100 Objects; get it here
• Provenance, by Ann Leckie; get it here
• The Enclave, by Anne Charnock; get it here
• After Europe, by Ivan Krastev; get it here.

This is the latest post in a series I started in late 2019, anticipating the twentieth anniversary of my bookblogging which will fall in 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.

I started the month with a trip to Istanbul to give a lecture on Brexit, and also had work trips to London and Sofia.

I read 21 books that month.

Non-fiction: 5 (YTD 8)
Europe Reset, by Richard Youngs
Who Is The Doctor, by Graeme Burk and Robert Smith?
A Preface to Paradise Lost, by C.S. Lewis
Mythology: Timeless Tales of Gods and Heroes, by Edith Hamilton (first 100 pages)
Seventeen Equations that Changed the World, by Ian Stewart

Fiction (non-sf): 2 (YTD 8)
Gone With The Wind, by Margaret Mitchell
Rebecca

sf (non-Who): 9 (YTD 19)
A Tangle Of Fates, by Leslie Ann Moore
The Universe Between, by Alan E Nourse
He, She and It, by Marge Piercy
The Sudden Appearance of Hope, by Claire North
The Uninvited, by Dorothy Macardle
Toast
Grand Canyon, by Vita Sackville-West
Dreams Before the Start of Time, by Anne Charnock
The Rift, by Nina Allan

Doctor Who, etc: 2 (YTD 6)
Parallel Lives, by Rebecca Levene, Stewart Sheargold, Dave Stone and Simon Guerrier
From Wildthyme with Love, by Paul Magrs

Comics: 3 (YTD 5)
Hoger dan de bergen en dieper dan de zee: kroniek van een migrant, by Laïla Koubaa and Laura Janssens
Four Doctors, by Paul Cornell and Neil Edwards
Outrageous Tales from the Old Testament, by Arthur Ranson, Donald Rooum, Dave Gibbons, Alan Moore, Hunt Emerson, Neil Gaiman, Mike Matthews, Julie Hollings, Carol Bennett, Peter Rigg and Dave McKean

~6,200 pages (YTD ~13,500)
13/21 (YTD 20/47) by women (Hamilton, Mitchell, du Maurier, Moore, Piercy, North, Macardle, Sackville-West, Charnock, Allan, Levene, Koubaa/Janssens, Hollings/Bennett)
2/21 (YTD 3/47) by PoC (Moore, Koubaa)

I’m going to be nice and just mention the three that I liked most here:

• Claire North’s The Sudden Appearance of Hope is typically inventive and fascinating; you can get it here.
• Richard Youngs’ Europe Reset: New Directions for the EU has some great analysis and ideas; you can get it here.
• Nina Allan’s The Rift takes family dynamics and parallel worlds and adds innovative narrative style and good story-telling; you can get it here.

This is the latest post in a series I started in late 2019, anticipating the twentieth anniversary of my bookblogging which will fall in 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.

December 2017 started with a trip to Amsterdam, where I found the apartment where Anne Frank and her family had lived before going into hiding.

I went to London twice, the second time for the office party with a James Bond theme:

I also had a day trip to Milan.

H joined us for Christmas, as so often.

I also answered the classic question, which lines of latitude and longitude pass through the most countries?

I had spent nights away from home in 20 places in 11 countries, and tansited another four in the course of the year.

I read 22 books that month:

Non-fiction: 8 (2017 total 57)
Guided by the Beauty of Their Weapons: Notes on Science Fiction and Culture in the Year of Angry Dogs, by Philip Sandifer
The Most Dangerous Book: The Battle for James Joyce’s Ulysses, by Kevin Birmingham
Alexander the Corrector: The Tormented Genius Whose Cruden’s Concordance Unwrote the Bible by Julia Keay
The World of Yesterday, by Stefan Zweig
A History of the Future: Prophets of Progress from H.G. Wells to Isaac Asimov, by Peter J. Bowler
Zola and his time; the history of his martial career in letters: With an account of his circle of friends, his remarkable enemies, cyclopean labors, public campaigns, trials and ultimate glorification by Matthew Josephson
Democracy and its Deficits: The path towards becoming European-style democracies in Georgia, Moldova and Ukraine, by Ghia Nodia with Denis Cenușă and Mikhail Minakov
The Story of English in 100 Words, by David Crystal

Fiction (non-sf): 3 (2017 total 26)
The Lies Of Fair Ladies, by Jonathan Gash
Men Against The Sea, by Charles Nordhoff and James Norman Hall
Pitcairn’s Island, by Charles Nordhoff and James Norman Hall
 

sf (non-Who): 3 (2017 total 68)
Everfair, by Nisi Shawl
Brave New Worlds: Dystopian Stories, ed. John Joseph Adams
The Power, by Naomi Alderman
  

Doctor Who, etc: 3 (2017 total 51)
Re: Collections, ed. Xanna Eve Chown
Fear Itself, by Nick Wallace
A Life in Pieces, by Dave Stone, Paul Sutton & Joseph Lidster
  

Comics 5 (2017 total 29)
Watchmen, by Alan Moore and Dave Gibbons
Aliénor: La Légende Noire, vol 3, by Arnaud Delalande and Simona Mogavino, art by Carlos Gomez
Het genootschap van Socrates by Yves Leclercq and Stéphanie Heurteau
The Autumnlands, Vol. 1: Tooth and Claw, by Kurt Busiek and Benjamin Dewey
Aliénor: La Légende Noire, vol 4, by Arnaud Delalande and Simona Mogavino, art by Carlos Gomez
    

6,900 pages (2017 total 60,500)
7/22 (2017 total 64/238) by women (Keay, Shawl, Alderman, Mogavino x 2, Heurteau)
1/22 (2017 total 17/238) by PoC (Shawl)

Top book of the month: Watchmen, by Alan Moore and Dave Gibbons (reread). Get it here.
Top new book of the month: The World of Yesterday, by Stefan Zweig. Get it here.
Nothing too awful.

2017 books roundup

Total books: 238, 11th highest of the years that I have counted.

Total page count: ~60,500, lowest of any year since 2005.

Diversity:
64/238, 27% by women, a bit below previous and subsequent years.
17/238, 7% by PoC, exceeded every years since.

Most books by a single author: Colin Brake and Leo, both with 5 (previous winners: Christopher Marlowe in 2016, Justin Richards in 2015 and 2014, Agatha Christie in 2013, Jonathan Gash in 2012, Arthur Conan Doyle in 2011, Ian Rankin in 2010, William Shakespeare in 2009 and 2008, Terrance Dicks in 2007, Ian Marter in 2006, Charles Stross in 2005).

Non-Whovian sff (68)

Back to the levels of pre-2014. (I was a Clarke Award judge in 2014-15, and then deliberately cast my sf reading net wider in 2016 as part of the anti-Puppy campaign.)

Best non-Who sff read in 2016: All The Birds In The Sky, by Charlie Jane Anders (review with other Hugo novels) – by a long way my top choice for the Hugos, a magical contemporary Bildungsroman.

Runner-up: The Underground Railroad, by Colson Whitehead (review with other non-Hugo novels)) – fascinating steampunk alternate history of slavery in America.

The one you might not heard of: The Deepest Sea, by Charles Barnitz (review) – much better than usual Celtic fantasy, marred however by a dodgy map.

Welcome rereads: The Illustrated Man (review), The Colour of Magic (review), Dune (review).

The one to skip: The Red Leaguers, by Shan F. Bullock (review) – Irish war of independence in 1904 goes wrong, flawed and unpleasant protagonist.

Non-fiction (57)

This was my highest non-fiction total since 2011, and my highest percentage for non-fiction since I started tallying categories separately in 2009. I think this was partly birthday presents, which were biased towards non-fiction; partly that non-fiction books have been moving to the top of my various piles; and partly a genuine shift in my own reading tastes.

Best non-fiction read in 2017: Common People: The History of an English Family, by Alison Light (review) – lovely micro-history of four lines of ancestry in the recent history of England.

Runner-up: Thinking Fast and Slow, by Daniel Kahneman (review)- great insight into how we think the way we do, and why we are wrong in what we think about it.

The one you might not heard of, if you’re not in the Dublin or Brussels bubbles: Brexit and Ireland: The Dangers, the Opportunities, and the Inside Story of the Irish Response, by Tony Connelly (review) – essential reading on both the behind the scenes diplomacy and the stakes for the country most affected by Brexit.

Welcome reread: In Xanadu (review)

The one to skip: 1434: The Year a Chinese Fleet Sailed to Italy and Ignited the Renaissance, by Gavin Menzies (review) – such a bad rewriting of history that I wondered what its purpose really was.

Doctor Who (and spinoff) fiction (51)

Picking up a bit from the dip of the last couple of years.

Best Who book read in 2016: The Pirate Planet, by Douglas Adams and James Goss (review) – Goss has ironed off the corners and made this a much smoother story, as usual a delight to read, and also includes bonus material on how Adams developed the plot.

Runner-up: Rip Tide, by Louise Cooper (review) – one of the good Telos novellas, taking the Eighth Doctor to a seaside resort to investigate mysterious goings on.

Worth flagging up for Whovians: Based On The Popular TV Serial, by Paul Smith (review) – a guide to the Target novelisations.

The ones you won’t have heard of: The three novels based on short-lived spin-off Class (review), by Guy Adams, A.K. Benedict and especially (again) James Goss.

Comics (29)

Best graphic story read in 2016: Antarès, by Leo – excellent futuristic yarn. I read it in the original French but it has been translated into English (1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6)

Runner-up: The Vision vol 1: Little Worse Than A Man, by Tom King and Gabriel Hernandez Walta (review) – I (somewhat reluctantly) really liked this story of an inhuman family trying to fit in.

Welcome reread: Watchmen (review).

The one you won’t have heard of: Re-#AnimateEurope: International Comics Competition 2017, ed. Hans H.Stein, by Jordana Globerman, Stefan “Schlorian” Haller, Štepánka Jislová, Noëlle Kröger, Magdalena Kaszuba, Davide Pascutti and Paul Rietzl (review) – nicely applying the medium of the graphic novel to the problems of Europe today.

Non-sfnal fiction (26)

A historic low for non-sf fiction reading, mainly I think because I had read almost all all the well-known books of that kind on my shelves, which were (and are) still heaving with unread sf and non-fiction.

Best non-sff fiction read in 2016: A Suitable Boy, by Vikram Seth (review) – brilliant huge story of India just after independence.

Runner-up: Children are Civilians Too, by Heinrich Böll (review) – gripping short stories from Germany of about the same period.

The one you might not heard of: Five Go On A Strategy Away Day, by Bruno Vincent (review) – quite a funny parody of the grownup Famous Five in competition with the Secret Seven.

Welcome reread: Robinson Crusoe (review).

The one to skip: The Angel Maker, by Stefan Brijs (review) – really horrible story set on the Belgian frontier with Germany.

Plays (5)

There were only five of these. The only one I’d really really like to see on the stage, having seen the film that was based on it, is Cavalcade, by Noël Coward (review including also the Oscar-winning film).

Poetry (2)

Just two. Catullus is better than Roald Dahl.

Book of the year

Common People: The History of an English Family, by Alison Light

Other Books of the Year:

2003 (2 months): The Separation, by Christopher Priest.
2004: The Lord of the Rings, by J.R.R. Tolkien (reread).
– Best new read: Samuel Pepys: The Unequalled Self, by Claire Tomalin
2005: The Island at the Centre of the World, by Russell Shorto
2006: Lost Lives: The stories of the men, women and children who died as a result of the Northern Ireland troubles, by David McKittrick, Seamus Kelters, Brian Feeney, Chris Thornton and David McVea
2007: Fun Home, by Alison Bechdel
2008: The Diary of a Young Girl: The Definitive Edition, by Anne Frank (reread)
– Best new read: Vanity Fair: A Novel without a Hero, by William Makepeace Thackeray
2009: Hamlet, by William Shakespeare (had seen it on stage previously)
– Best new read: Persepolis 2: the Story of a Return, by Marjane Satrapi (first volume just pipped by Samuel Pepys in 2004)
2010: The Bloody Sunday Report, by Lord Savile et al.
2011: The Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire, by Edward Gibbon (started in 2009!)
2012: The Tenant of Wildfell Hall, by Anne Brontë
2013: A Room of One’s Own, by Virginia Woolf
2014: Homage to Catalonia, by George Orwell
2015: collectively, the Arthur C. Clarke Award shortlist, in particular the winner, Station Eleven, by Emily St John Mandel. However I did not actually blog about these, being one of the judges at the time.
– Best book I actually blogged about: The Life and Death of Mary Wollstonecraft, by Claire Tomalin
2016: Alice in Sunderland, by Bryan Talbot
2017: See above
2018: Factfulness, by Hans Rosling
2019: Girl, Woman, Other, by Bernardine Evaristo
2020: From A Clear Blue Sky: Surviving the Mountbatten Bomb, by Timothy Knatchbull
2021: Carrying the Fire, by Michael Collins.

This is the latest post in a series I started in late 2019, anticipating the twentieth anniversary of my bookblogging which will fall in 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.

That month I travelled to Washington DC, Sofia in Bulgaria, and twice to London. I don’t seem to have taken a lot of photos; the vast majority were from a pleasant afternoon at the Udvar-Hazy Center of the National Air and Space Museum near Dulles airport.

More domestically, here’s a rainbow framing Leuven station.

I read 16 books that month.

Non-fiction: 4 (YTD 48)
Isaiah Berlin, by Michael Ignatieff
Washington, D.C.’s Vanishing Springs and Waterways, by Garnett P. Williams
Virginia Woolf, by Hermione Lee
Brexit and Ireland: The Dangers, the Opportunities, and the Inside Story of the Irish Response, by Tony Connelly

Fiction (non-sf): 4 (YTD 24)
A Man of Parts, by David Lodge
Dear Old Dead, by Jane Haddam
Wolf in White Van, by John Darnielle
Mutiny on the Bounty, by Charles Nordhoff and James Norman Hall

sf (non-Who): 5 (YTD 69)
The Deepest Sea, by Charles Barnitz
Charlie and the Chocolate Factory, by Roald Dahl
The Knight of the Swords, by Michael Moorcock
The Queen of the Swords, by Michael Moorcock
The King of the Swords, by Michael Moorcock

Doctor Who, etc: 3 (YTD 48)
Short Trips: Indefinable Magic, ed. Neil Corry
A Life Worth Living ed. Simon Guerrier
Doctor Who: The American Adventures, by Justin Richards

4,900 pages (YTD 53,600)
2/16 (YTD 57/214) by women (Lee, Haddam)
0/16 (YTD 16/214) by PoC

It was great to return to Charlie and the Chocolate Factory, which you can get here, and Tony Connelly’s masterful account of Brexit is going to be a set text for decades; you can get it here. Wolf in White Van was pretty bad, but you can get it here.

This is the latest post in a series I started in late 2019, anticipating the twentieth anniversary of my bookblogging which will fall in 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.

The highlight of the month was my first trip to South Africa, the farthest south that I have been in my life, for a Liberal International meeting.

The highlight of that was probably the tour of the Constitution Hill complex, including the Constitutional Court and the prison where both Mandela and Gandhi were imprisoned at different times.

Rigorous analysis of social media found that I was the 37th most influential of the top 40 EU twitterers.

Even more important, I got my photo taken with Jenna Coleman at FACTS in Gent.

I read 21 books that month.

Non-fiction: 6 (YTD 44)
What Made Now In Northern Ireland, ed. Maurna Crozier
1434: The Year a Chinese Fleet Sailed to Italy and Ignited the Renaissance, by Gavin Menzies (not finished) (tempted to put this in the fiction category)
Memoir of the Queen of Etruria, Written by Herself / an Authentic Narrative of the Seizure and Removal of Pope Pius VII, with Genuine Memoirs of His Journey Written by One of His Attendants
An Assessment of the Economic Impact of Brexit on the EU27, by Michael Emerson, Matthias Busse, Mattia Di Salvo, Daniel Gros, and Jacques Pelkmans
Running Through Corridors 2: Rob and Toby’s Marathon Watch of Doctor Who, the 70s, by Toby Hadoke and Robert Shearman
A Crocodile in the Fernery: An A-Z of Animals in the Garden, by Twigs Way

Poetry: 1 (YTD 2)
From Bed to Bed, by Catullus, trans. James Michie

Fiction (non-sf): 5 (YTD 20)
All Quiet on the Western Front, by Erich Maria Remarque
Cimarron, by Edna Ferber
Grand Hotel, by Vicki Baum
Caprice and Rondo, by Dorothy Dunnett
Cavalcade, by Noël Coward (theatre play)

sf (non-Who): 4 (YTD 64)
The Dancers at the End of Time, by Michael Moorcock (not finished)
The Last Castle, by Jack Vance
The Past Through Tomorrow, by Robert A. Heinlein
Thorns, by Robert Silverberg

Doctor Who, etc: 3 (YTD 45)
Short Trips: Christmas Around the World, by Xanna Eve Chown
The Big Hunt, by Lance Parkin
Plague City, by Jonathan Morris

Comics: 2 (YTD 23)
Antarès, Épisode 5, by Leo
Antarès, Épisode 6, by Leo

4,700 pages (YTD 48,700)
7/21 (YTD 55/198) by women (Crozier, Queen Maria Luisa of Etruria, Way, Ferber, Baum, Dunnett, Chown)
0/21 (YTD 16/198) by PoC

Several of these were very good, specifically:

• What Made Now In Northern Ireland, ed. Maurna Crozier (get it here)
• An Assessment of the Economic Impact of Brexit on the EU27, by Michael Emerson, Matthias Busse, Mattia Di Salvo, Daniel Gros, and Jacques Pelkmans (get it here for free)
• From Bed to Bed, by Catullus, trans. James Michie (get it here)
• Caprice and Rondo, by Dorothy Dunnett (get it here)
• Thorns, by Robert Silverberg (get it here)

On the other hand, 1434: The Year a Chinese Fleet Sailed to Italy and Ignited the Renaissance, by Gavin Menzies, is absolute tosh. You can get it here but I wouldn’t bother if I were you.

This is the latest post in a series I started in late 2019, anticipating the twentieth anniversary of my bookblogging which will fall in 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.

I went to Sofia once and London twice that month, the second London trip combining with a conference at Christ Church in Oxford, where I met Sir Tim Berners Lee:

and finished with a formal dinner at Blenheim Palace.

Back in London the next day, I went to the Pink Floyd exhibition at the Victoria and Albert Museum.

My other cultural expedition was to Leuven for a really great historical tour.

This was also the month that I started my sequence of Oscar-winning films with Wings.

I read 15 books that month.

Non-fiction: 4 (YTD 38)
Thinking, Fast and Slow, by Daniel Kahneman
A Short Guide to Irish Science Fiction, by Jack Fennell
Peoplewatching, by Desmond Morris
Space Helmet for a Cow, vol 2, by Paul Kirkley

sf (non-Who): 4 (YTD 60)
Synners, by Pat Cadigan
Press Cuttings, by George Bernard Shaw
The Red Leaguers, by Shan F. Bullock
The Famished Road, by Ben Okri

Doctor Who, etc: 3 (YTD 42)
How The Doctor Changed My Life, ed. Simon Guerrier
Life During Wartime, ed. Paul Cornell
Diamond Dogs, by Mike Tucker

Comics: 4 (YTD 21)
Antarès, Épisode 2, by Leo
Onthuld, by Kristof Spaey and Bart Vaessens
Antarès, Épisode 3, by Leo
Antarès, Épisode 4, by Leo

3,600 pages (YTD 44,000)
1/15 (YTD 48/178) by women (Cadigan)
1/15 (YTD 16/178) by PoC (Okri)

The best of these by a long way was Daniel Kahnemann’s Thinking, Fast and Slow; you can get it here. The worst is the near-future (of 1904) Irish independence novel The Red Leaguers, but you can get it here.

This is the latest post in a series I started in late 2019, anticipating the twentieth anniversary of my bookblogging which will fall in 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.

We had two lovely family trips, one to south-east Belgium for the National Day, where we took in Bouillon, Sedan and the caves of Han-sur-Lesse:

Though some of the cuisine was less healthy:

And another trip to London, for F’s 18th birthday, where I don’t seem to have taken many pictures apart from this one of the Tower.

I wrote some important pieces that month, including one on the Hugo artist categories whcih I hope will come to fruition soon, my advice for new Doctor Who viewers, a piece for Slugger on Brexit, and a piece for EurActiv which was shamelessly ripped off by the Daily Express.

I read 27 books that month, but a lot of them were rather short, and I see that I did not get around to blogging them until September.

Non-fiction: 5 (YTD 30)
1688: A Global History, by John E. Wills
New Europe, by Michael Palin
The Etymologicon, by Mark Forsyth
Austerity Britain, 1945-1951 by David Kynaston
Common People: The History of an English Family, by Alison Light

Fiction (non-sf): 4 (YTD 13)
Robinson Crusoe, by Daniel Defoe
Lives of Girls and Women, by Alice Munro
The Angel Maker, by Stefan Brijs
The Double Deckers, by Glyn Jones

sf (non-Who): 1 (YTD 51)
Sultana’s Dream, by Begum Rokeya Sakhawat Hossain

Doctor Who, etc: 15 (YTD 33)
Short Trips: The Quality of Leadership, ed. Keith R.A. DeCandido
Professor Bernice Summerfield and the Glass Prison, by Jacqueline Rayner
Decide Your Destiny: The Spaceship Graveyard, by Colin Brake
Decide Your Destiny: Alien Arena, by Richard Dungworth
Decide Your Destiny: The Time Crocodile, by Colin Brake
Decide Your Destiny: The Corinthian Project, by Davey Moore
Decide Your Destiny: The Crystal Snare, by Richard Dungworth
Decide Your Destiny: War of the Robots, by Trevor Baxendale
Decide Your Destiny: Dark Planet, by Davey Moore
Decide Your Destiny: The Haunted Wagon Train, by Colin Brake
Decide Your Destiny: Lost Luggage, by Colin Brake
Decide Your Destiny: Second Skin, by Richard Dungworth
Decide Your Destiny: The Dragon King, by Trevor Baxendale
Decide Your Destiny: The Horror of Howling Hill, by Jonathan Green
Decide Your Destiny: The Coldest War, by Colin Brake

Comics: 2 (YTD 14)
It’s Dark In London, ed. Oscar Zarate
Re-#AnimateEurope: International Comics Competition 2017, ed. Hans H.Stein, by Jordana Globerman, Stefan “Schlorian” Haller, Štepánka Jislová, Noëlle Kröger, Magdalena Kaszuba, Davide Pascutti and Paul Rietzl

5,500 pages (YTD 35,900)
5/27 (YTD 43/142) by women (Light, Munro, Hossain, Rayner, Globerman/Jislová/Kröger/Kaszuba)
1/27 (YTD 14/142) by PoC (Hossain)

The best of these were the two on British history, Common People, which you can get here, and Austerity Britain, which you can get here. The worst was Angel Maker, which I found repulsive, but you can get it here.

This is the latest post in a series I started in late 2019, anticipating the twentieth anniversary of my bookblogging which will fall in 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.

The month of the 2017 UK general election, where I provided BBC commentary again. The election of course left Theresa May dependent on the DUP for her parliamentary majority.

I also had two work trips to London, one of which had sidebars to Coventry for a client meeting and Canterbury for a conference – where I also caught up with my oldest first cousin, R.

I read 27 books that month.

Non-fiction: 9 (YTD 25)
Belgian solutions 1, by David Helbich
The Case for Impeachment, by Allan J. Lichtman
Great Again: How to Fix Our Crippled America, by Donald J. Trump
The Broken Road, by Patrick Leigh Fermor
Patrick Leigh Fermor: An Adventure, by Artemis Cooper
Europe In The Sixteenth Century by H. G. Koenigsberger and George L. Mosse
Walking the Woods and the Water, by Nick Hunt
Sapiens: A Brief History of Humanity, by Yuval Noah Harari
In Xanadu, by William Dalrymple

sf (non-Who): 10 (YTD 50)
The Voyage of the Argo: The Argonautica of Gaius Valerius Flaccus, translated by David R. Slavitt
Warriors ed. George R. R. Martin and Gardner Dozois
Annihilation, by Jeff VanderMeer
Authority, by Jeff VanderMeer
Harry Potter and the Cursed Child by J. K. Rowling
Acceptance, by Jeff VenderMeer
Dune, by Frank Herbert
De piraten van de Zilveren Kattenklauw by “Geronimo Stilton” [Elisabetta Dami]
HWJN by Ibraheem Abbas
A Woman of the Iron People, by Eleanor Arnason

Doctor Who, etc: 5 (YTD 18)
Short Trips: Defining Patterns, ed. Ian Farrington
The Infernal Nexus, by Dave Stone
Joyride, by Guy Adams
The Stone House, by A.K. Benedict
What She Does Next Will Astound You, by James Goss

Comics: 3 (YTD 12)
Professor Bell 1: De Mexicaan met twee hoofden by Joann Sfar
Professor Bell 2: De Poppen van Jerusalem by Joann Sfar
Marzi: A memoir, by Marzena Sowa

7,300 pages (YTD 30,400)
6/27 (YTD 38/115) by women (Cooper, Rowling, “Stilton”, Arnason, Benedict, Sowa)
1/27 (YTD 13/115) by PoC (Abbas)

Great to reread In Xanadu, which you can get here, and to read for the first time both A Woman of the Iron People, which you can get here, and Artemis Cooper’s bio of Patrick Leigh Fermour, which you can get here. Donald Trump’s Great Again is as awful as I expected, but you can get it here.

This is the latest post in a series I started in late 2019, anticipating the twentieth anniversary of my bookblogging which will fall in 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.

I started the month in Loughbrickland but immediately travelled to London for the third leg of my 50th birthday, in The Sun Tavern.

Later in the month I went to Strasbourg…

…Andorra, with its public sculptures by Dali…

…and Berlin, where I didn’t take any photos. But back in Brussels, I paid a visit to the site of the 1927 Solvay conference, beside the European parliament.

By the end of the month I was girding my loins to go to Belfast again for yet more election commentary.

A good month for reading, aided by some long flights and other journeys, and a couple of sunny weekends of sitting in the garden.

Non-fiction: 4 (YTD 16)
Descartes’ Clock, by Gary Powell
Broederschap: Pleidooi voor verbondenheid / Fraternité: Retisser nos liens, by Frans Timmermans
The Innocent Man by John Grisham
Katherine Howard: The Tragic Story of Henry VIII’s Fifth Queen, by Josephine Wilkinson

Fiction (non-sf): 4 (YTD 9)
The Parrot’s Theorem, by Denis Guedj
A Suitable Boy, by Vikram Seth
Every Step You Take, by Maureen O’Brien
A Motif of Seasons, by Edward Glover

sf (non-Who): 14 (YTD 40)
The Obelisk Gate, by N.K. Jemisin
All The Birds In The Sky, by Charlie Jane Anders
A Taste of Honey, by Kai Ashante Wilson
The Dream Quest of Vellitt Boe, by Kij Johnson
The Ballad of Black Tom, by Victor LaValle
This Census-Taker, by China Miéville
Lavondyss, by Robert Holdstock
The Jewel and her Lapidary, by Fran Wilde
The Winter Long, by Seanan McGuire
The Stormcaller by Tom Lloyd (did not finish)
Argonautica by Valerius Flaccus, translated by J.R. Mozley
An Equation of Almost Infinite Complexity, by J. Mulrooney
Everything Belongs to the Future, by Laurie Penny
Gentleman Jole and the Red Queen, by Lois McMaster Bujold

Doctor Who, etc: 3 (YTD 13)
Short Trips: Ghosts of Christmas, ed. Cavan Scott and Mark Wright
The Dalek Factor, by Simon Clark
The Squire’s Crystal, by Jacqueline Rayner

Comics: 3 (YTD 9)
Butterscotch, by Milo Manara
Ms. Marvel Volume 5: Super Famous, by G. Willow Wilson and Takeshi Miyazawa
Saga, vol 6, by Fiona Staples and Brian K. Vaughan

8,500 pages (YTD 23,100)
12/28 (YTD 32/80) by women (Wilkinson, O’Brien, Jemisin, Anders, Johnson, Wilde, Maguire, Penny, Bujold, Rayner, GW Wilson, Staples)
7/28 (YTD 12/88) by PoC (Seth, Jemisin, KA Wilson, LaValle, Miyazawa, Staples)

The best of these were A Suitable Boy (you can get it here), All the Birds in the Sky (you can get it here) and The Dream-Quest of Vellitt Boe (you can get it here). The worst was The Stormcaller (you can get it here).

This is the latest post in a series I started in late 2019, anticipating the twentieth anniversary of my bookblogging which will fall in 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.

I started the month in Helsinki, filming the Hugo ballot announcement, which was a thing of beauty, sadly now lost from the internets. I was one of a crew of four who spent the whole day running around the city, finishing in the cemetery.

I also went to Eastercon, where I was caught on a panel with Dave McCarty talking about Hugo administration.

And the month finished with my 50th birthday.

I had a great party on the day itself in Brussels:

And another in Loughbrickland on the last day of the month, jointly with my aunt, who turned 60 the same week.

Starting to get back into my groove, I read 15 books that month.

Non-fiction: 3 (YTD 12)
Traveler of Worlds: Conversations with Robert Silverberg by Robert Silverberg and Alvaro Zinos-Amaro
The View from the Cheap Seats, by Neil Gaiman
Words are My Matter, by Ursula K. Le Guin

Fiction (non-sf): 1 (YTD 5)
The Habit of Loving by Doris Lessing

sf (non-Who): 8 (YTD 26)
A Closed and Common Orbit, by Becky Chambers
Pounded In The Butt By My Second Hugo Award Nomination, by Chuck Tingle
The Arrival of Missives, by Aliya Whiteley
Daughter of Eden, by Chris Beckett
Europe in Winter, by Dave Hutchinson
Ninefox Gambit, by Yoon Ha Lee
Too Like the Lightning, by Ada Palmer
Death’s End, by Cixin Liu

Doctor Who, etc: 2 (YTD 10)
The Cabinet of Light, by Daniel O’Mahony
The Gods of the Underworld, by Stephen Cole

Comics: 2 (YTD 6)
The Vision vol 1: Little Worse Than A Man, by Tom King and Gabriel Hernandez Walta
Lars (Anders vol 1), by Kristof Spaey

4,500 pages (YTD 14,600)
5/15 (YTD 20/60) by women (Le Guin, Lessing, Chambers, Whitely, Palmer)
2/15 (YTD 5/60) by PoC (Lee, Liu)

Of these, I enjoyed Words are my Matter the most (and was delighted when it won the Hugo in Helsinki) and Too Like the Lightning least. You can get them here and here.

This is the latest post in a series I started in late 2019, anticipating the twentieth anniversary of my bookblogging which will fall in 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.

I started March 2017 in Northern Ireland for the Assembly election, finished the month in Helsinki for Hugo preparation and went to London twice in between for work. Here’s the first part of the election show:

And before-and-after photos with my comrade Mark Devemport.

I managed very little reading in March 2017, a combination of the Northern Ireland election and the deadline for Hugo nominations in my first time round as Hugo administrator.

Non-fiction: 2 (YTD 9)
The Intimate Adventures Of A London Call Girl, by Belle de Jour; you can get it here
The Princess Diarist, by Carrie Fisher; you can get it here

sf (non-Who): 1 (YTD 18)
Alien Stripper Boned From Behind By The T-Rex, by Stix Hiscock; you can get it here

Doctor Who, etc: 1 (YTD 8)
Short Trips: Snapshots, ed. Joseph Lidster; you can get it here (for a price)

Comics: 1 (YTD 5)
Black Panther Vol. 1: A Nation Under Our Feet, by Ta-Nehisi Coates and Brian Stelfreeze; you can get it here

1,000 pages (TYD 10,100)
3/5 (YTD 15/45) by women (“Belle de Jour”, Fisher, “Stix Hiscock”)
1/5 (YTD 3/45) by PoC (Coates/Stelfreeze)

With only five books, it would be invidious to choose a best and worst of the month, so I won’t.

This is the latest post in a series I started in late 2019, anticipating the twentieth anniversary of my bookblogging which will fall in 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.

Unusually, no trip to London this month; but I compensated with an epic trip to Albania in which I discovered the bunker museum in Tirana:

and also the fortress at Durres.

I was there for a conference on a topic where I am not really an expert.

At the end of the month I was in Belfast for the early Assembly election.

Hugo nominations were taking up a lot of my reading time, but I still read 12 books that month.

Non-fiction: 2 (YTD 7)
THEN: Science Fiction Fandom in the U.K., 1930-1980, by Rob Hansen
Based On The Popular TV Serial, by Paul Smith

Fiction (non-sf): 1 (YTD 4)
To Lie with Lions, by Dorothy Dunnett

sf (non-Who): 6 (YTD 17)
Broken Homes, by Ben Aaronovitch
The Raven and the Reindeer, by T. Kingfisher [Ursula Vernon]
The Wild Robot, by Peter Brown (did not finish)
Azanian Bridges, by Nick Wood
The Fell Walker’s Guide To Eternity by Andy Carling
Occupy Me, by Tricia Sullivan

Doctor Who, etc: 3 (YTD 7)
Short Trips: Time Signature, ed. Simon Guerrier
The Eye of the Tyger, by Paul McAuley
Bernice Summerfield and the Doomsday Manuscript, by Justin Richards

Comics: 1 (YTD 4)
My Daily Life Comics by Renée Rienties

2,800 pages (TYD 9,100)
4/13 (YTD 12/40) by women (Dunnett, Kingfisher/Vernon, Sullivan, Rienties)
0/13 (YTD 2/40) by PoC

The best of these was The Raven and the Reindeer, which you can get here, and I also very much enjoyed To Lie With Lions, which you can get here, though I don’t think it would be a good starting point for Dunnett’s Niccolo series; the worst was The Wild Robot, which you can get here.

This is the latest post in a series I started in late 2019, anticipating the twentieth anniversary of my bookblogging which will fall in 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.

The year started with my first experience of opening Hugo voting – always a white-knuckle experience, even though I’ve done it four times since. My first trip of the year was to London where I went to a lovely Moomin exhibition in the South Bank Centre, along with my newest relative and her parents.

Back home in Northern Ireland, the Executive collapsed and new Assembly elections were called after less than a year.

I read 27 books that month.

Non-fiction: 5
Samuel Pepys: Plague, Fire, Revolution, ed. Margarette Lincoln
The Horse, the Wheel, and Language: How Bronze-Age Riders from the Eurasian Steppes Shaped the Modern World, by David W. Anthony
Empires of the Word: A Language History of the World, by Nicholas Ostler
The Other Islam, by Stephen Schwartz
The Geek Feminist Revolution, by Kameron Hurley

Poetry: 1
Rhyme Stew, by Roald Dahl

Fiction (non-sf): 3
See How Much I Love You, by Luis Leante
Five Go On A Strategy Away Day, by Bruno Vincent
Five on Brexit Island , by Bruno Vincent

sf (non-Who): 11
A Fall of Stardust, by Neil Gaiman and Charles Vess
“Repent, Harlequin!” Said the Ticktockman, by Harlan Ellison
The Illustrated Man, by Ray Bradbury
The Palace of Dreams, by Ismail Kadare
Every Heart A Doorway, by Seanan McGuire
Penric and the Shaman, by Lois McMaster Bujold
Penric’s Mission, by Lois McMaster Bujold
The Colour Of Magic, by Terry Pratchett
The Underground Railroad, by Colson Whitehead
The Humans, by Matt Haig
The Rapture of the Nerds, by Cory Doctorow and Charles Stross

Doctor Who, etc: 4
Short Trips: Farewells, ed. Jacqueline Rayner
Doctor Who: The Pirate Planet, by Douglas Adams and James Goss
Rip Tide, by Louise Cooper
The Dead Men Diaries, ed. Paul Cornell

Comics: 3
Jeremiah: Een Geweer in het Water, by Hermann
Monstress Volume 1: Awakening, by Marjorie Liu and Sana Takeda
V for Vendetta, by Alan Moore and David Lloyd

6,300 pages
8/27 by women (Lincoln, Hurley, McGuire, Bujoldx2, Rayner, Cooper, Liu/Takeda)
2/27 by PoC (Whitehead, Liu/Takeda)

The best of these was The Underground Railroad, now a TV series which I have not seen; you can get it here. The worst was my sample of long-running Flemish post-apocalyptic comic series Jeremiah.

This is the latest post in a series I started in late 2019, anticipating the twentieth anniversary of my bookblogging which will fall in 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.

I started the month with a trip to SMOFCon in Chicago (flying out via Stockholm and back via Copenhagen), in the wake of which I saw the stage show of Hamilton, and then before Christmas went to Belfast and Frankfurt, with a side order of Strasbourg for the final European Parliament plenary of the year. My boss bought us all festive T-shirts.

F and I finished the year by visiting the Tintin exhibition at Trainworld.

2016 was and I think remains my record year for travelling, overnighting in 29 places away from home, in 22 different countries.

Books read this month:

Non-fiction: 4 (2016 total 37/212, 17%)
Alexander the Great: The Hunt for a New Past, by Paul Cartledge
Tolstoy, by Henri Troyat
Sex at Dawn: How We Mate, Why We Stray, and What It Means for Modern Relationships, by Christopher Ryan and Cacilda Jethà
What Makes This Book So Great: Re-Reading the Classics of Fantasy and SF, by Jo Walton

Fiction (non-sf): 2 (2016 total 28/212, 13%)
The Listener, by Tove Jansson
The Case of the Missing Books, by Ian Sansom

sf (non-Who): 6 (2016 total 80/212, 38%)
Kings of the North, by Cecelia Holland
AfroSF: Science Fiction by African Writers, ed. Ivor Hartmann
Angels & Visitations: A Miscellany, by Neil Gaiman
The Star Rover, by Jack London
Last Exit to Babylon – Volume 4: The Collected Stories of Roger Zelazny
Christmas Days, by Jeanette Winterson

Doctor Who, etc: 3 (2016 total 39/212, 18%)
Short Trips: The History of Christmas, ed. Simon Guerrier
Bullet Time, by David A. McIntee
Twilight of the Gods, by Mark Clapham and John de Burgh Miller

Comics: 4 (2016 total 27/212, 13%)
Apostata, Bundel I, by Ken Broeders
Apostata, Bundel II, by Ken Broeders
Apostata, Bundel III, by Ken Broeders
Brain Fetish, by Kinga Korska

Page count for December: 6200 (2016 total 62,300)
Books by women in December: 6/19 (Jethà, Walton, Jansson, Holland, Winterson, Korska), 2016 total 65/212
Books by PoC in December: 2/19 (Cacilda Jethà, the AfroSF anthology), total 14/212

Top book of the month: Christmas Days, by Jeanette Winterson; get it here

Worst book of the month: The Case of the Missing Books, by Ian Sansom; get it here

2016 books roundup

Total books: 212, the lowest since 2009, surpassed every year since.

Total page count: ~62,300, fifth lowest of the years I have been counting, lower than any year since except 2017.

Diversity:
65 (31%) by women, the highest % to date, though exceeded several times since.
14 (7%) by PoC, exceeded most years since.

Most books by a single author: Christopher Marlowe (previous winners: Justin Richards in 2015 and 2014, Agatha Christie in 2013, Jonathan Gash in 2012, Arthur Conan Doyle in 2011, Ian Rankin in 2010, William Shakespeare in 2009 and 2008, Terrance Dicks in 2007, Ian Marter in 2006, Charles Stross in 2005)

Non-Whovian sff (80)

Best non-Who sff read in 2016: Cuckoo Song, by Frances Hardinge – creepy doppleganger story set in England just after the first world war; get it here.

Runner-up: Wylding Hall, by Elizabeth Hand – I never wrote this up properly, but it’s an excellent fantasy/horror story, again set in England; get it here.

Welcome re-reads: Watership Down, by Richard Adams – get it here; the Alice books by Lewis Carroll – get them here.

The one you might not heard of: Time Bangers #1: One Does Not Simply Walk Into Tudor, by Luna Teague and Ivery Kirk – OK, this is not exactly great art, but the authors clearly had a lot of fun writing it; get it here.

The one to avoid: Nethereal, by Brian Niemeier; get it here.

Doctor Who (and spinoff) fiction (39)

Best Who book read in 2016: The Legends of Ashildr, by James Goss, David Llewellyn, Jenny T. Colgan & Justin Richards – all good stories, some really good; get it here.

Runner-up: The Mike Tucker (and Robert Perry) Seventh Doctor/Ace novels, Illegal Alien, Prime Time and Loving the Alien – great examples of respect for continuity and also bringing more; get them here, here and here.

Worth flagging up for Whovians: Drama and Delight: The Life of Verity Lambert, by Richard Marson – excellent biography of the show’s first producer; get it here.

The one to avoid: Heritage, by Dale Smith; get it here.

Non-fiction (37)

Best non-fiction read in 2016: Between the world and me, by Ta-Nehisi Coates -tremendous (and short) polemic about racism and violence in the United States; get it here.

Runner-up: SPQR, by Mary Beard – great account of the history of Rome; get it here.

The one you might not heard of: Baptism of Fire: The Birth of the Modern British Fantastic in World War I, ed. Janet Brennan Croft – fascinating essays on at the influence of the global conflict on the origins of the fantasy genre; get it here.

The one to really avoid: SJWs Always Lie: Taking Down the Thought Police, by Vox Day.

Non-sfnal fiction (28)

Best non-sff fiction read in 2016: Alice Munro’s short story collections, The Love of a Good Woman, Selected Stories, and The Beggar Maid: Stories of Flo and Rose – all fantastic vignettes of Canada; get them here, here and here.

Runner-up: Nemesis, by Philip Roth – the effects of polio on middle-class America in the 1950s; get it here.

Welcome rereads: A Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man, by James Joyce – get it here; Walking on Glass, by Iain Banks – get it here; The Count of Monte Cristo, by Alexandre Dumas – get it here.

The one you might not heard of: Dark Horse, by Fletcher Knebel – the Republican candidate dies just before the Presidential election; his swiftly conscripted replacement is an obscure New Jersey politician who starts shaking the political system; get it here.

The one to avoid: The Case of the Missing Books, by Ian Sansom; get it here

Comics (27)

Best graphic story read in 2016: Alice in Sunderland, by Bryan Talbot – brilliant exploration of the town and its links to literature in general and Alice in particular; get it here.

Runner-up: The Sandman: Overture, by Neil Gaiman, J.H. Williams III, Dave Stewart, Todd Klein – very satisfying prequel/sequel to the classic story, which won the Hugo; get it here.

The one you might not have heard of: Toch Een Geluk, by Barbara Stok – fun Dutch comics writer, sadly not translated into English yet; get it here.

The one to avoid: Chooz, by Santi-Bucquoy.

Plays

One is slightly comparing chalk and cheese here. I was lucky enough to see Hamilton in Chicago this month, but had also read the Hamiltome which has loads of information and is a must-have for any fan; get it here.

However I also read the complete Christopher Marlowe, and particularly enjoyed Edward II and The Jew of Malta; get it here.

Worst books of the year

To be found on the Best Related Work ballot for the Hugo Awards.

Book of the year

Alice in Sunderland, by Bryan Talbot

Other Books of the Year:

2003 (2 months): The Separation, by Christopher Priest.
2004: The Lord of the Rings, by J.R.R. Tolkien (reread).
– Best new read: Samuel Pepys: The Unequalled Self, by Claire Tomalin
2005: The Island at the Centre of the World, by Russell Shorto
2006: Lost Lives: The stories of the men, women and children who died as a result of the Northern Ireland troubles, by David McKittrick, Seamus Kelters, Brian Feeney, Chris Thornton and David McVea
2007: Fun Home, by Alison Bechdel
2008: The Diary of a Young Girl: The Definitive Edition, by Anne Frank (reread)
– Best new read: Vanity Fair: A Novel without a Hero, by William Makepeace Thackeray
2009: Hamlet, by William Shakespeare (had seen it on stage previously)
– Best new read: Persepolis 2: the Story of a Return, by Marjane Satrapi (first volume just pipped by Samuel Pepys in 2004)
2010: The Bloody Sunday Report, by Lord Savile et al.
2011: The Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire, by Edward Gibbon (started in 2009!)
2012: The Tenant of Wildfell Hall, by Anne Brontë
2013: A Room of One’s Own, by Virginia Woolf
2014: Homage to Catalonia, by George Orwell
2015: collectively, the Arthur C. Clarke Award shortlist, in particular the winner, Station Eleven, by Emily St John Mandel. However I did not actually blog about these, being one of the judges at the time.
– Best book I actually blogged about: The Life and Death of Mary Wollstonecraft, by Claire Tomalin
2016: See above
2017: Common People: The History of an English Family, by Alison Light
2018: Factfulness, by Hans Rosling
2019: Girl, Woman, Other, by Bernardine Evaristo
2020: From A Clear Blue Sky: Surviving the Mountbatten Bomb, by Timothy Knatchbull
2021: Carrying the Fire, by Michael Collins.

This is the latest post in a series I started in late 2019, anticipating the twentieth anniversary of my bookblogging which will fall in 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.

We spent the first half of the month in Loughbrickland as usual, and saw the Red Arrows fly over Tyrella Beach:

We met the Tandragee Man.

My cousin L asked me to be godfather to her baby E, and I accepted.

Taking a winding way back to Belgium, we encountered dead King John, live Chris Priest and Nina Allan, and Stone’enge.

I read 26 books that month.

Non-fiction: 2 (YTD 31)
Drama and Delight: The Life of Verity Lambert, by Richard Marson
Ghastly Beyond Belief, eds. Neil Gaiman and Kim Newman

Fiction (non-sf): 1 (YTD 20)
The Beggar Maid, by Alice Munro

Play scripts: 7
Dido, Queen of Carthage, by Christopher Marlowe and Thomas Nashe
The First Part of Tamburlaine the Great, by Christopher Marlowe
The Second Part of Tamburlaine the Great, by Christopher Marlowe
The Tragical History of Doctor Faustus, by Christopher Marlowe
The Jew of Malta, by Christopher Marlowe
Edward the Second, by Christopher Marlowe
The Massacre At Paris, by Christopher Marlowe

sf (non-Who): 11 (YTD 67)
The Host, by Peter Emshwiller
Merchanter’s Luck, by C.J. Cherryh
The Last Theorem, by Arthur C. Clarke and Frederik Pohl
Oracle, by Ian Watson
A Voyage to Arcturus, by David Lindsay
Robot Dreams, by Isaac Asimov
The Sea and Summer, by George Turner
Planet of Judgement, by Joe Haldeman
The Collected Stories of Roger Zelazny, Vol 3: This Mortal Mountain
Cuckoo Song, by Frances Hardinge
Watership Down, by Richard Adams

Doctor Who, etc: 3 (YTD 29)
Short Trips: Seven Deadly Sins, ed. David Bailey
Atom Bomb Blues, by Andrew Cartmel
Tears of the Oracle, by Justin Richards

Comics: 2 (YTD 19)
Alice in Sunderland: An Entertainment, by Bryan Talbot
Les Lumières de l’Amalou, by Christophe Gibelin and Claire Wendling

6,600 pages (YTD 46,900 pages)
4/26 (YTD 51/165) by women (Munro, Cherryh, Hardinge, Wendling)
0/26 (YTD 10/165) by PoC

I hugely enjoyed returning to Watership Down, which you can get here, and discovering Edward II and The Jew of Malta, which are included here, and Alice in Sunderland, which you can get here. On the other hand, as usual for that author, I bounced off Merchanter’s Luck by C.J. Cherryh; you can get it here.

This is the latest post in a series I started in late 2019, anticipating the twentieth anniversary of my bookblogging which will fall in 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.

July started with my personal Brexit bonuses as I gave talks on the subject in Birmingham and, more exotically, Portland, Oregon. Pleased with this picture of one of the Cascades, probably Mount Rainier, from the plane.

On the Portland trip I started off with a couple of days in Washington, taking in a Chinese TV interview on the issues of the day.

I also had work trips to Belgrade (not as enjoyable as usual) and to Dublin (more fun), and we finished the month in Loughbrickland at the start of our holiday.

Thanks to various daytime travels, I read 30 books that month.

Non-fiction: 9 (YTD 29)
Fanny Kemble and the Lovely Land, by Constance Wright
The Cuckoo’s Egg: Tracking a Spy Through the Maze of Computer Espionage, by Cliff Stoll
Hamilton: The Revolution, by Lin-Manuel Miranda and Jeremy McCarter
Boy, by Roald Dahl
Empire of Mud, by J.D. Dickey
Between structure and No-thing: An annotated reader in Social and Cultural Anthropology, ed. Patrick J. Devlieger
Voices from Chernobyl: The Oral History of a Nuclear Disaster, by Svetlana Alexievich
Tove Jansson: Work and Love, by Tuula Karjalainen
Between the World and Me, by Ta-Nehisi Coates

Fiction (non-sf): 5 (YTD 19)
Diary of a Wimpy Kid: A Novel in Cartoons, by Jeff Kinney
Diary of a Wimpy Kid: Rodrick Rules, by Jeff Kinney
Tales from the Secret Annexe, by Anne Frank
A Delicate Truth, by John le Carré
Holes, by Louis Sachar

sf (non-Who): 9 (YTD 56)
The Stars My Destination, by Alfred Bester
The Secret History of Science Fiction, ed. James Patrick Kelly & John Kessel
Gráinne, by Keith Roberts
Corona, by Greg Bear
Islands in the Sky, by Arthur C. Clarke
The Sands of Mars, by Arthur C. Clarke
Earthlight, by Arthur C Clarke
Galileo’s Dream, by Kim Stanley Robinson
Doctor Dolittle in the Moon, by Hugh Lofting

Doctor Who, etc: 4 (YTD 26)
Short Trips: A Christmas Treasury, ed. Paul Cornell
The Algebra of Ice, by Lloyd Rose
Dead Romance, by Lawrence Miles
Lethbridge-Stewart: Beast of Fang Rock, by Andy Frankham-Allan

Comics: 3 (YTD 17)
The Divine, by Boaz Lavie, Asaf Hanuka and Tomer Hanuka
Invisible Republic, Vol 1, by Corinna Bechko and Gabriel Hardman
Bétélgeuse v.5: L’Autre, by Leo

7,500 pages (YTD 40,100 pages)
6/30 (YTD 47/139) by women (Wright, Alexievich, Karjalainen, Frank, Rose, Bechko)
2/30 (YTD 10/139) by PoC (Miranda, Coates)

The two best of these were about race and America, the Hamiltome, which you can get here, and Ta-Nehisi Coates’ Between the World and me, which you can get here. I bounced off the Diary of a Wimpy Kid, but you can get it here.