Yearly Media Update: 2020

We've gone through hell and back. 2020 was a historical year for such a high volume of reasons, none of which I will get into here. The important part is; I consumed an absolute truckload of media with the amount of free time I had, and it's time once again to talk about it. 

This is gonna be a very long post, so without further ado, let's get into it. But to set your expectations, I will forgo talking about the music I listened to in 2020, as it wasn't that much and I don't have anything significant to say about it.

MOVIES AND TELEVISION

For television, the two notable things I watched in 2020 were Adventure Time, and Breaking Bad. 

Adventure Time is a cartoon that came out around my fifth grade year, and I instantly loved it. The adventures of Finn the human boy and Jake, his super stretchy dog, captivated me, made me laugh, and even brought the ever so elusive raw emotion out of me, even back when I was eleven. 

I bought up to season 5 when I was in high school, and watched it all as soon as it came in the mail. However, I had never gotten my hands on any content that came later. That was, until my friend loaned me his Hulu. 

Holy. Moly. 

Adventure Time really ramped up in its last seasons, with the great miniseries Stakes and Islands. I think I liked Islands a little more, but Stakes was great development for Marceline with fun villains and jokes (what comes to mind for me is the Jake as a house joke). I have to admit, the ending of the series made me tear up a little.

And next of course is... well, Breaking Bad. And nothing else needs to be said about that. 

The notable movies I watched this year were the Lord of the Rings extended editions, the first two Evil Dead movies, the new Borat: Subsequent Moviefilm, and Lawrence of Arabia. Beyond that, I saw 1917, which ended up being one of my new favorite films.

MANGA

The sheer volume of manga I read this year has finally convinced me to make a distinction between Japanese Manga/Korean and/or Chinese Manhwa (even Manfra or OEL Manga) and Western comics and graphic novels (in how I document my media). I honestly do not read that many western comics. Not that I won't, but I find manga far more enchanting. 

For continuing titles, we have... a lot. Demon Slayer, Berserk, Magus of the Library, Saint Young Men, Fire Force, My Hero Academia, Attack on Titan, Witch Hat Atelier, Golden Kamuy, Dr. Stone, Vinland Saga, Rent-A-Girlfriend, Heaven's Design Team... must I go on? 

Oh? Okay. I will. 

Blue Exorcist, The Promised Neverland, Tokyo Ghoul, Chainsaw Man, Jujutsu Kaisen -- and then the self-contained titles, like Inio Asano's Downfall, Junji Ito's Gyo, Tomie, Venus in the Blind Spot, and Remina, just to name a few. 

Right off the bat, I want to start with the negative, and that's Tokyo Ghoul: Re. I managed to get my hands on the final volume, and finally finished the series. I have never been so disappointed by something in my life (kidding). Whereas the first series is a decent -- if flawed -- little action/horror with some more dramatic, personal elements, Tokyo Ghoul: Re fails at literally everything it tries to do. Senseless plot twists, character backstory only for them to die instantly afterward, nonsensical plot direction, ham-fisted end-of-story moral that did not have the proper setup, forgotten plot points, abandoned plot threads, all of it was just a complete mess. 

And I hate to be the contrarian, but I must say, while Demon Slayer started strong I really think it's failed to live up to its own potential as of volume 19. It got stuck in a story loop of - demon attacks - characters get horrifically injured fighting it off - demon gets backstory - main character dies - main characters don't suffer lasting consequences for their absurd injuries - rinse repeat rinse repeat rinse repeat. Not to mention; a very important plot point, which it seems like most of the story was leading up to, suddenly just... got concluded. Out of the blue. And it's used to kick off the climax of the story? What? 

Don't even get me started on My Hero Academia, either. I read 22 volumes of that series and all I can come away with is the knowledge that I truly wasted my time.

On the positive side though, Blue Exorcist has gotten to a point where I think it's earned a lot of my respect. When I started the series in high school (holy moly... SEVEN years ago...) I thought it had a generic premise, and didn't do much to shake things up. However, as of volume 25 (yesIknowthatcameoutthisyearshhhh) I have to say, the story has fallen into place. I look forward to every new volume, I'm invested in the characters, and I'm not afraid to say I think it's developed great storytelling. 

Another series that blew me away was Chainsaw Man. The sheer nihilism -- meaningful emptiness, with a stark, existential tone -- really made it a solid contender for one of the better manga I read in 2020. I started with Viz's physical volumes, but I couldn't stand the wait, and switched to online reading. (I still love it enough to keep getting the volumes though). Tatsuki Fujimoto has a style that no one can really replicate. The art is always so rough, but complimentary to the dark, scathing ideas woven into the story; ideas like the meaninglessness of personal goals, the uncaring, brutal nature of our civilization, and what it means to know the good movies from the bad. And why, after all, we need both. (Manga readers will catch my drift). 

Downfall by Inio Asano was a harrowing exploration of the brutality of a manga artist's life, but I also found it a bit pretentious. I've read a few of Asano's works since and I really think he gets caught up in the wind of his own sails, lost in a cycle of sadness that I honestly just can't relate to. I will read Oyasumi Pun Pun at some point, or at least make the attempt. But so far, I am unimpressed.

The Junji Ito works I read were Venus in the Blind Spot, Cat Diary, Hellstar Remina, Uzumaki, and Gyo. The most notable of them all I would have to say are Remina and Cat Diary. Uzumaki is a great read, don't get me wrong, but why is it so lauded when Remina has such a more effective premise? And in a lot less time, too!

There are numerous other things I read. I dropped Heaven's Design Team and Jujutsu Kaisen, as they weren't bad, but none of them appealed to me enough to keep my interest. I'll be continuing Fire Force (for the Soul Eater references), Golden Kamuy (for all the cikapasi, man!), Witch Hat Atelier (for the fantastic whimsy), and of course the titles I mentioned liking. This leads me to the final two titles I want to talk about:

Finally we have Magus of the Library, a manga that seems like it was practically made for me. Unfortunately there isn't a huge amount to say about it since there's only four volumes, but rest assured it's a fantastic new series that I'd recommend to anyone.

But what was my favorite title all year? 

What do you think? 

~... you hear a rumbling sound...~ 

If you don't fight, you can't win.

~... like many thousands of enormous feet, stomping on the ground...~

I keep moving forward. 

~...coming straight for you...~ 

Until all my enemies are destroyed. 

~...upon the wings of a bird, cast in mid-flight...~

Because I was born into this world.

~...fly free of this cage...~

BOOKS (Poetry, Novels, Non-Fiction)

I think I read more novels this year than any year in my life! They usually take me a while, which is why I didn't manage many other kinds of media, but that's okay -- because a lot of them are honestly new favorites. Whereas 2019 left me mostly underwhelmed in the way of literature, 2020 helped me discover a lot of new stories that I'll remember for years to come.

To start it off, I began the year with Neal Shusterman's The Toll, the final book of his Arc of a Scythe Trilogy, and Conference of the Birds, the fifth novel in Ransom Riggs' Miss Peregrine's Home for Peculiar Children. The Toll was a great conclusion to a YA Dystopian series that I think actually got really good with each new installment; Scythe was alright, but its successor, Thunderhead, was great. I like it more than The Toll, but The Toll finds ways to wrap up the story's themes (should people be given the power to take life?) with a really satisfying bow. 

Unfortunately, I found Conference of the Birds disappointing. The Miss Peregrine series really grew on me -- I read the first one after seeing the movie, and liked it enough to continue -- book two was even better -- and by book three I'd fallen in love with the cast. Book four was honestly really good too, and I ate it up quickly despite its length. But the plot developments in book five were really... questionable? Almost as if too many plot threads were spun off the string for a second-to-last book. The protagonist's relationship with the primary female lead is a really underwhelming, unnecessary development (for reasons I can't really get into without spoiling). But I suppose we'll see where it goes from there. 

I read a few other books before I want to talk about the great reads (and there are a lot). Warlock Homes and the Hellhound of the Baskervilles, by G.S. Denning, The Body, by Stephen King, From Here to Eternity, by Caitlin Doughty, Earthlings, by Sayaka Murata, The Shadow of Kyoshi, an Avatar: The Last Airbender spinoff prequel by F.C. Yee, The Hungry Cities Quartet (Mortal Engines, Predator's Gold, Infernal Devices, and A Darkling Plain) by Philip Reeve, and yes... I read Five Nights at Freddy's: The Silver Eyes. I couldn't help it. With a growing FNAF section in the book store, and with strong memories of the games as they came out, I HAD to check it out, just to see what was inside. Well, now I know; and I don't need a single page further... ha ha.

These are all mostly decent reads, but the real juicy stuff -- the stuff that left an impact on me -- are as follows:

Smoke Gets In Your Eyes, by Caitlin Doughty, was an eye-opening, harrowing memoir by one of my favorite YouTubers, Ask a Mortician. Death is a really uncomfortable topic in the western world, but this woman has embraced the cultural importance of death and death practices in her career, and wrote a really amazing little book about her journey in becoming a mortician and working at a crematorium. It's honestly one of my favorite books now, and I want to recommend it to everyone; she has a lot of important wisdom about death that I think many western people -- especially young people -- should really get their hands on and think about.

The Golem and the Jinni, by Hellene Wecker, is now also one of my favorite fantasy novels. It follows a newborn golem (clay being of Jewish myth) crafted to be a sickly man's wife -- and a reawakened Jinni (to say, an elemental demon from Arabic myth), both of which find themselves in 1890's New York City woven into the lives of others while discovering their own. Their story has surprising amount of plot threads and side characters, but I thought their journey into human-hood, and the scope of them as characters and how they interact, had some powerful depth. I honest to god loved every page of this book.

Six of Crows, by Leigh Bardugo, needs no introduction; it's one of the most popular YA Fantasy/Adventures this side of the bookstore shelf, and you know what? It's well deserved. It and its sequel, Crooked Kingdom, were fantastic reads in a setting I adored (and is scarily like my own!), with a cast I loved and will never forget, topped off with a fun, twisting plot. She somehow handled three YA romance subplots with enough tact and restraint to where I was begging for each of the characters to get together. Also, the blend of early 20th century war, fantasy counterpart cultures embroiled in political intrigue, and strong level of magic not only recalled to me my own novels and fictional world, but the worlds and stories that have affected me enough to where I've taken influence from them. I'm trying to push through her Grishaverse Trilogy as we speak (which for obvious reasons, I like a lot less) so I can get to more of Nina's story in King of Scars. This duology, however, deserve high praise.

I tried to read J.R.R. Tolkien's Fellowship of the Ring once when I was in college, and it wasn't doing it for me. I don't think this is the story's fault. It's densely written, and very reliant on expository scenes, and that mixed with some brain-numbing school-year stress just made it a little too thick for me at the time. However I've since finished both it and The Two Towers, to which I think they are exemplary fantasy and it makes sense they're essentially the common ancestor of fantasy today.

But you may be thinking. Austin... what was the best book of the year? 

Well, here's a picture. 

Dune was, hands down, not only the best book I've read all year, but one of the best books I've read in my life so far. It is in no shortage of top ten lists, nor is it something that needs to be written about any further, as everyone and their mother knows about the book and its movie adaptation later this year. The narrative is filled with unique ideas drawn from history, religion, ecology and other forms of science, tied together and interwoven and jigsaw-puzzled all into a beautiful poetic epic that sets up an effective and powerful Greek tragedy. In space. With drugs and sandworms.

In 2020 I also read Dune Messiah, the sequel, and Children of Dune, the third book in the series. Frank Herbert says those three are essentially a complete trilogy with God Emperor of Dune as a bridge-book between it and the second trilogy, which he never finished. While Dune Messiah and Children of Dune were both not as good as Dune, I do commend the direction of the story and admire the idea of taking the protagonist and using him to show the problem with saviors, leaders, and power in general. Not because it corrupts, but as Herbert puts it, because it "attracts the corruptible." The story after Dune could have been handled a bit better in places, but I liked it all the way through and look forward to God Emperor when I'm done with my absolutely bonkers stash of manga for 2021.

So much praise! But was there a worst book of the year? 

Yes. Yes there was. 

I'm really punching up here, so I don't feel regret in saying that the fourth Dark Tower novel, Wizard and Glass, is a horrific shitshow. Over 800 pages of a nothing, nonsense, infuriating mess of a plot, with developments I couldn't give less of a shit about and awful awful awful characters. It took me three years off and on to finish this offensively bad volume in the series, and it has soured any interest I had in returning. There is no reason for Roland's backstory to be so long-winded, and even if there was, what we got is a spit in the face for readers expecting something a bit more interesting or nuanced.

I supposed it's bad manners or attempting to foster bad luck as an unpublished author such as myself in talking such mean shit about an existing story, but this man has made more money than I'll ever make in my life and I make no attempt to hide that I love many of his other works. 

And I--

I -- 

...

 

 

...

Through dust...

~...~...~...~

...and snow... 

...

I read many other books this year for research on my novel series. I wonder. One day when I'm published, will this blog exist? Will fans go searching back through the things I posted here? I suppose, in a hypothetical world where this happens, they'll be able to see some of my inspirations and the kind of stuff I was reading back when I wrote the books. I don't know what the future holds... but for now I can at least share some of the sources of research I've been drawing on for my fantasy novels, by sharing some titles I read for the project. These contain but are not limited to; 

Nicomachean Ethics and On Man in the Universe by Artistotle,  Artistotle's Way by Edith Hall, On Inequality by Harry Frankfurt, On Tyranny, How Fascism Works, Understanding War, Traveler's Guide to Ancient Egypt, and many many more that will appear in the image below.

I bring up this hypothetical (two paragraphs above) in attempt to make clear some of my intentions in my story before it's revealed to the public. I think a lot of stories are surrounded by speculation for a while about influences/themes and such when the author is quiet about what they are, and I don't know how open I'm gonna be at the time of publishing or if I will be at all, so I suppose to nosy fan can come down in here and see some of the things I wanted to imbue in my multi-book saga that may not be obvious at first. In the future I may have a more professional collection of these topics, but my hope is that if in some case I don't, this little hidden-away thing here will serve as a jumping off point for a reader that wants to know more in hoping to track down some of the story's ideas from where they appear in the real world. As such, here they are. Including, but not limited to; 

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- Greek Philosophy (namely the writings/teachings of Plato, Diogenes, Aristotle, and Anaximander) 

- Economic Strife/Equality and Inequality

- Fascism, Tyranny, Nationalism, and their implications of prejudice

- Faith, Religion, and the consequence/criticism of such ideas and how they apply to society

- Greek Mythology/Egyptian Mythology/Norse Mythology/Japanese Mythology/Chinese Mythology (and other assorted mythological influences like Hindu, Filipino, German, Irish, etc.)

- Urban Legends and Grimm's Fairy Tales

- War and its affect on the world, "justified" wars (or, in much more frequent cases, unjust wars), and military command, with much influence from WWI, WWII, Vietnam, and the War on Terror

- Early 20th century technology, social movements, wars, and their application to the Steampunk subgenre

- The Fantasy genre and its roots in mythology and pulp fiction

- Eastern Philosophies, namely Buddhist beliefs and Dialectical Monism 

- The Gaia Hypothesis

- The Tarot, mainly the Major Arcana

- The Bible, especially the books of Exodus and Genesis

- Ancient Conspiracies, involving many that have to do with Egypt, Spiritualism, and Occultism 

- The Arthurian Legend 

- The sun and the moon (with myths, legends, and sciences involving them)

- Classic Dystopian Science Fiction (Fahrenheit 451/Brave New World/1984)

There's also a minor focus on pollution, as well as many themes of finding a place to belong, a reason to live, and many many others that I don't actually have time to get into. Maybe putting this right in the post is foolish or uncalled for, but fuck you, my blog my rules.

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...

~~~...~~~...~~~

Under the sun...

~~~...~~~...~~~

...and moon...

...

...

Huh? 

Whose memories are these? 

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END COUNT:

•    Books: 43

•    Magazines: 2

•    Graphic Novels: 177

•    Movies: 36

•    Albums: 4

•    Anime: 13

•    Television: 14

 

 TOTAL: 289

 

BEST BOOK: Dune

BEST MOVIE: 1917

BEST MANGA: Attack on Titan

BEST SHOW: Breaking Bad

I hope you all had as fun of a time reading this as I did writing it, and by that I mean your experience was actually enjoyable because writing this when I'm up to my neck in other projects was torture.

Until next time. 

 

Just Another Useless Update Post

See this girl? That's me, working diligently on a lot of very dense projects. Yeah, you heard that right -- I AM STILL WORKING ON THE 2020 MEDIA UPDATE!!! I promise. I have everything I want written for Literature and Manga, but I'm still working on articulating my thoughts on the other categories. Plus, I will need to round up a bunch of the books I bought for the project and take pictures of them. 

I'm also writing the Manga Retrospective for Fullmetal Alchemist, as I just recently concluded my re-read of the series, and I also need to take pictures for that one as well. 

The thing is, I've been working SUPER hard on my newest manuscript (I'm at 85 pages, 26,000 words!!!) so I haven't exactly had a lot of time for side projects. But don't worry, they're still on my mind, and they're comin. Be patient. Please. 

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Where Have I Been?

Hey Blog! Long time no post. 

You can probably guess why. 

In mid March, when the precautions for the pandemic took full effect in my country (The USA of course), I lost my day job, and went on unemployment. Currently I'm working my summer job under a lot of heavy guidelines, which is hell a conversation for another day. 

But why haven't I posted? Surely I have time, right? 

I do. But, I've been spending it on writing -- and reading. However, I plan to come back, and write a bit more before the summer fully ends. Partly because I can't neglect this, partly because this country is collapsing and I need something to do. 

So, let's answer a few questions.

Q1. Have I gotten published yet?

A: No. Next question.

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Q2. Will the Dungeons and Dragons blog ever get an update???

A: I hope so. I have most of our adventures written down, but the game petered out because it moved to an online environment -- prematurely, I might add, at my own fault -- which is extremely unfun and stressful for me. Yes, the DM has to have fun too. I'm sorry I couldn't give a proper conclusion to the story, or even finish most of the site -- but sometimes life doesn't work out perfectly. However, I definitely plan on adding new things to the D&D blog in the future. 

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Q3. So you started a LEGO Instagram?

A: Yes! I'm using it to show off my hobby, sure, but it's damn good at gaining me a following too; 

Here it is if you want to check it out; 

And here's some pictures: 

That's Guts, Casca, and Griffith from the manga (and anime) Berserk --

Kaz Brekker in minifig form for his Six of Crows glowup --

And LEGO Sansa Stark in a diorama of her building Winterfell out of snow.

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Q4. Will you ever do another Media Update? 

A: Yes! I will write one up this December, or January of 2021. I chose not to do it in thirds this year because it felt like I was reading in a deadline, and my book stack is gnarly so I wanted to subconsciously read feeling like I had 12 months instead of 4. Here's a look at the stack (not up to date). 

(I'm already two books into the Hungry Cities series!)

And that's all I have left to catch you guys up on!

Here's me and a lil puppy:

Tri- Yearly Media Update #2 - May - August

Wild few months for me! 

For starters, my summer job ended and I got my first non-seasonal job. I don't want to get too into it on this blog for several reasons, but let's just say I've been busy. 

I started off strong in this part of the year, but it ended weakly due to my other obligations. Altogether I consumed 128 unique pieces of media (as opposed to last third's 138), so not too shabby. I'll cover literature and albums in the month's paragraphs, but films, television, and other stuff by themselves.

With May, I was waiting for my summer job to begin. It would be my last month of the year without work, so I tried to consume as much as possible. I began going to the library, I picked up a bunch of comics for Free Comic Book Day, and I even read some non-fiction, all the way from gem identification guides from the 70's, a collection of weird facts, and a memoir about the Vietnam Memorial. I read my first John Green novel, Turtles All the Way Down, one of King's first books, 'Salem's Lot, and began dozens of new manga series. In total, I read 50 books. For albums, I listened to the most here, with standouts being Spiritual State by my favorite Nujabes (rest in peace) and Aretha Franklin's Lady Soul. I also heard Green River by Creedence Clearwater Revival and Ye by Kanye West. While I liked a lot of the songs I heard on all these albums, the only one that I really loved was Nujabes's. In total, that was 13 albums.

In June, my job began. That being said, I still managed to read quite a bit. I carried through on some manga series I began the month before, like Kimetsu no Yaiba (Demon Slayer), Vagabond, and my Bakuman re-read. I finished a YA novel called Incarceron, read 1984 and The Road for the first time, and actually read a Veterinary handbook about the human-animal bond, all of which were informative if not entertaining. All in all, it was 21 books. In music I listened to only 4 albums: Skiptracing by Mile High Club (which I was told was incredible but didn't like that much), Dragon by Denki Groove (which I thought was fun and upbeat), and Shingeki no Kiseki by Linked Horizon, along with Attack on Titan Season 3's entire Original Soundtrack. I love music from the media I enjoy, and that's what puts those two ahead of the others for me.

You can already see it declining, right? 

By July, I told myself that I didn't need to consume that much. My birthday trip was coming up, four different friends were all going to visit me by the end of it, and I hit the peak of my summer job's busiest weeks. The only books I read were manga volumes (5 of them, to be exact) and I only managed a single abum -- Pink Moon, by Nick Drake. 

I got a few more things under my belt in August, but not much. I tried really hard to finish King's Cujo, Bradbury's The Martian Chronicles, and F. C. Yee's Avatar: The Last Airbender prequel novel, The Rise of Kyoshi. I wasn't able to, so those will be discussed in next third's entry -- all I managed were, again, a bunch of manga volumes - 10 in total, with titles like Golden Kamuy, The Promised Neverland, and Tokyo Ghoul: Re. I finished Black Torch, Magi: The Labyrinth of Magic, and began the grimdark fantasy classic Berserk, by Kentaro Miura. In music, I hit 4 albums again with Michael Jackson's Bad and Thriller, Scissor Sisters's bouncy Ta-Dah, and and the soundtrack of the first season of Stranger Things, probably the only "show" I care about. 

That makes it as so: 

Novels - 6

Non-Fiction - 4

Magazines - 4

Poetry - 1

Graphic Novels - 70

Movies - 28

Albums - 22

Anime - 16

Television - 1

Well... once again skewed in the favor of comics! I tried to work in some other media this time, but due to time constraints I just couldn't get everything. No matter... let's look at each category individually. 

Novels

Part of me feels really bad that I only managed six novels this time around, but goddamn does life just not care about your desires. It really doesn't, you could want something as simple as time to read a single book and it will just look you in face and go, "...NOPE!" 

That's sort of what happened this time around. I'm still learning how to manage my time with a project like this, so when I finally started my summer job all bets were off. My writing halted, my reading halted, and all I wanted to do when I got home was sleep.

I wish there was silver lining here in that the stuff I did get to was incredible, masterful works of literature that made up in quality for my lack of quantity, but that is not the case. I don't like talking too negatively about writing for obvious reasons, but part of this project is honesty and subjectivity, and I just have to tell it how it is.

I started off with Thirteenth Child, the first novel in the Frontier Magic series by Patricia C. Wrede, and it was just... awful. Awful pacing, awful characters, oddly vague setting, it wandered all over the place and didn't deliver on its premise in any meaningful way while boring me half to death. I'm gonna stop there because I'm already being very venomous, but I don't think the problems with this book lie with its demographic (it was more Middle Grade than YA). More to do with its execution. A girl's whole childhood is wrapped up in this book -- from birth to her eighteenth birthday -- and nothing happens. The title of the book comes from her unlucky circumstances of being the thirteenth child (twin to the seventh son of a seventh son) and while a few minor characters in the beginning remark about it, it is relevant in... maybe two chapters?

Yikes. Time to move on.

But moving on brings us to Incarceron by Catherine Fisher, which was also awful. I don't even know where to start with this one -- the setting is even vaguer than Thirteenth Child, which at least made sense in that it had a set time period. Incarceron wanders around in foamy prose with such light details on the actual events of the story that I genuinely forgot what was happening halfway through. I still don't entirely remember -- things happen out of nowhere and are described so awkwardly that at times the book just felt like text. I realize these two novels are the beginnings of a series, and to judge a whole story on its first installment is dreadfully unfair... but am I supposed to invest time in the narrative when it's opening is handled like this? It's okay to make mistakes, and I'm by no means the only person with an opinion on these books. Many love them. That's more than okay -- that's great, because it proves my point about the subjectivity of art. I just can't do it myself.

So I decided to go with a favorite. Stephen King.

Oh boy was I in for more hurt.

With 'Salem's Lot, his second novel and the classic foray into vampires taking over a small town, I expected to be given a savory narrative about the destruction of normalcy, the ever-creeping crawl of vampirism on innocents the way parasites feed off an unknowing host. And it delivered that... kind of? I don't know, I was too distracted by the endlessly boring small-town drama that, instead of really painting a picture of the life they live (for it to be torn down by an outside enemy) only ever made me peek at when the chapter was gonna end. Good lord, it's described as a slow burn, but not only is the climax of the story dutifully underwhelming (thematically more so than on a level of spectacle), the "slow-burn" setup to get there is the sloggiest of slogs. I was knee-deep in a bog, moving at a snail's pace to finish. One of his first, yes, but also one of his weakest.

At this point I'm probably asking for someone to swoop in on my first book and leave a scathing, nasty, awful review, but it would have happened whether I said this stuff or not. ¯\_(ツ)_/¯

There was a bit of sunshine, though. I read my first John Green book, Turtles All the Way Down, which while not exactly something I relate to, it was something that gave me an understanding of how to not only write a compelling, conventional story, but also how to utilize actual mental illness in a way that raises awareness and doesn't need to adhere to standard literary tropes -- what I mean by this is a bit of a spoiler, so I'll keep quiet; but it is enough to keep me suitably interested in Green's other works from hereon out. 

Then came Cormac Mccarthy's The Road, supposedly the saddest book there is. It certainly tries to be, with despair and violence that would make more empathetic or squeamish readers want to put it down. But instead of really "portraying" suffering through a bleak, dead world like this, he more showcases it, you know? With hunger, cannibalism and torture, the lack of any animals or clean air in a world ravaged by a never-specified catastrophe, the plight of a father and his son (and the terror they live through) is never fully articulated. It's just... on the page, if you get what I mean. This may be due to its really strange prose style (no quotation marks, short sentences, a straightforward way of wording things) but I think it's due to an attempt to paint a world so bleak it hurts by combining prose with content. It's got a decent little ending, but in many of its other messages it just falls flat. 

So what was the standout? What was the one book I read that really did pull in the sunshine? 

1984 by George Orwell. How ironic.

This was leaps and bounds above the others. And I really mean that. I don't really want to sit here and talk about its complexities and nuances, because this book has been analyzed to death and back. It's a classic, after all, and a classic in science fiction and dystopia alike. It's taught in schools. It has historical relevance. If we're gonna take the Big Three of dystopian science fiction, I would still pick Fahrenheit 451 as the best, and Brave New World as an effective but self-indulgent last, which would normally put 1984 in the middle of the tree. But I actually like it more than that. It's almost as good or just as good as Fahrenheit, with a strong world, a strong message, and a S T R O N G ending. 

BEST: 1984 by George Orwell
WORST: Incarceron by Catherine Fisher

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Non-Fiction

Interesting batch of books this time, all with unique stories of how I had acquired them. First up, we have Leslie Gilbert Elman's Weird but True: 200 Astounding, Outrageous, Totally Off the Wall Facts. I got it for Christmas many years ago as a gift from my aunt, who loves sending me books.

You wanna know what I remember from that book?

Nothing.
(Moving on!) 

Next up was a book I got from my third grade teacher. I had a thing for gemstones back then -- still do -- and she, taking notice, gave me a tiny children's field guide called Usborne's Spotter's Guides: Rocks and Minerals. Hardly thicker than an envelope, the book is from 1979, and has pictures/names/descriptions of various stones and minerals. There's also information about time periods, geological formations, and fossils that might be outdated at this point? I don't know -- but it's good to read about these things because I use information like this in my writing. Without this book, I wouldn't know what chalcedony is (it's a kind of quarts that forms "bubbles," and not sharp crystals) nor would I know that pyrolusite was often mistaken as fossils of some kind due to their inner patterns. When writing fantasy, small details in your world matter -- the fact that the Xenean High Council board chambers are made of malachite (instead of, say, emerald) is something that enriches the world and lore of my story. Especially when, in cases like mine, materials like plants, metals or stones could be relevant to the magic somehow.

And the third was another bit of writing I thought I'd learn something from; The Veterinary Clinics of North America: The Human-Companion Animal Bond, a medical journal from 1985! I have not even a passing knowledge of the medical field, but I do know that we're constantly making advancements and discoveries in all fields of science. I thought that reading studies from decades ago would broaden my understanding of how well we update widely available information. Beyond that, I'm sure some of what I learned is still relevant today. For example, apparently people in the 80's were embarrassed to admit their love for their pets. Can you believe that? There was a whole passage about people unable to deal with the deaths of their pets, but not being comfortable admitting just how much they loved them. I can't imagine that line of thought at all -- I hug and kiss and pet my dog constantly, he means so much to me.

There's also the knowledge that cultural attitudes toward animals have religious relevance. You know how much the ancient Egyptians (and Greeks, to an extent) revered cats? Well, their role in those systems of belief played a direct role in cats being seen as pagan in Christian societies (such as cats accompanying witches as familiars, black cats being bad luck and such). That makes so much sense, considering how thoroughly western society has been formed by Christian beliefs. There's also the fact that by the time we started truly domesticating cats, dogs had already been alongside people for several thousand years. Fascinating stuff you can learn if you just pick up any random book.

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Magazines 

All throughout my childhood, I routinely read two magazines; LEGO Club Magazine, and National Geographic Kids. That has always been my only foray into the medium at all; LEGO catalogues and game booklets, as well as the fun and informative Nat Geo, but for children (so without all the horror of the real world). I still have most issues of these magazines, and whether that's because I like to hold onto my knowledge or I'm just a hoarder is up to you. Regardless, I had never read another magazine ever.

Well that's a lie. I think I flipped through Game Informer once.

But other than that, magazines to me were just a joke. A money sink, like tabloids and all that hullabaloo. But I realized I'd do well to broaden my perspective, you know? Everyone would do well to do that to themselves once in a while. You might learn something.

So I decided that magazines would be things I'd record in these media logs, cause why not? They won't be frequent (because yikes are magazines ridiculously overpriced), but might as well learn a little, right?

I started with a LEGO fan-magazine called Brick Fanatics, from which I saw information about the new Overwatch line LEGO put out earlier this year (a good bunch of sets, if I do say so myself), a few incredible models like Matthew Ashton's amazing classic spaceship, how to tell a fake minifigure from a real one, and the pros/cons of buying multiple copies of LEGO's newest Quidditch Set.

There were great building techniques too, but what stuck out to me was the quote from Jme Wheeler's article, "where do ideas come from?" Jme says, "One piece of LEGO doesn't mean just one possible build. Inspiration can and will strike." There's a photo of DC's Manbat inside a birthday cake piece - but beside it is a lamp that uses the cake piece upside down. The idea of "seed pieces" is not new, and something I encourage new builders to think about when building with LEGO. A piece that looks unique or interesting may be the very seed with which you grow your creation! So in all, it was a decent read.

The June issue of Otaku USA was not actually that interesting. Just a few boring anime/manga reviews, a few pages of a strange manga by Atsushi Okada called Nyankees, (it's about stray cats and their way of life portrayed by Japanese street thugs), and little else. There was a huge section for Neon Genesis Evangelion, but there was nothing in that field I hadn't heard.

So then there was Archeology: Rediscovering a Lost Peruvian Pastime. I love me some archeology, and here I learned that dogs and humans have coexisted for at least 11,500 years, Greenland (during the time of the Vikings) was not as cold as it is now, and Stonehenge may have been made to track the movements of the sun and moon.

The last one I read was the May edition of National Geographic, titled Leonardo.

I learned a lot about the micro-plastics in the ocean (hopefully one day we can de-politicize pollution and climate change, because it is very real and very much something we need to take responsibility for) and how they affect the ecosystem, which was poignant and eye-opening. They don't teach you this stuff in school. Another thing they won't tell in school is that Leonardo Da Vinci was gay, and had only male lovers. The article about him and how he was creating what were essentially blueprints for tanks and airplanes so long before those things actually came to be is fascinating, and along with his extensive artwork truly helped me understand just how much of a genius this man was.

I unfortunately did not get to any more magazines, and I partly blame National Geographic. I liked the stuff I learned from the issue I read, so I decided to get a subscription with the card in the center of the copy I picked up at the bookstore. Dad wanted to read them too, so we split the price -- but he suggested we just do it online. So we did.

And waited.

And waited.

And waited for four months until eventually I had him take a look at what was going on, and found out that for whatever reason, it didn't get processed. So the whole time I was waiting on Nat Geo it wasn't even gonna show up.

Nice.

--

Poetry

I only read one poetry collection and it was really fucking bad.

I don't even want to mention it by name. So please, please don't make me.

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Graphic Novels

Oh yikes, lots to cover here.

Before we get into what makes up the majority of this list (manga), I want to talk about one of the funniest graphic novels I have ever read, which is KC Green's Graveyard Quest.

A story about an undertaker haunted by his angry father. He keeps his mother's body in the cabinet in the living room, and one day when it disappears he goes on a journey through hell to retrieve it.

The facial expressions alone in this comic are the stuff of hilarity, but so are many of the jokes. It uses these elements in a really unique way, eventually painting a story about a disjointed, flawed relationship between a father's expectations and a son's problems. I recommend it to everyone.

There's also a bunch of Free Comic Book day comics I got, and all of them were bad.

Then there's the manga. For series I started in this time-frame, it was Detective Conan, Dr. Stone, Gleipnir, Radiant, Golden Kamuy, Vagabond, Komi Can't Communicate, Dorohedoro, Kimetsu no Yaiba, Doraemon, Ran and the Gray World, and Berserk. 

So which ones won out? Which ones will I be continuing?

Golden Kamuy, Berserk, and Vagabond. They're the most mature and captivating stories of the bunch. I also decided to go with Kimetsu no Yaiba in hopes that it will really take root and grow, as for now it's good, but bare of what makes something a classic.

In terms of series I continued with, I finished Magi: The Labyrinth of Magic, and adored it. People like to say that series tanks in the last few volumes, but I genuinely disagree. I can't say why without getting into some serious spoilers about the setting and who eventually becomes the main antagonist, but its messages and characters really made the story worthwhile. I've been reading it since 2014 (which is when I started seriously reading and collecting manga) and I'm honestly heartbroken to see it go -- but all good things must come to an end, and I think Magi's conclusion, while a little quick, is a good one. A happy ending -- not that everything needs a happy ending, but it was a good pick-me up for a series that does actually portray tragedy in a strong way.

Another standout I think is Tokyo Ghoul: Re, in that the story has broken down and gotten so jumbled to a degree that I am honestly appalled with each volume. At this point my insistence on seeing it out with each release is just an example of the sunk-cost fallacy, but I'm the kind of person who likes to own what they read, and I've already committed. Only four volumes to go, thankfully.

Of course the other manga I have been continuing -- mainly, The Promised Neverland and Attack on Titan, are nothing short of extraordinary. I still can't get over how well Attack on Titan has gotten especially. A really multifaceted, complex story about the nature of humanity, discrimination, suffering, and the cycle of human violence. The story flipped the idea of a formless enemy on its head with a deep exploration of the idea that "we are our own worst enemy," and the awful things we do to each other in the name of freedom.

A story where, despite differences and violence and war, the ultimate path to "freedom" is compassion. It's obvious that the story is going to end in at least some level of tragedy, and right now the protagonist doesn't exactly agree with all these ideas -- but we have yet to see the actual outcome. And while I think the story is truly going to end off with a massive punch to the gut, I think it will end with the idea that we, as a people, may be capable of change. That, or the cycle of violence begins anew -- and that is also a very strong message... a message we've proved throughout our specie's history time and time again. This story has been set up to be effective regardless of the message it ends on, which is just genius level writing.

To see a phenomenon of what seemed strictly like action/mystery go to a very dystopian, honest story of our crimes against each other and what we can do to break that cycle is honestly breathtaking. Each chapter leaves me in awe.

And for The Promised Neverland, I just have to say that it's good -- very good -- but the quality it had as a battle of wits and a race against the clock in the beginning of the story is lost a bit, as it has turned into quite a bit of action instead of some really strong mindgames. I don't particularly mind the change, and I can see it going a direction that has a lot of potential -- but I do miss what the series used to be, even if only for a few volumes.

Other series I've read were Hunter x Hunter (not that the man makes much of it) and Bakuman, which I have read before and am happy to be re-reading.

BEST CONTINUING TITLE: Attack on Titan, by Hajime Isayama
STANDOUT VOLUME: Magi: The Labyrinth of Magic vol 37 (for wrapping up the story in a satisfying way)
BEST GRAPHIC NOVEL: Graveyard Quest by KC Green
WORST CONTINUING TITLE: Tokyo Ghoul: Re by Sui Ishida
WORST GRAPHIC NOVEL: There really wasn't one this time around!
And the most important award...
BEST HIATUS: Hunter x Hunter by Yoshihiro Togashi

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Movies

I'm a pretty off-and-on movie watcher. I love film as a medium, and have a big list of favorite movies (that you can find in the "view my complete profile" link beside my profile picture) and a lot of my work is inspired by masterworks of film that have touched me on a very deep, personal level.

But like I said, I'm off-and-on. Some months I can manage dozens of movies, maybe more -- and other months I get around to, like... two. I prioritize reading, and that takes much longer for fewer units.

But this year, I've gotten to thirty-some odd movies. The first standout is Tobe Hooper's classic 1982 supernatural horror Poltergeist. I really liked this movie. As a fan of ghosts and specters, those kinds of spirits and haunting tropes, Poltergeist really cements itself as a classic in the genre with dazzling practical effects.

Some of the scenes I thought were really spectacular were what's pictured above, as well as the scene at the end of the film where dozens of caskets and coffins are bursting up through the ground from the foundation of the house. That imagery, especially with old corpses tumbling about, is some really good genre work.

Then there's Jim Henson's The Dark Crystal, a fantasy film many people would consider a classic as well. I won't deny the charm and wonder of the practical effects in this film. Anyone who is familiar with Jim Henson will recognize his work on The Muppets, Sesame Street, and much of the practical effects work on many films like Star Wars (Yoda!) and The Labyrinth with David Bowie.

The Dark Crystal tells what is probably intended to be a dazzling epic fantasy, but it does fall short of portraying a deep conflict. I liked it for its artistry, and maybe the Netflix prequel, The Dark Crystal: Age of Resistance offers a better insight on this world that, and I quote (though I don't know who), "is clear there's more to this world than we've seen."

Between Zombieland, Mr. Mom, and Monty Python and the Holy Grail (which was hilarious), I saw Stanley Kubrick's A Clockwork Orange, which adapts one of my favorite novels (somewhat) faithfully (all except for the ending, which in original releases of the book was cut in western editions), but the things it cuts shouldn't be put into a live-action film. The Secret Life of Pets 2 was utter rubbish, Into the Spiderverse was pretty ambitious and entertaining, and I tried to show one of my friends the Harry Potter films. Of course, he was stubborn and refused to admit that they were at the very least charming movies, but that's neither here nor there. We had to stop at three -- when he decided that The Prisoner of Azkaban, likely the best of the Potter films (and just a fantastic "film" by itself) was only a 5/10, I realized my effort was fruitless.

I watched a few short films too, but by far the best movie I saw from May to August was none other than Steven Spielberg's Jurassic Park.

For my whole life I had thought the film was overrated. I don't really know why -- it just looked cheesy, people praised it to high heaven, and I just never understood why. Dinosaurs? Meh.

But this was just unfair of me, because I'd never actually seen the whole thing -- just bits and pieces. I finally decided I needed to see it for myself in August, and oh my GOD. What a fantastic film, and in every way; visually, script-wise, characters and sets, even with the simplicity of the story the film is enjoyable as a suspense/action thriller alone. The action scenes are all shot so well, with unique scenarios (like a vehicle stuck in a tree, about to fall on two of the characters climbing down) that are quite engaging as devices for suspense. The effects have aged a tad, but that marks it in film history for pioneering things like CGI.

BEST MOVIE: Jurassic Park by Steven Spielberg
WORST MOVIE: The Secret Life of Pets 2 by Chris Renaud

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Albums

Let me set the record straight!

I am not a musician. I am not a music critic. I am a casual listener of the occasional song at best, and dreadfully ignorant of melody at worst. This section will be short and brief, because I don't quite have a firm understanding of what I like about certain songs/artists and what I don't like about others.

That being said, in holding to my beliefs in the subjectivity of art, I won't hesitate to lay out my thoughts. Defending them may be harder, but hey -- this is my blog.


On the "good" end of music I listened to from May to August I would say it's Lady Soul, by Aretha Franklin, Dragon by Denki Groove, Thriller by Michael Jackson, and a fantastic album called Spiritual State by Nujabes, the man himself -- one of my favorite all-time musical artists.

That leaves a lot of stuff I can barely remember a track from. I think this is just my relationship with music in general. It doesn't usually stay with me unless I really, really like it. Even of the albums listed above I can't name more than a couple of tracks from Thriller and Spiritual State, and the others I literally can't recall anything about other than generally liking the music as I listened to it. The more I type I realize that reviewing music is not in my future. Critically acclaimed albums, like Green River by Creedence Clearwater Revival, Ye by Kanye West, Skiptracing by Mile High Club, and Pink Moon by Nick Drake, I just did not care for in any way at all. And I almost can't remember a thing about them.

Maybe I won't write about music in the next entry.

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Television

If you really have read this far, then chances are you'll know the only show I gave a hoot about this year was Stranger Things.

Stranger Things is honestly the only show I give a hoot about at all, and what can I say for season 3?

It was phenomenal!

It's been since 2017 since I'd seen the first two seasons, so I did have a year of gap in my memory. That being said, I didn't forget any of the character's names, nor the setting, nor the general conflict of the story since then.

A lot changes this season; for one, (all of you have seen it, right?) instead of just channeling what are essentially 80's horror tropes like the first two seasons, we get a lot broader of a look at the 80's -- evil Russians (Cold War, remember? Red Dawn and War Games and all that), Breakfast Club-esque summertime teen drama, and all the cheesiness of beat em' up cop anti-heroes, in which Hopper gets to wear Hawaiian shirts and beat the jelly out of the Red Army like Rambo or Indiana Jones.

That of course means this season is quite a bit cheesier than the last two. A bunch of kids decode a secret Russian transmission for God's sake, and they even break into their base. Plausible? No. But that doesn't mean the show isn't still engaging, nor is it less meaningful with really good characters. I wish the story had made more progression -- the Upside Down, the Mind Flayer, all of that would do well with an explanation at some point -- but if we never get that I'll be fine as long as we do get good entertainment. Others disagree with me, but hooey on them. I liked it.

Those first two episodes are a bit rough, though. 

--

Overall: 

I would say I somewhat wasted a bit of time handling some of the stuff I consumed this time around. I learned a lot, but among the things I learned was that we really just don't have a lot of time, do we? And we never know when our last day is upon us. Heavy, but true.

So now I don't know if I'm gonna read/watch/listen to stuff for the sake of it. You all can see I omitted an "Anime" section of this post, and I may not in the future -- but I didn't have anything significant to say about the stuff I watched, so it would have been filler. Filler is a waste of time for everyone.

I'm on a better track right now, as I'm writing this (in mid September, yikes), breezing through novels like I should be. I'm actually really excited to talk about the stuff I'm reading now, so stay tuned.

Still Not Done! But Almost! (And other stuff)

I really didn't expect it to take this long, but for the sake of not leaving things unspecified I want to say I am still writing the blog post about the media I consumed from May to August, I'm just super duper busy. 

Some of you may also be wondering what happened to my Twitter. I think it was hacked -- the password was changed somehow, to which I spent a dubious amount of time getting it back, and at that point I just shut it down. I'll make a new one at some point, but it was more important that I didn't have some rando tweeting weird stuff under my name.

Regardless, the article still needs the Movie, Album, and Anime portions written. I'd publish it in multiple parts, but I'm beginning to really like it as a single article. A big, long, door-stopper fantasy-novel series of an article. That's kinda fun, right? 

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See you soon! 

Tri - Yearly Reading Update 2: What to Expect.

Yow! Hey! 

Time is almost upon us for the second third of the year to come to a close. That means my "Reading Update" log is nearly here.

Last time I wrote one of these, I only counted books -- novels, non-fiction, comics, etc. Stuff you could pick up and flip through. This time I went all out, and have compiled my thoughts on a lot of other media I consumed in these short four months. In the next update I'll be listing; 

- Novels 

- Non-Fiction 

- Magazines

- Poetry

- Comics/Manga/Graphic Novels 

- Film and Television 

- Anime

- Albums/EP's/Original Soundtracks 

That means I'll be restructuring how I approach this project. Instead of "Reading Update," I think I'll re-title it to something like "Media Update." I played with the idea of using the word "Art," as in, "Art Update," but despite all of this media being art in a literal sense I think using the word a little cheesy and/or misleading. 

In the future I want to include live performances (such as plays or concerts), video games, possibly YouTube content, and visual arts like paintings and sculptures if I manage to see or acquire them. These aren't things I partake in frequently, so don't expect them; but if I do, you'll see it here. 

And then this brings us to the future of my Tri-Yearly "Media" Update. I will finish out this year with the last log in December, and see where we go from there. This blog doesn't have a large audience (or really any audience at all), which is totally fine; it's more for me than for anything or anyone else, but tracking my media is actually really exhausting. It feels intimidating, like there's a quota. Writers should read, and to that I agree -- but we'll just have to wait and see how much more I do for the time being. 

Until then. Keep reading, watching, listening, and discussing. Bye for now!

Tri - Yearly 2019 Reading Update: December through April

Here we are! First entry.

I read some wild stuff these past few months. Before I give you the rundown of my thoughts on the stuff I read, let's look at an overview and some stats. 

December was a slow month. I had just gotten out of a reading slump, brought on by the stress of school (it took me three months to finish a single book!), and was getting back into reading again for the year. I wanted to make real progress in 2019, so I needed to start slow and pick up some speed. Graphic novels are a good place for that. They can be consumed quickly (depending on the title) and keep you invested with more than just prose, but artwork as well. I read 9 books. 

After receiving some books for Christmas (and money with which to buy others) I read more in January, and managed to finish off a book I'd put down the year prior. I read 12 books. One of the standouts was Tales of the Samurai, a collection of ancient Japanese folklore like The 47 Ronin, The Wonderful Adventures of Funakoshi Jiueymon, and The Ghost of Sakura. My favorite of the tales was definitely The 47 Ronin, which is based on real history of 47 samurai taking revenge for their humiliated lord, and then committing mass suicide to uphold the idea that they had broken their vows of honorable combat.

February is a short month, and my reads dropped back down to 9 books. That being said, I was able to catch up on some of my favorite manga titles, and read my first Brandon Sanderson novel, Warbreaker, which I happened to really enjoy.

In March, I picked up speed. I had started Tokyo Ghoul: Re (the sequel series of Tokyo Ghoul) the month prior, and finished out the volumes I owned when the calendar progressed. I quickly realized I quite disliked it. I intend to see the series out, as I'm at 10 volumes (of a total of 16) and don't like parting with my collection even if I dislike the title... but the quality of the story took a massive nosedive. Despite that, I completed 16 books. 

Then April hit, and I was on a roll. I finally found the momentum of my time before college, and managed to read a whopping 40 books. As with all months there's a bit of roll over, if I start a book at the very end of a month I complete it in the next, but this month I actually went and got a library card instead of reading what I had or buying books new. This is one of the smartest things I've done all year -- I can consume stuff from the library relatively quickly, and find things I hadn't even thought of before. This goes double for anything non-fiction. When I want to read about something but don't know any specific books, the library will have something to check out. I read some comic classics, like The Dark Knight Returns, I finished out Neal Shusterman's Unbound (a short story collection set in the world of his Unwind books), and re-read several volumes of manga to refresh my memory.

All together, from December of 2018 to April of 2019, that's a whopping 86 books.

But something should be remembered.

Graphic novels seriously conflate these numbers. They're a lot less impressive if I take them out -- but I believe comics shouldn't be taken for granted. They're literature just like a novel or piece of poetry. The story is told with artwork too, which takes practice, skill, and talent just like writing does. I'm not going to do the medium a disservice by saying the volumes I read don't count.

So, that being said, here are the stats!

Novels - 15

Non-Fiction - 4

Graphic Novels - 66

Poetry - 1

Magazines - 0

Wow! It really is skewed. While not a bad thing, I can look upon the numbers now and see a need to read things from other mediums. Reading shouldn't have to fill a quota, but I'm excited to see what I learn from more magazines, poetry, and non-fiction in the future. 

Now, let's get on with the standout works. 

Novels

I haven't yet read many novels that I thought were that stellar this year, but there are a few. To start, Warlock Holmes: A Study in Brimstone by G. S. Denning was a funny romp, parodying the titular character Sherlock Holmes by making him a host to the thoughts of a demon-ified Moriarty, and I liked it well enough. Clementine by Cherie Priest and Redshirts by John Scalzi were, however, quite forgettable. And the only Stephen King book I've read in the past few months, The Sun Dog, had a promising premise, and a terrible conclusion.

A Clash of Kings, the second novel in George R.R. Martin's A Song of Ice and Fire series, was quite fantastic, though. The artistry in his ability to worldbuild through the consequences of how specific characters are apart from one another/interact with their surroundings (especially off page) is pretty engaging. As with all multi-pov novels, some characters lag in a reader's interest, but every chapter is brimming with stakes and the guarantee that what happens won't be irrelevant. To follow, the newest book in Ransom Riggs's Miss Peregrine's Home for Peculiar Children series, A Map of Days, has proven his ability to grow along with his characters. Important social issues (like racism and other forms of prejudice) are brought to light quite naturally, and the developments in the protagonist's love life are original and realistic. Unlike previous installments, the photographs used this time didn't make that much of an impression (either with being out of place or forced, as with all the three books in the series), and it left me with wanting more, which is far and away what a book should do when sequels are planned and coming. 

Other titles I read include Brandon Sanderson's Warbreaker and The Rithmatist, which I thought were both very good -- The Haunting of Hill House by Shirley Jackson, a horror classic which I found to be a massive disappointment -- Kinslayer, the second book in Jay Kristoff's Lotus War trilogy, which I found a massive slog -- and It Devours! The newest novel in Joseph Fink and Jeffery Cranor's Welcome to Night Vale series. I liked it decidedly more than the first book -- but while I think the commentary on belief v.s. science was engaging and funny, Welcome to Night Vale as a whole relies far too heavily on a brand of humor that can quickly get stale. 

BEST: A Clash of Kings by George R.R. Martin

WORST: The Haunting of Hill House by Shirley Jackson

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Non-Fiction

I didn't read much non-fiction. Only four titles fall within the category; Visual Reference Guides: Mythology by Philip Wilkinson and Neil Philip, Manga in Theory and Practice by Hirohiko Araki, Tales of the Samurai by various writers, and The Art of War by Sun Tzú.

I think the standout here goes without saying. The Art of War is the oldest piece of writing I've ever read, having been written somewhere around the 5th century B.C.E, and it presents a host of informative tips on commanding armies and rules to warfare that are broad enough to be applied to many different forms of conflict. It uses metaphor liberally, and paired with commentary from translator Lionel Giles (and various comments from other figures in China's history, like poets Du Mu and Mei Yaochen) offers a lot of knowledgeable insights on the nature of combat. That being said, I can't help but feel put off by the way war is described, even in the title. War is an evil that, while possessing many attributes of planning, communication, cooperation and the like, only ever results in more life lost than the day prior. To call it an art is a misuse of the word.

Besides that, I learned a lot about making manga from the perspective of industry giant Hirohiko Araki, mangaka of JoJo's Bizarre Adventure, and quite a bit about mythology from the visual reference guide. I don't know if I'll include a Worst/Best in this category in the future, but I don't think labels like that apply as readily and easily to non-fiction. And despite my issues with The Art of War's outlook on conflict, I did enjoy its knowledge regardless.

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Graphic Novels

Yikes. Where do I begin? To start with manga, which is what makes up the majority of these entries, I caught up on titles such as The Promised Neverland, The Ancient Magus Bride, Hunter x Hunter, Magi: The Labyrinth of Magic, Attack on Titan, and Tokyo Ghoul: Re. I started a few new series, such as Sleepy Princess in the Demon Castle, The Blue Eye of Horus, Black Torch, and The Rising of the Shield Hero. 

As always, Attack on Titan and The Promised Neverland continue to wow me with their complexity and, especially in Attack on Titan's case, nuance. Its character development has come a long way, it's been able to foreshadow intricately since day one, and things we would have thought are random twists have relevance and consequences unprecedented in earlier chapters. Magi: The Labyrinth of Magic is in a similar place in its story, and since it's wrapping up soon, it's fun to see how far the narrative has evolved. The Ancient Magus Bride was decent enough, but volume releases are few and far between, so it's hard to stay invested when I have to wait another seven or so months for the story to continue. 

Tokyo Ghoul: Re and The Rising of the Shield Hero, however, prove to me that you really need to learn where to invest in the manga hobby, because they are atrocious. I'm too far invested in Tokyo Ghoul (both in time and my money) to quit now, but luckily I borrowed Shield Hero from a friend after he got into it because of the currently airing anime. Both of these manga are good examples of how not to characterize or build your world, as Ghoul can be boiled down to, "This character you thought was dead! Nope! Look at all this movement! Blood! Oh, his head came off," where Shield Hero is dead set on putting the protagonist through such stupid trials that I can only scoff, all while having one-note side characters that I can only bear to look at for a few pages at a time.

I also read Frankenstein: The Graphic Novel, Abara, Batman: Haunted Knight, The Dark Knight Returns, Pokemon Adventures volumes 1 and 2, Spiral, Piper, Ultraman, among others. The Dark Knight Returns is a classic in Batman comics, and it shows; while I was a little underwhelmed when all was said and done, part four of the story, involving Batman's eventual conflict with Superman, was well illustrated and the perfect way to finish the narrative. Compare that with Piper, a retelling of an old Irish folk tale, which was astoundingly bad. The art itself was unconvincing at the best of times and laughable at the worst, with such bland panel flow that it may as well have been scribbles. The story had no subtlety and just barely a lesson about trusting others. Not even the protagonist's deafness, something that can be utilized to bring light to the difficulty of living with a disability (and thus used to humanize her) is treated with real sincerity.

BEST CONTINUING TITLE: The Promised Neverland by Kaiu Shirai and Posuka Demizu
STANDOUT VOLUME: Attack on Titan vol 27 (for outstanding narrative developments)
BEST GRAPHIC NOVEL: The Dark Knight Returns by Frank Miller
WORST CONTINUING TITLE: Tokyo Ghoul: Re by Sui Ishida 
WORST GRAPHIC NOVEL: Piper by Jay Asher
And the most important award...
BEST HIATUS: Hunter x Hunter by Yoshihiro Togashi

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Poetry

The only bit of poetry I read this year has been Collected Poems of Emily Dickinson, which was fantastic. I'm not one for poetry, so I think reading more will do me good, and who else to start it off but one of the greatest? I wasn't disappointed. 

The poems are broken up into four parts; Life, Love, Nature, and Time & Eternity. There's a lot of wisdom to be read from poems in every section, and none of them I can say I liked above the others. For a woman so reclusive, she had invaluable perspective and the ability to weave it into words that stand the test of time. I don't want to plagiarize her works, so I'll just leave a list of some of my favorites. 

The Mountain,

Unreturning,

Aspiration,

Life's Trades,

With Flowers,

The Chariot,

And, of course, Farewell. It was particularly hard to read, because its finality was present in nearly every word. Dickinson passed without ever having published a single one of her works, and while my knowledge of her is sparse and I know I wouldn't want to go without publishing my stuff, I can't help but feel she probably liked it that way. 

I definitely recommend it. 

Overall

Next round, I'm gonna work on reading more kinds of literature. I already have a particularly large pile of Ancient Egyptian history, as well as WWII books, a few old Marvel comics, among more books of varying types. I'm not in a rush to read more magazines, but I do think I'll take a look at what I can learn from things like National Geographic or Reader's Digest.

Thanks for staying with me for so long! Reading so much has been a joy, even the worst of it is knowledge and emotions from someone that I can glean wisdom from. Literature is a lovely thing, as all forms of art are. And that brings me to my last announcement for this article, and that's that starting with my next Tri-Yearly Reading Update, I will also cover the music albums I listen to and what I think of them. I'll see how that goes...

Until next time. Keep reading!