Alchemy & Capitalism

 Will I get to 50 Saturday Notes in 2023? We shall see!

I have finished the Thrawn Trilogy, and now I’m going to read a couple of books before we get to the next Skulduggery Pleasant, I think? I am not sure. I have some mixed feelings about this Anne Bonny book (it relies heavily on using modern arguments about sexism to make its point, but that doesn’t mean it’s wrong; it also doesn’t cite sources in a few early statements which I have questions about), but who knows?

I’ve started replaying Shadow of War again, too. It’s fun–and I’ve found that I prefer messing around more fun than the storyline? Not that the story is un-fun, but even in the tutorial phases the Nemesis System is really cool.

Food in Speculative Fiction

 I reached over 51,000 words for National Novel Writing Month, I’m three books away from two hundred for the year, and I finished Assassin’s Creed: Origins. The remaster for Assassin’s Creed III isn’t working on my PS4 for whatever reason, but I have a bunch of other games so it all works out, I think.

Not sure which book I’m reading next, which is a bit frustrating. I’ll get to something though.

Now let’s talk about FOOD!

On Nostalgia as Substitute for Writing Characters

 I somewhat considered not doing Saturday Notes this past few weeks, because I’ve been so busy with YALLFest, National Novel Writing Month, and Thanksgiving. At the same time, I’m also desperately hoping to reach 50 Saturday Notes this year, and for that I need to fill out the next few weeks.

So! Note this week. Because I read a book about education this week, I started writing a Note about that, but the fact is that I have nothing valuable to say about the subject other than school sucks and so does the education system in this country.

Stakes in Fiction

 I am back from YALLFest! And I am behind on everything except my word count for National Novel Writing Month. I need to post a movie review, write and post another one, read some more, and on top of everything I am feeling a bit under the weather. I should be fine by Thanksgiving, but I’d very much like to feel better now, D’Arvit.

Anyhow, at least I’m re-reading The Aeronaut’s Windlass, and I’ve forgotten what great fun it is!

On Saints (in Fiction)

 When you read this, I will be at YALLFest going to panels and such, so I went ahead and wrote this before the weekend. I realized, right after I got this idea last weekend, that it would have been suitable for the Saturday after All Saints Day, but it didn’t occur to me then. Oh, well.

In other news, I’ve finished the “Curse of the Pharaohs” expansion for Assassin’s Creed: Origins, and so I’ll have to decide in a bit what the next game will be. I have a few options. And for whatever reason, I’ve been thinking a lot about Skyrim lately…

The Problems of Tie-Ins

 National Novel Writing Month has begun! Which means every evening I’m rushing home to fill out my word count for the day, despite being absolutely terrible at writing a Plot. The difficulty is getting characters to do things I find interesting, without them being stupid. Which is harder than it looks! I often come up with Plot ideas and then say, “Wait a minute, the characters would have to be stupid for that to happen/to allow that to happen.” You can’t just string cool things together! That’s how you get a bad book, or maybe a hilarious one.

Anyhow Across the Spider-Verse should be on Netflix right now, and both Paolini’s Murtagh and Butcher’s Olympian Affair are going to be out in bookstores on Tuesday, which is quite exciting. And a week from now is YALLFest! I don’t know if I will have a Saturday Note up then.

Bad Monster Tropes

Hallo! National Novel Writing Month is next week, and that is very stressful. There are less stressful things on the way too, though–YALLFest is coming up, and next week there will be pizza. You win some, you lose some. I am also currently re-reading Guards! Guards!, so expect that in the Book Diary review if you’re on Facebook or Goodreads.

I wanted to do something vaguely for Halloween, and I settled on this. I’m not really a horror guy, it’s the best I can do. 

Another listing! I’ve been re-reading some Limyaael recently as well.