Monthly Archives: March 2020

Book Review: What Angels Fear

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Book: What Angels Fear (Sebastian St. Cyr Mysteries Book 1)
Author: C.S. Harris
Release Date: October 2006
Source: Bought
Rating: 5 out of 5 stars

After reading The Body in the Garden by Katharine Schellman last week, I still had both Regency England and mysteries on the brain, and I needed desperately to scratch that itch. I thought about re-reading Mairelon the Magician for the millionth time, but then I remembered that I had bought this book, What Angels Fear, a year ago (at local mystery bookstore Murder by the Book, on Indie Bookstore Day in fact!) and never got around to reading it. It is a murder mystery novel that is set in Regency England, and its the first in the series, so if I liked it, I had plenty more where that came from!

my baby boy Sebastian

I will fully admit that when I first saw this book at the bookstore, my main impetus for picking it up was because of the main character’s name: Sebastian. Sebastian was the name of my cat, my baby boy, who died at the age of 18 a few years ago. (I had him since he was 6 weeks old, when I was in 7th grade. I named him after Bastian from The Neverending Story and St. Sebastian – I was a a very devout Catholic obsessed with hagiography at the time… and just because I love the name). Anyway… I picked up the book because of the name. But the description quickly grabbed me too: Regency England, murder mystery, brilliant dashing troubled hero? This is my jam!

I’m embarrassed it took me so long to get around to actually reading it, but boy did I enjoy it!

Here’s the basic plot synopsis: Sebastian St. Cyr, Lord Devlin, has returned to London from the wars against Napoleon in France, where he worked as an intelligence operative because of his particular skills. He has been getting into trouble for dueling (outlawed quite awhile ago) and is generally considered by his father, his sister, and most of society to be a libertine and a layabout. He’s actually an honorable man – his duels have mostly been in defense of innocent people, and he doesn’t sleep around nearly as much as people assume he does. The real problem comes in when a beautiful young actress is brutally raped and murdered late at night in a church, and the evidence points to Sebastian St. Cyr, despite his insistence he is innocent. Bad luck and a general disdain for the Bow Street Runners leads to a series of incidents that make Sebastian look even more guilty, and he is forced to go on the run, avoiding capture so that he may have a chance to clear his name. Along the way he gains the help of a young street waif, an old friend from the war, and Kat Boleyn – an actress and acquaintance of the murdered actress, who broke Sebastian’s heart six years ago, and who has plenty of secrets of her own. As Sebastian investigates the murder, he discovers that the truths he may found could have profound consequences not just for him, but for the entire country.

This novel was a tightly-plotted twisty exciting ride of a mystery. I was following along carefully, trying to solve the murder with (or ahead of) Sebastian, but I did NOT see the ending coming until it was just about right in front of my face. There are quite a few characters to keep track of, and as the novel is told in omniscient third-person, you get the chance to be right in the heads of quite a few of those characters. Even so, I did not guess the culprit until Sebastian had. And then I was like: “oooooh! I get it!”

Sebastian is in some ways your typical Regency hero (mystery novel or otherwise): he’s brilliant, handsome, honorable, much more forward-thinking than most of the other men around him, and of course an excellent lover. He has the added benefit of better-than-usual eyesight, hearing, and reflexes. Is he a little TOO perfect? Yeah, probably. But I honestly don’t mind that when I’m reading this kind of book. Despite that, C.S. Harris does a good job of fleshing the character out, giving him some depth and nuance. I think it is safe to assume that will continue in the next books.

The other characters all vary in dimension and depth, of course. Kat Boleyn, the heart-breaking actress, is fairly well-written. She is, to an extent, also a typical Regency heroine – beautiful, intelligent, willful, etc. The secret to her motives are a little too obvious and stereotypical. But she has a secondary secret that gives her more interest and keeps her from being too one-dimensional. And I liked her even if she was a tad cliche at times. I also assume she will get more fleshing out in later books, and I look forward to seeing how that turns out.

I felt that the historical elements of the novel were well-considered and deeply researched. Some Regency novels just kind of toss in an archaic word or place name here or there and then don’t worry about it much. This narrative felt nicely grounded in its time and place, with characters drawn from real historical reference, and a great use of the language of the time. The prose is also wonderful: descriptive and intriguing without being too florid.

Overall, I really really enjoyed this book. So much so that I got online and ordered books 2 and 3 before I had even quite finished it. I imagine they should arrive sometime next week and I look forward to seeing how Sebastian gets into trouble next time.

Also, apparently book #15 (!!) of this series is coming out on April 7th, so I have a lot of catching up to do!

For links to this book, What Angels Fear: Amazon, Barnes & Noble, Indiebound
***Under the current circumstances, please try to buy from an indie bookstore if at all possible. Indiebound is a great way to find one near you that delivers. Or, if you want, you can order from MY favorite local indie bookstore: Murder by the Book

And here is the Goodreads page with a list of all the books in the series

Quarantine Check-In!

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Hello everyone! How are we all doing with the quarantine situation? I’d love to hear from you folks! Feel free to sound-off/share/commiserate in the comments!

Hibiscus in my front garden

I have spent the last two weeks vacillating between deep anxiety and surprising calm. I am enormously worried for friends and family and from the general population at large. I feel so much concern and gratitude for all the people who are still going into work because they are essential services: this, of course, includes doctors and nurses and pharmacists and techs and janitors and cooks and other hospital support staff; it is also includes EMTs and grocery store workers and postal workers and truck drivers and food delivery drivers and fieldhands who are keeping farms (and thus our food supply) moving.

On a personal level, I have a cousin who is an EMT in Austin, TX and a very close friend who is a pharmacy tech at a hospital in Ohio, and I am very worried about both of them. They are the frontlines of this situation. They face the possibility of contamination every day and its terrifying.

I am also very worried about the financial fallout of this situation. I do not care about big corporations or the stock market or whatever else the death cult that calls itself the GOP is concerned about. I’m worried about normal people who are losing their jobs, or if not losing them outright, are at least losing income for weeks or months. I am worried about small businesses like family-owned restaurants and little boutiques and mom-and-pop grocery stores and indie bookshops who have lost business or been shut down completely. I am worried about artists who live commission to commission at the best of times. And debut authors whose first books are coming out right now and who may never get another book contract if sales are bad enough during this slowed down market.

Mr. Erasmus Flattery helping me read…

And yet… personally, I’m doing ok. Pretty well, actually, all things considered. And I feel a bit guilty about that. My job is already part-time and inconsistent so I’m not doing any worse than I already was, and the job will still be there when things settle down. My mother, who is my financial support system, is working from home and her employer is working at reduced capacity, but otherwise she’s ok. We’re all staying home as much as humanly possible. No one I know personal has gotten sick (yet, fingers crossed). And I am, for the most part, enjoying all this sudden downtime. For which, again, I feel guilty.

I have read 2 novels, a novella, a graphic novel, and an audiobook. I have written quite a few blog posts/book reviews. I have sat comfortably in my front garden with the flowers. I have cuddled with my various cats. I have taken advantage of the Met Opera’s free streaming previews and have now seen Carmen, La Boheme, Das Rheingold, Die Walkure, and Siegfried for the first time ever! (And loved them!) And I have taught myself to cross-stitch. All while keeping up with laundry, and dishes, and dusting/sweeping, and cooking dinner.

My very first cross-stitch!

I have always been an introvert who enjoys staying at home. As long as I have the internet and books, I’m good. The only things I really miss so far are: walking around at the park (which my mother and I usually do quite often), going to the movie theatre, and window-shopping at the mall or some such place.

And again, I feel guilty about mostly enjoying my self-isolation. Even though it in no way negates my anxiety, fear, and anger over the state of things: the people who are suffering physically or mentally or financially because of this; the people who have or are going to die because of this. I am absolutely blindingly-furious about the callous, evil, and incompetent responses from the federal government writ large. I have several rants about all of that, which I have shared with friends and on my facebook, but which I am (for the moment) going to avoid sharing here. I will try to avoid letting this blog devolve into moral and political ranting. But if this situation continues much longer in the directions that certain political figures have allowed it to, I may reverse that decision. We’ll see…

Anyway, please tell me how you all are doing? Good, bad, in between! No judgement here! Only empathy, understanding, and commiseration. I’m sending virtual (safe-distance!) hugs to you all! Be safe and smart!

Book Review: The Daughters of Ys

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Photo by me

Book: The Daughters of Ys
Author: M.T. Anderson (writer)/Jo Rioux (artist)
Release Date: May 2020
Source: ARC provided by publisher (obtained through my work)
Rating: 4 out of 5 Stars

The Daughters of Ys is a graphic novel written by M.T. Anderson, with art by Jo Rioux, that is based on an old Breton folktale. “Breton” refers to the area of France called Brittany, which actually originally had a Briton/Celtic population, before it was colonized by the Roman Empire, and then was eventually subsumed into France. So the folktales of the area are a very fascinating mix of cultures.

This graphic novel contains beautiful full-color art with a soft color palette and a sweeping style, that tells a sad, foreboding far-reaching story in a surprisingly small, tightly-narrated package. 

The Daughters of Ys are two sisters, Rozenn and Dahut, the daughters of King Gradlon of the kingdom of Kerne, who live in the capital city of Ys. The sisters drift apart after the death of their magical (possibly faerie) mother, and follow divergent paths that bring them into conflict with each other. Rozenn, the eldest and heir to the throne, goes to live in the wilds, to be among the plants and animals and away from the riotous parties and debauchery of the capital city. Dahut, the younger, takes on the task of maintaining the kingdom for her increasingly broken and useless father, the king, and revels in the parties and the young men who come to court her. But Dahut has a dark secret. A secret that makes their kingdom the richest and most powerful of all, but at a steep cost. When Dahut and Rozenn come into conflict, one sister betrays the other, and their choices have the potential to ruin the entire kingdom.

This story is a dark lesson in obligation, desire, and what happens when debts finally come due. It is also about the ways that family can fall apart and even destroy each other in the face of competing needs and motivations.

When I first saw the cover, I didn’t care for the art style, but as I got into the story I decided that the style – somewhat loose and soft with a kind of colored pencil texture to it – actually fit the folktale-nature and tone of the narrative. Also, by the end of the story I was very fascinated by the original folktale, and had to go look it up on Wikipedia later. I’m now wondering if there’s a full collection of Breton folktales somewhere, because that would be cool. AND I went in search to see if anyone had written a full novel adaptation of the story, and lo and behold! There is, in fact, a whole 4 book series based on the folktale written by respected SF/Fantasy writer Poul Anderson and his wife/sometimes-coauthor Karen Anderson! So I’ll be looking for those later…

I gave this graphic novel a 4 out of 5 stars. I’m not going to singing its praises to the rafters for weeks, but I did really enjoy it. And I highly recommend it.

For the curious, here is the Wikipedia page about the legendary city of Ys.

And the Wikipedia page about Brittany, where this folktale originates from.

Finally, here is the goodreads page for Poul & Karen Anderson’s book series: The King of Ys.

Comfort Movies

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Do you have any comfort movies? Movies that you have watched over and over again until you can recite the whole thing word for word at the drop of the hate? Movies that you watch at 2am when you can’t sleep and need something to soothe you into drifting off? Movies that you watch when you are sick or stressed or upset?

I suppose you can guess by now that I do. I have a whole list of standards. Safe stand-bys. The usual suspects, as it were.

The first of these is Disney’s Robin Hood – yes, the animated one with the animals. I have been in love with this movie since I was a very little kid. I believe a lot of people around my age would admit that the fox Robin Hood was one of their earliest crushes (don’t lie! Admit it!). He was certainly one of mine. (And yes, Nick Wilde from Zootopia is on that list now too.) It’s Robin Hood’s VOICE, courtesy of Brian Bedford that really does it for me! It’s such a LIKEABLE voice! but the whole movie is just gold. Wolfgang Reitherman was one of Disney Animation’s greatest directors, and his direction for Robin Hood is no exception. The animation is fun, despite or perhaps even because of the amount of designs and sequences they recycled from previous productions. All the voice cast, not just Brian Bedford are fantastic. Especially Peter Ustinov, who plays Prince John – he is clearly having WAY TOO MUCH fun recording his lines, and he steals every scene he’s in. And the songs are some of the best Disney has done, in my humble opinion. “Oo-de-lally” and “Not in Nottingham,” in particular, are absolutely wonderful songs that have even been covered by contemporary bands.

My second favorite comfort movie is My Neighbor Totoro by Studio Ghibli and Hayao Miyazaki. I love all the Ghibli films, and I would agree with the assessment that technically the BEST of these movies are Princess Mononoke and Spirited Away. However, because of its gentleness, sweetness, comfort, and pure nostalgia, my favorite will definitely always be My Neighbor Totoro. When I can’t sleep, I like to listen to something soft and familiar to hopefully lull me into drifting off, and this is one of my go-to choices. If you are familiar with Studio Ghibli’s films, you know about the high quality of their animation, the beauty of their stories, the supremacy of strong girl characters, and the absolutely STELLAR scores always written by constant Ghibli collaborator, Joe Hisaishi. Totoro is just a perfect movie to me. I do not think I single line of dialogue or single animation cell could be improved upon. And, unlike some anime dubs, the English voice-over dubbing for this movie is phenomenal as well. Dakota and Elle Fanning play the two sisters and they proved very early on as children that they were both going to be fantastic actresses. And Tim Daly (best known as Joe from the sitcom Wings, and Superman/Clark Kent from Superman the Animated Series) is wonderful as their father. The score might be my favorite part though, and never fails to comfort and calm me.

My third favorite comfort movie is not TECHNICALLY a movie. It’s Over the Garden Wall, created by Patrick McHale (creative director for Adventure Time) and released on Cartoon Network. This was actually a mini-series released in November 2014 (I cannot believe it’s been that long!) and was 10 episodes of 12 minutes each. I bought the dvd version of it the second it was available, and when you use the “Play All” option, it runs through the whole series which, without commercials, is approximately 120 mins long. Thus, it works kind of like a movie. Like Totoro, I believe this show is one of the most perfect pieces of animation ever made. I do not believe you could improve on a single element. It is one of my most favorite things in any visual media. It has such a perfect folktale/fairy-tale style and tone. The animation style is wonderfully whimsical. The characters are funny and poignant and real. The voice acting is stellar (Elijah Wood is the main character and he’s fantastic!). Parts of it are delightfully strange and wonderfully creepy. And just like with Totoro, I think the music is my favorite part. The score and songs are composed/written by The Blasting Company and I love every single one of them. There was a period between 2016-2018 when my depression was really really bad (it’s still pretty bad) and I literally watched Over the Garden Wall every single night as I fell asleep. I am not exaggerating. Every single night for two years. It is still my most common late-night-watch, but I have mixed it up a bit in the last year or so. (I am, in fact, watching it as I type this…)

I have a few more comfort movies on my list. Pride and Prejudice (2005), Disney’s Tangled, The Labyrinth, and How to Train Your Dragon are all favorites, but the three above are definitely the ones I turn to most often.

How about you? Do you have any favorite movies you return to again and again?

Book Review: Middlegame

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Book: Middlegame
Author: Seanan McGuire
Release Date: May 2019
Source: ARC provided by publisher, then audiobook bought from Audible
Rating: 5 out of 5 stars

Seanan McGuire is a very prolific writer. She has written two different urban fantasy series (The October Daye books and the inCryptid books). She has written a bunch of horror novels, including the acclaimed Newsflesh Trilogy under the pen name Mira Grant. And she has gained, probably, her most impressive accolades from her novella Wayward Children series, the first of which – Every Heart a Doorway – was how I came to her in the first place.

Middlegame is a standalone fantasy novel (which I really appreciated! I love a good epic fantasy series but sometimes they get too exhausting and I enjoy a good immersive standalone book). And guys, it is SO GOOD.

I first started reading it in April 2019, when I borrowed an ARC through my work. However, I only got about a third of the way through it before various issues got in the way and I never finished it. And then I returned the ARC to my employer and that was that. So, when I started my “Storm the Castle” 2020 Reading Challenge with my friends, I knew that Middlegame would be on the list of books in the “Books You Started But Never Finished” Category.

A few weeks ago I caved in and just bought the audiobook. Even though I am slowly getting better at reading print books again, I still do the majority of my reading through audiobooks, especially because I can often listen to them while I’m working. It took me quite awhile to finish the audiobook of Middlegame though, for a few reasons: first off, I started it but then decided I really REALLY just wanted to finish the book Lawrence in Arabia first because it had stolen all my attention; second, the plot of Middlegame was stressing me out so much and giving me so much anxiety that I had trouble listening to it for more than half an hour at a time; and third, I didn’t really care for the narrator, Amber Benson.

Amber Beson is the actress who portrayed Tara in Buffy the Vampire Slayer, and by and large I really do like her as an actress. But no matter how hard I tried to get used to her, I just did not like her narration – especially her voices for two of the antagonists, Reed and Leigh. Her voices for the two main characters I didn’t LOVE, but I could handle. Her voices for the two villains just set my teeth on edge every single time. So, that didn’t help. But oh well.

The story itself, however, is AMAZING. I’m going to try to explain what is a rather complex premise and plot without giving away anything too spoilery (I know its been out for almost a year but I still would like to avoid spoilers if I can).

Middlegame is set in a version of America where alchemy exists in secret all around us. Asphodel Baker, one of the great alchemists of her age, sets out to lead humanity to a kind of utopic vision called “The Impossible City” by embodying something called the “Doctrine of Ethos” – a kind of philosophical and magical concept that controls (or perhaps more accurately, creates?) reality – into a biddable human form. However, Asphodel Baker can’t do this on her own, and when her greatest alchemical creation – her protege Reed – kills her, he takes over her task with the help of violent, I would say INSANE, golem-woman named Leigh. And together they create a group of children, created in pairs as twins, with rhyming names, who each MIGHT come to embody the doctrine as they grow.

To be clear, all that is just the PROLOGUE. Stay with me!

The MAIN plot of the book follows one set of these pairs, brother and and sister Roger and Dodger. The twins have been separated at birth by Reed and his associates, but discover each other when they realize they can see through each other’s eyes and speak to each other in their minds despite living on opposite coasts. They do not know WHY or HOW they can do this, and decide they must be quantum-entangled somehow but since they are kids they don’t question it much. They grow up on opposite sides of the country as best friends, but as they become teenagers and then adults a variety of incidents keep tearing them apart (I’m trying really hard not to get spoilery here, folks). They keep coming back together again, and then splitting up, over and over. It was very stressful for me!

Finally, as adults, they reunite one last time as they realize that a) they were created beings, not born in the traditional sense, and b) their creator might be trying to kill them.

The plot of this novel is enormously complex. There are several important characters to keep track of, one of whom you don’t realize will be important until much later in the book. Parts of the novel are told out of chronological order: the book is organized into Parts 1-7, but it continues to return to Part 7 THROUGHOUT the novel! In addition, each part is prefaced with a passage from “Over the Woodward Wall” which is a children’s book that exists in-world for the characters (but not for us) written by Asphodel Baker to indoctrinate children to her ideas. (Fun fact: Seanan McGuire is now actually WRITING this not-real book and it is being published by Tor). On top of all this: there’s TIME TRAVEL in the book. Quite a lot of time travel in the second half (I hope that doesn’t give away too much!).

As I said earlier, this book gave me a lot of stress and anxiety. I want to be clear that this is not a mark against it! It just goes to show how REAL the characters were to me, and how tightly, tensely written the plot was! Every time the two main characters, Roger and Dodger, got separated, or were put in danger, I got very stressed!

This book is brutal and cruel. Both to its characters and to its readers. It is almost physically painful to read. On the other hand, Seanan McGuire’s writing always has a beautiful, almost poetic quality to it. It is especially noticeable in her Wayward Children series, but it is also in evidence here. Some of the passages are just SO PRETTY. Here’s just a few examples:

“Words can be whispered bullet-quick when no one’s looking, and words don’t leave blood or bruises behind. Words disappear without a trace. That’s what makes them so powerful. That’s what makes them so important. That’s what makes them hurt so much.”

“Maybe it would be comforting, to her. The math would be true, and that’s all she’s ever asked from the world. He knows the words that apply to this situation—exsanguination, hypovolemia, hemorrhage— but they don’t reassure him the way the numbers reassure her. They never have. Numbers are simple, obedient things, as long as you understand the rules they live by. Words are trickier. They twist and bite and require too much attention. He has to think to change the world. His sister just does it.”

“For a man on a mission, a hundred years can pass in the blinking of an eye. Oh, it helps to have access to the philosopher’s stone, to have the fruits of a thousand years of alchemical progress at one’s fingertips, but really, it was always the mission that mattered. James Reed was born knowing his purpose, left his master in a shallow grave knowing his purpose, and fully intends to ascend to the heights of human knowledge with the fruits of his labors clutched firmly in hand. Damn anyone who dares to get in his way.”

“She looks like peaches and cream, like Saturday afternoons down by the frog pond, innocence and the American dream wrapped up in a single startlingly lovely package. It’s a lie, all of it. He believes in exploiting the world for his own gains, but she’d happily ignite the entire thing, if only to roast marshmallows in its embers.”

There is also something to be said about determination and hope in this book. These characters balance just on the edge of giving up and giving in every other page, and yet somehow manage to keep trying and keep fighting, in the face of failure and death and worse. And it is also about love – familial love, the love for family and friends, rather than romantic love. And that was something else I really appreciated about this book. No knock on romance – I love a good romance – but this was something different. You’re going to think this is a weird comparison – but it is different in the way Lilo & Stitch was different from the usual “princess falls in love” Disney fare. As someone with three siblings, it was something I could really appreciate (even if I don’t get along quite so well with my siblings as Roger and Dodger do).

All in all, I really enjoyed this book. Just as I have enjoyed everything I have read by Seanan McGuire so far (and I have so much more of hers to read!). I highly recommend this book. Just… maybe not the audio version…

And, even though I didn’t intentionally time the finishing of this book and the writing of this review quite so well on purpose, it is actually quite nicely timed because the trade paperback printing of Middlegame is being released on April 7th. So you can pre-order if you like! How apropos is that?!

For links to buy the book: Amazon, Barnes & Noble, Indiebound

And Tor.com has a couple passages available to read on their website as well: from Part One and Part Four

Addendum: A few more fun things to do while social distancing

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Since I wrote my last post on Tuesday, a few more interesting/fun things have popped up on my feeds and various articles. Apparently a BUNCH more museums have made their collections virtual for online viewing, and so forth. So I thought I would just add an addendum here.

According to Google, approximately 2500 museums and galleries have now made all or part of their collections available for virtual viewing on the

The National Aquarium in Baltimore has now joined the Georgia Aquarium in making livestreams of various habitats available online. Fun fact: I lived in the D.C. area from 1st through 6th grade and the National Aquarium in Baltimore was and remains to this day one of my favorite places in the world.

There is also such a thing on VIRTUAL RIDE-ALONGS for various Disneyland rides. And as a Disney-fanatic (as mentioned in previous posts), I love this more than words can say.

The ebook/audiobook app Scribd is offering 30 days access to their entire library for free, without needing to put in credit card info or anything (so you don’t even have to worry about canceling your promo subscription for fear of being charged their monthly rate later!) Though, honestly, their monthly rate is pretty reasonable!

For more reading options, Humble Bundle has a great collection of Science Fiction/Fantasy ebooks from Tachyon for a minimum donation of $15! (Humble Bundle does, of course, also have enormous collections of video games, etc but I’m not a gamer so I can’t speak to that).

Lastly, for now, BroadwayHD is offering a free trial or their streaming service of Broadway musicals and plays. Now, this one is only a 7-day-free-trial, which under the circumstances is not that much, but its still a chance to maybe watch a few musicals you’d been hoping to catch but hadn’t managed to yet.

If you’ve seen something cool that I have missed here, please feel free to share it in the comments! It’s impossible to catch it all, and I’d love to see what else is out there!

Some Fun Things To Do While Self-Isolating

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There have been a few of these posts and articles floating around the internet, but I thought it would be fun just to compile and share a few of the things I’ve found to keep you entertained, to keep you indoors, to keep your anxiety under control, etc…

Keep in mind that these are just things I’ve managed to find, and things that I personally find fun or cool or whatever (I’m sure you’ve seen many of these and more besides in other places).

First off, I love museums! So, here’s an article about 12 museums that offer virtual tours, including the British Museum in London, the Van Gogh Museum, and the Guggenheim!

And since we’re talking about museums, we can’t forget that these Paris Museums have put 100,000 images online for free unlimited viewing!

Next, I love music. I love going to concerts in genres ranging from classic rock to indie alternative to classical! I regularly attend concerts at the Houston Symphony. I was hoping they might do something online for audiences, but I suppose they didn’t have the setup necessary for it. Instead, the Seattle Symphony has done something very cool and is sharing previously recorded concerts for free streaming on YouTube and Facebook. More information can be found on their website here.

In for more classical music, you have probably heard that the Met Opera is doing free viewings of some of their previous Met Opera in HD programs (which they usually broadcast via Fathom Events in movie theatres and on their Subscription App). You can find more information, including a schedule on their website here. 

Yesterday (Monday, March 16th) they streamed Carmen, which I watched and really enjoyed. Tonight (Tuesday, March 17th) they will be streaming La Boheme. Just fyi: you can stream these performances straight from the website, however due to more site traffic than they were prepared for, the Met Opera recommends streaming from their On Demand App. The App does technically cost money, however you can access the free broadcasts without signing up by going to the “Browse and Preview” option! It’s a tiny bit glitchy (again, due to more traffic than they’re used to) but it worked me just fine!

For more fun, the Georgia Aquarium has live cams in many of their habitats so you can visit with the fish and animals going about their lives without any clue of the turmoil currently going on among us crazy humans.

I recommend watching some Mister Roger’s Neighborhood if your anxiety or restlessness is especially bad. Amazon Prime has quite a few episodes. And the Fred Rogers Productions website releases 5 new episodes twice per month for free.

I always, of course, recommend reading. If your local library has been forced to shutdown due to the social distancing efforts, I recommend looking for their digital collections. You’ll find that most (though not all) libraries have a partnership with one of the two e-catalog apps for ebooks and audiobooks: Overdrive and Libby. Keep in mind that you do need a library card from your local library to access the collections, but many libraries allow you to apply for a digital-only “card” on their websites that will give you a code or number to use the digital collections.

Speaking of books, I also HIGHLY recommend Levar Burton Reads. Obviously this is going to appeal to the millennials who grew up on Reading Rainbow, but really anyone who likes fiction would probably enjoy this. It’s a podcast that Levar Burton started awhile ago where he chooses a short story to read. It’s a delight!

And, of course, there are plenty of tv series and movies to watch on cable and on the myriad streaming services available these days. Perhaps I’m wrong, but I think it’s generally safe to assume that most people have at least ONE of the major streaming services such as Netflix, Hulu, Amazon Prime, or DisneyPlus. Just for the fun of it, here are a handful of television series that I really enjoy:

The Good Place (seasons 1-3 on Netflix)
Community (on Hulu)
Lost in Space (the new one on Netflix)
The Umbrella Academy (on Netflix, and the wait for season 2 is killing me!)
Hilda (Netflix, animated and family-friendly)
Futurama (one of my all-time favorites, on Hulu)
Adventure Time (another favorite, also on Hulu)
Amphibia (a really cute new-ish animated series on DisneyPlus)
Gargoyles (if you want to go old-school on DisneyPlus)
Good Omens (on Amazon Prime, based on the novel by Neil Gaiman and Terry Pratchett, and possibly the best thing to come out of 2019)

And for the anime fans: Fairy Tail, My Hero Academia, Soul Eater, Tada Never Falls in Love, Golden Time, Inuyasha, Cowboy Bebop, Trigun, and Yu Yu Hakusho (to name just a few…)

Also, a friendly reminder that STAR TREK exists and has gifted the universe with seven different series, 13 movies, and more novelizations than you can shake a stick at.

I might also suggest something to help keep you calm and balanced, such as meditation. There are a ton of meditation books, videos, and apps. But I personally use and really like an app called Stop, Breathe, and Think. It has both a free and a paid premium version, and contains quite a lot of guided meditations and some short videos for yoga and such as well.

So that’s what I have! I would love to hear about some of things you have found, either online or elsewhere, to keep you busy, calm, and/or entertained! Please feel free to share in the comments!

Book Review: The Body in the Garden

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Book: The Body in the Garden
Author: Katharine Schellman
Release Date: 7 April 2020
Source: ARC provided by publisher (obtained through my work)
Rating: 6 out of 5 Stars (I can do that if I want to!)

Photo by me

Let me begin this review with a little backstory (kind of like I did for Disney’s Land). I love many things. I am a very enthusiastic, some might say obsessive fan, of quite a few pop culture subjects. But here are a few of my EARLIEST obsessions: Jane Austen, Sherlock Holmes, the Regency England fantasy novels of Patricia C. Wrede and Caroline Stevermer, and murder mysteries in general.

I read my first Jane Austen novel – Pride and Prejudice – in 5th grade (I was reading WELL into a college-level by fourth and fifth grade) and became immediately obsessed, proceeding to read all of her novels. At about the same time, I had become obsessed with mystery novels. I started with age-appropriate books such as Nancy Drew and the Boxcar Children, but very quickly moved on to Sherlock Holmes, who is still one of my greatest loves. Not long after that I read Mairelon the Magician by Patricia C. Wrede – a book that combined Regency England historical setting, fantasy, and a pair of beloved character solving a mystery. Her sequel The Magician’s Ward, and her trilogy of related Regency Fantasy novels co-written with Caroline Stevermer (Sorcery and Cecilia, The Grand Tour, and The Mislaid Magician) all follow in this same delightful vein.

I would easily rank Mairelon the Magician as one of my top 5 favorite novels – it is my most-commonly-read “comfort novel.” When I am sad or restless or can’t focus enough to read anything else, I read Mairelon the Magician. I have read it approximately 5 PER YEAR since I first picked it up 1995 or 1996, which means I have read it approximately 120 times!

So, to bring it back to the present: I received an ARC of The Body in the Garden by Katharine Schellman through my work. I discovered to my delight that it combines my favorite things: it is takes place in Regency (1815) England, it is a murder mystery, and it features an awesome woman detective and a dashing sea captain (a la Captain Frederick Wentworth from Jane Austen’s Persuasion). I told my friend about this perfect storm of my favorite things in one book and he replied with this Doctor Who gif:

(if you’ve seen the Doctor Who episode “The Doctor’s Wife” you get why this is so funny)

I was only 20 pages into the book and I was already absolutely DELIGHTED!

The main plot is this: Mrs. Lily Adler, recently widowed and heartbroken has returned to London from the country at the insistence of her (former) mother-in-law. There she meets up with two old friends: Lady Serena Walter (a school friend) and Captain Jack Hartley (her husband’s best childhood friend). While attending a ball thrown by her friend Serena, Lily has the supreme misfortune of accidentally overhearing an argument, pertaining to a blackmail, between persons unknown through a hedgerow, which then leads to gunfire. She and Captain Hartley then discover the dead body of an unknown young man. When the Bow Street Runners (the very early version of a police force only recently coming into itself in the early 1800s) are bribed into NOT investigating the murder, Lily Adler decides that something must be done, and determines to take on the case herself. She quickly enlists the aid of the dashing and protective Jack Hartley, and a smart determined young heiress from the West Indies who has been uncomfortable in London society because of her mixed parentage. Together they risk their reputations and their lives to solve the murder.

To say I enjoyed this book would be gross understatement! I should add, as further backstory, that I suffer from severe depression. I USED to be a prolific reader (2-3 books per week) but as some know, depression can absolutely DESTROY higher brain function. The ability to read, to write, to concentrate and focus just completely EVAPORATE. I haven’t been able to really read in at least 4 years. I switched to audiobooks a couple years ago, which helped. And in the last few months I have been slowly relearning how to read again. But VERY slowly.

So when I say I inhaled this book in THREE DAYS (just 20 pages the first night, then about ⅓ the second night, and finally finishing the whole last ⅔ in one sitting on a third day), you may perhaps understand how big a deal this is for me!

I just loved this book THAT MUCH. It was like my brain just CLICKED back on for awhile! It was AMAZING.

The two main characters, Lily and Jack (well, three I suppose if you include the heiress Ofelia Oswald), are completely wonderful. They are fully-realized, complex people who bond over their shared love for and grief over the loss of Lily’s husband, Freddy. But they also share a sense of justice, and fairplay, and hilarious SARCASM and wit. I was glad to see that they did NOT form a romance over the course of the book, but a great and touching respect and friendship. I adored them both, and I am going to jump in now, before the book is officially released in April and other people discover these characters: I am going to marry both Lily AND Jack. They are mine. You cannot have them!

The plot of the murder mystery was well-crafted and clever and kept me guessing. I thought I had it figured out and then a twist about ⅔ of the way through proved me wrong. I didn’t figure out the truth until RIGHT as the characters were ready to reveal themselves.

In addition, this book was ENORMOUSLY well-researched. It is clear that Katharine Schellman both loves the time period and has the work ethic and attention span to research the fine details that give a good story its texture and its realism. I have taken several college and graduate level courses on the subject of Jane Austen, and both Georgian and Regency-era novels, and so I recognized (perhaps more than the average reader) the kind of historical research that went into this book. It was very impressive! And really added to the overall effect and enjoyment of the book.

I really cannot stress enough how much I loved this book! I was on twitter a couple nights ago raving about it and the author herself very kindly responded. She was so friendly and she is seriously becoming one of my new favorite internet-people.

What makes me even more excited is that the cover of the book announces that it is “A Lily Adler Mystery.” Both this and the ending imply that another book (possibly many other books!) is either already being written or is at least contracted to be written. I am so happy that there will be more of these! The only downside to reading a book before it has even been released is the fact that it means waiting EVEN LONGER for the next one!

Everyone should go pre-order this book NOW while you can! (Katharine Schellman also has a pre-order sweepstakes going on her Instagram, so there’s that).

For links to pre-order there is, of course: Amazon, Barnes & Noble, and Indiebound

For the Instagram sweepstakes head here to Katharine Schellman’s profile

The Joys of “Social Distancing”

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I’ll be honest, when this whole COVID-19 thing was first becoming an issue, I wasn’t that concerned. I knew it was spreading fast but the effects didn’t seem all that severe for the majority of cases. No worse than a bad cold, it seemed to me. I knew there was reason for caution and concerned, but I figured as long as people used some common sense, it would be fine.

Now that we’re several weeks into the spread and it is officially a pandemic, it looks far more serious. The numbers coming out of places like Italy and France are, frankly, horrifying. And the U.S. as a whole is not dealing with the issue very well at all, even if some individual cities are trying their best. It is pretty shocking to watch all these huge events and things being canceled: sports events, conventions, etc.

I was really surprised when the Houston Rodeo was canceled! (I live in Houston fyi). The rodeo is THE biggest event in the city every year, and one of the biggest events in the state, right behind SXSW in Austin. The financial cost of such a cancelation has to be ENORMOUS. A lot of comic/pop-culture conventions are being canceled around the country too. And of course, all sports events have been suspended. I don’t watch a lot of sports, but I am a tennis addict so I’m REALLY feeling that loss (especially since Indian Wells, one of the bigger tournaments of the year, was supposed to start last week…).

Now that the situation has proven itself more serious that I initially thought it would be, we are all being asked to practice “social distancing.” My mother’s employer has shut down all their offices and her entire company is now working from home (she’s currently holed up in her room with 3 computer monitors, doing conference calls remotely). I work for a small online retail business and asked my employer (who is also a friend) if I could take the week off from shipping items in order to help support the whole “social distancing” thing. So I’ll be home all week too.

I’m not hugely concerned about my own health. I get sick a little easily but I’m pretty sure IF I got COVID-19 I’d probably get through it ok like I would the flu. But mother is definitely in the high-risk/immunocompromised category (with diabetes, asthma, a history of getting pneumonia at the drop of a pin, and several other co-morbid issues), so I am trying to be extra-careful not to bring anything home to her.

So we haven’t much left the house since Friday. We did do some grocery shopping yesterday – we are trying not to panic-buy and hoard but we definitely needed SOME things. And I did – in a kind of show of solidarity with the Asian community who has been so hit by racism in the midst of this – go to Chinatown for lunch at one of my favorite restaurants on Friday. My mother and I were the only people in the restaurant. It was sad. I know as more and more people self-isolate that ALL restaurants and retail stores are going to be taking a financial hit, but Asian communities are definitely getting the worst of it right now.

What have been I doing with isolation, then? I read a whole novel and a graphic novel so far. I’ve watched quite a few episodes of Fairy Tail (an anime, for the uninitiated). I did a bunch of laundry and dishes. I cleaned every flat surface, door handle, light switch, and remote in the house. Several times. I played Clue with my mother, my brother, and my brother’s fiancé (I’m not a big fan of board games overall but my mother and brother love them and they begged, so…. *shrug*).

This week I have plans to read a bunch more. Write some blog posts. Watch some movies. Maybe work on a puzzle I started months ago but never got far on. I do have some work-related things to do from home – logging receipts and basic bookkeeping things mostly. But I am hoping to take advantage of my time off to do some ME-things. *fingers crossed*

So how about you folks? How are you all managing the situation? Are you able to work from home, or are you in the unfortunate category of people who have no choice but to go in to work? If you’re self-isolating, what are you doing to pass the time?

Flatten the curve, my friends! Flatten the curve!

Book Review: Disney’s Land

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Book: Disney’s Land: Walt Disney and the invention of the Amusement Park That Changed the World
Author: Richard Snow
Release Date: December 2019
Source: Hardcover bought At Barnes & Noble
Rating: 5 out of 5 Stars

I love Disney. Let me just be clear about that. I know it’s “cool” right now to criticize Disney (the company as a whole). I see comments and articles all over Twitter and Facebook and such about how horrible the company is, or how the Academy Awards are rigged to give them (more specifically Pixar) the Animated Feature Award every year, or how badly they treat their park employees, etc. I know all these things, and I agree with plenty (though not all) of them. There are many issues with the company as a whole that need to be addressed. Absolutely.

But I still LOVE Disney. Most little kids do, but many adults grow out of it. I never did. I never will. I have no wish to do so. It’s practically a religion to me. I love the movies (most of the time… no, I did not go see the live-action Aladdin nor the “live-action”-but-really-CGI Lion King). I love the tv programs. I love the Marvel movies (despite their many flaws). I haven’t entirely loved what they’ve done to the Star Wars films, but… *shrug* I ADORE the parks. I have loads and loads of Disney merchandise – art books and prints and dolls and pins and and and…

All this is to say: OF COURSE I was going to buy Richard Snow’s new book about the invention and design of Disneyland. And OF COURSE I was going to love it.

Now, Richard Snow is a well respected journalist, editor, and history writer. He has worked a quite a few documentaries including the Burns’ brothers’ The Civil War. And his last book, Iron Dawn: The Monitor, the Merrimack, and the Civil War Sea Battle That Changed History, won a prize for Naval Literature. So perhaps it was a bit odd that a history writer who has written about such serious topics would choose to write about something as “frivolous” as Disneyland. Thankfully, Richard Snow happens to be a HUGE fan of theme parks, and Disneyland in particular, and thankfully his editor and agent give him full rein to explore this topic, and thankfully he knew and PROVED that Disneyland is not such a frivolous topic after all.

His book Disney’s Land: Walt Disney and the Invention of the Amusement Park That Changed the World, is an enormously well-researched deep-dive into not only the park itself, but Walt Disney’s life and frame-of-mind leading up to and during the build of Disneyland, as well as providing snippets into the lives of the many many people (animators, designers, “imagineers”) who made Disneyland possible, all while also keeping the narrative deeply grounded and rooted in its context of post-WW2 1950s America.

To say this book is thorough and filled with more research – primary, secondary, interviews, etc – than you can shake a stick at would be a massive understatement. The bibliographies section is 7 pages long (in small print!) and has given me a mind-bogglingly huge new goal to find and read as many of the materials cited in the book as possible. But more than that, this book is also delightfully well-written: the prose is smart, and entertaining, and often very funny. And Richard Snow approaches the subject with so much respect and love, while remaining balanced, honest, and fair about Walt Disney’s (and others) faults and shortcomings, that I believe even the most hardened anti-Disney heart MUST come away with at least a LITTLE respect for the overall concept and project of Disneyland, and the men and women who made it possible.

If you, like me, love Disney. You absolutely definitely must read this book. If you are a tepid about Disney, I think even YOU might enjoy this read. I also believe that anyone in a creative business would find this book highly enlightening, inspiring, and possibly instructive. So get to it people!

(Next on my list of nonfiction – I read a LOT of nonfiction – is a book on a related topic to this one. It is The Queens of Animation by Nathalia Holt, which is about the women who worked for Disney Animation often with little or no recognition in the early days. One of my favorites of these women is Mary Blair. I’m really looking forward to this book!)