This weekly roundup will be a bit different since I’m pulling together a whole month instead.
At the end of October, I shared my goals for November. They were ambitious and I’m happy to say I achieved none of them, so I got that going for me!
I did get quite a lot done, but I also ran into various complications owing to having a life and all that jazz.
I started a new substack that will just republish obscure or forgotten works in the public domain. Right now, we’re serializing Varney the Vampyre.
It’s fun.
This Month’s Posts
Going to break things down a bit differently this time.
Interviews:
TV Shows:
Interview with the Vampire - Just a tremendous adaptation of Anne Rice’s novel that both transforms the novel while also becoming, somehow, more itself.
Wheel of Time: Season One - An interesting adaptation that suffers from the same problems most dramatic television has. I’ve previously called it Prestige TV Syndrome.
Politics:
The End of Nonviolence - This is, in many ways, a sequel to October’s essay about Israel and Palestine (which, somehow, became one of my most popular essays). In my view, the antiwar movement, at least in the US, has been buried.
Writerly Things:
Broken Katana Cover Reveal - Um, exactly what it sounds like!
Broken Katana Release Day! - Uh, well, you get it. My new book came out on Friday. Paying subscribers received the ebook on Thursday. If you didn’t, get in touch with me. I’ll send it to you.
An excerpt from Broken Katana - Two chapters from the new novel hosted by
Short Stories:
Your Heart Looks like a Fist Wrapped in Blood - Bookworms
All My Heroes are Russian Folksingers - Untold Stories Anthology
He sleeps with garlands woven in his hair - Into the Forest Anthology
Allegedly, I have three more stories coming out before the end of the year.
Emrys the Fool:
I continued to publish my serial novel (about 15,000 words). You can see the full Table of Contents here.
Dadpod Gamescast:
Doki Doki Literature Club - We discuss this fascinating little game.
A Medley of Short Games - We discuss a bunch of games that you can play in a short amount of time.
Superhero Games - The first of these podcasts without me! But Joe and Rik discuss superhero games from the NES era up until the current generation.
Other Podcasts:
- .
Also discussed Doki Doki Literature Club with the Agitator boys.
And then I discussed Sally Rooney’s Normal People at the Getting Lit podcast with
From the Archives
I have an idea of something I’m going to be proposing here over the next few months, so I’m going to reshare these outlines I wrote for books that someone else should write.
I think I’ll start doing more of these now that I know there are so many writers in the crowd.
Listening
I am not a manga/comics person, in general, but I do like this podcast where the hosts read the first volume of a manga and then discuss it. It’s the weird, highly specific kind of thing I’ve always loved.
Reading
Read five Richard Brautigan novels sort of randomly. Just read a novel called The Hole by Hye-Young Pyun. It’s pretty good! Also read The Historian by Elizabeth Kostova, which is kind of all right, and The Sailor Who Fell from Grace with the Sea by Yukio Mishima, which was great. Then there’s a reread of Normal People by Sally Rooney and a first read of The Third Policeman by Flann O’Brien.
Currently reading a Warhammer 40k book because I’m an idiot, but it’s pretty interesting! Also Marguerite Duras’ The Lover because that’s the kind of thing people like me read.
Watching
I watched the first season of Wheel of Time, but you know that. Not sure what else I’ve been watching. I mean, really, who cares. Most shows are terrible and I only make it through a few before forgetting about it.
A lot of movies are also terrible.
Substack Articles to Check Out
Taylor Swift Does Not Exist Also by Sam Kriss
The End of the Extremely Online Era by
Dread: A Tumbling Tower of Terror by
How to be a Public Historian by
Why so Cyan? On the digital modernization of The Abyss by
Pull Me Under gets an ebook by
Become a proverb a la Ahti from Control by
The Fun Fallacy in Game Design by
- I’ll be writing a response to this one, so keep an eye out for that.What Else?
Interestingly, November saw decent growth here, considering I wasn’t writing or publishing anything. I also saw more book sales than typical. I’m wondering if people just began missing me and so they sought out my books!
Who can say, but I am considering changing my publishing schedule because of that.
Not yet, mind, but maybe next year I’ll try doing purely one essay per week rather than two (or three).
Some things to consider.
That’s it from me.
Anyway, read my books that are currently out. Then review them.
Thank you.
Read the first three chapter of Sleeping Giants.
Glossolalia - A Le Guinian fantasy novel about an anarchic community dealing with a disaster
Sing, Behemoth, Sing - Deadwood meets Neon Genesis Evangelion
Howl - Vampire Hunter D meets The Book of the New Sun in this lofi cyberpunk/solarpunk monster hunting adventure
Colony Collapse - Star Trek meets Firefly in the opening episode of this space opera
The Blood Dancers - The standalone sequel to Colony Collapse.
Iron Wolf - Sequel to Howl.
Sleeping Giants - Standalone sequel to Colony Collapse and The Blood Dancers
Broken Katana - Sequel to Iron Wolf.
Wolf.
Howl.
Love Leonard Cohen! Thank you for the mention.
Thanks for the mention!