August Wrap-Up

I think my book reading pretty much disappeared by the last week of August, because I found myself occupied during the weekends and then-some. School is starting soon, though, so I’m actually glad at the amount of books I managed to read over the summer, on top of being able to take proper vacations with friends and family. 🙂

Books Read

I actually didn’t have a favorite book this month. Normally I’d have read something super fabulous by now, but eh, I guess it could explain some of my book rut during the month.

|| A Promise of Fire by Amanda Bouchet || The Exile: An Outlander Graphic Novel by Diana Gabaldon ||
|| Secrets in the Snow by Michaela MacColl || Snow White: A Graphic Novel by Matt Phelan ||
|| The Cake Therapist by Judith Fertig ||
|| William Shakespeare’s The Empire Striketh Back by Ian Doescher ||
|| William Shakespeare’s The Jedi Doth Return by Ian Doescher ||

Currently Reading

Don’t laugh, but I totally considered it an accomplishment that I read another 200ish pages of The Way of Kings. I WILL GET IT DONE THIS YEAR. I might, however, just DNF Jade Dragon Mountain. I got pretty bored with it by this point.

|| Jade Dragon Mountain by Elsa Hart || The Way of Kings by Brandon Sanderson ||
|| Career of Evil by Robert Galbraith || Rebel Genius by Michael Dante DiMartino ||

Writing

• I pretty much wrote everywhere in August. The best part about Vakarian is that I can move him anywhere in the house, and even outside. Of course, for a more compact sort of writing, I fished out my lovely traveling notebook and jotted notes down there, too.
• Author party with Dreaming Robot Press! As part of the publisher’s promotion of the 2017 Young Explorer’s Adventure Guide, DRP hosted a Speculative Author Party on August 16th. There, authors of the upcoming anthology (and a few previous ones in the YEAG series) came to join in the fun and posted a things about themselves and about the stories they have planned in the future. It was super-fun, and I cannot believe I was part of the stellar group of writers for the anthology. Support the Kickstarter here!
• An SFWA surprise. Related to the above point, of course. We also heard word that the Science Fiction and Fantasy Writers of America has selected us as one of their Star Project kickstarters. THIS IS KIND OF AWESOME, YOU GUYS. Alright, I can breathe now.
• I finished my steampunk novel! Well, the first draft is DONE DONE DONE. This isn’t to say I’m anywhere near querying this project, but the first hurdle is done, and I can now move onto the grueling editing stage.

Movies

Had a bit of a Star Wars kick in August, so I ended up watching the old, non-remastered original movies (you know, the one where Han Solo SHOT FIRST? XD). I also FINALLY watched The Force Awakens, which, shamefully enough, I hadn’t seen at all until now. My friend and I are winding down on our animated movies list, so we’re totally going to need a new list to deal with. I’m thinking a certain director or other, but I haven’t chosen yet. I did see Suicide Squad and am thinking about writing a review for it, because I thought it was okay. It wasn’t good enough for me to love it, but I also didn’t think it was bad enough to garner all the hate on review sites like Rotten Tomatoes.

|| Perfect Blue || High Strung || Jane Got a Gun || Chicken Run ||
|| Star Wars IV: A New Hope || Star Wars V: The Empire Strikes Back ||
|| Star Wars VI: Return of the Jedi || Star Wars VI: The Force Awakens ||
|| The Illusionist || Suicide Squad || Son of Batman ||

Television

• Jonathan Strange & Mr. Norrell – I’ve actually sold my copy of the book without having read it, since it was so low priority for me, but the show is interesting so far! It’s so British and Victorian and fantastical and magical.
• Gran Hotel – So, uh, I hadn’t realized this was a Spanish drama up until I looked at the opening cast credits. But the closest I can describe this series is that it’s Spain’s version of Downton Abbey but with murder. XD
• Midsomer Murders – I normally put this in the background while I do other things. Like blog. Likely I’ve got it in the background now.
• The Olympic Games – I had to find many creative ways to watch the Olympics this year, owing to the fact that NBC completely commandeers the event for the US and I do not have cable. I made do, though.

Video Games

• Dragon Age: Origins – I realized my friend had actually sent me the ultimate edition of Dragon Age: Origins which included all the DLCs. Which meant this was the only thing I’ve played in August. Also, hot damn, the Awakening DLC has left me confused over how I feel over Anders. I love him because he’s peppy and has Cullen Rutherford’s voice, but then I remember him blowing up the Chantry in DA2 and then I hate him all over again. Damn you, Anders!

Fooding

Learned quite a bit about vegan baking and cooking this month! And also learned quite a bit about how much food ten or so people eat on a weekend in entirety (the answer is A SHITTON, lol!). Also did quite a bit of eating around the city pier and the beach. Lovely yummy stuff.

|| Grilled Pork and Vegetables on Skewers || Fish Tacos || Chicken Teriyaki Crepe ||
|| Mini Brownie Cookies || Funnel Cakes || Sushi ||

Miscellany

• Glamping camping – A group of us headed on over to the Poconos for a bit of a spell one weekend. I got dragged hiking, though I didn’t quite make it to the top of the mountain. Instead, I meandered towards a lake and proceeded to write there instead. No regrets!
• Knitting stuff – I’m on my way to making several infinity scarves on commission. Grabbed myself more colors, believe it or not! Because clearly I need more yarn…
• Beach day – More like Beach weekend. If anyone was near the Jersey Shore and saw two dinosaurs with super soakers running rampant on the beach, that was probably my group wreaking havoc. Yeah.
• Harry Potter pub trivia – So there’s this pub in NYC that hosts geek trivia every Wednesday night. As an extension of the geek trivia, there was a Harry Potter trivia challenge on Saturday evening. Naturally, my friends and I went! It may have been a good idea to wait until the END of the trivia challenge before we started drinking. Um. We didn’t actually win, but we did jump 7 spots up by the second half of the trivia!

Nerdy News

Elijah Wood stars in Dirk Gently’s Holistic Detective Agency. I cannot wait for this, it looks SO GOOD!

My opinion of the past seasons of Doctor Who have been lukewarm at best. Mostly because I’m really not fond of some of the actors they’d cast in the roles (mostly I just did not like Clara Oswald). The latter episodes I did really like, though, so that’s a good thing. But I did love Capaldi, and I wish him all the best for the next season.

The notion of trying to shut a review website down is kind of silly, IMO. Yes, it discolors audience’s opinions of a movie, but honestly, I never really put much stock in movie critic reviews. I was more interested in the audience response, because occasionally, there’s a huge disjoint between “critic” reviews and what the audience thought.

Welcome to the massive CW super-crossover. I really, really need to catch up on these shows…

Hello, Superman. May I take this moment to welcome you back?

You go, Niantic. Honestly, I don’t see the point in cheating on Pokemon Go. Where’s the fun in that?

I wish this was lengthened to a full animated movie. You cannot take the sky from meeeee!

More Harry Potter books? Yespls! Although according to a few sources, these books are short stories penned by J.K. Rowling herself, and are to be released as e-books. Some may have already been Pottermore stories. But since I may have forgotten my Pottermore account, yespls to this!

Game of Thrones is delayed to summer 2017. I’m not sure how I feel about this…

No Man’s Sky hype kind of sputtered out and died. Honestly, I’d only heard of the game a month or two ago, and while I was interested in seeing the gameplay, I’m not nearly as gung-ho about getting this game. Besides, I’ve already sold my soul to Bioware and Bethesda for their next games.

Hadn’t heard of this show before, but steampunk wild west? Yespls!

More Agatha Christie productions! Yesssssss.