Books Completed January 2024

 

The Game Master's Book of Astonishing Random Tables, by Ben Eglof - A surprise gift from my friend Bud, who got a copy for themselves as well. This does what it says on the tin for the most part, and is pages and pages of tables for fantasy RPGs, with a strong focus on 5e D&D without saying that. The first section on world-building seemed like decent advice, but quite unlikely to fall into the hands of someone who would need it. The second section is the meat of the book, and I won't say I read every line, but there's inspiration here. The random encounter tables could have used more cross-referencing to other tables in the book and fewer "1d6 [level-appropriate monsters] leap from nowhere". The three one-shot adventures at the end were the weak part of the book, only ever utilizing the wealth of tables as a seeming afterthought, and broadly feeling like railroads in the worst 2e tradition, though the mystery had an approach to the solution that was useful for a one-shot.

Mourka, by Tanaquil Le Clercq (Author) and Martha Swope (Photographer) - Before there were cat blogs, there was Life magazine. I received this as an Xmas gift from my cousin Nate, and it expounds on a famous cat photo from the 1964, telling the fictitious exploits of a real rescue cat owned by a real ballet director. The photos are cut together with more than amateur but less than professional expertise, and that makes it fun. It's like a printed tweet thread.

boing

New England Cook Book of Fine Old Recipes, by Kay Morrow - A gift from my brother for Xmas. This is from 1936, and falling apart a bit, sadly. Another one of those old cookbooks that really hammers home how cheap and available seafood used to be, and how maaaybe that wasn't a great idea. Not too many show stopper recipes in here, though sour-cream and raisin pie stands out. Oh, and

a gentleman's dish

What Moves the Dead, by T. Kingfisher - An Xmas present from my wife (there is a theme this month). A retelling and exploration of Poe's Fall of the House of Usher, which I had just so happened to read in December. A delightful and spooky little tale that really leans into the italicized bits of its inspiration (it's the fungi). Describing the inhuman in a relatable way is always a challenge, and Kingfisher rises to it while riffing on the source material admirably but not obsessively.

The Kaiju Preservation Society, by John Scalzi - Source: See above. I think I might have been banter-deprived, because this book delighted me, and it is a rich seam of banter My banterometer is full now.

Legends & Lattes, by Travis Baldree - Source: See above. A slow and (generally) kind fantasy romance that I really enjoyed. I showed my friend Bud the cover and they picked it up with no further information and are also enjoying it. I should seek out more books like this, it took my blood pressure down a few points without ever being saccharine.

Career Cat, by Eleanor Harris - In the same vein as Mourka, above, and from the same source (thank, Nate) this would have been a blog post or a tweet thread these days. It follows the life of a cat in the 50s in New York who becomes famous for numerous advertisements. The origin story seems a little too fabulous to believe, but not enough for me to dig in and try to confirm or refute it. Handsome cat, to be sure, I do wish this version had been in color.

Caribbean Cookbook, by Rita G Springer - I found this in a little free library, along with a trove of other cookbooks from the 60s. It's fascinating in its completeness - it's not a cookbook of, say, Caribbean recipes, but a cookbook of how to cook in the Caribbean, down to how to make coffee, or what to serve for Christmas. There is a continual focus on nutrition and economy that aligns with the author's home economics credentials stated in the introduction. It's another seafood-heavy cookbook that feels like it's from another time.

The Mold Farmer, by Rick Claypool - I actually read this in December, but forgot to include it in that post, so rolling it over here. A gift from my friend Daniella, this novelette uses Lovecraftian tropes to tell a harrowing and odious story of oppression through the life of the titular mold farmer. I think I might need to read this one again and really sit with it. I bet if you had children it would hit a different chord. It's one of those ones I can't say I liked, but it was impactful. 

Kidnapped, by Robert Louis Stevenson - A little free library find. Kind of hard to believe this was children's literature back in the days. Maybe kids are soft now, or maybe we didn't care about them at all back then. Hard to imagine a middle ground, and I'm in my mid-forties and grew up with unrestricted and voracious access to a library back then. Anyway, this was a ride, and I want to watch a couple of the many film adaptations. I simply did not have the religious background that was assumed the average (ten year old?) reader would have, but I loved the characters (when they weren't dying horribly).

The ABCs of Casseroles, by Ruth McCrea - An Xmas gift from my brother. This is a supermarket checkout book from 1954 that sticks to the gimmick of its title and arranges dozens of casserole recipes alphabetically. Some are pretty forced, like "Johnny's Favorite" or "XYZ Pudding", but they're all cookable at least. I wasn't left craving any. There's also a little rhyme and period illustration for each letter, which are cute.

Books Completed December 2023

  

A Christmas Bestiary, by John Kenn Mortensen and Benni Bødker -Think I saw this promoted when I was ordering Night Terrors, and it'd be one of the few times I can remember an internet ad actually working. This is an advent calendar of Christmas and Yuletide related beasts, spirits, and spooks mostly from Scandinavia, with pointers for the reader on their danger levels and survival tips. I picked up a copy for my brother as well with the intent we'd each read a page a day. Really a fun ride and glad to have it my stack of Christmas books now.

North American Lake Monsters, by Nathan Ballingrud - My friend Daniella kindly sent me a stack of books from Lovecraft Arts & Sciences, and this was among them. I thought it was a bestiary at first glance, but it turned out to be a collection of grim and haunting short stories, many centered around New Orleans, all centered around something sucking at the heart of whatever America is, with the supernatural aspects applied more for contrast of that in most cases than as the real horror themselves. Quick and gripping reads with some genuinely unsettling moments.

The Old Farmer's Almanac Colonial Cookbook, edited by Clarissa M. Silitch - Received this from my parents for Christmas. I'm pretty sure I have another version of this somewhere, or something quite, quite similar, but I can't find it. Does what it says on the tin - a collection of colonial-era recipes, adjusted for modern measurements in most cases, if not modern tastes. I do not particularly want to try the ham-stuffed calves' ears, for example, but most of these look fine, if demanding more time than I have these days. It definitely has some rose-colored glasses on in the historical anecdotes that accompany some recipes in how it discusses Native Americans and the "servants", ahem, at several plantations.

The Shortest History of India, by John Zubrzycki - Sometime last year I realized rather out of the blue I know very little about India despite working with many people who live there. So I looked around and ordered a few books, and this is the first one I finished. I now still know that I know very little about India, but I'm more aware of the depths of my ignorance, so, that's a start. Cramming 5,000 years of history into under 300 pages is obviously never going to be more than a survey, which is why I was surprised the author often chose to linger on some episodes that felt sensationalist, or graphically violent. But I had to start somewhere, and it was a good read overall. Also, apparently, there is a whole line of short histories by this publisher, so I may get more to fill in some other gaps in my education once I winnow down my TBR pile.

Hogfather, by Terry Pratchett - I read this every year for Christmas. Still holds up, not much new to say. I lent an extra copy to a neighbor, but haven't had the chance to see what she thought of it. This year the character of Violet stuck out to me more than usual. I noticed she made some contradictory statements and got to wondering if that was on purpose to show her rather flighty personality, or an editing mistake. Maybe I'll remember to look around for others' thoughts some day. Probably not. In any case, a tradition I look forward too each year - there are not many books at all I read over and over.

The Notes and Commonplace Book of H. P. Lovecraft - Another entry from Daniella's gift stack. This is a reproduction of a facsimile of a notebook where HPL scribbled his half-formed ideas and bits of inspiration as they struck from whatever source, mostly as sentence fragments. I have several books that reference this, and knowing of it made me start one of my own years ago, but somehow I never actually read it until now, so that felt nice. You can see which of these ideas were developed into stories, and which never quite justified it (vampire seals, looking at you). The second half of the book is summaries of dozens of works he considered interesting or inspirational, but I only read the ones for stories I'd read, of which there were only seven or eight, for fear of spoilers. It is, however, a great-looking reading list once, again, I winnow down the current TBR pile from Christmas.

Books Completed November 2023

The Narrative of A. Gordon Pym of Nantucket, by Edgar Allan Poe - I pulled this from the shelf from a collection my wife has had for ages and ages after finishing the manga of At The Mountains of Madness last month, which was so heavily inspired by this. A few years ago, I was writing a pirate TTRPG that I put aside after learning too much about actual piracy - if I'd read this back then, it might have pushed me onward. There's some absolutely weird tonal thumps in here that don't connect with the modern reader, and I mean thumps like shoes in a drier. The framing is bizarre, and there's the requisite early 1800's racist subplot, but on the whole I'm glad to have read this, especially knowing all the other works it's inspired over the centuries. Love how you could just... stop writing a serialized story back then and be like "figure it out, weirdos".

Cookbook of the Seven Seas, by Dagmar Freuchen - Part of a trove of 1960's cookbooks I found in a little free library. It's not explicitly framed as such, but this is an homage by the author to her husband, who died unexpected on an exploration trip. His memory touches every chapter, which are based around how the couple interpreted the seven seas of the world. The only recipe I bookmarked was about making rice pudding with Coca Cola and a single almond merely to make my own spouse shudder. It's a sweet and sad cookbook illustrated by the author, her own vanished world wrapped in other layers of disappearance here for me decades later.

Taste of Eritrea, by Olivia Warren - Same cache of books, but from the 90s. I can't find out anything else about the author, but the subtitle for this one is "Recipes from one of East Africa's most interesting little countries". Hrm. Well, it's autobiographical of her several-month stay, and she seems to have had a lovely time. The recipes themselves are two thirds "yes, cook food with spices" and one third "oh no that would take three days". Her hopes for the country itself have not turned out quite the way she hoped, sadly.

Saga Vol. 11, by Fiona Staples and Brian K. Vaughan - Forgot I ordered this, and got a nice little mailbox surprise. It's more Saga, it's more "war is awful" drum beat, but a few surprising character moments. The dream sequence/flashback is getting a little tired as a storytelling device, no matter how much of an excuse it gives to draw dead characters. Still, looking forward to the next one.

42: The Wildly Improbable Ideas of Douglas Adams, edited by Kevin Jon Davies - I Kickstartered this and a 42nd birthday present to myself, thinking the timing was just too good. The pandemic slammed research and production though, and I just got it this year, having almost forgotten about it. The drafts and scraps of unproduced works I found the most fascinating, these stories that'll never be fully told. The letters that his friends were invited to write were a touching addition I don't recall seeing in other anthologies. I think I'm going to have to pull some of his books off the shelves soon after reading this, I haven't touched them in too long.

Worlds Beyond Time: Sci-Fi Art of the 1970s, by Adam Rowe - I got this new, but I can't remember where I heard of it. I was at first surprised at quantity of the writing, expecting more of an art book, but then pleased by its quality and the context it set. The production quality is quite nice, which is fitting of the gorgeous subject matter. I want to take another couple lazy passes at this one, just soaking in the imagination oozing out of these pages.

Books Completed October 2023

 Good ol' spooky season.

 

 

 

Night Terror, by John Kenn Mortensen - I got Mortensen's Post-It Monsters years ago, and was thrilled and surprised to see, via another blog's monthly media post, he had some new work out. This is a big-format art book full of his creepy and evocative line drawings that was great to have for Halloween time. It's definitely going on the bestiary shelf.

Just a few sample images.

 

Sean Äaberg's Halloween Book - I backed this on Kickstarter back in 2021, and forgot about it until it happily showed up at the start of October. I was expecting more of an art book, but it also contains several essays by the author on his own vision of what Halloween should be about. I'll admit it wasn't clicking right for me until I started thinking about it as a hardbound zine, and then it all worked. I only found out after the fact that he was really involved with zines of various sorts for years, so there you go. The Halloween menus lists actually really inspired me and I ended up making a lot of corn bread and chili and pumpkin curry over the month, so that was fun.

 

Something Wicked This Way Comes, by Ray Bradbury - Normally in October I read The October Country, but I just wasn't feeling it this year for whatever reason. I remembered a discussion with a friend at work about this one though, and her being surprised I had never read it, so I picked it up. Turns out I have read this before, but not for something like 20 years, and I somehow forgot about it, which doesn't seem like it should be possible. I don't know if this is Bradbury's masterpiece, but it's certainly one of his strongest works, very much in his primary-colored idiom, while breaking from it in startling ways that are still his own. Fantastic.

The Halloween Tree, by Ray Bradbury - This one I do read every year, not a tall order for a young adult book. This year the theme of smiles really jumped out at me for some reason. Everything is smiling or is a smile (particularly scythes). Some day I will have to vet the history he describes against the real world. I'm sure it was at least good-faith accurate when he wrote it, but he also has his own mid-century, middle America biases I don't feel like he ever really addressed.

H. P. Lovecraft's At the Mountains of Madness, by Gou Tanabe - A quite faithful manga retelling of Lovecraft's longest work that my wife gave me for Christmas several years ago and I decided to pull off the shelf for October. I love Tanabe's intricate line work and ability to convey a sense of vast, horrifying scale from a 7 x 5 paperback 2-page spread. Having the Elder Things convey emotion somehow is also impressive.

The Handyman Method, by Nick Cutter & Andrew F. Sullivan - The same blog post above says "this book opens the door to the dank basement of Gothic masculinity, forcing us to examine the dark shape of manhood in the current moment". Sounded enticing, so I picked it up new to get some contemporary writing into my October reading. I think I'm just straight up bad at reading for themes though, because this landed as a pretty standard modern terror tale for me. It had its moments, and I'm stealing the dungeon idea for an adventure at some point.

Methuselah's Children, by Robert Heinlein - Not Halloween really at all, but I found this on a shelf and had no idea where it came from. Since it was short and I didn't recall ever reading it, thought I'd just tear through. It's a Heinlein novel, yep, but the Lazarus Long character always feels like he wandered in from a pulp comic from two decades earlier. The structure is quite odd, feeling like three and a half smaller books kind of strung together with self-insert political rants and Math. Fun in its own way?

Cat and Girl Vol. 5, by  Dorothy Gambrell - The last volume of the set I picked up in a flash sale. More wit, cynicism, cloudcuckoolanders, and simmering despair. A few more color page experiments than the last volumes. All told, glad to have this set in my comics bookcase finally.

Peter Hunt's Cape Cod Cookbook - I found a trove of a half-dozen cookbooks from the 60s in a little free library, and this was the first one I went through -- what a trip. I was not familiar with Peter Hunt, but he was apparently a famous folk artist living in Cape Cod in his later years. The recipes are fine and interesting (but with an approach to the availability of seafood we'd find hard to fathom these days), but taken as a snapshot of a certain lifestyle in the early 60s on the Cape, it's fascinating. Most recipes are described as coming from a certain neighbor, and the notion of just dropping in at someone's studio until a party forms spontaneously and someone decides to start making paella, or having the restaurant across the street from your house decide to send a violinist over to your patio party on a whim are... another world.

Books Completed September 2023

 

 

Analog: The Best of Science Fiction, by Analog Magazine - I think I've had this anthology from 1982 since high school, almost certainly from a library sale. Some of the stories were distantly familiar, so I must have picked through it at some point or another, but I pulled it off the shelf a while ago to use as bedtime reading and finally finished it up. There are 32 stories which vary quite a bit in quality and length, and several more right-wingish ones than I'm used to running across. I particularly liked the stories by Arthur C. Clark and Lester del Ray, not so much the longest one by Randall Garrett (mysteries that rely on magic are really dodgy to me), and was reminded I don't much care for Asimov's preachy self-insert characters.

The Snail Factory, by Ari Bach - Originally a webcomic about the factory that makes the world's snails by the guy who runs https://facts-i-just-made-up.tumblr.com which I read via RSS when it was being posted, I decided to pick up this print-on-demand version when he announced it to support him a bit for years of entertainment. Surreal illustrations, some shaggy dog storytelling, and still some legitimately funny and unsettling moments.

Fevered Star, by Rebecca Roanhorse - The second installment of the Between Earth and Sky series "inspired by the civilizations of the Pre-Columbian Americas" that I picked up new after getting the first one as a gift a while back. I had been wondering if the series was going to turn out to be one of those where you think it's a fantasy but it's really a distant future where people are using misunderstood ancient technology, but I'm pretty sure given the stuff that happened in this volume that is off the table and we're off to full-blown magic land. I enjoy this series quite a bit despite it having so many characters and relationships the book comes with a "players" section at the start, which is a challenge for me, but I'm sticking with it. I think the third one comes out soon.

Cat and Girl Vol. 3 & 4, by Dorothy Gambrell - Yep, plinked through a couple more of these that I picked up last month during a flash sale. Still satisfying, clever, and poignant, and there are a few experiments with color in these volumes. They also have indexes which should seize anyone's attention with the breadth of topics included.

A Natural History of Nonsense, by Bergen Evans - I don't know for sure where this book came from, but I think it was part of a Christmas gift years ago of a stack of natural history books and bestiaries. This is not a natural history at all though, rather a collection of short essays printed in 1947 where the author, who was apparently a prominent skeptic at the time, discusses a variety of topics of common knowledge addressing the misconceptions and logical fallacies that underpin them. He would have done numbers on YouTube. It was striking to me how relevant many of these writings still felt - we're still batting around the same assumptions over 70 years later. The language in the later chapters on race and gender relations have not aged super well, but I think he was coming from the right place.

Bunnicula, by James and Deborah Howe - Saw this in a little free library and it flew into my pocket somehow. This was the first "chapter book" I remember reading cover-to-cover back in elementary school. One thing I appreciated as an adult that I certainly didn't as a kid was how the illustrations by Alan Daniel have an etching quality that plays with what classical illustrations for Dracula. Still a funny and charming  book, and another one I will have to send along to the niblings.

Some Magical Items

Potion of Shirt-On-Backwards

The imbiber of this cursed potion cannot put their shirt on the right way. Normally this is just embarrassing and can be hidden under a cloak or shawl. Unfortunately the effect extends to armor, and affected's armor class is always treated as a class lower. Also may mess with some high-necked sorcerer robes.

Teleportato

Eat this whole tuber raw and you'll be warped back to where it was grown. The crops are a little weaker and meandering each year. Cooked into a meal it invokes strong yearning for that place instead and grants everyone who partakes advantage on checks to navigate there for a month.

Knobgoblin

A leering, verdigrised codpiece that bestows all the advantages of a ring of protection if worn proudly and obviously. Its facial expression shifts slightly to match the wearer's subconscious when not observed. Once per week it can be used to cast magic missile with a suitably obscene set of somatic gestures.

Pom de Terror

Planted in a garden, this root will flourish with almost no care. In fact, it will grow luxuriously when other plants near it flounder, and produce far too many offshoots. Within a year, it becomes the basis of farming within the hex it was planted in. And then it withdraws its nourishment -- the roots become bitter and underwhelming, providing just enough to keep people and livestock moving but not nourished. Soon they advance to their neighbor's farms, sickles sharpened, hungry grins waiting. The Pom de Terror is upon them.

Glaive of Mutilation

On a critical hit, this outlandish polearm deals an outlandish amount of extra damage (6d, maximum x 3, +3, whatever comes up to the borders of the system without being vorpal).

You Tuber

A wriggling 5-pronged root. Cut yourself, dribble some blood on it while you whisper, and plant it somewhere dank. Come back in a year, and unearth a simulacrum fascinated with your whispers and gaining approval, though not necessarily yours. It's a crappy copy of you with expertise in one of your skills, no loyalty, and an intense desire for fame. Good luck.

The Book of Making Ready the Way

This spellbook would look at home on any academic's shelf. A leather-bound, tastefully-gilt vellum volume. The internals are fairly common observations on the night sky and weather patterns, with a lot of internal references. Like, a lot. Holding certain pages that reference each other forces one's fingers into the correct patterns, and there lie the book's spells of abjuration and, with practice, hidden names.

If the Book of Making Ready the Way is used as a material component in any ritual that requires tracing a geometry, that ritual is a level more effective due to the precise placement of angles and points the book engenders.

Bolus Bolas

Rank and stinking bolas with a wet mass bound on each end. They deal escalating acid damage to a creature bound up in them for a few rounds until they burn themselves out.

Given a pair of rations, they can recover or even reproduce themselves.

Trickledown

This magical saber is forged of pure reaganite. On a hit, compare the wielder's lifestyle to the target's (luxury > wealthy > modest > poor > squalid): Trickledown deals additional damage for each step the wielder is above the target (a d6, or a +1, or bump the weapon die, depending on the system).

Additionally, the wielder has advantage on any Deception-style checks to convince someone a plan is in their best interest, or to stoke fears of a nebulous "they", so long as the notion is mostly lacking in details.

Trickledown is a mildly intelligent weapon with a weak and mumbly ego wrapped around a blistering Neutral Evil core dedicated to the golden rule: He who has the gold makes the rules. It will nudge its bearer to acquire wealth at any cost, but preferably at someone else's cost.

The saber's goat-skin scabbard, Throat, is also mildly enchanted. Once per month, it can be used to cast commune, but it can just say no. It's said that on lonely nights, some adventurers have put the scabbard to unusual uses with remarkable success, but this is likely merely a rumor.

Books Completed August 2023

I'm reading a lot of books right now, but I didn't finish many in August.

 

 

The Monster Overhaul, by Skerples - A birthday gift from my brother, and right up my alley. It's a Kickstartered tabletop RPG book billed as "a practical bestiary" with a focus of usability at the table and a minimum of cruft. The monsters are grouped by theme, which is generally quite nice and useful, except for the kind of abstract groups by season, but the indexes are so complete it still works okay. Art is lovely throughout, with lots of well-known contemporary artists who were paid out of the crowdfunding campaign, no filler or public domain art. I didn't read every line of every table (and there are hundreds of tables) but I can see how this would replace my other monster manuals in my bag if I ever were to play in person again.

 

Project Hail Mary, by Andy Weir - The last of the pile of Christmas gifts from my wife. I was surprised how much I liked this - I think it came right up to the edge of how hard I can take my sci-fi. Even then it had two different flavors of unobtainium to make things work, but still a compelling story told through a narrative flashback framework that's real easy to do wrong. Maybe I will have to check out The Martian after all.

 

Cat and Girl Vol I & II, by Dorothy Gambrell - I saw a comment on this long-running comic's RSS feed that the author was clearing out a storage unit or something, so picked up five volumes. I've been reading this online forever it seems like, but actually it started in 1999. The author also added some sketches and dedicated the volumes, which was a cool surprise. The comics themselves mostly hold up well! I remember some of them, but some come hit me broadside with absurdity and insight and despair and she knows the medium so well.

 

 

The Emerald City of Oz, by L. Frank Baum -  Found this in a little free library and realized I hadn't read it. Apparently this was supposed to be the last Oz book, and it certainly ends on that note, but "financial troubles" saw Baum writing like seven more. Whoops. The story is kind of all over the place. Baum makes up horrible monster and tosses cruelty around casually in a way children of all ages are sure to love despite what grown-ups might think ("Please take General Crinkle to the torture chamber. There you will kindly slice him into thin slices. Afterward you may feed him to the seven-headed dogs."). Dorothy and friends Gulliver's Travel around Oz visiting various planet-of-hats style towns. Ozma and Glinda omnipotent away all threats, and then the series ostensibly ends. But it doesn't. Weird one.