I’m wondering if you prefer my usual wrap-up format of putting the date at the start of each week, or the format that I wrote the October and this November issue. I will leave a poll at the end of this wrap-up to get an idea.
Watching
I tried to find a new series to get into and have been mostly unsuccessful.
McMahon
The Vince McMahon documentary was quite good. I didn’t know what it would include or exclude, whether it would be in interview format or follow him around with a camera crew.
It maybe had a bit too much Hulk Hogan and little to no screen time for many other big names that could easily have made it in.
Fright Night
I really enjoyed this film. It has a very similar feel to Disturbia and I Am Not A Serial Killer. Highly recommend.
The Day of the Jackal
This is about an agent tracking down an assassin and hasn’t finished yet. The agent is a diverse girl-boss who doesn’t look after her daughter but is also never wrong. She is the embodiment of everything wrong with feminism and I am cheering for the assassin.
Mr Mercedes
Series 1 was good but series 2 only retained me for an episode.
Nautilus
It was a nice but short-lived surprise when I saw this pop up on Amazon Prime. I was hopeful going into it but after three episodes which quickly became background noise while I did other things, I will forget it ever happened.
Writing
I have made some initial notes on my next couple of essays and thought about some of the books I’ll include.
I finished writing an essay about architecture and buildings in Gaslamp Horror. Read it here:
Architectures of Fear: Hidden Spaces and Dark Secrets in Victorian Fiction
In 1849, Maria and Frederick Manning murdered Patrick O'Connor, a customs officer and Maria's lover, and buried his body beneath the flagstones in the kitchen.
In Plain Sight, Unseen is coming along nicely. An idea for the collection's last story I needed to write randomly came to me as all my ideas do. READ THE OTHERS HERE.
Reading
I’m going through an extended reading slump. This particular dry spell has been going on for a few years. Don’t get me wrong, I’ve read some books, but it feels like a right chore for some reason.
A lot of books I’ve started I’ve not gone back to. Sometimes because they’re rubbish, sometimes I haven’t had the time or couldn’t be bothered.
The main way I’ve consumed books for the last couple of years has been by listening to them. Audiobooks are fine for a reread, but more often than not I find that listening alone is a crap way to consume a book for the first time. My attention often drifts and I have to go back to listen to parts again. The quality of the narrator can be hit-and-miss too.
However, without audiobooks, I don’t think I’d have read 10 books. I used to be a book-a-week guy, physical books as well.
I am still listening to Joe Abercrombie’s books. The next one is Red Country.
I am currently listening to Knight of the Seven Kingdoms by George RR Martin. It is apparently being adapted like Game of Thrones and House of the Dragon so I want to get ahead of the game for this one.