December 2023 Monthly Update (Patreon)

I survived Christmas! Just barely lmao. I had a ton of work to catch up on, and a lot of grading and stuff to do, so I super stressed myself out to get it all done before Christmas vacation. I'm going on ANOTHER short trip to see family Jan 3-6 so I graded some stuff even though we're supposed to be on break so I don't have as much next week. And I worked super hard to finish the first draft of the article I'm writing this week. But I've finally got that mostly finished, so today I actually did some writing for my second book, amazing. And now I'm writing this!

The article will be a My Fave is Problematic article for Anifem, ft. I'm in Love with the Villainess. Vrai from Anifem approached me to do it, and I was super flattered to be approached for an article so I agreed even though I knew I was super busy, RIP me. But hey, I managed and now I'm more freed up to work on my fiction writing and do my best of 2023 book and anime roundups in January.

Spending New Years Eve with my partner tomorrow, we'll probably go see a movie or something.

Bookwise, I finished The Adventures of Amina al-Sirafi! Which is a about a middle-aged Muslim female pirate living around the Arabian Peninsula and fighting demons and monsters and ex-husbands. I've bounced off a lot of pirate books that don't include the fun swashbuckling action and shenanigans that draw me to those stories, and this one actually does,  so gold star. It was a lot of fun, definitely rec it!

I finished rereading Hogfather right on Christmas Eve, which I'm super proud of. It's definitely my favorite of the Discworld novels I read this year, just Pratchett firing on all cylinders. Mort was my second favorite. It's weird that I love the Witches books overall but I have a hard time picking a favorite out of them, there's usually some kind of 'eh' bit that makes it hard. It's probably Maskerade or Carpe Jugulum, but the ending of Maskerade fell a bit flat for me (I was on an airplane so I might have been in a bad mood though) and I loved the overall plot and vibe and development in Carpe Jugulum but it felt like it needed more editing sometimes-- especially the rant Granny had about religion to Oates that went on forever. I know you have a lot of opinions Terry (Rest in Peace) and I largely agree but you don't need to dump them on me all at once, basically.

I've going back and starting Reaper Man now, since I initially skipped that in the Death series to get to Hogfather in time for the holidays. I also started Red, White and Royal Blue which is fun so far.

After that I finally caught up in the MASSIVE manga backlog I'd built up. It was mostly continuing series. Sadly, some manga I really loved concluded (My Love Mix Up was fantastic all the way through, The ending of The Two of Them Are Pretty Much Like This felt abrupt, like it was canceled or something). The only new series I tried was Monthly in the Garden with My Landlord, a yuri about an adult woman who ends up subletting from a carefree woman who it turns out it a former idol. It ended up being kind of just okay, which was disappointing.

Video game wise, my Switch with Pokemon Scarlet on it came back to life miraculously when I picked it up to check if the warranty ran out! so now I have a backup Switch and I can finish the DLCs. Happy about this, and happy my character finally gets to wear clothes that aren't orange.

Show  wise, I've started watching Pluto, which is just utterly fantastic. Based on an arc of Astro Boy, it's a tightly plotted robot murder mystery (someone is murdering the most advanced AI on earth alongside human robot rights activists and scientists, and an advanced robot detective is on the trail- but maybe something's messed with the detective's memories?) It's beautifully animated too.

I've also been watching Tearmoon Empire for goofy fun (a Marie Antoinette like princess is about to be guillotine'd by a revolting populace, but just before she dies she's sent back in time five years, to when she was twelve...now she has a chance to fix things so she doesn't get killed, so she starts fixing the social and economic problems of her country using her future knowledge, entirely out of self-preservation, but people actually start thinking she's super smart and kind and saintly even though she super isn't). I read the light novels in 2020 and it's been nice revisiting them, they're light and silly, despite the loaded premise.

Next anime season, I'm probably going to try out Metallic Rouge (female led robot series animated by Bones? Sign me up), and check out Sengoku Youko, A Sign of Affection, The Witch and the Beast and possibly Cherry Magic...and of course, Dungeon Meshi! Absolutely here for it finally getting an anime.

That's about it! Thanks so much for supporting me this year, everyone. You'll be seeing more anime reviews and the 2023 roundups coming soon. See you in 2024! Let's make it another fantastic year full of fun liveblogs!