Lovecraft’s Monsters by Ellen Datlow

My rating: 4 of 5 stars

As usual for an anthology I will post my status updates per story. Before I get to that, I wanted to note that this is the first time I’ve read anything Lovecraftian. (There were Eldritch horrors in the first couple Discworld books, but I had no idea what that was at the time) I think these authors did a great job creating stories based on or inspired by his creatures. If, like me, you’re a Lovecraft neophyte, be sure to read the introduction as it helps explain some of the concepts. And now the stories:

The Magician’s Land by Lev Grossman

My rating: 4 of 5 stars

Like a beautiful fractal, this book is doing the same thing on the individual story level and on the series level: joining together all the threads. This book starts off with Quentin trying to get money on by participating in a magical mission impossible after having been kicked out of Fillory in book 2. It then pivots to Janet, Eliott, Josh, and Poppy in Fillory where things are going a bit screwy. By the end of the book the two plots have not only joined, but have revealed themselves to be workings towards the same goal from different ends. In the same way, this book ties together all the plot threads from books 1 and 2 and has characters and plot points from all of those joining together. I’ll get back to this below in the spoiler section. Before I get to the spoilers, I do want to say that Grossman also does a great job with the fact that our characters have grown over the seven years we’ve known them.

God’s War by Kameron Hurley

My rating: 4 of 5 stars

““I’d rather find a call box,” Nyx said.
“God does not answer the phone.”

There isn’t one person among us heavy users of Goodreads who doesn’t know the truth behind taking the phrase “don’t judge a book by its cover” literally. Now I have found incredible books by being attracted to their covers, but sometimes you miss out if that’s all you depend on. Take this book, for example. I don’t remember when or how I got it. It might have been back when I was religiously (no pun intended) making sure I took advantage of Barnes & Noble giving away a book every Friday or it might be from a Humble Bundle or something. Either way, I’d skipped over it because the cover and description made it look like it was going to end up being a Romeo and Juliet story. She’s from country X and he’s from country Y and they have to learn there’s something more important out there!

Took advantage of MIL’s presence to get some gaming done before I would be too busy to game for a while.

Civilization VI (18 hours):

https://youtu.be/9eHVWDntw4g?list=PLEJrELYLxNgWZ4TsugA53ODOuSvnraSVu

This time around I play as Greece and try for a cultural victory while also getting more involved in the religion part of the game.

Vertical Drop Heroes HD (1 hour 25 minutes):

https://youtu.be/2VyexAVIwEY?list=PLEJrELYLxNgXBv5HxeZNUxg5AWWM9QGJb

On Extra Life game day I end up further than I’ve ever been in the game.

Civilization VI (9 hrs)

https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLEJrELYLxNgWZ4TsugA53ODOuSvnraSVu

The latest iteration of this series I’ve been playing for the past 25 years was released and the changes have made the game more dynamic and, for the first time in the series, have really made it so that I can’t just do the same thing every game because of how much the terrain makes a difference. It’s been neat and with the reduced gameplay over the past two months, it’s displaced all over games. Civilization III  (15 minutes)

Another awesome costume designed by my mother-in-law.

I figured this might be the only year I can pick their costume, so I *had* to go with The Wonder Twins from the old Super Friends cartoon. My mother-in-law sewed up the awesome costumes.

That near-year flew by! I can’t believe a year ago we were nervously attending Dina’s wedding, unsure if the kids were going to want to pop out early and steal the show.

Every year since Scarlett was born we’re been going to Clark’s Eliok Farm to get a pumpkin to decorate the house (and in later years for Scarlett to carve). This time was the first year for Sam and Stella. Overall they did extraordinarily well for 11 month olds who’d never been to a pumpkin patch before. Only Stella cried and that was only after it had gone on for a while.

When I went to do the 10 Month Photos for the Twins, Scarlett really wanted to participate. She helped me with the color picker and white balance. Then, afterwards, she wanted to do these veil photos. My favorite thing is that I didn’t tell her to do ANY of this. This is what she wanted to do and I just photographed. I enjoy her creativity.