The Princess in Black by Shannon Hale

My rating: 4 of 5 stars

If you have little girls or little boys who love princesses and a little mischief, this book is a great first chapter book. I read this to my four year old twins and they really loved it and immediately asked for the next book. I’m going to admit that some of the jokes and sarcasm DEFINITELY went over their heads. But if they re-read it when they’re in first grade, I think they’ll be the perfect age to get all the jokes. Additionally, it introduces them to the idea of chapters without the chapters being too long. Overall, I think it’s a great kids book with great illustrations.

Rave Master Vol. 3 by Hiro Mashima

My rating: 3 of 5 stars

All the manga tropes continue piling up. This book has the “pervert who wants to watch the girl in the hot springs” trope. Compared to the last two books this one is just wrapping up the last storyline and then ramping up for the next one. Kind of a weird set of chapters to package together because while the story they tell is necessary, it makes this book on its own kind of dull. The story was originally serealized, so maybe that has a factor in the pacing. I think at this point you’re either into the story of the RAVE MASTER vs DEMON CARD or you’re not, so you’re moving on to Vol 4 or have already quit.

The Bob’s Burgers Burger Book: Real Recipes for Joke Burgers by Loren Bouchard

My rating: 4 of 5 stars

There are a lot of crazy burgers in here. What did you expect from a book inspired by a blog inspired by burger puns in a cartoon voiced by H. John Benjamin? And yet… the authors worked with some chefs to massage the blog’s burgers and, while I’m not going to try all of these, I wrote about 2 dozen burgers recipes in my To-Make list. If you like puns and Bob’s Burgers, you’ve basically got reason enough to get this book. But if you don’t mind getting a little adventurous with your burgers (which I do, although I find my smash burgers to be the holy grail of burgers), there is some real value in owning this book. If you’re looking for a more serious one, I’ve done a lot of recipes from Weber’s Big Book of Burgers: The Ultimate Guide to Grilling Backyard Classics and highly recommend it. (Their grilled fries recipe tasted a LOT better than I thought it would)

Clarkesworld Magazine, Issue 137 by Neil Clarke

My rating: 5 of 5 stars

This issue was full of longer piece, but also pieces I loved so much. I was cracking up so much with Solderin’. I felt pretty emotional with Umbernight, especially as I am getting older like the protagonist and slowly being replaced by the next generation. I also really enjoyed The Power is Out - I couldn’t stop reading that story. And The Girl-Thing was a good story, despite the few nits I had to pick with the narrative style.

Clarkesworld Magazine, Issue 136 by Neil Clarke

My rating: 4 of 5 stars

This one was a tough choice between three stars and four stars. The stories I didn’t like: “Say it Low, Say it Loud” and “Her Smoke Rose Up Forever” I REALLY didn’t like. But from the stories I liked, some of them like: “A World to Die For” and “Lighthouse Girl” I REALLY liked. And the Non-fiction section helped push it over the edge.

Sparklers were an ever-present feature of my childhood 4th of July celebrations. This year we introduced the twins to sparklers (I’m pretty sure Scarlett has used them at least once before). They kids had a lot of fun and there were a couple burn-scares, but I think it was worth the slight parental anxiety. (Did our parents care? They seemed a lot more laize-faire about us with sparklers, but maybe they were just good at hiding their fears?) Took out the DSLR and introduced the kids to light painting. Scarlett had the winning light-painting photo that made it past the multiple discard passes.

Rave Master Vol. 2 by Hiro Mashima

My rating: 3 of 5 stars

Nobody does comics storytelling like the Japanese. Some 400 pages in we’re still meeting new characters and we haven’t really gone anywhere story-wise. Plotwise it’s a pretty standard journey plot a la Journey to the West, Dragonball, or even Pokemon. Haru, our main character, is battling foes with nonsensical magic/karate and joining up with other youths who have other insane powers. This volume introduces us to Ellie, a typical tsundere heroine who leaves destruction in her wake. Overall it’s fun, but we’ll see how it goes since it’s looking like the plot itself probably isn’t going to matter as much as the journey.

As food stocks started to normalize towards the middle of COVID summer, I started to take advantage and try out more new dishes. It also helped that we were FINALLY able to find yeast again!

• Chicago-style pepperoni pan pizza
• hoisin-glazed baby back ribs
• oatmeal-rasin bread
• Grilled brined zucchini with cilantro-yogurt sauce
• succotash
• vanilla icebox cookies

The Chicago-style pepperoni pan pizza was one of the first recipes I wrote down to make. However, I never seemed to have both time and pepperoni at the same time. So I finally made it. I think America’s Test Kitchen’s decision to have me precook the pepperoni to render some of the fat helped both mellow the pepperoni taste (my kids were able to eat it) and keep this from being a greasy mess.

The Philosopher Kings by Jo Walton

My rating: 4 of 5 stars

I had no idea how the story could continue after The Just City. It seemed to have such a finality to it. Yet Ms Jo Walton has really shone with this sequel. It finds a way to build on just about everything from the first book in a way that makes perfect sense while continuing to introduce even more ideas. Just as with the first book, it’s told through diary entries of the main characters and so it’s it’s an exploration of Platonic ideals as they interact with reality. One of our point of view characters is a child born after the events of The Just City, so we get a new perspective from someone who knows about the successes and failures of the first city.