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2026 Reading List

36 novels in 2025 (list here)! I have been reading quite a bit: escapism! Here’s what is in queue for 2026 so far!

King Sorrow is wrapping up, so I’m leaving on 2025. GREAT read! This epic tale is like Dark Tower and Fairy Tale (by King) had a baby. SO GOOD.

Apparently I forgot to update here when I decided to start the Dark Tower series again! Which I did in April, I think? Here is the list and where I am:
I The Gunslinger
II Drawing of the Three
III The Wastelands
IV Wizard and Glass
V Wolves of the Calla <-- I am here July 2026
VI Song of Susannah
VII The Dark Tower

The Couple Next Door, Shari Lapena. It’s supposed to be a “psychological thriller”. It is not thrilling or great. It’s my treadmill book. Meh.

Dream Girl, Laura Lippman. Turns out, Lippman is a pretty famous writer. This novel is the story of an author intertwined with a mysterious stalker of the author. Decent plot and characters. It’s OK.

The Golden Gate, Amy Chua. This is a crime drama set in historical fiction. Pretty good read.

When She Woke, Hillary Jordan. Re-read! It’s similar to The Handmaid’s Tale in many ways, and SO relevant to today’s Christian Nationalism that is running rampant.

2025 Xmess Hurl:
Filterworld ST How Algorithms Flattened Culture, Kyle Chayka. I tried, I really did. The title seemed like a relevant read, but it turns out that while the subject is relevant, the content is pretty fucking banal. The author is a millennial and I just can’t take the whining. “Oh, woe is me, I HAVE TO SUBSCRIBE to Spotify, it’s where all my music is!” Or this one: “I found my CD case from the 90s. I wish I could play these CDs now!” Wow, really? You know WHY algorithms run everything? Because millennials and beyond have zero awareness of doing anything OTHER THAN using these stupid services and have zero ability to think for themselves. If you are too dumb to figure out how to set up a server for your shit, hook up an optical drive and make your own library, then I have no sympathy for you. You probably don’t back up your shit, either. I got to page 78 of this drivel and bounced. I think if you ARE a millennial, and confused about why you can’t control your apps, then this book would be relevant. However, if you are someone who’s been in tech since the mid-90s and understand how it works, don’t bother with this. It’s interesting to note that this guy also does a newsletter called Dirt that I recently subscribed to. It must be pretty banal, too, since I can’t tell you a thing that has been in the couple of issues I’ve looked at. (And I ditched the newsletter.) ::shrug::

The Sweetest Fruits, Monique Truong. I think I’m done with Monique. Bitter in the Mouth was good, but the other two I’ve read are just too slow and convoluted.

Mediocre, Ijeoma Olouo. ST “The Dangerous Legacy of White Male America.” This one is very good so far. It was published in 20 or 21, so it’s before that orange turd was elected AGAIN. UGH. This book is well researched and pretty much 100% on point. At about 2/3, the book gets bogged down in a long discussion about race, which is fine and part of white America, but I feel she was retreading stuff from her first book. It picked up a little towards the end, but I will admit to skimming. A LOT. It’s worth the read, but be prepared for a bit of a slog.

Care and Feeding, Laurie Woolever. This is a memoir by the author of a Bourdain biography. This is her stories and her experiences with Tony Bourdain. I was happy to have my suspicions about that cunt Asia Argento confirmed. It’s a decent memoir and an easy read.

Fairy Tale, Stephen King. REREAD, but still counts! King Sorrow made me want to revisit this one!

The End of the World as We Know It, New Tales from Stephen King’s The Stand. A collection of stories spun off from the The Stand. Nick says it’s awesome, it’ll be my read after King Sorrow. I started this, but got very tired of the theme about 1/3 in. I have gone back to this book after Mediocre. It’s best to do this one in chunks, since the subject is the same for all the stories. It is a perfect interstitial book.

Find Me, André Aciman. This is from 2025, it was my treadmill book, so it took WAY too long to read. This author wrote Call Me By Your Name, which was a hit movie. Find Me is an excellent novel. Aciman is a master of conveying the emotional states of his characters. He is verbose at times, but even so, his words have a place in the narrative. He writes about “unconventional” love, such as gay and bisexual. This story is about two men who love each other, but part ways for 20 years to marry and have families. Then they reunite and rekindle their love. The stories in between are quite engaging. Highly recommend!

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2025 Reading List

Welcome to a new year of reading!

I read 28 novels and 26 graphic novels last year. Not bad! This year, I’m putting recent acquisitions and reads at the top. That does not mean READING order, just PILE order. As of 12.31.25, I’ve read 36 novels and the Courtney series of GNs.

King Sorrow, Joe Hill. EXCELLENT read. It’s a cross between Dark Tower and Fairy Tale by Joe’s dad. :) Good stuff. Not quite finished (1/3) but leaving on 2025.

Enshittification, Cory Doctorow. His book that breaks down the total destruction of the internet and how corporations have managed to do this. It covers Meta, Amazon, Twitter, and pretty much everything else that we’ve watched turn to SHIT. Everyone should read this book.

Blood, Bones & Butter, Gabrielle Hamilton. Byline “The Inadvertent Education of a Reluctant Chef”, which was why I bought it. A very good read! I saw a LOT of myself in her – not the work parts, but the interaction with people parts.

The Book of Salt, Monique Truong. You might remember her from Bitter In the Mouth that I read last year. This is her first novel and it is NOTHING like I was expecting! This is a story of a man who travels the world as a cook in the late 19th and early 20th century. It is a pretty good read, but I liked Bitter more.

The Sweetest Fruits, Monique Truong. She fascinates me.

The Secret Life of Groceries, Benjamin Lorr. Byline “The Dark Miracle of the American Supermarket”. I watched a documentary about groceries recently, so this caught my eye. Very interesting so far. He did a TON of research for this book! He rode with truckers, worked in stores, talked to execs. It’s well done.

Gifted from the Kiss My Acid Goodbye guy:
Prison Break, Jason Goldman. While I truly do like JG, and the KMAG product does help with VSG GERD, he has a background in coaching, so he tends to be a little on the rah-rah side. Not my bag. This book is all about not being a victim (he uses prisoner) and taking charge of your shit (he uses self leadership). Nick and I are “self leaders” from way back, so all I do is nod at the obvious (TO ME) and do a lot of skimming. I can see how this sort of coaching would be helpful for LOTS of people — just not me in particular. It’s a conversational style, easy read. If you have GERD, you should look into kissmyacidgoodbye.com. You’re welcome.

Ollie’s Hurl September 2025

Find Me, André Aciman. This is the guy that wrote Call Me By Your Name, which was made into a movie that I did not see. I might get that book, too, though, because this book is quite good! It’s set in Italy but the main character is American. The characters are well written and the dialog is good, too. I’ve just started this one.

A Bright Ray of Darkness, Ethan Hawke (yes, THAT guy, who is also a writer!). This was an odd book, but a pretty good read. It’s about an actor and all his angst. Worth a shot if you come across it.

Dream Girl, Laura Lippman.
The Golden Gate, Amy Chua.

Lessons in Chemistry, Bonnie Garmus. I’d seen comments that this book was terrible, as compared to the limited series on AppleTV and I’d have to agree. Every single character in the book is unlikeable. She also gives the dog full character status, as in: the dog is given the ability to reason like a human and has running commentary. Skip the book and watch the limited series with Brie Larson and Lewis Pullman (yes Bill Pullman’s look alike son).

Attainable Sustainable Pantry, Kris Bordessa. EXCELLENT cookbook for assembling your pantry and canning foods. The canning section is SO well done! It’s all vetted for proper canning info. I love it!

When the Moon Hits Your Eye, John Scalzi. I had to start this as soon as I got it. It’s an absurd notion, housed as if it really happens and people have to deal with it. It’s got plenty of Scalzi humour and I’m liking it, despite its silly premise. In mid-read.

Never Flinch, Stephen King. This was a surprise from Amazon, we’d pre-ordered! I started it immediately after I finished Bazaar of Bad Dreams. It is another Holly book – he just can’t quit her!! This novel was good – not great. I do fervently wish the next book is called Two For Flinching, however.
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DragonCon ’24

I think this is the end of DragonCon for us. This year was TERRIBLE.

We got Saturday passes only, since we just wanted to shop and get a couple of autographs.

WELP. That was a bust. The line to get into the Mart was 2+ hrs. It was doubled up on the sidewalks, wrapped around the building several times AND serpentined through the loading dock.

Needless to say, we did not get in.

We did not get to see our vendor friends that we only get to see at Con. We did not get to shop. We did not get to see our comics and author pals. Nothing.

DragonCon is notorious for overselling. The owner is a money grubbing asshole who does not give a single shit about the con, only the money he makes from it. He does not care about vendors, guests or attendees. If this convention cared, it would not be the dumpster fire that it is. As I’ve stated before, it must be nice to have a business that makes MILLIONS with no staff.

When people complain, the standard con response is “oh, well, we do the best we can!” Right.

Well, people are certainly complaining now. There are several forums/groups that are chock full of vendors, guests and attendees who are vociferously complaining about the shitshow that we witnessed this year. I hear it was the same last year – we skipped, so we were unprepared.

Not only is it unpleasant and unsafe for guests, the vendors that must load-in and -out of this con spend pretty much a whole day just waiting to get into the dock.

It is perfectly clear that putting comics, pop art, vendors and authors all in the same building is not working. This convention needs to spread out these tracks like it used to be, in order to have more access for the attendees. But even with that, this convention needs to have a cap that is not whatever it is now. I’ve heard 80k, and I think that’s about 20k too many people. Every single area was overcrowded.

When the bulk of the con is either walking, standing in 90 degree heat in a line or dodging projectiles thrown by drunk people, that is not much of a con. Panels were pretty much inaccessible as well, with lines wrapping around the hotels. On top of that, the Walk of Fame (that is now run by a third party) has become too pricey for most people. $60 for an autograph from a NOT FAMOUS person outside one show is pretty fucking ridiculous. It was $40 2 yrs ago.

In the Olden Days™ (pre 2010s), the con was bustling and there were crowds, sure, but not like this. Also, we RARELY had fighting, people throwing projectiles from hotel balconies and other such jackassery. In all our years of going, we only saw one blackout drunk guy throw a beer bottle from the second floor of the Hyatt. That’s IT.

This convention refuses to hire security or any other needed staff, which is the main issue. When you cram 80k people together, you fucking need REAL security, not some con slave with a radio. DUH. This seems pretty obvious to me. But staff is not hired because the owner is a money grubbing ASSHOLE (as previously mentioned). Hells bells, they won’t even fund a proper green room for celebrities! They feed them hotdogs and other junk because “there’s no money” for a properly catered room. BULLSHIT. I’d be ashamed to run a multimillion dollar convention and have such a shitty green room!

I am so disappointed in this convention. It used to be our big event of the year. People go now just to stay in their rooms and party. That is NOT why I go to cons! I want to see the panels! I want to shop! I want to be able to afford getting the whole SNW cast to sign our poster. But DragonCon is not interested in doing any of that. I can stay home and party with friends. I don’t need a $500/nt hotel room for that.

So, I guess we’re done. I am really sad about that. But so many of our friends have already stopped attending, it’s not like we see THEM there, anyway. Sigh. I tell you, if they limit ticket sales and fix the logistical issues, we might consider attending again, but I seriously doubt anything will change. What would help is that if you are a vendor/author/artist and are sick of this shit, PLEASE SAY SOMETHING. Go to the groups/forums and BITCH. It might encourage this convention to fix its shit. Other conventions can manage it, why not this one? (Answer: GREED)

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2024 Reading List

Welcome to the 2024 Reading List! I read 39 books last year! Very happy with that number! This year I will keep the list more orderly, with newest acquisitions at the TOP. It got messy last year! All the books brought forward from 2023 will be at the bottom, with xmess next, and so on. Here we go!

Number of novels: 28 That’s it for 2024, folks! The next book I start will be on the 2025 list!
Number of graphic novels/comics collections: 26

A couple strays from Goodwill:
The Recipe Box, Viola Shipman. This is a fluffy girly novel about how important family and heritage is. It’s sappy, but I’m getting through it. The book is written by a dude who uses a pen name for all his girly stuff, which I find infinitely amusing. It’s a quick read, very formulaic.

Learning to Bow, Bruce Feiler. Subtitled Inside the Heart of Japan. I got this one for the look inside Japanese culture, but this guy writes a lot of Christian crap, so we’ll see how it goes. It seems to be less novel and more guide? I’ll report.

Memorials, Richard Chizmar. I got this randomly. As Stephen King describes it, it’s ‘suburban horror’, and I agree. Chizmar is a slow burn kind of author. He takes his time with set ups and character development. This is the best of the books I’ve read of his. My one criticism is the ending(s). The Big Finale is, indeed, BIG, and I liked how the story came to its penultimate scene. I did NOT like how Chizmar prattled on with irrelevant chatter for a dozen pages AFTER the Big Finale, BEFORE he got to the wrap up. I actually skimmed those pages and was actively annoyed. I’m not sure WTF he was trying to do, but that whole section should’ve been edited out. IRRELEVANT. Once he finally go to the wrap up, it was satisfying. Not satisfying in how it ended, but a good END of the story. He did not pull any punches with the wrap up and I appreciate that. Not every story has a happy ending; not every character comes out unscathed.

Courtney Crumrin, Ted Naifeh. (Things I realised I’d missed!)
Courtney Crumrin Vol 4: Monstrous Holiday
The Crumrin Chronicles Vol 1: The Lost and the Lonely
The Crumrin Chronicles Vol 2: The Charmed and the Cursed
The Crumrin Chronicles Vol 3: The Wild and the Innocent

Ollies/Goodwill Summer

The Drowning Kind, Jennifer McMahon.

The Restaurant, Pamela Kelley. The author calls this “fiction for women”, I call it a 100% predictable, light summer beach book.

Rewired, S.R. Johannes. A YA novel that is VERY teen oriented. The author misuses tech terms (LAN is NOT any cable) and there are many typos of the sort that autocorrect will miss (breath is not the same as breathe; sentence fragments) which tells me this is definitely a low budget YA book. It’s just OK. The story is fairly good if the author would get out of her own way. I’m not in a hurry to read anything else by her.

Leaving Time, Jodi Picoult.

The Cure for Dreaming, Cat Winters. A YA novel set in 1900. It centers on suffrage and women’s rights with a little hypnotism thrown in for colour. It is a good read and the author added a suffrage timeline as well as more reading for the younger readers this book is aimed at. Well done!

Strike Me Down, Mindy Mejia. This was a mystery, action-y type story. A fast read and entertaining.

Ollies Hurl Feb 2024!

Finding the Flavors We Lost, Patric Kuh. Started today. It’s a tad dry, but it is an exploration of the notions of “artisanal” and “farm to table” and how they’ve shaped the American restaurant landscape. This is my treadmill book, so it will take a minute to get through it. Finally finished! Yay! This one is strictly for those who wax poetic about high end chefs and restaurants. It is ponderous and meandering.
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2023 Reading List

Welcome to the 2023 Reading List!

As always, I’m pulling over the books I didn’t get to last year and I’m full out dropping a couple that I just could not finish. In process or finished reads are in BOLD. They are not really in any particular order.

I read 31 (and 3/4) books in 2022, a number I’m very happy with. I hope to meet and/or top that this year.

After reading the synopses of these, they are dropped for 2023:
Land of Big Numbers, Te-Ping Chen
Empire of Pain, Patrick Radden Keefe
Things We Lost to the Water, Eric Nguyen
Intimacies, Katie Kitamura

I read 39 books in 2023!

Surprise gifts:
Garlic and Sapphires, Ruth Reichl. NYT food critic’s memoir. Really enjoyed it!

Comfort Me With Apples, Ruth Reichl. Another memoir. Very good, but a bit more personal that the one above. This woman hung out with the chefs that we venerate these days: Alice Waters, Jonathan Waxman, Wolfgang Puck – hell, she was even besties with Danny Kaye, who was an amazing gourmet cook!! 

Making It So, Sir Patrick Stewart. YES! Got my preorder and started! SO GOOD. Of course, I read it in his voice! He starts at the beginning, in England during WWII when he was born. LOVE IT! (But I will say, it is very much geared towards theatre nerds than Trek nerds.)

Holly, Stephen King. About Holly from the Mr Mercedes books. This character will not let him go! EXCELLENT! The premise is so crazy, it is compelling! One of the best King reads since Fairy Tale.

Book Nick picked up:
Gwendy’s Final Task, S King and Richard Chizmar. Final book of the Trilogy: Gwendy’s Button Box, Gwendy’s Magic Feather and this book. It’s NOT AT ALL what I expected, but good in a Stephen King kind of way. 

Pulled from a donation pile: 
Brave New World, Aldous Huxley.  Surprisingly readable, considering he’s English and the book is old. HOWEVER, the notion of children being encouraged to “play erotic games” does squick me out a bit. The whole premise is using pleasure and conditioning to control the population. Creepy, man. 


Goodwill hurl! (late Aug)

On Gold Mountain, Lisa See. I always get her books.

Wake, Lisa McMann. Some creepy story about people invading your dreams.

A Cat Is Watching, Roger A. Caras. Author is a wildlife authority and this is a book about cats! It was a silly book. This guy is a little on the dotty side.

Preserving the Harvest, cookbook with tons of canning/preserving info.

Chinese Cuisine, cookbook of authentic Chinese recipes, directly translated from the Chinese. Cool!

Born Standing Up, Steve Martin. His autobiography/memoir. I’ve read some of his fiction – he’s a good writer.

The Revenant, Michael Punke. Yes, the book that the movie is based on.

Drowning Ruth, Christina Schwarz. I think I may have read this long ago? Looks interesting even if I have.

Teachings of Zen, Thomas Cleary. Just curious about Zen.

The Rules of Magic, Alice Hoffman. As I’ve said, I like her writing, so I picked this one up, too.


Ollie’s Graphic Novel HURL Aug 6!
Book:
Memories of the Future, Siri Hustvedt. Sounded interesting. Started this (9/6) and while it’s called a novel, it is actually a memoir!! And a GOOD one, too! She’s got a conversational tone rather like Mary Karr and I am IN LOVE with this book!

GNs:
Get Jiro!, Anthony Bourdain. I think I’ve got the comics of this? It’s Tony, I’m IN.
Fables: Farewell Last of the series, will hold on this.
Fables: Happily Ever After
Fables: Snow White
Fables: Storybook Love
All Fables GNs/collections are done by various writers and artists, but ALL these are Willingham, Buckingham and Leialoha.

Books brought forward:
Fear, Bob Woodward. Yes, THAT Bob Woodward. Nick picked this one, but I’ll read it, it’s about T****.

A Country Road, A Tree, Jo Baker. WWII historical fiction set in Paris. VERY English, which to me, means rather dry and boring. I’ll probably get through it. See next!

To The Lighthouse, Virginia Woolf. I didn’t count this as READ in 2022, I’m about 1/4 into it… Probably won’t finish. VERY English. Blech.

Paper Son, S.J. Rozen.

Fifth Chinese Daughter, forgot about this one, it’s my treadmill book. Finished this one. It’s dry, but OK. You really have to remember it’s written in the 40s and in the Chinese way: third person – even tho it’s an autobiography.  It’s odd. 

Jasmine, Bharati Mukherjee. This is a short novel and a fast read. The story is pretty good, nothing special. It’s a story about an Indian girl’s journey from a poor, remote Indian village to New York, then to Iowa. The pacing is good, I’d recommend for a good summer read.

The Distance Between Us, Reyna Grande.

The Good Demon, Jimmy Cajoleas.

The Silver Star, Jeannette Walls. This is NOT a memoir, unlike the two books of hers I read last year. I like her voice, I hope it carries into fiction. 8/7 Almost finished. It is a retelling of her rather terrible childhood with different characters. It reads well, but has not much new to offer as far as her stretching her writing abilities.

The Interior, Lisa See. NOT a Chinese historical fiction, more of a mystery. Just started this one Dec 20, so it won’t be finished this year. It’s pretty good. It’s a mystery within a historical setting.

Island of Sea Women, Lisa See. This historical fiction is about the island of Jeju, a Korean island where the women open dive into the sea for food and products to sell. It is a matriarchal society, which is interesting in itself. I picked this one up randomly at Ollies. It is typical See, except for being Korean rather than Chinese. This novel starts during the Japanese occupation of Korea and the island of Jeju (1930s-40s) and covers the decades into the 21st century. It’s a good read.

OLLIES HURL Jan 23!

Ollie’s Hurl!!

Fairest: Return of the Maharaja Graphic Novel, various writers and artists. This is an offshoot of the Fables series, which I LOVE for the art! The stories are usually pretty engaging, too. This one is really good! It’s a collection of the comics series for this story line. Excellent!

The World That We Knew, Alice Hoffman. Set in WWII Germany and France. A Jewish girl leaves her home in Germany with a golem her mother had created for her. History AND magic. A good read so far! 

Crush, Cathy Alter and Dave Singleton. This is a collection of essays from famous people and their first crushes. It’s pretty interesting. Not a page turner, but good! Almost done with this one, I recommend it.

Burn the Place, Iliana Regan. This is a memoir by Michelin star Chef Iliana Regan. It’s about her life and how she ended up being the renowned chef she is today. It’s a good read! It is about growing up queer AND being a chef, so a great twofer.

The Road Home, Richard Paul Evans. I was hesitant to start this one when I discovered it was the third of a trilogy AND it had a whiff of religion to it, but I started it today and it’s oddly good – no religion so far. Perhaps I resonate because I am familiar with Route 66, but the author also has a conversational tone that reminds me of Stephen King a little bit. It’s my treadmill book and will be a quick read! Good read, does not require reading the first two. Skirts religion nicely.
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