December Wrap-Up

Books Read This Month

1. Front Stoops in the Fifties: Baltimore Legends Come of Age by Michael Olesker
2. Embrace Your Weird by Felicia Day
3. The 100 Most Jewish Foods, Ed. Alana Newhouse
4. The Bookish Life of Nina Hill by Abbi Waxman
5. The Golden Compass by Philip Pullman (reread)
6. The Subtle Knife by Philip Pullman (reread)

Thoughts 

First, I want to highly, highly recommend Embrace Your Weird by Felicia Day. I've been a fan of hers since watching the Guild and I also read her memoir, You're (Almost)Never Weird on the Internet. My husband is also a huge fan of hers and we used to watch a lot of Geek & Sundry, and that's how he got into Critical Role. My husband actually got this for me. I didn't even know she had a new book out. The promotion for this one has been much more low-key, but I want to shout it from the rooftops! This is such a fun book, or really, a guided journal. Although it's meant to help jumpstart creativity, which it definitely does, I personally found it helpful on a therapeutic level. It's like therapy in book form, and deals especially with issues like anxiety, but really, anything that creatives might struggle with that gets in the way of them and their work or having fun. This is really for anyone who wants to do anything creative for any reason or is just looking for stress-relief. It's low-pressure, quirky, and relaxing in an active way. I recommend buying this along with a nice pencil or two. I actually ended up using colored pencils for some of the drawing prompts, but it's totally up to you!

Second, the His Dark Materials series, starting with The Golden Compass, were among my favorite books as a kid. I remember finding The Subtle Knife in my school library, and then the long wait until The Amber Spyglass came out. I was eager to see HBO's new His Dark Materials television series, which I loved, but I wanted to reread the books to see how accurate the show was. After finishing the first two books, the show, which covers the first book and the first chapter or so of the second book is not only riveting but extremely close to the source material. I'm enjoying this reread immensely; it has been so many years, I have forgotten a lot. It's also nice to see that even though they are children's books, they really hold up to an adult reading. Also, luckily for me, the second book in Philip Pullman's new series on Lyra, The Secret Commonwealth, is out, and I got a copy for Hanukkah, so I can read that next!