Updates

Q1 & Q2 Recap 2024

Barnaby's Best Day EverI had every intention of doing a real update this month reflecting on the first two quarters of 2024, but life got in the way, and this wasn’t even published last week like it should’ve been. I’m back dating it though. So, this is the short update that you get which includes:

  • The adorably hilarious photo of Barnaby from January when we were on vacation in the Caribbean. Because he’s a doodle, we generally have him in boots and a jacket/snowsuit so that his hair doesn’t get super matted, so seeing the excitement and freedom of him running in the snow was just such a heartwarming thing for us on vacation.
  • A screen shot of some lovely feedback on a piece of writing from a course I took wrapping up my degree. I graduated in May, and we then went on a two week cruise in Scandinavia, which was fantastic and I loved it and bought so much yarn. But this feedback on a piece gave me the life I needed to get through February-May and graduation!
  • And list of books that I’ve read since my last monthly update. I am VERY slowly making my way through these responses. I was on track to catch up but had to demonetize the blog because WordPress/Jetpack got super greedy and wanted to charge for stats access and the cost of that was significantly more than any kickback I got from being an affiliate. As well as even more ARC’s I should never have said yes to.

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Books

Book 1,043: Northranger – Rey Terciero & Bre Indigo

I don’t know how I didn’t know about this one sooner. I mean, I do. Life has been incredibly busy and non-stop post-pandemic, and 2022-2024 was a blur of classes and life, which explains how this 2023 release slipped under my radar, but OMG I’m so glad I found it. Terciero takes Jane Austen’s Northanger Abbey and turns it into a wonderful MM romance while Bre Indigo does a fantastic job of capturing a Texas ranch in this adaptation.

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Books, Professional Development

Book 1,042: Getting to Yes – Roger Fisher, William Ury, & Bruce Patton

This was the last book I had to read as I wrapped up my master’s degree earlier this year. It was part of the negotiation course it was written for many years ago and we were taught by members of the negotiation project (but not these authors). Reading it for a course made this a bit more of a slog than it probably would’ve been. We only had to read roughly half of it so I was like may as well finish it out. If I would’ve picked this up on my own, I probably would’ve read through it a lot faster.

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Books

Book 1,041: Would You Like to Be a Family? – koyama

Apparently, there are three stories in this one short collection, and I only remember one, so that doesn’t bode well. The biggest struggle for me was the style. I’m not the biggest fan of the super stretched out/tall bodies and super angular faces. I think it just makes them all look creepy.

The story itself was actually very cute (or least the one I remember) Takemura is a shy loner who had a bad bullying experience in high school, so he keeps to himself, but his coworker Natsui is outgoing and has tried to engage him before. They meet one evening in the grocery store and Takemura finds out Natsui has a kid and can’t get out of a dinner invite.

Before you know it, they’re all hanging out all the time. There’s even an awkward moment where Takemura has to go pick up the kid (cannot remember their names) and it goes well even though Takemura is SOO nervous. In the end the kid is the one that’s like hey you need to move in here, we’re always happier when you’re here. I’m 99% sure the book was sex free and that anything that did or didn’t happen was 100% off page and it was kind of refreshing knowing how edgy manga/yaoi/BL can get.

Recommendation: It’s a cute read. I’m a little concerned I have ZERO recollection of the other stories, but the entire book was pretty short, so they must’ve been even shorter. Illustration style wasn’t my jam, but I could see where others like it as there are quite a few in this style.

Books

Books 1,037-1,040: I Think Our Son Is Gay, Vols. 1-4 (I Think #1-4) – Okura

Y’all, I can’t even tell you how adorable these books are. Think Heartstopper, but without the getting together (they’re younger than Nick and Charlie) and the beautiful acceptance of My Brother’s Husband and you’ll start to see where these fall.

These are told from mom Tomoko’s point of view, and she is the most loving and accepting person. She’s started to note that Hiroki, her oldest son, slips up saying “he’s handsome” or “my husband” and she just goes with the flow. She doesn’t ask questions or ask for declarations, she just let’s it slide and tries to make an accepting home for her son.

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