Hellooo!

Only a few years ago many of us were stuck at home missing life and I do have to say while now I have freedom to roam in many ways this has been ther busiest year in quite some time. My new job coincided with the several delayed launch dates of what we will call Project from Hell and each time I had to ramp up work before being told it was on hold again. I’ve enjoyed it but the last couple of months have been touch and running on fumes to keep up the pace. Hopefully by next year’s update things will be calmer but my prediction of a tough year came true. I did have highlights - the gardening of last year paid off, I’m healthier than I’ve been for a while and got way past week 9 on Couch to 5K (the 5k is a work in progress) and we got to see Athens and weekends are far less work focused. Work in progress as always but it was a decent year.

Blogging Life

The sixth year of the blog went well over 260 posts of reviews, updates and interviews. Having a large 2023 schedule spreadsheet and a mini one per week on a whiteboard has done really well on keeping on top of things and that will continue. As with all bloggers the nature of social media is a challenge - I’ve been around a while so that helps but its been fascinating how much where people find you is changing. Lets start with some nice stats - I saw a 21% increase in traffic from last year. Blogging ain’t dead and thanks for reading and keeping up with books! Its lovely to know the audience appreciates you! Tempting is caring.

Now some would say I’ve had an obsessive life with the app everyone calls Twitter. But the take over by a man we shall call a Giant Right Wing Edgelord Jerk has led to a place that was at best described problematic but now downright unsafe and unpredictable and also unusable - the terrible ads every three posts, the disturbing lack of safety on dangerous posts I’ve reported to be told are fine and its generally no longer a place to chat and have fun.I’e branched out into Threads, Instagram and recently Blue Sky and I like those places a lot more. Twitter as we’ll see is useful but I think in terms of audience its now delclining fast.

How so - let us looks at the stats!

In 2022 40% of my blog traffic came from what the Squarespace app records as Social Media and of that 83% via twitter - pretty common for years prior too. Alongside that are search engines - 25% and direct hits 32%

Now there has been a sea-change my biggest channel is Search with 36%, Direct 35% and Social is down to 23% of which Twitter is only 73% and actual volumes for Twitter were half the visits from 2022. I do note that my blogsite does not record currently record from Threads, Blue Sky and Mastodon yet so I do wonder if the other sites are in the non-social categories.

My overall feeling is Twitter is still popular but increasingly less so and I do recommend bloggers branch out a bit more and we need to learn the ropes of the new channels. I’ve no desire though to tik tok yet.

Reading stats

I read 216 books via 222 authors this year

129 books by women (58% versus 54% last year)

82 books by men (37% matching last year)

11 mixed anthologies (5% versus 7 per cent last year)

51 books by authors of colour (23% versus 22% last year)

I strongly recommend as always to look at these stats just to see how your reading is going.

Now lets get on to the main event

My Best Reads of 2023

The Why By Great Uncle Bulgaria Have I Not Read This Earlier

Octavia E Butler - Parable of the Talents — - I’m very glad to have finally finished the Octavia E Butler readalong they were a brilliant author but this stands out as a superb piece of SF that seems to see the issues of the 21st century. Its dark, challenging and yet still says survival is possible but it will never be comfortable.

The Tomsk - Scream If You Want To Go Faster

For Horror two novels

The Whispering Muse by Laura Purcell — - a gorgeous piece of gothic theatre and one of the best WTF moments of gore to indulge upon

Looking Glass Sound by Catriona Ward — - a horror story playing with the power of stories, unlikeable characters, playing with time and reality in very smart ways this is a dark delight.

The Orinoco - Novellas Have I Told You Lately How I Love You?

I’ve three that lingered in my mind this year

Pomegranates by Priya Sharma — - A reimagining of the Persephone myth that uses it for climate change in a really remarkable way. Brilliant!

Linghun by Ai Jiang — - A tale of the one place ghosts are real and they are not he most scary part of the story - its the people being haunted who are. A powerful tale of grief and life that marks an author to watch out for.

The Last Dragoners of Bowbazar by Indra Das — - A tale that is a love letter to being a fantasy fan, a tale of family secrets, growing up and just a delight to read.

The Alderney - Mix Tapes Just For You

Two collections really impressed me this year

Jackal, Jackal: Tales of the Dark and Fantastic by Tobi Ogundiran — - tales of horror, myth and the fantastical. Constantly surprising and can be amusing or grim - its a brilliantly surprising collection

No One Will Come Back For Us by Premee Mohamed — - I adore Mohamed’s work and this collection continue to underline their versatility and brilliance. If you’ve not yet read them catch up!

The Madame Cholet - Its The End of the Tastiest Series as We Know It?

Lords of Uncreation by Adria Tchaikovsky — - This series is big - the end of the earth is just a prologue and this novel wraps up a massive fight for the galaxy and the most loveable cast of misfits this side of the universe. Just a giant fun series I will miss!

The Bungo - Hold Me Kiss me Thrill Me

What July Knew by Emily Koch — This thriller is innovative and uses the world of the 1990s to create a cunningly plotted tale of family secrets told by a child

The Wellington - Let me Be Your Fantasy

Three Different novels captured me this year

Now She Is Witch by Kirsty Logan — - came out early 2023 and its a gorgeously atmospheric and powerfully dreamlike quest for a young woman to find out who she is now

Broken Light by Joanne Harris — - A contemporary fantasy exploring life in the 2020s and its take down of life, social media and how women are treated made this very powerful

Winter Harvest by Ioanna Papadopoulou — - Just a stunning retelling of Demeter’s story and explores the complexity fo the Greek Gods and how that shapes the mythos (and us too)

The Tobermory - Together in Electric Dreams

For science fiction I loved these two

The Ten Percent Thief by Lavanya Lakshminarayan — - A stunning and fresh cyberpunk tale of rebellion and also the dangers of a world that expects us all to have productive value.

Translation State by Ann Leckie - A smart piece of SF that explores aliens who are very alien but also re-examines gender and identity with a fresh focus. Smart storytelling

The Runalong These Three I Loved The Most

The Spear Cuts Through Water by Simon Jimenez — Runalong The Shelves - this novel is a future classic it takes epic fantasy and creates something new, gorgeously written and ambitious. UK readers go get this next year when it comes out

A Sword of Bronze and Ashes by Anna Smith Spark — - I’m very much of the view fantasy’s new edge is not romantasy or cosy but writers taking the bones of the myths and doing very new things with them. This tale merges life as a mother with epic battles of light and dark and the use of language is brilliant.

Dark Woods, Deep Water by Jelena Dunato — Dark Woods, Deep Water by Jelena Dunato The Shelves - Three seemingly unrelated tales all collide in the spookiest of castles for gods and magic to have the last laugh. Inventive, uses myths in new ways and damn good storytelling!

And that is it for the year. have a great year ahead and a new year of great books and booktempting awaits. I leave you again with these words from the novel Far From Uncommon Stars

“Tomorrow is tomorrow. Over there is over there. And here and now is not a bad place and time to be, especially when so much of the unknown is beautiful”

I hope you have a beautiful surprise next year. may there be cake and joy in your future and keep reading!