{"id":11925,"date":"2016-12-06T18:32:55","date_gmt":"2016-12-06T23:32:55","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.unreality.net\/weblog\/?p=11925"},"modified":"2016-12-06T19:53:47","modified_gmt":"2016-12-07T00:53:47","slug":"november-2016","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.unreality.net\/weblog\/?p=11925","title":{"rendered":"November 2016"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"cyiivtaweaeutq0-1\"<\/a><\/p>\n

So November. I think it’s safe to say that the first week of it did not<\/i> play out as expected. The many long weeks since then have pretty felt just like shell-shocked aftermath. It’s anybody’s guess how exactly things will play out over the next four years, but it’s almost guaranteed to be difficult and ugly on a lot of levels.<\/p>\n

But Thanksgiving was nice, so there is that.<\/p>\n

Anyway, beyond the holidays — which was just me, my sister, our parents, and my sister’s cat — and politics, November was a pretty uneventful month. I read one book<\/a> and thirty-two short stories<\/a>, watched sixteen movies<\/a>, and listened to a little music<\/a>. It was that kind of month.<\/p>\n

The book<\/strong><\/a><\/p>\n

I read Company Town<\/i> by Madeline Ashby for my monthly book group. And I didn’t much like it.<\/p>\n

It wasn’t terrible, but I think the group largely agreed with my own assessment: there’s way too much going on in the novel, with too few of its threads connecting or being resolved. And the ending…ooh boy. It’s rare to find a book where you want many, many longer stretches of exposition just so you can better know what’s going on and who everybody is. The book’s pacing is really weird, and it really does feel like working on a mystery without any clues. <\/p>\n

It seems to set itself up for a sequel — despite rumors it’s a one-and-done — but I don’t think I’d read more. Maybe another book by Ashby, or even a completely rewritten and expanded version of this<\/i> book, but no, not a sequel.<\/p>\n

The stories<\/strong><\/a><\/p>\n

I read thirty-two short stories in November, upping my one-a-day habit all the way up to two-a-day on a couple of occasions. (I took all of Thanksgiving week off from work.) These were my favorites:<\/p>\n