I read a ton in August, there was a lot to do with work and cleaning and chores so I did a lot of audio books. The wife and I also started exercising together and we listen to audiobooks while we do that so our listening increased as well.
I read 3 non-fiction books this month! That's more than I read in all the 2010's most likely. I've found some interesting, and mildly infuriating, but also a few hopeful. Bad Company: Private Equity and the Death of the American Dream by Megan Greenwell was the most infuriating. It was how private equity has destroyed several parts of companies and peoples lives. The creation of public shareholders and then the alteration of that into private equity has gone the way of excess and I believe is causing the downfall of capitalism into oligarchies. The second book was The Cornfield by Mike Peters, a local cold case murder that was solved 30 years later thanks to DNA. It was crazy the lengths the county and city went to to solve this case only for it to go cold, and by a fluke of preserved but thought lost evidence get solved. It was slightly upsetting as it was very one sided as the man convicted never game statements to the book. Not saying that he was innocent or anything, but it felt like a large missing gap in the story. The final non-fiction book I read was How to Be Perfect: The Correct Answer to Every Moral Question by Michael Schur (Mose from The Office and creator of The Good Place). This was a very interesting book about philosophy and morality. I really liked it and thought it was very hopeful.
Bad 8/10
Corn 6/10
Moral 9/10
The wife and I enjoyed two books from the Quinn & Costa series by Allison Brennan, The Third to Die and Tell No Lies. The first was a serial killer hunt and was quite interesting, if resolved with a cute little bow a bit quick by the end. The second was decent enough, but not that engrossing. We then listened to My Sister is Going to Kill Me by Nina Simon, a new release and was very enjoyable for us. It was funny and mysterious and engrossing, even though the first murder didn't occur until more than halfway through the book.
Third 7/10
Lies 5.5/10
Sister 8.5/10
I've gotten the itch to play Dispatch lately, but haven't had the time commitment to be able to focus on it and see where that story goes, so I read a couple books instead. I reread Confessions of a D-List Supervillain by Jim Bernheimer and read Hench by Natalie Zina Walschots. Both are good stories with a view about how awful "heroes" can really be. Hench has gotten a lot of social media buzz I guess, but honestly I prefered the indie D-List to it. It was funnier, felt a little more real, and not quite as tied to The Boys.
Hench 8/10
D-List 8.5/10
I also continued Seth Ring's The Exlian Syndrome Series with Dark Dawn. The second book in this LitRPG wasn't quite as good as the first, it felt like much more plot without a ton of meaning behind it, but I'm hopeful that it's setting up the third and beyond. I did enjoy it and like this series more than Dungeon Crawler Carl, but I'm probably in the minority there.
Dark 7/10
The last book I read was the horror/mystery new release, I Didn't Do It by Elle Gonzalez Rose. This was engrossing, and had a good twist. I did like it overall, and if you like teenage slashers with a bit more depth, this is a decent one.
Didn't 8/10
I played just a couple video games this month, I continued playing Combat Master, it fed my periodic FPS needs and as a free to play game was totally worth it. The matched load significantly faster than what it tries to copy, CoD or Battlefield. I also played some Clue and it was awesome! I love this game and using logic and deduction to figure things out.
Combat 7/10
Clue 9/10
There were definately a few highlights in the movies I watced this month!
I watched Spider-Man: Brand New Day and talk all about it with Marshal and Rish on the Journey Into... podcast, give it a listen! https://www.patreon.com/JourneyInto/posts/comics-cave-10-168257529
Spidey 9/10
Spider-Man: Across the Spider-Verse was watched because Brand New Day gave me an itch and only Spidey could reach it. Fantastic movie and I like these Spider-Verse movies more than the live action ones I believe.
9/10
Tied in with my super-villain reading, I also watched Henchmen, it wasn't as good as Megamind, but it made me laugh and the soundtrack was classic rock gold.
Henchmen 6/10
I saw a few little shorts that I thought were Dropout or Viva la Dirt League-esque parodies, but turned out to be from The Jester and it's sequel. I only watched the first one so far and it's a PG-13 rated version of The Terrifier, but I appreciate it for what it is. Not good enough to watch again, but good enough to give it a shot if you're looking for something to watch.
Jester 5/10
Possibly my favorite movie that I've seen this year is The End of Oak Street. It was soooooo good. The special effects may not be at Jurassic Park level, but the terror and emotions are there. I heard it called "Look Behind You, The Movie" and that is hilariously accurate. This was a truly enjoyable movie and I will be buying it. And watching it quite often.
Oak 9/10
We had a family film fest of Tim Curry movies, RIP. They were all great, you can't go wrong with the amazing Mr Curry, espeically in FernGully: The Last Rainforest, Muppet Treasure Island and potentially my favorite movie of all time Clue!
FernGully 6/10
Muppet 9/10
Clue 10/10
Watching FernGully weirdly led us into watching The Last Unicorn, which is a fever dream of a movie and is very good, but man it goes hard into embracing the strange.
Unicorn 8/10
