Quit Arguing with the Yard Signs

book recs and other tips for surviving the approaching Appocalection.

KIDS. This instruction is for me, I have GOT to quit arguing with the yard signs. For one thing, they’re not listening, especially since I’m in the car, alone, basically ranting in my head. Not good. It’s just that there’s this one local election where one of the candidates says one thing now and said a very very different thing last election and it makes me crazy!! There’s also another local one in which my choices are a) candidate whose views I disagree intensely with and b) candidate who I personally watched be removed from a party in an ambulance due to extreme intoxication, and not in our reckless youth.

Whoot! Good times. There’s only one thing I can actually DO next week, and that’s vote… so otherwise, my goal will be to, as Oliver Burkeman put it in his last issue of The Imperfectionist (subscribe here, I love it), hold “space for sanity” which, he notes, “is itself a useful contribution to keeping the planet on an even keel.”

Following the immediate ups and downs and swings and madness won’t make me happier, and it won’t help me make anyone around me happier, either—and honestly I find that a relief to remember. The political world will clack on whether I’m grasping at every last straw of news or not. I plan to choose “not.”

One final word from the great OB: “Finally, you might go and do something fun, because that matters, too.”

Great! Let me suggest a good, diverting, promise you’ll forget about it, try to remember to get some sleep too, BOOK. (I feel it’s important that these all be guaranteed locks, so you may have seen some before, but if you haven’t yet clicked buy, now’s your moment.)

The Five Year Lie, Sarina Bowen. This one’s #1 in the ENTIRE AUDIBLE STORE at the moment for a reason, kids. Go audio or text, either way, you’ll forget about your troubles for a while.

Starter Villain, John Scalzi. I called this “Hitchhiker’s Guide meets James Bond meets Single Childless Cat Lady” on Instagram recently and I’m not sure I can do better.

Check & Mate, Ali Hazelwood. This got marketed as YA, which I think was a mistake. Think The Queen’s Gambit but make it romance—light on the steam for a Hazelwood, too.

Mistborn, Brandon Sanderson. If you spent your teen years scuttling through the halls clutching huge fantasy novels as I did but have since moved away from the complex world-building and elaborate plots, maybe now’s the time to return? There is a reason Sanderson raised more $$ on Kickstarter for his next books than anyone else on that platform ever, and that reason is because he is GOOOOD. Give this a try.

All Systems Red, Martha Wells. As long as we’re possibly diving outside our comfort zones to give our minds that added bit of challenge that might be necessary to really force them to release the here and now, how about this short novella (excellent in audio) about Murderbot, a sentient android security guard trying to figure out what he owes to the humans he can’t quite figure out and to himself.

Wreck the Halls, Tessa Bailey. Get a steamy head start on the holiday season with this gloriously OTT romcom about the kids of the lead singers of the most popular raucous feminist singer-songwriter duo ever, who need to reunite their estranged and angry moms before Christmas or… I forget, something, who cares, it’s just fun.

And don’t forget: The Scandalous Confessions of Lydia Bennet, Witch; The Murder of Mr. Wickham, The Road to Roswell, Emily Wilde’s Encyclopedia of Fairies.

ALL of these should be massively distracting. I could point you to more literary works that I’ve loved, things that maybe move a little more slowly but are still wonderful.. but that is NOT THE GOAL. And if you haven’t read MY books—those work too! BUY THEM. Or if you already have, buy one for a friend!

Get The Chicken Sisters (HERE), In Her Boots (HERE), Playing the Witch Card (HERE)

IN OTHER NEWS

Writing-wise, I’m doing a thing over on #AmWriting, in which I write every day of November and call it November because that’s harder to pronounce. I want to give y’all a new book soon! But the going is slow. Writers, there will be write-alongs and accountability and whining. Join up HERE.

Now is the PERFECT time to binge The Chicken Sisters, because all the episodes are out and you can gobble them all down during your trial week and THEN decide if maybe you also want a full serving of Hallmark’s best holiday movies. Details HERE.

Finally—I’ve been “getting dressed” lately! And I feel like if I’m going to go to all the trouble of a full on OUTFIT (which seem to involve a lot of my new favorite hat) someone should see it so here, in the style of my fave fashion substackers, is what I wore this week (not really, it’s what I wore the last 6 times I bothered to take a selfie in a mirror, so it’s probably a little more elevated than the sweater and jeans I’m wearing now… although not really! I’m wearing what I’m wearing in the pic where I have the fake Happy Halloween bangs, except with a cardigan instead of the pleather biker jacket because I am in the house, jeez, there are limits to even what we glamorous fashion influencers* can do.

*I can call myself that, because there are no glamorous fashion influencer police. I can call myself whatever I want.

Phew, that was a lot! Want more “other” in #AmReading? Or should I stick to my knitting… well my books, because it’s entirely possible that I might decide to share knitting too.

That’s it from me this week, see you on the other side!