The Month in Review and of Things to Come

So I did a lot of reading this month.  Better still the overwhelming amount of what I read was really good.  It always seems that I have one month out of the year when all of the best stuff presents itself to me at once.  That said I kinda wish my reading for November came earlier in the year to so I'd have more time to gather my thoughts concerning my end of the year awards.  Oh well, thems the breaks. 

This was the first month in a while in which I got through five novels: Between Shades of Gray (a title that I can associate no meaning to the book), Hate List, Paper Towns, and Once was Lost were all unconditionally exceptional.  It's kinda lame to say that as they are all known titles by established authors, some even won awards and the others were all nominated.  I didn't discover anything by saying these were great reads rather I'm reaffirming what so many already concluded.  I'd hate to pick a novel as the best read this month even though I'll essentially be doing that in a few weeks...  I think I've said enough about Fire and this seems to be a safe enough distance from the other titles mentioned in this paragraph. 

I also made a big dent in an excellent short story collection by Al Sarrantonio Flights.  I'll have much much more to say about that in my forthcoming review.  Oddly, of all the reading I did in November Neil Gaiman's story The Problem of Susan was the one that stuck out the most.  The reasons why are many; primarily: I like Gaiman, and I love Narnia. 

Also this past month's reading brought to mind a few essay type things I need to attempt.  One would be on the absurdity and fruitlessness of swearing in a secondary fantasy world if the author is not going to use real world expletives.  The other, which would be much harder to write--that said, both are beyond my ability--would deal the definition of 'young adult fiction,' because existing definitions are lacking to ludicrous. 

So my sister thinks it's hilarious that I'm reading all the 'kid stuff' I've been reading lately and tells me if I'm gonna talk about books I need to get back to the grown up stuff.  Needless to say I'll have more on that later but looking forward to December I do plan on reading more books for big people.  I'm going to finish the decidedly not for children's Flights and also plan to get to The Prestige by Christopher Priest, and The Dumas Club by Artuo Perez-Reverte.  If the holidays don't get the best of me I may manage to knock out another but I'm playing it safe as of now. 

And speaking of things I wanted to be reading this month anyone know what up with Catherynne Valente's newest book in the Dirge for Prester John series?  I was really hoping it would be out now-ish.  Or even right now. 

Christmas... Holidays... Blah...