Category: Reviews

I know I’ve been reading a lot of nonfiction this year, but I’ll mention why I keep reading these finance and self-help types of books. I’m looking to write something in this general genre, specifically about publishing, and I’m trying to get my footing for what it should read like. And this one reads a lot like the rest.

You Need a Budget is something I know mostly as a budgeting app. The book gives a lot of helpful tips about the first steps you could take into creating a budget based on what your actual spending looks like, rather than applying blanket rules that your money should conform to. It’s very similar to what I did when I first moved out, so I know the strategy works well, and there are other useful tips throughout that are great for people at the start of their budgeting journey.

There are some specifics in here that feel very much like it was from a different era. Even in my day, I couldn’t go to school without loans or getting my parents to pay for it, even if I worked throughout1 and applied for scholarships, for instance. I get the feeling that this is just what happens with finance books. Specifics get out of date, but the overall ideas and messages remain good.

Overall, it’s a good read for someone looking to get started with budgeting. It is US-focused2 but the general strategies can be used just about everywhere.

1. Which I did [↩]
2. Aren’t they all? [↩]

Back in elementary school and high school1 I was a huge high fantasy fan. Somehow, though, I never got around to Earthsea, which I’ve since learned is a genre staple!

The story follows Ged as he develops his magic into becoming a great wizard. He spends a lot of time early on doing whatever he can to prove he’s the best, to the point where he causes problems and gets one of his teachers killed. After this point, a dark shadow follows him that seeks to possess him and he must either evade it for the rest of his life or confront it and risk losing himself to it.

It’s interesting to see the contrast here to a lot of the books I’ve been reading lately. The perspective is not in Ged’s head, but in third omniscient and separated from the action. It’s interesting because you get to see his actions without the justification and need to make him sympathetic. His actions speak to his character, and he is a prideful kid who is making mistakes and doing things for bad reasons. If this were told from his perspective I would have hated it, but the separation made it interesting to watch his character learn and grow.

Nostalgic is how I’d describe the reading experience. It reads very much like the fantasy books I’ve grown up with, but with a focus on a single character learning, changing, and growing as he explores an interesting world. Overall, I really liked it though it really does read a lot different than anything I’ve read in the past couple years.

1. There was no middle school here. I thought that was a fiction-only thing for a very long time. [↩]

So let’s do a book 2 in a series. It’s been a while. Also, I’m going to go ahead and spoil the story, so heads up about that.

This book follows the larger cast of the first, minus April because she’s effectively dead at the start. As they move on with their lives with the Carls gone, something strange starts happening. They start getting mysterious books telling them how to move through the world to get the best results and April’s rival from the previous book has started on a new business venture and has divorced himself from his involvement in her death.

As the story unfolds, April comes back and they learn of Atlus, a new technology that will allow users to experience other lives that is actually being controlled by the Carls brother. A whole bunch of stuff, as we discover, is controlled by this other alien being, and it becomes a story about taking down this other force using stocks and corporate sabotage.

The climax did take me out of the story, though it’s entirely because I work in tech. After over a decade where I’ve worked as a back end, front end, and UI developer, then moved into UX and product, I paid a bit more attention when the UX guy not only was writing and deploying code as part of his job but decided to push a code change directly to production with no review.1 I missed that he went from being hired to do UX at his introduction to becoming a UI developer, which is a different job, at the climax and the only other time his job is mentioned.

You can absolutely justify this. Tech companies are erratic at times and people explain their jobs badly. But I don’t like the book enough to create and accept a justification that wasn’t in the text. Instead, I’ve spiralled into realizing Atlus has been hiring exclusively recent grads and junior level employees2 or people who might qualify for Catherine House3 and there was no way to do good UX work at this company anyway.

I also fundamentally do not understand why Atlus is addictive.

Overall, I don’t think I liked it as much as the first. This is a consequence of traditional publishing, but I thought the first one wrapped up just fine and didn’t need a sequel. It’s fine and it might be something that I just didn’t read at the right time.

1. And no automated tests, but no one has automated tests [↩]
2. And maybe conspiracy theorists [↩]
3. Who else is going to leave their life for a year upon an interview to a place with no internet or contact with the outside world? Senior-level talent, in particular, tends to have a family and a life. [↩]

Today in reading nonfiction to feel smarter, a book about where I live! This one covers some of the history and current social landscape of the city of Vancouver and a little of the surrounding areas…. if you consider 2012 current. It starts with the neighbourhoods and some of the context behind how they became what they are today, and what happened to some of the places that are no longer there. And then it gets interesting.

I really do feel like the book shines a lot more in discussing some of the topics, from where the black people are to indigenous issues to cops to even the dog culture of the city. And, as I mentioned earlier, there’s even discussion of how the outlying areas of Vancouver like Richmond and Surrey play a role in the larger ecosystem of Vancouver.

It did get my protectiveness of Surrey to kick in, though. Nothing said about it is wrong in any way, it just feels different coming from someone who isn’t from the area.

Overall, I did really like it. It feels authentic in the way it talks about the city and the surrounding areas. If you want to get a sense of the city, at least how it was back in the early 2010s, it’s a nice reference point.

I’ve been around a while and I’ve been trying to get better with my finances, start a side hustle, and start looking into the idea of eventually retiring. I thought this might help figure out how to streamline my hours for Scrap Paper Entertainment, but instead I found what might be the source of a certain type of influencer.

While The 4 Hour Workweek does have some good advice about streamlining your work, such as limiting email and eliminating or automating tasks that are annoying, there’s a lot of unfortunate things in here too that I ended up paying more attention to. Mostly because it sounded really familiar. For instance, outsource your tasks1 to cheap labour in India. Cut your costs by moving to a third world country. There is good advice in here, but it’s undercut by the exploitative nature of the solutions offered.

It also really advocates for dropshipping. This was likely good advice in 2010, but now that market is saturated and this illustrates something that’s pretty well known in my circles at least. Business ideas are great if you get in early, but anything that works will not work for long.

If you can find the advice buried under the solutions, there’s some good stuff in here. Minimize the fluff and focus only on the important tasks. Delegate and eliminate as much as possible. Find an income source that involves as little attention as possible. Just maybe skip over the solutions offered.

1. Including emails to your wife? Divorce this man. [↩]

Did I need something cute? Absolutely yes. And I found something that has just the right kind of cute for me, which means tinged with murder.

The story follows Mona, a young wizard with magic over pastry that she doesn’t put much stock into because it is considered minor and she uses it mostly to help in her Aunt’s bakery. Unfortunately, when she finds a body in the bakery, it is the start of her becoming the most important wizard as she’s the only one left to defend the city from traitors and invaders.

I found myself delighted at the tone of the book being fairly light while the subject matter veers a little darker. There is a surprising amount of death and Mona creating monsters that go to war, as well as an ongoing theme that the adults should be dealing with the problems that have fallen on the children’s shoulders. If you’ve read my stuff, you know why I love this.

Also, Uncle Albert turned into Uncle Earl for half a chapter. That was odd.

Overall, it was a great read. It was a lot of fun, and I liked the younger tone with the more mature themes playing throughout it. I know I would have enjoyed it as a kid just as much as I did as an adult.

Somehow my financial planning books have led me here. To a book on retirement. As if that’s something that I will ever be able to do. I can dream!

This book, however, is very much written for not me as an audience. This is targeted specifically at people who were ready to retire in 2010, complete with advice that does not hold up very well anymore. They have a lot of faith in your employer providing funds for your retirement as thanks for your years of service, as well as far more trust in Canadian social programs for retirement than I do.

There’s also a really existential dread I’m noticing in books talking about retirement. Namely, the idea that without work, you lose a part of your identity. I do wonder if that’s as big of an issue as the book implies, though I wouldn’t be surprised now that I think about it. Still concerning, though.

Today in random books I found in my library, let’s learn about urban planning! I do have two series that involve cities that exist in isolation and are cut off from the world, so that seems like a good enough reason to start reading up about the usability of cities.

The thesis of what makes a happy city is pretty straightforward. Create a city in a way where the primary purpose is for humans to live in it as opposed to a means for cars to get from one location to the next. Make the cities more walkable, create public spaces for people to congregate and enjoy leisurely. Invest in other ways for people to get around. And make options in housing for people with lower income to still live in.

I will admit, I paid a lot more attention to the parts about Vancouver than the rest of the book, mostly because I know exactly what he was talking about.1 It’s interesting to see how the same or similar issues are treated in other places, and how the changes have impacted things like hospitalization and crime rates.

Overall, I really liked this book! It was a lot of fun, and informational. While I did pay more attention to some parts than others, I did learn a lot about how urban planning is done in other places.

1. What was considered “low income” for that apartment complex is appalling [↩]

Today in random library books, yet another horror novel! I think I must have added a bunch of them to my list at once and just didn’t remember it. Probably for the best, because apparently this is what I’m in the mood for!

The book follows two people: Mila and Curtis. Mila lives in the past, a recent immigrant to Canada whose mother is betrothed to a powerful man in a strange house that she slowly learns is dangerous and she must find a way to destroy before it takes her like it took the rest of her family. Curtis lives in the present and is tasked with taking care of his mentally ill father and teenage sister, but the weight of his father’s illness is getting to be too much and he’s starting to hear voices as well. They meet one day through a mirror, Mila gaining hope from the experience while Curtis is scared that this means he’ll soon become insane and dangerous like his father.

It’s been a while since I have read a haunted house1 story that wasn’t a struggle to get through, but this one turned out to be fun. Mila slowly realizing that the thing to fear is not just the master of the house but the house itself was fantastic, and I can see how the author was trying to create that parallel between what was happening with her and with Curtis. There were a lot of twists I didn’t see coming and, while some of the explanations for how the mechanics worked were sparse, I don’t think it ever detracted from the story.

The relationship between Curtis and Mila near the end felt very much like it came out of nowhere. I don’t think they interacted enough to build to that point, and the two of them were both so wrapped up in their own traumas that I’m not sure how this was supposed to work, but ultimately I do realize that it was a thing that the author likely felt had to happen.

I also wanted more of Diablo. I thought that horse was going to play a much larger part in the story.

Overall, it was a really fun read! If you’re looking for a relatively quick spooky story, it’s great. The characters are interesting and feel unique, and I’d definitely recommend it for a hounted house fix.

1. About the house itself being the antagonist, unlike Into the Grey [↩]

And I’m back to the random library books! Libby had this in a list of books that I cannot remember too much about, but it was at least somewhat featured and it sounded interesting enough to pick up. And then I promptly forgot about it for a few weeks until it came up on my rotation of books.

Feeder primarily follows Lori, a young woman who gets paid to deal with otherworldly eldritch horrors called Feeders. She takes a job for the Lake Foundation that ultimately turns into a rescue mission where she saves several people from a shipping container and earns the wrath of her employer, a god looking to essentially end the world.

To start, I’ll warn that there’s very little in terms of explanation of how the world or the specifics of how a lot of other elements of the story actually function and I am completely okay with that. The focus is entirely on the narrative and explains only enough to give the characters what they need to continue to move through the story. As a result, the story is very fast pace and great for a quick read, but not as good if you’re trying to figure out the mechanics.

But the story is where all of the fun happens. It is very much a modern YA Lovecraft story, with the focus being on the unknown and the horrors that lie just where you can’t see them and how they are always around you and sometimes even inside of you. In the tradition of the modern Lovecraft narratives I’ve seen, there’s also a lot more diversity1 that is done really nicely that helps to compliment the story.

Each of the characters have been brought from around the US and the world, with different worldviews that both clash and compliment one another. It’s great to see them interact with one another, particularly as you get to see the world from their perspective and get to understand why they are the way they are. All five of the leads is diverse in a different way, and in some cases you don’t even find out about that until the very end of the story though it’s clear that their diversity impacts their interactions. And I really liked that.

I will also add that the story left me feeling like there could be more. At the end, the status quo gets reset to a degree and it feels like this could work really well as a prequel to a whole series of books that has the kids going out and encountering more horrors throughout the world. Which I would be great with, because the characters were a lot of fun and it was an entertaining take on the genre.

Overall, it was a fun read! I do recommend reading it over the weekend and not spending too much time analyzing the why of some of the elements. The characters are fun, the voices are unique, and the premise makes for an interesting story.

1. Suck it, Lovecraft [↩]