Manton Reece
About Photos Archive 30 days 88 parks Replies Reading Search Also on Micro.blog
  • Finished reading: The Final Empire by Brandon Sanderson. This is the first of his books that Iโ€™ve re-read, listening to the audiobook this time. Still great. ๐Ÿ“š

    โ†’ 8:47 PM, May 2
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  • Finished reading: Dragonsteel Prime by Brandon Sanderson. I read the last several chapters on my flight. Fascinating to see such an early take on a few pieces that would later turn up in Way of Kings, and other draft ideas for the Cosmere. ๐Ÿ“š

    โ†’ 10:31 PM, Apr 10
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  • Finished reading: The Bear and The Nightingale by Katherine Arden. Beautiful and haunting. ๐Ÿ“š

    โ†’ 11:28 PM, Mar 30
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  • Did not finish: The Adventures of Amina al-Sirafi by Shannon Chakraborty. I enjoyed the first part of the book but after setting it aside just couldnโ€™t get back into it. ๐Ÿ“š

    โ†’ 9:46 AM, Mar 30
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  • Got my copy of Dragonsteel Prime in the mail from the last crowdfunding. ๐Ÿ“š

    A red book titled Dragonsteel Prime with intricate gold designs on the cover, and A Sanderson Curiosity at the top.
    โ†’ 9:06 PM, Mar 24
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  • Finished reading: Queen of Shadows by Sarah J. Maas. Slowly working my way through the series with breaks to read other books in between. ๐Ÿ“š

    โ†’ 8:46 PM, Mar 23
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  • Finished reading: Locke Lamora and the Bottled Serpent by Scott Lynch. Great to have another Gentleman Bastard story. Split into two parts in Grimdark Magazine. ๐Ÿ“š

    โ†’ 4:21 PM, Feb 26
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  • Finished reading: Empire of Exiles by Erin M Evans. This was excellent. Starts like a murder mystery set in a fantasy world, with unique magic. ๐Ÿ“š

    โ†’ 4:48 PM, Feb 23
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  • Finished reading: The Lost Bookshop by Evie Woods. Not all of it worked for me but Iโ€™ll read almost any book about books. Also some nice historical fiction-y bits weaved in. ๐Ÿ“š

    โ†’ 5:32 PM, Feb 16
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  • Finished reading: Wind and Truth by Brandon Sanderson. Not even sure what to say. Still letting the end of the first arc sink in. ๐Ÿ“š

    โ†’ 9:47 PM, Feb 3
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  • Nowhere Bookshop. ๐Ÿ“š

    โ†’ 5:54 PM, Dec 31
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  • Found this first edition, signed copy of A Song for Arbonne at Half Price Books the other day and had to get it. Read it so long ago that itโ€™ll be like reading it for the first time. Iโ€™m always on the lookout for old Kay books, they seem in short supply. ๐Ÿ“š

    โ†’ 1:09 PM, Dec 29
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  • Christmas tree with green books at Half Price Books. ๐Ÿ“š

    A Christmas tree is made from stacked green books and adorned with blue and silver ornaments, topped with a star.
    โ†’ 12:06 PM, Dec 27
  • I’m falling well short of my reading goals this year. My currently reading list keeps getting bigger, but I’m not finishing anything. For the rest of 2024, just want to finish Wind and Truth. ๐Ÿ“š

    โ†’ 3:47 PM, Dec 22
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  • It kind of snuck up on meโ€ฆ It’s Wind and Truth release day. Looking forward to starting it this weekend. ๐Ÿ“š

    โ†’ 11:09 AM, Dec 6
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  • Finished reading: Sourdough by Robin Sloan. Enjoyed this so much. Just the book I needed this week. ๐Ÿ“š

    โ†’ 4:03 PM, Nov 9
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  • Finished reading: The Mountain in the Sea by Ray Nayler. This was brilliant. I may need to read it againโ€ฆ Sometimes my mind would wonder, thinking about the future. ๐Ÿ“š

    โ†’ 11:26 AM, Nov 1
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  • Finished reading: Boom Town by Sam Anderson. Could not ask for a more perfect book to finish before driving up to Oklahoma City. Great mix of basketball and the history of the city going back to the founding. ๐Ÿ“š

    โ†’ 10:07 PM, Oct 29
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  • Pre-ordered Directing at Disney a few months ago and promptly forgot about it until it arrived this week. Looks good just flipping through the pages. ๐Ÿ“š

    A book features a black-and-white cover photo of two men, one of them Walt Disney, reviewing a printout of storyboards.
    โ†’ 12:27 PM, Sep 18
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  • Finished reading: The Wild Robot by Peter Brown. Mostly for kids, but I had already been looking forward to the upcoming movie and kept running across the book, so I bought it. Wonderful story. ๐Ÿ“š

    โ†’ 8:00 PM, Sep 11
  • Finished reading: A Wrinkle in Time by Madeleine L’Engle. Somehow I had never read this before now. Also my edition had an interesting afterward by her granddaughter with a history of the book and notes from earlier drafts. ๐Ÿ“š

    โ†’ 7:38 PM, Sep 9
  • A small, probably unfair, book rantโ€ฆ When I start a fantasy book and discover it’s written in first person, I groan a little. It takes a unique story or very good author to pull it off. (Thinking of Robin Hobb.) Even great books would be a little better in third person, with multiple perspectives. ๐Ÿ“š

    โ†’ 9:06 AM, Aug 27
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  • Finished reading: The Exchange by John Grisham. A sequel to The Firm. I usually try to find something positive to say about a bookโ€ฆ I didnโ€™t enjoy this after the first few chapters. But itโ€™s short and I wanted to know how it ended. ๐Ÿ“š

    โ†’ 9:09 PM, Aug 24
  • Finished reading: Heir of Fire by Sarah J. Maas. Felt a little muddled in the middle but solid closing, setting up more characters for the rest of the series. ๐Ÿ“š

    โ†’ 4:06 PM, Aug 20
  • Finished reading: The Ninth Rain by Jen Williams. Strong characters in this. The monsters creeped me out a little. There is a lot going on, maybe a little too much, but it wraps up well for the first book in a trilogy. ๐Ÿ“š

    โ†’ 11:29 AM, Aug 4
  • Finished reading: Blood on Their Hands by Mandy Matney. Wasnโ€™t planning to read this but got into it when @traci started the audiobook. Interesting behind-the-scenes story of Mandy reporting on (and hosting a podcast about) the Murdaughs. ๐Ÿ“š

    โ†’ 8:36 PM, Jul 28
  • Cheat sheet for emoji in my blog posts:

    • ๐Ÿ“š: about books I’m reading
    • ๐Ÿ‡บ๐Ÿ‡ธ: politics
    • ๐Ÿ™‚: friendly reply, please don’t take offense
    • ๐Ÿคช: usually gripes that are slightly exaggerated from how I really feel
    โ†’ 10:08 AM, Jul 26
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  • Finished reading: The Terraformers by Annalee Newitz. I enjoyed the first half of this book. But after the time jump, for me it couldnโ€™t recapture what had worked in the opening characters and story. ๐Ÿ“š

    โ†’ 4:56 PM, Jul 15
  • Finished reading: The Assassin’s Blade by Sarah J. Maas. A set of novellas that take place before the main series. ๐Ÿ“š

    โ†’ 7:30 PM, Jul 3
  • Finished reading: Blood Over Bright Haven by M. L. Wang. This was excellent. It mustโ€™ve been a challenging book to write, fascinating magic and ambitious take on society. Really something special. ๐Ÿ“š

    โ†’ 4:51 PM, Jun 22
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  • โ€œI only came back to myself when I decided something: all emotions are just energy, just potential fuel for action. Everything I felt about what I sawโ€”the guilt and the terrorโ€”wasnโ€™t poison. It was power.โ€ โ€” from Blood Over Bright Haven ๐Ÿ“š

    โ†’ 12:05 AM, Jun 22
  • Finished reading: Sunbringer by Hannah Kaner. This was excellent. Loved the way it revealed more of who the characters are and built up toward the end, setting up what I assume will be a third and final book. ๐Ÿ“š

    โ†’ 4:34 PM, Jun 12
  • Finished reading: Crown of Midnight by Sarah J. Maas. Fast-paced. This was a stronger book than the first one. ๐Ÿ“š

    โ†’ 12:35 AM, Jun 10
  • Finished reading: Slow Productivity by Cal Newport. Some good ideas in this, formalizing what we often have an instinct about with our work day but maybe havenโ€™t put into practice. ๐Ÿ“š

    โ†’ 8:55 PM, Jun 2
  • Finished reading: Throne of Glass by Sarah J. Maas. If this was only a standalone novel, Iโ€™d have some complaints, but I know people love the series. Seems like a good setup, and Iโ€™d like to see where it goes. ๐Ÿ“š

    โ†’ 10:23 PM, May 26
  • Finished reading: Bookshops & Bonedust by Travis Baldree. Iโ€™ll read almost any book about books. Something was missing in this one compared to Legends & Lattes, through. ๐Ÿ“š

    โ†’ 7:16 PM, May 15
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  • Finished reading: The Long Way to a Small, Angry Planet by Becky Chambers. It didnโ€™t quite work for me, lots of interesting characters but very little story. Still enjoyed it, just not as much as her recent novellas. ๐Ÿ“š

    โ†’ 8:01 PM, May 5
  • Didn’t realize my library card was expiring, and now I can’t get the books I’ve been waiting weeks for in Libby. Life is rough. ๐Ÿ™‚ Going to renew online but it’s not exactly automatedโ€ฆ Luckily have more than enough to read in the meantime. ๐Ÿ“š

    โ†’ 1:14 PM, Apr 24
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  • Dauphine St. Books. ๐Ÿ“š

    Books piled everywhere in the French Quarter.
    โ†’ 6:48 PM, Apr 11
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  • Finished reading: The Diamond Age by Neal Stephenson. Hadnโ€™t read this in about twenty years and I wondered if it would be as good as I remembered. It was. ๐Ÿ“š

    โ†’ 4:58 PM, Apr 7
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  • Finished reading: The Book That Wouldn’t Burn by Mark Lawrence. Still not completely sure what this was. Feels unique. Had my doubts midway but now I need to read the next one. ๐Ÿ“š

    โ†’ 11:13 PM, Mar 20
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  • Finished reading: Sea of Tranquility by Emily St. John Mandel. Wonderful. I had been stalled in my reading and this book was just what I needed. ๐Ÿ“š

    โ†’ 1:40 PM, Mar 9
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  • If you’re a fan of Brandon Sanderson, make sure to watch today’s crowdfunding video to the end. I’m excited. Also going to pick up Dragonsteel Prime, but skipping the leatherbound books. ๐Ÿ“š

    โ†’ 3:05 PM, Mar 5
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  • Having a difficult time finishing books this year. Keep starting new ones but not ready to officially let the other ones go. So just going back and forth between multiple books. Need a couple short books to get out of this cycle. ๐Ÿ“š

    โ†’ 3:11 PM, Mar 3
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  • New sticker, Books Are Magic. Also started reading The Bone Season. ๐Ÿ“š

    Photo of sticker and 10th anniversary edition of The Bone Season.
    โ†’ 7:19 PM, Feb 19
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  • Read And Find Out shirt from Dragonsteel. Brandon Sanderson picked up this phrase from Robert Jordan, answering reader questions that might be covered in future books. ๐Ÿ“š

    T-shirt that says RAFO on it.
    โ†’ 6:28 PM, Jan 17
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  • Finished reading: Godkiller by Hannah Kaner. If I knew this was going to be this good, wouldโ€™ve started it earlier. Great pacing and length. Glad thereโ€™s a sequel not far off. ๐Ÿ“š

    โ†’ 5:33 PM, Jan 15
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  • Finished reading: Age of Death by Michael J. Sullivan. Fifth book and I think the weakest in the series, felt like an unnecessary detour. Still a fairly quick read. ๐Ÿ“š

    โ†’ 9:20 PM, Jan 3
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  • Finished watching the Dragonsteel spoiler Q&A. It took a few days, off and on. I’ve read about 20 of Brandon Sanderson’s books and I still don’t even understand many of the questions! Love the super fans. ๐Ÿ“š

    โ†’ 4:08 PM, Dec 27
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  • Finished reading: Age of Legend by Michael J. Sullivan. Didnโ€™t expect this one to end so suddenly because the last 15% left on Kindle was actually an excerpt from another book. ๐Ÿ“š

    โ†’ 10:23 PM, Dec 10
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  • Finished reading: The Ocean at the End of the Lane by Neil Gaiman. Absolutely wonderful. ๐Ÿ“š

    โ†’ 8:10 PM, Dec 5
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  • December already! I still have 9 books left on my reading goal for the year. I’m halfway through a couple things already so I might hit it if I read more over the holidays. ๐Ÿ“š

    โ†’ 3:02 PM, Dec 1
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  • Default apps for 2023

    There have been a bunch of “what apps am I using?” blog posts recently, inspired by an episode of Hemispheric Views. Robb Knight has a page with links to other people’s posts.

    Here’s my list:

    • ๐Ÿ“จ Mail Client: Hey
    • ๐Ÿ“ฎ Mail Server: Fastmail and Hey
    • ๐Ÿ“ Notes: Ulysses
    • โœ… To-Do: Basecamp, GitHub, and Ulysses
    • ๐Ÿ“ท iPhone Photo Shooting: Apple Camera
    • ๐ŸŒ… Photo Management: Apple Photos and Dropbox
    • ๐Ÿ“† Calendar: Fantastical (iOS) and Apple Calendar (macOS)
    • ๐Ÿ“ Cloud File Storage: Dropbox
    • ๐Ÿ“– RSS: NetNewsWire and Feedbin
    • ๐Ÿ™๐Ÿปโ€โ™‚๏ธ Contacts: Apple Contacts
    • ๐ŸŒ Browser: Safari
    • ๐Ÿ’ฌ Chat: Messages and Slack
    • ๐Ÿ”– Bookmarks: Micro.blog
    • ๐Ÿ“‘ Read It Later: Micro.blog
    • ๐Ÿ“œ Word Processing: Pages and Google Docs
    • ๐Ÿ“ˆ Spreadsheets: Numbers and Google Sheets
    • ๐Ÿ“Š Presentations: Keynote
    • ๐Ÿ›’ Shopping Lists: none
    • ๐Ÿด Meal Planning: none
    • ๐Ÿ’ฐ Budgeting and Personal Finance: Numbers
    • ๐Ÿ“ฐ News: Safari and YouTube TV
    • ๐ŸŽต Music: Spotify
    • ๐ŸŽ™๏ธ Podcasts: Overcast
    • ๐Ÿ” Password Management: 1Password
    • ๐Ÿค– Code Editing: Nova and Xcode
    • ๐Ÿ“š Books: Kindle
    • ๐ŸŒŽ Blogging: Micro.blog

    I added a few at the end that I’ve seen other folks use even if they weren’t in the original list. There is scoring too, but I don’t understand how it works. ๐Ÿ™‚

    โ†’ 11:10 AM, Nov 28
  • Finished reading: Divergent by Veronica Roth. Wasnโ€™t planning on getting this but it was on Libbyโ€™s no-wait list when I was queuing up books for my trip. Never saw the movie. ๐Ÿ“š

    โ†’ 11:27 PM, Nov 14
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  • Finished reading: Age of War by Michael J. Sullivan. Another good audiobook to finish on the road. Been working through this for a little while. ๐Ÿ“š

    โ†’ 9:48 PM, Nov 13
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  • Finished reading: The House in the Cerulean Sea by TJ Klune. Listened to the audiobook version. Love the way the narrator interpreted all the kids' voices. ๐Ÿ“š

    โ†’ 12:16 AM, Nov 13
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  • Finished reading: She Who Became the Sun by Shelley Parker-Chan. An ambitious book that kept surprising me. Not everything worked, but I was hanging on until the end anyway. Curious if some unresolved threads will get attention in the next book. ๐Ÿ“š

    โ†’ 5:03 PM, Nov 3
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  • Finished reading: Shadows for Silence in the Forests of Hell by Brandon Sanderson. Hadnโ€™t realized until I had finished The Sunlit Man that I had missed this Cosmere novella. ๐Ÿ“š

    โ†’ 10:25 PM, Oct 21
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  • Picked up Killers of the Flower Moon a few weeks ago and only now starting it. Got tickets for the movie next week so I have a little time to make a dent in the book, at least. ๐Ÿ“š

    โ†’ 2:58 PM, Oct 20
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  • Finished reading: Age of Swords by Michael J. Sullivan. Still enjoying this series. ๐Ÿ“š

    โ†’ 9:59 PM, Oct 18
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  • Finished reading: The Sunlit Man by Brandon Sanderson. Listened to the whole audiobook on the drive to and from the Davis Mountains. Brandon giving us a taste of the Cosmere endgame! Loved it. ๐Ÿ“š

    โ†’ 5:32 PM, Oct 17
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  • Finished reading: Cloud Cuckoo Land by Anthony Doerr. Takes a little while to get there but love when all the threads start to come together. Wonderful. ๐Ÿ“š

    โ†’ 10:22 PM, Sep 21
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  • Got my signed copy of Sword of Kaigen from the Kickstarter. The hardcover turned out great. ๐Ÿ“š

    Book with nice silver paper edge.
    โ†’ 3:58 PM, Sep 16
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  • Half Price Books flagship store in Dallas. ๐Ÿ“š

    Bookshelves. A small part of the largest Half Price Books in Texas.
    โ†’ 4:58 PM, Aug 4
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  • Finished reading: Age of Myth by Michael J. Sullivan. This was great. Really well paced, seems like a perfect setup for the series. First of six books. ๐Ÿ“š

    โ†’ 9:14 PM, Aug 3
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  • Finished reading: Dungeons & Dragons: The Druid’s Call by E. K. Johnston. I think I was drawn to these prequels because of the fond memories I have of reading Dragonlance back in the day. ๐Ÿ“š

    โ†’ 10:10 PM, Jul 27
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  • Got my copy of Yumi and the Nightmare Painter in the mail today. I continue to be amazed at how great these print editions look. My favorite so far. ๐Ÿ“š

    Photo of book open with illustration.
    โ†’ 3:15 PM, Jul 24
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  • Finished reading: The Ember Blade by Chris Wooding. Read the first half of this a few months ago and then took a break before picking it up again. Really gets going in the second half. Excellent. ๐Ÿ“š

    โ†’ 1:44 AM, Jul 22
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  • Finished reading: Yumi and the Nightmare Painter by Brandon Sanderson. This book alone was worth backing the Kickstarter project. Loved it. ๐Ÿ“š

    โ†’ 6:04 PM, Jul 11
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  • Finished reading: The Magician’s Daughter by H. G. Parry. ๐Ÿ“š

    โ†’ 5:18 PM, Jul 7
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  • Finished reading: A Prayer for the Crown-Shy by Becky Chambers. A great second book. Hope there are more of these. ๐Ÿ“š

    โ†’ 10:39 PM, Jul 6
  • Finished reading: The Frugal Wizardโ€™s Handbook for Surviving Medieval England by Brandon Sanderson. Another totally different book from his usual. Fun. ๐Ÿ“š

    โ†’ 12:56 AM, Jul 2
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  • Realizing that Brandon Sandersonโ€™s secret project #3 is coming out in just a few days. And itโ€™s another book in the Cosmere! Want to try to finish #2 this week even though theyโ€™re not related. ๐Ÿ“š

    โ†’ 5:59 PM, Jun 28
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  • Did not finish: The Reading List by Sara Nisha Adams. I usually like books about books, but could not get into this one. I think I was too impatient for the plot to go somewhere. ๐Ÿ“š

    โ†’ 9:44 AM, Jun 23
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  • Good morning, Libby fans. Experimental feature now available in Micro.blog: go to this special path in Micro.blog in your web browser: /account/libraries. Enjoy! ๐Ÿ“š

    โ†’ 11:08 AM, Jun 21
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  • On the flight back to Austin, finished reading A Psalm for the Wild-Built by Becky Chambers. Wonderful. Queued up the second book for later. ๐Ÿ“š

    โ†’ 9:27 PM, Jun 9
  • Finished reading: Astrophysics for People in a Hurry by Neil deGrasse Tyson. Remembered only a little of this from college astronomy. The audiobook is about 4 hours, great for a short drive today. ๐Ÿ“š

    โ†’ 8:13 PM, Jun 8
  • Finished reading: Recursion by Blake Crouch. This book blew my mind a little. ๐Ÿ“š

    โ†’ 1:22 PM, Jun 7
  • Finished reading: Tomorrow, and Tomorrow, and Tomorrow by Gabrielle Zevin. All the praise for this book is justified. A masterpiece. ๐Ÿ“š

    โ†’ 11:49 AM, Jun 4
  • Haven’t been able to finish any books lately. Probably way behind where I was for reading goals last year. Not sure if I’m working too much or just no books are quite the right fit. ๐Ÿ“š

    โ†’ 8:58 AM, May 18
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  • Finished reading: Spinning Silver by Naomi Novik. I really enjoyed this story. First-person for multiple characters was a little awkward, though, and maybe held it back from what it couldโ€™ve been. ๐Ÿ“š

    โ†’ 11:57 AM, Apr 28
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  • My copy of Tress of the Emerald Sea arrived! Love the green ink throughout the book. ๐Ÿ“š

    Inside page of book with green illustration of leaves.
    โ†’ 9:42 AM, Mar 28
  • Finished reading: The Cat who Saved Books by Sosuke Natsukawa. Books about books. ๐Ÿ“š

    โ†’ 12:31 AM, Mar 24
  • Finished reading: Elder Race by Adrian Tchaikovsky. A short, great read. ๐Ÿ“š

    โ†’ 11:51 PM, Mar 15
  • Did not finish: Senlin Ascends by Josiah Bancroft. Just couldn’t get into it. Might try to pick it up again some other time in print instead of audiobook. ๐Ÿ“š

    โ†’ 11:16 AM, Mar 15
  • Finished reading: Assassin’s Quest by Robin Hobb. An extraordinary series.๐Ÿ“š

    โ†’ 7:36 PM, Mar 9
  • Loved the first book in this world so decided to get A Day of Fallen Night on release day. Still have a couple other books to finish first before I can start this. ๐Ÿ“š

    Hardcover book with dragon on cover.
    โ†’ 4:50 PM, Feb 28
  • Last night, stayed up until 1am reading Assassin’s Quest. Felt like I was 17 years old instead of 47. ๐Ÿ“š

    โ†’ 11:36 AM, Feb 28
  • Finished reading: Ready Player One by Ernest Cline. So much fun. Still going to skip the movie, doesnโ€™t seem possible to adapt without losing too much. ๐Ÿ“š

    โ†’ 9:39 PM, Feb 22
  • Finished reading the last few chapters of Royal Assassin by Robin Hobb on the flight back to Austin. Canโ€™t wait for the next one. ๐Ÿ“š

    โ†’ 2:47 AM, Feb 19
  • Yesterday at the Rose City Book Pub, catching up with @jean. ๐Ÿ“š

    Bookshelves.
    โ†’ 11:03 AM, Feb 18
  • Finished reading: The Dragon Republic by R. F. Kuang. Not sure Iโ€™m going to continue the series. Thereโ€™s great stuff here but Iโ€™m no longer feeling much sympathy for the main character. ๐Ÿ“š

    โ†’ 10:40 PM, Feb 4
  • Last night, instead of actually reading, I wasted a lot of time conflicted on whether I could finish reading an e-book before it was due at the library or if I should pause and read something else. Usually juggle 2-3 books (at least 1 audiobook)… So much to read. ๐Ÿ“š

    โ†’ 10:45 AM, Jan 30
  • Finished reading: River of Stars by Guy Gavriel Kay. Iโ€™m sort of left without the right words, dumbfounded after finishing this. Really good. ๐Ÿ“š

    โ†’ 2:43 PM, Jan 29
  • Finished reading: The Poppy War by R. F. Kuang. Loved Babel so wanted to read this series too. Strong first book. ๐Ÿ“š

    โ†’ 12:25 AM, Jan 24
  • Started listening to River of Stars by Guy Gavriel Kay today while on the road. Love his writing. Also have the print version which I may switch to later. ๐Ÿ“š

    โ†’ 1:18 PM, Jan 20
  • Finished reading: The Kingdom of Back by Marie Lu. A mix of historical fiction and fantasy. Took me a while to get into it, but enjoyed it more as it progressed. ๐Ÿ“š

    โ†’ 11:32 AM, Jan 18
  • Finished reading: Assassin’s Apprentice by Robin Hobb. That was excellent. ๐Ÿ“š

    โ†’ 11:38 PM, Jan 10
  • After several months, decided to cancel Kindle Unlimited. I didn’t think about how it could become an incentive for authors to go Amazon-only, which isn’t good for the larger e-book ecosystem. Still mostly using Libby, purchased books, and Audible. ๐Ÿ“š

    โ†’ 1:28 PM, Jan 10
  • Finished reading: Tress of the Emerald Sea by Brandon Sanderson. First book of the new year! Different than Brandonโ€™s other novels but wonderful in its own way. ๐Ÿ“š

    โ†’ 12:01 PM, Jan 8
  • Did not finish: Deadhouse Gates by Steven Erikson. Decided to start 2023 by giving up on this. I want to get back to it one day because I think I’ll like it after I get through the first couple books, but might need to start the series over. ๐Ÿ“š

    โ†’ 12:38 PM, Jan 1
  • Excited for Brandon Sandersonโ€™s secret book release tomorrow. It has been a long time since Iโ€™ve started a book with thousands of other people on the same day. Probably not since Harry Potter. ๐Ÿ“š

    โ†’ 11:31 AM, Dec 31
  • We re-watched all the Harry Potter movies over the last week or so. Thinking about putting a books re-read on my list for next year… Haven’t read Deathly Hallows since it’s release. ๐Ÿ“š

    โ†’ 4:28 PM, Dec 18
  • Finished reading: Legends & Lattes by Travis Baldree. I love fantasy books and I love coffee shops, so how can I not love this? Fun story. ๐Ÿ“š

    โ†’ 10:08 AM, Dec 18
  • Finished reading: Babel by R. F. Kuang. Fantasy but only just barely, itโ€™s really an alternative history about language, race, class, friendship. Brilliant. ๐Ÿ“š

    โ†’ 11:46 PM, Dec 8
  • Finished reading: The Lost Metal by Brandon Sanderson. Mistborn era 2 is a wrap. Really want to reread The Emperorโ€™s Soul now. And not long until the secret project books. ๐Ÿ“š

    โ†’ 12:39 AM, Dec 1
  • Finished reading: The Light of All That Falls by James Islington ๐Ÿ“š

    โ†’ 4:15 AM, Nov 27
  • Excited to jump into reading The Lost Metal by Brandon Sanderson, released today. Had a dream the other night where I met Brandon and he critiqued my book collection. ๐Ÿ“š

    โ†’ 10:13 AM, Nov 15
  • Finished reading: Some Kind of Happiness by Claire Legrand ๐Ÿ“š

    โ†’ 11:15 PM, Nov 10
  • Finished reading: An Echo of Things to Come by James Islington. There is a lot going on in this. Hope the next book in the series has a little less timeline jumping, but really good. ๐Ÿ“š

    โ†’ 5:47 PM, Oct 29
  • Finished reading: All the Light We Cannot See by Anthony Doerr. Incredible. ๐Ÿ“š

    โ†’ 4:44 PM, Oct 12
  • Finished reading: The Shadow of What Was Lost by James Islington. Great start to this trilogy. Hit all the right notes for a fantasy series. ๐Ÿ“š

    โ†’ 2:02 PM, Oct 8
  • โ€œDonโ€™t you want to be alive before you die?โ€ Reading All the Light We Cannot See. No spoilers, Iโ€™m about halfway through. ๐Ÿ“š

    โ†’ 6:16 PM, Sep 27
  • Finished reading: The Slow Regard of Silent Things by Patrick Rothfuss. Not what I expected, but a short read and nice complement to his other books. Smiled when I noticed the rhymes, almost couldโ€™ve been poetry. ๐Ÿ“š

    โ†’ 2:42 PM, Sep 27
  • Finished reading: Anxious People by Fredrik Backman. Wonderful characters. Starts kind of all over the place (by design) and really comes together nicely. ๐Ÿ“š

    โ†’ 8:09 PM, Sep 21
  • My book reading has been a little random lately, bouncing between a few novels based on mood and what is due in Libby soon. On track to read more books in a year than I ever have before. ๐Ÿ“š

    โ†’ 3:18 PM, Sep 21
  • After working at a coffee shop downtown, took a break to read by the trail. Finished reading: Mr. Penumbra’s 24-Hour Bookstore by Robin Sloan. Loved everything about this book. ๐Ÿ“š

    โ†’ 11:43 AM, Sep 13
  • Audible: “Next credit arrives on Sep 13, 2022”. Checking today’s date. Reload reload reload. ๐Ÿ“š

    โ†’ 10:11 AM, Sep 13
  • Reshuffled my Libby holds queue with new books. Also, wasn’t sure I was going to stick with Kindle Unlimited after the free trial because of the limited selection, but I’ve found it’s mostly been worth it as long as a few books I’m interested in are in there. ๐Ÿ“š

    โ†’ 12:14 PM, Sep 11
  • Finished reading: Locklands by Robert Jackson Bennett. Impressed with the way each book in the trilogy built on the initial foundation, taking it much further than I expected. ๐Ÿ“š

    โ†’ 10:09 PM, Sep 10
  • Did not finish: The Time Traveler’s Wife by Audrey Niffenegger. I started reading this when the TV show came out. Neat idea but haven’t been able to get back into it. ๐Ÿ“š

    โ†’ 2:45 PM, Sep 10
  • Finished reading: Shorefall by Robert Jackson Bennett ๐Ÿ“š

    โ†’ 10:53 PM, Sep 2
  • Finished reading: Foundryside by Robert Jackson Bennett. Looking forward to the rest of the trilogy. Interesting magic system. ๐Ÿ“š

    โ†’ 4:50 AM, Aug 26
  • I thought I was following Beto pretty closely, but didn’t realize he was working on a book, out today. Looks good. Ordered: We’ve Got to Try. ๐Ÿ“š

    โ†’ 12:44 PM, Aug 23
  • Did not finish: The Ruins by Scott Smith. Listened to the first part of this on audiobook with @traci, but it’s not really my kind of book. Don’t particularly care about these characters or how it ends. ๐Ÿ“š

    โ†’ 8:44 AM, Aug 22
  • Finished reading: The Wise Man’s Fear by Patrick Rothfuss ๐Ÿ“š

    โ†’ 10:50 PM, Aug 19
  • Finished reading: Gardens of the Moon by Steven Erikson. There is a lot going on in this. So many different point of view characters. Going to start book 2. ๐Ÿ“š

    โ†’ 5:43 PM, Aug 6
  • Finally starting the Malazan series. Iโ€™m reading on Kindle Unlimited which includes the Audible narration as an option, so I can read or listen and itโ€™s synced up. Wish every e-book purchase worked this way. ๐Ÿ“š

    โ†’ 8:10 PM, Jul 25
  • Finished reading: The Ten Thousand Doors of January by Alix E. Harrow ๐Ÿ“š

    โ†’ 1:55 PM, Jul 25
  • Finished reading: My Neighbor Totoro by Tsugiko Kubo. A short book, for kids or Miyazaki fans. Adds more details and scenes than the movie. Wonderful. ๐Ÿ“š

    โ†’ 4:59 PM, Jul 23
  • Just discovered The Wandering Inn, an epic 7-book (and counting) fantasy series that the author publishes on the web every week as new chapters are written. Essentially a massive blog, later collected as Kindle and Audible books. ๐Ÿ“š

    โ†’ 3:48 PM, Jul 23
  • Finished reading: From the River to the Sea by John Sedgwick ๐Ÿ“š

    โ†’ 11:44 PM, Jul 17
  • Finished reading: The Cartographers by Peng Shepherd ๐Ÿ“š

    โ†’ 11:55 PM, Jul 5
  • Did not finish: Dragonflight by Anne McCaffrey. I’ve been reading some older fantasy books that I had missed. I’m 3/4 of the way through this and keep hoping it starts to work for me, but now giving up. ๐Ÿ“š

    โ†’ 10:06 AM, Jul 2
  • Finished reading: Under Heaven by Guy Gavriel Kay. It had been years since I read any books by Kay. I had almost forgotten how beautiful his writing is. ๐Ÿ“š

    โ†’ 5:59 PM, Jul 1
  • Got a hardcover of The Lies of Locke Lamora, which I had only read in e-book before. Want to re-read it after I get through some more of my current reading list. ๐Ÿ“š

    โ†’ 12:44 PM, Jun 19
  • Finished reading: Big Wonderful Thing: A History of Texas by Stephen Harrigan. Excellent. Took me a while to finish it, but so glad I did. It’s got all the facts but it’s not a textbook-like history… You can tell it’s personal for the author. Well researched, well crafted. ๐Ÿ“š

    โ†’ 5:24 PM, Jun 16
  • Finished reading: Enchanters' End Game by David Eddings ๐Ÿ“š

    โ†’ 3:50 PM, Jun 8
  • I donโ€™t buy that many print books anymore. Decided to splurge on this copy of Mistborn. This quick video is my first time looking at itโ€ฆ Really nice paper and ink. ๐Ÿ“š

    โ†’ 2:48 PM, Jun 6
  • Finished reading: Klara and the Sun by Kazuo Ishiguro. Brilliant. I loved this. ๐Ÿ“š

    โ†’ 11:34 AM, May 28
  • Day 3 of the photo challenge is experimentalโ€ฆ Didnโ€™t have a good idea for the photo until I was reading (Wise Manโ€™s Fear) and noticed โ€œexperimentโ€ on the page. ๐Ÿ“š

    โ†’ 9:30 PM, May 3
  • Now that I’m tracking all of my book reading in Micro.blog, I cleared out my “currently reading” and “want to read” lists in Goodreads. But when I finish a book, after blogging it I do add it to Goodreads just to let Goodreads keep track of my 2022 reading goals. ๐Ÿ“š

    โ†’ 10:54 AM, Apr 17
  • Finished reading: Castle of Wizardry by David Eddings. When I started this series, I thought it was a little obvious. But Iโ€™m enjoying it more and more with each book. ๐Ÿ“š

    โ†’ 6:40 PM, Apr 16
  • Finished a bunch of work this morning, now taking some time to get into the 2nd book of The Kingkiller Chronicle. Already can tell Iโ€™m going to love it. ๐Ÿ“š

    โ†’ 1:23 PM, Apr 9
  • Finished reading: The Girl Who Fell Beneath the Sea by Axie Oh ๐Ÿ“š

    โ†’ 2:04 PM, Apr 5
  • Finished reading: The Paris Library by Janet Skeslien Charles ๐Ÿ“š

    โ†’ 7:32 PM, Apr 4
  • Iโ€™ve been reading a lot of e-books and audiobooks, so wanted to pick up something new in print. Just arrived: The Girl Who Fell Beneath the Sea by Axie Oh. ๐Ÿ“š

    Book cover
    โ†’ 3:00 PM, Mar 29
  • Finished reading: Magician’s Gambit by David Eddings ๐Ÿ“š

    โ†’ 3:03 PM, Mar 28
  • Finished reading: The Priory of the Orange Tree by Samantha Shannon. Epic. Felt like 2 books and easily couldโ€™ve been. I wonder if we could ever see a sequel or novellas with these characters. ๐Ÿ“š

    โ†’ 8:32 AM, Mar 21
  • Finished reading: The Emperor’s Soul by Brandon Sanderson ๐Ÿ“š

    โ†’ 11:35 PM, Mar 6
  • Finished reading: Queen of Sorcery by David Eddings. The series is slow at times but starting to get good. I can see why itโ€™s a classic. ๐Ÿ“š

    โ†’ 2:24 PM, Mar 4
  • Brandon Sanderson drops some big news in a video on YouTube. I did not see this coming. ๐Ÿ“š

    โ†’ 1:04 PM, Mar 1
  • Finished reading: Sixth of the Dusk by Brandon Sanderson ๐Ÿ“š

    โ†’ 9:11 PM, Feb 26
  • Finished reading: Pawn of Prophecy by David Eddings ๐Ÿ“š

    โ†’ 10:47 AM, Feb 26
  • Finished reading: Stardust by Neil Gaiman ๐Ÿ“š

    โ†’ 9:57 PM, Feb 20
  • Finished reading: Termination Shock by Neal Stephenson. Love the premise, characters, and strong first half, then I started to wonder if Stephenson had lost the plotโ€ฆ but it comes together and he sticks the landing. ๐Ÿ“š

    โ†’ 5:12 PM, Feb 10
  • Finished reading: White Sand (Volume 1) by Brandon Sanderson. Another part of the Cosmere. Wonder if heโ€™ll ever release the draft that this graphic novel is based on. ๐Ÿ“š

    โ†’ 6:10 PM, Feb 7
  • Finished reading: The Art of Wolfwalkers by Charles Solomon. I have a lot of โ€œart ofโ€ books, but usually just skim them and then they go on the bookshelf to pick up again later. Decided to actually read this front to back for a change. ๐Ÿ“š

    โ†’ 10:26 PM, Feb 6
  • Finished reading: How to Stop Time by Matt Haig ๐Ÿ“š

    โ†’ 2:20 PM, Feb 6
  • Nice to see Maus at the top of the best-sellers list. I actually ordered a copy last week too. I’ve been meaning to re-read it for years… Haven’t read it since I was a kid and one of my friends had a copy. ๐Ÿ“š

    โ†’ 6:24 PM, Jan 31
  • Finished reading: The Republic of Thieves by Scott Lynch ๐Ÿ“š

    โ†’ 9:30 PM, Jan 25
  • A date has been set for the IndieWeb personal libraries pop-up session: February 19th. Looking forward to it! ๐Ÿ“š

    โ†’ 10:11 AM, Jan 25
  • I should be able to finish The Republic of Thieves this week, so I went to order the 4th book in the series… It’s not out yet! Supposedly was set to ship last year. ๐Ÿ“š

    โ†’ 2:22 PM, Jan 24
  • Finished reading: Red Seas Under Red Skies by Scott Lynch. First book of 2022. Love this series. ๐Ÿ“š

    โ†’ 12:30 AM, Jan 8
  • Iโ€™m not big on stats, but a positive change I made last year was to get my reading time way up, from a handful of books usually, to 33 books last year. Setting a goal of 40 for 2022. ๐Ÿ“š

    โ†’ 1:07 PM, Jan 1
  • Finished reading: A Darker Shade of Magic by V. E. Schwab ๐Ÿ“š

    โ†’ 10:39 AM, Dec 26
  • Feel like Iโ€™m almost on the other side of the COVID booster knocking me around for 24 hours. Luckily it was a good rainy weekend to stay in bed anyway. Started reading A Darker Shade of Magic, probably be my last book of 2021. ๐Ÿ“š

    โ†’ 3:20 PM, Dec 18
  • Read most books as e-books this year, but if I started a series and loved it, I usually picked up the other books in print. I think my bookshelf is going to end up with a lot of book 2s and 3s. ๐Ÿ“š

    โ†’ 10:39 AM, Dec 16
  • Finished reading: The Lies of Locke Lamora by Scott Lynch. This novel is so well crafted. Loved it. ๐Ÿ“š

    โ†’ 5:44 PM, Dec 15
  • I started reading The Wizard and the Prophet a couple years ago and liked it, but I stalled about halfway through… This glowing review by Seth Godin makes me want to pick it back up and finish it. ๐Ÿ“š

    โ†’ 10:48 AM, Dec 10
  • Finished reading: State of Terror by Hillary Clinton and Louise Penny. Iโ€™ve been listening to the audiobook in the car the last few weeks. I was curious what characters and setting Hillary would come up with based on her experience in the White House and state department. ๐Ÿ“š

    โ†’ 10:26 PM, Nov 29
  • Finished reading: Rhythm of War by Brandon Sanderson ๐Ÿ“š

    โ†’ 6:26 PM, Nov 28
  • Hot off the press, just got the test printing of my book 30 Days. Very happy with it. Just need to tweak a couple things like margins inside. The print edition of Indie Microblogging will match, with the same size and layout. ๐Ÿ“š

    โ†’ 5:56 PM, Nov 9
  • Finished reading: Warbreaker by Brandon Sanderson ๐Ÿ“š

    โ†’ 11:20 PM, Nov 8
  • I was thinking a lot about how I track books in Micro.blog and what could be improved. I put together a quick survey to get your thoughts too: forms.gle/6mUbvsohR… ๐Ÿ“š

    โ†’ 9:40 AM, Oct 26
  • Finished reading: The Library Book by Susan Orlean ๐Ÿ“š

    โ†’ 6:12 PM, Oct 21
  • Finished reading: The Name of the Wind by Patrick Rothfuss ๐Ÿ“š

    โ†’ 11:52 AM, Oct 1
  • Just purchased some ISBNs. Starting to get real. ๐Ÿ“š

    โ†’ 2:33 PM, Sep 21
  • Finished reading: Elantris by Brandon Sanderson. Not often that I finish 2 books in the same day, but I’ve been alternating both audiobooks and e-books over the last few weeks. Loved this and couldn’t put it down tonight for the final chapters. ๐Ÿ“š

    โ†’ 10:23 PM, Sep 3
  • Finished reading: The City of Dreaming Books by Walter Moers. ๐Ÿ“š

    โ†’ 3:04 PM, Sep 3
  • Finished reading: Project Hail Mary by Andy Weir. Ended up listening to the whole thing on audiobook. It was fantastic. ๐Ÿ“š

    โ†’ 5:08 PM, Aug 12
  • Finished reading: Made to Stick: Why Some Ideas Survive and Others Die by Chip and Dan Heath. I listened to the audiobook version of this. Lots of good lessons that we could apply to how we talk about Micro.blog. ๐Ÿ“š

    โ†’ 11:20 AM, Aug 10
  • Finished reading: Mistborn Secret History by Brandon Sanderson ๐Ÿ“š

    โ†’ 4:40 PM, Aug 2
  • Time to read Rhythm of War. The longer I put off reading it, the more daunting it started to seem. Also got the e-book at the library for whenever 1100 pages isnโ€™t convenient to have with me. ๐Ÿ“š

    โ†’ 8:05 PM, Jul 17
  • Finished reading: The Midnight Library by Matt Haig ๐Ÿ“š

    โ†’ 11:51 PM, Jul 16
  • Finished reading The Bands of Mourning by Brandon Sanderson. That’s it for the Mistborn series until the final book in the 2nd era is out later this year. ๐Ÿ“š

    โ†’ 9:01 PM, Jul 12
  • My name is very uncommon, so it’s weird that there’s a character named Manton in The Bands of Mourning that I’m currently reading. Also still need to visit Manton, Michigan one of these years. ๐Ÿ“š

    โ†’ 8:21 AM, Jul 7
  • Finished reading: Shadows of Self by Brandon Sanderson ๐Ÿ“š

    โ†’ 7:36 PM, Jul 3
  • Finished reading: Alloy of Law by Brandon Sanderson ๐Ÿ“š

    โ†’ 2:23 PM, Jun 27
  • Finished reading: A Man Called Ove by Fredrik Backman ๐Ÿ“š

    โ†’ 7:03 PM, Jun 19
  • While on the road last weekend, we started the audiobook for Project Hail Mary. I’m now reading the 2nd half in print form because I had already ordered the book, but the audiobook reading is very good. ๐Ÿ“š

    โ†’ 3:48 PM, Jun 15
  • Finished reading: Crooked Kingdom by Leigh Bardugo ๐Ÿ“š

    โ†’ 2:39 PM, Jun 15
  • I’ve finally been supplementing all the books I buy with also checking out e-books from the library. I love it, except I need to get used to the timing of everything… I was 2/3 of the way through A Man Called Ove when my loan expired. Back into the month-long hold queue. ๐Ÿ“š

    โ†’ 1:32 PM, Jun 1
  • Finished reading The Invisible Life of Addie LaRue by V. E. Schwab. Unlike anything I’ve read before. Beautiful. There’s never enough time. ๐Ÿ“š

    โ†’ 11:16 PM, May 31
  • Finished reading: The Old Man And The Sea by Ernest Hemingway ๐Ÿ“š

    โ†’ 10:27 PM, May 22
  • Finished reading Six of Crows by Leigh Bardugo. Different kind of book than Shadow and Bone, and it wasn’t until I was halfway through that I really got into it because it takes time for all the backstories to develop. Loved it. ๐Ÿ“š

    โ†’ 3:21 PM, May 17
  • Finished reading Ruin and Rising by Leigh Bardugo, wrapping up the Shadow and Bone trilogy. ๐Ÿ“š

    โ†’ 12:28 PM, May 4
  • Finished reading: Siege and Storm by Leigh Bardugo ๐Ÿ“š

    โ†’ 6:29 PM, Apr 30
  • Finished reading Shadow and Bone by Leigh Bardugo. Enjoyed it, so I’m going to read the next 2 books in the trilogy and then queue up the Netflix series. ๐Ÿ“š

    โ†’ 8:44 AM, Apr 27
  • Finished reading: Howl’s Moving Castle by Diana Wynne Jones ๐Ÿ“š

    โ†’ 10:23 PM, Apr 24
  • Finished reading The Sword of Kaigen by M. L. Wang. Halfway through this turned into a different (and even better) story than I was expecting. Surprising and tragic and very good. ๐Ÿ“š

    โ†’ 4:52 PM, Apr 10
  • Finished reading: Dawnshard by Brandon Sanderson. Now only have Rhythm of War as the last published Stormlight Archive book to read. I bought it already but going to detour into some other books first and save it for later. ๐Ÿ“š

    โ†’ 9:45 PM, Mar 28
  • Finished reading: Oathbringer by Brandon Sanderson ๐Ÿ“š

    โ†’ 8:28 PM, Mar 24
  • Finished listening to the audiobook of How to Avoid a Climate Disaster by Bill Gates, read by Wil Wheaton. I learned a lot from this book. ๐Ÿ“š

    โ†’ 10:42 PM, Mar 21
  • Finished reading: Sharing a House with the Never-Ending Man: 15 Years at Studio Ghibli by Steve Alpert. Japanese culture, international travel, Miyazaki tidbits, and entertaining stories of meetings and clashes in bringing Ghibli to the rest of the world. Enjoyed it. ๐Ÿ“š

    โ†’ 4:50 PM, Mar 10
  • Finished listening to the audiobook for The Great Hunt by Robert Jordan. Think I’m going to switch over to the print version for the next book in the series and see how it compares. ๐Ÿ“š

    โ†’ 2:13 PM, Mar 1
  • How to blog about books

    First, there is no right way! Just type something about what youโ€™ve read or want to read, hit post, and youโ€™re good. However, we have built a few book-specific features in to Micro.blog that arenโ€™t obvious on first glance.

    My favorite is the book search. Enter an ISBN-13 or a book title and author, and Micro.blog will return a list of books it finds using Open Library and ISBNdb. From there, you can click to automatically draft a post with the book title, link, and author. You can then add some commentary or just publish it as-is.

    Blog posts that contain the books emoji ๐Ÿ“š will get collected in our Discover โ†’ Books collection. If the post includes a link to Micro.blog with the ISBN (micro.blog/books/isbn-here, added for you by the book search), then Micro.blog will also show the blog post on our book covers grid, which is another fun way to discover what people on Micro.blog are reading.

    A nice bonus with including ๐Ÿ“š in your posts is that itโ€™s easy to tell Micro.blog to add all your book-related posts to a category on your blog. Click on Categories โ†’ Edit Filters and make a filter that assigns the Books category whenever a post contains that emoji.

    Micro.blog also supports indiebookclub. It uses the Micropub API to publish blog posts, and Micro.blog will format them so they are also included in the book covers and Discover collection.

    Personally, Iโ€™ve been reading a lot the last few months. Iโ€™ve also started to use Goodreads more, in addition to blogging about books I finish on my own site, to better understand what additional features we could build around books for Micro.blog.

    โ†’ 2:43 PM, Feb 25
  • I’ve been reading Big Wonderful Thing by Stephen Harrigan. Growing up in Austin, I thought I knew Texas history, but this book has so many details that are new to me. Both extraordinary and heartbreaking. Not quite halfway through, just after the Civil War. ๐Ÿ“š

    โ†’ 1:25 PM, Feb 23
  • Finished reading: Edgedancer by Brandon Sanderson ๐Ÿ“š

    โ†’ 11:46 PM, Feb 14
  • Finished reading: No Filter: The Inside Story of Instagram by Sarah Frier ๐Ÿ“š

    โ†’ 9:58 PM, Feb 13
  • Finished reading: Words of Radiance (The Stormlight Archive, Book 2) by Brandon Sanderson ๐Ÿ“š

    โ†’ 2:42 PM, Feb 7
  • Finished reading: The Way of Kings (The Stormlight Archive, Book 1) by Brandon Sanderson ๐Ÿ“š

    โ†’ 4:08 PM, Feb 1
  • Finished reading: The Hero of Ages by Brandon Sanderson. Discovering the Mistborn series and reading the first 3 books mostly back to back reminded me of how I felt when I was younger, reading every book I could get my hands on. ๐Ÿ“š

    โ†’ 11:48 AM, Jan 19
  • Finished listening to the audiobook version of Eye of the World by Robert Jordan. I had always put off reading this series because there are so many books, but I’m finding the audiobook great to supplement podcasts and other books. ๐Ÿ“š

    โ†’ 12:01 PM, Jan 15
  • Finished reading The Well of Ascension by Brandon Sanderson, 2nd book in the Mistborn trilogy. ๐Ÿ“š

    โ†’ 10:47 AM, Jan 5
  • Finished Mistborn: The Final Empire by Brandon Sanderson. It’s fun to get back into reading fantasy. Looking forward to the rest of the Mistborn series and Sanderson’s other books. ๐Ÿ“š

    โ†’ 3:26 PM, Dec 9
  • Countdown to Sunlit 3.0: discovery

    Sunlit 3.0 will ship in 3 days, on Tuesday. Today I want to highlight another new feature: the redesigned Discover browsing interface.

    Both Sunlit and Micro.blog use Discover to help you find people to follow. Because Sunlit is all about photos, Sunlit takes the usual Discover sections from Micro.blog, but shows only the photos from each section instead of all post types.

    For example, tapping on ๐Ÿ“š at the top of Discover will show microblog posts that have used the books emoji along with a photo, which will often be a book cover or other photo of the book. Tapping on ๐Ÿงถ will usually show peopleโ€™s knitting or crochet projects. Tapping on โ˜•๏ธ will show coffee-related photos. Tapping on ๐Ÿž will show baking.

    Discover knitting screenshot ย  Discover coffee screenshot ย  Discover bread screenshot

    Itโ€™s a great way to discover people to follow even if they havenโ€™t posted a recent photo that you might see in the main ๐Ÿ“ท photos section.

    Check back tomorrow for another blog post in this series as we look forward to the Sunlit 3.0 launch. And thanks to everyone who tested the Sunlit beta!

    โ†’ 3:36 PM, Aug 29
  • M.b books wrap-up

    I’ve been experimenting with a few different features around books on Micro.blog. The goal is to make it easier to blog about a book youโ€™re reading, or to discover other books from fellow microbloggers. Some of these features are now tied together in a more cohesive way, so Iโ€™d like to summarize what we have.

    There are 2 new buttons on the Discover โ†’ ๐Ÿ“š page:

    • Book Covers shows a grid view of covers for books that people on Micro.blog are blogging about. Each cover links to the individual microblog post. Any microblog post that links to Micro.blogโ€™s book detail page (micro.blog/books/isbn-here) will automatically be included in the grid view.
    • Book Search lets you look up a book by an ISBN-13 number, or search for a book by its title or author. This uses a combination of Open Library and ISBNdb. I added ISBNdb to have another source of metadata and it really helps fill in some gaps.

    Micro.blog also continues to work great with indiebookclub. Micro.blog will format your microblog post and link the book if youโ€™ve included the ISBN, so it will show up in the ๐Ÿ“š page as well as the new covers grid view.

    We’re not trying to reinvent all of Goodreads here, but Iโ€™m pretty happy with the way these book features are falling into place. If you like to read (or wish you read more often!) I hope this makes Micro.blog more useful for you.

    โ†’ 8:16 PM, Aug 5
  • Currently reading: The Farthest Shore by Ursula K. Le Guin ๐Ÿ“š

    โ†’ 4:02 PM, Jul 28
  • Book recommendations challenge this week on Micro.blog! Check out the books section of Discover. And nice timing, I haven’t started reading it yet but just today Dan Moren’s latest arrived in the mail. ๐Ÿ“š

    โ†’ 9:22 PM, May 19
  • Micro.blog filters with post length

    There’s a powerful filter mechanism inside Micro.blog for automatically assigning categories based on criteria in the post. For example, if the post includes an img tag, assign it to a Photos category. Or if the post includes the ๐Ÿ“š emoji, assign it to a Books category. I blogged about this in September.

    Today I’ve expanded this feature to also allow matching on whether the post is a short microblog post or whether it’s a longer post with a title. Like other parts of Micro.blog, it uses the title to determine how to categorize the post. Posts without titles are always considered short microblog posts.

    To create new filters, go to Posts โ†’ Categories โ†’ Edit Filters.

    Filter screenshot

    You can use this in combination with matching the title or text in a post, or leave those fields blank when creating a filter to match all posts. This makes it easy to move all full-length posts into a category, which can also have its own RSS feed.

    โ†’ 10:29 AM, Nov 6
  • Reading more of App Launch Map Field Guide from Aleen Simms after picking it up on launch week. Great advice on helping you tell the story of your app. ๐Ÿ“š

    โ†’ 3:14 PM, Sep 5
  • I’ve always liked the 36 Hours travel series in The New York Times, so as we’ve been used-book shopping recently, I’ve started picking up the collections. They’re from 2013 but still really nice. ๐Ÿ“š

    โ†’ 2:54 PM, Jul 10
  • I’ve been thinking about using NaNoWriMo to finally finish my Indie Microblogging book, even though it’s not a novel. I wonder if we can do something special on Micro.blog for anyone writing in November. ๐Ÿ“š

    โ†’ 5:55 PM, Sep 30
  • IndieBookClub

    As I mentioned in my IndieWeb Summit wrap-up, I added support for IndieBookClub while in Portland. IndieBookClub is a little like Goodreads, but built on standards like Microformats and Micropub so that you can post what you’re reading to your own blog.

    Now that I’m back in Austin, I’ve tweaked the behavior to be smarter about recognizing the ISBN that IndieBookClub sends to Micro.blog. Posts from IndieBookClub also get the ๐Ÿ“š emoji added automatically so that they show up in the books Discover section on Micro.blog. Here’s a screenshot of what posts look like on your Micro.blog-hosted site:

    Screenshot of IndieBookClub post

    If the ISBN is specified, Micro.blog will redirect the link to Amazon, although we may change that in the future. And it’s just a regular blog post, so you can always edit it using Markdown in Micro.blog.

    โ†’ 2:06 PM, Jun 30
  • Discover books update, day 2

    I love how the Micro.blog community is using the new emoji topics that I wrote about yesterday. We started with books because many people were already sharing what they were reading or wanted to read in 2018. This is working out so well that I definitely want to improve and expand upon it.

    Some people have asked for more topics, and several already work: music, basketball, football, and tv. I’m thinking that some of these will pop up in the Discover section when they are actively being used, or when there’s a special event. For example, during the Super Bowl you’d see ๐Ÿˆ to click on.

    On Micro.blog there were some good discussions around this feature. Chris Aldrich said he was already using different book-related emoji, and Ben Norris wondered about supporting those too:

    I love this! I thought I was ironic that you started it almost right after I went through and posted the books I read this last couple years on my microblog. I used ๐Ÿ“– instead of ๐Ÿ“š though.

    I decided to add the open book and bookmark to the books topic, so they all map to the same place, but stopped short of adding all the other single-book emoji because I thought they might be confused with notebooks. After a few more days it may be more obvious how we should treat this.

    Belle Cooper also had a good question about whether this is really much better than hashtags:

    This is a cool idea, but I'm not sure I get how it can't be gamed compared to hashtags. Or is that not the point of using emojis instead?

    My answer is that they can be gamed, but the limited number of emoji means we can have a better sense of what people are writing about. It’s just simpler. Also, the backend implementation is not a search; it’s a live collection of posts that is updated whenever Micro.blog sees something new, and there’s a mechanism to easily exclude any inappropriate posts that show up without needing to block users or delete posts.

    The Micro.blog community has grown a lot in the last couple of weeks. Every new feature has the potential to change how people interact with the platform, and I think this experiment with books has been almost completely for the better. I don’t think every post needs emoji โ€”ย most microblogs will continue to be mostly text and some photos โ€”ย but sprinkling in an emoji every once in a while will start to add value to the Discover section, and it also keeps Micro.blog fun.

    โ†’ 1:38 PM, Jan 10
  • One of my goals for 2018 is to read more novels. As soon as I finish Ink & Paint I’m going to start on the 2-3 novels already in my queue. ๐Ÿ“š

    โ†’ 12:45 PM, Jan 9
  • Books on Micro.blog

    Micro.blog doesn’t have special support for hashtags. It doesn’t automatically link them. There’s no global search yet. While Micro.blog users can include hashtags anyway, especially if they are cross-posting to Twitter, I’ve found that the timeline is much cleaner and readable without hashtags.

    I’m not saying we’ll never have hashtags. But I’m not in a particular hurry to introduce native support for them. (Once a feature is added, it can’t easily be taken back. So we try to be deliberate in everything we do.)

    Hashtags and Twitter trends go together. They can be a powerful way to organize people and topics together across followers. But they can also be gamed, with troublemakers using popular hashtags to hijack your search results for their own promotion or unrelated ranting.

    It’s the organizational and discovery aspect of hashtags that I most want to bring to Micro.blog. There have been several recent discussions on Micro.blog about book clubs and reading, and this seems like a perfect topic to experiment with. I’ve also noticed that people love to include an emoji in their microblog post as a kind of theme indicator โ€” everything from ๐Ÿ“š to ๐Ÿ€.

    Today we’re introducing a search collection using emoji, starting with books. Just include ๐Ÿ“š with your microblog text about a book you’re reading or related topic, and your post will automatically be collected on /discover/books. There’s also an emoji link at the top of the Discover section in the iOS and Mac apps. (Make sure you’re on the latest version of the apps released yesterday.)

    If people like this, we’ll generalize it and start surfacing other topics. Enjoy, and happy reading!

    โ†’ 12:35 PM, Jan 9
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