Hi, lovelies. Here’s my month in books, movies, television, games, and podcasts.
Books
I bought Network Effect, the latest book in Martha Wells’ Murderbot Diaries, a while back and I’ve been meaning to read it ever since. When I picked it up this month, however, I realized that I really wanted to reconnect with the original novellas that made me fall in love with the character. So, one by one I ordered and reread each book in the series (in ebook format, because I wasn’t willing to wait) — discovering nuances to the characters I hadn’t noticed the first time around and falling in love all over again.
Network Effect is a beautiful, action packed addition, bringing back beloved characters and introducing new ones. Murderbot (aka Sec Unit) is hired on to protect the crew of a research mission. As the group is heading home after a dangerous encounter on another planet, they are suddenly attacked by a strange ship and dragged through a wormhole. Murderbot is once again faced with trying to keep it’s humans safe against insurmountable odds.
One of the things that strikes me about each of these books is the level of humanity that they bring. Though the story features threats from evil corporations and the danger of death, the focus is on a a variety of characters (both human and otherwise) who are flawed and imperfect, but nevertheless care and love each other, offering compassion and understanding for each other’s differences. They’re smart and work together to work through the dangers they all face. It’s the kind of story that gives me hope for humanity and for what we can achieve if we try to really see and understand each other.
Honestly, these books have been providing the same level of comfort as rewatching some of my favorite TV shows. Even after finishing each of the books, I’ve returned multiple times to my favorite scenes.
As I was finishing the book, I was delighted to discover that the sixth book in the series, Fugitive Telemetry, will be out in April. I immediately preordered the book and I can’t wait to read it. (I may or may not do a second reread of each of these books before reading the sixth.)
T. Kingfisher is a fantastic writer, taking fantasy tropes and turning them into pure horror. Portal fantasies tend to lead to wondrous worlds filled with fantastical creatures and adventures. However, in 
I read two fantastic poetry books this month. The first was 
What should be no surprise to anyone who reads my blog at this point is that I love Junji Ito — a writer and artist who continues to prove himself a master of the horror genre with his graphic novel, No Longer Human. The story follows the life of a man who feels disconnected with humanity to the extent that he finds it incredibly anxiety inducing — and at times outright horrifying — to interact with other people My full review is 
After watching Hellier, I’ve taken an interest in the idea of synchronicity (or meaningful coincidences), which is often discussed on the show. Carl Jungthe concept in his paper, Synchronicity: An Acausal Connection. The paper presents his theories on synchronicity, which he ties to psychology, psychic phenomena, quantum mechanics, and and the collective unconscious. For Jung, synchronicity was a defining principle of nature as valid as space, time, and causality. It makes for a fascinating read, even if some of the technical aspects of the paper were a bit hard to follow. I found it so interesting that I put together a