Book Bingo Reviews 2023

And suddenly it’s 2024…. A new book bingo will soon commence, but first the reviews of the previous year.

Book Review: Heartstopper Vol. 1-4. – Heart-stoppingly beautiful

“Heartstopper” vol. 1-4 by Alice Oseman started as a webcomic and has by now become a phenomenon with four graphic novels and a Netflix series (season 2 is on the way). 

The story follows teenagers Nick and Charlie, who meet while attending a British grammar school and fall in love. In many ways, the story of Nick and Charlie is your typical teenager-falling-in-love story, but it is so much more than that.

Book Bingo Reviews 2022: I Lost, But I’ll Be Back in 2023

This year, Sunny decided to sprint out of the gates and left me in the dust. So, she won a well-deserved victory. (Only very slight spoilers below)

Book Bingo Reviews from Hunter

I won, again, and thus the standing is now 2-2. So, I guess, next year will be the tie breaker. But this year, it was close, very close. And frankly, I think the only reason that I managed to win was, because I spent most of a weekend and a Monday afternoon after work reading and only stopping for dinner and a shower. Sunny’s very dramatic gifs and bitmojis (what even is the plural form of bitmoji?) over Snapchat, when I announced my win, was both hilarious and making me feel just a teeny bit bad, but not really, since we are now even. 

But now to discuss the books I read, in the order that I started them:

A Work Older Than 500 Years: Geoffrey Chaucer, The Canterbury Tales

The book was written in the late 1300s and is a collection of 24 separate stories told by the various members of a party of pilgrims heading to Kent (in England). The group met at an inn and decided to travel together, and along the way each member of the party shares a story. 

Now, despite the stories being over 500 years old, I did enjoy most of them. Although, if you intend to read or listen to the book, I would advise you to seriously keep in mind, when the stories where written. Because from a modern 21^st century perspective more than a few parts of the stories can be seen as derogative towards pretty much anyone, who is not white, male, Christian, straight, and at least middle class. In fact, one of the original stories had been removed from the edition that I read, due to extensive use of racist language. All that being said, the book does give you a pretty good look into the mind of the people of 14^th century England, and it also marks the beginning of the modern English language. 

So, yes, I would recommend the book, but go in to it with an open mind, and remember that it was written 500+ years ago, and luckily times have changed. 

A Classical Science Fiction Book: Aldous Huxley, Brave New World (1932)

Happy Pride Month – Hunter’s Favourite Happy LGBTQ+ Books, Movies, and TV Shows

First off, sorry about being kind of MIA for a while, but these last six months life has honestly given me more than one kick in the teeth, what with the continued Covid-19 situation, my parents getting a divorce in January, and general family drama. But now that my brain seems to have caught up; and I’m in the middle of moving, I’m swooping in to say (a slightly late to the game) “Happy Pride month!” *sprinkles rainbow confetti*, and drop a few LGBTQ+ movie, TV show, and book recommendations in your lap. These are just off the top of my head, and they all make me smile. Besides, if I were to mention each and every single book, movie or TV show with a LGBTQ+ story line that I enjoyed, this would be a very long post. So, enjoy these recommendations that I pulled from my head at a moment’s notice. Happy Pride Month, everybody. 

The Carl Hamilton Saga – Hunter’s Latest Audiobook project.

First of all, sorry for being MIA for a while, but life, work, and the continuation of the Covid-19 lockdown happened. So, a couple of months ago, I started to re-read the Carl Hamilton novels by Swedish author Jan Guillou. I started reading them when I was around 11/12 (I think – it’s been a while) and frankly, I might have been a bit too young to read them, but I turned out all right. 

The first book in the Carl Hamilton Saga

Before starting this re-read, I had read most of the novels once, a few of them twice, but never in order of publication. And thus a new reading/audio book project was born. The posts for this read through will be divided into three parts. This post, part one, will be my general thoughts and some background information about the novels. Parts two and three will be my thoughts on the individual books. Fair warning, as I’m only 2/3 of the way through all the books, part three might not be for a while, but I hope you’ll hang in there. Also, whether I’ll stick with only three parts is still subject to change. 

The End of a Show — Hunter Reflects on the End of Supernatural and Her 10 Years as Part of the SPNFamily

So, it’s been a month, and at this point I may have stopped crying, and I may have finally decided, if I liked, loved, hated, or just accepted the ending of this little show called Supernatural. But frankly, the ending is not what is important to me, not the most important, anyway. 

Long story short, about 10 years ago I was in high school, when I, completely by accident, discovered Supernatural. I decided to give it a shot and ten years later I am still here. My show has now ended, and as I reflect back, it is now clearer than ever that this show has meant more to me, than I ever thought possible for a TV show or the fandom that have grown from it. I say 10 years, because when I discovered the show, it was already on it’s fifth season. Discovering a show already going on 5 seasons, I had no great hope of the show continuing for this many years. But 10 years and a total of 15 seasons later the show has been with me throughout the years that have shaped me the most as a person.

Horror and Horror-esque Podcast Recommendations for the Month of Halloween – Part 2

Here goes with part two, and just to rehash from last time, all of these are available on Apple Podcast, and pretty much everywhere you can listen to podcasts, and down below I will add a link to their websites or social media pages. All of them are free as well, but many have the option to pay for season passes or to become a Patreon supporter to unlock even more content. And if you do try to avoid certain themes, please do check for trigger warnings in episode descriptions, the episode introductions, or the websites. 

Horror and Horror-esque Podcast Recommendations for the Month of Halloween – Part 1

It’s that time of year again, when ghosts and ghouls come out to play, or perhaps more likely when pumpkins, fake blood, and fake spiders are everywhere you look. And this month, I’m borrowing (with permission) Sunny’s “Podcastmania” concept, because down below you will find a bunch of recommendations for the all those horror podcasts that takes up (probably more than) half of my podcast feed and fills the silence, when I bike around the city, make dinner, clean my home, crochet, and…. well, essentially every time I have a quiet moment. 

Also, fair warning, while most of these podcasts list trigger warnings either in the episode descriptions or before the stories in the episodes, some do not, so if you have any specific triggers, please look in to the shows and check out episode descriptions before you listen.

Third Time’s the Charm: Book Bingo Reviews 2020

I finally won! And it only took three tries. Overall, I attribute my victory to Denmark being on corona lockdown and me taking long walks, because my fitness centre was closed, so quite a few of the books ended up being audiobooks that entertained me on my walks.