Blogocentric Formulations

For fiction, I highly recommend Gregg Hurwitz for thriller fans out there. His Orphan X book series is only two volumes at this point but already one of the best thrillers I've read in years. Blake Crouch's Letty Dobesh stories were also excellent. I've been on far more of a science fiction kick this year, though, and I read a lot of great stuff. Marcus Sakey's Brilliance was, well, pretty brilliant, and Andy Weir had a worthy follow-up to The Martian with his new book Artemis.. The Legionnaire series of books by Anspach & Cole is fantastic and something I'm really looking forward to continuing next year... and Chris Fox's many books, particularly his Tech Mage and Void Wraith series were worth reading for the way they blend genres.

For nonfiction, and speaking of Chris Fox, his write to market series of books are a fascinating look at how data and research can play into a writer's business plan. Lilly Singh and Jen Hatmaker had great books if you need to be uplifted and want a good laugh, but Elizabeth Gilbert's book on living a creative life was probably the best book I read all years... if not several years. For anyone who wants to be a writer, she gives great advice as someone who's had both incredible success and heartbreaking disappointment.

With such a turbulent year in politics and world news, I listened to a lot of current events podcasts. The Crooked Media podcasts were all great for different reasons. The guys on Pod Save America and Lovett or Leave It were great about distilling down the issues and expressing the same concerns and frustrations I had; Pod Save the World was great about giving me a new perspective on world affairs; the other podcasts (Majority 54, Pod Save the People, With Friends Like These) were excellent about providing different perspectives on a variety of issues.

I also found quite a few new self-publishing podcasts that I really enjoyed. I'm still fascinated by the process of self-publishing but some of the longtime favorites of mine are starting to feel a little stale and out-of-touch with entry-level writers, so it was refreshing to find some new voices in the field.

Not a lot of comic reading from me this year, but they did finally publish the final two issues of The Red Ten so I was finally able to finish the series after almost three years of waiting for them to slowly trickle the issues out.

I'm not putting any favorites or highly recommended on the script section of my reading list because a lot of the writers on this list are my friends and/or colleagues and I don't want to play favorites with my friends and business associates.