First, a list of non-media activities.

• I'm collecting subscribers for my new-release emails. (you can be one, click on the big "click here" button somewhere on this post) and I wrote a whole new story about Jack Coby as a teenager to lure people in.
• All my books are moving into wide distribution off Amazon-exclusivity, and if your your library gets ebooks through Cloudlibrary or Overdrive, you can ask them to get my books for you that way now.
• I'll have a boxset edition of the Restoration ebooks soon. Just needs a cover image.
• Sharp Edge of Yesterday: A Rough Passages Novel should be back from the editor any day now, and its cover is almost done too.
• My new ghost mystery work-in-progress is over a third of the way finished.
• Went on a cherry-picking day trip to Michigan & had a blast. 22 lbs of tart cherries, 5 lbs of sweet. and a major tendonitis flare-up afterwards.
• I survived being a featured reader at Gumbo Fiction Salon and have the mermaid necklace to prove it.
• The yard is in happy jungle mode, and the first veggies have been harvested.
• The butterfly-garden summer volunteer gig is in full swing, and  I can't believe it's year 7...wow.
• I'm spending much less time online and getting more things done in real life.

...things like watching TV & reading. Books first, then TV, then movies.All the Confederation Universe books, Tanya Huff. I was writing about Jack Coby and got a free Confederation book from the Nebulas conference, and that was justification enough to re-read all of Ms. Huff's Condeferation books. I adore her writing, and this universe feeds my love of Space Marines and fabulous space opera world-building.If you want to see the result of my writing efforts, sign up for the new-release emails. It's an exclusive subscriber story.The Werewolf of Marines trilogy, Jonathan P. Brazee: Rollicking good men-at-war military paranormal popcorn reading.  I'll reward myself with the Space Marines series ...after I finish Ghost TomeNeogenesis & select re-reads of other Liaden Universe books by Sharon Lee & Steve Miller.Because I finished TWO short stories and sent a book off to an editor, I rewarded myself by catching up on the  Liaden releases from the last little while. *HAPPY SIGH*Instinct season 1: Basic buddy-cop drama, with the obligatory "not-a-cop sidekick" twist that allows for lots of rule-bending. BUT. The characters are complex, the plots are off-the-wall entertaining, and the acting is excellent. Bonus points for the character and his husband being portrayed as a couple with believable couples issues and dialogue.Luke Cage Season 2: The plot took a turn to the grimdark side, which isn't to my taste, but the situations supported that bleakness a LOT better than most lure-of-the-dark-side stories. And they didn't trash the character's development the way Certain Other Series did. (Looking at you, Jessica Jones, with your sexist WTFuckery) Hoping for some gritty, difficult redemption arcs next season.Red Sparrow: IMHO this movie wanted to be Atomic Blonde crossed with Alias by way of La Femme Nikita. Spoiler alert: fail on all fronts. Some fine performances, but the slow pace, murky character motivations and reliance on absurd complications...big nope.Wrinkle In Time: It could have been great. It was okay. I loved the lush visuals. I adored the Mrs. Which, Mrs. Whatsis & Mrs. Who. Great casting on the kids. Meg & Charles Wallace were very much how I pictured them in my head. Sadly, the directing just felt clunky and telegraphed, which did the dialogue no favors. I could also wish they'd stuck closer to the original plot--far too much screen time on fleshing out backstory that didn't need fleshing &Greatest Showman: Wellllllllll, I loved it, but hey, it's Hugh Jackman singing and dancing, so cut me some slack. It's a fantasy about a world that isn't this one, about someone who isn't the real P. T. Barnum--it's about a charming and socially-conscious rebel, not a manipulative money-grubbing status-climber. Yeah. Singing. Dancing. Uplifting as fantasy.Game Night: I can see why it was popular, but it was not my cup of whiskey. The plot is a mess of cliches and sends a slew of awful messages (not least of which is "lying to people and humiliating them is hilarious")I Kill Giants: It was...good, I guess? Gorgeous film, sweet and simple. I was not the target market. The general plot & likely resolution were obvs within 10 minutes.  The protagonist was about 5 years too old for the way she was handled by adults in the film. (Retreat into fantasy is natural for grieving kids. The protag is in her teens and no one even mentionsThe Quiet Place: as long as the premise is accepted, it's a decent post-apocalypse horror flick. (plot holes include farm fields somehow planted silently after civilization's collapse  due to noise-targeting monster aliens and people who can't manage non-baby sex iwhen obstetric care and/or A CRYING BABY will likely be fatal. Seriously? The sex menu is huge, people. Plenty of ways to have max fun without baby-making.)Anyway. I can't accept the premise because it's so damned stupid. ANYTHING THAT HUNTS BY SOUND CAN BE BLINDED/CRIPPLED BY SOUND. The strategy isn't complicated or secret. The organized military could've created safe zones inside noise-protected "blind spots" with layered perimeter defenses and created traps to eradicate the monsters the same way.But then there wouldn't be a movie about brave sacrifice blahblahblah....harumph.Westworld Season 1: this series was disturbing for many reasons that I don't think occurred to its writers. It's brilliant in potential, and I will keep watching it because it's kinda like watching a beautifully filmed car crash, but wow. It's a pretentious mess of unexamined racism, misogyny & truly muddy pseudo-existentialist nonsense.  Conflict arises from some questionable philosophies, and the story spent a lot of time building to a "huge surprise reveal" that disappointed me in all possible ways.The show is so, SO pretty, though.Logan Lucky: total miss. Did not finish. (Do you know how boring+annoying something has to be for me to turn it off? I WATCHED ALL 4 SHARKNADO MOVIES ON PURPOSE.) I do not know how this got made. The script must have looked good to someone.Victoria & Abdul: an unexpected delight based on a true story that turns out to be actually true or at least true-ish. Wow.That's a wrap. I'll try not to keep updates closer together and shorter, but no promises.  I have Gen Con in two weeks (AAAAAHHHHHHHH KERMIT FLAILING AAAAAHHHHH) and a lot to do with edits and prep for Dragon Con after Gen COn, and writing and reading a bunch of books on my TBR list...and so on. Life is busy.Until later!