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Anime Books Film Games Magazines Music TV Web

Favorite Media of 2023

For the 14th time (following 2010, 2011, 2012, 2013, 2014, 2015, 2016, 2017, 2018, 2019, 2020, 2021, and 2022), here then is my entirely subjective compilation of favorite media I devoured over the past year. The main rule? It only contains things that were released in 2023, which of course means there’s tons I’ve missed (or haven’t had time to get to yet) that I’ll end up enjoying in the years to come, but I still find it to be a fun exercise to do, and hopefully it acts as recommendations for others. For each category I include a top 5 in alphabetical order, and then include a few honorable mentions (also in alphabetical order) if warranted. Let’s jump in.

Favorite Games
The biggest change in my gaming life this past year was getting a Steam Deck, which finally gave me the opportunity to play PC games in a big way (and I later even got an Asus ROG Ally, to play PC games from the Epic Games Store, PC Game Pass, Ubisoft Connect, and even Steam stuff that doesn’t run on the Deck). That also meant that a lot of what I played was from previous years, as I dove into a lot of things that I had in my Steam library, and added a lot as well. But this is representative of my favorite games that were released in 2023, including stuff like MK8, Vampire Survivors, and Warframe because they received new content.

  • Mario Kart 8 Deluxe (Nintendo Switch)
  • Pikmin 4 (Nintendo Switch)
  • Super Mario Bros. Wonder (Nintendo Switch)
  • The Crew Motorfest (Xbox Series S)
  • The Making of Karateka (PC)

Honorable Mentions: Hi-Fi Rush (Xbox Series S), Jusant (Xbox Series S/PC), Like a Dragon Gaiden: The Man Who Erased His Name (Xbox Series S/PC), Metroid Prime: Remastered (Nintendo Switch), Parnanormasight: The Seven Mysteries of Honjo (PC), Planet of Lana (Xbox Series S), The Legend of Zelda: Tears of the Kingdom (Nintendo Switch), Vampire Survivors (PC), Warframe (Xbox Series S)

Favorite Movies
Looking at my favorite films of the year you’d think I just like stuff that’s action-related, but I definitely watch more older films than I do new ones, and continue to do my year-based movie marathons — this time for 1983 and 1993 (still ongoing), and you can see my faves from those years below — as well as my October horror marathon.

  • John Wick: Chapter 4
  • Mission: Impossible – Dead Reckoning Part One
  • Spider-Man: Across the Spider-Verse
  • The Creator
  • The Killer

Honorable Mentions: A Haunting in Venice, Barbie, Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 3, Indiana Jones and the Dial of Destiny, Nimona, Shortcomings, The Covenant, The Super Mario Bros. Movie, Wingwomen (Voleuses)

Favorite Movies of 1983

  • National Lampoon’s Vacation
  • Never Say Never Again
  • Octopussy
  • The Dead Zone
  • Trading Places

Favorite Movies of 1993

  • Dazed and Confused
  • Sonatine
  • The Firm
  • The Fugitive
  • The Scent of Green Papaya

Favorite TV
The biggest change this year is that despite the fact that my absolute favorite thing to watch every week continues to be all of the AEW weekly pro wrestling shows (Dynamite, Rampage, and Collision), it always takes up one of my top 5 slots, and since it’s live content and I watch it via a streaming service (Triller TV), I’m moving that to what used to just be my “Web” category (where I already include F1 anyway). Also, I’d say this is probably the strongest top 5 I can remember having, as I loved all of these series incredibly and equally.

  • Copenhagen Cowboy
  • Poker Face
  • Scavengers Reign
  • The Bear
  • Welcome to Wrexham

Honorable Mentions: Ahsoka, A Murder at the End of the World, Blue Eye Samurai, Brawn: The Impossible Formula 1 Story, Break Point, Citadel, Drive to Survive, Sanctuary, The Makanai

Favorite Anime Series
Another great year for anime, with a few returning series with new seasons. I think the biggest surprise has been Frieren, as I don’t generally like fantasy series, but his one just feels so different and special.

  • Frieren: Beyond Journey’s End
  • Jujutsu Kaisen
  • Phoenix: Eden17
  • Pluto
  • SPY x FAMILY

Honorable Mentions: Demon Slayer: Kimetsu no Yaiba, Mobile Suit Gundam: The Witch From Mercury, Nier Automata

Favorite Web/Sports
I’m updating this category this year to include both web content and sports, which I was sort of already doing by including F1 TV in previous years, but I want to move all pro wrestling content here (instead of in the “TV” category).

Favorite Albums
Last year I feel like I included way too many records in the honorable mentions section, so this year I’m trying to highlight just records I think I really listened to the most, or that I feel were really favorites — there are probably many I’m missing, but this is stuff I quite enjoyed that came out in 2023.

  • Anything in Return – Instrumentals (Toro y Moi)
  • Crispy Crunchy Nothing (Packs)
  • Get Up Sequences Part Two (The Go! Team)
  • Off Planet (Django Django)
  • Pedestal EP (Fraulein)

Honorable Mentions: Flowers at Your Feet (Rahill), Parade (Takeshi Nakatsuka), Paris-Hawaï (La Femme), Sandhills EP (Toro y Moi)

Favorite Tracks
I haven’t included a “Tracks” category in years since I found it hard to remember what tracks I really liked more than others, especially since I tend to listen to albums, but this year I did some digging via Apple Music, and I think these are tracks that stood out for me over the past year.

  • “4th of July” (Packs)
  • “Big Cool” (Fraulein)
  • “Complete Me (feat. Self Esteem)” (Django Django)
  • “Gemini” (The Go! Team)
  • “The Weasel” (Young Jesus)

Honorable Mentions: “Give a Little Time” (Belle and Sebastian), “Ladies and Pac-Man” (Takeshi Nakatsuka)

Favorite Podcasts
The only change this year is the inclusion of the 60 Songs That Explain the ’90s podcast, which I came across a couple of months ago, and have enjoyed immensely, as I continue to dig back into the archives.

  • 60 Songs That Explain the ’90s
  • All Songs Considered
  • Pop Culture Happy Hour
  • Pure TokyoScope
  • Whatculture Wrestling

Favorite Comics
This year I found myself enjoying the books of Mark Millar again, which I had stopped reading years ago, and so found myself catching up on many of his series (and include here his books that came out in 2023). It’s also amazing to me how much I continue to enjoy Larry Hama’s G.I. Joe series, which just re-launched with a new publisher (but continuing the issue count from back in the 80s).

  • Batman Off-World
  • G.I. Joe: A Real American Hero
  • The Ambassadors
  • Usagi Yojimbo (Ice and Snow, Lone Goat and Kid)
  • Void Rivals

Honorable Mentions: Batman: Gargoyle of Gotham, Big Game, Creepshow, Cyberpunk 2077: XOXO, Geiger: Ground Zero, G.O.D.S., Groo (Gods Against Groo, In the Wild), Hexagon Bridge, Junkyard Joe, Nemesis Reloaded, Night Club, The Forged, The Human Target, The Ministry of Compliance, Wonder Woman

Favorite BDs
I feel like there are quite a few other bandes-dessinées (French language comics) that came out in 2023 that I haven’t had a chance to read yet and that could end up being in this list, but this at least serves as a round-up of things that I really enjoyed so far.

  • Adieu Aaricia (Thorgal Saga, Tome 1)
  • Azur noir (XIII Trilogy – Jones, Tome 1)
  • Bellatrix – Épisode 1
  • Scotland – Épisode 2 (Kenya, Saison 4)
  • Vertiges (Europa, Tome 2)

Honorable Mentions: Danitza 1965 (La Fortune des Winczlav, Tome 3), Le retour de Lagaffe (Gaston, Tome 22), L’Iris Blanc (Astérix, Tome 40)

Favorite Magazines
No change here from last year. I still read a lot of magazines via Apple News+, but at the same time, I don’t find many that I truly love (I browse a lot of them), but these are the ones I tend to read more, with Monocle remaining my top choice.

  • Edge
  • Empire
  • Monocle
  • SFX
  • Total Film
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Books

Books Read in 2023

This is the fifth year of doing book challenges (following 2019, 2020, 2021, and 2022) and it’s unfortunately been my worse year yet when it comes to the number of books read. As with last year, I had given myself a target of 20, and felt incredibly short this year, only finishing 7. I’m not sure what happened, I still read tons daily, but mostly on the web, magazines (via Apple News+), and comics (both American and European). When it comes to books, I’ve also regressed to my bad habit of starting a lot of them, but moving on to other things — according to Goodreads (I always log a book when I start it), I’m “currently reading” 27, which is a problem (although many of these were started before 2023). For 2024 I’m again giving myself a target of 20, and also to try and tackle as many of those unfinished reads as possible (and to just give up and remove the books I really don’t want to finish). Below are links to my mini reviews on Goodreads of the books I did finish.

  1. Make Something Wonderful (Steve Jobs)
  2. Boss Fight Books: Metal Gear Solid (Ashly Burch & Anthony Burch)
  3. On His Majesty’s Secret Service (Charlie Higson)
  4. The Big Four (Agatha Christie)
  5. The Mystery of the Blue Train (Agatha Christie)
  6. The Strategy Book: How to Think and Act Strategically to Deliver Outstanding Results (Max McKeown)
  7. The Three-Body Problem (Liu Cixin)
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Books

Books Read in 2022

This is the fourth year I’ve given myself a target of books to read (since giving a push to start reading more books in 2019), but unfortunately, I didn’t make it. Like last year, I had given myself a target of 20 (which I completed last year), but fell short at 16. I found myself going long periods, sometimes months, without making much progress this year. As the year was coming to a close, I was actually planning on trying to give a huge spurt during the last 1-2 weeks, but I ended up getting sick and wasn’t really in a state to read much. Oh well. I did also feel a bit bad because a few of the books I did get through were quite short, but looking at the stats on Goodreads, my total page count is in keeping with previous years (even similar to last year), so looks like I read a few bigger books that balanced out with the short ones.

Below is the list of those 16 books I did read, with links to my mini reviews on Goodreads. And yes, I’m again giving myself a target of 20 for this coming year, which I hope to surpass.

  1. After Steve: How Apple Became a Trillion-Dollar Company and Lost Its Soul (Tripp Mickle)
  2. Becoming All Elite: The Rise of AEW (Michael Sidgwick)
  3. Disrupting the Game: From the Bronx to the Top of Nintendo (Reggie Fils-Aimé)
  4. Goldfinger (Ian Fleming)
  5. LaserWriter II (Tamara Shopsin)
  6. Les mystères du lotus bleu (Pierre Fresnault-Deruelle)
  7. Measure What Matters (John Doerr)
  8. Press Reset: Ruin and Recovery in the Video Game Industry (Jason Schreier)
  9. Severance – The Lexington Letter (Anonymous)
  10. The Art of War (Sun Tzu)
  11. The Hunting Party (Lucy Foley)
  12. The Man in the Brown Suit (Agatha Christie)
  13. The Secret of Chimneys (Agatha Christie)
  14. Wallpaper City Guide: Shanghai (Wallpaper Magazine)
  15. Waste Tide (Chen Qiufan)
  16. With a Mind to Kill (Anthony Horowitz)
Categories
Books

Books Read in 2021

After trying to get back into reading books regularly in 2019 by giving myself goals, I’m so happy that for 2021 I was able to reach my goal of reading 20 books. In 2019 I was overly ambitions and had set a goal of 24, only reading 11, and then it got better in 2020 with a goal of 18 and reaching 16. But more than just reaching that goal, what I’m especially happy about is that I feel like reading books as finally turned into a routine, not something I’m doing to accomplish a goal. I used to be a big reader when I was a kid, and then for some reason lost that habit. The other thing I started doing this year was that instead of mostly alternating between fiction and non-fiction, I tended to have both on the go at the same time, as sometimes I was just in the mood to read fiction. And you’ll probably notice that when it comes to fiction, I’m big into murder mysteries.

So what’s the goal for 2022? Instead of putting extra pressure and risk losing that comfortable habit I’m starting to form, I’m going to stick with a goal of 20, which I of course hope to reach again. I log all of my reading in Goodreads, so below is a list of everything I read in alphabetical order, with links to my short reviews.

  1. Ask Iwata: Words of Wisdom from Satoru Iwata, Nintendo’s Legendary CEO (Satoru Iwata)
  2. Busy Doing Nothing (Rekka Bellum)
  3. Doctor No (Ian Fleming)
  4. Earthbound (Ken Baumann)
  5. From Russia With Love (Ian Fleming)
  6. Ici OSS 117 (Jean Bruce)
  7. Lending the Key to the Locked Room (Tokuya Higashigawa)
  8. Light of the Jedi (Charles Soule)
  9. Lion’s Pride: The Turbulent History of New Japan Pro Wrestling (Chris Charlton)
  10. MOX (Jon Moxley)
  11. Nightmare Mode: A Boss Fight Books Anthology (Various)
  12. Once Upon a Time in Hollywood (Quentin Tarantino)
  13. Peanuts: The Art of Charles M. Schultz (Chip Kidd)
  14. Radical Candor: Be a Kickass Boss Without Losing Your Humanity (Kim Scott)
  15. The 8 Mansion Murders (Takemaru Abiko)
  16. The Ginza Ghost (Keikichi Osaka)
  17. The Gray Man (Mark Greaney)
  18. The Guest List (Lucy Foley)
  19. The Murder on the Links (Agatha Christie)
  20. The Secret Adversary (Agatha Christie)

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Books Film Meta

Letterboxd & Goodreads

I’ve decided to change the way I track all of the movies I watch — which I share here mostly in the form of my various movie marathons — and my book reading as well.

For books, I actually did start using Goodreads to track my book reading in 2019 when I decided to increase the number of books I read each year, but it was only at the end of the year that I bothered writing mini-reviews in posts here (2019, 2020). I’ve now copied over all of those mini-reviews to my Goodreads log, and written a few for what I’ve read so far this year (I’ve read 6 of my planned 20). So if you’re curious to follow what I’m reading and my thoughts on those books, I invite you to follow me on Goodreads.

As for the movie stuff, as mentioned, I’ve been writing mini-reviews for the movies that I watch as part of my movie marathons over in the “Debaser” section of this site, which I then sum up in round-up posts for each. In terms of all of the other movies I watch, I usually just write quick thoughts that I share on Twitter — like this thread when I recently started re-watching Wong Kar-wai movies, as well as the films of Zhang Yimou, and Tintin films. I started thinking there might be a better way to share and then track all of this, and remembered Letterboxd (I’ve had an account for years, but never used it). So I’ve gone and added most of my movie watching so far this year there, creating entries for all of the 1981 movies I’ve watched so far, and the other things I’m watching. My intention is to still create round-up posts here when I finish a marathon, like I’ve done in the past. So if you’d like to follow all of my movie viewing — which now include adding a star rating — I invite you to follow me on Letterboxd.

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Books On Something

Busy Doing Nothing

I’ve been a huge fan of Rekka and Devine’s — better known as Hundred Rabbits — adventures sailing around the world over the past few years, following them through their various posts, tweets, and especially videos that they would share as they sailed from Vancouver, down the coast to Mexico, then to New Zealand, before reaching Japan and then back again. But despite all the following I was doing, it’s reading their book Busy Doing Nothing that gave me the best understanding of what they were actually experiencing and going through as they made those multi-week crossings. From the mind numbing to the fear-for-the-end-of-your-life, the book is an extended log of the 51 days it took them to sail from Japan back to Vancouver, and it’s a fantastic read. As much as I admire what they achieved, there’s no way in hell that I could put myself through something like that, but Busy Doing Nothing at least gave me an intimate look at what they had to endure, both physically and mentally. You can read the raw logs on their website, but I recommend picking up the digital book, as it expands on the entries, with additional info and details, as well as all of the recipes that kept them going through those long days and nights. I can’t recommend this enough.

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Books

Books Read in 2020

At the start of 2019 I gave myself a goal to read more books (in an effort to rekindle my inner bookworm), and this past year saw a continued growth in the number of books I read, which makes me very happy. Following the 11 I read in 2019, I got through 16 this past year, which falls just short of the goal of 18 I had given myself, which is close enough for me. I did hit some dead spots throughout the year where I didn’t read any, and a few (like Ametora, Pure Invention, and Killing the Business) I ended up reading in 1-2 days. That said, I’m raising my goal for 2021 to 20 books, which I think is very doable, as long as I manage to be more consistent throughout the year — and I think the lesson here is to not feel bad about dropping a book if I’m not really enjoying it. Below, are a few thoughts on everything that I read in 2020, which again saw me mostly alternate between fiction and non-fiction.

Moonraker (Ian Fleming)
This past year I continued to make my way through all of Fleming’s Bond novels. Despite being a huge Bond fanatic, this obsession has always entered around the movies, and I’ve never actually read all of the books (some here and there, but I don’t really remember which ones). This was one of my favourites so far — and it’s nothing like the wacky Star Wars-inspired spacefest that we see in the movie adaptation.

Katamari Damacy (L.E. Hall)
I’m a big fan of the Boss Fight Books series — each one focuses on one game. I usually end up reading 1 or 2 each year, and this one was as enjoyable as they generally are — and it covered a game I’ve always loved. After reading this, I ended up with the multiple soundtracks of the game series on heavy rotation.

Agent Running in the Field (John le Carré)
Despite my love for Bond and spy fiction in general, surprisingly, this is the first novel by le Carré I read. I really enjoyed it, and although it may be weird to start by reading his final novel, it did make me want to go back and read more (which I will surely do in 2021).

Diamonds Are Forever (Ian Fleming)
This was the second Bond book I read this year, and I continue to read them in order of their release. Of all the Bond novels I’ve read so far, this one is maybe the one that feels the most like the movie, at least in terms of general structure.

Pure Invention: How Japan’s Pop Culture Conquered the World (Matt Alt)
I devoured this over a weekend, and you can read why in this post I wrote after.

Five Little Pigs (Agatha Christie)
Reading Agatha Christie novels is comfort food for me, I feel so comfortable in them. It’s usually my go-to when I hit a patch of not reading for a while, as I find it easy to get back in reading mode, and getting through one doesn’t take very long. This was quite enjoyable as well, and I loved the structure.

Annabel Scheme and the Adventure of the New Golden Gate (Robin Sloan)
This is more like a novella in terms of length — it’s a collection that was originally serialized in a newspaper. I quite like Sloan’s writing (including his newsletters), and this was as enjoyable as anything else I’ve read by him.

Magpie Murders (Anthony Horowitz)
So far the only Horowitz I had read was his Bond novels, but there was a lot of buzz around this, and so I decided to give it a try. I ended up quite liking it — even though one aspect bugged me in that it had me knowing that something was up, and so I was anxious to get to a point where more would be revealed. But yes, it’s a very smart murder mystery, and this year I plan on reading the sequel that was published last year.

Ametora: How Japan Saved American Style (W. David Marx)
This is another book that I plowed through in a weekend because I couldn’t stop reading it — this post explains why I enjoyed it so much.

The Monocle Book of Gentle Living
When I started this book reading quest in 2019, I told myself that I would just count regular books, and not something like this, which I guess falls more in the “coffee table book” category. But in the end, these Monocle books (I picked up a few this past year) are pretty text-heavy and take a while to get through, and so I felt like I should include them. And no, I don’t feel like this is cheating.

The Monocle Book of Japan
Of all the Monocle books I read this past year (the three included in this list, as well as another one that I’m not done reading yet), this was my absolute favorite. It’s a beautiful love letter to Japan, and it definitely made me feel incredibly homesick.

The Monocle Guide to Shops, Kiosks and Markets
I’ve always meant to buy the various books that Monocle has been putting out over the years, but never got around to it until recently. These are all beautiful publications, and I do intend on getting all of them eventually.

A Wizard of Earthsea (Ursula K. Le Guin)
I don’t really read fantasy anymore, not since I was a kid, but I thought it might be interesting to read this, as it’s considered a classic. It was indeed an enjoyable read. Interestingly, after I was done I wasn’t really planning on reading any more in the series, but then I re-watched the Ghibli adaptation of the third book (Tales From Earthsea) and enjoyed it so much that it made me want to go and read more. I expect I’ll do that in 2021.

Young Bucks: Killing the Business From Backyards to the Big Leagues (Matt and Nick Jackson)
The Young Bucks are not only two of my favorite wrestlers (along with Kenny Omega), but they are also the reason I’ve become such a huge fan of pro wrestling over the past two years (through their “Being the Elite” web series and the role they played in the formation of All Elite Wrestling). I devoured this in a day, as I just couldn’t put it down.

Ready Player Two (Ernest Cline)
The first book has certainly been criticized a lot since it was originally published, but I remember having a really good time reading it, and so I was certainly willing to give the sequel a go. I enjoyed bits here and there (especially the sequence around John Hughes films) but overall it wasn’t as fun as I remembered the first one being, almost coming off as a parody of itself.

All Systems Red (Martha Wells)
This is a novella that I read over the last two days of the year, and found it to be pretty fun. I had heard good things about this “Murderbot” series, and so was curious to check it out — and I won’t lie, I wanted to try and get one more book in before the end of the year. I think I’ll probably read more in this series.

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Books On Something

On Books: Ametora

I’ll start off by saying that I’m completely embarrassed by the fact that it took until now for me to finally read my buddy David Marx’s Ametora: How Japan Saved American Style. I’m not quite sure why, I think it’s just one of those things that you keep meaning to do, and it slips through the cracks, and then you get to a point where you’re like, hey, I didn’t read this yet, what’s up with that?

With that out of the way, I just blasted through it over a couple of days (thank god for vacation time) as I couldn’t put it down. Just like my experience reading Matt Alt’s Pure Invention, I was just completely drawn into each chapter, which focus on various aspects of David’s thesis on how Japan absorbed American fashion styles, and ended up guiding it. Not only is it fascinating to see how all of this develops in the postwar era, but also how it links up to a lot of the companies and brands anyone who has spent time in Japan will be very familiar with.

One aspect I also loved is that the influential role magazines played in the development and evolution of these styles means that he spends a lot of space writing about how these magazines came to be and how their editorial direction evolved and grew — properly framing the “catalog” style of reportage any Japanese magazine addict is very familiar with. To be honest, my wish now is for David to do a book that focuses on the world of Japanese magazine publishing.

If you have any interest in contemporary Japanese culture — and of course fashion (but I don’t even think that’s necessary, as I’m not a particularly fashion-oriented guy) — then I can’t recommend this enough. Whatever next he’s working on can’t come out soon enough — and you should of course pick up the first issue of NJP magazine (if it’s still available).

The funniest thing though is that reading this has actually made me want to pay a bit more attention to what I wear (beyond my typical t-shirt and black jeans uniform).

Categories
Books On Something

On Books: Pure Invention

I read it back in July, but I really need to highlight here just how much I enjoyed reading my old friend Matt Alt‘s fantastic deep-dive into Japanese pop culture of the decades following the end of the WW2. Pure Invention: How Japan’s Pop Culture Conquered the World is a ridiculously good read, and I found myself reading it in a couple of days because I couldn’t put it down. Each chapter focuses on a different topic (karaoke, anime, the Walkman, Hello Kitty, etc.), and it’s so satisfying to really dig into every single one of them in so much detail. I was expecting to enjoy more the chapters that touch on the 80s and later, but the context that you get from learning about what happened during those early post-war years — like the production of tin toys — was just so fascinating.

This is what you call a real page-turner, and sure, I’m of course partial to all things Japan and pop culture, but I can’t imagine someone not enjoying this.

Categories
Books

Books Read in 2019

At the start of last year I wrote a post about wanting to read more books. As I wrote at the time, although I do a lot of reading, when it comes to getting through books proper, that was something I found myself not doing much of anymore. So I gave myself a pretty ambitious goal of getting through a couple of books a month, which I also set in my Goodreads account. Did I make it? No, but I’m still quite happy at how many books I did read (11, about to finish a 12th one as the year ended), which for me not only made me feel good about doing what I set out to do, but more importantly, also got me back in a book reading groove.

I’ll also say that I probably would have gotten closer to my goal if I hadn’t hit a couple of books that slowed me down (and that I ended up putting down) in the summer, as it then took months to get back “on the wagon.”

So what’s my goal for 2020? I’ve set it to 18, which I think is very doable — it’s just 6 more than last year, and I’m already about to finish my 2nd book this year (L.E. Hall’s book about Katamari Damacy, following Ian Fleming’s Moonraker). I also think that my plan to mostly alternate between fiction and non-fiction worked well, and so I’ll probably continue to do that.

Below, a list of the books I read in 2019, with a short write-up.

Forever and a Day (Anthony Horowitz)
This was the Bond novel I was reading as the year started, telling the story of a young Bond as he becomes a 00 agent, and it was quite a good read. As with other recent Bond novels, I like that they are set in the years that Fleming wrote the original Bond novels, instead of just a modern take (which I already get out of the film series).

Significant Zero: Heroes, Villains, and the Fight for Art and Soul in Video Games (Walt Williams)
This was quite an enjoyable — despite the frustrating situations that come up throughout — and definitely gives you a good idea of how things are done (or can be done) in the games industry. Sure, it’s not always like this, but I definitely found myself understanding what the author was going through.

Maigret et le corps sans tête (Georges Simenon)
I quite like murder mysteries, and it’s a genre you’ll see me revisit a lot, but I had never read a Maigret novel, and so figured it was finally time to do so. I really enjoyed this, and I like that it’s a quick read, which was good for me while I was trying to get back into the habit of reading. I definitely plan on reading another one this year, if not more. I read it in French, but I’m sure there are English translations.

Peyo l’Enchanteur (Hugues Dayez)
This is a biography of Peyo, the creator of the Smurfs, and I found it to be a fascinating chronicle of his life/career. I’m sure I’ve read pretty much all of the series he’s created, but I liked finding out more about the context of when these were created. Again, this was a book I read in French, and I don’t know if it’s available in English.

The Moai Island Puzzle (Alice Arisugawa)
This is one of my wife’s favorite Japanese mystery authors (and one of her favorite novels), and I’ll say that I enjoyed it immensely as well. Highly recommended if you like “closed room” mysteries — and I also enjoy the strong meta feel of the book (lots of references to the genre). One of the best mystery novels I’ve read.

Crash Override: How Gamergate (Nearly) Destroyed My Life, and How We Can Win the Fight Against Online Hate (Zoe Quinn)
This is a story that most people who work in or follow the games industry knows about, but I found it good to really dig into all of the details of what happened, as well as the timeline.

The Tokyo Zodiac Murders (Soji Shimada)
Another Japanese mystery novel, by an author who marked a big shift in the genre in Japan at the start of the eighties (he writes a great intro for The Moai Island Puzzle, in which he talks about this shift). I read a French translation, but it’s also available in English. I enjoyed Moai more, but this is still a fantastic read, and a fascinating puzzle to get though.

Final Fantasy V (Chris Kohler)
I quite like the Boss Fight Books series, and have already read quite a few of them (and as I mentioned earlier, I’m currently in the middle of the Katamari Damacy one). Chris is a great writer, and this is a fantastic look at a game I’ve never played, but a series I know of-so-well.

Good Luck Have Fun: The Rise of Esports (Roland Li)
I read this around the time I took on my new role at Ubisoft, and found it to be a great read on how we’ve gotten to what we have now when it comes to the world of esports. A good read if you want to know more about competitive gaming, and the major players (not necessarily current major players, but the people who helped define the scene).

Live and Let Die (Ian Fleming)
About a year ago I picked up what I think is the entire Bond series in paperback form through a sale (except for Casino Royale, which wasn’t available anymore), as I figured that it’s about time I read all of these books. Yes, as much a Bond fanatic that I am, that’s always been on the movie side, and I’ve only read a few of the books over the years. So I’m reading them in chronological order, with Live and Let Die being the second Bond novel. It’s of course quite different from what we got in the movie, and there is a lot of unfortunate vocabulary that is used that certainly hasn’t aged well, but I still found myself enjoying it.

The A.B.C. Murders (Agatha Christie)
Even though I haven’t read many books in recent years, I have read a few Agatha Christie novels here and there, as I discovered that I quite enjoy them. I pretty much just jump around when it comes to the one I’ll read next, selecting the ones that are considered her best. This was indeed a great read, with a great ending.