I started this year with a few goals:

-Include more books written by women (although not intentional, my reads have traditionally ended up being those written by Caucasian males)

-Read more books written by Norwegians & Filipinos as that’s my own ethnic background (Filipina mom & Norwegian dad). I’d barely read anything Norwegian since my days in school which honestly nearly put me off Norwegian lit altogether.. the little I’d read since then had mainly been Jo Nesbø’s Harry Hole books. Filipino reads fared even worse as I can’t recall having read any.

-Read 5 books Graham (my fiance) picked for me: it’s an annual tradition and ensures that I get some fantasy & sci-fi into my diet.

-Read as many books by authors I haven’t read anything by before from my massive TBR (850ish books) .

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-1st goal: Books by women: I’ve read 51 books so far this year and I’m pleased to say that 24 of those were authored by ladies (an additional read featured both men and women). I intend to include far more for the 2nd half and expect it will end up being at least 50/50. I got off to an unbalanced start as all I could find as far as Norwegian reads were those written by men. I’ve done some more research since then (thanks Knut Nærum) and my TBR includes a lot of Norwegian ladies I weren’t aware of.

-2nd goal: Norwegian & Filipino writers (mostly within horror & horror-adjacent genres): The beginning of the year saw me ordering alot of Norwegian-authored books by men as that was all I could find. That is, until I stumbled upon Knut Nærum’s post which was a treasure trove of Norwegian horror that included a fair number of ladies! I ordered a ridiculous amount of books and the last half of 2025 will see me focusing on those. Getting my hands on Filipino books has also been a bit of an adventure.. I quickly found out that the Philippines pubs a lot of books in English but that they’re damn near impossible to get overseas! Fortunately I’ve been able to befriend a lovely eBay seller who focuses on Filipino books and sources them for me. It’s been an absolute delight to discover Eliza Victoria and Yvette Tan’s writing + Trese by Budjette Tan has reawakened my love of comic books.

-3rd goal: Graham’s 5 picks for me to read in 2025: I suspect I’ll reach this goal quite comfortably as I’ve read 3/5 (the chunkier ones).

-4th goal: New authors (to me, anyway): I’m very pleased with what I’ve gotten around to reading. Main points include: A total of 38 new authors, of which 24 women are women. 10 Norwegians (only gents; the women are coming), 8 Filipino authors (equally split between 4 dudes & 4 ladies).

What I’m currently up to: I’m currently on the most recent Yvette Tan collection and loving it so far (there’s a reason why I keep buying them and bumping them up). She does quintessentially Filipino quiet horror remarkably well and her stories tend to make me feel closer to a part of my heritage than I’ve ever been. Can’t wait to introduce them to my mom (I’ve already handed her one). As for what’s next: I intend to read a Felix Blackwell story as he’s kept popping up on my radar and I have 4 of his books waiting for me.

I’ve tended to plan my reads by having a subgroup of ‘prioritized reads’ at hand. I’m now finding myself pretty worn-out by the state of the world and generally a bit affected by what I assume is this year’s round of SAD. To make the start of the next year a bit more exciting for myself I’ll be focusing on a couple of areas within horror that I’m woefully ignorant of: Norwegian & Filipino horror. Sidenote: My mom is Filipina and my dad was Norwegian.

I’ve already got ~13 of these reads waiting for me and will be going through them as I see fit. I’ve technically already begun my dive into Filipino horror by watching the anime ‘Trese’ by Budjette Tan & Kajo Baldisimo (you can find it on Netflix: https://youtu.be/3IhCjxVjM-A?si=IgjCbepYDlNTdtWl ). I found it enjoyable. It’s not entirely dissimilar to the tv show Grimm as it focuses on folklore in a modern setting. I remember an episode of Grimm featuring the aswang and that I wished they’d included more Filipino lore; seems like I’ve gotten my wish with Trese 😊 here’s to hoping there will be another season down the line. Trese also happens to be one of my new comic books arrivals

As per today, these are the Filipino reads I’ve managed to get my hands on (all horror except Nick Joaquín’s book)

As I had so much fun watching Trese I’m also hoping I’ll have some downtime to watch the idiot box/tv, which brings me to the latest arrival of my Filipino books: ‘Ang mga Kaibigan ni Mama Susan’ (Mama Susan’s Friends) by ‘Bob Ong’

Seeing as this hasn’t been translated to English (yet), I’ll be getting my mom to read it for me/translate; something that takes me back to my childhood of being read nighttime stories= I’m looking forward to it. Said book had also made it into the big screen and can be found on Prime, so I’ll definitely be giving it a watch on one of those days where I find myself unable to read again. Coming across the trailer for that has also lead me down a bit of a rabbit hole as far as Filipino horror movies go, and I doubt I’ll have any trouble finding something to watch when I feel like it. The trailer: https://youtu.be/xXp3vWCRKPw?si=jT06nSt_lXlMe_RD

Buying these books has taken me down memory lane and our visits to the Philippines when my grandma was still alive. My mom’s family was poor as far as money went but rich in conversations and stories. There was no electricity in the house and it felt like stepping back in time as soon as the dark arrived. Folkloric creatures had a way of feeling closer and more real. My grandma passed away years ago and more and more years separate me and my time in the Philippines but I’m hoping these particular additions to my library and watchlist will be able to bring it a bit closer again.

The next post will be about the Norwegian part of my collection.

I’m close to unfollowing one of the horror book-groups on FB due to posts like the one below:

I’m not going to touch on the content of this ‘review’ nobody asked for because that’s not the point even if I think it left a lot to be desired.

-not every book is going to cater to your tastes; that’s just the nature of reading. Not liking something is also fine, and yes; you’re entitled to your opinion. That being said, having an opinion vs forcing that opinion down other people’s throats is a different matter. There are places where you can post your criticism but a group where a not-insubstantial number of the members are authors is not the best move. Keep it to your own feed or reviewing sites ffs. Constructive criticism when asked is one thing, but this kind of uninvited sh*t flinging is such a ‘shitty for the sake of being shitty’-act very few are interested in.

There’s been many books I’ve disliked but I don’t kick down the door announcing it to people I don’t know; if they want my opinion they’ll be quite able to search it out. The kind of behavior as the one above comes close to the kind of socially-stunted act of tagging authors in a tweet about how I thought their book was awful; like who tf does this?

NGL. It’s becoming increasingly uncomfortable posting my less than gushing reviews on my Twitter feed because a few authors follow me and it demands I think twice about the tone simply because I don’t like hurting people’s feelings. I like to think most writers are able to handle it, but you never know just how things can come across in writing, nor do you know what they’re going through that day: a negative review might be a bit too much in the big picture at that particular moment. Yes, authors should be able to handle criticism if they put their work out there; but there’s a difference when they go seeking for it vs. me lighting a turd on fire at their door. If they didn’t ask there’s no need for me to pop up in their notifications like some sort of deranged Karen in the box espousing ‘your book sucks, you suck and I want my time back’. That kind of opinion is what you have friends for (I’m assuming you have friends, but your post makes me uncertain). As far as the nature of my negative review, I’ve been trying to focus on my feelings surrounding it and how I experienced the story rather than making assumptions about the writer’s character or stooping to personal attacks. I’ve not always kept this in mind because it can be easy to forget that a human being is reading any of my badly written takes, but I’ve gotten old, tired and more aware of how I communicate. It costs me far less energy to be rational than mean and later on going “oh, I regret that” and having to go back to edit it.

The other part of this delightful cretin’s post included some delusional comments, like this:

I… I have no words. I’m just going to assume you’re new here and haven’t read very much at all.

I’m grateful my Twitter-sphere is a far more welcoming place (amazingly) and I think I’m done with the FB-cesspit.

Ugh. I’d finally just about forgotten about Tom Monteleone’s bitter, racist/transphobic/fatshaming/misogynistic rant of last year. Then he decided to regurgitate the same rhetoric once again.

For those lucky enough to have missed it, but who (for some reason or other) are curious; google ‘Tom Monteleone’ and ‘Substack’.

I am genuinely mystified as to what he thought that rant would gain him. Also, the ebook route not working the way you envisioned, Tom? I can’t imagine what kind of friends you have if they suggested this way forward.. but anywho.

I used to get fired up and pissed off at this kind of good-ol’ man BS, but it’s honestly happened so often lately that it’s simmered down to a mostly ice cold fury. I want to touch on some of the things his post contained:

Tom strikes me as the man time left behind; cartoonishly outdated opinions from a time most women and POC are happy to see the back end of.

Monteleone seems offended that women and POC have won a prize he himself has benefited from and wrote:

“for the last six years, Straight, White Guys: two; Women: eight; “Writer of Color”: five.  I rest my case.  Nothing I said about the DEI initiative was false or slanderous, but they hated me for bringing it up.”

I find it convenient that Monteleone didn’t mention that the first African American only won the lifetime achievement award in *2017*. That out of 60+ winners less than 10 have been people of color, less than 20 have been women. This amounts to about a 4th of the wins. As far as I’m aware that doesn’t really represent the community of writers, does it? But you tell me Tom, how many percent of the wins do you feel white men are entitled to? Also, goddamn! What a weird hang-up to have to the point where you obsess over ethnicity/gender/sexual orientation and count them off. I’m borderline resentful that I became curious about the years he handily left out; you know.. those years with a ridiculous majority of winners being white, straight males..

He then went on to name and shame specifically those he found undeserving; a suspicious number of them women and POC… I don’t understand how you could have spent decades in the community being this blind to such a big part of it, that is, unless purposely so. That you prefer to read a select corner of the genre is on you, and honestly a bit sad. I’m incredibly glad that it’s encompassing more than stories from a white-dude point of view. I’m thankful that the prizes are starting to acknowledge this part of horror and that I get to experience new perspectives from my tiny nook in Norway. We’re all made better for it. I’m so sick of all these woe-is-me posts coming from a certain vintage and gender, let alone having to read your diatribe(Monteleone sent his rant to an unknown number of people who do not share his sentiments). Climate change is not political. Trans people’s right to exist is not political nor is black people’s right to live; if you can’t see that people are fighting for basic rights and to live their lives, I don’t know what to tell you. Climate change is real no matter what party you vote for; although some are far more willing to exacerbate it than others.

He also saw fit to complain about how his hatefilled rhetoric has negatively impacted his business.. well, that’s the free market for ya, isn’t it? Nobody “torpedoed” anything but you. You have a right to your opinions but so have others, and that includes not agreeing with you and deciding to support people who don’t belittle parts of our community. I’d rather not spend my money on books published by a person who refers to my friend as “a political issue” in a day and age where violent crime directed towards trans people runs rampant. I’d much rather throw my money at all the people you find less deserving and disrespected. I have to thank Monteleone for that; his rant added a lot to my TBR. I hadn’t heard of some of the people because I’m also not as well- and widely read as I could be. The difference being that I recognize that as a failing on *my* part rather than theirs.

A sidenote to the “I was drunk and might have said a few things you might have found offensive”-excuse: I grew up with alcoholic uncles on both sides of the family tree; I’ve observed that how you act when drunk is more often than not dependent on your personality. My nice uncles were “nice drunks” and my mean uncles were the same abusive AHs when inebriated. Alcohol amplifies, but racism/transphobia/misogyny does not occur in a vacuum- it was always there in the background, waiting to come out and play, Tom.. also, regarding that podcast: if you feel the need to tell people that “friends have been telling me ‘I know you’re not racist, Tom’”, then you might just want to look into who you’re really trying to convince here. I’ve also made my assumptions as to what kind of shade your friends come in and I suspect they are a nice varied lot representing everything from shades of bone white to off-white (nothing beyond beige).

Everytime something like this blows up I see the odd ‘people must have known’. I have no doubt some people in Monteleone’s circle knew and share his views. I also suspect that many more suspected but weren’t entirely sure; I assume Monteleone is many things, but not necessarily an idiot- that at least he didn’t use to be (he managed to run a fairly decent press for many years). In these cases I suspect people would have heard the odd “nutty uncle” comments but nothing as inflammatory as what we now have seen from him. He might have adapted depending on who the audience was with inappropriate “jokes” to those with a similar background (white, male). Some would have laughed it off, others would have ignored it & some (hopefully) noted him as someone they weren’t interested in spending time with. It’s ridiculous how much bad behavior has been excused with “he’s just a straight talker”, “he was just kidding” and “it’s just that generation”, especially when one has a similar background and are blind to how many of these jabs POC/trans/women experience. Another layer as to why it took this long for the real Monteleone to be known is simply because isolated events take a while to show a trend; social media and people sharing their stories across the community kicked that door right down.

It’s easy to fall into the “all old white men are the same”-trap, but if it’s one thing I’ve realized is that there’s a sizable part of that subset of the community who most definitely are not. I’ve seen former friends of you hold you accountable, Tom. I’ve seen them try to help you see the bigger picture. Those men I applaud. Losing what they thought was a friend AND addressing it is not easy. I hope you reach a point in time where you recognize how hurtful and wrong you’ve been but at this point I’m not holding my breath. You did, after all, spend 1,5 years stewing and growing embittered rather than taking the time to look into the people you so easily disregarded and labeled undeserving instead of going at it with curiosity and an open mind, (or just letting shit go and not emailing x amount of people who don’t subscribe to your particular kind of awful).

June was a horrible month. June 1st: My dad lost his battle against the infection they’d been treating for several weeks. The rest of the first half of June was spent somewhere in the midst of grief/stress to the point where I found myself nearly completely losing the milk supply (I have a 3 month old I’m breastfeeding). To top that off my youngest lost quite a bit of weight before we realized.

Here’s to hoping July is better than June was.

I started a collection of cat art 3 years ago. It originally began as a bit of a joke along the lines of “cat art to keep our resident feline company at night”. It also happens that I have a bit of a horror book collection and I’m quite fond of a lot of the cover artists featured on them, so I’ve seen fit to combine the two with cat art by (mostly) artists within the horror community.

It should be noted that there’s a delightful overlap in the Venn diagram when it comes to people who love horror and those who love cats. One of these people is a friend of mine (Stina), who is directly responsible for having kicked off the next level in my collection:

Art featuring our own cat. This is Stina’s portrait of Sookie; the portrait that started it all.

I haven’t been doing this for particularly long, but I have commissioned 3 artists for Sookie portraits and hope to add more in the near future. The artists include:

Dave Dick: https://www.davedickillustration.com who’s responsible for this wonderful piece:

Luke Spooner (Carrion House): https://carrionhouse.com (see timelapse below)

David Simon: https://davewritesanddraws.com/ -forthcoming

Do you collect anything?