Stuff We Like :: 12.2.16

Around the Web

It’s the most wonderful time of the year -- time for the Best Books of the Year lists!  Plus Gift Giving Guides!  If you listen closely, you can actually hear my to-read list streeeeetching.  (It makes a creaking noise as it grows.)  These are great, diverse lists well worth diving into.

• BuzzFeed’s Best Fiction of 2016

• The Guardian’s Best SF and Fantasy of 2016

• Boing Boing’s 2016 Book Gift Guide

Reading List

• Saga is the best comic series I have ever read.  (What? Better than Gaiman’s Sandman?!?  Sandman is AWESOME.  Definitely read it.  But I like Saga even more.)  It’s an epic space opera/fantasy about family and love and us vs. them and every single panel is gorgeous.  It’s not yet complete (Rejoice! for there is more coming!), but 6-issue compilations are released regularly.  BE AWARE that it is definitely an adult R-rated series, so please read it yourself before deciding to give it to your favorite tween or teen.  Aside from being gorgeous and funny and moving, the themes here are very relevant to what’s happening in the world today.   

• Also relevant: Romantic Outlaws: The Extraordinary Lives of Mary Wollstonecraft and her Daughter, Mary Shelley by Charlotte Gordon.  Aside from having read Frankenstein a few times, I didn’t know much about these two amazing women. This biography is a great read and comes at a time when I need some inspiration.  The Marys experienced legal and cultural oppression that I can’t even imagine, and still managed to live by their principles, fight for women’s rights, and create work that echoed down through the generations. I expect I’ll be reading about and reading the works of many feminists (past and current) in the coming days, and this was a great start.

• In the I-know-I-know-I-should-have-read-this-years-ago category, I am FINALLY reading To Kill a Mockingbird. I’ve put it off for years (even while making it part of my kids’ homeschool curriculum), but I’m finally doing it. And...in a lot of ways, it’s not at all what I expected.  Tune in to episode 10 of the home|school|life podcast to hear all about my thoughts and feelings!  I’m sure they’ll be fascinating!!

At Home

• So the Hamilton Mixtape is out.  You probably want to get that.

• Also, go watch Lin-Manuel Miranda on the Drunk History Hamilton episode!  (That counts as homeschooling, right?)  It’s not on Hulu yet so I haven’t seen it, but while I’m waiting I can re-watch all the old episodes. (Definitely counts as homeschooling, I think.)

• And just to continue the all-things-Miranda all-the-time theme: Moana is wonderful!  The movie is gorgeous, the music is wonderful, and Moana herself is a fantastic new Disney “princess”.  (Moana: “I’m NOT a princess.  I’m the daughter of the chief.”  Maui: “You wear a dress, you have an animal sidekick, you’re a princess.”)

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