Good lord, I can't believe it's been almost a month since I last updated. Where did August go? Seriously! I was fairly busy with work stuff, and certainly busy prepping for what is shaping up to be a *very* busy September, but it didn't seem like it was all that crazy.

Anyway, I just got back from spending the long weekend up in Monterey with my mom. It was gorgeous, fully of sea otters, seals, aquariums, perfect weather, good food and good conversation, and I was glad that I got back early enough in the afternoon today to be able to reset a bit for the coming week (although it's unpleasantly hot here at the moment--I took a cold shower this afternoon, and when I got out, it felt like the towels had been stuffed in a toaster oven or something. Everything in my apartment felt *hot* all afternoon).

As an added bonus, I had my first real (ie. non-comic-related) Los Angeles celebrity sighting last week! Mom and I went out to dinner at the fantastic Italian restaurant up the street, and Jeremy Piven, of "Entourage" and various other fame, was at the table kitty-corner to us. I had to really focus on making eye contact with my mother while she was talking so that I didn't just drift over and start to stare at him in all his gorgeousness. Unreal, I'm telling you. I didn't quite recognize him at first, since I'm used to high-strung Ari Gold, and he was dressed-down and looking a little scruffy in that super-expensive Los Angeles way, but yeah. Yum.

But yeah, instead of updating my blog, I've actually been spending a lot of time reading. This probably doesn't seem very noteworthy, but I've really been reading very little in the past six months or so (and that includes, shockingly, manga! Aside from a brief "Emma" bout in late May), for a variety of reasons, heavy television "research" being only one of them.

Anyway, starting from the release of Harry Potter 7 (literacy advocates take note! I present personal evidence that the HP series get people into books in a big way!), I've been keeping a pretty steady diet of fiction going. It hasn't generally been anything of huge literary merit (in fact, the first post-HP round was a lot of fan fiction, although in my defense, I'm pretty picky about stuff like that and tend to stick to individual and specific writers who know what they're doing and whose style I enjoy), but it's still been whiling away my post-work evenings and peaceful weekends.

The item most of the folks on my Flist would be most excited about was that I managed to get a hold of the latest in the Temeraire series almost two months early. :-) Fantastic former boyfriend (still friends) procured the ARC at San Diego Comicon apparently by browbeating the DelRey staff, and after he devoured it, he passed it along to me. He truly is a fantastic former boyfriend (although I did get him into the series in the first place, so credit where credit is due). So for the curious, I will vouch for "The Empire of Ivory" being quite possibly the best installment in the series yet, after the thrilling first volume.

Also read/re-read: some of Silver Diamond (manga), some of Yamada Taro Monogatari (manga--I've been enjoying the tv drama lately as well, even though it goes for the sweet over the original's painfully sharp sense of humor), Koukou Debut (new volume!), Naruto (new volume! Emo Sasuke!!), Naoki Urasawa's "Pluto" (Atom-kun!! ee!), The Earthsea Trilogy (wow, does she grow as a writer over the course of these. Fascinating. And Arren's massive crush on Ged is totally awesome, but her portrait of him as a budding king and leader is even more awesome. Why can't anyone make a visual adaptation of these that doesn't suck?), I finished "Garlic and Sapphires," a book by the former NYTimes food critic about her experiences with the New York restaurant scene (and how she'd disguise herself and invent alternate personae in order to get a more impartial experience in a city where every waiter knew what she looked like--surprisingly entertaining, and total porn for foodies), "Jinx," the new Meg Cabot book, also in ARC form (disappointment), Laurie Halse Anderson's "Twisted," (great!), a re-read of Anderson's "Speak," which I purchased at the same time (definitely worth owning a copy), and a book called "Like the Red Panda," by a young female SoCal writer. That was the best surprise, actually. It was a recommendation from a co-worker, and aside from the theme of suicide, the story encapsulated the twisted academic rigor of my high school experience in a way that I never imagined possible. You wouldn't think that historical Lexington, MA, and uber-contemporary, consciously constructed Irvine, CA, would have that much in common, but I related to the story to a degree that I found almost frightening. Not a perfect literary work, mind you, but I really look forward to seeing where this author goes from here (her next book is on my to-read list now).

The most literary of the bunch: Margaret Atwood's "Oryx and Crake." I pulled this off the shelf at the library last week because I was looking for something to take with me over the long weekend, I was curious, and it was in paperback. I'd read "Handmaiden's Tale" about a year ago, and was impressed, but not blown away, but she's got enough of a reputation that I figured it was worth another shot. Wow. I *loved* this book. It was a grim and horrific vision of the future that was all too plausible, and even though you pretty much know from the beginning what is happening and how things will end, it's a gripping, beautifully written page-turner the whole way through. It's funny, too, since I vaguely recall that this wasn't very well-received critically when it came out. I could have sworn that the New Yorker had some scathing review or something. Am I confused? Anyway, I definitely look forward to exploring more of the Atwood canon now.

Next up on the agenda: "Darkly Dreaming Dexter," which should finally be back in the LA Public Library circulation now (although the dvds for the Showtime series just came out, so interest may have revived again...), Susan Cooper's "Dark is Rising," since the film is coming out, and the trailer looked less sucky than it could have (and I read the series only once, and so long ago that I don't remember it well enough to really do a film/book comparison), more Atwood, Michael Pollan's "The Omnivore's Dilemma," and whatever else strikes my fancy in the meantime.

So, what are all of you reading?

In other news, I have a newfound love for KT Tunstall and her song, "Black Horse and the Cherry Tree," partly because I love female vocalists and jangly guitar, and partly because of this:

(ahahahahaha! I love you, John Barrowman!)