K.M. Alexander's Blog, page 4

My Kingdom for an Injury Designation

As a statistics enthusiast and a guy who now regularly works out, I have fully embraced the data I get from my Apple Watch. I’m not alone. Go to a gym or any popular trail, and you’ll see everyone from runners to cyclists tracking their workouts on their smartwatches. I watched the US Olympic Marathon Trials today, and one of the announcers talked about the Strava runs from one of the competing runners. Data has become a part of sport and exercise. Tracking that data is beneficial for more than just coaches and athletes. As a normie, it lets me make many choices in my daily life, and using the information, I can track and push for improvements.

But, over the last few years, I’ve grown frustrated that some of that data has been contaminated. Treating each day as the same, these watches and the software that powers them give you a single view of your workout history. Recovery days are almost treated as taboo; they break streaks and those quieter days lower averages. But it was when I was recovering from an injury that this stood out the most.

With any regular exercise and training, injury is inevitable. Yet, all these data access points on Apple’s Fitness products ignore that injury occurs. It just compiles data all together and treats every day the same. Aren’t exercising? It’ll nag you to go for a walk. Need to stay off your feet? Too bad, it’s going to encourage you to stand. Gotta keep those streaks alive. (This is where I state that I don’t care about streaks, but the Apple Fitness ecosystem is heavily built on streaks as a gamification reward for exercise. They do matter to a lot of users.)

So, if I end up hurting myself (my right knee has been a persistent problem) and take a few days off to rest and recoup, those down days are recorded equally alongside workout days. There’s no way for me to flag those days, meaning there’s no way to filter the aberrant data. So, when I look at my averages, they’re all averages in the aggregate, meaning they include down days, sick days, injured days, and quieter days of recovery with less activity, which means all of my data points falter and streaks break. How much have those averages faltered? It’s hard to know because I can only parse the data on a macro level. It’s all or nothing, bucko.

The fix is simple in concept: build a way for the user to flag periods of time with an injury designation or even a broader “recovery” designation. Even professional athletes need down days. On those days, target goals would be lowered automatically, exercise could be tracked differently, and pestering messages could change. When looking at your trends, you could filter out those days from the end-point data, giving the user a better glimpse of progress or regression. It’d even allow you to filter to just those days, which could also be helpful. This isn’t a cheat; I doubt any health professional would encourage a day of unabashed slothfulness. We should strive to be active every day. This additional data point would allow the end user to adjust their data. It would make understanding setbacks or tracking improvements easier to parse and give statistics enthusiasts like me more ways to study their data.

This is absolutely a first-world problem sort of complaint. But it’s been on my mind recently. I figure once we get this solved, we can talk seriously about why the Apple alarm snooze is only 9 minutes*, and you can’t adjust it without a third-party app. Hrumph.

* The reason is historical! Back in the mechanical clock days, manufacturers couldn’t line up the clock’s gear teeth for a perfect ten-minute snooze—they either had 10 minutes and 43 seconds snooze or nine minutes and three seconds. They opted for nine. But, in reality, we all know they should have shot for fifteen like good and decent people.

Tall Ships & Sea Monsters

January has already been a busy month for me, both personally and creatively. Kari-Lise and I rushed off to New York City to celebrate her birthday and attend one of the final showings of Sleep No More. (More on that in a coming Trip Report.) I’ve put down a few thousand words on my latest manuscript, plus I’ve also shifted away from my standard brush sets to focus on a new section in my expanding #NoBadMaps Toolkit: Decorative Assets.

Back in December, my assets and brush sets were shared by some kind soul on Hacker News, which drove some fourteen thousand people to my site. It was a splendid early Christmas present. It’s been fun to watch that excitement spread, and I am amazed how many people find my weird little hobby useful. Along the way, I realized it was time to differentiate between my standard sets and the decorative sets designed to enhance other work. So, I moved them to their own page, which you can check out here.

There’s been a few other sets that have been in the back of my mind so I expect this section to grow. Over the last few weeks, I’ve also quietly launched two new decorative asset sets. Since they are smaller sets, I don’t usually write a whole post about these, but they are both unique and exciting enough that I think they deserve it.

Bellin’s Navy: A Tall Ship Asset Pack

Oceans are now battlefields with the thirty-eight 18th-century tall ships and a few other goodies you’ll find in this set. This mini navy is lifted from Jacques Nicolas Bellin’s 1785 Carte Geometrique De L’Entree De La Rivierre De Bordeaux, depicting Brittany’s coast and the Gironde estuary’s mouth—a perfect way to liven up the oceans of your fantasy maps. Expect a few more of these in the future. I’d love to capture more eras of naval activity.

Here There Be Monsters: A Sea Monster Asset Set

Cannonballs aren’t the only thing seagoing vessels need to dodge. The oceans are vast and dangerous and often unexplored; bold adventurers must be warned of the possible creatures lurking in the deep. Here There Be Monsters is a historical asset set to help you do just that! This set features various sea monsters taken from (primarily) 16th-century documents. Version 1.1 features the monstrous imagination from the following cartographers and engravers:

Olaus Magnus (1539) is the earliest artist features, depicting some of the more fearsome creatures in this set. Magnus’ unique Scandavian style has been on my list for a complete set in the future, but his monsters were too good to pass up.Italian engraver Ferrando Bertelli’s (1568) creatures are some of the sillier in this set. But he also decided to expand to the monsters on land as well and you’ll find both included here.The man himself, Gerardus Mercator (1569), is our third artist here, and his creatures tend to be more realistic, except for that sea serpent, I suppose.Spend any time in historical maps and you’ll come across the extensive work of Brabantian Abraham Ortelius’ (1570). Whaling had existed for centuries, but you wouldn’t know it from some of his depictions. Johannes Baptista Vrients (1583–1608) is the last cartographers who’s work is featured in this set. His work was primarily based on Ortelius’ (he bought the plates from Ortelius’ heirs) and you’ll find plenty of similarities between his monsters.More to come…? I plan on Here There Be Monsters to be a ongoing set. Expect updates in the future with new monsters by new cartographers and engravers.

All these and a few others can be found on my new Decorative Assets page. Check often to see what else I release over the coming months. (I won’t always make a post like this.)

Big thank you to all of you who bought my books and those supporters of both Kofi and Patreon; your support has helped make both these sets a reality. If you want to help support #NoBadMaps there are three handy ways you can do so:

Buy My Books→

I’m not just a map enthusiast. I’m also a novelist! The easiest way to support me (and get something in return) is by purchasing one of my cosmic horror urban fantasy novels.

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Buy Me a Coffee→

A simple and quick way to support the #NoBadMaps project is through a one-time donation of any amount via ko-fi. Your support helps keep this project going and is appreciated.

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Join my Patreon→

If you want to continually support the #NoBadMaps project through a reoccurring monthly contribution, consider joining my Patreon and get sneak peeks into what’s coming.

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Happy Mapping!

Happy 2024

It’s always a good idea to ring in a new year with a sassy Mark Twain quote. This letter was written on January 1, 1863, to the Virginia City Territorial Enterprise. I found it amusing, and I think you will as well.

‟Now is the accepted time to make your regular annual good resolutions. Next week you can begin paving hell with them as usual. Yesterday, everybody smoked his last cigar, took his last drink, and swore his last oath. Today, we are a pious and exemplary community. Thirty days from now, we shall have cast our reformation to the winds and gone to cutting our ancient shortcomings considerably shorter than ever. We shall also reflect pleasantly upon how we did the same old thing last year about this time. However, go in, community. New Year’s is a harmless annual institution, of no particular use to anybody save as a scapegoat for promiscuous drunks, and friendly calls, and humbug resolutions, and we wish you to enjoy it with a looseness suited to the greatness of the occasion.”

MARK TWAIN

I hope you had a solid 2023 and that your 2024 is even better. Thanks for sticking around here, being a reader, and supporting this strange little corner of the internet. It means the world to me. I wish all of you a safe and healthy new year.

In keeping with my theme from Christmas, here’s a weird Victorian postcard of chicken people playing soccer. (I didn’t actually set out to have a theme. But hey, kismet.)

A strange New Year postcard

Happy new year, dear readers!

My Reading List for 2023

This has been a banner year for me reading-wise. I tend to be a slow reader; books that my friends will fly through in a few sessions take me much longer. But this year, I buckled down and focused much of my leisure time on reading, and I don’t regret it. To that end, I am proud to say I have set a personal record, finishing the year with fifty-four books behind me. That’s over a book a week! I don’t really know how I did it, who knows if I’ll replicate it again. As always, I mainly focused on novels, but a few novellas are scattered in there, and a few epic tomes for balance.

On other fronts, I read more graphic novels this year than last. But not enough to feel comfortable to name a favorite, although it is probably evident which series stood out from my list. (It’s not Saga!) However, I surpassed my goal in poetry, there was enough there that I forced myself to pick a favorite and a few runners-up. Don’t miss that section if you’re looking for a poetry fix.

As it does every year, this list correlates with my Goodreads 2023 Reading Challenge. Occasionally, you might find some slight differences between the two. (Not this year.) This list is all strictly reading for pleasure—I typically forgo listing any research/history books I’ve read for a project as I read those differently than I do fiction. This list is always enormous, so l skip reviews except for the standouts. However, I’d invite you to follow me on Goodreads, where I occasionally leave other reviews.

Most links will go to IndieBound/Bookshop.org—now more than ever, be sure to support your local bookstore. If possible, I am directly linking to each author’s website—if you’re on the list and I didn’t find your website, please let me know about it. (I won’t link to social media, sorry.)

Quick Links• Novels & Novellas • Graphic Novels • Poetry • Novels & Novellas Babylon’s Ashes (The Expanse #6)
by James S. A. Corey The Great Hunt (The Wheel of Time #2)
by Robert Jordon A Black and Endless Sky
by Matthew Lyons The Hunger
by Alma Katsu Racecraft: The Soul of Inequality in American Life
by Barbara J. Fields &  Karen E. Fields Queen of Teeth
by Hailey Piper Synners
by Pat Cadigan Book of Night
by Holly Black Zeus Is Dead: A Monstrously Inconvenient Adventure
by Michael G. Munz The Dismembered
by Jonathan Janz Jade Legacy
by Fonda Lee The Cabin at the End of the World
by Paul G. Tremblay The Conspiracy Against the Human Race: A Contrivance of Horror
by Thomas Ligotti The Justice of Kings
by Richard Swan Babel: Or the Necessity of Violence: An Arcane History of the Oxford Translators’ Revolution
by R. F. Kuang The Victorian City: Everyday Life in Dickens’ London
by Judith Flanders You Shouldn’t Have Come Here
by Jeneva Rose Altered Carbon
by Richard K. Morgan Locklands
by Robert Jackson Bennett Tropic of Kansas
by Christopher Brown The Book Eaters
by Sunyi Dean World Without End
by Ken Follett Duma Key
by Stephen King Smoke
by Dan Vyleta The Poppy War
by R. F. Kuang The Snows of Kilimanjaro and Other Stories
by Ernest Hemingway Today’s Saints
by Michael Ripplinger Dark Night Golden Dawn ( Amazon …*grumble*)
by Allison Carr Waechter City of Illusions (The Hamish Cycle #3) …again.
by Ursula K. Le Guin Pawn of Prophecy ( Amazon …*grumble*)
by David Eddings The Hand of God
by Yuval Kordov Cruel Angels Past Sundown
by Hailey Piper Blood Meridian, or, the Evening Redness in the West …again
by Cormac McCarthy The Hod King (The Books of Babel #3)
by Josiah Bancroft Infernal Machines (The Incorruptibles #3)
by John Hornor Jacobs The Monster of Elendhaven
by Jennifer Giesbrecht The Covenant
by James A. Michener Mongrels
by Stephen Graham Jones What Moves the Dead (Sworn Soldier #1)
by T. Kingfisher For Whom the Bell Tolls
by Ernest Hemingway The Shining
by Stephen King Negative Space
by B.R. Yeager Below
by Laurel Hightower The Prestige
by Christopher Priest Children of Time
by Adrian Tchaikovsky Small Mercies: A Detective Mystery
by Dennis Lehane Red Mars
by Kim Stanley Robinson Dreams of Shreds and Tatters
by Amanda Downum The Farthest Shore (Earthsea #3)
by Ursula K. Le Guin On a Pale Horse (Incarnations of Immortality #1)
by Piers Anthony Kings of the Wyld
by Nicholas Eames Witchmark (The Kingston Cycle #1)
by C. L. Polk The Parable of the Talents (Earthseed #2)
by Octavia Butler Half a King (Shattered Sea #1)
by Joe Abercrombie Favorite Novel of 2023 Children of Time

by Adrian Tchaikovsky

Weaving a few classic sci-fi tropes, an uplift story, a first contact tale, and an ark ship set across a time span of thousands of years on a remote planet. Tchaikovsky managed to create a compelling set of characters while maintaining their utterly alien perspective on life, society, and the world around them. It’s a feat that worked perfectly for me, and I found myself enamored from start to finish. I can’t wait to dive into the next one.

Favorite Novel Runners-up of 2023 The Hand of God

by Yuval Kordov

There is so much here that sucked me in. It’s a post-apocalyptic book that confronts dealing with an apocalypse, it’s a mecha book but done in a grounded way that feels more Battletech than Transformers, and it’s a weird-fantasy-faith book that at times feels like an homage to Warhammer 40k, but forges its own path. Loads of twists and turns and solid characters, the sort of thing I crave in a genre-bending novel. I’ll be back for more.

The Prestige

by Christopher Priest

Having seen the 2006 Christopher Nolan film a few times, I knew the secret twist going in. But the compelling writing, wonderful characters, and significantly expanded plot made any spoilers inconsequential. Told in an epistolary style, the tale of rival stage magicians weaves with that of their grandchildren who meet to discover the mystery of their grandfather’s illusions and the wedge that was driven between them. The book here is much larger than the film in scope, and the ending is more unsettling than I could have anticipated. Fantastic work.

 Honorable Mentions of 2023

Picking those three was not easy. There were a lot of books that engaged me this year. Some other standouts:

Babylon’s Ashes by James S. A. Corey
It’s Book Six in The Expanse which is probably my favorite sci-fi series of all time. So more is always better in this regard.
Book of Night by Holly Black
Solid second-world urban fantasy with fun shadow magic and delightful worldbuilding.
The Dismembered by Jonathan Janz
A fast-paced gothic horror about a writer who discovers more than he bargained for when he offers to help a young woman rescue her sister.
The Cabin at the End of the World by Paul G. Tremblay
A family staying at a remote cabin for vacation is terrorized by four strangers who claim they must make an impossible sacrifice or the world will end.
The Justice of Kings by Richard Swan
Fantasy lawyers with unique magical abilities unearth a conspiracy that could upend the empire they’re sworn to protect.
Today’s Saints by Michael Ripplinger
An action-packed adventure that blends genres, yet looks deeper. A book infused with the fun of 80s cartoons and somehow still a study on trauma and faith. Solid endings to a wonderful series.
Mongrels by Stephen Graham Jones
A young boy learns the ins and outs of werewolf life from his aunt and uncle. No one writes rural poor like Jones, he captures the complexity and nuance perfectly.
Negative Space by B.R. Yeager
Profoundly disturbing but strangely captivating, Negative Space is more of a treatise on the pervasive malaise and discontent experienced by American youth. Not for everyone, but it was almost one of my top three.
The Shining by Stephen King
It’s the tragic story we all know but done so much better and with more deftness and nuance than the film ever managed. I’m now a “the book is better” guy. (I was always that guy.)
Small Mercies: A Detective Mystery by Dennis Lehane
It is a murder mystery with a grieving but tough-as-nails mother as a central character told against the backdrop of the Boston bussing crisis.
Witchmark by C. L. Polk
A doctor with magical ability tries to solve the murder of a patient and ends up uncovering a complex conspiracy (and finds a little romance.) Delightfully sweet, very prim and proper.

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 Graphic Novels

I read quite a few graphic novels this year. But I read zero short stories. (Hence why it’s missing from the list this year.) As far as comics go, digital reading has revitalized my experience. Not totally surprising since it did the same with novels. I am a graphic novel trade reader, and I appreciate being able to lose myself in a story and not have to figure out dedicated bookshelf space.

Undiscovered Country, Vol. 1 – Destiny
by Scott Snyder (Author), Charles Soule (Author), Giuseppe Camuncoli (Cover Art, Artist), Leonardo Marcello Grassi (Artist), Daniele Orlandini (Artist), and Matt Wilson (Artist) These Savage Shores
by Ram V (Author) and Sumit Kumar (Artist) Gideon Falls, Vol. 5: Wicked Words
by Jeff Lemire (Author), Andrea Sorrentino (Artist), and Dave Stewart (Artist) Undiscovered Country, Vol. 2 – Unity
by Scott Snyder (Author), Charles Soule (Author), Giuseppe Camuncoli (Cover Art, Artist), Leonardo Marcello Grassi (Artist), and Matt Wilson (Artist) Undiscovered Country, Vol. 3 – Possibility
by Scott Snyder (Author), Charles Soule (Author), Giuseppe Camuncoli (Cover Art, Artist), Leonardo Marcello Grassi (Artist), and Matt Wilson (Artist) Census, Vol. 1 (Link goes to Amazon)
by Marc Bernardin (Author), Adam Freeman (Author), and Sebastian Piriz (Artist, Colorist) Bitch Planet Vol. 2: President Bitch
by Kelly Sue DeConnick (Author), Valentine De Landro (Artist), and Taki Soma (Artist) Undiscovered Country, Vol. 4 – Disunity
by Scott Snyder (Author), Charles Soule (Author), Giuseppe Camuncoli (Cover Art, Artist), Leonardo Marcello Grassi (Artist), and Matt Wilson (Artist)

I don’t think I have read widely in comics to pick a favorite, but I think, based on my list it’s clear that Snyder and Soule’s Undiscovered Country has been my go-to series this year. The first few books remind me the most of the Morrison era of Vertigo. It’s surreal and weird and wonderful. While it’s slipped a little in the last few editions, I still eagerly anticipate the next volume. (Gotta wait until April, though.)

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 Poetry

Last year I set a challenge for myself to read more than fifty poems. I did that and more, ending with nearly sixty. The Poetry Foundation’s Poem of the Day mailing list was a godsend in this regard. Even if I didn’t read them all, their daily poems sent to my inbox were always excellent and often topical and poignant. I’ve read enough this year that I picked a favorite as well as my runners-up—they can be found after the list.

“Verses Designed to be Sent by a Friend of the Author to His Brother-in-Law on New-Year’s Day”
by H. P. Lovecraft “At the New Year”
by Kenneth Patchen “The Robots are Coming”
by Kyle Dargan “If you smell iodine, the captain is nearby”
by Lyudmyla Diadchenko “In the Storm, a Country” via The Deadlands , Issue 21
by Omodero David Oghenekaro “The Lammergeier Daughter”
by Pascale Petit “Scallop Song”
by Anne Waldman “No Images”
by William Waring Cuney “We Play Charades”
by Uma Menon “Show Biz”
by Charles Bukowski “Why Did It”
By William J. Harris “In My Dreams”
by Stevie Smith “People”
by D. H. Lawrence “I Was Sleeping Where the Black Oaks Move”
by Louise Erdrich “Memoir V”
by Rodolfo Avelar “A Memory of Us”
by Safia Elhillo “The Author to Her Book”
by Anne Bradstreet “The Lost Land”
by Eavan Boland “In Defiance of Fortune”
by Queen Elizabeth I “A fierce and violent opening”
by Dorothea Lasky “picasso laughing”
by Patti Smith “The House of Life: 66. The Heart of the Night”
by Dante Gabriel Rossetti “Bay Leaves”
by Nikki Giovanni From “Listen to the Golden Boomerang Return”
by CAConrad “Dawn Will Usher Me”
by Juan Felipe Herrera “Am I Going to Kill My Daughter”
by Rae Rose “All You Have is a Country”
by Ha Jin “Elliptical”
by Harryette Mullen “The Language of Joy”
by Jacqueline Allen Trimble “On Confinement”
by Torrin A. Greathouse “This Is Not a Small Voice”
by Sonia Sanchez “You Also, Nightingale”
by Reginald Shepherd “Of Monsters I Loved”
by Ali Trotta “Then the War”
by Carl Phillips “Silent is the House”
by Emily Brontë “Passage over Water”
by Robert Duncan “Submission”
by Lynn Crosbie “The Look”
by Sara Teasdale “The Unknown”
by Edgar Lee Masters “Holy Sonnets: If poisonous minerals, and if that tree”
by John Donne “Dear Dr. Frankenstein”
by Jericho Brown “Triolet on a Line Apocryphally Attributed to Martin Luther”
by A.E. Stallings “The Song of the Smoke”
by W. E. B. Du Bois “Sheltered Garden”
by H.D. “When I Stutter”
by Elizabeth Meade “The Beautiful Changes”
by Richard Wilbur “Advice to a Prophet”
by Richard Wilbur “Echolalia”
by Noa Micaela Fields “Danse Russe”
by William Carlos Williams “A Future History”
by Suzi F. Garcia “Monster in the Lake”
by Martín Espada “One Cow, Two Moos”
by J. Patrick Lewis “The Haunted Palace”
by Edgar Allen Poe “Notes on “The Scream””
by Edvard Munch translated by Eirill Falck “Ars Poetica”
by José Olivarez “Full Moon”
by Elinor Wylie “To The Dead in the Graveyard Underneath My Window”
by Adelaide Crapsey “Witch Wife”
by Kiki Petrosino Favorite Poem of the YearHa Jin “All You Have is a Country”

by Ha Jin

Honorable Poetry Mentions of 2023

Poetry, to me, is a lot like music. Some days a poem will hit you the right way, and in others it’ll fall flat. The poems below all struck a nerve when I read them this year. Perhaps you’ll find your own emotional connection to them as well.

“Of Monsters I Loved”
by Ali Trotta

“The Unknown”
by Edgar Lee Masters

“Dear Dr. Frankenstein”
by Jericho Brown

“Triolet on a Line Apocryphally Attributed to Martin Luther”
by A.E. Stallings

“The Song of the Smoke”
by W. E. B. Du Bois

“Sheltered Garden”
by H.D.

“When I Stutter”
by Elizabeth Meade

“Advice to a Prophet”
by Richard Wilbur

“A Future History”
by Suzi F. Garcia

“Monster in the Lake”
by Martín Espada

“Full Moon”
by Elinor Wylie

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So, there has been my year with the written word—many fantastic reads, a few new favorites, some books I still think about, and, as always, there are a few terrible ones I never want to think about again. I suppose that comes with the territory. Overall, it was a record-setting list for me and a good year in reading. I can’t complain. I am excited to see what’s next in 2024.

How about you? What were the standout books, graphic novels, short stories, or poems you read this year? I’d love to hear about it. Leave a comment and let me know!

Are you looking for a good book? Want to see my reading lists from previous years? Check any of the links below and see what I was reading in the bygone days of yore.

• 2013 •  2014  • 2015 •  2016 •  2017  •
• 2018 • 2019 • 2020 • 2021 • 2022 •

Next year, why not join me? Goodreads does a reading challenge every year, and I am an active participant. First, follow me on Goodreads (leave me a review while you’re there), and once the New Year arrives, participate in the Goodreads Reading Challenge for 2024.

Want to stay in touch with me? Sign up for Dead Drop, my rare and elusive newsletter. Subscribers get news, previews, and notices on my books before anyone else delivered directly to their inbox. I work hard to make sure it’s not spammy and full of interesting and relevant information.  SIGN UP TODAY →

2023 in Ten Significant Photos

I always disliked the Top Nine meme that tends to roll through Instagram this time of the year. The idea that a handful of photos with the most “Likes” served by an algorithm mark a special place in one’s life is manufactured nonsense. Life’s most significant moments are often experienced through quieter and more subdued occasions. The things we find important aren’t always the events that generate ‘grammable content. Events like that might not even be something we share on social media.

That brings us to this post. This is my annual reckoning, where I reflect on the last year using ten photos that marked significant experiences or moments throughout my year. These are the moments that mattered—both good and bad—to me.

The rules are simple. Pick ten photos from my past year that are the most significant: positive or negative—significance can be found in either. It can’t be more; it can’t be less. Some moments will have to fall by the wayside—that’s intentional—culling is a part of this process. It helps create a more realistic and personal picture of the year. Some years will be more complicated than others, and sometimes, one will discover significance in the smaller, quieter moments. This is the way.

Okay, the rules have been established. The setting has been set. Let’s dive into my 2023.

Heather Lynn & Uncle Michael (Left – Photo by Kari-Lise Alexander), Rykley Tyler (Right – Photo by Meghan Mitchell)

The brood of niblings has grown yet again! My streak of a new niece or nephew (which started in 2019) continues! This spring, Heather Lynn was born to Kari-Lise’s sister-in-law and her brother, and later this summer, my sister gave birth to her third daughter, Rykley Tyler. Two in one year! I love being a big ol’ weird uncle, and watching all these kids grow up and seeing their personalities develop has been wonderfully rewarding.

Sugar on the couch.

After sixteen years, our old poodle Sugar passed away. It was hard to let her go; writing this now still makes me tear up. She was a wonderful little light in our life, and through sheer tenacity and a little bit of deviousness, she had become the leader of our brigade of pets. I wrote a tribute to her shortly after she died, and it does a better job of capturing her than a little paragraph ever could.

It’s impossible to capture the scope of the Lauterbrunnen Valley in Switzerland, but this gets close.

At the end of spring, as a celebration (more on that next), we took an extended trip to Europe. We began in Iceland (again), then hit up Norway (again) before joining our travel buddies Kelcey and Jim Rushing to explore Paris, France, and a large chunk of Switzerland (and smaller chunks of France and Germany). Trying to pick a single photo that captures a trip like that is impossible. Luckily for you, I assembled a full trip report with many, many more.

The author and Kari-Lise in 2003 (Left), the author and Kari-Lise in 2023 (Right)

This summer, Kari-Lise and I celebrated our twentieth wedding anniversary—the reason for the big trip above! I am so grateful to have a partner in this chaotic life, a best friend I’ve got to grow up next to, and someone so supportive of all my outlandish schemes. Good, bad. Ups, downs. Joys, sorrows. I wouldn’t trade it for anything. It’s been twenty incredible years. I love you, Kari-Lise.

My first novel, The Stars Were Right

It has been a year of anniversaries. This fall, my first novel and the first book in The Bell Forging Cycle, The Stars Were Right, celebrated its 10th birthday! These ten years have been a wild ride. I am humbled and grateful so many readers have joined Waldo Bell and ventured into the streets of Lovat and the world of the Territories. Thanks for all the support. It means the world.

A shaft of sunlight penetrates the clouds, viewed from Double Bluff Beach on Whidbey Island

Sometimes you gotta get away. This fall Kari-Lise and I took a week to chill out, poke around, cook delicious foods, and watch spooky shows in a cabin on Whidbey Islands. It’s a ritual we’ve done a few times since the pandemic, and I always find retreating from the hustle and bustle of the city to the quiet of an island a wonderful respite. You should try it.

The author in a spooky wood (Photo by Steve Leroux.)

Speaking of getting away. I took a few writing retreats! One was on Whidbey Island (separate from the week above), and the other was down at Stingeroo. Both experiences were refreshing and inspiring, allowing me to work through the knots I’ve struggled with in book five. Since the last retreat in October, my word count has increased significantly. I like where the story is going, and I think you will, too. (That photo above also spawned my Quiet Corner video, “forest walk.”)

Blowing past my reading goal

I have always said I am a slow reader; it takes me a while to get through books that my friends will blow through in a few sessions. But I am very proud to have crossed the fifty-book line this year. I made it a priority to read and am thrilled to have hit this mark. I’m not quite at a book-a-day like Teddy Roosevelt, maybe next year. My full list, with my favorite picks, is coming in the next few days.

One of the most precious gifts I’ve ever received

In celebration of the ten-year birthday of The Stars Were Right, my friend R. L. gave me one of the most incredible and special gifts I have ever received—a hand-tooled, hand-dyed, leather-bound copy of the book. The level of detail is exquisite, and the amount of time poured into this project leaves me in awe. It’s the full cover. All of Dore’s illustrations with Jon’s lettering. They even did the entire blurb and the pull quote on the reverse side! It’s so special. I will cherish this forever.

An avuncular Christmas

This Christmas, we managed to brave the elements and cross the passes to spend time with our families for the holidays. If you remember, the weather foiled our plans last year, and we had to fake it in February. That meant I got to spend the first holiday since the pandemic with my nieces and nephews, actually ON the holiday. As you can see above, I used it well and spent some time practicing my public reading skills. The audience was appreciative.

There you have it, my ten significant photos representing some bright spots and lower points of the year. 2023 was a year of celebration in many ways. Often, it’s easy to forget these milestones in the jumble of daily life, but looking back, it’s good to know we took the time to celebrate those significant accomplishments.

There were so many more things that happened over this last year. We celebrated a late Christmas in February; my mom even put up a tree and made Christmas dinner. Then, there were great visits from family and time spent with our nieces who live locally. A family trip to Port Angeles. Whale watching from the office (we do more watching than seeing.) Trips to Vashon. More Moth and Myth installations. A deck rebuilding project. Our garden. The 10th Anniversary of my Lovecraftian Gift Guide. Trips to Stingeroo. Backyard BBQs and smoke weekends. Several great visits from our parents. Seeing all the Bird King trolls. Baseball games. MLS games. My day job being acquired and then being sold again eight months later. Art openings and friend’s performances. #NoBadMaps hitting #3 on Hacker News. The list could be endless, but there’s a reason the culling is a part of the process.

So, how about you? What did you experience in 2023? What are your ten photos? Assemble them and leave a comment with a link! Let us all know about the significant events in your year.

I’ve been doing this since 2014, and even in challenging years, I’ve found it beneficial. Interested in revisiting my photos from past years? Just click on any link below and check out my selection from that specific year.

• 2022 •  2021  •  2020 •  2019 •  2018  •
• 2017 •  2016 • 2015 •  2014 •

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Hey, Merry Christmas

I am spending my holiday with my family including my eight rambunctious nieces and nephews, but I wanted to make a quick post wishing all of you a Merry Christmas and a Happy Holidays! I hope your year has been a fantastic one. Thanks for coming around here from time to time. Thanks for buying my books. Thanks for supporting #NoBadMaps. Thanks for just being swell. It means the world to me.

A strange Christmas postcard

Here is another weird 19th-century Christmas card to befuddle you this holiday. What does a pair of sledding chicken people have to do with Christmas? No idea! Why does it offer the gift of a crow, but no corvid is to be found? Again, no idea! Perhaps the rooster is crowing as he sleds? Perhaps. Still not finding any real Yuletide connection there. But I don’t know what Santa abducting a child, or ants at war, or sentient oysters have to do with the season either. The Victorians were weird.

I didn’t release a new Old Haunts this last year, I was focused on Quiet Corners, and I thought it’d be strange to have two holiday-themed vignettes next to each other in the release order. But, if you miss my seasonal Old Haunt, you can check out, Happy Auseil, A Serene Auseil, or Alleyway Holiday. Maybe they bring you some pleasant cheer.

Merry Christmas, everyone.

Moronobu Mokuhanga: A Free 17th Century Cartography Brush Set for Fantasy Maps

The early Japanese road maps, or dōchūzu (道中図), became popular during the Genroku Era. These detailed (and often long) manuscripts feel more like illustrations than traditional maps. As travel along the Tōkaidō became popularized, depictions of journeys flourished. Poetry, story, song, and maps gave the peasant farmer or merchant a chance to experience the wider country and partake in a bit of “armchair travel.” These maps were very detailed and depicted the everyday life of the travelers and residents who lived in the settlements throughout the Tokaido.

Today, I am launching Moronobu Mokuhanga, the second set in The Moronobu Duo, based on the 17th-century work of Hishikawa Moronobu. Today’s set comes from 東海道分間絵図 (A Charted Map of the Tōkaidō). Whereas Gansai was washes of ink and watercolor, today’s set is firmly in Hishikawa’s wheelhouse, a solid example of the ukiyo-e (浮世絵) woodblock work he made famous, which works particularly well for fantasy maps.

All my Map Tools will always be free. Want to help support this work?
Click here to learn how.

A sample of the settlement buildings and objects you’ll find in Moronobu Mokuhanga

Much of this will feel familiar if you have spent time with the Gansai set. It depicts the same route, after all, and Hishikawa has a certain approach to how he illustrates objects. But the shift in style is very apparent. Based on a woodcut, the lines here are cleaner and much more substantial. These take color well and can be modified easily. Villages line the roads, shrines emerge from the forests, and mighty fortresses loom over the landscape. Because armchair travel was a focus, these maps worked as a guide; famous places would be pointed out, travel fees listed, and favorite tea houses recommended. You’ll find thickets of bamboo, copses of deciduous trees, and evergreen forests everywhere. Even poetry would crop up, describing the landscape one passed through. And beyond the nearby flora, the mountainous landscape of Honshu rises. There’s a lot here, making your fantasy maps unique.

Some of the flora and landform brushes.

Unlike the dreamy emptiness of Gansai’s source, this rendition of the Tōkaidō teems with life. People are everywhere. You see them working the fields, chatting in town, moving through the forest, and linking arms to cross large rivers. It makes the place come alive, which I am sure was the intent. Travelers walk the road; some travel on horseback, and others take boats. Many wealthier travelers are carried in kagos, a type of litter. Then there is the procession. Under sankin kōtai, the Shogun required his daimyos to leave their holdings and travel to Edo. Over the years, these trips became lavish processions to display the daimyo’s military and financial might, and you’ll find plenty of brushes taken from one of these processions.

Some of the people within Moronobu Mokuhanga’s brush offerings

The first half of this duo, Moronobu Gansai, was the biggest set I’ve ever released. But it didn’t hold that crown for long. Mokuhanga is ENORMOUS, over thirty percent larger. Inside, you’ll find just over two thousand brushes covering a range of objects to construct your perfect Japan-inspired fantasy map. Inside Moronobu Mokuhanga, you’ll find:

50 Individual Buildings30 Building Pairs25 Building Clusters100 Building Rows35 Buildings w/ Flora15 Schools50 Bridges45 Signs8 Towers6 Walls6 Fortresses11 Statues and Monuments23 Torii Gates20 Shrines30 Shrines w/ Trees5 Shrines w/ Mountains3 Pagodas2 Unique Shrines5 Empty Boats3 Fishing Boats11 Ferry Boats6 Sails7 Sail Boats3 Ships8 Unique Boats18 Unique Buildings20 Fields20 Grasses50 Bamboo50 Evergreen Trees150 Sml. Evergreen Groups 50 Lrg. Evergreen Groups55 Cherry Trees40 Fancy Trees75 Pine Trees10 Willow Trees10 Ponds20 Water Flora100 Waves10 Breaking Waves30 Rocks100 Rocks w/ Trees150 Mountains6 Unique Landforms100 Individual Travelers40 Travelers w/ Loads10 Travelers w/ Fans14 Porters40 Pairs of Travelers9 Unique Travelers20 Kagos5 Stopped Kagos5 Unique Kagos14 Resting Travelers12 River Crossers13 Keyari Wakato5 Bowmen5 Riflemen11 Unique Processioners17 Farmers17 Unique People9 Individual Horses8 Groups of Horses25 Horse Riders9 Horses w/ People6 Unique Horses7 Birds4 Unique Animals20 Rain Brushes100 Clouds2 Clouds w/ Moons15 Oval Markers10 Solid Oval Markers10 Sml. Rectangular Markers7 Lrg. Rectangular Markers10 Compasses2 Unique Markers

The button below links to a ZIP file that contains a 12.3 MB Photoshop ABR brush set (it’ll also work with GIMP, Affinity Photo, and I’m told Procreate now). I also release the set as a pack of individual PNGs organized by folder, similar to how I organize the ABR file. This should make using these with tools like Wonderdraft much easier. No more extracting symbols from an enormous PNG.

Like this set? Click here to learn how you can support this project.

DOWNLOAD Moronobu Mokuhanga

Download the Moronobu Mokuhanga PNG Pack
(19.9 MB)

As with all of my previous brush sets, Moronobu Mokuhanga is free for any use. I distribute my sets with a Creative Common, No Rights Reserved License (CC0), which means you can freely use this and any of my brushes in personal or commercial work and distribute adaptations. No attribution is required. Easy peasy!

Enjoy Moronobu Mokuhanga? Feel free to show me what you created by emailing me. I love seeing how these brushes get used, and I’d be happy to share your work with my readers. Let me see what you make!

Moronobu Gansai in Use

Want to see how I’ve used this set? The term “ukiyo-e” translates as “picture[s] of the floating world.” While the intentional intent was more poetic, I figured it’d be fun to be a bit more literal, and use these brushes to make a map of islands and ships drifting among the clouds. There are three versions: a colored example, a black-and-white rendition, and a decorated sample. Click on any of the images below to view them larger. Perhaps this will inspire you as you get started on your projects!

4000×5000 (23.8 MB) 4000×5000 (14.8 MB) 1080×1350 (1.9 MB)

Sample Details: Landmasses were hand drawn by me in Photoshop. The font is Nazare, which I licensed through Adobe Fonts. All the names come from ukiyo-e artists throughout history. I use Kyle’s Watercolor Brushes for the color effects. The paper texture is from True Grit Texture Supply’s Infinite Pulp, and they’re also where I got Atomica, which gives me ink-like effects for the text, the roads, the borders, basically everything—big fan of their tools.

Support this Work

Brushes and tools released through the #NoBadMaps project will always be free and released under a public domain CC0 license. If you’d like to support the project and help me cover the cost of hosting, research, and tool-set development, I’ve put together three ways you can help, and all are detailed below.

Buy My Books→

I’m not just a map enthusiast. I’m also a novelist! The easiest way to support me (and get something in return) is by purchasing one of my cosmic horror urban fantasy novels.

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Buy Me a Coffee→

A simple and quick way to support the #NoBadMaps project is through a one-time donation of any amount via ko-fi. Your support helps keep this project going and is appreciated.

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Join my Patreon→

If you want to continually support the #NoBadMaps project through a reoccurring monthly contribution, consider joining my Patreon and get sneak peeks into what’s coming.

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More Map Brushes

This is just one of many brush sets and map tools I’ve released. You can find it and other free brushes covering a wide variety of historical styles on my Fantasy Map Brushes page. Every set is free, distributed under a CC0 license, and open for personal or commercial use. I’m sure you’ll be able to find something that works for your project. Click the button below to check them out!

view more Fantasy Map Brushes

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Teddy Roosevelt’s Advice on Reading

America’s 26th President was a voracious reader. He read a book a day, sometimes more when he was on vacation. The Theodore Roosevelt Center mentions that during his 1900 campaign, he scheduled four and a half hours of reading into his day. His love of books was well known, and he lauded reading every chance he could get. In Theodore Roosevelt: An Autobiography T. R. spends time advising the reader on the subject of reading itself, and the following is a list of some of that advice. Often I’ve seen this referred to as “rules,” but the man himself never calls them that. The following quotes are extracted from Chapter 9, “Outdoors and Indoors,” and have been reordered as they appeared in the book.

“Books are almost as individual as friends. There is no earthly use in laying down general laws about them. Some meet the needs of one person, and some of another; and each person should beware of the booklover’s besetting sin, of what Mr. Edgar Allan Poe calls ‘the mad pride of intellectuality,’ taking the shape of arrogant pity for the man who does not like the same kind of books.”

“Personally, the books by which I have profited infinitely more than by any others have been those in which profit was a by-product of the pleasure; that is, I read them because I enjoyed them, because I liked reading them, and the profit came in as part of the enjoyment.”

Theodore Roosevelt reading onboard the SS Imperator , 1914

“Ours is in no sense a collector’s library. Each book was procured because some one of the family wished to read it. We could never afford to take overmuch thought for the outsides of books; we were too much interested in their insides.”

“Now and then I am asked as to “what books a statesman should read,” and my answer is, poetry and novels—including short stories under the head of novels.”

“But, in the final event, the statesman, and the publicist, and the reformer, and the agitator for new things, and the upholder of what is good in old things, all need more than anything else to know human nature, to know the needs of the human soul; and they will find this nature and these needs set forth as nowhere else by the great imaginative writers, whether of prose or of poetry.”

“The room for choice is so limitless that to my mind it seems absurd to try to make catalogues which shall be supposed to appeal to all the best thinkers. This is why I have no sympathy whatever with writing lists of the One Hundred Best Books, or the Five-Foot Library [a reference to the Harvard Classics]. It is all right for a man to amuse himself by composing a list of a hundred very good books… But there is no such thing as a hundred books that are best for all men, or for the majority of men, or for one man at all times.”

Theodore Roosevelt reading in front of his tent during the Smithsonian African Expedition , 1910

“A book must be interesting to the particular reader at that particular time.”

“The reader, the booklover, must meet his own needs without paying too much attention to what his neighbors say those needs should be.”

“He must not hypocritically pretend to like what he does not like.”

A Stranger Quest

My NoBadMaps project and the free brush sets that have been born from it wouldn’t have been possible without me discovering the absolutely incredible David Rumsey Map Collection back in 2018. So, you can imagine how excited I was to learn yesterday that the man himself is the subject of a new documentary made by Italian filmmaker and it’ll premier at the Torino Film Festival on November 30.

The premise sounds intriguing, and you can watch the trailer below.

A Stranger Quest comes out next year. You can find out more details, watch the second trailer, check out some stills, and see the full poster over on the David Rumsey Map Collection Blog.

Open Call for 2023 Cosmic Horror Items

I need your help! Every year since 2014, I have assembled a holiday gift guide focused on cosmic horror and Lovecraftian goodies. It’s become one of my favorite annual projects. Our little corner of the horror world is full of talented creators, and I like to use the gift guide to highlight some of the fabulous weird-fiction-related items I’ve discovered throughout the year. 2023 will be no different.

That said, I am but one man, and there’s always cool stuff out there I missed, which is why I need your help. As I have for the last several years, I’m getting an early jump on assembling the guide. And it’s always worthwhile to do an open call and see what else lurks in the internet’s shadowed corners. This is that open call! Link me cool stuff! I want to know about it, and I’m sure others do too.

As always, the categories are:

Books (I generally have this covered)MusicApparel (no teeshirts—there’s a bajillion of them)GamesHousewaresMiskatonic University

You can leave a comment below, message me directly, or drop me an email. (Lots of ways to connect.) Let me know what you’ve found that you think would be perfect for this year’s Gift Guide! Not everything submitted will be featured. I curate the heck out of this.

Thanks in advance!

Previous Cosmic Horror Gift Guides

Below are links to the guides from the last eight years. Some of the products were one-offs, others are out of print, some just aren’t sold anymore. Don’t be shocked if you find broken links, especially in those earlier guides. It happens. Still, loads of cool stuff to check out.

2022 ・ 2021 ・ 2020 ・ 2019 ・ 2018  
  2017 ・ 2016 ・ 2015 ・ 2014  

The annual 2023 Cosmic Horror Holiday Gift Guide arrives on Black Friday, the darkest and most vile winter “holiday.” Return here in a few weeks to see this year’s thematic selection.

Tell your friends! Share with your family! Shout it from the rooftops! It’s going to be a good one.