 Hello my darling extraterrestrials, I am Kim, this is Dustmotes and Velikor and let's be real, it's been a minute. It has been several minutes. Oh before I forget, hello to all of my new subscribers who joined us while I was not posting videos. Hello lovelies. Okay so I spent most of December at my best friend's house. She and her wife Ariel just had a baby Felix and I said that in such a way that it's like a baby Felix but it's a baby whose name is Felix. Like it is like a baby Felix like a like a baby ocelot. It's not what that is okay. He is adorable and he is growing like a weed so I spent most of my time doing dishes tidying up so that moms could catch up on sleep. So that's why I didn't do a wrap-up video in December and then in November okay in November I went a little overboard and I read 19 books all by the same author all in the same series so like when I tried to write the wrap-up video for November it was just like so I read this book by Lois McMaster Buchold and then I wrote read this other book by Lois McMaster Buchold and then I read a third book by Lois McMaster Buchold. So I kind of realized that I couldn't actually wrap up November without you know spoiling an entire sci-fi series and that just wasn't cool with me so I decided that if you can't do a job right why do it at all which is a terrible philosophy and I do not recommend it but that's why you didn't get a wrap-up video for November. However you are getting one now if you have noticed the title of this video it is the November December I'm sorry wrap-up and we have just exited the I'm sorry portion by the way I'm sorry onto the books. As I may have mentioned in the month of November I worshipped at the altar of the Vorkosigan saga by Lois McMaster Buchold. These are a political sci-fi slash philosophy slash war slash heist bacchanalia with an ever-present psychological bent. My friend Alex handed me the first omnibus and that really was a mistake because I have a problem and I don't care. Okay so Buchold has been publishing Vorkosigan novels sporadically since the 80s so there's several reading orders that you could ascribe to so I read them in order of the age of the main character which due to the perceived linear nature of time meant that I started before his birth. The main character Miles Vorkosigan is not even a glimmer in his mother's eye when the first book Shards of Honor introduces Commander Cordelia Naismith of the beaten astrological survey to Bariahrin Lord Arl Vorkosigan vis-a-vis the wonderful expedient of being taken captive. It quickly becomes apparent to her that her captor supposedly the commander of the outfit that just raised her survey camp to the ground is the unlikely survivor of a mutiny and needs her assistance to regain his command. Bariah, the seventh book in publication order but the second in internal chronology, shows the two reuniting under the most bizarre of circumstances, basically eloping and conceiving their first child named Miles. But when the decaying emperor taps Arl to be the regent until the five-year-old heir can come of age, things get more complicated. An assassination attempt is foiled but doesn't spare Miles, still in utero, and he's moved into a tank called a uterine replicator to complete his pre-birth growing. A lot of people, including Miles' grandfather, believe that this child is going to be a mutant, and there's a lot of hostility against mutants on Bariah, for a lot of reasons. But all the uncertainty in the line of succession leads to civil war and a pretender appoints himself emperor and kidnaps Miles in his tank. Cordelia is not happy. She is not happy at all. The third book in internal chronological order, and the last I will talk about about the forecoast against Saga, is The Warrior's Apprentice, where we meet Miles again at say age 17. He is a brittle-boned, hyperactive, tactical genius getting himself into trouble flying by the seat of his pants. Through panache and sheer desperation, he finds himself as the head of an as-yet-imaginary mercenary outfit. Scramble to survive in an enemy war zone, convince the enemies that he is their superior, keep the enemy's real superiors far, far away, and maybe, hopefully, succeed in delivering their cargo and getting out alive. Warrior's Apprentice really sets the tone for the rest of the saga. It's fast-paced and twisty, and Cordelia is the woman I want to be when I grow up. And Miles is my son, and I love him. In internal chronological order, the books go like this. Shards of honor, Bariar, both contained in Cordelia's honor omnibus, and then Warrior's Apprentice, Mountains of Mourning, The Vore Game, which are all contained in Miles—oh, sorry, that's young Miles. And then there's Setaganda, Ethan of Athos, and Labyrinth, which are all contained in Miles, Mystery, and Mayhem. And then Brothers in Arms, Borders of Infinity, and Mirror Dance, all contained in Miles' errant. And then there's Memory, which is not included in any of the omnibuses and is considered kind of pivotal to the overall plot of the saga. And then there's Comar and Civil Campaign and Winterfare Gifts, which are all contained in Miles in Love. And then Diplomatic Immunity, Captain Vore Patrol's Alliance, Cryo Burn, and Gentleman Joel and the Red Queen, none of which are as yet included in any omnibus, and you have to find them independently. So yeah, I'm crazy. Oh, somewhere in there, probably while I was trying to locate the next Forkosigan novel, I read The Bells by Daniel Clayton, a surprisingly dark world of young women who can transform the people of their planet who are born gray-skinned and white-haired and red-eyed into more beautiful versions of themselves for a price. Tightly controlled and well-conditioned against the perils of independent thought, The Bells compete to be the favorite of the Queen, but the tapestry of their world is unraveling as Chamelea starts putting together what's really happening behind the curtain. This book has some incredible world building and the way they do magic is really impressive, but I personally found the characters a little bland, so. If you like seedy underbellies and conspiracies, all tied up with a beautifully aesthetic bow, you'll like The Bells. At the start of December, I was wrapping up the Forkosigan saga, but my very next pick was The Mortal Word by Genevieve Cogman. You might know this is one of my absolute favorite series, The Invisible Library. I read this new volume in about a day and then I immediately took the stack of all five and handed them to my friend Lilith, who read them all in about a week. They are page-turners, you will devour them. The Mortal Word sees Irene cast as the mediator in an investigation into a murder that disrupted the political merger of the Eon. Fairies and Dragonkind are coming together to negotiate a truce between their warring peoples. Who doesn't want this historic treaty to take place? Who would go through all the trouble? And why are people disappearing in this version of 1890s Paris? And then I got my hands on a copy of Eleanor and Park by Rainbow Rowell and then this one's a doozy. Park is a quiet young man who likes to read comic books and do martial arts, and he kind of exists outside of the power center of his high school. Peaceful, but not really a part of. Eleanor is the new girl, red-haired and round and so far out of step with contemporary fashion that she's in outer space. They meet when Eleanor gets on the bus her first morning and Park is the only one unlucky enough to have an empty seat beside him. This bus is where they fall in love. It's not easy, and for a while it's pretty hostile. Eleanor is getting bullied from all sides and her home life is precarious at best, and she's not very much of a sharer. Park, on his part, is a little more ride-or-die than I think even he expected. It is a terrible, honest portrayal of young love and really funny throughout. This is one of those books that if you enjoy crying you'll like this one. So I highly recommend it. Next up was Damsel by Elena K. Arnold. This one was a quick one, it read more like a novella, and it has a kind of fairy tale-esque cadence. A young prince must defeat a dragon and rescue a maiden in order to become king in his country. The damsel wakes with no memory of her life or her captivity. She can't remember her name. She's not sure she ever had one, but nonetheless she journeys with the prince to his home because he says that's just how it's done. In the category of new fairy tales, this one is definitely one of my top ten. At this point I was so close to hitting my Goodreads goal. Like I, after Christmas I think I had four books to go, and when I mentioned this to Katie she walks over to her bookshelf and she hands me a copy of An Absolutely Remarkable Thing by Hank Green. This book has no business being as good as it is. I think Patrick Rothfuss has some blurb on the cover that's like, I don't need this kind of competition in my life. It's Patrick Rothfuss. It's Hank Green's first novel and it is a beautiful look at first contact through a millennial lens. April May is the first to notice a 10 foot tall, metal warrior man guarding the Chipotle on her way home from work. She ropes her friend Andy into making a video and it goes viral because there are 10 foot tall metal warrior men in every major city around the globe and April May has the first documented evidence of them. So if you like aliens and YouTube and a nuanced discussion of toxic personalities, this book is for you. I loved it. The last book I read in 2018 and bringing my Goodreads total to 128, which is still too under my goal, I will make it this year. But anyway, it was Nimona by Noelle Stevenson. This is a graphic novel about the unlikeliest super villain slash sidekick duo. Lord Ballester Blackheart works solo and then this upstart sidekick Nimona shows up and starts wrecking things and, you know, breaking all of his hard set villainy rules. He's not psyched about her being around, but it turns out that she's pretty good at the whole villainy thing, you know, once he gets her to stop killing people. And it turns out she's got some pretty cool shape shifting powers. Together they take on Lord Blackheart's nemesis, Sir Goldenloin. Yes, I said that right. But this isn't even one of those villains as heroes heroes as villains, morally, morally swapped things. It's much more ambiguous than that. And even Nimona has secrets. This book is beautiful and it is going on my list of books I will buy once I have money again. That's it. That's all the books that I think it was 17 in November and seven in December. But honestly, I'm not sure anymore. I will be making and posting a January 2019 wrap up video in January. So you'll see that in like a week or so. I need to get back on schedule. So much. So much. Okay, how do I usually end these things? All right, come talk to me about books. And I'll see you next time.