Best of 2023: TV Shows

While I went through long stretches of time where I didn’t watch anything this year (and not because of the writer’s strike, honestly), there was still magic and joy in what I did feel like watching this week and still things I connected with at the right time that I wanted to share. The state of television is such a fractured one now with streaming and full season releases and it’s so easy for things to be overlooked or to not find an audience that would have watched, if only they had heard about it or weren’t made to feel like they missed it because they didn’t watch things immediately upon release. It’s not the way I approach television (I love discovering a canceled show for the first time or the thrill of catching up with one) but it’s become all too common, thanks to services who want immediate success. So I want to take the time to celebrate what I loved, even months after some of these shows aired and even though these are the only posts that exist on this blog any more.

If you’re looking for more year-end content, Marvelous Geeks has you covered, along with many other great features and reviews so head over and check them out.

Somebody Somewhere This isn’t the flashiest show on television. There’s not an externally-driven plot or a lot of action or even very much of the show at all with only 7 episodes a season that run about 25 minutes each. But it might be one of the most human and heartfelt. There is a quiet, real, lived-in energy to this show and these characters. It’s a magic that’s hard to capture, you don’t get this with every casting or with every writer. It’s grounded in humanity, in its beauty and its messiness in equal quantity. Bridget Everett is phenomenal as Sam and it was a stellar season for her, both on the comedy front and in her moments of wanting vulnerability and to open herself up to it and then pushing it away and often the other person with it. We see her mess up and be a little miserable about it and we see her be guided gently back to the life and love waiting for her. In every way, it is a show filled with love and life and a celebration of what it is to be human. 

Reservation Dogs The way this show blossomed and expanded and became not just a story of the Rez Dogs but of the whole community over the course of 3 seasons was nothing short of remarkable. You see the generational trauma and loss but also the healing and the coming back together and mending what was broken. It was one of the most visually beautiful series on television and managed the feat of having strong individual episodes (“Deer Lady” which is one of the best TV episodes I have EVER seen) within a cohesive season, which is becoming rarer and rarer these days. This was a show with a vision and clarity, one that enjoyed playing around with different ways of telling a story and showing us who these characters were and the way their lives intersected. For that, it already stands apart. Like Somebody Somewhere, this isn’t a show with an externally-driven plot. It’s character-driven with a specific point of view, an Indigenous story told by Indigenous writers and directors, and that sharpness of perspective grounds it and brings it to life. Three seasons wasn’t enough but it was also the perfect amount for this story and I’m glad we got to see it. 

Last Meals Some of the best shows I watched this year weren’t fictional and sometimes weren’t even on TV or an equivalent streaming platform. I was already a fan of Mythical Kitchen and Josh but throughout the course of the year, they’ve sneakily become my favorite food-related YouTube channel, in part because of this series. Much like Hot Ones, this is an interview show centered around food. Unlike Hot Ones, this one doesn’t require physical discomfort on the part of the guests, just a willingness for vulnerability and conversations about life and what comes next. The guests have varied from major traditional stars like Tom Hanks to internet creators like Brittany Broski to athletes like Seth Rollins but regardless of the person sitting across from him, Josh is a thoughtful, dedicated interviewer and makes the show what it is. The Andrew Rea (Binging with Babish) episode is an absolute masterpiece, both in Andrew’s willingness to share about a very difficult time for the first time in video format and Josh’s ability to listen with kindness and empathy and give his friend the space to be heard and seen. Other highlights for me have been the Jason Kelce episode where we see Josh’s love of the Eagles on full display and Jason Kelce being a big wife guy on equally full display, Padma Lakshmi and the way they were able to connect through a shared love of food, and kallmekris and the very specific way those two personalities and people bounce off each other and relate in a way that speaks to some of their shared experiences. 

Best of 2022: Books

Once again, I disappeared for months. Since last year’s best of posts to be precise. But these are still my favorite posts to write and my favorite to look back on for myself and so here we are again. It was a weird reading year for me, with lots of time away from reading when my brain couldn’t focus and a struggle to find things that caught my interest at the right times. Even in the weirdest years though, there will still be media that catches our interest and grabs hold of our hearts and those things are always going to be worth celebrating to me. This year’s Hugo nominations were particularly strong and the most I enjoyed reading all year so if you’re a sci-fi or fantasy fan, I’ve listed a few of my favorites below but I would strongly recommend checking them out as a whole. Working my way through the nominees is one of my favorite yearly traditions for the opportunity to try things I wouldn’t have necessarily picked up and discovering something new you love is really rewarding.

So here are my top 5 (which a robust Honorable Mention section) books of the year! This list is woefully short of romance recs so if that’s what you’re looking for, head over to Marvelous Geeks because Giss has you covered.

Be the Serpent by Seanan McGuire Of all of the worlds Seanan McGuire has created, October Daye is my heart. My door, if you will. Even more than Newsflesh, which solidified and clarified so much for me as a person. And what a stunning entry in a series this was. Brutal and heartbreaking but still so full of love and family and the hope for something different than has existed before. In the eyes of Faerie, Toby is so incredibly young. She hasn’t seen worlds fall and be rebuilt like her aunt. She’s human enough to know that there are more possibilities than millenia have given the Fae and to see the patterns that have repeated out of tradition and where they have so utterly failed. And she is determined to break them. To change her world for herself and her family. It’s a book that builds so surely from the groundwork laid over the past 15 books and lays the path moving forward and to wrangle both the emotional journey and the mythology so deftly in one book speaks to McGuire’s incredible skill and love for this world she’s created. 

Light From Uncommon Stars by Ryka Aoki I finished this book while I was stuck in an airport with a delayed flight after a very good vacation and nearly cried at the gate. There is a kindness to this book in a world that like ours, isn’t very kind to those it marks as different (specifically, trans teens of color and especially in the upper echelons of classical music). Despite needing her to fulfill her literal deal with the devil, Shizuka cares about Katrina because she takes the time to see her. She sees her connection with music that may not have been the cleanest or have the strongest technique, but there was a passion and a voice that shone through her playing. There was feeling and life instead of a technical checklist to master. She sees her for who she is and defends that and protects and nurtures that feeling. They both find family and community and that is the answer because that’s always the answer. That love and those ties give you more freedom and creativity, not less, and those are the tools needed to break free. 

Iron Widow by Xiran Jay Zhao I haven’t read a lot of mecha stories (or watched Pacific Rim, which I will get to and probably love at some point) so I wasn’t sure what to expect going into this story. Did I fully understand the world and the actual mechanics of these devices or how they are used in battle? No, I could explain nothing to you there. But I did I love how we saw the shape of the society that formed because they existed and were deemed necessary for protection through their use? Absolutely. There’s a lot in here that appeals to my sociology roots and how systems arise and support the things that the powerful decided are needed to keep the status quo intact and their power unthreatened. But on top of that, we got a love story that went in an unexpected direction and gave me an ending whose possibility excited me so much that I spoiled myself halfway through so I could believe it was actually happening. Love triangles serve their purpose, particularly in this area of YA, even if they’re not my favorite. Both of these boys have so much more depth than we initially think and watching Zeitan really see who they are (and also watching them see her anger and strength as something that brings them life and clarity instead of something to be feared) and watching them team up to form something incredibly powerful that is going to both save and change their world is incredible. All three of them are needed and all three of them want what the other two offer and that is my absolute favorite type of triad. It’s balance and stability and love and it was so refreshing to find when I wasn’t expecting it at all. 

Legendborn by Tracey Deonn Stories about loss are still hard for me. Even though the circumstances of Bree’s mother’s death couldn’t have been less similar, losing your mom is hard. And watching her be unmoored and driven for answers and some form of understanding so she wasn’t just left with the pain before finding comfort in her memory and life was the story I needed when I read this book. On top of that, this was a really cool urban fantasy story with a take on Merlin and his knights that was unlike any I had read and I loved it. Like Iron Widow, there’s some good commentary about how injustices are upheld under the cover of necessity instead of the reality of their construction. I love the two different approaches to magic and how that manifests itself in Bree and the power contained within her (and how threatening that power is to the whole Legendborn system bc I have a type when it comes to sci-fi and fantasy books and it is knocking down harmful and oppressive structures). It is such a solid and compelling debut and I’m looking forward to getting to book 2 and anything else Deonn writes in the future. 

Shake Things Up by Skye Kilaen After reading Tell Me Anything last year, I knew I was going to have to read more of Skye Kilaen’s books. I love being able to feel the love and care romance authors have for their characters and their story and that is once again, exactly what you find in Shake Things Up. First of all, where is my equivalent of Knockdown Cafe? I would like amazing baked goods in a casual and supportive queer space. Second, watching people fall for each other and become each other’s people never gets old. And watching Allie and Matt find Noelle and the way she fits so easily with them and the ways they all realize it at different moments and in different ways but are supported and cared for the whole way through was something so fun and special to experience. I loved Matt and his journey to figure out himself and what he wanted and I love the way Allie loved him so consistently once he was ready to share. I loved Allie finding someone who wasn’t Matt and couldn’t replicate that bond but could add to it and develop something equivalent and just as deep. I loved Noelle stepping off the very focused road she was on and finding somewhere she could do what called to her heart and be exactly who she was. I truly cannot recommend Kilaen’s books enough and I can’t wait to see which one (or ones) call to me for 2023.

Honorable Mentions: Paladin’s Grace by T. Kingfisher, A Prayer for the Crown Sky by Becky Chambers, Where the Drowned Girls Go by Seanan McGuire, A Master of Djinn by P. Djeli Clark, Christmas Inn Maine by Chelsea M. Cameron, Checking it Twice by Lucy Bexley, The Hookup Project by Farrah Rochon, Black Cake by Charmaine Wilkerson, Jesus and John Wayne by Kristin Kobes Du Mez

Best of 2021: Television

It was a weird TV year. There were long stretches of time in which I just didn’t consume any scripted content. Or that I only got to because I was watching them with a friend. But then there were things that grabbed hold of my heart and made things feel right and normal again for a while. So this is less a list of my favorites of the year and more a list of shows that made me want to talk about them for some reason. Sometimes it was a character, sometimes it was a premise, and sometimes it was because it was everything I wanted it to be and more.

If you’re looking for more year-end content broken up into categories, you’ll want to head over to Marvelous Geeks for some amazing recs and thoughts. And if you’re looking for a gorgeous essay on change and TV and what we needed (or specifically what Katie needed) this year, head over to Nerdy Girl Notes.

Leverage Redemption I needed this reboot/revival/return to be good. I love the original SO MUCH and desperately did not want to be let down. I trusted the creators but years of television have taught me that’s a dangerous thing. Thankfully, my faith wasn’t misplaced and I largely adored this season. My show came back, just as I would have wanted it. Not the exact same, it’s somehow less subtle now in its condemnation of the bad guys (and the real people they are based on) and it’s angrier because it’s 2021 and we’re all a little angrier about the ways in which we have been failed by so many systems. But the heart is the same. This family is the same. That drive to make the world just a little bit better is the same. It felt different without Hardison, in many ways, he is the glue that keeps everything together. But I love the explanation given for his absence and like the original did with Gina’s pregnancy, this version let Hardison grow as a character while giving Aldis Hodge the ability to keep his very busy schedule as his career skyrockets. But wow did I love the new additions to the cast. Our dear Mr. Wilson as the vehicle through which we explored the Jewish concept of redemption was a fantastic way to give shape to the season and he ended up being an incredibly endearing character on top of it. And then there is Breanna Casey. That fresh perspective she brings as a young woman who hasn’t known a different world breathes new energy into the show. Everyone else’s worse is her normal and her speech about that is the reason I will follow John Rogers as a creator wherever he goes. I am thrilled we are getting a second season to spend with these characters because I am not ready to say goodbye again. The only thing that could make it better is if they follow through on what they’ve written and make my beloved OT3 fully canon. It’s right there and while they are amazing now as they are, there is that potential for something even better and I want it.

Ted Lasso More than anything else on this list, I would have liked to rewatch this season before writing this like I normally would have. I think it would have benefited from a second watch in a binge format but I didn’t get to do it so instead I’m just going to talk about the things I loved the most instead of tying anything together nicely. I continue to be fully on board with Ted and Rebecca as a ship and want to yell about it all the time. If Leverage Redemption didn’t exist, they would be my #1 ship of the year. I love Rebecca being the one to consistently see through the walls Ted puts up (however positive they may look, they are still walls) and continuing her actions in Make Rebecca Great Again to show up and support him however she can. I love Ted being the person who knew exactly what to say to Rebecca at her father’s funeral and that he was the first to join in with her song. They understand each other and care for each other in ways that are simultaneously very quiet and very loud and I hope we get to watch them gravitate back toward each other next season as they get out of the dark forest. I love the redemption of Jamie Tartt alongside the fall of Nate Shelley. One blossomed under Ted’s style of leadership as soon as he let himself actually embrace what he stood for and one repeatedly pushed it aside because he couldn’t see past his own issues to believe in what he was demonstrating. And most of all, I love AFC Richmond as a club and as a family. Every scene of the players together in the locker room and the Christmas dinner at the Higgins’ house and the fact that every single person showed up for Rebecca at her father’s funeral (she’s not alone any more and I have entirely too many feelings about it) is what my found family loving heart needed from this season. It was dark and many characters were going through things and isolating themselves or shutting down communication when they needed it most. But it was never without hope or without love. 

The Expanse I will admit that I have not started the final season yet. But the back half of season 5 was more than strong enough for the show to make this list and it is primarily for one reason. Dominique Tipper gives one of the most extraordinary performances I have seen of determination and survival and intelligence and love in the season finale “Nemesis Games”. Naomi is an incredible character and Tipper does not get nearly enough credit for the absolutely incredible work she is doing and I will be mad about it forever. In addition, the reunion scene on the Roci is one of my favorites. They are a family and they may have lost someone but they are still strong and have each other. They are each other’s people and no amount of distance has shaken that and that’s the story I will always want from my science fiction (and television in general). I don’t want this story to end but I can’t wait to dive into the final episodes soon because I have faith that they will nail this ending. 

Best of 2021: Books

I kind of fell off the grid this year. I had two monthly recommendation posts and then life fell apart and I lost all interest in both consuming media of any sort or writing. A full October Daye re-read helped bring some of my love of reading back for a while but where I have had enough content for multiple book posts by genre in previous years, this year this is what I’ve got. Because I love books and I love recommending them to people in the hope that they might find something they need in one of them. It was a year of familiar reading to me. Three of these ten books were by a new-to-me author. Everything else was a return to authors I love. Because when everything else is a little too much, you need to put your hands in authors you trust and that’s exactly what I did. I hope you find something in this list that catches your attention and wish you happy reading in 2022!

Romance

Queen Move by Kennedy Ryan This was the first book I read this year and I couldn’t have picked a stronger start to a year of reading. The only word that comes to mind when I think about the book and how I felt reading it is “wow”. The writing is absolutely stunning in a way I don’t know fully how to talk about. It’s poetic and visceral and feels so effortless that you know a tremendous amount of skill has gone into creating it. I am not typically a fan of childhood friends turned lovers and am very picky with second chance romances but this one is both and Ryan sells it beautifully. You cannot help but love these two and this book uses flashbacks absolutely perfectly to help understand the depth of Kimba and Ezra as children and who they have become as adults. There is angst and you will feel a lot but it is handled with so much care and you always feel safe in Ryan’s hands. 

Act Your Age, Eve Brown by Talia Hibbert I love Talia Hibbert and this series in particular so it’s no surprise that the final Brown sisters book has ended up on this list. It’s grumpy/sunshine at its finest and very few authors are as good with characters as Hibbert. There is so much care and love that goes into them and it results in really fully-inhabited characters who come to life. I absolutely adored Eve and how big and bubbly she was in contrast to Jacob’s very orderly existence. The characters in a Hibbert story are always just allowed to be and that’s where the growth comes from. There is compassion and respect for who they are and where they are on their independent journeys and you see them learn how to best love each other and it is always immensely satisfying. I cannot recommend this trilogy enough and need it adapted for a Netflix series ASAP. 

Why You Should Watch Leverage (and Leverage: Redemption)

In less than a month, my most anticipated media of the year will be debuting on IMDB TV and I will get my beloved Leverage team back in my life with new content. It’s something I have not let myself think about too much because I will reach an unfunctional level of excitement and I am an adult with things that need to get done. I watched the original show at the start of 2017 and knew by the 2nd episode that I had found something that would stay with me forever and since then, have been very loud about my love for the show on both Twitter and Tumblr. This is a post that is four years in the making and now that the show will be getting a second life became something I needed to write so I can drag as many more people into this fandom with me as possible. 

So, starting extremely basic. Leverage is a heist show. It is a modern day Robin Hood-esque band of criminals who steal from the rich and powerful for the benefit of those they have harmed. That means we get 77 episodes (plus 16 new episodes this year!) of heist goodness along with the catharsis of seeing bad people suffer the consequences of their own greed and callousness. It is a glorious fantasy that has only continued to be more compelling as time goes on, especially as it becomes increasingly clear to anyone paying a modicum of attention that it normally doesn’t happen that way. 

It’s a show that understands the world it was created in but also says that we don’t have to accept it as it is. John Rogers, the creator and one of the two showrunners for the original, described it as “an uncynical show made by cynical people” and he’s not wrong. The targets and their crimes are all at least loosely based in reality, sometimes after being toned down because the actual crime was too unbelievable for television. As a result, there’s an anger that simmers under the surface of the show. It exposes our broken systems for what they are but never in a way that feels hopeless. It is a show about taking back power and doing what you can to make the world work a little closer to the way you want it to work. It is driven by the belief that change is necessary and the hope that it can be possible, even in small ways. 

It finds a really wonderful balance between a fun heist-of-the-week show (which would still have made it a solid show, this team of writers understands grifting and cons extremely well) and having something to say if you’re willing to look beyond what we’re taught this format should be. It loves the fact that it’s largely non-serialized and especially as the show goes on, revels in getting to play with format and structure. But what makes this show continue to stand out is that it understands that nothing matters if you don’t care about the characters. That they shouldn’t just exist to make the plot happen. That it should be them driving the story, not being wildly steered around at the whims of a story that doesn’t fit. 

Monthly Recommendations: February 2021

I’m going to be honest, this wasn’t a great month of media consumption for me. I had movies and TV shows I wanted to watch that just never happened. I am also in a reading slump and only got through one book this month and it was only alright for my personal tastes. So this is a little bit of a lean recommendation post but feel free to leave the things you enjoyed in the comments and send me some secondhand joy along with things to add to my list that maybe I can actually get through in March.

Show Title: The Expanse

Episodes: 56

Where to Watch: Amazon

I recommended this show in a post just like this two years ago but with two more seasons completed and a final one announced, it feels like time to bring it back. Even if it’s only so I can tell you that the fifth season of this show featured some of the strongest performances on television and I am going to be eternally frustrated if/when (listen, I am under no illusion that Emmy voters even know this show exists) Dominique Tipper isn’t given every possible acting award. I will admit to struggling a little with this season because I missed having the Roci fam together and have had enough bad experiences with sci-fi and fantasy shows that separate their characters only to never really put them back together again. But I shouldn’t have worried, this show knows where its emotional core lies and the good these people have done for each other. Even with my slight disappointment at the separation, it led to two phenomenal stories for my two favorite characters. We got to see Naomi stand tall and take pride in the woman she has become and in the knowledge that she made the right choice for herself. She owned her past and her truth in the hopes of reuniting with her son and when that wasn’t possible, she did what she needed to do to save herself and was brilliant and brave and driven by the love she has for the family she’s made for herself. We saw Amos revisit his past and realize just how far he’s come and how badly he needs his family to be the person he wants to be. We saw his loyalty and drive and love alongside the brutality he’s capable of and it was everything I could have wanted from him. For a show that is telling a much wider story, it never loses sight of its intimate character moments. It is deeply concerned with making its characters feel like fully formed people and making you understand their perspective, even when you disagree. It’s a style of storytelling I will always appreciate and I’m grateful to them for doing it so well. 

Monthly Recommendations: January 2021

I missed talking about the things I love on a regular basis, so these rec posts are back for 2021! The content in them may vary on what I’ve been doing for the past month but they’ll always be some combination of book, TV, movie, and music recs that have gotten my attention in the past month. But these aren’t just about me, I also want to know what things you’re currently loving and we can all share our interests and have even more fun with them.

Book Title: Queen Move

Author: Kennedy Ryan

Genre: Contemporary Romance

I’m pretty sure this book ended up on a lot of Best of 2020 lists and no matter how many it was on, it still wouldn’t be enough. This is one of the most gorgeously written romance books I have ever read. It’s my first by Kennedy Ryan and I was blown away at her poetic language and the yearning she infused in the whole story. It’s a childhood friends-to-lovers, second chance romance and the emotional grounding in these characters is the feature at every step of the way. We get Kimba and Ezra’s story from their first meeting when they were babies to their first kiss and separation to their reunion as adults and it is as magnetic for the reader as their bond is for them. You cannot help but invest in their story, the love between them is so special and rare that through everything that happens, there’s faith that it will survive because something like that can’t just disappear. I cannot recommend it enough and I will leave you with this gorgeous phrasing because it blew me away when I read it, “She was there for my scaffolding – there when my flesh was knit over my bones. And if love is not an emotion, but a type of eternity, an infinity that lives in our hearts, then we have always been in love.”

Best of 2020: Things That Made Me Happy

I think everyone can agree that this was a mess of a year. Cancelled plans of all forms, loneliness, and general frustration at the subset of people who refused to care about others made it a challenge in multiple ways. But even in the worst of times, there is always joy to be found. Sometimes that came in the form of Skype chats with friends, sometimes in the satisfaction of making or creating something that made you proud, and sometimes it was in YouTube binges. So to conclude the year, I thought I would share some of the things that made me the happiest or most fulfilled this year and offer up a whole lot of YouTube links to explore and enjoy.

Cooking

SortedFood I talked at length last year about how much I love this channel but this year I appreciated them even more. Like everyone else, they had to pivot and change their plans in March but through it all, they improvised and found a way to continue offering the same terrific content they always have on top of bonus features like a couple solid months of Instagram Lives that functioned as a way to hang out and watch them in a more casual setting. They made the first few months of lockdown easier by giving me a structure and something to look forward to daily and I am extremely grateful for it. They are dedicated to helping people fall in love with cooking and food in general, all while making us smile. Their passion is evident in everything they do and I can’t wait to see what they do in 2021.

Recommended videos: 2 Chefs Cook an Easter Feast, Ultimate Fusion Battle, one of their Pick the Premium series, a Restaurant Meal Kit review, a test of Vegan Fish and Chips, How to Roast a Chicken, and a Pretentious Ingredients Taste Test.

Mythical Kitchen This offshoot of Good Mythical Morning highlights the incredible talent and chaos of their cooking team and is ridiculous in the best possible way. It most often takes something prepackaged or fast food based and re-imagines it in some way and takes that process very seriously without ever veering into pretension or the need to act like they’re above the base food they’re working with. Everything on the show is done to their best ability but with a sense of playfulness and fun that is found in everything they do. It’s more than a little chaotic because Josh brings that out in people and Nicole and Trevor act both as perfect foils and facilitators of that chaos. It’s a source of silliness with a side of genuinely very good looking food and my 2020 would have been worse without it.

Recommended videos: Peanut Butter and Jelly Pizza recipe, Recreating Taco Bell’s Discontinued Volcano Taco, Food Fights: Hamburger Helper Hacks, Fancy Fast Food: Burger King Breakfast Sandwich, I Crashed Guy Fieri’s Party and It Changed My Life (which absolutely sounds like clickbait and it is not, it’s a really good story).

The Takeout If YouTube videos aren’t your thing and you’d rather just read an article, but still want the same sense of fun and genuine love of all things food, The Takeout is the website for you. From interesting deep dives into a local food or food celebration, to fast food taste tests, fantasy food drafts, general food news, and a whole of delicious sounding recipes that I will one day try, it’s a website for people who love food and want to talk about it with others. Its comment sections are usually wonderful and made up of people sharing food stories and recipes. It is a daily read for me with excellent staff members and guest writers that I highly recommend if it’s something you’re at all interested in.

Recommended posts: Hardee’s BFC Angus Thickburger review (or really, any of Allison Robicelli’s taste tests), the Hibernation Holiday series, Miso Butter Spaghetti Carbonara, Peanut Butter Milk, Fantasy Food Draft: Best Ballpark Food, When Finding the Tastes of Home Requires A Roadtrip, The Worst Meals I’ve Cooked This Year (So Far), Ice Cream For Dinner Night

Best of 2020: Romance Novels

Like so many others, romance novels helped get me through this terrible year. The comfort in a promised happily ever after and stories that are extremely character-focused were something I could handle when my ability to follow complex plots was limited. Stories about healing and thriving after hardship were a reminder that better days were to come and that the future is worth fighting for. The kindness extended these characters at their lowest and the belief that they deserved happiness reminded me to extend that same kindness to myself when I was struggling. Romance was here to make me smile, to make my cry, and to make me forget everything else, if only for a little while, and live in the joy of these characters and the many I couldn’t include in this list.

But more than the books itself, it was the community that meant the most. It was a rocky start to the year as RWA continued its very public implosion but it also brought me a whole lot of new authors to follow on Twitter (which in turn brought me more recommendations and even more happiness). Their discussions on Romancelandia and where they would like to see it go in the future, feelings and analysis of current events, and their general no-nonsense attitude when it comes to dealing with outdated, often sexist, attempts to devalue the work they do educated me, made me think, and gave me hope when I needed it most.

Then the Fated Mates phonebanking and Romancing the Runoff happened and I really got to see the power of community. Out of a shared interest in stories, people joined together to turn that love into action and it was inspiring to watch. As of December 17th, Romancing the Runoff raised almost half a million dollars in a month and a half for voting rights organizations in Georgia and Fated Mates have made hundreds of thousands of phone calls and organized postcard drives for both the national election and the Georgia runoff. The enthusiasm and drive was infectious and did so much to make a never ending election feel a little more survivable. I couldn’t be prouder to be a part of this corner of this community and what they have chosen to stand for.

1. Xeni by Rebekah Weatherspoon I am pretty sure that Rebekah Weatherspoon is my most read author of the year at 8 books and this was my very favorite of hers. As with all of her books, there is a grace and compassion that she extends toward her protagonists that gets me every time and then couples that with supportive friendships and truly some of the best sex scenes in the genre. I loved Xeni as a character from the little bit we got of her in Rafe and loved this particular story for her. It is a contemporary marriage of convenience plot with two bisexual leads, a whole lot of family secrets and baggage, and an incredibly sweet love story. It was a connection they never expected when they started the project (though there’s never any real animosity or bickering as they figured out their arrangement) and they were both able to find comfort and security in the other. They are both such good, kind, loyal people that you root for their happiness individually and with each other. Her books, especially her Loose Ends series, which are very connected with the Fit and Beards and Bondage trilogies, are some of the emotionally fulfilling romances I’ve read and I love their emphasis on healing and community. This book may be my favorite but really, this is just a plea for you to check out Weatherspoon’s work in general because she deserves to be a huge success. (Add to Goodreads)

2. The Boyfriend Project by Farrah Rochon How do you not immediately love a book where three women realize their boyfriend is cheating on them with the others and instantly decide they’re going to be friends from there forward? I am in love with all three of these women and the easy friendship they struck up, it is probably my favorite trilogy setup in a very long time. This is Samiah’s story and first of all, I love that she is a Black woman developing an app that I would very much like to use. We do not talk about women in the tech world enough and that is especially true for Black women and other women of color so I appreciated that we got this look in what that means in her work life. Romance novels in general have been terrific at exploring lived experiences like this and not shying away from both the difficulties and the joys and it really brings them to life. Second, few things are more enjoyable to read than inconvenient romances. Love doesn’t always come on a timeframe and that is exactly what Samiah and Daniel found in each other. There were reasons that they should have started anything but the chemistry and attraction was undeniable and they took a chance that (of course) ultimately paid off. Sometimes we have to let our feelings take us where they will instead of shove them away and take joy when it comes and I loved watching Samiah do just that.  (Add to Goodreads)

3. Take A Hint, Dani Brown by Talia Hibbert This was one of my most anticipated books of 2020 after loving Get A Life, Chloe Brown last year and it did not disappoint. I love a determined heroine who insists she doesn’t have time (or the emotional capacity) for romance and a hero with a soft heart. Throw in some fake dating and I am all the way in. But one of my favorite things about this trilogy so far (and Hibbert as an author in general) is the weight she gives to the mental health of her characters. Zaf has anxiety, including an on page panic attack, and it’s never treated as anything that makes him less desirable as a person. Dani has some issues to work through with feeling like her personality and way of approaching the world makes her fundamentally incompatible with romance and they both start to work through and address those issues. They’re never things keeping them from being together, just things to work on and with to be the best versions of themselves. It is full of compassion for these two characters at every stage of their journeys and celebrates holding the things that bring us joy and fulfillment close, which was a message we all needed this year. (Add to Goodreads)

4. Boyfriend Material by Alexis Hall If you haven’t had enough fake dating, don’t worry because this book also has you covered. Luc is the son of a rockstar and enough of a mess that he’s a tabloid staple. Oliver is the son who will never live up to his parents’ expectations but he’s going to try his hardest anyway and shut out anything that might mess up that image of himself. So naturally, when Luc needs a boyfriend to convince his nonprofit’s stuffy donors to continue to support them, his friend Bridget recommends Oliver. They are both a pile of unaddressed issues and coping mechanisms disguised as reasonably functioning adults and in addition to seeing them learn to fit together, we get to see them start to heal and move past their traumas. It gets heavy in moments but never overwhelming as it all takes place alongside Luc’s absolutely ridiculous coworkers and his fantastic group of friends who have the best group chat names. Luc’s world feels real and lived in and it’s truly wonderful to see Oliver find his place in it. (Add to Goodreads)

Best of 2020: Sci-Fi and Fantasy Books

I say this every year and it continues to be true so it’s worth saying again – these two genres are producing so much amazing content right now that it is hard to keep up with it all. But when with as many of them I read this year, there are so many more that generated a lot of enthusiasm that I couldn’t fit in and that is truly an exciting place to be as a reader. I love the variety of stories being told and all the ways these authors and more are expanding the ideas of what these genres can be and who these stories are about and for. These were some of the books that moved and excited me the most this past year, regardless of genre, with many favorite authors and some that I got to discover for the first time this year.

1. The House in the Cerulean Sea by TJ Klune This was my favorite book of 2020. It is beautifully kind and has the most precious found family full of slightly unusual children that deserve all of the love in the world. It’s a fantasy take on a “very regimented main character learns that sometimes a little chaos makes for a happier life” story but mostly it’s about finding your place and your people where you’re allowed to be exactly what you are and so you become a better, fuller version of yourself. Arthur is truly the best adoptive father to his house full of children that no one else would care for and seeing how all of these children blossom throughout the story is heartwarming, as is Linus’s growing love and protectiveness toward them. They may have started as an assignment but they became his and learning to reconcile that with the life he thought he was supposed to have, where he never knew that colors like cerulean could exist and be a part of your life, is the most satisfying emotional journey. It’s a story of good people finding happiness and it was the story I and so many others needed this year. (Add to Goodreads)

2. The City We Became by NK Jemisin I was always going to love this book. It’s by an author I love and it has an amazing premise (5 New Yorkers band together to protect their city from an ancient evil). But even going in with high hopes, it moved me in a way I wasn’t fully prepared for because of when I read it. Fiction is never divorced from our world, it is created from what is and what could be and what ifs. But to read a story of these people fighting for the soul of their city, explicitly against a villain that foments hate and distrust in others, while pausing to browse Twitter and see New York (along with cities across the county) turning out in huge numbers to say that Black Lives Matter and to demand a better, more just world, was an incredibly powerful experience. It is a love letter to New York and the diversity of its residents and neighborhoods and the way they stand together. It’s a world that is simultaneously ours and not ours and that makes the anger and sharpness of the rebukes more straightforward than the sentiments in Jemisin’s Broken Earth trilogy (which is also a gorgeous, searing read) but it does the same thing for the hope. It is a book that explicitly says “the world might be awful, but we don’t have to like it that way” and tells us to want and fight for better. It’s a tremendous start to what is sure to be another outstanding trilogy and I cannot wait for more. (Add to Goodreads)

3. A Killing Frost by Seanan McGuire No piece of media I consumed this year gave me as much excitement or happiness as this book. It is the 14th book in the October Daye series and I don’t understand how this series keeps getting bigger and deeper while still feeling so small and character-driven. It’s a book with gigantic plot implications that immediately set my theorizing brain (and that of the wonderful fandom on Discord) going in all sorts of fun ways but it also features one of McGuire’s favorite things to write about and that is the idea of finding your way home. Over the course of the book, it’s a description that could apply to three different characters and each time, it made me very emotional. Home is the place you fit, where there are people who love you. Whether that is a daughter, a squire, a fiance, an aunt, the man you once loved and his wife, or any of the other complicated string of relationships that make up this wonderful universe, it is finding those people and holding on to them. It gave a character I adore the happiest ending (or maybe just a new beginning) that could ever exist for him, in a way I was so utterly unprepared for and that still fills me with indescribable joy, and expanded (or just made official) Toby’s ever-expanding family and was the brightest spot during a difficult time. I am so grateful for this book and this series and the way it continues to mean a little more to me with every passing year. (Add to Goodreads)

4.The Relentless Moon by Mary Robinette Kowal I absolutely love this alternate history of the space race and attempts to move significant portions of Earth’s population to space after a natural disaster. I think the worldbuilding is fascinating and with this book, we get to see a different aspect of it after the first two books spent with Elma navigating the space program as the first Lady Astronaut. Nicole is a politician’s wife as well as an accomplished pilot with space experience and watching her navigate those two warring identities would have been fascinating enough for a whole book. But then it threw in a compelling mystery with sabotage and betrayal and I couldn’t put it down. I love stories about politically savvy women who are all about image management. They know who they are expected to be and use that to their fullest advantage. I find them utterly fascinating and Nicole is such a good example. She gets to be what others expect her to be on the surface and full of depth below that she is only able to show to a few trusted friends. She’s calculating and brutal and will do it all with a smile and heels and it’s a thing of beauty to witness. It pushes things forward in a very interesting way and leaves you completely satisfied before we return to Elma’s journey to Mars in book 4. (Add to Goodreads)