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It’s been over three years since ChatGPT started the revolution of AI. As a curious person I’ve been looking at that for quite some time, but I still remember the first time I realized how we got here and what the impact was. If you know me you know I’ve always been reluctant with AI, what some would call a hater, although that’s far from reality. I loved the idea of AI, just not the timeline we live in.
This essay gathers my personal thoughts on the matter. Something I’ve been pondering for a long time. It will start with quite a lot of doom, but hopefully gets better by the later sections.
People see ChatGPT replying to them and think it’s AGI (artificial general intelligence). But if you know how the tech works you realize it’s just old tech but with tons of data and power thrown at it. It’s just a probability machine: a bunch of matrices doing expensive math.
It’s like the glorified autocomplete, although we have to admit that the “glorified” word is doing A LOT in that sentence. It’s autocomplete with an end goal and semantic knowledge, trying to follow a reasonable direction.
When I visualize the internals of an LLM as a huge multidimensional space with words and vectors, the engineer in me smiles. It’s actually pretty amazing that with math we can represent a vector that goes from man to woman, and if you apply it to king it gives back queen. This is the dumbest example and probably not something people are hyped about, but this sort of thing is the one that made me excited about AI tech.
But none of this was what surprised me in the past years, what surprised me is how dumb this whole tech is. It’s not smart, it’s not thinking, it doesn’t have knowledge or experience. It’s just an autocomplete.
And that was enough.
For me, that was the most surprising thing, the fact that something so simple in the basics, turned out to be enough to replicate humans in more ways than we could imagine. And yet that was not enough of a surprise, because the cherry on top is how realizing this, made me question my own beliefs.
Look, I’m not a philosopher, but I was top of the class in high school philosophy and I’ve always been curious and learned things along the way. It also helps my best friend is actually a philosopher. And yet, it’s not something I spend too much time thinking about, but when I do, I’ve always had the feeling that there was nothing special about humans. It’s probably my engineer background, but I’ve always thought that we are just emergent behavior. A powerful concept that I believed could explain everything.
And yet, here I was, seeing how a bunch of matrices behaved like humans and I started thinking if maybe we had something else they didn’t. We must, right?
But fear of AGI is not at all what made me dislike AI. Once I got past the technical awe, the real discomfort wasn’t intelligence, it was how it was built.
Let’s go back to how these things got here. With data. A. LOT. OF. DATA. To get the current models where they are nowadays, they’ve had to be trained on vast amounts of human text. For all intents and purposes, they have been trained on the entirety of human knowledge, imagine, the entire internet, plus everything written on paper. And here is where one of my biggest gripes with this technology is. It wouldn’t exist if it wasn’t because a few privileged decided to ignore all laws and morality and steal all of it without giving anything back to the authors. We’re talking about terabytes of books, uncountable images, songs, movies… anything that a human has created was up for grabs for these progressive thieves.
And the fact that the top few can get away with this without real consequences, while somebody goes to jail for downloading a bad movie is insane, but is the world we live in.
People will try to defend the morality of this, and to that I call it bullshit. We all want progress, we all love the ideal future that AI promises. But let’s not be hypocrites here, we’re building this future by stealing from millions and enslaving others.
Look, AI was not the problem, it just exacerbated it. It’s been clear for years that this late capitalism we live in doesn’t work. I mean, it’s the best thing we have, just like democracy, but the systems are falling apart. While a few billionaires keep getting richer, the rest of the world is in a place that we shouldn’t be in 2026. Guys, look around the current world, we’re killing Earth, letting rich people destroy democracies, and we keep dealing with wars to fuel the ego of others. And then realize it’s 2026. These things shouldn’t happen two decades into the 21st. It could have been solved. What are we doing?
Well it’s just how the system works. For some to win others have to lose. I don’t believe that’s reality, but that’s what humans desire.
Enter AI, with all its promises and the impact that will have. Jobs will be lost, not changed. This is not impacting a specific role, or sector. This is changing everything. The industrial revolution will be nothing compared to this. And jobs won’t “evolve”, they will disappear. But not for free. Business will now have to pay the billionaires instead of the hard workers. Because after all the stealing, this is not something that is given back to society, this is kept in the pockets of the privileged ones.
I can’t believe that the ones actually giving back to society are the Chinese, releasing open models while the Americans keep pretending they are the saviors and convincing politics to let them mess with the world as they desire. What a world we live in!
And people that think jobs won’t disappear, I hope you are right. I’ve heard many versions of this.
“Arts won’t ever die cause humans like human art.” Yes, sure, the Banksys will survive this. But how many of those do we have, and how many can sustain themselves? Because for every master there are millions trying to survive with their art. And if that was already difficult, what do you think is gonna happen? And no, this is not like the revolutions of photography, cinema or even Photoshop. They could be, but corporate greed will make sure it’s not the case.
“Chess was solved by AI years ago, and now chess is more popular than ever before.” This is the worst take ever, because how many chess players do it for a living? Again, we’re not talking about hobbies disappearing, we’re talking about ways of surviving disappearing.
And what happens when the youngsters growing up accept that watching a game of FIFA, machine vs. machine, is equally exciting as watching real players? Or a race in the F1 videogame? I’ve been thinking this for years, even before the current AI generation, back when football videogame graphics and audio commentary were already getting hard to distinguish from a broadcast. Imagine now, or in a few years, with the current pace of AI advancements. And have you seen the recent robots with an agility and human movement that surpasses the best gymnasts? Not even sports are safe.
But that’s only the economic end of it. The social end is what happens to privacy when a few companies own the interface to everything.
And the other consequence of these AIs being owned by a few is that if you want to participate in society you will have to not only pay those folks, but also give them all your information. This has already been a trend for years, but again, AI just turns it to the max. We’re already seeing people give all their bank accounts, all their medical records and therapy conversations to these companies. And the only thing they say is in a small letter saying they won’t train on it and don’t store it. Something that nobody can confirm, and a line that can be removed easily in any update.
And with all of this in mind, already years ago, I realized that was it. Pandora’s box was opened. As soon as there was proof that LLM capabilities were possible, nothing else mattered. People asking to slow progress, do a hard restart to respect morality and laws, how this won’t be such a big deal… all illusions and impossibilities. Pandora’s box was opened. Nothing would have ever been the same. It was just a question of time.
And that was before 2025, when things really changed.
I won’t pretend all this darkness went away. The theft, the inequality, the privacy decline… they remain real and unresolved. But something else happened too that we can’t deny. The technology crossed a tipping point. It got better, much better. Not just incrementally, but in ways that forced me to stop just watching from the sidelines and actually engage publicly with what this means for my work, my writing, and my future. What follows are the written thoughts of that reckoning.
During those beginning times I struggled with the internal fight of hating the world AI was being born into, and the excitement of progress. Of course, the constant conversation and everybody trying to fit AI everywhere ultimately burned the excitement for many. But deep down it was still there.
The psychology of having to resist the impending progress was not the problem. The problem was rejecting something I knew could be used for good, because it was tainted from the start. And that’s why from time to time I felt like shit for using ChatGPT and Claude to help me fix typos in a couple of my posts, or to criticize my writing. I refused to use them for anything more, because the hypocrisy it would imply, but it was hard to deny that it was a powerful tool that could be used for good.
It was a time for play. Things were not that good yet, sure we could pay private companies to generate images and illustrations, instead of paying humans to do it, and it had some sort of fun. The fun you have when playing with a new toy. But besides using it to show your friends, there was not much value in it. And yet, I could see my own shame growing as I felt how I was betraying my fellow humans just for playing with it.
When the future we all dreamed, where machines would do the hard jobs and humans could live a better life, was turned upside down. We had machines doing the fun and creative works, and humans still breaking their backs with manual labor. Who had that in their century bingo card?
But the worst was yet to happen. I could see artists, writers, all fighting back. It was just a posture to show the world that things mattered. Of course it wouldn’t change anything, individuals have little power in today’s world. But at least the feeling that things were not okay was there.
And then, the agentic revolution started. And programmers were the first ones to praise this new overlord. This is something I never understood. How could they all be building the path for their own demise?
Before we get to 2025, one quick detour into my own frustrations with the industry, because it explains why AI felt like it fit so easily.
Software has been in decline for years, even before AI. In a world ruled by corporate greed, where quality doesn’t matter, it’s just a question of time before things turn for the worse. And I think it happened in three ways.
First, mediocrity became the norm. AI can take over very easily in a world where the job is already “copy paste from Stack Overflow and ship.” And that was praised. The industry even started pushing back on being able to ask certain things in interviews. We were forced to disregard the experience and quality of people, just because we needed more people typing letters on the screen. These might sound like harsh words, but it’s the reality that all of us in the industry know, and we tried not to talk about. Because you don’t need hundreds of developers to make a product. And the proof is how many of these businesses create unrelated and unnecessary things. Time was free, until it wasn’t.
Second, output mattered more than craft, because capitalism was the driver of everything. Look, we’re not stupid here. Everything is a business. We all need to put food on our tables and buy those yachts. But when that is the only goal, instead of the consequence of doing a good job, it’s a question of time before things go sideways. The lack of care, and quality reached incredible lows. I recently saw a video of Microsoft Word opening on an old Pentium and it took less than a second. I still remember when macOS apps opened and the icon in the dock didn’t even bounce once. Or when loading a website was instant when we got ADSL. Now people are happy if anything takes 10s. Insanity. But as long as the bottom line is fine, we accept it.
Third, knowledge and control stopped mattering. And this is the worst. Very few care about really understanding how things work, or having control of the thing they are building. Their tools, their frameworks, whatever it is. We’ve just accepted that not knowing is fine.
So all of the above were things that were happening before AI, in a world where software was in decline. When AI arrived, it was the perfect storm.
And yet, since it’s here to stay, and is clearly the future, you better accept it. At some point it stopped being a question of if, and became a question of when — and the when was now.
2025 saw more evolution in AI than even before. That’s when I had to take a personal decision and just accept Pandora’s box was here. Luckily, I’ve always been looking from the side, so when I decided to get into AI it didn’t take me long to catch up. After all, my brain has certain facility for this sort of thing, that I wish I had for other real life stuff :D
During 2025 new AI models became actually really good, not only at simulating human text, but also at interacting with external systems. In my mind, this is what happened:
With this, AI left the chat interface. The chat box is just a UI. The real thing is when the model lives inside your workflow: your editor, your terminal, your files, your browser. AI isn’t useful stuck in a chat, it’s useful as part of your computing life.
This is when it was clear that programming was done.
So I’ve been seriously using AI for a few months now, more seriously in the last couple. And I’m still grasping the impact of reality. It’s still frustrating that I can only do this thanks to employers riding the hype and providing AIs for free for work. For personal stuff I’m paying the lowest tier available and thinking about it as paying for a learning course. But let’s not forget some people can’t afford it.
AI now can write full applications on its own.
Are they good? No. Does anybody care? No.
But remember, it’s all a bubble. So we keep hearing how people are letting AI write 100% of the code. And then we see Windows being broken in a thousand new innovative ways. And it’s not just memes. Executives are saying it out loud. Firing thousands of people, saying “I need less heads” just to hire them again later.
Even the AI labs are doing it. The head of Anthropic’s Claude Code said he hasn’t written code by hand in months, and that Claude Code writes most of Claude Code. And OpenAI engineers have said similar things about their own day-to-day coding too. And I believe them, because the tools they are releasing are the worst apps I’ve seen. I’ve never seen my M4 MacBook Pro suffer so much just by having their apps open doing nothing. But again, it doesn’t matter.
Today, AI is not as good as me. That’s the truth. I don’t think it’s even faster when you think about all the wasted time. But that doesn’t matter anymore. Because in a few weeks, months, or years in the worst case, it will. Because AI can do a thousand tasks at a time while I can only do one, or half if I keep being interrupted with meetings.
And in practice, it’s messy. You ask for a tiny fix and it adds three new files. You push back and it rewrites half the module, always saying “yes, you are right.” It keeps adding code and abstractions when a couple of precise incisions would cure the patient. You ask for a test and it papers over the symptom instead of the cause. It’s great at a level that would have been unimaginable just a few months ago, but it gets brittle fast the bigger the codebase gets.
So what is the future? I don’t know, but I do have a hope. A hope for people to realize that you don’t go from a prompt to something decent. That you still need an engineer, with experience and a clear goal, to guide the AI to do the actual work. Because otherwise, the AI will surely do something, but it might have spent your monthly budget for nothing useful.
Are these just illusions and hopes? Maybe. I still want to have a job after all. But it’s also the reality after having worked with it. Is it good? Yes. But it needs somebody that knows what they’re doing. Without it the AI is just a machine that vomits words. And guess what’s the goal of good software engineering? Reducing complexity. AI is not doing that, at all, at least not now. This might make good programmers even better, and mediocre developers disappear.
But the reality is that all the magic wins that the bubble keeps announcing, are mostly made up. Not all of them. It’s true that people are doing more than before, people have multiple agents coding and shipping. And that’s only doable by not caring about the output. Because the solution to AI’s problems is just more AI. But the ones to learn from are those that do the same, and still care. Still make sure things work and are safe, maybe they do it themselves, or maybe they run other AIs to do it, or have a proper testing infrastructure in place, whatever it is, if you still care, thank you.
But there are two categories where I find that AI excels, and there is no denying that it has already changed many things in my day to day.
First is everything that doesn’t matter. All those random scripts, all those tasks that are useless, all those ideas that you wanted to prototype but didn’t have the time or energy. Just let AI burn the atmosphere for a while and see what comes out. You probably will use it once and forget, or trash it and start over. Who cares! (the planet does, but it’s fine, it will be a problem for our kids). This has already allowed me to clean up a backlog of personal tasks that I’ve wanted to do for a long time and that I never thought I would get to. Some of these things are now cheap to try.
And the second aspect that is related to the first one, a specific case of it, is anything that has to do with manipulating your computer. This is actually where I’ve found AI more useful. I still find that for coding it’s still a couple of models away from satisfying me personally, but for this it’s already a game changer. Configuring your zsh, managing the AI agents setup themselves, fixing or working on home servers, etc. There are so many things that it can do once it lives in your machine that are not really related to making a product. This is actually my recommendation for where to start, it’s a game changer. And it’s such a game changer that even Anthropic is now, months after, including this sort of functionality on their consumer app.
What is also very curious is how I don’t think that even the bubble realizes the impact of this. Because if everybody can have a piece of software that they need, for their specific task and taste, just by asking for it. Who do you think is gonna pay all these SaaS that you are all pumping out? Yes, exactly. Nobody will. And if your argument is that there will still be a need, well, then the bubble is lying. You can’t have your cake and eat it too. So in the end we’re going back to the main issue, the money will only go to the billionaires that own these models. And if nobody gets paid, nobody spends money. Checkmate.
Just to leave the programming aspect aside, this is the reality. We could argue if it makes any sense where we are going, but we can’t argue that we aren’t going there. So my recommendation is that you start getting on the bandwagon for learning how to use these tools. Become as effective with them as you are with your framework of choice. But still be an engineer, be curious, learn what the AI is doing, understand it. Don’t lose yourself. But with that done, go ahead and ship a thousand projects that you could have never done before!
And, as I always preach, self-reflect, don’t be an automaton. AI is clearly making people lazier and dumber, I’ve already seen it happen. This technology has something that makes our human brains tickle. The dopamine of having impressive outputs just by writing a sentence is undeniable. We like quick rewards, and AI coding is like TikTok for developers. Don’t let it rot your brain. Be one of the few that actually still has curiosity and desire to learn and grow as a human. If you do, AI is an amazing tool that will facilitate your learning and growth. Use it for good.
And if code was my professional dilemma, writing was the personal one.
But then, a huge part of my life is also writing. Sure, it’s just a hobby so I’m less concerned with it than programming, but I still care and I empathize with my fellow authors that I admire so much. Let’s leave aside how they’ve been stolen, and let’s focus on how AI impacts myself.
In the beginning I tried it and saw that it could write something, but it was not good. But it could point out a few things that helped me learn how to write better. I still want control and ownership, so I always have the last decisions and the words are my own, but it was clear it could help in the learning process.
Nowadays, with a full agentic setup, the questions come again. How helpful can it be? Because the limitations are almost gone. So it’s all about using it for the good. We need to ignore the hypocrisy of how AI was born, as I said, not much we can do at this point as much as it pains me. But what is that? I still want every single word to be mine. I don’t mind it fixing typos, because we’ve done that with automated classical tools for years. But I don’t want it writing or even rewriting.
But I worry, how long is that gonna last? I do feel it inside me. I still love authorship, and the whole point for me is to express myself and use my words, as I’ve been doing for 3500 words of this essay. But I’m afraid if those feelings change at some point, if the value of utility of helping me put my thoughts in text grows exponentially, I don’t know what will happen.
And I hate it, and hate myself for it.
The reason I can feel the pressure on writing is because music has made me confront an uncomfortable truth: I’m a hypocrite.
I can’t judge music in the same way, I’m not a musician or have ever had music as a creative output, but my point is that I’ve reflected myself and I see how I do care a lot about programming, writing, visual arts… and I would never accept something without a human behind. But then for programming the industry is pressuring me to actually change that.
But then we have music. I listen to music a lot. It helps me focus and enjoy myself. But since I was a teen I noticed how I didn’t care about the artist behind. Sure, I loved their music, and I knew who the artists were, so I got excited when they did something cool, or sad if the band changed a member. But I’ve never been a fanboy of the bands. It was the same for authors by the way, but that has actually changed over time, although not as much as others, I feel like I can enjoy the art even if I despise the artist.
And I’m not sure if it’s that, or something else, but I’ve found myself realizing that I wouldn’t care to be in a future where all the music I listen to is AI generated. And that realization scared me. I really don’t want the promised future in Black Mirror where we open the TV and we get real-time AI-generated movies just for us. That sounds disgusting. But for music? I don’t know why but I don’t care. I’ve spent some time generating my own songs, giving it lyrics I wrote myself inspired by my own fantasy stories, and the output… is literally the kind of music I listen to so I don’t see a difference.
I don’t feel a difference.
And now I realize this must be how 90% of society feels with everything else, from art to books, to movies. If I, as a person who cares deeply about authorship, can’t be concerned with fully AI created music, why would others care about AI art, AI books, AI anything? That’s the terrifying part. Not that I might accept AI music. But that I now understand why everyone else will accept everything else.
Is this what society is gonna devolve into? I don’t know, but I can’t deny my own feelings.
So is this a bubble? Yes.
Will it explode? I don’t think so.
I’m far from an expert, but my feeling is that when we think about economy bubbles we keep thinking about how they were in the past. But looking at this one, where there is a self-fueling cycle of made up money, but kept in the hands of the very powerful that are already very rich, I don’t see how the bubble breaks.
Even if things don’t go as they are promising, it doesn’t matter. They already have the deals, they have the hardware, they have the control, and they have the politicians. Sure, maybe some cryptobros cry about it, maybe the bubble is not visible in the sky anymore… but it won’t explode. It will just fade under the vast ocean of wealth that you can’t even imagine.
This is a funny one, because it all depends on your definition of AGI. I don’t think we’re even close to AGI. But I do think we’ll reach a point where the label stops mattering, because it will feel like it. As I said, back when the first versions of ChatGPT came out, I was surprised by how such a simple technology was enough to replicate human behavior. I think the same will happen again, but this time with what will feel like AGI: a few improvements, maybe a bit better models, and suddenly the debate becomes just semantic masturbation.
Just look at things like the Claude constitution, and have a conversation with Opus. Sure, it’s still just matrices doing expensive math, but then… those things that we still don’t fully understand start to feel like something more.
Given everything I’ve said so far, it’s not that difficult to imagine what my ideal future for this would look like. If I was in charge of designing the future with pervasive AI, I would do it like this.
I know I’m leaving a bunch of things out, as this just refelcts my current state of mind. But at least that’s the minimum bar for my ideal AI future.
But that’s not the world we have. So here’s where I am right now.
I don’t know why I felt like I had to write this (this is what an AI would also say lol), but it came from deep down.
I’m not an AI hater anymore. I’m not an AI-crypto-bro either. But the reality has changed in the past few months, and denying it won’t help me.
So don’t be surprised if the day I come back with tech articles or videos, they are about AI.
As per my writing, as I said, that will still be me. Maybe it’s a mistake and society will embrace AI books. But I still want to express myself and put MY thoughts on paper. I’m probably okay with fixing typos and critiques so I learn and improve. Time will tell how wrong this is.
This essay starts with doom, and a lot of that doom stays. But I’m done pretending I can sit this out. I’m choosing to engage anyway and enjoy it along the way.
", "date_published" : "2026-02-02T23:00:00Z", "id" : "https://alejandromp.com/personal/blog/accepting-pandora-s-box", "summary" : "It’s been over three years since ChatGPT started the revolution of AI. As a curious person I’ve been looking at that for quite some time, but I still remember the first time I realized how we got here and what the impact was. If you know me you know I’ve always been reluctant with AI, what some would call a hater, although that’s far from reality. I loved the idea of AI, just not the timeline we live in.", "tags" : [ "Life", "Writing", "Software" ], "title" : "Accepting Pandora's Box", "url" : "https://alejandromp.com/personal/blog/accepting-pandora-s-box" }, { "authors" : [ { "name" : "Alejandro M. P." } ], "content_html" : "Looking back at 2025, reading kept surprising me. I wandered into new territories, like John Cleaver, tabletop RPG handbooks, and yeah, more Cosmere (because how could I not?).
23 books, 6,949 pages, not too shabby. Average about 302 pages per book, pulled down by shorter RPG supplements and pushed up by longer ones like Jade Legacy (713 pages). You can see my Goodreads Year in Books for more.
Average rating: 3.7/5. Lower than past years, but not because I’ve read worse books, but because I pushed myself to step outside my comfort zone.
Quick stats:
Light spoilers ahead (I keep endings vague).
This year I leaned into discomfort: horror that feels plausibly close to home, a family saga that unfolds over decades, and formats that reshape familiar stories. Between GraphicAudio dramatizations and RPG lore, “reading” stretched past prose, and the surprises, especially John Cleaver, reminded me why experimenting pays off.
My explorations outside my comfort zone started early in the year, with a therapist’s recommendation that reframed how I read the rest of the year.
I rarely read non‑fiction, but it aligned with questions I’d been circling for a while, so I took a chance and it helped me articulate a few things I only sensed before. Two ideas in particular stuck: naming boundaries as acts of care (for self and others), and noticing how small habits shape patterns over time. Neither is novel on its own, but the book gave them workable language; I found myself applying its framing to how I choose what to read and how I spend attention. It’s the kind of perspective shift that doesn’t end at the last page.
That inward lens made me hungrier for stories that complicate heroes and power, which is exactly where Mysteries of the Material hooked me. Mysteries of the Material is book two in the Way of the Wilder series. I read the first book in December last year and liked it so much that I picked up this one at the start of this year. The series is a favorite already, and I’m glad I found this author.
This second book is another great ride with these characters and their intricate world. The series keeps revealing its rules bit by bit and avoids the easy ‘power = villain’ shortcut. I love Kizune, especially their attention to ordinary people, and I’m dying to know more about their history and world. The ending lands like a blow, earned, unsettling, and hard to shake.
Even if on the surface you might think the magic is just another elemental system, there’s more at play in how the worldbuilding unfolds and what it asks of the characters. And let’s be honest, I have a soft spot for elemental systems. I’m eager to read book 3 as soon as I can in 2026.
From intimate, character‑first fantasy, I swung toward a sprawling family saga to see how time reshapes power and loyalty.
I picked this up to catch up with a much‑praised series, I kept seeing it on YouTube, and even Sanderson mentioned it, so I decided to go for it. I liked it; it’s very well executed, and the intrigue is genuinely engaging, especially the family dynamics.
What I didn’t love as much, likely a matter of taste, was the density of the family drama. Structurally, the multi‑POV focus and political‑intrigue pacing keep the pressure high, but sometimes I wanted a pause to step back and take stock, to see what those moves meant for the themes and relationships. And of course, I wanted more magic. Don’t get me wrong, it was cool and basing the power in such a specific and scarce material has huge implications, but… I wanted more magic.
That said, the generational sweep is a standout. The fact that the series happened through such a long time period, let us see this generation almost end‑to‑end, how it starts, how it ends, and what it hands the next. It’s a thoughtful way to stage the themes.
After all that generational intrigue, I craved something leaner and sharper. The John Cleaver books scratched that itch with grounded horror.
This wasn’t my first Dan Wells book, I read the Partials series last year, but this was something else entirely. I wasn’t expecting the blend of grounded reality with horror and a touch of the uncanny, close enough to feel plausible. Nothing feels weird… until it does. The small‑town day‑to‑day and routines keep the horror grounded.
Following the main character as he discovers and fixates on the truth is compelling because the escalation feels earned: each choice narrows the path forward. We see how the character gets pulled out of our apparent reality while at the same time becoming more human and caring about the rest. The entire series, from the initial reveal of a variant of our world through how the adventures unfold and how we meet more of these enemies, whatever you want to call them, stays intriguing without losing its footing.
I also watched the film adaptation, “I Am Not a Serial Killer,” and liked it more than I expected. It’s surprisingly faithful to the book. I’d have watched more if they’d made them. I’m not sure when I’ll pick up my next Dan Wells, but I hope it’s soon, maybe even a Cosmere book! Who knows?
Experimenting this year wasn’t only about genre. I also returned to a format I already enjoy, GraphicAudio, to experience a favorite in performance.
I re‑listened to The Final Empire because my little brother decided to read it; I wanted to read alongside him, but in a different way since I almost never re‑read. GraphicAudio isn’t a substitute for audiobooks or print; it’s a different medium. Because it’s performed, they trim description, actors and sound do the showing. You actually hear what’s happening in the scene, so the script doesn’t need to spell out every sound.
What won me over was the craft of the production: the sound work is wild, coins pinging, ash falling, boots scraping, and the spatial mix makes scenes breathe. Between actors, sound, and score, pacing becomes physical. It reaffirmed something I’ve felt for years: The Final Empire is my favorite Sanderson book. Even though I love The Stormlight Archive and the later books, this one is still my top. I highly recommend trying a GraphicAudio production; it’s worth it.
Back in Cosmere proper, Sanderson’s sci‑fi tilt tested my comfort zone again, mixing spaceships with dragons in ways that still feel human.
This was one of the first moments where we see Sanderson tackle the more space‑leaning, sci‑fi future of the Cosmere, which worries some readers who arrived for the fantasy. I’m not afraid of the shift, tho I’m curious how it will feel once the era fully turns. Sanderson’s gift for mixing genres shows here: we have spaceships and spacefaring civilizations, but it still reads like fantasy. Spaceships don’t kill the sense of wonder.
What resonated was how tradition tempers progress: it doesn’t do a clean break; the future has to earn the past. The blend of what we want to keep and what we must let go is beautifully woven. Seeing familiar characters, learning more about dragons, and glimpsing the Cosmere’s future was a delight, but, as usual, it’s the human questions beneath the swords (or lasers) that move the story forward.
And the world kept spilling off the page, maps, stat blocks, and lore vignettes made “reading” a more tactile, playable experience.
Books read: Stormlight Handbook, Welcome to Roshar, The First Step, Bridge Nine Adventure, Daggerheart Core Rulebook.
The Kickstarter buildup and finally receiving the materials was pure joy. I devoured the PDFs, then got even more excited when the physical books arrived. After that, they are really gorgeous. Brotherwise Games and Dragonsteel continue to ship products that feel thoughtfully built and aligned with the Cosmere, and we fans love them for that.
As a side note, the Mistborn deck‑building game was one of the year’s biggest surprises; I’m happy I added it to my backer kit.
Not a deep review, Unfortunately I’m not that deep into the hobby, just notes from a fan. One vignette reframed a familiar corner of Roshar for me. With the map and the stat blocks in front of me, the constraints feel physical, and the stakes click in a way prose alone doesn’t. It’s exciting to see these worlds find new forms beyond books.
If you’re not into RPGs, this might not be for you, but at least browse the canon story online. And especially Welcome to Roshar: one to own physically as the art direction and layouts do real work.
To refresh my taste buds, I picked up a small, eerie classic. Tone can be just as impactful as page count.
This one has sat on my list for a long time. I decided to read the book first, then watched the film, and I’m glad I did. Short sentences, domestic details that tilt uncanny, very Gaiman. It isn’t my usual register, which is part of why it worked for me this year. On the page, the restraint makes the dread feel intimate; the film amplifies spectacle (beautifully), but the book’s quieter chill lingered longer. It’s short; worth your time.
Everyone was talking about this. The book of the moment. Not my usual thing, but I was curious, and reading it wasn’t a waste of time.
The book was recommended to my wife, and she decided to give it a chance, and as it was her first foray into fantasy, I decided to read along. Unfortunately I came away quite disappointed. It isn’t the worst book I’ve read, but it isn’t what people make it out to be.
Most of the characters are fine and even interesting, but I really dislike the main character, and being in her head for most of the book made the ride less pleasant. The broader cosmology, ancient powers and hints of other worlds, still tugs at me, but the romance leans on familiar tropes; that’s fine for this kind of book, yet alongside the fantasy thread it often clashes and pulls focus from what I find most interesting. On the sex front: if people read this for that, fair enough, but those scenes didn’t add much for me. It’s also very predictable: by the first chapters of book one I could already see where book two was going, and only one moment truly surprised me. The mystery side isn’t well scaffolded, so the reveals feel telegraphed more than discovered. The things I’m most curious about sit at the edges of this world, and the book doesn’t spend much time there; I keep reading hoping those threads will show up, but I’m not sure they will, which is why this doesn’t match my expectations. The prose moves quickly, but at times it felt unpolished to me, long expository paragraphs that don’t quite land, and even a chapter that reads like a monologue.
As a point of comparison, Laura Gallego’s Guardians of the Citadel scaffolds its mysteries and monsters with a patience that rewards curiosity; ACOTAR gestures toward something similar but often prioritizes romantic beats over mystery architecture. I don’t think I’m the primary audience, and that’s fine.
And yet I read the second book, and I’ll probably read the rest of the series. There’s enough here to keep me curious about where the fantasy thread goes, especially reading alongside my wife.
If 2025 taught me anything, it’s stepping out of my comfortable zone is worth it. Not everything will be great, but it all adds to my reading history.
Forget the numbers, I’m chasing books that make me think and remind me why I fell back in love with reading.
Happy reading in 2026! 🎉
", "date_published" : "2025-12-29T23:00:00Z", "id" : "https://alejandromp.com/personal/blog/2025-year-in-books", "summary" : "Looking back at 2025, reading kept surprising me. I wandered into new territories, like John Cleaver, tabletop RPG handbooks, and yeah, more Cosmere (because how could I not?).", "tags" : [ "Books" ], "title" : "2025 year in books", "url" : "https://alejandromp.com/personal/blog/2025-year-in-books" }, { "authors" : [ { "name" : "Alejandro M. P." } ], "content_html" : "It’s time to review and reflect about Yumi and the Nightmare Painter, the third instalment in The Year of Sanderson and the second in the Cosmere. This will probably become one of my favorite books of the Cosmere and be in my top tier of fiction books.
Rating: 5/5
I haven’t experienced many world-hopping narratives, so what might come across as a trope to some was very appealing to me. The execution of the plot is brilliant, especially the dynamic where the two main characters need to learn to live each other’s life. It is fascinating how Painter, who comes from a modern world akin to ours, needs to understand and follow the constraints of a world made by doctrine. In contrast, we observe Yumi thrust into a more open-minded world as she navigates her inner suppression and confronts her fears.
The asymmetry goes further than that. Painter having to live in Yumi’s body initiates a subtle, yet impactful, conversation about the experience of living in a body that doesn’t align with one’s identity, a conversation still too often silenced in our society. On the other hand, Yumi keeping her own body introduces a more conventional underpinning of deception to the plot. The contrast between these two representations of what is living in a foreign world operates on many levels that are fascinating to read. The origin of these differences and the magic behind them are a mystery that keeps you hooked until the end.
Setting aside the fantasy and magic of the story, which in typical Sanderson’s fashion is one of the best ones I’ve experienced, what resonated deeply with me was the core theme of personal growth. The journey of self-improvement that forces the characters to open their mind and shift their perspective, dismantling their own dogmas and fears. Among the many narrative threads, a particular subplot I really liked was about meditation. What started as a push for the other character to do meditation in the only correct way evolved into the understanding that each person is different and has its own path to tranquility, of emptying their mind or even of not emptying it at all. Coming to terms with the difference between each individual was an enriching and fulfilling experience.
The other part I liked a lot was the intricacies of the love story. As I often tell my wife, love finds its way in every tale, even in those that don’t exactly belong to the romance genre. I’ve never been captivated by the romance genre, but I still find myself seduced by the deep connections that love weaves into every story. With “Yumi and the Nightmare Painter”, while the main plot is about figuring out what happened and how to fix it, through the course of the story we see how two strangers naturally bound thanks to mutual understanding and sharing their fears. This evolution culminates in a lovely relationship that plays an integral part of the climax. It’s a delight to see the author be less shy with certain scenes and letting these human aspects arise n the story.
Now, the question that everybody asks: Is this book enjoyable if you haven’t read the Cosmere? Well, I can’t tell you for sure because for me the Cosmere is the main reason I love Sanderson’s work. I’m a sucker for interconnected stories and worlds and is where a big part of my enjoyment comes from. Yet, I truly think that you can enjoy this, and all other stories, without being an expert in Realmatic Theory. The story stands on its own and is self-contained. You will miss on the occasional nod to the rest of the Cosmere but that is normal and expected. So don’t ignore this book just because of this.
I want to conclude with the only point of critique I have about this book, a concern that involves none other than our beloved and mischievous Hoid. The voice of the book being narrated by Hoid is very interesting. It feels different from other occasions while still being clearly Hoid. This narrative choice worked really well. However, I have to admit that there are a couple of moments where the exposition runs for a bit too long, even for me. This was particularly notable towards the end of the story, when the prose stops showing the events and just lets the narrator tell us exactly what happens in what feels like an “info dump”. Granted, it makes sense from the narration point of view, as Hoid is narrating the story to somebody in the Cosmere, but while I was immersed in the story this pulled me out of the fiction immediately and made me ask: am I accepting this because the author is Brandon Sanderson? Would I accept it from another author lacking the same level of reputation?
The immediate answer that came to mind was that I would have been more critical of another author. However, after some introspection, I realised how I ignored a critical factor: context. Brandon Sanderson has not only carved his reputation through the years, but directly made a tremendous impact on me. Of course I can accept a bit of whimsicalness from time to time if that’s what he enjoys. I shouldn’t forget that’s precisely why I baked the secret projects and why I love them so much!
In summary, a resounding endorsement. Must read. Cosmere pinnacle, and top fantasy book.
", "date_published" : "2023-07-17T22:00:00Z", "id" : "https://alejandromp.com/personal/blog/yumi-and-the-nightmare-painter-review", "summary" : "It’s time to review and reflect about Yumi and the Nightmare Painter, the third instalment in The Year of Sanderson and the second in the Cosmere. This will probably become one of my favorite books of the Cosmere and be in my top tier of fiction books.", "tags" : [ "Books" ], "title" : "Yumi and the Nightmare Painter, review", "url" : "https://alejandromp.com/personal/blog/yumi-and-the-nightmare-painter-review" }, { "authors" : [ { "name" : "Alejandro M. P." } ], "content_html" : "The conclusion of the Remembrance of Earth’s Past Trilogy comes to an end. The story has come far since those first chapters of The Three-Body Problem so focused on Chinese history that one had to read translators comments to understand the intention of the words. Now, after many years after the crisis began, humanity lives in a completely different world, confronting threats that were unimaginable before.
I really like how we see the conclusion of some of the recurrent characters, some who I ended up despising and others that I felt close to. But the character that makes more progress is humanity itself. The challenges that face humanity in this story are eye opening. The author not only presents a sci-fi story to spark a wild imagination, but it also solidifies philosophical questions and shows the possible consequences of our naïve space exploration.
For years, we have been wondering if we are alone in the universe, if there is life beyond the heat of our sun. And assuming we are not as special as we usually pretend, why we haven’t found it yet. Remembrance of Earth’s Past puts us in a fictional result of those thoughts. It tells us what could happen if we keep asking those questions instead of asking if we should even look for other civilizations. Maybe we should do everything we can to make ourselves invisible in the vastness of the dark forest.
Seeing the consequences of the Dark Forest theory, introduced in the previous book, and put beyond what I could have imagined, is also great. The author keeps surprising me with additional levels of power and technology. I always wonder how much further can power go in a science-fiction scenario. I’m used to see fantasy grow the power to extremes, but how can you do that with hard science and technology? The technologies and fundamental theories explored by this series are mind blowing. From new forms of communication to technology to travel at light-speed, even higher dimensional physics, the series explores mind-blowing concepts that will make me read additional explanations and summaries to grasp fully.
As with everything I read, some details run wild in my imagination, morphing and growing to eventually settle in some part of the Pulubi. It’s what I love the most about reading, how it fuels the infinite machine of imagination to bring into existence new forms.
One concept that fascinated me the most is to see how the author raises the question of what makes us humans. During the events of the book, we find on multiple occasions when humanity itself considers how some fellow humans have lost their humanity, how they are something else entirely. I often find thoughts like this come from brutal acts that dehumanize the characters in question or from a scientific long evolution that departs the physical form from the original. But in this case, the author makes us question how seemingly small acts and just a bit of time can come to question if those committing them are still one of us. Seeing how being isolated in a spaceship in an unreachable part of the universe makes one question their relation to humanity. Or how stuffing the entire human race in a confine space and make it fight for survival to the extreme would make us consider if those taking part in such survival game are still human.
Overall, I really liked the book and the series. Very thought provoking, with plenty of ideas that will keep echoing in the back of my mind for a long time.
Now let’s see how the adaptations fare in comparison.
", "date_published" : "2023-07-03T22:00:00Z", "id" : "https://alejandromp.com/personal/blog/death-s-end-review", "summary" : "The conclusion of the Remembrance of Earth’s Past Trilogy comes to an end. The story has come far since those first chapters of The Three-Body Problem so focused on Chinese history that one had to read translators comments to understand the intention of the words. Now, after many years after the crisis began, humanity lives in a completely different world, confronting threats that were unimaginable before.", "tags" : [ "Books" ], "title" : "Death's End - The naïveté of humankind, review", "url" : "https://alejandromp.com/personal/blog/death-s-end-review" }, { "authors" : [ { "name" : "Alejandro M. P." } ], "content_html" : "I approached the Lawful Times series from a position of having watched the author’s YouTube videos for a long time and sharing some of his taste about fiction. Considering this, I was certain that I would, at the very least, find the experience enjoyable. However, I was pleasantly surprised to find myself captivated and craving more from this series.
Rating: 3/5
But I had another motive to read Daniel’s words: to convince myself that I could write too. As someone who has been grappling with self-doubt regarding the worthiness of putting my thoughts into words, I actively seek any fragment that can fuel the self-confidence required to embark on such an endeavor. Seeing what Daniel has accomplished is another stone in the unfinished building of trusting myself. With this, I don’t mean to diminish his work. Quite the opposite. He has accomplished something many could only dream of. But it also helps me believe, and, as with many things in life, that’s the first step towards going anywhere. The rest is time and dedication and, well, that will need other stones and bricks.
But let’s talk about the series itself.
I’m very intrigued by all the possibilities of the world building. That is not something that happens often, but it’s also not surprising seeing the amount of reading that Daniel has made and how much of it matches my taste. Watching the videos where he explains a bit of the world building and magic system also makes me desire to see even more stories based on this world. What I really liked the most in these first two novellas is how they are so character focused. The plot leaves the intriguing world-building as a backdrop for an emotionally intense story. It would have been very easy to focus on the interesting bits of the world and its magic, but that would have made for a poor story. Very well done and something to learn from.
The other aspect I liked is how the words are not shy about using swear words when necessary. I always find most prose to be severely censored when, in reality, most people swear from time to time. Used poorly can make the text become distasteful, but when used appropriately, it makes me feel closer to the characters and the reality they are living.
Another notable aspect of Daniel’s words is their fearless embrace of horror and visceral scenes. They are far and between, but when they come, they pack a big punch. Others would have skimmed through the events in the scene without focusing on delivering the impact they needed. I really appreciate Daniel being bold delivering the perfect amount of explicitness in the moments where the story benefited from it. Touché.
Overall, I admire the smart move of starting with novellas. It brings the focus to a concise plot and lets us taste of this world while leaving us wanting more. I hope Daniel returns to this series soon because I want to see how things progress forward.
", "date_published" : "2023-06-02T22:00:00Z", "id" : "https://alejandromp.com/personal/blog/lawful-times-1-2-breach-of-peace-and-rebel-creed-review", "summary" : "I approached the Lawful Times series from a position of having watched the author’s YouTube videos for a long time and sharing some of his taste about fiction. Considering this, I was certain that I would, at the very least, find the experience enjoyable. However, I was pleasantly surprised to find myself captivated and craving more from this series.", "tags" : [ "Books" ], "title" : "Lawful Times 1 & 2, review", "url" : "https://alejandromp.com/personal/blog/lawful-times-1-2-breach-of-peace-and-rebel-creed-review" }, { "authors" : [ { "name" : "Alejandro M. P." } ], "content_html" : "I’ve always been an avid fan of podcasts, but surprisingly, I had never listened any true crime audio serials. It was an absolute delight to have my first experience with a fictional one through Dark One: Forgotten. It transported me back to the days when podcasts were crafted purely out of passion and genuine love, rather than being driven by money. The combination of the captivating mystery intertwined with the knowledge that there’s a fictional element at play made it impossible for me stop listening. I wholeheartedly recommend this immersive experience!
What truly adds to the allure of Dark One: Forgotten is the collaborative effort of Sanderson and Wells. Their partnership holds immense potential, evident through the subtle traces of their individual brilliance that I discovered within this production. This exciting glimpse into their combined creativity has left me eagerly anticipating what they have in store for us next.
Rating: 4/5
", "date_published" : "2023-05-17T22:00:00Z", "id" : "https://alejandromp.com/personal/blog/dark-one-forgotten-review", "summary" : "I’ve always been an avid fan of podcasts, but surprisingly, I had never listened any true crime audio serials. It was an absolute delight to have my first experience with a fictional one through Dark One: Forgotten. It transported me back to the days when podcasts were crafted purely out of passion and genuine love, rather than being driven by money. The combination of the captivating mystery intertwined with the knowledge that there’s a fictional element at play made it impossible for me stop listening. I wholeheartedly recommend this immersive experience!", "tags" : [ "Books" ], "title" : "Dark One: Forgotten - A Captivating Fictional Podcast Experience", "url" : "https://alejandromp.com/personal/blog/dark-one-forgotten-review" }, { "authors" : [ { "name" : "Alejandro M. P." } ], "content_html" : "Last year, I embarked on an incredible journey through the first two acts of The Sandman audio series, and now, at long last, I’ve been immersed in the highly-anticipated third act. The Sandman keeps being an extraordinary masterpiece; simply calling it an audio-book fails to capture its true essence. Every aspect of the production, from the exceptional cast to the mesmerizing sound design and enchanting music, harmoniously blend together to create an incredible experience.
Rating: 3.5-4/5
The third act of The Sandman continues to follow its captivating path, although I must admit that I found myself longing for more moments with Dream, as he isn’t the central figure in many of the episodes. Nonetheless, each episode remains very enjoyable thanks to the diverse range of characters whose individual storylines weave together seamlessly, adding depth and richness to the overall narrative.
Despite my initial yearning for the previous storylines, I found myself thoroughly engrossed in the captivating arc that followed Delirium, Dream’s extraordinary younger sister, in her quest to find their lost brother, a pursuit dismissed by the rest of the familay. Her character is nothing short of fascinating, with her whimsical demeanor and unpredictable nature adding a unique layer of intrigue to the narrative. This arc not only deepens our understanding of the Endless family but also grants us the opportunity to delve deeper into the intricate tapestry of the Sandman universe, introducing characters from other times.
Undoubtedly, the most captivating arc is the one set in the inn at the end of all worlds. The disconnected short stories, narrated by an intriguing ensemble of characters, are all fascinating. What adds to its allure is the intriguing framing narrative, which builds anticipation and culminates in a impactful and mysterious ending. While the concept of such a place is a common fantasy trope, the masterful execution by Gaiman makes it work exceptionally well within the story, providing valuable lessons to learn from.
I eagerly await the culmination of this extraordinary journey in The Sandman, I hope Act four is not too far away.
", "date_published" : "2023-05-15T22:00:00Z", "id" : "https://alejandromp.com/personal/blog/the-sandman-act-iii-review", "summary" : "Last year, I embarked on an incredible journey through the first two acts of The Sandman audio series, and now, at long last, I’ve been immersed in the highly-anticipated third act. The Sandman keeps being an extraordinary masterpiece; simply calling it an audio-book fails to capture its true essence. Every aspect of the production, from the exceptional cast to the mesmerizing sound design and enchanting music, harmoniously blend together to create an incredible experience.", "tags" : [ "Books" ], "title" : "The Sandman: Act III, review", "url" : "https://alejandromp.com/personal/blog/the-sandman-act-iii-review" }, { "authors" : [ { "name" : "Alejandro M. P." } ], "content_html" : "And here we are again, the second book of The Year of Sanderson has arrived. This time though, I didn’t jump on it immediately, unlike Tress, this is not a Cosmere novel so I was not so eager to devour it; I was deep in another world of Critical Role, catching up with the show and reading a novel.
But then I started The Frugal Wizard’s Handbook for Surviving Medieval England, what a title!, and remembered how curious I got when Sanderson read the first chapters on his promotional videos last year. That excitement got the best of me. That was three days ago.
Rating: 4/5. Four of five stars. The author keeps delivering. Interesting premise, world and characters. Funny and mysterious in equal parts. Would recommend.
Like Tress, the Frugal Wizard is a different beast from what I’m used to with Sanderson, something that definitely will give him critical reviews again, from those that prefer their favorite authors to stay monotone. For me? I loved it. The way Sanderson mixes the seriousness of the mystery with the lightheartedness of the premise and the marketing materials of the Guide is nothing short of brilliant. It’s a testament to his talent that he can balance all of it so effectively, and it’s one of the many things I’m really enjoying about his more recent work.
The world-building in this book is so clever. For those who have followed Sanderson outside of his books, you may know that he has two unbreakable rules that he follows on the Cosmere: no time travel and no multiverse. I love those rules, and they are ones I’ve followed on my amateur fiction creation too. They are very important to keep the stakes of a story. As soon as time travel or multiple versions of the same characters are introduced, consequences lose their impact.
But in the Frugal world, he doesn’t have to follow Cosmere rules, and he has broken them, not to the detriment of the story, but quite the opposite. The “Medieval England” of the story is not our Medieval England, the main character hasn’t travelled to the past; instead, he has travelled to an alternate dimension that is similar but not exactly like ours. This is brilliant because it keeps the consequences of time travel away from the plot, and still it gives a chance to develop stories with what feels like time travellers. At the same time is not a multiverse of clones, but one where each dimension is slightly different, which means those are different and real people that the characters, and the reader, can care about. Brilliant!
In the same vein, I loved the main character. That he starts without memory in a strange land and starts remembering things of his past that may or not be correct is great. It’s so relatable, not the loss of memory, but how our present mind can wrongly interpret old memories. The character is very flawed and we can feel the roller coaster of emotions and realisations that he’s going through the entire book.
And finally, the setting of medieval England is very nice. I’m not a historical fiction reader but this was very interesting, mainly because one knows Sanderson style and you know he can’t resist giving a twist to any world he builds. The mystery of knowing where things may differ from our history kept me on my toes, not at the level of the Cosmere, but enough to keep me going.
", "date_published" : "2023-04-28T22:00:00Z", "id" : "https://alejandromp.com/personal/blog/the-frugal-wizard-s-handbook-for-surviving-medieval-england-review", "summary" : "And here we are again, the second book of The Year of Sanderson has arrived. This time though, I didn’t jump on it immediately, unlike Tress, this is not a Cosmere novel so I was not so eager to devour it; I was deep in another world of Critical Role, catching up with the show and reading a novel.", "tags" : [ "Books" ], "title" : "The Frugal Wizard’s Handbook for Surviving Medieval England, review", "url" : "https://alejandromp.com/personal/blog/the-frugal-wizard-s-handbook-for-surviving-medieval-england-review" }, { "authors" : [ { "name" : "Alejandro M. P." } ], "content_html" : "As I advanced in Back to Critical Role, I’ve been reading a book from Critical Role, the adventures of Vex and Vax before the events of Vox Machina. This came out because I was completing the YouTube channel and saw a promotional video about the book. I immediately got curious about how the world and characters were portrait in writing, so I just went for it!
Rating: 3/5
I really liked how the present of the story is mixed with flashbacks of their past. Knowing the characters from the show, it felt like I was getting a view of multiple moments of their life, all in one book. The best thing was how the ends and beginning of the chapters segued so well into and from the flashbacks. It was very enjoyable.
The story’s narrow focus was appropriate to highlighting the characters instead of the world of Exandria. By splitting them up, readers were given a chance to learn more about each character individually, which was particularly rewarding given how much of their plotline is about sticking together.
Overall, quite happy with the book. It is what it is without pretensions of trying to be what is not. Very enjoyable, would recommend for any fan of the show.
", "date_published" : "2023-04-23T22:00:00Z", "id" : "https://alejandromp.com/personal/blog/critical-role-vox-machina-kith-kin", "summary" : "As I advanced in Back to Critical Role, I’ve been reading a book from Critical Role, the adventures of Vex and Vax before the events of Vox Machina. This came out because I was completing the YouTube channel and saw a promotional video about the book. I immediately got curious about how the world and characters were portrait in writing, so I just went for it!", "tags" : [ "Books" ], "title" : "Critical Role: Vox Machina — Kith & Kin, review", "url" : "https://alejandromp.com/personal/blog/critical-role-vox-machina-kith-kin" }, { "authors" : [ { "name" : "Alejandro M. P." } ], "content_html" : "After finishing A Crown of Swords, I started with the next book but got stuck in the prologue. The Wheel of Times prologues are so annoying because they are very long and about characters I rarely care about. It’s a way to put you up to speed with those characters, but is very draining.
That allied with other things that were going on in my life and Critical Role crossed my YouTube suggestions again. I stopped watching Campaign 2 a while ago and a thought came to me, “what if I watch it again”. I needed to put something that could stay in the background and didn’t require me to focus on all the characters in the world, something to pull my mind away from the shitty reality I was living in.
And those I was hooked to Critical Role, yet again ^^
Although I had paused the show during what seemed like a quiet period, a few episodes later, the story took shape. The mysteries grew more complex, and the tension escalated, leading up to what I can confidently say was one of the most unforgettable moments I’ve ever seen:
What Laura did in #CriticalRoleSpoilers episode 93 of campaign 2 with the cupcakes 🧁 represents the things you only get in roleplay based storytelling.(Yes I’ve been catching up a bit 😂)
After that, the party got involved in plots that would endanger Exandria, magic from ancient civilizations and political intrigue; all of that made me pause book reading for a bit and instead focus my fiction consumption on Critical Role.
That’s how after so many hours I finished watching campaign two, with an epic final battle that just kept getting better and better. With moments that got me on the edge of my sit, and where tears peaked from my eyes.
Those moments made me remember why I love watching Critical Role. As I quickly posted, this is just another form of storytelling, but one that can make you feel more than any other. I truly believe this cast makes the most epic fiction there is to be, not because of the story, but because of the impact that it has on you. The passion, the emerging plot, the jokes and fun they have, the tears… Other mediums can hardly achieve this high emotional mix.
I really wish more people could enjoy this, but as with many good things it has, the over five-hundred hours one needs to enjoy it means this is not something for everybody. Even for me, somebody that watches at 2x (or more) it’s a big time investment.
Totally worth it for something that no other form of storytelling can offer.
After campaign two, I was so hooked that entered a completionist mode where I just went and watched every video in Critical Role’s YouTube channel. Including one-shots and the short alternative campaign of Exandria Unlimited.
Watching this other show made me remember why Critical Role is the only live-play I keep coming back to. Everything I’ve said about emerging story telling is true, but the reality is that Critical Role hooks because of its cast. Not only because they are great voice actors and know how to make you forget it’s just a story, but because they are all super nice to spend hours with and the chemistry they have between themselves is gorgeous. Basically, Critical Role is its cast. The story and events are the epic parts, but none of that works without the people.
I’ve watched my fair share of role-play shows, but none of them have managed to capture my attention and keep me invested like Critical Role. Even though I finished Exandria Unlimited, I realized that it was the cast that made the first two campaigns truly memorable. While I appreciate that Critical Role has grown into a major production house, is expanding into new territories and including other voices that deserve to be heard, I fear that this might dilute the essence of what made the show so special for me.
At the moment of writing, I’ve made it through the first 10 episodes of campaign three, and it’s been a bit of a strange beginning with mixed emotions about carrying over some characters from Exandria Unlimited. However, I was pleasantly surprised to find that my apprehension about a different cast affecting my enjoyment is not an absolute. Robbie’s delightful presence in campaign three has erased any doubts I had and made the experience all the more enjoyable! And of course, my positive feelings about Robbie’s presence in campaign three are not meant to be a critique of anyone else who participated in Exandria Unlimited or any other guests. It’s simply a personal sentiment that’s difficult to articulate, based on the social dynamics and human interactions that make the show so special.
For now, Campaign 3 hasn’t hooked me completely yet, although it has a few things going for it; in-world and external.
The weird set of character choices is very interesting and is already showing many interesting interactions. It’s interesting how fresh it seems to have a robot and undead in the main cast, interesting because this is fantasy after all!
The chance to explore a new continent of Exandria is always exciting as it engages my world-building brain to its max. I’m interested to see more places besides the city where the characters started, because in my mind Marquet was mainly a dessert, but hearing things about jungles and other populated areas piques my interest.
But the thing that really makes me curious about where the campaign is going is what’s been happening in the real world with WotC. I’ve heard rumblings of God level events in this campaign, which makes me excited to see Matthew get rid of the last bit of ties that Exandria has with D&D lore. This idea just got more exciting a few days ago when they confirmed the ongoing development of their own RPG.
Exploring different worlds and immersing myself in their intricacies is a passion of mine. While I could potentially use that time to focus on writing my own material, the human brain is complex and mine is not collaborating lately. Life happens. Therefore, I find myself indulging in the vast universe of Exandria instead, not just through gameplay, but also through a novel from Critical Role.
Fiction is truly unlimited.
", "date_published" : "2023-04-22T22:00:00Z", "id" : "https://alejandromp.com/personal/blog/back-to-critical-role", "summary" : "After finishing A Crown of Swords, I started with the next book but got stuck in the prologue. The Wheel of Times prologues are so annoying because they are very long and about characters I rarely care about. It’s a way to put you up to speed with those characters, but is very draining.", "tags" : [ "TV Show" ], "title" : "Back to Critical Role", "url" : "https://alejandromp.com/personal/blog/back-to-critical-role" }, { "authors" : [ { "name" : "Alejandro M. P." } ], "content_html" : "After just 12 days, I just finished A Crown of Swords, the 7th book of The Wheel of Time.
Given some personal circumstances, I find myself with more time to listen to audiobooks, so that’s why this is probably the fastest I’ve ever read a book in my life. After Lord of Chaos I’ve found the seventh book more interesting.
Rating: 4/5
This book just continues the events of the story, so my overall opinion is still a bit of the same. It feels like we’re just watching events happen, following people around doing things that sometimes feel too mundane or without a clear and specific purpose. It’s like we are seeing the scenes that would be cut in other stories. But it still has its charm, and in this instance more happens.
It’s probably because we follow Rand for longer, doing random things all over. I really like how at this point he’s more comfortable with his powers and position, although he still feels terribly responsible for many things, which clearly shows the mental burden he carries.
We see the powers taking place also with Matt and his Ta’veren status. I really like this because it feels like a passive power that none of them control and that sometimes turns out well and sometimes doesn’t. It’s not an absolute, they are as much in the hands of destiny as their enemies.
I really like Matt, so the fact that we follow him for a while on this book it’s also a positive for me. It’s even nicer because we have most of our main characters together, well, mostly split in two, but it’s much nicer than having them all individually doing their own thing.
There are also a bunch more confrontations that make me wonder and be hooked into the plot. I loved how the Aes Sedai are forced to realise that they should chill a bit and stop pretending they are the rules of the world. Yes, I freaking hate the Aes Sedai 😂, not all of course, but the air of superiority that surrounds them is so exaggerated and palpable on every scene that becomes infuriating. That’s what has made me love the appearance of the Asha’man.
One thing that still tickles me after having finished is how there are a couple of scenes that don’t resolve with answers. There are a couple of characters that appear and we don’t know who they are. I love this sense of mystery which is not that common in this story.
And I guess that summarizes my issue with the overall story. There is no mystery. Don’t get me wrong, of course there are things we don’t know and get revealed on time. But overall there is no big mystery that I’m eager to know. We know who is the Dark Lord; their followers are known; even the steps we need to take to destroy them and what needs to happen in the last battle. We may not know all the details, but there is no big mystery either. We are just here for the ride of seeing our characters’ lives.
Nothing illustrates more clearly this aspect of just progressing through a big plot that the ending of the books. They mostly seem just another scene that could be anywhere else, and the ending of this book seven is no different. After spending the entire book following Rand around, the book ends just by doing another one of his incursions. Yes, there is a bit of a bigger battle and a tense chapter, which is great!, but the payout doesn’t feel that big.
In any case, I already have book 8 ready. Let’s go!
", "date_published" : "2023-03-17T23:00:00Z", "id" : "https://alejandromp.com/personal/blog/a-crown-of-swords-the-wheel-of-time-7-review", "summary" : "After just 12 days, I just finished A Crown of Swords, the 7th book of The Wheel of Time.", "tags" : [ "Books" ], "title" : "A Crown of Swords (The Wheel of Time, #7), review", "url" : "https://alejandromp.com/personal/blog/a-crown-of-swords-the-wheel-of-time-7-review" }, { "authors" : [ { "name" : "Alejandro M. P." } ], "content_html" : "And here we are again! After pausing The Wheel of Time and having ready all the Cosmere I decided it was time to go back to the epic adventures of Rand al’Thor.
After just short of a month, I’ve read (a.k.a. listened) the sixth book in the series, Lord of Chaos (The Wheel of Time, #6), what an epic ending to the over 40 hours of audiobook!
Rating: 3.5/5
I’ve shared my overall feelings about the series before and I don’t think they have changed, especially with this installment which feels quite slow. I still love the series for its depth and world, but what makes it really shine are its realised characters and the epicness of its events. Unfortunately, these epic moments diluted among a mountain of text that spends too much time to on chores.
I’ve spent the vast majority of the book just wondering where things were going because they were not going anywhere. Too many points of view and too much time spent in scenes that didn’t move the plot. And is an awful feeling because I really wish I loved more those scenes! I’m pretty sure that all of them are necessary, because when I think about the Wheel of Time I can imagine a fully realised world full of incredible characters, and I doubt this would still be the case without all those filling scenes.
So yes, I’m not saying there is too much filling, but I’m saying there is a bit too much? Again, is hard for me to reconcile this feeling.
Because then, when a scene actually moves the plot forward, you could hear me scream! 🙀 There are moments so memorable and epics in this book that when I finished it last night, I immediately got better feelings about it.
Seeing our characters reunite, Rand accepting his position on all of this, and also friendships that are being muddled by world events… it’s very impressive.
During this same month I’ve been watching Castle, the serial tv show. The fact that every episode has little to do with the previous but that as the seasons go, the writers add more and more details into the overall story line, made me realise that it’s how I started looking at the Wheel of Time. Usually when I read fantasy I’m tied to the three story act, expecting the plot to move forward towards a conclusion, but after six books I think that the way to read the Wheel of Time is far from that. Each individual book doesn’t strongly follow the classical formula, yes there is a meaningful ending, but the book doesn’t really build up only towards that. It’s closer to a tv show where we just spent time with the characters while they are doing their own thing, sometimes we spent time with them to know them better (too often) even if the plot doesn’t benefit from it. So I’ve changed my attitude and now I’m just reading the Wheel of Time enjoying the ride with no expectation of what needs to happen or when.
It’s a bittersweet realisation but I think this will propel me to the upcoming books, and I still love what’s going on, so I really want to get to the conclusion of the series. I can’t wait to get more epic moments like the last chapter of this book. Rand is such a freaking main character!
This experience is being strange indeed. I see myself trying to understand what I love and what I hate about the epic story, and I really can’t pinpoint what’s going on. I have plenty of critiques but I still see how this is one of the best epic stories ever written and I’m still loving the ride. So weird.
", "date_published" : "2023-03-04T23:00:00Z", "id" : "https://alejandromp.com/personal/blog/the-wheel-of-time-6-lord-of-chaos-review", "summary" : "And here we are again! After pausing The Wheel of Time and having ready all the Cosmere I decided it was time to go back to the epic adventures of Rand al’Thor.", "tags" : [ "Books" ], "title" : "Lord of Chaos (The Wheel of Time #6), review", "url" : "https://alejandromp.com/personal/blog/the-wheel-of-time-6-lord-of-chaos-review" }, { "authors" : [ { "name" : "Alejandro M. P." } ], "content_html" : "Fated Blight is the first entrance in the trilogy of The Sum of Ages Series and I think this is a very good first book. I got this book via a giveaway in The StoryGraph and it has been a pleasure.
Rating: 3/5
I really loved having characters of a different race and seeing a different mythology, Philippine, feed the world where the story takes place. It was a breath of fresh air in a space filled with English lore. On top of that, reading some Spanish sounding words in a fantasy novel was new to me and made me a bit more special than usual.
The underwater scenes require a special mention. They made me live things that I have not experienced before in other books. It felt very original to me. And the writing was to the point, it can be tricky to make the reader connect with otherworldly situations in a way that makes us feel like we are there. Even though being underwater might not seem as unfamiliar as other environments, I have only been a few meters below the surface, and those who have gone deeper, it was surely not without the aid of an oxygen tank. Those scenes being rooted in reality, albeit a reality that few have experienced, made them just more impactful to me.
Something I was not a fan of is how the two POVs were so disconnected throughout the entire book. I was waiting for the characters to touch point always in the next chapter, but to no avail. I imagine they will get closer later in the series, but not having them connect in the first book broke my expectations and made me be more aware of this flaw. More than it deserves, because I don’t think it’s a bad thing that the two main characters have their separate paths, but I was not expecting it.
The story of the boy didn’t quite hit the mark. Aside from the main action scene, the rest of the story felt like a prolonged setup. While it was interesting and left me curious to know more about the world, I found myself more entertained with Olenka’s narrative.
Overall, I’m quite happy with it! I enjoyed the reading and I’m interested in knowing more. The next books definitively go on my to read list and I hope to get to them soon! 👏
", "date_published" : "2023-02-03T23:00:00Z", "id" : "https://alejandromp.com/personal/blog/fated-blight-review", "summary" : "Fated Blight is the first entrance in the trilogy of The Sum of Ages Series and I think this is a very good first book. I got this book via a giveaway in The StoryGraph and it has been a pleasure.", "tags" : [ "Books" ], "title" : "Fated Blight, review", "url" : "https://alejandromp.com/personal/blog/fated-blight-review" }, { "authors" : [ { "name" : "Alejandro M. P." } ], "content_html" : "I just finished The Dark Forest, book 2 of the Remembrance of Earth’s Past trilogy.
Rating: 3/5
My feelings about this book are very similar to the first part of the series, and that’s no surprise since the story maintains the same tone. I really like the survival puzzles proposed by the story and how humanity reacts and adapts to (maybe) solve them. This book, since it happens a few centuries later, also shows us a possible future for humanity. It was cool to see the new technology and how it affected society.
But like the first one, it has too much text, and in this case is even worse because the book is longer. The fact that this happens in a more international environment reduces the footnote reading that polluted the first book (for a European reader at least), but the amount of scenes in this book that have very little impact in the overall plot is just too much for me. Some of these scenes are interesting on their own, but the more the book advances, the more these scenes become void.
But then, like in the first book, the overall plot and story are so enigmatic and the puzzle humanity faces is so complex that it leaves the reader wanting more. And so I had to finish the story, even though I almost leave it multiple times, and I will have to read the last book.
Overall, I can see how many people love it, but it hasn’t clicked for me.
", "date_published" : "2023-01-16T23:00:00Z", "id" : "https://alejandromp.com/personal/blog/the-dark-forest-remembrance-of-earth-s-past-2", "summary" : "I just finished The Dark Forest, book 2 of the Remembrance of Earth’s Past trilogy.", "tags" : [ "Books" ], "title" : "The Dark Forest review", "url" : "https://alejandromp.com/personal/blog/the-dark-forest-remembrance-of-earth-s-past-2" }, { "authors" : [ { "name" : "Alejandro M. P." } ], "content_html" : "I just finished this beautiful book, the first one in The Year of Sanderson.
From my review on Goodreads:
5/5
This book is great at so many levels. After having read Sanderson’s all Cosmere books reading this narrative with such a different voice is mesmerising. Being a tale narrated by a character in the Cosmere, who is at the same time a secondary character in the story, brings a different perspective that I enjoyed very much.
The characters are great, from the girl that embarks on an adventure to each of the named characters. Sanderson is able to take care of real world situations and human characteristics, I loved the deaf character and the one with very bad aim (😉).
And the plot, oh I loved it! Look, I get bored of a love story told like they do in romance. That’s just boring most of the time. Love is just an, albeit important, part of a human live, so it needs to be just a part of a story. For Tress love is what makes her embark on and amazing journey do discover herself and grow. Yes this is not an epic story with armies, but is a romantic journey on the seas, with battles and death! so is not that far <3
To tip it off, the Cosmere. This book may not be a core story of the Cosmere, but it seems quite important to get to know more about what’s going on. I love two things: 1) Sanderson doesn’t get shy anymore about including Cosmere things in the story. Things that don’t break the immersion if you haven’t read the rest (I think), but that are like a juicy fruit for any of us that love this universe. and 2) how this little details are included in such a natural way with the narration. The narrator just mentions it like if they were not important; while as reader I was here screaming of excitement and highlighting lines that gave us more details about an important back story.
I’ve loved Tress of the Emerald Sea, a well rounded book in many aspects and a great start of the Year of Sanderson. I think I will be very fond of this story for many years to come.
", "date_published" : "2023-01-07T23:00:00Z", "id" : "https://alejandromp.com/personal/blog/tress-of-the-emerald-sea", "summary" : "I just finished this beautiful book, the first one in The Year of Sanderson.", "tags" : [ "Books" ], "title" : "Tress of the Emerald Sea", "url" : "https://alejandromp.com/personal/blog/tress-of-the-emerald-sea" }, { "authors" : [ { "name" : "Alejandro M. P." } ], "content_html" : "A few years ago I felt back in love with reading again. I’ve always been a reader, but for a long time I prioritized other hobbies. The social web and easy to digest content occupied most of my leisure time for many years. But the desire nostalgia for experiencing fantasy put me again on the right track.
Don’t get me wrong, I still spent time on YouTube and reading about other stuff, books are only a part of the amount of things I experience in life, but they are a very important one for me. Reading challenges are a fun way to make sure I don’t forget this. They are not a mandatory task, but a pleasant reminder of how much I enjoy it.
Because life is hard, it’s tricky sometimes to remember what we should do day-to-day, our mind travels to far places, places that are the total opposite of nice fantastic lands. And when we are in those obscure places, we often forget about the nice things we already have.
Ignoring a very rough 2019, I’ve been reading more and more every year. This is mostly because I found an author that resonates with me like nothing before, Brandon Sanderson. You can see how the way I talked about fantasy changed when I discovered him. When I decided to pause The Wheel of Time I was about to enter a hiatus on reading again. But thankfully, I gave Mistborn a try, and oh my, was I lucky discovering my favorite novel yet!
So after that, I started devouring the Cosmere, the fictional universe where most of Sanderson’s fantasy novels happen. That took me from 2021 to 2022 and I can say now that I finally caught up with the Cosmere and I’ve even been able to enjoy for the first time a new book launch with The Lost Metal!
25 books! That’s quite a lot for me! The number doesn’t really matter, everybody reads at different speeds and kinds of books, what matters is how much enjoyment it brought me!
8,517 pages! It’s funny how that gets to an average of only 340 pages per book. When my impression is that I read way lengthier books, and I do, but I’ve also read a bunch of short stories that pull that number down. From 25 pages of The Hope of Elantris to the 1248 pages of Oathbringer.
My average rating is 4.2/5. That’s basically because I only read things that I kinda now I will like, and because I’ve been reading a lot of Sanderson and, for now, is very rare I don’t like something from him.
It would take me too long to write all my thoughts about the different Cosmere books, so I will only highlight a couple. If you are curious, I keep a thread in Twitter with my Sanderson reading and you can see my reviews in Goodreads.
As a side note, with everything that has been going on with Twitter, one thing I would love to do is to move all these reading updates and book reviews to my domain. We’ll see if I can get that done.
The Emperor’s Soul has been, with no doubt, the nicest surprise of all. A short story about art, in the same world as Elantris, that I still keep thinking about.
All the other smaller stories in the Cosmere (Shadows for Silence in the Forests of Hell, Sixth of the Dusk, etc) are something that many won’t bother to read, and you don’t really need to, but I love the inter-connected facet of Sanderson’s writing so I’ve put a lot of effort in reading them in what I consider the best order possible for my personal enjoyment. And I have to say that it has paid dividends! I should write about that someday.
Mistborn Secret History is one of these things that you can only enjoy once in a lifetime. It’s a short story that you should know anything about. Really, anything you read or see, by small, it’s a major spoiler. And the experience I got while reading it and discovering things… I can’t describe it.
Mistborn Era 2… what can I say about this. I’ve been able to finish it with the rest of the fanbase and it has been an experience! It’s a very distinct style than the first Era, something that put many people out, but I still like it a lot. The mix of western with new tech and humor worked very well for me. And the ending… what an ending! A new era for the Cosmere begins!
The Stormlight Archive is with no doubt my favorite epic fantasy series of all time. It pulls the best of Sanderson for sure. This year I’ve continued the series and caught up with it and yes, now I’m waiting the last book of the first half like everybody else. With excitement but also fear. I have no clue how things will go. Well, of course I have many theories like everybody… it’s a hot topic of conversion with my friends, BUT Sanderson can pull plot twists that even after paying attention and commenting all potential solutions with friends, nobody saw coming.
This is the only non-fiction book I’ve read this year. I don’t really do non-fiction with books since I spent most of my day to day reading it by other means already. But this one was a recommendation to understand better the psychology and mental health of people. It’s eye opening to see what others go trough and makes you be more attentive and willing to help.
From watching Brandon Sanderson and Dan Wells on their podcast I ended up being very curious about Dan work. I picked up Partials as an introduction to his work, and I have to say I enjoyed it. Is a bit too YA for what I was looking for, but it has many interesting details. I still have book 3 pending, which I’m hoping to finish next year.
This is a book about the universe of Runeterra, full of artwork and short-stories. I really loved the stories, and the art is astonishing. Runeterra is probably in my top 3 of fiction worlds and I wish people paid more attention to the multitude of stories and characters in it.
Many people discards it because it has the League of Legends brand associated with it, “it’s just a game”. And that might have been true many years ago but Riot has been working on this universe for so long that it has quickly become a rich world that doesn’t have to envy anything from others. I mean just look at this beautiful map.
My favorite part is how nicely in pulls together seemingly incompatible themes and environments. In Runeterra you can find anything you like: Horror and ghosts, pirates, a land of magic and nature, empires at war, ancient dangers in the frozen north, a high-tech city, ancient Egypt like, jungle and elemental magic, and a mountain to ascend to godhood.
I’m still fascinated by how all of this can match in a very nice and coherent way. That is Runeterra. Seriously, visit their site and discover a new Universe.
This year I finished reading the DM’s guide to D&D. Of course, being a guide it means I flipped through its pages way more than once, but I still wanted to go trough it in sequence to enjoy the fiction in it.
Reading tabletop game guides is an enjoyable experience for me. It engages not only with my “game mechanics” brain but also with the fantasy literature part thanks to all the lore and adventure suggestions in them.
I started Sandman after watching the Netflix tv show and I have to say I enjoyed it a lot, way more than expected. Neil Gaiman storytelling is so peculiar that makes Sandman an incredible experience way beyond what the plot could give.
I’ve just finished Act 2, the last thing I will read this year, and there some stories in it I can’t wait to see adapted on television. I’m amazed how Gaiman takes folk-tales and religious stories that we all have heard about and gives them a twist integrating them into the Sandman world.
Okay, this is a weird one. If anybody did what I did here with the Cosmere I would tell them the big mistake they made. I’m not sure how important is with Dresden but I know I was taking a risk. You see, Amazon Prime gave an offer with free access to their Kindle Unlimited books, and even tho there is a lot of content there was not much that I found interesting to jump into.
But I’ve been hearing about The Dresden Files for ages, and is a series I really want to read sometime, so when I saw this short story I just took it. I knew I was risking huge spoilers since is the 17th book of the series, but I risked it anyway.
And I’m glad, now I’m more curious about Dresden and its world. It seems like a mix that I could enjoy a lot. So it went up on my priority 😜
Because it was in Kindle Unlimited and I wanted to change a bit to sci-fi, I jumped in the first book of the Remembrance of Earth’s Past Series. I had plenty of good things about this book so I was eager to enjoy it. And I have to say… it was difficult to finish.
It’s true that when I was done, I appreciated the story and its complexity, and I’m curious to see how it continuous. But I don’t know if it’s because it is too hard sci-fi and is not for me, or because the different author culture (seriously, having to read footnotes every two pages is not good…) but it didn’t pull me in the story much.
I actually started the second book, The Dark Forest, but it’s still in progress because is taking me even more to get into. There is simply too much text. I actually switched to Sandman Act 2 to disconnect from it and I finished that one in 2 days 😂 so it’s not that I don’t want to read! We’ll see if I come back to this series.
I’ve read other books that, for one reason or another, are not in Goodreads. I’ve posted them as “general updates” on the site, but of course that doesn’t count as a book.
This is another reason I would love to find an alternative to it.
After having caught up with the Cosmere I was eager for more and didn’t want to wait for The Lost Metal release. So I started looking at what other things Brandon had done around the Cosmere, I knew there was some unpublished work and that seemed like an ideal way to keep the Cosmere alive in my head.
Aether of Night is an unpublished novel, a draft, that he wrote years ago but never published. He has transformed the ideas in it into other published work. Even knowing that is non-canon and that the writing was in draft form, I really enjoyed the reading.
Seeing some of the early versions of some things that happened in other books was fascinating to me as a hobbyist writer. And know more about, a version of, the Aeathers, something that we are just starting to see in the Cosmere, was a delightful gift.
My post in Goodreads about Aether of Night.
With everything that happened in Twitter this year, and the move to Mastodon, I’ve been paying more attention to the indie-web. I think the social network boom has helped in some aspects to move society to a more connecter world, but I really miss the times of blogs and RSS.
Manton Reece is part of the indie-web movement that tries to protect the openness of the web. The book talks about his solution, micro.blog, but is not a sell pitch for it. It’s very recommended if you are curious about the dangers that are risking the web as we know it.
My post in Goodreads about Indie Microblogging.
My goal for 2023 is to keep enjoying reading as much as I did this year, no matter how many books I read.
I already have 4 that are clear thanks to The Year of Sanderson that will start on January 1st! After that, I may try to finish some open series and look at others on my pending list.
Happy new year of reading!
", "date_published" : "2022-12-30T23:00:00Z", "id" : "https://alejandromp.com/personal/blog/year-2022-books-reviews", "summary" : "A few years ago I felt back in love with reading again. I’ve always been a reader, but for a long time I prioritized other hobbies. The social web and easy to digest content occupied most of my leisure time for many years. But the desire nostalgia for experiencing fantasy put me again on the right track.", "tags" : [ "Books" ], "title" : "My 2022 in books", "url" : "https://alejandromp.com/personal/blog/year-2022-books-reviews" }, { "authors" : [ { "name" : "Alejandro M. P." } ], "content_html" : "Last night I finished Mistborn, The Final Empire. And I have to say: I loved it! If it’s not my new favorite story it’s very close.
As I teased last time, this is my entrance into Brandon Sanderson’s Cosmere. On March 2019 I tried with The Way of Kings, but I was not mentally at the right time to take an epic fantasy story. So that year I went for something lighter. When I decided that it was time to start with Brandon’s books again, I preferred to avoid its bigger piece. After putting on pause The Wheel of Time I wanted something smaller, more approachable.
I’ve always had a curiosity for Mistborn. I think it’s the name that attracted me first. It makes my imagination fly. But then when i heard it was a fantasy heist plot, I got overly excited. Ocean’s Eleven, but with magic? Heck yes! And now that I’ve finished the first book, I annoyed that I didn’t read it sooner!
As my first Sanderson’s book I have to say that I really like how he writes. I’m sure the style will vary from book to book, but I found Mistborn’s prose very good but approachable. Something that as a non-native speaker I really appreciate.
The characters are lovely. Not only the main two but also the rest of the crew. Vin is arguably the principal character of the story and it has been very enjoyable to see her grow, from the first chapter to the last. She has learned and changed a lot, but you can still see her past self in her. It’s so well done.
The plot makes you flip pages like there was no tomorrow. There are no slow parts. Even the chapters with less action, there is still something very interesting happening. There is no filling. The plot moves page after page. If there is one detail to comment is that the heist itself takes a bit of a back sit, but it’s to focus on the characters and make them shine, so it’s all for a good purpose. And don’t get me wrong, the heist is still there. Is the main driver of the story. It’s just not a one hour film where everything that matters is how to rob the bank. It’s way more than that!
And the setting? Well, well well. The setting is so vivid in my mind. It’s so different that I really feel like I was running through the mists at night with our protagonists. And the best thing is that it doesn’t take much time boring you with explanations of it. Sanderson is able to sell us this world with very little. No filling.
But let’s get to what had me more curious. The magic system. A hard magic system. Pretty much everything I read has been soft magic systems, and I was very expectant to see what everything was praising Brandon for, the king of magic systems. Well, people were not mistaken. He delivered. Now, if you don’t get pumped up by details about how magic works, this may not excite you as much. And it’s truth that there is a bunch of word count dedicated to the magic by necessity. But even if you are not a fan of this style I think you will like it because it’s so well woven into the character development and action scenes that I don’t think there is a single paragraph where you will be bored.
And those action scenes! Between the characters, the big plot behind each scene and the spectacular magic, I would say that Mistborn has some of the best action scenes I’ve ever read. And there are a lot of them.
Finally, the world building. As I said the, setting is magnificent, but it doesn’t stop there. The wider world and universe are what interests me the most. Being able to finish this book and step into the bigger world of the Cosmere is something I’ve wanted to do for a while. And just with this book, I can already see glimpses of what could be. I’m eager to enjoy the discovery.
So yes, I don’t know if this is my favorite novel, but it is. And the best thing is that Brandon is a machine, and he keeps writing and writing. So I signed up for an amazing long ride!
", "date_published" : "2020-09-19T22:00:00Z", "id" : "https://alejandromp.com/personal/blog/is-mistborn-my-new-favorite-novel", "summary" : "Last night I finished Mistborn, The Final Empire. And I have to say: I loved it! If it’s not my new favorite story it’s very close.", "tags" : [ "Books" ], "title" : "Is Mistborn my new favorite novel?", "url" : "https://alejandromp.com/personal/blog/is-mistborn-my-new-favorite-novel" }, { "authors" : [ { "name" : "Alejandro M. P." } ], "content_html" : "This year I got into The Wheel of Time series. I wanted to get a test of this well renown epic fantasy before the TV show aired. I’m sure the show will be good, but is going to differ from the books for sure. You can’t adept fourteen thousand pages book without cutting corners.
So I went for the first and thought it was fine, but not amazing. It was the first one and seemed like an introduction to the world with not a lot of interesting action. So I kept going. Now I finished the fifth entry on the series, The Fires of Heaven. And I’m still with this weird sensation of missing something.
The book is wonderful, but I don’t think is such as amazing as the huge fans say. And that’s normal. They wouldn’t be fans otherwise. But I’m talking about myself here.
The characters are very well realised, and there are a lot of them. Which maybe is the big problem for me? Too many characters. I know their stories and interwoven, but I can’t avoid the feeling of being lost every time the scene changes. That’s probably my fault. To read epic fantasy, you need to be well versed on novels, so maybe I’m just not there yet.
The magic is very, very interesting. It’s not a hard magic system by any means, but the combination of different sources of magic and styles in the same story is super interesting. It’s something that is very close to my fantasy world. Maybe I should have read this long ago!
The plot is also very, very interesting. Is an epic fantasy after all. The world is at risk of being destroyed by the evil overlord, and our main characters need to stop it. But that’s not it, there are a lot of subplots happening constantly. Each character pursuing their own motivations without forgetting about the big picture.
When you read that it seems like the best thing in the world. And I keep thinking about that. Or at least about the promise of that. But after finishing every book, I can’t stop feeling that not much has happened. Yes, the plot has moved forward and the characters have grown, but the proportion of that with the number of pages is way too low for my taste.
And for other people that may be fine, since all those extra pages are dedicated and making us feel like part of the world. This immense world with very detailed cultures. But I guess I want a bit less of that and more action. And I FEEL BAD for saying that about world-building, which is one of my passions. But really, I don’t need hundreds of pages to tell me how Aiel are.
As the Spanish meme says…
![\"maxresdefault\"](\"https://alejandromp.com/personal/blog/pausing-the-wheel-of-time/maxresdefault.jpg\")
I still like the books. And I still want to keep reading and finish it. But is a daunting task. With the feeling of not much happening on every book and still nine books to go. Without mentioning that apparently on the seventh one there is a big depression where the pacing slows down, even the fans have trouble with those. So I’m scared. I don’t want to leave it, but it won’t be easy.
So my plan is to pause it before I burn out of it. I want to go back to it after the first season of the show airs, and I’m hooked by the story and the characters again. But for now, I want to disconnect for a bit.
So what’s next?, you may ask. Well, it is time to taste a hard magic system.
", "date_published" : "2020-08-29T22:00:00Z", "id" : "https://alejandromp.com/personal/blog/pausing-the-wheel-of-time", "summary" : "This year I got into The Wheel of Time series. I wanted to get a test of this well renown epic fantasy before the TV show aired. I’m sure the show will be good, but is going to differ from the books for sure. You can’t adept fourteen thousand pages book without cutting corners.", "tags" : [ "Books" ], "title" : "Pausing The Wheel of Time", "url" : "https://alejandromp.com/personal/blog/pausing-the-wheel-of-time" }, { "authors" : [ { "name" : "Alejandro M. P." } ], "content_html" : "When I was younger, I loved fantasy so much that I always wanted to make a world of my own. When I was around fourteen, I started doing it. Yes, I started writing a novel. I still have it in my hard drive. It’s very cheesy, but I find in there the dreams of a younger me. And the interesting thing is that those dreams never died off.
When I decided to pursue a career on software development is not just because of the technical aspect of it, but also because I was a very creative person. If have never written code you may not relate it to creative thinking, but it is. Think about it this way: you are literally creating something, whatever you want, from nothing. That’s what made me go to university to study computer science. The freedom and limitless creative possibilities of it.
Those old word documents of mine got lost between a plethora of other hobbies and life. But one of the major reasons for my younger self to stop writing was that was not a good writer. We wrote and shared our text with a group of close friends, yes we had a writing group even without knowing that was a thing, and their prose was much better than mine. So I knew that pursuing a professional career in writing was out of my reach.
And that was the big mistake.
No. I’m still convinced I don’t have enough skill to be a good writer. You won’t see my novel in a bookshelf. I was correct in that. The mistake was about thinking writing had to be a professional career. Nobody had ever told me that writing could be just a hobby. And that’s something that is very rotten in our society. We all played on some sports team. As a hobby, nobody was pursuing being a pro realistically. It was just fun and healthy. I even did drawing and painting classes. As a hobby. But writing? When you think about writing you immediately think about those authors that have been blessed with enough skill to be in a bookshelf.
So I didn’t write for many years.
I, and my friends, made a similar mistake with D&D. We heard it was too hard, and since we didn’t have examples, we just accepted it was too difficult for us. So we never played. But then in my late twenties I discovered FATE, Critical Role and the D&D renaissance. Suddenly role-playing seemed something we could enjoy doing, but now with a friend on each corner of the world not that easy. Too late.
But that didn’t stop me of organizing some sessions when we were together. And we had fun. Or at least I had. I went from never playing to being the dungeon master, skipping the player position completely. And I loved it! For the first time in years, I could externalise somehow the world that my mind has been creating for twenty years.
And finally, early this year, I started being curious again. It all started by being hooked up with fantasy again. When I decided to read The Wheel Of Time I started hearing more and more about Mr. Sanderson and his part in finishing the series. I’ve heard about him before and I still have on my list getting into his world. But his charisma made me follow him, even reading nothing from him yet.
Then is when I discovered he had a complex inter-winded world of fantasy, the Cosmere. Something very exciting because an inter-connected fantasy world is something that excites me a lot. And then I found out he does university classes about writing fantasy and sci-fi and, more importantly, they are available online. So one night, alone, during the pandemic, I decided to take a look.
And it changed my perception on writing.
\nI finished watching @BrandSanderson 2016 lectures and now 2020 show up! :D The introduction is great, I wish somebody had told me "writing can be JUST a hobby" 15 years ago. Funny how when I was on my 14/15 I actually wrote half a book, and started another
— Alejandro Martinez (@alexito4) January 23, 2020
But I stoped.
Are you saying that I can write just for fun? Without having to suffer because not fulfilling expectations? SAY WHAAAT?
So I opened Scrivener. Recovered the old documents of my novels, pulled the world-building from my D&D sessions and started writing.
Even at that point I was not convinced that I could write a novel, I’m still not sure to be honest. So I just started with the mission of keeping memories. As I said before, I’ve been building this fantasy world with dozens of stories in my head for many years. Of course not everything is good material, but my brain has been an imagination machine for a long time. But I’m a human that is getting old, and those memories from fantastic worlds, creatures and battles will fade away at some point. So my task was just to write a list of what my imaginary characters have gone trough. Keep a list of the major story lines, how they connect and the peculiarities of my world.
But you can guess what happened.
That sparked a wave of inspiration in me again. With everything that has been happening this year, and spending so much time alone enclosed at home with my girl int he other side of the world the fantasy realm was a more comfortable place to be. So I took the present story that my brain was developing and started writing it down.
Of course things have to change a bit when you put them on paper, but overall I’m excited about it. My plan is to finish it before my next birthday. I don’t want to leave other parts of my leave behind, but I think I will dedicate a bunch of time to this.
We’ll see how it goes. There is no pressure. Is just for fun.
It’s my new old hobby.
\n", "date_published" : "2020-08-19T22:00:00Z", "id" : "https://alejandromp.com/personal/blog/my-new-and-old-hobby", "summary" : "When I was younger, I loved fantasy so much that I always wanted to make a world of my own. When I was around fourteen, I started doing it. Yes, I started writing a novel. I still have it in my hard drive. It’s very cheesy, but I find in there the dreams of a younger me. And the interesting thing is that those dreams never died off.", "tags" : [ "Writing" ], "title" : "My New and Old hobby", "url" : "https://alejandromp.com/personal/blog/my-new-and-old-hobby" }, { "authors" : [ { "name" : "Alejandro M. P." } ], "content_html" : "I've had this in the back of my head for too long so I decided to do something about it. Last year I promised to myself to ship a new app just for myself to have fun again. So this year I will try to finally write a novel, I've been ignoring this passion of mine for too long. https://t.co/5xFnImJAUS
— Alejandro Martinez (@alexito4) August 20, 2020
When somebody asks me what kind of books I read the answer is always the same: fiction. I very rarely read non-fiction books because real life is boring, a funny sentence that I said without thinking many years ago and became a constant joke at work. Jokes aside, I think it describes quite right what I look for when reading: I want to visit other worlds and live other lives.
![\"\"](\"https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/0/00/WoT01_TheEyeOfTheWorld.jpg\")
One of the fantasy series that I’ve always heard good things of is The Wheel of Time by Robert Jordan and Brandon Sanderson. I heard ramblings about it but never paid attention or did any research about it. That was until the tv show started to be rumoured. I immediately got worried about that. I didn’t want to watch the show without having read the book first!
Of course, thanks to the creepy Internet we live in, it didn’t take even five minutes for Youtube to show me videos from Daniel Greene talking about it. And, this time, I’m happy it did because I’ve become a huge fan of his channel.
His video convinced me on giving this series a chance. Even if I was a little scared, fourteen books are not a joke. But the, very, positive thing is that the series is finished and right now that’s something that I’m very keen on.
So I decided to give it a go. I bought the book for my Kindle and started reading for a couple of evenings. But one of my flaws quickly showed up, I have always some trouble with starts, specially in epic fantasy where they present to you a thousand characters in a couple of pages… and I’m very bad at names!
The other inconvenience that I found is that my eyes are already drained enough after an entire day in front of a computer to keep forcing them until midnight. I have many issues with eye sight and so I’m always careful with adding more work to them.
I was about to drop it but then took the decision of switching to the audio-book instead. For me this was the best decisions, it solved all my problems. I have to admit that took me a couple of chapters to get use to the voices, specially since they change the narrator depending on the main character and I’m not a big voice of the woman’s narration. But once I got use to it everything changed.
First of all, I can read more and faster. As you may know I usually consume content at 2x, but reading at double my usual speed would be quite tricky. But whith an audio book I can crank up the speed with no problem. I keep it at 1.5x because of course comprehending a fantasy story is way harder than a youtube video but still, I gain some time with that. But more importantly, I can read while doing chores at home. This means I can read more often and, as a good side effect, that I don’t mind doing them ^^.
I finished the first entry, The Eye of the World, in about a month. Sadly I was not really impressed by it. I was aware that it’s really just an introduction to the series, to a huge world and story, but that’s not an excuse for moving on so slowly. You can read on Goodreads the review I left just after finishing it.
But that didn’t made me stop. Just by the end it got interesting so I quickly jumped into the second one before I lost the hype. Right now I’m about 80% on The Great Hunt and I have to say that I’m liking it way more. The story still moves really slow but I think the characters caught my interest already, which is good.
I hope I can finish it soon and have enough energy to continue with the series!
", "date_published" : "2020-03-25T23:00:00Z", "id" : "https://alejandromp.com/personal/blog/getting-into-the-wheel-of-time", "summary" : "When somebody asks me what kind of books I read the answer is always the same: fiction. I very rarely read non-fiction books because real life is boring, a funny sentence that I said without thinking many years ago and became a constant joke at work. Jokes aside, I think it describes quite right what I look for when reading: I want to visit other worlds and live other lives.", "tags" : [ "Books" ], "title" : "Getting into The Wheel of Time and audiobooks", "url" : "https://alejandromp.com/personal/blog/getting-into-the-wheel-of-time" } ], "language" : "en", "title" : "Personal Blog - Alejandro M. P.", "version" : "https://jsonfeed.org/version/1.1" }