Happy New Year. It is 2024. Well, when I'm filming it is not 2024, but it's nearly 2024. As my last few videos have probably made a parent again, like new job, new situation, trying to make videos when I can. So I had the best of intentions of doing separate videos for worst of best of priorities, but that didn't happen. And I don't really feel like breaking it up cause I like really the only reason to break it up is like for views. And I just, whatever. That's not really why I have a YouTube channel. I just do this for funsies. Anyway, so yeah, today we're gonna do them all. So I thought it would actually be kind of cool to do them all together. Like it actually does make kind of sense in addition to just being also because I need to. So like on that little like cusp night before day of to do, to wrap up the old year and to then set plans for the new year. So that's what we're doing today. I've got 10 best of, 10 worst of for 2023. And then as last year I had my priorities list and then I ended up vlogging me reading those priorities. I basically wanted to do that again for 2024 because that worked out pretty well.  If you watched the vlog, then you know that I very much did not. But that's not, I mean, I have some of my favorites of the year. We're also from that project, so it wasn't all bad. So yeah, that's what we're doing. I guess a few disclaimers. I don't have disclaimers, the right word. I did a ton of rereading this year, which made it a little bit difficult, frankly, to kind of one of the reasons that mostly it was time. But I was also like, oh man, like I reread so much. Like what did I even read this year? And I do like the books a lot that I picked for my best of. Don't get me wrong. But when I thought back on the year, other years I've been like, well, obviously this is going on, so let's see what else I read. And there wasn't a single book really that came to mind as like, oh well, this obviously. And I felt a little bad about that because when I looked at what I had read this year, there were some really good books. But my overall impression of 2023 as a reading year is like not very great. Cause again, a lot of it was rereading, which I do like to do, but when it's so much as rereads, it does feel like I'm not actually reading anything, if that makes sense. Cause I'm not like encountering new stories. So when I look back on 2023, I'm like, oh, what are these like new favorites of mine? I'm like, well, mostly I was just rereading stuff. I definitely also overextended myself. I both like by agreeing to other people's ideas and projects and my own and just a bunch of things. I just had too many things going on that just didn't make it fun. So I was constantly like reading stuff that I had was for some obligation that I had signed myself up for slash half the time those obligations were rereads. Yeah. Anyway, so I read a total of 128 books in, is that true? I wrote it down. Yeah, I read 128 books as of right now. Tonight I could read two more and make it 130, but I probably won't do that. But of those 128, 37, nearly 40 of them were rereads. So do you see how I feel?  It doesn't feel like progress towards anything.  I really feel like reading right now. I'm really just like dying to read the first law, which is always true. But instead they were rereads that were for like, readalongs and buddy reads and projects and things like that. So yeah, I've been the happiest reading, I think in the last couple of months because I was mostly finished with those obligations or I had given up on them, looking at you year of naming. In the last couple of months, the majority of my like reading months have been new reads and that has been great. Anyway, okay, all that to say, I originally was gonna give myself permission to use rereads on my worst of and best of. I didn't end up needing to, but I almost did that. And it was kind of close. Cause originally I was gonna allow myself to choose it for best of, but not for worst of. But then I was like, actually, I didn't actually like all my rereads. I could do some rereads for worst of. But anyway, no, everything on my best of and worst of is new to me.  With all of that out of the way, I've, in the past I've done best, worst, best, worst, best worst, like as like a back and forth type thing. I did not rank them, I cannot rank them or I cannot be arsed to rank them. But I just also, I don't think that I could. So it's just 10 and 10. They're not like in ascending order of greatness or anything like that. They're just 10 books, no particular order. And because I'm also doing my priorities, I think that's a positive thing. So I will start with best of books, then we'll do negativity and do worst of books and then we'll end positive again with priorities for 2024. And that's like a kind of compliment seeing which approach to my reading. All right, finally done with announcements and things. Let's do, what did I say first? Best, best of the year. So again, in no particular order, these are not like 10th to first or anything like that. If you saw, I did do a clip for a library of a Viking when he asked booktubers to film a clip sharing their favorite book of the year. I did pick one for that. And I guess if I had to rank these, I guess that one would be at the top, but yeah. Okay, so first, just because it's the top of my stack, no particular order, it is A Lud in the Mist by Hope Merleys, which was actually towards the beginning of the year. I chose this for the plays and bodice servers of Book Club, which we were doing again in 2024 where we dress up, me, myself, me, myself, me, Mara from Wicked Like Well, Bethany from Beauty, Food, Book, Bethany and Amanda from The Naughty Librarian. So this is my pick. And I can confess now because I don't know, I still kind of want to do it, but I didn't. This is originally intended to be part of a vlog project that I didn't get around to making much progress on in 2023. And so originally I chose it because I was like, well, I would like to choose it for Book Club Plus. It'll like knock out one of the books for my vlog project. And then yeah, I didn't end up being able to finish that. So I still kind of want to do that vlog project and I might include this one in it even though it will have, maybe I'll reread it. I don't know. I might still want to do that vlog project so I won't say what it is because I like to keep them kind of as a surprise, but... Anyway, this book, this is a pre-Tolkenean fantasy and it is, it was cited as an inspiration both for Neil Gaiman writing Stardust and for Susanna Clark writing Jonathan Strange and Mr. Norrell. And for both of those reasons, I was very interested in reading this, actually for all three of those reasons because reading pre-Tolkan fantasy, it's like, did fantasy exist before Tolkan? Is that allowed? And I do really love Jonathan Strange and Mr. Norrell and I like Stardust. I don't love it. And reading this, as I said in my Stardust video and in book club meeting for this, made me like Stardust better because instead of Stardust just being a book by itself, it is just like eh, I still don't think it's that good and it's certainly a pale imitation of this but it made me kind of appreciate like what it was that Neil Gaiman was kind of in conversation with and what he was driving inspiration from. So seeing it as a, not really a retelling of this but you know, as like a kind of successor to this is makes Stardust better. So if you've read Stardust and you were not that keen on it but it's a story that like, you feel you ought to have been keen on if that makes sense, then I highly recommend Let in the Mist. And also if you like Jonathan Strange and Mr. Norrell, I also highly recommend Let in the Mist. I made a book for and read this as well for our TBR swap and she enjoyed it. I think this is a pretty good, actually, I don't think I ever read this little blur but I don't know how I missed it. I don't know who Mary Gentile is but she says a Shakespearean tragic comedy, a murder mystery and a multifaceted allegory all in one and a damn good story too. And I would fully endorse that description of this book. So it's older, so the prose in it is a little bit more verbose, a little more formal and therefore a little bit harder to like get into but not harder than reading any classic frankly. So you know, if you're reading Rebecca by Daphne Jamaurier that's a little bit more verbose than something written nowadays. Just like, I mean, Tolkien is that way as well. So if you're willing to sit down and kind of like take a minute to digest the sentences. And then after that, I think you kind of get a flow, at least I did, reading it. Once you kind of get into the headspace of wordier sentences that are more formal, I feel like it gets faster. Anyway, I really, really enjoyed this obviously. It's in my top 10. Then finally, at long last, I did finish reading The Green Bound Saga, Jade Legacy by Van der Lee. I did read this brick because it was on my priorities for the year. My patrons picked it for me to vlog for them and that ended up being a two-parter because I, because it was so long. So they ended up getting like, I think in total like three hours of vlog for this. And yeah, this, what an ending. Green Bound Saga, man. I think when in the priorities vlog where I also had a clip about this, it might complaint, if any, is that because this spans so many years to wrap up the story, that there is a bit of like time skipping that is kind of takes you out of the flow a bit and doesn't really allow you to kind of like linger on some of the more dramatic moments because we have to move on to the next time skip. So you don't really get to see a lot of the kind of ramifications in the short term after something cataclysmic has happened because now it's five years later and you get a recap of what they ended up, how they ended up kind of like recovering from the last bombshell. But you don't have like see that recovery. It's just like, by the way, that's kind of how they handled it. I personally would have preferred this because I don't think this book could possibly be any longer and that'd be reasonable. So I would be, have been fine with the Green Bound Saga being four books instead of three to give this a little bit more breathing room. But that being said, it wasn't, I still give it five stars. So pacing is like really the only complaint that I had about it. And for something that had to cover so very much, I think it still did a pretty good job. Like the pacing wasn't as good as the previous two, but if like the assignment is you have to get through the story in this one book, you cannot have two books, then if that is the like requirement, then I think it was done as well as that could possibly be done, if that makes sense. So yeah, the Green Bound Saga, one of my favorite series now, and I probably will reread it. It is still so unique, so different from everything else out there. Jade City remains I think my favorite installment in terms of reading experience, but all three, five stars each, just an absolutely amazing series. And this is the book that I did pick for my favorite of the year for that clip. And that is Citadel of the Autarch. I don't have a volume of it that is by itself, only in bind ups. I have the Folio Society editions that are also bind ups and then these editions which are bind ups. So I'm not choosing Sword and Citadel. I mean, I'm choosing, well yeah, I'm not choosing Sword and Citadel, which is the name of the bind up, but I'm not choosing Sword of the Lictor, which is the first book in this bind up. I am choosing Citadel of the Autarch, which is the fourth and final-ish book in the Book of the New Sun. The Book of the New Sun, which like I have a video covering this, is supposed to be four books, which is what is contained in these kind of bind ups, but he did end up writing Earth of the New Sun as a code after that and whether or not you counted the story as complete before that or after that is a matter of discussion. I think I gave each of the installments in this quartet four stars until Citadel of the Autarch, and I give that five stars. And I think that as a whole, the Book of the New Sun is five stars, but each of the installments kind of each had a thing in it that kind of made me want to docket a star until the last one, because I really feel like the last one sticks the landing in a way that I can and don't envision and being satisfying for every person reading it, but if you're kind of into the project that is the project of these books, if you're down for that, then I wouldn't say the, I wouldn't like it to neatly tie a bow on everything, but I think in terms of what it's been building towards and how it's been written, I think the final installment is as conclusive as it was ever going to be and the way it still leaves a ton of room for questions without being necessarily an open-ended ending, because those can be frustrating as well. And there's certainly books where I'm like, well, I know it's better to leave it open-ended, but it's so frustrating to get to that point. And I feel like a book that is able to both be a conclusion and leave enough kind of open where it's not like, you know, roll credits, you know? Leave something still not fully explained, leaves enough for you to kind of like see where this would continue without it feeling like bait for a sequel. I think the first law does this really, really well. I think last argument of Kings does that really well where it's a conclusive ending that still has open-ended bits. Yeah, I just, I think, this is certainly not for everybody, the series at all in general, but I think if you are down for this project, I think it's well worth the read and I think that you are, if you're worried about whether or not it's worth it to read through this, like if it's gonna go somewhere that's satisfying, I personally feel that it is quite satisfying. It is my favorite installment in the four. Oh, if you don't know what this is at all, which I'm kind of assuming you do, it's a dying earth story that was written in the style of supposedly, in this far future, this is the memoir of a person living in this far future that was for timey-wimey reasons like this manuscript was received by Gene Wolfe who is able to translate it into our present day speech because language has changed a lot, you know, in the thousands of years that betwixt our time and their time. So Gene Wolfe has translated this far future manuscript for us, so there's like multiple layers of how reliable this narrative is because it is a memoir which is inherently kind of unreliable from a time and place that we don't fully understand what we'll have no context for that is being kind of like translated for us from a perhaps unreliable translator. So I think it's a fascinating project and I think it's exceedingly well done. Not an easy read for many reasons, but I think it's worth it. Then a more recent read is Parable of the Sower by Octavia Butler, which my patrons chose for me to read. And I really, really enjoyed this. Octavia Butler is three for three. Each of her books that I've read has had something in it for me to be like, it's not perfect. So I think I've given them all five stars, definitely four stars, possibly five stars for all three, but it's never been like, oh, that was five stars, no question, no complaint, that was perfect. It's always been like, that bothered me, but still five stars, or that bothered me. Almost five stars had to give it four, you know, like, but still fantastic. Like there hasn't been a week one in the bunch really. There's just always been like a little bit of a something in the books to make me go, well, not that bit, or I wish that was a little different or something like that. So I really, really enjoyed Parable of the Sower. I had originally intended this to be my first Octavia Butler and then it didn't end up being my first or my second. I certainly want to read Parable of the Talents. I have some reservations just because I know this is an incomplete series. So it kind of, I don't know. I know people, I don't feel that way about King Killer or Song of Life and Fire. Maybe it's because the authors are still alive. So there's always the chance that they could be finished. But I often say that I don't care if it ever is finished or I shouldn't say I don't care, but like I don't think that should affect your choice whether or not to read it. I think it's worthwhile to read what's there. So weirdly for this series, I feel more so, kind of like, well, it's not finished. So these ideas are never gonna like fully be, you know, come to whatever that she had envisioned. But I do still want to read Parable of the Talents. And this was something about Octavia Butler's writing, all three books. It's just so digestible. It's so readable. This harrowing content in all three books, but it just goes down so smooth and easy. I think in my vlog for this book, I compared it to like a really strong cocktail that's done a really good job of masking the flavor of alcohol where you can just like swallow it really fast. And then it hits and you're like, whoa, that was strong. But it wasn't like hard to get it down. That makes sense. But it's strong content. I hope that metaphor makes sense. Anyway, again, it's on my top 10. So I do recommend it. Next, perhaps controversially, is Fool's Assassin by Robin Hobb. Notably this is on my top 10, but no other Robin Hobb, meaning that the books two and three in the fits in the full series are not. On this list, because I think that the series, this trilogy peeked at book one. I unpopularly have a great deal of issues with the ending of this trilogy and therefore the ending of The Realm of the Elderlings, which I've talked about quite a bit, especially in our sort of like wrap up live show, Me and Mara, we read the whole realm of the Elderlings together. But I still highly recommend The Realm of the Elderlings. And I love Robin Hobb's writing and I love these stories and I love these characters. I just have very particular issues with certain kinds of stories and ideas and certain kinds of choices and et cetera and certain kind of narratives. And they are very oftentimes things that don't bother anyone else that aren't even the things that don't bother people. There are things that people like that I actively dislike. So I'm by no means like representative of the majority when I say that I dislike the ending. I think most people do love the ending or at least if they don't love it, I don't think it's for the same reasons that I don't. Anyway, this first book in this trilogy, I gobbled it up, devoured it, like swallowed it in a day and was like, Mara, Mara, we cannot wait a month to read the next one. And she read it, she was like, okay, yeah, no, we need to read immediately. So this first book, it was so unexpected and so, I mean, it's book, what, 13, 12, 13 in the series. So it's kind of hard to say what it is or what's going on without being spoilery. It somehow manages to be both like cozy in the way that Robin Hobb's books often can be while still like heart wrenching, heart warming, heart racing, just such strange things that I didn't like didn't expect, didn't wasn't on my bingo card for this to be in a book at all, let alone in this book. It was fantastic, possibly my favorite book in the whole realm of the Elderlings, although I think that honor still goes to Royal Assassin. But so very, very good. That's why it's on my top check. Next is an extremely recent read, very recent. And that is Winter Spirits, Ghostly Tales for Frosty Nights, which is an anthology of ghost stories for Christmas. And I have always, ever since learning of it, loved that idea and wished that we still kind of did that, the idea, the tradition of telling ghost stories at Christmas, which is like why the Christmas Carol exists. It's like that's part of that tradition. So it's like the only one that we still do and it's not even like a particularly scary one. It's more of a heartwarming one. But like The Woman in Black, I think the framing device for that is that it's being told at Christmas as a ghost story. I love the idea of like Christmas Eve ever going around the fire telling ghost stories. Anyway, that's neither hand or there. This is an anthology and I found it actually because I loved the binding and the betrayals by Bridget Collins. So I was just looking to see if there were other Bridget Collins books. And this popped up because she is one of the authors that contributed to this collection. And when I saw that I was like, well, who else I'm not gonna buy a collection just because of her one story, who else is in it? And there were other authors here that I was familiar with slash liked. So Catriona Ward, Kieran Millwood Hargrave, Natasha Pooley, Stuart Turton. Anyway, there were other authors that I liked and was interested in. So I got the collection and honestly the weakest story of the bunch was Bridget Collins. The entire reason that I found this and got this so it was kind of surprising and disappointing. But frankly, every single other story was really good to really great. There really wasn't a weak story in the bunch except for Bridget Collins story, which again, it's kind of surprising. But for an anthology, for there to really be only be one story that was kind of a letdown, amazing. So I really enjoyed reading this in December. They are, they kind of span from a little bit kind of unsettling to like quite unsettling. And basically every single story again except for Bridget Collins left me wanting more but not in like a negative way. Not like, well, this would have been better if it was longer. Just like, I was so invested in the vibe and like with any like collection of stories, I do feel kind of this whiplash of like I've just sunk into this character and this story and this world and this place and I'm already done and I already have to do it all over again. Where I have to like, okay, where are we now? Who are we now? What's the situation? And you can't like stay in it for that long. You have to like keep doing that over and over. Like, where are we now? Where are we now? Where are we now? So that being said, each one pretty much hooked me almost right away except for Bridget Collins and kept me hooked until I finished the story. And yeah, every story basically. So I know this is the second collection they did. I wasn't aware of this until this book. So unfortunately the stunning like special edition of the first collection they did which is the haunting season I think is like long since sold out but it is still available for purchase in paperback. So I'll probably get that. Well, it's as pretty as this one, but yeah. Anyway, I highly recommend this collection. They are Christmas stories but only pretty much in so far as like each of them takes place on or around Christmas. Almost none of the stories, almost none have much to do with Christmas. Mostly it's just like when they are happening. So Christmas is like in the background or like the reason the family members are together is because it's Christmas. So like they're all in the same house right now but it's not like about Christmas. So you could read it in January or just get it now and read it next December. It's so good. Next was a book that I almost got rid of before reading it and then I'm so relieved and glad that I didn't. And that is Other Birds by Sarah Addison Allen which I got from Book of the Month and I didn't read it in the month that I got it. And then it had been months and months and months and I still hadn't read it and the library did not have the audio book for it which is usually how I get through books that I'm like not that excited about. I'm like, oh, let me just get the audio from the library at some point, you know, in the car or something, I'll listen to it. And I was like, I have to sit down and actually read this book. And I was like, okay, fine, well, I'll give it a go. And if I don't like it, then I can get rid of it. Like at least try it before getting rid of it. And I loved it so much and it made me go and buy the author's backlist. It was also like the bright time to reading it. So it was just as well that I waited because the book has a kind of summary vibe and I read it in summer and it takes place kind of, I think it's on an island. Or if not an island, it's certainly like a coastal area. And there's, it's a small town and there's like, there's a mystery and there's like, it's kind of magical realism and there's, it's like, it's warm and charming and also kind of chilling and unsettling at times and mysterious and there's, because it's like summertime and like, the ocean side and this place, they, they marshmallow grows there. So they're famous for their marshmallow candy made with the marshmallow that grows there. I lit like a marshmallow scented candle and sat, you know, for the long summer evenings reading this. And it was just like the perfect time for it. It just hit the spot. It's exactly what I was needing and craving. And again, I went and bought the other author's backlist. I have not read those books, but I loved this so very, very much. It was just, it was just perfect. So yeah. The book that was in my priorities vlog, they weren't all horrible. And that was The Secret Commonwealth, a book two of the Book of Dust by Philip Pullman. With this, again, there was a thing in it that I called out as like, I don't know why this is here. I don't know if this is necessary. This is kind of weird. But aside from that really, I was kind of surprised by how very, very much I liked The Secret Commonwealth. I really enjoyed the Belle Sauvage, the first book. But The Secret Commonwealth, I really, really, really liked. And for this being like a spin-off prequel-sequel situation, that doesn't ever sound promising. It's like almost always a bad idea to do something like that. You know, like coming back to a story that you already finished, it's like, but why is it necessary? And Abercrombie and Pierce Brown and now Philip Pullman have proved that like it was a good idea. It's not always a bad idea. So yeah. I love the world that this takes place in. I like following these characters when they're a little bit older. It follows up on some of the themes of His Dark Materials in a way that continues like the characters have matured and so these themes have matured with them and there are new questions to be asked about the implications of some of the situations set up by His Dark Materials. And I think it's just handled so well and so interestingly and so immersively and I really, really want him to finish the book of dust. I really want to read the next book. So if you read His Dark Materials and had reservations similar to what I alluded to you might have in reading the book of dust, you're like, well, do we need to spin off? I think it's very good. In some respects, the book of dust I think is, you know, not wholly, but again, in some respects, I think it's better than His Dark Materials. We haven't seen the conclusion yet. Maybe he fumbles the landing. But so far, Lebel Suvage and Secret Commonwealth, well worth the read. Another super recent read and not as recent as Winter Spirits, but pretty recent is Starling House by Alex E. Harrow, which I also got from Book of the Month. This is not the Book of the Month Club edition. After I finished it, I went and got the Barnes and Noble special edition because I wanted a nicer copy for the Book of the Month Club editions. You know, they all have the little Book of the Month Club thing and they're all as like stripped down in bare bones as possible, which is why they can be so cheap, which is nice for like books that I don't care that much about. But this one I wanted to own a nice, nice copy of. I actually sent my Book of the Month Club edition to someone that I was talking to about the book. And I was like, I have an extra copy that I'm probably just gonna sell on Pango. Like, do you want it? And they were like, okay. So I don't have that copy anymore, but yeah, this is kinda like other birds in that like I kind of got it from Book of the Month and was like, ah, I might like it, I don't know. And I did read it like pretty immediately, which it wasn't like months and months, but I didn't have any particularly high hopes for it. I wasn't like gagging to read it or anything. I read it because I got it from Book of the Month. And it was like, it sounded like good enough. And I devoured this, love this. And the best read alike I can give for it is that this feels like The Raven Cycle by Maggie Steve Otter for grown-ups, both because the characters are more adult and also because like the themes and the way the story unfolds and the things in it are a little bit more adult. But like the way it's written, like the style of the prose and then also the kind of like magical realism, nature, creepy, haunting, gothic-ness of everything really reminds me of The Raven Cycle. So if you like The Raven Cycle and in general enjoy Maggie Steve Otter's writing, then I highly recommend Starling House. And if you really enjoyed Starling House and have not read The Raven Cycle, then I also recommend you read The Raven Cycle. And last but certainly not least is another book from my priorities project, Demon Voices by Philip Pullman. I kind of went on and on and on about this in the priorities vlog. And so yeah, I kind of said all the rest, well I shouldn't say all the rest to say, I shouldn't say a ton because I just kept yammering on and on and on and on. And I love this collection so very much. And I guess a part of why I yammered on and on and on is because Philip Pullman's positions on certain controversial topics is controversial. And I don't want that to put people off from reading this collection because I mean I was I guess belaboring the point in that clip. I don't think that you need to agree with everything Philip Pullman thinks or says to read this book or to enjoy this book. Because I certainly don't agree with everything that Philip Pullman thinks or says. But I love this book. And I loved engaging with the ideas as presented and discussed by Philip Pullman. Even if I have a different conclusion or perspective, like reading his was an invitation to consider these things for myself. And to ask myself, what do I think about this? So yeah, in terms of his positions on writing craft and on reading craft and on different mediums for storytelling and on children's literature versus adult literature, on speculative fiction and what it is or should be and more strictly philosophical topics, you know the nature of religion, the nature of organized religion the nature of faith and belief, the nature of science versus belief. Like there's lots in here and lots of food for thought. And that's how I regard this book as just a feast for thought. So yeah, Heather Piment. The books that I are my worst of the year I do not have a stack. I own some of them physically still possibly with the majority, I don't know but I don't have them all because I tend to get rid of books that I don't like. So I wasn't gonna have a partial stack. Just no stack at all. Actually, I think I might own all of the books. Like I might actually be able to hold. No, no, no. I am missing at least one. Again, in no particular order. So first, just on the list is Sharkheart. I didn't write any author's names down. So the image that presumably I have put here shows you who the author is. Sharkheart was awful. Well, I shouldn't say a lot. One, two, four books are from Book of the Month which I did cancel. I think I mentioned it in a previous video. No more Book of the Month Club for me. Anyway, Sharkheart was a ridiculous premise but a premise that had the potential to if done right kind of like, say something quite worthwhile or be quite brilliant despite being kind of bizarre. Oftentimes the most brilliant books take a bizarre idea and just like handle it really well but it handled it up poorly and it didn't seem to know why it had chosen this ridiculous premise. Like what exactly it wanted to do? Like what was the purpose of this metaphor? If you're not familiar, Sharkheart is about this couple where early in their marriage or just before they get married but regardless, it's a young couple. One of them gets diagnosed with turning into a shark which is I guess not a terminal condition but it is an irreversible condition. And I feel like you could really write something that was like poignant and heartwarming while being ridiculous and that that book wasn't it. It was really long and for being what you would imagine like a really character driven story because that's gonna be kind of how that has to work. It's not very like, the character work is not good or well done and this whole, like here and there there are these kind of like obvious scenes where like it's really obvious what this whole shark disease thing is a metaphor for but so much of the world building is not thought through. And if the story had been told more fable like perhaps that would work but the story does actually like bring into it you know like government policies regarding how people have these conditions to be treated. So it like invites you to question how the world actually works where this kind of a condition is a possibility and has not fully thought through the implications of how it has set up its world building. So it's just badly thought out, badly done badly executed. So yeah, and it's a slog to get through. Next on my list is a book that I originally intended to do a full review for and then it had been too long and now it's definitely been too long but I ran into my patients the better while I was reading it. And that's Immortal Longings by Chloe Gong and I am done with trying Chloe Gong. This was sold as a Anthony and Cleopatra retelling has very little to do with Anthony Cleopatra. I heard some people saying, well that's kind of like that's misleading in the marketing and for sure fair, fair enough. And if it was a great story then I would be happy to be like, well I wouldn't, I don't know how much of a retelling it is but it's a great book on its own. It's not a great book on its own. It's a terrible book. It's written like YA, this is her first adult book but like with so many unfortunately, books that are like on YA authors first foray into adult writing. It's like, but this isn't any different from what you usually write. The only difference is that the characters are older. So if you're not gonna write any different, like why? Why not just keep writing YA? This isn't, you haven't changed anything.  Characterization is awful.  The prose is frankly atrocious. So yeah, it was, yeah, it was terrible. Number three on my list, I was like looking at this list and going, did I read that this year? And I did, but it was in January. So it feels like it barely counts. That is The Winter King by Bernard Cornwall which was a big disappointment. I have a quite lengthy, well lengthy-ish review on Goodreads for it. I hated this book so very much. I still wanna read more Bernard Cornwall, not the rest of the Arthur series though I do own those books. Definitely not that. But his Viking books and the Shark books, I do still wanna read those. But The Winter King was terrible and so many baffling choices in terms of the perspective of who's telling it and how we're telling it and what we're trying to do with this Arthur story. And the amount of sexual violence that's in it is staggering. It's just a miserable read in my opinion. And it's so hyped. I, it is not for me to say the least. Another book of the month, the book Pineapple Street by, I forget. After reading it, I learned that the person who wrote it is like somebody from publishing. I think she was like an editor or some kind of an exec in publishing. So it made a lot more sense to me that this book was published and promoted so much after I learned that because I was like, this is not a good book. I don't know who this book is for.  But there's like not really a story and it's not, it's neither like tearing down the rich and satirizing them nor is it like trying to make them like relatable and sympathetic. It's doing me there somehow. So it's just like, who is this for? What is this for? It's not interesting. It's not engaging. It's not like, wow, let's like a gawk at the ridiculousness of the rich nor is it saying, hey, the rich are humans too.    So it's just like, why? I do love the cover, adore the cover. That's probably the only reason I got it. Then number five fittingly is five warrior angels. I didn't realize I had done that on my list until just now. I read the first two books. I didn't want them to take up two slots on this list. So they both share number five. Again, these are in no particular order. I was reading these four are read along that we cut short because we were hating the books. We did not want to continue reading the books. We could not imagine that the third book would improve matters. And everything that we've heard is that it doesn't very much does not. Five warrior angels is too long for one. Extremely heavy handed with its messaging. The world building is delivered really, really poorly. The characterization is done really badly.  We're just heavy handed. But also just because this world is bad to women, then the author thinks that's an excuse to kind of write about women in dehumanizing ways. And it's like, no, that's not how that works. Just some baffling descriptions of women. And then all of these really unfortunate kind of, are they tropes? These are like tropes that authors fall into where it's like, well, how do we show that this woman is like, not like other girls? You know, like, let's give her a sword. Or like, how do we show that we don't like this girl? Oh, she's like freely and likes her appearance. And every woman's appearance is described so much more than the appearances of the dudes. I guess stuff like that where the author's just telling on himself, like, you can set up a world where in that world women have less rights and that's part of your real building. But just the way you're choosing to describe people and things, the way you're choosing to focus on women's appearances more so than men's and how much that is a focus of the male characters around them as well, is really gross to read.  But this is like 80, 20. And it's just exhausting to read it after a while. It just feels gross and the story isn't good enough for me to like put up with that. It just, there wasn't an upside. So yeah, it was terrible. Next I have The Unmaking of June Farrell by Adrienne Young and I am finally done with Adrienne Young. I keep buying her books and I keep not liking them. She peaked at her first one, Sky and the Deep, which wasn't great. For a debut, there was a YA Viking book when no one was doing that. It was good, it was like decent. And every book since then has been worse and worse and worse and this was not her first adult book. Her first adult book was last year, the year before, Spells for Forgetting, which was very forgettable.  Like I would want to like get coffee with her and like have her as a neighbor. Like she's really like a chill person. And then the concepts for all of her books, they always sound intriguing to me in the cover designs. They're always like, oh, that sounds like a really cool idea for a book, but then the execution is always so lackluster to terrible and I'm finally done. Like I'm sure that whatever she comes out with next will once again be a premise that sounds intriguing, that sounds like a book I'd be interested in and will probably have a really cool cover and I will probably be like enticed to buy it. But I'm, no, I've never liked her books. The best that it's ever been is me going, well, I'm trash for Vikings and this was decent, therefore I like this fine. That's the best that it's ever been. So I, yeah, I'm finally done. No more. I've accepted it. I don't actually think she's a good writer. Oh yeah, but the reason it's friend making of June for Sharon Farah being bad is again, it feels really amateurish for this. This is like what her seventh book or something, if not more. And so the writing itself amateurish. The story is like it's okay. This once again, it's like a cool concept but it's not executed terribly well. Characterization is not done very well. And then there's some like kind of like implications of how it was written that were kind of not great. But I was like, whatever. I mean, I don't like this book and that doesn't make it better, but like whatever. And then her afterward like drew attention to the fact that she knows exactly why some of those choices might be a little bit questionable but how, because she's like aware of it that makes it better. And I was like, oh, that made it so much worse. For you, like reading this, me just going kind of like, ah, it's kind of thoughtless of you to have written it like this, but fine, whatever. And for her to write the afterward to be like, yeah, no, I know actually what I did. I just want you to know that I know. Like how is that better? That was so much worse. And I'm sure she was told to put that there. I'm not necessarily saying that she decided that it would be better to point it out, but whoever decided to point it out, I don't think that did what you thought it would do. Then the next three were all in my priorities vlog and I ranted at length about all three. So that's Wolf Hall and the Essex Serpent and Priory of the Orange Tree. Again, I've ranted for so long about those that I don't have the energy to rant about them all over again. But suffice to say, Wolf Hall overrated terribly written. I don't understand the hype or the awards. She did her research, woo, gold star. Essex Serpent made me livid. Awful, terrible characterization. This is not feminism, hate it. And Priory of the Orange Tree, also this is not feminism. This does not need to be 800 pages. This is not how you world build. This is not complexity in politics. This is not how you write good fantasy. And last is Splendid by the author of the Bridgerton books, Julia, something, I think. This was a Blaze and Bodice Rippers book club pick. Clearly not my pick. And I hated it so very, very much. It was really, really long. I did not find the romance compelling. I found a lot of the kind of like anachronistic, like supposedly feminist points I was trying to make. Again, not just anachronistic, which always irritates me, but like also not very feminist. Like it ultimately ended up kind of like doing things that made it anti-feminist in some respects. And some of the like ways that the hero would like speak and do things. And it was like, this isn't romantic. That is, those are red flags. I was not entertained. It was not enjoyable. And it was in fact, quite infuriating. Onto then my priorities for 2024. And the stack is yonder. So let me go and fetch it. Oh God, I'm trapped. Last year's priority list had no rhyme or reason in terms of the number of books. It was just like a stack of books. And this year, I decided specifically to choose 12 books so that in theory, I could read one a month and achieve this goal. Not that I necessarily will structure it that way, but that I could structure it that way and get it done. But I might read to them all in January. That's not gonna happen. Anyway, so that's, it's another stack of books that for one reason or another, which I will explain now, I want to get it done, that it's, yeah. Okay, let's do it. First and foremost, and I do mean foremost, is Lightbringer, my first brown, which I should have read in 2023 and I still haven't. I did start it. I did start it. I have not finished it. And so the read-along lies dead and dormant. I will though. This is priority number one. In January, this can be number one. I will finish Lightbringer because, because I need to. Next up is a book that has not been around for very long on my TBR at all, at all at all. That is Encyclopedia of Ferries by Heather Fawcett. The main reason for this is because there are other books coming out slash have come just, just either have just come out or are coming out or both. Anything one's a spin-off, one's a sequel? I don't know. There's other books connected to this that intrigue me also. And I am very likely to just go out and buy them, but I would like to have read this first. To know that I like this. And if I don't like this, well then I'm not gonna buy those other books. This is kind of priority of the orange tree. Like I really wanted the sequel to it because it was so pretty. But I was like, you haven't even read priority yet.  Now I have and can say for certain that I hate priority and I would certainly hate the other books. So no, it's beautiful, but no. So similar to this, like I think I might like this, but I don't know that. And I'm not gonna go out and buy all the other books that are also pretty until I know that I like this one. So girly, you better read this this year and read it quick so that you can go buy those other books or not because you hate this. Then I want to read my broken binding books because of the main reason I'm subscribed to broken binding is the first law books. Everyone is shocked. But there's all these other pretty books that they keep sending me and I keep not reading them. So I have put the Boneships on this. Actually that was part of why the ninth reign was on my list this last year. And I didn't like it. So that's three gone. So the Boneships, I have the whole trilogy from the broken binding and these stunning additions. So let's read the first one and see how I like it. If I like it, well then great. Let's read the trilogy and we can be glad to have it. If not, well then let's get rid of it. Then I keep collecting Natasha Pooley books. There's just dust on this because I've had this for forever. This was the first one. So that's why it's on this list. I have owned the Watchmaker of Filligree Street since it came out. This is probably a first edition. Okay, it's not a first edition. I've owned this basically since it came out because it's pretty and has this like hole in it and it's gilded and pretty. And I've said pretty like 10 times. And as far as I know, I don't even know that much is that it's either alternate history or like steampunk or like historical fantasy, something like that. And all her books are so pretty and I keep buying them and not reading them. And I need to like actually know if I like them. I think there's a good chance that I would. They all sound great. And again, Adrian Young's books sound great and they aren't. So anyway, this was the first one that I ever bought. So I want to read it and confirm if these are any good. So yeah, looking forward to this. The next one, actually the next two are books that I keep putting on buddy read polls for my patrons and they keep not choosing them. So you know what, screw y'all. I'm not gonna wait for y'all anymore. You don't want to read a message received. I will read them myself and they're probably great and you're missing out or they suck, I don't know, we'll find out. But that is A Crown for Cold Silver by Alex Marshall and Heroes Die by Matthew Woodring Stover. I really want to read these. And I, I'm tired of waiting. So I'm just gonna, but then it's also because I tend to only read books that are in some way a priority. They're for a project, they're for a buddy read, they're for a read along, which is kind of, I was like, I really want to read these. Well, if I make it a patron buddy read, well then I have to read it and I want to read it. And they know if they never choose it. So I'm making it a priority for the priorities project. So now I can read them for that and y'all are gonna miss out. Next is a book that one of my patrons raved about and then a different patron got the book for me. And that is Illborn by Daniel T. Jackson. I have since heard, this is really heavy. Why is this, are these pages just like Bible-thin pages? Anyway, I have since been told that I probably will not like this but I would like to know for myself and I have it. So if I hate it, well then I can sell it. And if I love it, well then great. I have a new book to love. This is so heavy, why is this so heavy? Next is a book from a friend that is always complaining that she reads the books that I suggest to her but she never reads, but I never read the books that she suggests to me which is partly true. But I also just have more obligations than she does in terms of reading. So I'm like, I don't have time. Anyway, she not only recommended this, not only recommended this to me but gave me a copy of The Bonechart Daughter. So I'm gonna read it, okay? I'm gonna freaking read a book that you recommended and you have, this friend has since read the second book or maybe the third book later in the series and is like, ah, it's actually not that good. I was like, well, you gave me the first one. I said that I have to read it. So I'm reading it, okay? Okay. Next up I have Starsight by Brandon Sanderson because I really, really liked Skyward and I've been very nervous about reading other books because everyone tells me that I will not like the rest of the series. The fourth and final one just came out. I own them all in the Pretty UK editions and Bookborne tells me that I would probably like Starsight possibly even better than Skyward but that I should stop after that. Can't promise I'll stop after that because I do own them all but all right, I will read Starsight and we'll see if I like it better than Skyward. The next one, I just own so many copies of this. Ink blood sister scribe. I feel like I heard nothing but like excitement and praise and then nothing since. So it like, it's like a firework and then disappeared. I don't know, but I own so many copies of this. I own, I don't even know which one is this. This is the Waterstone edition which my friend kindly got for me. I also have the Illumicant edition and I have another edition. Yeah. Anyway, I have so many copies of this book and it did almost win the Buddy Read poll. It was like so close to winning. So then I put it on the next month and the next month after that and it's like barely anyone's voting for it. And I was like, again with the whole, everyone was hyped for it and then they just like disappeared including on my Patreon. I don't know, I own a bunch. So I wanna know if I like this or if I should get rid of all these pretty books because they are really, really pretty.  Is the naked cover stunning? No, but it's fine. Anyway, yeah, that's the reason for this. Then the next book I've owned this for forever ever. Actually, I haven't owned this for forever, ever, ever. I have owned this trilogy for a really long time and I had like the little, little, the UK paperback size for the first one and then this bigger size for the second and third ones. And for the life of me, I could not find a first book that was like this size and I finally did. And now I have the little size all matching all three and then I have the little size matching all three that are like with signed book plates and I also have these big ones. And so I think I have two and a half or three complete sets of this trilogy and I've not read a single one. And I love the covers of these books. That's mainly why I have them. Anyway, yeah, I should read these since I own so many copies of them. I've been told that I'll probably hate this which I guess we'll see, won't wait. But I'm excited to have the big floppy one to read instead of the tiny one. So yay for that. And I hope I like it because the covers are so pretty and I love guns at the dawn. So, and I liked children of time, didn't love it. So Adrian Tchaikovsky is an author that I have enjoyed. So fingers crossed. And last and possibly least, oh my God, I still have a sticky note in here from like three years ago when I was like trying to be like, read half one day and half the next day. Here's a sticky note to mark your place. I said you should do that more. God's of Jade and Shadow by Sylvia Moreno-Garcia. I got it from Book of the Month and I've put this on so many TVRs and I've put it on buddy read polls and I've like tried to like find a reason to read it and I keep not reading it. And I need to freaking read this book. July 2019 is when I got this. I'm tired of looking at it. I've heard a lot of people say they love it and I've heard a lot of people say they hate it. And I just want it to be done. Maybe this is my new favorite book ever which would be fantastic or it's not. Either way, I just need to know and move on. And that is that 2023 is done and we're ready to start 2024 by reading some of these books. Let me know in the comments down below your plans for the year. If you have read any of the books on my to read list predictions for how I'll feel about them. Whatever you wanna let me know. I post videos, period. Happy new year. Happy to have you here. Checking out my videos if and when I post them. And yeah, I'll chat with you soon in another video presumably. Bye.


My name is Peggy and this is my first time at DEF CON. I'm a noob, although I feel like I know a lot about it already. I have three kids that come to DEF CON every year, and my oldest has been coming for ten years. And he was too young to come at first. He was not an adult yet, so my husband brought him. And we thought after the first year that he had it all out of the system. And then the next year he said that he wanted to go back, and we were a little concerned. And so my husband had to bring him the second year, but he also informed us that he wanted to bring his younger brother.  The third year my oldest was old enough to come by himself and brought his younger brother. And consequently, a year or so later, they brought my youngest daughter. And so they all three come, and they've been coming, like I say, for ten years. It's been a wonderful trip to follow them on and to join them.  They were dumpster diving after reading Grifter's article. I mean, they've done a lot of things. Being the parent of computer geeks who are into building computers and hacking them, and worried about that word hacker ten years ago when it was still new, and they were taking pictures of phone booths everywhere we went, and sending them to 2600 and all of these things they were doing, you know, we were a little bit concerned. And so we thought, well, we'll go with him once, and my husband will go with him, so we thought that was going to be it. And when he said, no mom and dad, I think I'm going to go every year, we realized that we'd better get used to it. And not only have we gotten used to it, we've embraced it. And here I am, after ten years.


You're all very welcome to the IEA this afternoon. Just before I go on to introduce our speaker, the usual housekeeping rules. Mobile phones either off or certainly on silent, please. And Fern von Daal's address when it comes will be on the record. But the question and answer which will follow will be under the Chatham House rules. I'm just thinking that given the news this morning, Brexit does seem to consume all of our time and attention these days. But it's good to be reminded of the much more wide-ranging scope of this institute's ongoing work. And that includes the broader question of the future of the EU, presumably an EU of 27, and the various issues that are posed in that context, greater or lesser integration, the future of the euro, institutional change, and so on. And on one aspect of that, namely the EU and its place and potential in our changing world, we've had the benefit already at the IEA in recent days of sharing views with a distinguished speaker from Chicago, the Council on Foreign Relations there, on the apparent abdication of the United States leadership in the world. And yesterday from a speaker, Dr. Biscop, from the Eggmont Institute on EU external relations in an era of great powers. So to continue in this vein today's address is on opportunities for the European Union in the changing international order. And it's a great pleasure to welcome and introduce our speaker, Baron Transfondal, to this theme. He brings a very varied and deep experience to his presentation on the EU role and potential in a world undergoing significant repositioning of the major global powers. He has represented his own country, Belgium, founder member of the EU, in a number of positions bearing on the European Union and Europe, including as Director General for Political Affairs, permanent representative to the EU from 1997 to 2002, and Chief of Staff to Foreign Minister LaTerm. Most recently, he has been Chief of Staff to His Majesty the King of the Belgians. Secondly, serving in the broader European Union framework, Mr. Vandal has been Chief of Staff to the first President of the European Council. That institution has set up under the Lisbon Treaty, Herman van Rompuy, from late 2009, I think, until 2012. This is a position, obviously, at the heart of the EU's internal workings, but also a post with a significant international profile, not least in the Sherpa role conferred on the Chief of Staff for broader international meetings, not least the G7 and the G8. And finally, outside the strictly EU domain, Baron van Vandal has served as Belgian Ambassador to the United States from 2002 to 2006, Belgian Ambassador to NATO from 2007 to 2009. And I know that he has lectured at and retains links with Stanford, with Johns Hopkins, and in Europe with the College of Law. So drawing on these multiple vantage points, we certainly look forward to your address at a time when, as a former Irish permanent representative to the EU, which is here today, Bob McDonough, as he wrote in yesterday's newspaper, has said the EU is seen by many as a bulwark in the defense of the infrastructure of decency and rational debate, which generations of us have striven to build up. The floor is yours. Thank you very much for your introductory remarks. In the first part, I will be slightly more diplomatic than in the second part, but I was used to this kind of convention when I came to the first time to the Institute five years ago. I would like to share with you some thoughts about the way the world is moving full speed ahead toward the new world disorder. And then I would like to share with you a couple of my thoughts on the place of the European Union in there. My bottom line is very simple. The world is in disorder, so more than ever, we need a strong European Union, but you don't need me to know that. First of all, the world disorder. Like some of you, I remember how the first wave of globalization, which I call the first wave of globalization between 1960 and 1990, just overwhelmed us in the 60s. Remember in the 60s, when I was in high school, we had five hours of Greek, five hours of Latin, five hours of French, four hours of Dutch, and only in the three last years of high school, every week, one hour of German and one hour of English. So the Anglo-Saxon world was not on the screen yet. Then came Dr. No, and West Side Story, and Ledefi American. And so we were living in this first wave of globalization, just mentioning two particularities of this first wave of globalization. It was partial in the sense that it only extended to the countries which were allies of the United States or were living under the American umbrella. It was a partial. And secondly, it was an organized globalization. We had structures which had been built under American leadership. Since the Second World War, we had the WTO, we had the Bretton Woods Institutions, and so on, we had NATO, and we had leadership. American leadership. So this first wave of globalization worked actually quite well. It was structured, and it was led. Then happens the fall of the Berlin Wall. And then we see that we won the Cold War, like President Busch said, we discovered that the United States, having won the Cold War, started the slow inexorable process of withdrawal from global responsibilities. This withdrawal during the second wave of globalization after 1990, after the fall of the Berlin Wall, the second wave of globalization. In the second wave of globalization, we had this American withdrawal on the one hand. It took different forms with Democratic presidents and Republican presidents. On the Democratic side, there was an increasing reticence against military intervention. On the Republican side, withdrawal took the form of trying to withdraw from the multilateral system. And so instead of being in a world was strongly structured and which was led, like we were in the first wave of globalization, in the second wave, we have the absence, the withdrawal of the American disengagement. What was filling the void? Basically, the void was being filled with Asia, China in more in particular. And even today, it's so obvious that during the second wave of globalization, there was a gigantic shift of power from west to east. Look at it ideologically. I mean, the Chinese will always tell you that it's perfectly possible to have prosperity without liberty. They are quite vocal about what they think about, or democratic, et cetera, values. So there was a hydrological shift. There was, of course, a military shift. If you see the military buildup in Asia, it is quite impressive. And there was, of course, a shift of economic power. So in the second wave, you have this withdrawal from its traditional responsibilities by the United States. And you had the void being filled, not by the European Union, but in Asia. So where does that lead us? We are now reverting to a disorderly world. We have known that in our past in Europe. You have a world of shifting alliances. You have a world with arms race. You have a world without much of a rulebook. So this has become something much more unpredictable than we knew in the past. Some people say, well, what is going to define the times we are living in? It's going to be the rivalry between an emerging power, China, and a declining power, the United States. This book of Graham Allison about Tukedidus' strap is worth reading. He tries to prove that, where generally speaking, a declining power meets an emerging power that ends in war, safe in one case, he describes, which is between the United States and the United Kingdom. And he tries now to define. He tries now to define the conditions under which between China and the United States, a rivalry should remain under control. Now, Graham's book was written, I think, before the presidential election in the United States. Because what we are seeing is not necessarily conducive to a more stable situation, it's clear that China has been put on the defensive. The rule which the Chinese leadership has been following is we just have to bide our time. And I put this nearly under quotation marks, because I think it has been used several times, even in official statements. And I think the arrival of President Trump was a surprise to them, as it may have been a surprise to many others. And so the timing we have the time to bide our time is not necessarily there anymore. And so there are, I think, on the defensive. On the American side, President Trump, in a way, is representative of both the Republican strain of withdrawal and the democratic strain of withdrawal, like I defined them. But he has become aware that you cannot just withdraw from responsibility. And he has been compensating that phenomenon, of which, in certain ways he's an expression, he has been compensating that by expounding and practicing this America first theory. It hides, in a way, the ongoing withdrawal, I think, of the United States from a number of its responsibilities. So yes, there is a void. Yes, there is disorder. Yes, the president of the United States is aware of that. He tries, in a way, to fill it in his own fashion. And so when you follow American politics, we all know there is much more to it than just the antics. Now, where is Europe in all that? We have been doing rather well economically, even externally, the climate agreement, the deal with Iran, trade norms and standards. So a number of things we have been doing well, which are part of filling the void. Enlargement was a success as well. So people should know that, yes, we have been exporting stability. Yes, we have been contributing to filling the void. But we show, as well, every day a lot of weaknesses. I think we suffer from a number of divisions internally between North and South, the whole story about solidarity. Between East and West, the whole story about balance between national sovereignty and commonality. Externally, well, we have diplomatically too many players on the book. Militarily speaking, there are a couple of building blocks around, but nobody is dealing with us. I mean, no external factor is dealing with us with the idea at the back of its head that, oh, these guys, they can be quite dangerous. So our weaknesses are glaring. We have a number of merits, but our weaknesses are glaring. And so what can we do about it? Are the political conditions there to do something about it? Will the conditions be there, let's say, after Brexit? Because Britain, rightly and wrongly, or wrongly, has been scapegoated for having made a number of things impossible. Sometimes they did make things impossible, but not always. But when you move over and beyond Brexit, what are we then going to do? Who is going to be in the driving seat? Well, I think the traditional driver, the Franco-German couple, doesn't seem to me, at the time of speaking, politically strong. I hope they are, because they are indispensable to a common interest. But the political, the domestic difficulties, both in France and in Germany, are not in themselves very promising on a very active Franco-German couple. Again, I hope I'm wrong. But it's not helping for the time being, I think. Then around public opinions, populism and make it even more difficult. Still, what should we try and do, nevertheless? First of all, in the short term, we should try and complete and finish the two main questions of deepening we put on the table after the fall of the Berlin Wall, is the common currency and the common border. I think we are rather far as the common currency is concerned. I hope that in December, the last nuts will be tied on issues like the European Monetary Fund, the transformation of the European stability mechanism into a European Monetary Fund. I hope that we will make progress in respect to the deposit protection. But on the common currency, a lot has been done as a consequence and during the euro prices. Then the common border, a number of measures to strengthen the border have been taken. I think negotiations with the Turks and with whomever is in power in Libya made a huge difference as well in the number of people coming across the Mediterranean. But still, I think on that second one, there is more to be done than on the common currency because the crisis of the common border has come so much later than the crisis of the common currency. And just building strong borders is only part of the answers. We have to look at something which is genuinely difficult. It's a common asylum policy, common immigration policy. We have tried that a couple of times in the past. It didn't work out because for the simple reason is that, of course, your immigration policy is very much a matter of national competence, national power, and national politics. And what is possible in one country is not possible in the other country. I remember being in the chair of the Committee of Permanent Representatives and trying to do something on common immigration policy. At that time, the differences between the sensitivities in Germany and the sensitivities in France were extreme. So you couldn't build out of that kind of a common position. And I think mainly we are still there. But just having a tight border is important, is part of the solution. But there are a number of corollaries which are difficult to make. But well, these are the kinds of subjects for which the Brussels machine is well equipped. That kind of negotiation, it's complex and complicated. And as long as things are complex and complicated, we tend to be good at it, look at the Brexit. Just to conclude there in the longer term, I think we have a problem of methodology. You can approach further integration either through the road of objectives and aims, or you can approach it to the road of means and instruments. As far as our aims are concerned, we have been rather successful in explaining in the past to a public opinion that the European Union had a value added in terms of security and prosperity. And people accepted that. They could see it. The next step which some people like my former Prime Minister Giverofstad is trying to make is to ask the question about our common institutions. And then he has written about it extensively in his book, The United States of Europe, to which I contributed my own little part. It's obvious that member states, even if the pressure heaped upon them were to be much higher, it is obvious that for most member states, going further in terms of political integration, going further in terms of transferring additional powers to Brussels, and given the state of public opinion is something which is not obvious for them to do. But we should try, nevertheless, to continue developing a narrative about why are we making Europe. We lose a lot of credit with public opinion because we do not explain sufficiently because we disagree on it over and beyond I mean prosperity and security. What is this game all about? And well, there are a couple of discussions which have taken place already in the European Council, the discussions to come, discussions you have here. But how can you define a common objective in the European integration process? A common objective, which is credible and credible in the sense that people say, well, this is a smart thing to do. And moreover, yes, this could be politically acceptable. And I don't think we have already found and defined that. But we shouldn't stop thinking about it. The other way to approach European integration is the old Schumann method, step by step, and organic growth. And if you have an internal market that leads inexorably to a common currency union. And I think that in daily life that remains to my view the only practical way in advancing Europe. But by using that way of doing business, at the same time, you do it at the price of not explaining what you are really, really doing well. You say, well, I do this. And then after a year, people will discover you have to do this. But you have not explained why we are doing this. So this remains for us all quite a daunting challenge to which I don't have a precise answer. One thing which, and I will leave it there, given the state of disorder of the world, we will come again and again to the question of common foreign policy and common defense. I think that as far as common defense is concerned, the one country which has most to offer in that respect is France, given the simple fact that they have the strongest military and the hugest military investments. But are the conditions there for them to play that card? They have already been instrumental in two things. That was the cooperation structurée permanente and the intervention initiative. Those are important steps. We have a nucleus of headquarters in Brussels. That's an important step. So we have been doing bits and pieces. But when will the conditions be ripe for these bits and pieces to come together so that then, and only then, Europe will become a real factor of power in the world and be part of filling the void? I'm not sure that, let me leave it at that, that soft power without hard power is real power. Thank you.


Just want to give some helpful hints for some of our citizens out there with the pets. If you're driving around with your pet in your car, don't leave your pet in the car temperatures at 100 degree. The car inside could be anywhere from 120 to 140 degrees. Make sure your pets have a lot of water if they're outside, even if you're on walks with them in the parks. Try to have them walk in the shade on the grass. Their little pads on their paws are very sensitive. Some of the things you can do for their pads, you can put suntan lotion on them, pet friendly suntan lotion. Definitely no signs for overheating for your dog, heavy panting, excessive drooling. If they look like they're about to collapse, you want to definitely get vet care for them.


A stem and leaf plot is a quick way to organize 25 to 100 pieces of data. Each data value is split into a stem and a leaf. Highlighted here is a stem of 7 and a leaf of 1, which means 71. We will create a stem and leaf from the above data set. The stem will be the digits in the tens place. In this case, the numbers 6 to 10. Place them in order vertically from smallest to largest. Working from left to right in the data set, place the leaves, the digits in the ones place in their corresponding row. Next, put the leaves in order in each row from smallest to largest. Be sure to include duplicate numbers. Finally, create a legend or key from your stem and leaf plot. The legend tells the reader the values of the numbers in the plot. Here 7 and 1 means 71. If you were creating a legend for this stem and leaf plot, what would a stem of 3 and a leaf of 2 mean? It means 3.2. If the stem and leaf plot is turned sideways, a histogram is created. In this histogram, all the original data is preserved. That's all there is to creating a stem and leaf plot.


Nobody is busier than the person that is not into you.  The person that says, you know, I'd love to, but I'm busy the next two weeks. Or the person that sort of ghosts or semi-ghosts you. Listen, they are not busy. They know your phone number. They know where you are. They're just avoiding you and saying they're busy. They're not busy, so you need to stop hanging around waiting for their validation and waiting for them to reach out to you. You do not need these people in your life. They are not into you. Someone else is going to be into you who you'll never meet if you don't keep moving. Love you guys. Thanks for being here.


Today's video is sponsored by Squarespace. Question that comes up all the time in astrophotography circles is, should city imagers who are interested in narrowband imaging of emission nebulae stick with color cameras or make the switch to a monochrome camera? And it seems like a fairly clear cut question on the surface. And when I was first researching this back in 2017, I went right into a mono and expensive three-nanometer narrowband filters. And I still use those filters, so I don't regret getting anything that I did get back then. But in 2017, this was right before all of these excellent multi-bandpass filters for color cameras were available, like the Radian Triad, the Optalongel Enhance, and now the Amplia ALP-T. So now I think this is a bit more of a complicated question. So in this video, I'm gonna explore this question from a few different angles out loud with you. And then I'm also going to review this new mono camera on the market that I've been testing the past few months. This is the QHY 533M. Hey everyone, this is Nico Carver from Nebula Photos. And since this video is partly a review, let's start with some disclosures. I'm in an agreement with QHY that in exchange for long-term loans of their cameras, I will in exchange test the cameras, provide feedback to them and then also review them. There is no money changing hands and QHY also has no input in what I say in these reviews. The cameras that I currently have on loan from QHY are these two, the QHY 168C and the QHY 533M with the 3S filter wheel. Everything else that I'm gonna be mentioning in this video, if there's anything else, is stuff that I've personally bought with funds from my Patreon campaign, which is the main way that I support this YouTube channel. So thank you very much to all my patrons and to QHY for making this video possible. And that's it for disclosures. So let's move into the first topic of discussion. And I wanna start with something that might seem a little bit basic, but it's actually pretty complex. And that is, what's the difference really between a one-shot color camera and a mono camera? The sensors in one-shot color cameras don't directly sense the color of the light. They're actually the same sensors that are in mono cameras. They're mono sensors. They just sense how bright or dark something is in the scene. And this is why if you open a FITS file from a one-shot color camera directly, it is mono, or another word for that is grayscale. And at first it seems like, well, what's gone wrong here? Why is there no color in the photo for my color camera? Well, color in digital cameras is actually something that is interpolated by software using something called a debayer algorithm. And for that algorithm to work properly, it needs to know the pattern of the color filter array inside the camera. And this color filter array is a physical thing. It's hard to see, but it's made up of tiny little red, green, and blue color filters, one filter over each photo site on the sensor. And the reason that algorithm is called debayer is because the first and still most commonly used pattern for a color filter array is called the Bayer pattern, named after its inventor who worked for Kodak. And the Bayer pattern uses two green filters for every one red filter and one blue filter. And the reason for this has to do with the way that the cones in our eyes work, which generate color in our brain. And the goal is to mimic our eyes color response to get us close to a natural color rendering, which is what works pretty well for normal photography. The downside, which we'll get to is that this means only a quarter of the sensor is set up to receive red light, a quarter of the sensor for blue light, and half the sensor area is for green light. So to sum up the difference between a mono camera and a one shot color camera is with the color camera, there is a fixed, you can't remove it, physical color filter array placed over the sensor with a mono camera, there is no color filter array. So no debairing to make a color image, we actually have to shoot through external filters one at a time and then put all of those data stacks together to make a full color image. And this is why we say one shot color OSC with a color camera because you can literally take one shot and have a color image after you debair it. While with a mono camera, if you just took one shot through one filter, there is no way to colorize that to make it look like a full color image because you just have one color. So you need to use at least two or three filters to get full color with all the color contrasts. So the next question is, what kind of camera is better for narrow band image? And the clear winner here, just in terms of image quality, I think is always going to be the mono camera. And let me explain why. When you're shooting broadband, a one shot color camera is pretty efficient because all of the photo sites on the sensor are receiving light. When you use a single line narrow band filter though, you're blocking 99% of the visible light. And just focusing on one tiny sliver of the visible spectrum. So if that tiny sliver is in the red part of the spectrum, as it would be with an HA or S2 filter, you're letting only those particular red wavelengths pass on to the color filter array. So by the time they get to the color filter array, there are no photons hitting the blue and green filtered photo sites. So you only are using approximately 25% of the sensor when shooting HA or S2. And this is a simplification, but the broad strokes of that are right. With a mono camera, the entire sensor area is being used. So that's a lot more efficient. Now, the introduction of these multi band pass filters designed specifically for color cameras has evened the score a bit between OSC one shot color and mono, because with these we get a lot more efficiency back because we can target both the HA line in the red spectrum and the O3 line, which is in both the green and the blue spectrum at the same time. With mono, you have to target one emission line at a time. You have to use a separate filter for each line when doing narrow band imaging. But with a color camera, with a multi band pass filter, you can actually target and isolate multiple emission lines. And then after you get past the multi band pass filter, it's the, those colors can be separated out using the color filter, right? We can separate out the red response from the blue and green response. You can't do this with mono, right? So you can use these multi band pass filters with mono, but you'll never get a color image out of it. It'll just, because there's no color filter array to separate out the signal. So you just get a grayscale image. So is mono is still better in this case, even though you have to shoot through multiple filters instead of just one? I think yes, because the whole interpolation of the colors using the debayer algorithm, that's not a perfect process. In that process, it's gonna generate some color modeling, some inaccuracies, which you wouldn't get with mono. And also mono is more sensitive to the light since there's less filtration. There's no CFA. There's no color filter array. So you typically see a better cleaner result, more signal with a mono camera, even though you have to shoot through each filter separately, which can take more time. And that better performance means it's easier to go after more difficult objects, like very dim objects in the O3 band, like the squid nebula, for example, which you're seeing here. And so that in a nutshell is the performance debate. Of course, you can get good results with either of these days, but like I said, I always get better, faster results with mono when imaging from border eight or nine. And I wanted to do an actual, like same night performance tests like I usually do with these videos through the same telescope, comparing one shot color to mono, but I've been waiting over a month here and the weather has not cooperated yet. So you'll have to wait for a part two to see that. Next question is, which costs more? Pretty easy. Mono is basically always more expensive to get into. The mono cameras themselves are typically a bit more because it's more of a niche product. So you don't get the economies of scale that you do with color cameras. As an example, the QHY533M is $200 more than the color version. And then with that color version, after you get the camera, you're gonna want a couple filters. I'd say most people at minimum want an IR cut filter, like an Astronomic L2 for doing broadband and then a multi band pass filter like this Optalong L Enhance for narrow band and then maybe a filter drawer for convenience for switching them. On the other hand, with mono, you're gonna want at least red, green and blue filters to do broadband. You're probably gonna want that luminance filter too because LRGB is a cool way to image. Then to do pure narrow band, you need at least the HA filter and the O3 filter. Most people are also gonna want the S2 filter so you can do full Hubble palette and we're already up to seven filters. So in the case of having seven filters to go through, you're probably not gonna want to use the filter drawer. Instead, you're gonna wanna go for an electronic filter wheel for switching between them. So the cost of this is a lot more than a filter drawer. And even if you went with the cheapest filter set, which I believe are the Optalongs, which have seven nanometer band passes for the narrow band filters, the difference between a complete package with the QHY533C versus the M is at least a $500 difference with the monochrome being about a $500 premium. So is that $500 premium if you're doing narrow band imaging from the city worth it? I think absolutely, but you might not have $500 to spend. So I think either way can work, but it is to me worth it for the mono. Another question that is pretty important is which is more of a hassle? And this sort of depends on the person, but with one shot color and a multi band pass filter, you set everything up at the beginning of the night. You get the telescope in focus. You start your imaging run and then there's nothing else to really change. Yes, you should still probably occasionally check focus because focus can shift like if the temperature changes during the night, but that depends a lot on, you know, how stable the temperature is over the night and also your focal ratio with a slower focal ratio not being as big an issue. With mono on the other hand, anytime you change the filter, you know, for red to green or HA to O3, you're most likely gonna have to refocus. Even if a filter set claims to be parfocal, that doesn't mean your telescope is parfocal at all these different wavelengths. So most of us have to refocus when doing mono for each filter change. And if you don't have an automated focuser on your telescope, that means being out there physically refocusing, pausing your imaging run, refocusing at the right time, anytime you change the filter. Another hassle factor is incomplete captures. If you're shooting mono, and let's say you're planning a bi-color HOO style image so you're shooting HA and O3, you start the night shooting H-alpha, then you plan on shooting O3 later when the moon is set, but what actually ends up happening is clouds roll in right when you start shooting O3. If that happens, well then you can't make a full color image because you've only shot the HA. But if instead we've been using a color camera with a multi-bandpass filter that's picking up the HA and the O3 at the same time, then when the clouds roll in, we can still make a full color image with what we got already. So this hassle factor isn't usually a big deal for me personally because with most of my narrow band projects, I'm collecting data over multiple nights. But if you're the kind of imager that likes to get one finished picture per night, then mono might not be for you because it might be occasionally frustrating when you have clouds ruin the later part of a night. Another hassle with mono is each filter needs its own set of flats because anytime you change that physical light path, you're gonna need new flats to get a good calibration. And then when we get to pre-processing because you have all these different sets of flats and lights, you need to calibrate, register and stack on each filter separately before you can combine them all together to get on with processing. So there are some automation tools for this, but it will always still take more time to pre-process mono data than it would one shot color. But once we get past pre-processing, I think most people will agree that mono data is actually much easier to work with because it's cleaner, you can stretch more aggressively, you usually have more signal to work with and so you can play with it more and that's why I still really love it. I just really like processing mono data versus one shot color. So next up, I'm gonna talk about what I like and dislike about this new mono camera, the QHY533M. But before I jump into that, a few words from this video's sponsor, which is Squarespace. When Squarespace offered to sponsor a series of my videos, I was very glad because I'd been putting off revamping one of my websites, nicocarver.com and I knew that I wanted to make it into this like nice portfolio design that could show off my photography but I'd been putting it off because I knew from making lots of websites how long it can take to design a website from scratch. But Squarespace made that process incredibly easy after I transferred over the domain name, I was up and running very quickly because their professional templates and website editor is super easy to use, no coding, what you see is what you get with it and I think it looks very elegant and it just took me one afternoon. I also really like that everything is included. Of course it does responsive design so it looks good on mobile phones or on desktop. I didn't have to search through any confusing plugins to get a really nice contact form that works. It was all part of the template that I chose and if I wanted to add an online shop later I can already tell that would be really easy to do with Squarespace's built-in e-commerce tools. It can handle your inventory, shipping labels, shopping carts, everything is already there for a very reasonable price. So if you're interested in trying out Squarespace use the link in the description of this video and the link is squarespace.com slash Nebula Photos. You'll get a completely free trial and if you like it you can get 10% off your first purchase with the code Nebula Photos. Okay, so now let's review the QHY 533M, a camera I really liked. It's going for $1,159 at the time of recording. Personally I think that is a fair price for this tech. It is a fairly small sensor for deep sky. I'm not sure if you can see that. It's a one inch square sensor so that's smaller than micro four thirds. Here's a graphic I made to show if we were shooting at 300 millimeter focal length this would be the field of view with the 533M in yellow. Here's an APS-C crop sensor camera in green and a full frame camera in pink. And you can see the other thing that sticks out is the aspect ratio of the 533. It's a one to one square while a typical camera is a three by two rectangle. Another interesting thing is while the sensor is much smaller the body size of this camera is actually the same size as my 268M which has a crop sensor. So I'm not sure why they didn't make the 533M body size smaller but I mean it does feel like a premium camera. It weighs 845 grams or 1.8 pounds which is just a little bit less than the 268M which is one kilogram or 2.2 pounds. They made a few design changes to the camera body here. The first one is they added this little metal foot which can be handy for attaching the camera to a dovetail if you wanted to mount a camera lens on the front here. I tried it out, it worked fine especially because the aspect ratio of the sensor is square. So if you have this attached to a dovetail you're not gonna be able to rotate but that's fine because rotation is more important with a rectangular sensor. And speaking of rotation QHY has developed something pretty neat which is this faceplate for the camera that has these little screws so it offers easy rotation. So you can more easily get the sensor square onto the filter wheel and the telescope if you wish to without the need for any kind of like thin spacers to get it exactly in the right orientation. And this faceplate has standard 42 millimeter threads on the front which is different from QHY's bigger cameras which only offer bolt-on connections. If you really wanna get the most out of the QHY system I do highly suggest getting one of their matched electronic filter wheels with their cameras because it's really meant to be a system and you can take advantage of their special cable which connects between the camera and the filter wheel and seems much more robust than just USB. And speaking of this filter wheel it comes with these bolt-on spacers right here that I already have installed and when you put all of this together like this and the camera you have perfect 55 millimeter spacing so you get that's normal back focus requirement for a lot of field correctors, field flatners, coma correctors and then this thread at the end of the spacers stack is 48 millimeter female thread so that's exactly what you want for screwing on to that field flatner or coma corrector and attaching it to the telescope. So everything is in the box ready to go. If you take this whole stack of bolt-on spacers off you can easily switch it out for QHY's 42 millimeter EF adapter which just screws on and it gives you the correct back focus of 44 millimeters for Canon EF lenses.  I really think that's a great combo in terms of this camera system. In terms of the imaging performance of this camera and looking at the specs this is gonna get pretty nerdy for about 30 seconds here so bear with me. The 533M works exactly like the 268M in high gain mode but unlike the 268M you only get one readout mode rather than four and it's a 14-bit ADC rather than a 16-bit but even with those changes the dual gain amplifier kicks in at gain 56 with both cameras so that is the sweet spot where I would use that gain because you're maximizing dynamic range and low read noise. At gain 56 offset 35 I used Pixinsight's basic CCD parameter script to measure the performance of this camera it had a read noise of 1.647 electrons and a full well capacity of 21,808 electrons. So that's a very low noise sensor that should work very well for narrowband but for me I would use these same settings for broadband too and just shoot shorter exposures. So specifically again those settings are gain 56 offset 35 and I had the cooler set to negative five Celsius which I think is plenty sufficient in terms of cooling this camera because these cameras have such low dark current that with dark frame calibration you really shouldn't have to push the cooling too hard. The important part is that you can match your calibration frames, your darks, your flats, your bias with the exact same temperature as the lights using the set point cooling. QHY said that they guarantee no amp close up to five minute exposures with the latest firmware I haven't really found amp close with any length exposure but I will say just like the 268M this camera is super sensitive to light leaks. So you really have to take your darks in a super dark location and just make sure that there's no possibility of any light hitting a sensor. The reason is just because it's a very sensitive sensor. So to wrap up I'll share some images I've taken with this camera so far with the specs along the right hand side. I've really enjoyed testing this camera for QHY and I'm happy that this camera is now available for sale so you can all go buy it and start taking pictures with it. If you have a question just drop it in the comments below and since this video is clocking in at over 20 minutes long you are now seeing the names of everyone who currently supports this channel over on my Patreon campaign which you can get to by going to patreon.com slash nebula photos. And one of the perks for signing up is you get your name in the credits like you're seeing right now of all long videos over 20 minutes. But there's a bunch of other benefits outside of that including exclusive videos, monthly Zoom chats, a vibrant discord community, monthly imaging challenges with prizes, bi-yearly group imaging projects and the summer targets have just started so you have plenty of time. And then of course a direct way of messaging me with your questions and comments. So if you like my videos you want to accelerate your learning further consider joining us over there it starts at just $1 a month and again the link is patreon.com slash nebula photos. Till next time this has been Nico Carver, Clear Skies.