Best of...

It's traditional to do a year end post, but I don't really feel much like going though my posts to see which one got the most hits, or +1, or comments. Instead I'm going to share some of the things I really liked:

Books:
Prince of Thorns, King of Thorns, and Emperor of Thorns by Mark Lawrence - I wrote about these books already, so in my first pick I'm already kind of doing what I said I wasn't going to do, but this series really was just that amazing.

Control Point and Fortress Frontier, books 1 & 2 of The Shadow Ops series by Myke Cole. Myke takes the idea that magic is real, and suddenly appears in the modern word, and runs with it. Shockingly most governments militarize it, basically drafting anyone who turns up with magical talent. This doesn't go over well with everyone.

Ben Aaronovitch's Rivers of London is another look at magic in the real world. And as much as I love books, I can't recommend enough the audiobook. Kobna Holdbrook-Smith narrates this series so amazingly well.

TV:
Once Upon A Time - Fairy Tale characters in a small town in Maine. At first I wasn't particularly impressed, but a couple of episodes in, I was hooked.

Sleepy Hollow - This is a new series with Tom Mison, Nicole Beharie, Orlando Jones, and Katia Winter, based around the story of the headless horseman. In this take, there was no Washington Irving or the story of Ichabod Crane. Rather, Crane was a revolutionary war soldier who had a witch as a wife, and the Hessian horseman he beheads was actually the first of the Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse. Ichabod and the now headless horseman end up in a magical stasis (thanks to the witch wife) which ends with them awakening in modern rural New York.

Music:
Hugh Laurie - Didn't It Rain Just a great album of jazz. Aside from Mystery (a really funny song) I hadn't heard any of his music before. It's definitely worth checking out.


The Lone Bellow - I saw them live a couple of months ago, and they put on an amazing show.

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What's something new you discovered in 2013?