welcome to camp telophase

myrialux and I have been eating way too much fast food, mostly because we want to get out of the house at lunchtime, so we drive through various places and sit in the car while eating and listening to audiobooks.*

We're planning to try to refocus lunch onto things we can make and easily take with us and eat in the car while we park somewhere nearby and listen to audiobooks in the car.** Which means...bento! Made to be transported and eaten at room temperature.

All of this (the stuff above, the footnotes below) is all to explain why I purchased this book (affiliate link), although you probably didn't care. It's Bento Power, and I would say it's Japanese- and Asian-inspired rather than pure Japanese--good, given that I don't want to eat Japanese food every day for lunch.

It's more on the order of trendy health food and is mostly vegan with a few vegetarian elements (and a lot of gluten-free stuff if you're avoiding gluten). But the author doesn't appear to be afraid of flavor the way so many health food enthusiasts seem to be.

So far I've only made one recipe from the book, and that was for lunch today, topped with leftovers from a meal earlier this week. It's pretty simple: throw rice in the rice cooker with a handful of another grain (quinoa, because that's what we had) and a piece of kombu or shiitake mushroom to oomph up the umami. (We had both. I used both.)

I know I said she wasn't afraid of flavor and that's a bit on the bland side, but it served as a base for a couple of Chinese dishes we had that were loaded with garlic and ginger and a bit of chile, so it was Just Fine.

Anyway, the primary reason I'm mentioning it here is that the ebook is, at the moment, $1.99 and it's absolutely worth $1.99. The sample is unfortunately so loaded down with personal memoir and pantry stuff that it stops before it gets to actual recipes. Amazon, Barnes & Noble or Alibris if you want to get a used paper copy, though the one-star review on Amazon mentions that the text in the hardback is really small.

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* Currently Harrow the Ninth. I pre-ordered the ebook and smashed through it the day it dropped, and am now enjoying a more leisurely re-read with the audiobook. It's a book that you really have to read twice, because a lot of clues to the revelations in the last 25% or so are fed throughout the first part, but you won't get a lot of them, and a lot of secondary meanings, until the second read-through.

I love books like this, but then again Gene Wolfe's Book of the New Sunis in my top 10 favorite books for a reason.

** Walk to a park? This is Texas. It's hotter'n'hell outside and the cityscape is built around cars. Which means that we do have a park within walking distance...it has no tables, one bench on the end close to us that's a reasonable walking distance, and no shade over that bench. Plus, we couldn't listen to the audiobook there. :)

I don't remember who it was that recced Star Nomad (and sequels) to me, but so far (two books and a short story in ) it's really hitting the spot. I don't remember because every time I come across a rec that sounds interesting, I just send the sample to my kindle and, perhaps weeks later, read it and make the decision. Anyway, it's a basic ragtag group thrown together in a starship getting into trouble* sort of book, but that's apparently what I was looking for.*** So if that's what you're looking for, you might also like it.


* I have a vague recollection that something I sent to my Kindle in the recent past had a comparison to Firefly attached to it. It might have been this, but I don't remember for sure, Either way, that wouldn't have made my decision for me because I never got into the show. (GASP! THE HORROR!)**

** There was a time there a few years ago where I had this exact same conversation multiple times with multiple people:

Them: Have you seen Firefly?
Me: I tried it, but it wasn't for me.
Them: Did you watch the pilot?
Me: Yes.
Them: But did you watch the episode that was the real pilot?
Me: Yes. A Firefly fanboy showed it to me and explained why we were watching this episode. I didn't like any of the characters and didn't care about them.
Them: Oh, no, no! The characters change over the course of the show! You just have to keep watching!
Me: I have too many other things I want to do to invest time in watching a show that I don't like starring characters I don't care about on the off chance that I might eventually give a damn.
Them: Oh.
Them: ...
Them: ...
Them: ...
Them: Have you seen Lost?

The end of Lost has, finally, put an end to that particular conversation.

*** okay i have a weakness for supersoldiers in power armor

Recs for books that are (a) available for the Kindle and that are (b) somewhat brainless fluff, or otherwise easy reading. Fiction (mystery, fantasy, SF, YA) and nonfiction (memoir, science, nature, travel or living in another country, history).

Example of what I'm thinking of in fiction: Scalzi's Fuzzy Nation, Three Men in a Boat, the Repairman Jack YA novels*, Terry Pratchett, Bellfield Hall and its sequel, Aaronovitch's Midnight Riot and sequel, Kat, Incorrigible.

Non-fiction: Mary Roach, Bill Bryson, Tim Moore, the Freakonomics books, The Mind at Night, etc.

I've got The Disappearing Spoon on audiobook waiting to be listened to. Category/genre romance appears not to be working for me, although Regency-era settings in other genres are. Most urban fantasy isn't working for me, although Aaronovitch is an exception (probably because it's set as a police procedural?)

Also, quick reviews (Yea or Nay) on some of the book samples I have in my Possible Purchase collection on my Kindle would be appreciated, in order to help me make a decision. :)

( cut for list )


* I binged on the adult ones until the unexamined general stereotypes got to me. It's the sort where if you're introduced to a non-white, non-American character, they're going to be a bad guy or a stereotyped sidekick of some ilk. Rather like a lot of action movies.