TET.Life (The Extraordinary Tourist Life)

I  wasn't familiar with Rebecca Yarros prior to receiving the first two books in her Empyrean Series, Fourth Wing and Iron Flame , as a gift. (Note: links will take you to the audible product page versions of the book on Amazon and are affiliate links. You should be able to find links to physical copies of the books from there if you prefer). It's been a long time that I've read a book that I don't want to put down after the time I have to read for the day is over. These two books, which are not insignificant in size at 498 and 623 pages respectively are page turners from beginning to end (almost but I'll get to that later). The story is set in a fantasy mythical world where dragons and magic are common place. Fourth Wing opens as Violet, the younger, weaker daughter of a fairly infamous general in a dragon riders army, is pushed into the first year of dragon rider school, rather than her preferred, and prepared for, path of scribe school. Both her mother (the afor...

A lmost a year ago I featured Go West Girl , Book 1 of author, Kit Mackenzie's Alias Jeannie Delaney series. Now, the next book in the series,  Alias Jeannie Delaney - Book 2 - The Outlaw's Return , is soon to be released in August, and is available for pre-order on Amazon. If you love a powerful female lead in a traditional western packed with action and adventure, this is the novel for you. The story centers on Cowgirl Jeannie Morgan who grew up in Coyote Creek, Wyoming, where she became persecuted for her lethal gun and a sexuality that swings both ways. Tomboy beautiful and tough as the nails in a miner's boots, she is on the run with a bunch of boys who would die for her. Her snake strike gun, soul-slicing gaze and dangerous magnetism leaves a trail of intense emotions, killings and would-be death threats in her wake. Heading south, she finds herself becoming a legend. She's in deep trouble, but her home town demands her return and they pin a badge on her. It'...

A s someone who has written a travel diary about driving across three states of Australia , and owning a frog van that became very much a character in touring my own state of South Australia at sometimes well below 80ks, I have some affinity for Meredith Schofield's book, Around Australia at 80k's . I'll definitely tip my hat to Meredith and her husband Sean for going way further in a bright yellow, unairconditioned, mid 70's kombi van, than they were ever designed for.  Also kudos to them for traveling with their dog Bandit. My partner and I have also taken our dogs on our holiday adventures and, even though South Australia is likely the most dog friendly state in Australia, it's still a challenge planning a trip where you can all stay together. Particularly, your dog will keep you out of most national parks. Meredith's book is a road trip adventure across five Australian states, NSW, SA, WA, NT, and Victoria (technically four states and one territory I guess)...

One day I'm going to write my own remarkable guide to happiness and this will be the cover image (but don't hold me to that). I 'm a big fan of Bill Bailey's comedy stand up, as well as his acting (mainly in the TV series Black Books that I mostly know him from). Generally he is laugh out loud funny. As such I was probably expecting similar, laugh out loud humor from his book, Bill Bailey's Remarkable Guide to Happiness , but what I got, while still humorous, was more of an introspection on Bill's life and moments he feels represent happiness for him. Which is fine, I guess, but to call the book a guide (and a remarkable one at that) is something of a stretch. Not that I was expecting an actual guide book on happiness, but the book is more of a collection of thoughts, retelling of moments, and Bailey's own drawings (additional images by Joe Magee), centered around the theme of happiness. It's more of a things that make Bill happy kind of a read. Bill s...

TET and Mary Roach's Book, Gulp . I 'm the kind of person who only reads one physical book at a time. For context I consider a 'book' to be anything over 100 pages of mostly text. Basically your typical work of fiction novel or factual biography. It's not that I can't read more than one book at a time, I just choose not to because I don't set a lot of time aside for reading. Maybe 30 minutes a day when I'm on a good run with a really engaging text. Little did I know that Mary Roach's Gulp: Travels Around the Gut *, a book of 317 pages (minus the Acknowledgments and Bibliography) would become a bottle neck for my reading for the next three and a half years. As such, I'm calling it the worst book I have ever read. Despite how long it took me to read, it is not a bad book in the slightest, and is in fact, quite light, somewhat entertaining, reading for a book that explores the science, and the resilience of the human digestive system.  I'm no st...

Today's guest post is by returning Artist, Writer, and Mental Health Advocate, Jo B Creative who writes for her blog, Creating My Oddessey . Jo's previous 2019 post,  MY SOOPER DOOPER NEW CONSERVATORY/ART STUDIO! for a long time was one of this blog's most read pages. Jo returns under a new alias, author Kit Mackenzie , and with word of her new novel, ALIAS JEANNIE DELANEY - BOOK 1 - GO WEST, GIRL! which is now available on Amazon. T he first book of this epic western trilogy, Alias Jeannie Delaney - Book 1 - Go West, Girl!  is the life story of a devastating and charismatic pants-wearing cowgirl who's the fastest gun in the west and bisexual. A crack shot story that blazes across the wild west! Jeannie Morgan, a devastatingly tomboy-beautiful, pants-wearing maverick who flicks a finger of contempt at society in the latter half of the nineteenth century. Her speed with a gun is faster than the strike of a rattler, outshooting every man she meets. Love, hate and jealo...

It's rare these days that I come across a TV series that disappoints me at the end of each episode because I don't want it to stop. The Peripheral is exactly like that. However, now all of the first season's eight episodes are on Prime Video, you don't have to wait week to week, as I did. Binge them all in one go if you must. My only disappointment in Season 1 is that now I have to wait and hope there is a season 2 because (minor spoiler) the story is only half way done (or less if they do a third season). At the time of writing season 2 was not yet confirmed but The Peripheral overtook The Rings of Power as Prime's top streaming show, so that is very promising for the show to return. Based upon a William Gibson novel of the same name, which I have not read, but I am aware that Gibson is a big gun amongst influential Sci-Fi authors. I've only read his book Neuromancer many decades ago which influenced the rise of Cyberpunk  in popular culture during the 1980s...

I was quite looking forward to reading this book despite being on the complete opposite side of the political spectrum to Donald Trump. However, while it started out strong, it reads very much like how Trump's Presidential campaign panned out, getting less and less interesting as it gets closer to an ending that everyone knows. Unbelievable - My Front-Row Seat to the Craziest Campaign in American History by Katy Tur doesn't really deliver much of an insider view beyond what NBC correspondent, Katy, and others reported on the news. Sure we get an insider look at Katy's perspective and some of the politics of being an on air news reporter when you're not particularly known for political reporting, but I don't feel we really get too much more. I didn't get the sense it was particularly any more crazy than any other campaign despite Trump's head on approach to saying exactly what he thought in front of the media, and for his supporters seemingly thinking they h...

Score a Goal in Five Steps Tracker. Digital or Printable Worksheet. Completing any complex task or project can be made simple by breaking it down into smaller, more manageable steps. If you're the kind of person who does this, and likes to see more measurable results than just ticking off tasks on a to do list, then my Score a Goal in Five Steps Tracker may be for you. This Five Step Tracker is a two page digital or printable worksheet that you can fill in anytime you have a complex task that you want to track your progress on. If you find the format useful there's also a 24 page, 5"x8" journal version so you can track multiple goals. To use the Five Step Tracker, write your Goal/Project in the top box of the first page. Next break this down into five smaller steps and write those into the boxes provided. If any of the five steps are still quite complex tasks on their own then there is room to break each step down into up to five additional sub steps. Write these in...

Side Hustle by Chris Guillebeau Chris Guillebeau is probably one of the most unassuming, down to Earth entrepreneurs, authors in the side hustle space. Somehow he manages to give practical advice through his books and Side Hustle School podcast without actually looking like he's trying to sell anything. So how is it I'm now reviewing a fourth book of his that I purchased? He's clearly doing something right. I actually bought Chris' book, Side Hustle , quite some time ago but I've been so busy in my side hustles it's taken me a while to set time aside for reading.  These days if I don't schedule reading time and commit to it each day I just don't read actual books. So that's what I did. Cut down on my YouTube watching at breakfast by 30 minutes so I could read instead of watching videos. Well worth it, without a doubt. If you're like me, aware that you should also set time to work on your business rather than in your business, Chris' book, ...

Still from Animation, Principles for Dealing with the Changing World Order by Ray Dalio When you hear the term 'The New World Order' which is somewhat interchangeable these days with 'The Great Reset' your mind may tend to wander to global conspiracy theories and The World Economic Forum (who I've previously established as so evil they don't even hide what they're doing). While I don't put much stock in what people think the WEF is doing (as opposed to what it actually is doing) there is such a thing as 'The New World Order' that can be demonstrated as a reoccurring construct of change throughout history. Ray Dalio , the founder, co-Chief Investment Officer and co-Chairman of Bridgewater Associates , which is a global macro investment firm and is the world’s largest hedge fund, is also  connected to the WEF (so must be up to no good), has written a book,  Principles for Dealing with the Changing World Order  (Amazon Affiliate Link), in which he...

Based on the best selling novel by Jane Harper, The Dry is a murder mystery set in a small, drought affected, Australian outback town. Eric Bana plays Federal Agent, Aaron Falk, who returns to his hometown to attend his childhood friend Luke's funeral, who died in what appears to have been a murder suicide of his family.  Unfortunately Aaron's presence opens up some old wounds for some locals surrounding his departure from the town as a teenager some twenty years prior. Luke's parents, not convinced that the investigation into their son and his family's death has reached the right conclusion, ask Aaron to look over the case. Given the plot of this film, and its very confronting opening scene (if you're not really used to watching murder mysteries) it's hard to describe this film as 'enjoyable', even though it is, in the sense that it kept me engaged the whole time. The story is split between present day and twenty years earlier, just prior to Aaron'...

I remember listening to a podcast interview with Steve Glaveski where he talked about 'being in flow' and how artists and other creative people struggled with time management because they needed to be in the 'flow state' to do their most creative work. The 'flow state' is basically being on such a roll with whatever you're doing you don't want to stop just because your diary says you've scheduled something else for the next 30 minutes. I don't remember too much from the podcast but it really resonated with me so much that I immediately ordered a copy of Steve's second book, Time Rich - Do Your Best Work, Live Your Best Life  that he was promoting at the time. To cut straight to the bottom line, probably one of the most disappointing books I've read in quite a while. Which is not to say the content is bad, it's just the title and blurb information, in my opinion, completely misrepresents what the book is about. There is a strong sugges...

The Happiness of Pursuit by Chris Guillebeau. Reviewed by TET Unlike Chris Guillebeau's other books, such as The $100 Startup , The Happiness of Pursuit is less of a how to guide and more about finding inspiration. The book is set out in a logical order of sections and chapters starting with why people go on quests, what to expect while on a quest, and then debriefing once a quest is achieved (or not). However there is no ten point plan or step by step guide to achievement. Instead the book looks at many different case studies of people who have pursued seemingly insurmountable quests, what it took to get started, how they broke everything down into manageable tasks, the problems they faced, and their conclusions after having completed their goal. Along the way Chris offers practical advice from both his research and as someone who also pursued a quest of visiting every country in the world. Some of the real case studies include (and many probably wouldn't even spring to mind...

Short Range by Stephen Leather. I haven't read a novel in quite a while so I was looking forward to Stephen Leather's Short Range , which is his sixteenth Spider Shepherd thriller. The book was given to me as a gift, and I can't say I was familiar with Stephen or this book series. Essentially it's my first introduction to the character of British MI5 Agent, Dan 'Spider' Shepherd. Fortunately I do like a good thriller novel, and Stephen includes enough information about his lead character, as the story unfolds, that I didn't feel like I was missing any crucial information from past adventures. The basic premise of Short Range is undercover agent Dan Shepherd is assigned to an operation to take down a terrorist group. His assignment crosses paths with another operation using a child informant to help them take down a drug dealer. Meanwhile Dan's personal life is about to be shaken up in a way he never sees coming. As far as police thrillers go...

The Cartoon World of The Extraordinary Tourist Act One - 1982-1995. If you're looking for an opportunity to leave some small legacy of your art behind, or just looking for another place to get eyeballs on your work then The Sketchbook Project by  The Brooklyn Art Library may be of interest to you. The Brooklyn Art Library is a crowdfunded library of artist sketchbooks that anyone can join. Their focus is on creating a collection of physical art that viewers can interact with. The collection is made up of literally thousands of sketchbooks submitted by artists of all levels worldwide. You can physically go to the library in Brooklyn to view the collection. A selection of books are toured around the USA each year, and artists also have the option to digitize their sketchbooks for people to view online. The Brooklyn Art Library is home to more than 45,000 sketchbooks. Photo: The Brooklyn Art Library Website . It is a bit of a vanity project since the artists thems...

The Artist's Way by Julia Cameron I'd heard a lot of good things from various successful people about Julia Cameron's book, The Artist's Way , particularly about this daily activity called 'Morning Pages' that seemed to help focus their day. I was curious to know more so I decided to buy the book and see what it was all about. As it happens The Artist's Way is a self help, Twelve week program to assist you in discovering or rediscovering your creativity. As such it's not a book you want to read cover to cover just to get the information. To get the full benefit it's designed so you can read a chapter each week and do the activities, until you've completed the full twelve weeks. Which is what I chose to do, with every intention of following the course as instructed, but as I started reading, I just didn't recognize the person this book is reaching out to. Initial impression The book is intended to help you discover or rediscover ...