PicoBlog

Flameaway's first foals will be two-year-olds of 2023, and he is one of the stallions I am the most excited for in this upcoming class of freshmen. Flameaway was a $400k yearling in 2016 by Scat Daddy and out of the Fusaichi Pegasus mare Vulcan Rose, whose first foal to race was a stakes winner at two, three months after the sale of her half brother. As a racehorse, Flameaway was a stakes winner at two, three, and four, and was able to win stakes on both dirt and turf in addition to breaking his maiden in his debut over Woodbine's synthetic track.

The Next Level is a Good Game series where we chat with collegiate coaches about all the intricacies it takes to get to the next level. Credit: Stanford Athletics Happy Friday, Good Gamers! Thanks for your continued support of our growing newsletter. I hope that we’ve been a helpful add to your youth sports repertoire, and I’m excited for what’s ahead. Starting next week, we will be publishing 2x/week, on Wednesdays and Fridays.

I’m thankful for all Star Wars books, honestly. But there are quite a few that mean a lot to me, came to me at the perfect time, and still resonate with me long after reading. I’m a prequel kid, so I have the fondest memories of seeing The Phantom Menace, Attack of the Clones, and Revenge of the Sith when they first came out over 20 years ago. They’re my comfort movies — and I’m typing this as I watch The Phantom Menace.

There have been eight new Star Wars books released in 2023 so far. I’ve read all of them, plus I finally finished the Thrawn trilogy with Thrawn: Treason. And I’ve loved all of them. I rated none of them below four stars, which is not a surprise for me since I generally have a great time with every new Star Wars book that comes out. Call me whatever you want, but I feel so lucky to live in a time where we get new Star Wars stories almost every month — and that’s not counting the animated and live-action TV shows.

I love new Star Wars book weeks. Okay, technically, the Essential Legends Collection is a series of reprints and the text between the pages isn’t new. But books still got delivered to me that I didn’t own before, so hey, it counts! Books — holding them, reading them, shelving them — have been a great comfort to me lately, something I talked about in this newsletter earlier this week (and will recap for you below).

I put off reading Star Wars Dark Disciple for a long time because I didn’t watch enough of The Clone Wars to properly understand (or appreciate) the character of Asajj Ventress. Friends and people who enjoy Star Wars-novels speak highly of Christie Golden’s book but I didn’t feel confident in the lore to read and/or appreciate what it had to offer.  Over the last couple of months I decided to watch all 130+ episodes of The Clone Wars.

IEM Katowice 2023 came and went a few weeks back, capping off yet another season of professional StarCraft II. Watching Oliveira’s legendary run unfold on a busy Sunday afternoon, I started working on a piece wondering whether a more aggressive tuning philosophy, especially around map pools, was a good direction to head in now that the professional players’ balance council was off and running. Little did I know - I was writing about a game that was dead!

starling house—my third novel—is out now. it’s sort of a southern gothic beauty and the beast, and you can find it wherever books are sold. signed copies and other editions: you can order signed copies through my local indie store, new dominion bookshop, or from any of the shops on my tour list (below). barnes & noble also has an exclusive edition, with fancy endpapers, a case stamp, and a bonus epilogue.

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