After a nice long stretch of updates, this blog went silent again. I think I’ve identified what causes these occasional dark periods here — it’s not that I have nothing to say, but that I’m pressuring myself to review a long list of books I’ve read. I don’t always have time to write reviews, so I hold off on blogging at all until I’ve had a chance to catch up.

Having recognized this problem before, I’ve tried a few tricks like writing very short reviews, or throwing several mini-reviews into a single blog post.

I’ve decided to let myself off the hook on book reviewing. I still want to recommend books that seem worthwhile, but I don’t necessarily need to review every book I read. When something strikes me as especially worthwhile or notable, I’ll mention it. I may even be inspired to write something that could be called a “review.” I just need to relinquish this self-imposed expectation that if I read a book, I’ll take notes, formulate an opinion, and express it in a formal or semi-formal review.

Having said that, I’m currently assembling a list of the best and most notable 2013 books. This has been a great year for dark, weird and horror fiction. Some of this top 10 I’ve already reviewed, and I’ll link to those reviews. Those I haven’t already reviewed in depth, I may write about in greater detail after posting my list of 10. Others I may not. I’ll post that list within the next couple days.