iiinova — where your digital self keeps evolving

Ben O'Connell @benjaminoc.bsky.social · 04/10/2026

I’m halfway through my latest library loan, Halik Kochanski’s RESISTANCE, an exhaustive history of armed, political, and social opposition behind Axis lines. Suspect I’ll be purchasing it soon—I feel a years-long project coming on: using it for reference as I read Alan Furst’s NIGHT SOLDIERS series.

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Ben O'Connell @benjaminoc.bsky.social · 27/09/2026

Vicente Luis Mora’s CENTROEUROPA (trans. Rahul Bery) may be the strangest book I’ve read this year. After a Viennese emigre—deceased wife in tow—lays claim to a Prussian farm, local officials continually put off deciding what to do with frozen corpses of soldiers buried throughout the land.

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Ben O'Connell @benjaminoc.bsky.social · 26/09/2026

Maylis de Kerangal’s EASTBOUND (trans. Jessica Moore) is the most claustrophobia-inducing novel I’ve read since Kōbō Abe’s WOMAN IN THE DUNES.

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Ben O'Connell @benjaminoc.bsky.social · 24/09/2026

Made a couple P&P (Politics & Prose for those outside the DMV) stops today.

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Ben O'Connell @benjaminoc.bsky.social · 20/09/2026

Proof that CGI is a scourge upon filmmaking.

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Ben O'Connell @benjaminoc.bsky.social · 19/09/2026

A book and a beer on the back patio—life is pretty good sometimes.

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Ben O'Connell @benjaminoc.bsky.social · 18/09/2026

Some personal news: 25 years (and 7 months) at C-SPAN

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Ben O'Connell @benjaminoc.bsky.social · 07/09/2026

It’s a thrill reading the work of a writer taking a big swing. And when it connects—boy howdy. Daniel Kraus’s ANGEL DOWN could have been another horror story set amidst the brutalities of war—and a very good one—but his stylistic choices give it a vitality that makes it something else entirely.

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Ben O'Connell @benjaminoc.bsky.social · 07/09/2026

I can’t recall when I last had time to sit on the patio and read. What a delightful afternoon.

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Ben O'Connell @benjaminoc.bsky.social · 05/09/2026

The best purchase I ever made at the Berryville Old Book Shop: this BOMC hardcover of Charles Portis’s TRUE GRIT. It cost $4.

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Ben O'Connell @benjaminoc.bsky.social · 05/09/2026

Bummed to find that the Berryville Old Book Shop has closed. I rarely found anything, but I always enjoyed browsing for the few minutes I could take the smell of cat piss.

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Ben O'Connell @benjaminoc.bsky.social · 04/09/2026

A pleasant surprise awaited me at Third Rail Records & Books this afternoon

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Ben O'Connell @benjaminoc.bsky.social · 04/09/2026

I rarely leave the Arlington Central Library’s little shop without across a gem. In this case, it’s a recent biography of the early 20th century radical Elizabeth Gurley Flynn.

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Ben O'Connell @benjaminoc.bsky.social · 30/08/2026

Howard Fishman’s remarkable TO ANYONE WHO EVER ASKS is as much a chronicle of the author’s fascination with songwriter Connie Converse as it is of Converse’s life. The former proves infectious.

Book cover of HOWARD FISHMAN’s
TO ANYONE WHO EVER ASKS
THE LIFE, MUSIC, AND MYSTERY OF CONNIE CONVERSE

It shows Connie sitting on a couch, lighting a cigarette

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Ben O'Connell @benjaminoc.bsky.social · 23/08/2026

Thomas Mann neglects few currents of early 20th century intellectual history in THE MAGIC MOUNTAIN. Philosophy, politics, science, religion—the list goes on. It is a work of extraordinary ambition and density that somehow remains a joy to read.

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Ben O'Connell @benjaminoc.bsky.social · 22/08/2026

Our coverage of the National Book Festival has kicked off on C-SPAN2.

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Ben O'Connell @benjaminoc.bsky.social · 20/08/2026

MASTERS OF THE UNIVERSE was mildly entertaining despite the terrible CGI and some bizarre casting choices. Still, beat the hell outta DEVIL WEARS PRADA 2.

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Ben O'Connell @benjaminoc.bsky.social · 19/08/2026

Mann could have been a horror writer.

“Two half-naked old women were busy at a ghastly chore among flickering braziers-their hair was gray and matted, their drooping witches' breasts had tits long as fingers. They were dismembering a child held above a basin, tearing it apart with their bare hands in savage silence— Hans Castorp could see pale blond hair smeared with blood. They de-voured it piece by piece, the brittle little bones cracking in their mouths, blood dripping from their vile lips. Hans Castorp was caught frozen in the gruesome, icy spell. He wanted to cover his eyes with his hands and could not. He wanted to flee and could not.”

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Ben O'Connell @benjaminoc.bsky.social · 15/08/2026

And one last lovely evening (this season) for a ballgame.

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Ben O'Connell @benjaminoc.bsky.social · 14/08/2026

K. C. Constantine shifts his focus from anthropology to psychology in JOEY’S CASE. While his novels had increasingly explored class and race in a struggling Rust Belt town, JOEY’S CASE goes deep into self-examination and questions of conscience. Good book, as usual from the reliable Constantine.

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Ben O'Connell @benjaminoc.bsky.social · 13/08/2026

Lovely afternoon for the ballpark

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Ben O'Connell @benjaminoc.bsky.social · 12/08/2026

Also, good night for a date night

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Ben O'Connell @benjaminoc.bsky.social · 10/08/2026

One of my dogs had torn a ligament last time I watched something limp like this.

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Ben O'Connell @benjaminoc.bsky.social · 06/08/2026

I’ve already read Sylvia Townsend Warner’s LOLLY WILLOWES, but I’m tempted to pick up this Book of the Month Club hardcover reprint.

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Ben O'Connell @benjaminoc.bsky.social · 05/08/2026

It’s only natural to stop by Half Price Books when in Dallas.

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Ben O'Connell @benjaminoc.bsky.social · 04/08/2026

Our long weekend in New Orleans was too short, so I took a brief mental trip back with Yuri Herrera’s SEASON OF THE SWAMP. Even if it didn’t quite live up to Herrera’s TEN PLANETS, it was an enjoyable diversion.

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Ben O'Connell @benjaminoc.bsky.social · 31/07/2026

Readers, it was the best of the three. It was not good.

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Ben O'Connell @benjaminoc.bsky.social · 31/07/2026

Stopped by Faulkner House and Crescent City Books in New Orleans and picked up a couple gems this afternoon.

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Ben O'Connell @benjaminoc.bsky.social · 23/07/2026

A light rain and mountain views welcome me home to Montana

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Ben O'Connell @benjaminoc.bsky.social · 22/07/2026

omg guys you’ll never guess what just happened

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Ben O'Connell @benjaminoc.bsky.social · 19/07/2026

I’m rereading (heavy skimming) Caroline Fraser’s excellent PRAIRIE FIRES: THE AMERICAN DREAMS OF LAURA INGALLS WILDER for a book club and just got to the Peshtigo wildfire. Extraordinary it happened at the same time as The Great Chicago Fire and had 4x-8x the casualties, yet it’s nearly forgotten.

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Ben O'Connell @benjaminoc.bsky.social · 17/07/2026

Well, this one was a heartbreaker.

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Ben O'Connell @benjaminoc.bsky.social · 10/07/2026

Finally picked up my copy of Paul Tremblay’s latest, DEAD BUT DREAMING OF ELECTRIC SHEEP. Tremblay’s horror novels are among the most narratively sophisticated I’ve read in recent years. I always know I’m in good hands with him.

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Ben O'Connell @benjaminoc.bsky.social · 10/07/2026

COWBOYS & ALIENS is both not good and better than its reputation suggests. It also left me with one lingering question: what in the hell was Sam Rockwell thinking?

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Ben O'Connell @benjaminoc.bsky.social · 09/07/2026

Angels trapped in statues, time-traveling Nazis, and messy adult relationships—Francis Spufford’s historical fantasy NONESUCH is magnificent.

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Ben O'Connell @benjaminoc.bsky.social · 07/07/2026

Having previously read only JOSEPH & HIS BROTHERS, Thomas Mann’s THE MAGIC MOUNTAIN is coming as quite a shock.

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Ben O'Connell @benjaminoc.bsky.social · 07/07/2026

Took it off the shelf to peruse again

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Ben O'Connell @benjaminoc.bsky.social · 05/07/2026

Ivy curled up with a good book in the bay window.

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Ben O'Connell @benjaminoc.bsky.social · 05/07/2026

Only one of our current two is a pit mix, and she refuses to acknowledge the world exists outside the house if there is a hint of rain. This is my favorite recent picture of our current babies. They were keeping watch over my wife as she changed shoes.

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Ben O'Connell @benjaminoc.bsky.social · 05/07/2026

LEGALLY BLONDES may not be the worst Hollywood movie ever made but damned if I can prove it.

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Ben O'Connell @benjaminoc.bsky.social · 01/07/2026

Amy Gamerman’s THE CRAZIES tells the story of a battle over a wind farm in Montana’s Crazy Mountains. Despite the pun-begging title, Gamerman does not condescend to the rubes or mock the elites. The people are colorful and complicated—and perfect illustrations of tensions roiling the state.

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Ben O'Connell @benjaminoc.bsky.social · 01/07/2026

Ryszard Kapuściński’s SHAH OF SHAHS is an impressionistic portrait of life under the Pahlavis and the last Shah’s downfall, but it is about more than Iran. Kapuściński writes as if to explain the sweep of history—the mechanisms of power, the delusions of despots, and the inevitability of revolution.

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Ben O'Connell @benjaminoc.bsky.social · 01/07/2026

Ethan Rutherford’s magnificent NORTH SUN, OR THE VOYAGE OF THE WHALESHIP ESTHER had me hooked long before hints of magical realism crept into the text. What follows is as terrifying and awe-inspiring as the finest horror novel.

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Ben O'Connell @benjaminoc.bsky.social · 01/07/2026

K. C. Constantine excels at sociological fiction, portraying the intertwined politics, prejudices, and relationships of mid-size city life with extraordinary vitality. UPON SOME MIDNIGHTS CLEAR is another fine example.

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Ben O'Connell @benjaminoc.bsky.social · 01/07/2026

W. P. Wiles’s THE LAST BLADE PRIEST has hallmarks of epic fantasy: quests, politics, gods, prophecies, unlikely fellowships, high-stakes conflicts, and fantastical creatures. Yet Wiles defies expectations at every turn.

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Ben O'Connell @benjaminoc.bsky.social · 01/07/2026

BRIAR ROSE is Robert Coover’s short, dense retelling of Sleeping Beauty. It has some things in common with Angela Carter’s THE BLOODY CHAMBER, but Coover seems far more interested in the nature of storytelling than anything off the page.

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Ben O'Connell @benjaminoc.bsky.social · 01/07/2026

I will reread Denis Johnson’s TREE OF SMOKE someday. He nods to Greene, Conrad, Dante, and the Bible throughout the narrative sprawl as his characters attempt to divine salvation from damnation amidst a purgatory. It would take another read for me to start putting those pieces together.

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