Friday

20221230 - My Year in Reviews (Project Roadmap 2022 12)

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Following threaded / passageways, choices to choose, / forming mediums.

#HAIKUPRAJNA - My Year in Reviews (Project Roadmap 2022
12)

https://haikuprajna.blogspot.com/2022/12/20221230-my-year-in-reviews-project.html

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Hello readers,

It is the time of year where everyone is rounding up their 2022 Year in Review across the various websites that offer it, which means that it is time for a new Project Roadmap.

This year, eighty-five hundred (8.5k!) people read on the HaikuPrajna blog.

Readers are enjoying these book reviews across social media; over 900 followers have joined HaikuPrajna on Medium.com; 500 people follow on Instagram; 300 subscribers are reading on LinkedIn.

Since the last Roadmap update [ https://haikuprajna.blogspot.com/2022/09/20220907-forming-attractions-project.html ], these readers have been enjoying free ebooks on not only Fridays, but also every Monday as well.

Read on until the end to hear about our upcoming and recent book releases.

The Best Books Reviewed in 2022

Before we head onto new book releases, let’s check out the top five HaikuPrajna book reviews--as chosen by you, readers!

The top books on HaikuPrajna are...

.1. Seconds - Bryan Lee O’Malley [ https://haikuprajna.blogspot.com/2022/05/220530-review-seconds.html ]

.2. Bloodborne - Ales Kot [ https://haikuprajna.blogspot.com/2022/06/20220614-bloodborne-comic-book-summary.html ]

.3. Scott Pilgrim - Bryan Lee O’Malley [ https://haikuprajna.blogspot.com/2022/07/20220712-scott-pilgrim-comic-book.html ]

.4. Batman and Robin - Grant Morrison [ https://haikuprajna.blogspot.com/2022/02/20220209-review-batman-and-robin-2009.html ]

.5. The Legend of Sleepy Hollow - Washington Irving [ https://haikuprajna.blogspot.com/2022/02/20220202-review-legend-of-sleepy-hollow.html ]

.Honourable Mention. Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep? - Philip K. Dick [ https://haikuprajna.blogspot.com/2022/03/20220307-review-do-androids-dream-of.html ]

The Highest Rated Books of 2022

Last, but for certain not least, here are the best books that I read during 2022, on Goodreads:

.1. The VALIS Series - Philip K. Dick [ https://www.goodreads.com/review/show/2449886486 ]

.2. The Epic of Gilgemesh - Unknown [ https://www.goodreads.com/review/show/4659102995 ]

.3. A Scanner Darkly - Philip K. Dick - [ https://www.goodreads.com/review/show/2449885461 ]

.4. The Enneads - Plotinus [ To be reviewed ]

.5. Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland - Lewis Carroll [ https://www.goodreads.com/review/show/2449833643 ]

Did your favorite books make the cut? Either way, let me know in the comments! Maybe your favorite book will end up here next year~

Shoutout to Goodreads for their 2022 “My Year in Books” page. Check out my stack here: [ https://www.goodreads.com/user/year_in_books/2022/83965332 ].

Last year I pledged to read two books a month, and I wrangled together twenty-seven books (which composed of two comics and one of my own releases, for an even twenty-four), you can check out that reading challenge at the end of my Goodreads Year in Books (linked above).

I keep comics that I read unlisted, for the most part, to avoid inflating my reading stats, but readers are free to browse my been-read comics shelf on Goodreads: [ https://www.goodreads.com/review/list/83965332-allen-mclean?order=d&ref=nav_mybooks&shelf=co-been-read&sort=rating&view=table ]

There is a Goodreads shelf for the books yet to be reviewed with a few from 2022 that I still need to do; most of the comics are probably able to be moved to my to-reread shelf. Check out the to-be-reviewed shelf here: [ https://www.goodreads.com/review/list/83965332-allen-mclean?ref=nav_mybooks&shelf=to-be-reviewed ]

I shake up my reading routine by rereading favourites and books that need a review, and you can view that shelf over here: [ https://www.goodreads.com/review/list/83965332-allen-mclean?ref=nav_mybooks&shelf=to-reread-and-review&sort=rating ]

Last year, I put together a shelf for the books that I wanted to read in 2022, and at its close I started putting together my 2023 shelf: [ https://www.goodreads.com/review/list/83965332-allen-mclean?ref=nav_mybooks&shelf=2023 ]

Now for some project announcements.

BATT-LE Colosseum

Blurb:

" Welcome, Nina, to BATT-LE Colosseum!

Here, using over one hundred unique armours such as Ian the Turtle, players engage each other across the different environments spread across the arena’s map.

Bring your telekinetic abilities into the game with you!

Secure all of the badges and compete for the Champion position against old allies and new foes!

Score the highest kill count today in BATT-LE Colosseum! Available at your local MEGA Holo-Plex. "

BATT-LE Colosseum is the next book in the Fluke series, set after ULTRAVIOLET. Set to release in the first quarter, expect a separate reveal post in January 2023.

Falgara the Giant

Falgara the Giant, the third story in The Wisps Book, will release on Kindle Unlimited in January 2023. Expect a release announcement soon!

Throughout 2023, readers can expect more Terraform stories on the likes of Regica the calcified calamari, Simongia the bear, Summond the jack-o-lantern, Sol the Sun, and Christmas the sheep.

The Wisps Book, when its collected physical edition is released, will serve as the fourth entry in the HaikuPrajna Collection.

Elephant in the Room

In a slight delay to ensure sufficient care and quality, before Spring 2023 the second edition of Elephant in the Room will see a wide release, just like Ado the Owl and Hector Blake.

Before autumn 2023, Two Elephants in the Room, the fifth book in the HaikuPrajna Collection, will feature all of the book reviews and poetry featured on HaikuPrajna up to the end of 2022, including the to-be-reviewed books that I had read in the year. Read about my book reviews : [ https://haikuprajna.blogspot.com/p/book-review-summary-study-notes.html ]

Looking to the rest of 2023 (and beyond) for the rest of these announcements; Bucket and Train will occupy the HaikuPrajna Collection VI slot, and will feature more stories in the same vein as the bonus Halloween story “Sprouting” which can be read for free here : [ https://haikuprajna.blogspot.com/2021/10/20211031-happy-halloween-nanowrimo.html ]

There are even more projects still being developed, including Orson Tripp and more Fluke, along with projects such as “The List”, for music/movie/game reviews.

Project Roadmap

At last, the moment we have been waiting for; here is a revised HaikuPrajna Project Roadmap, featuring all the anniversary dates for each of the stories--along with a glimpse into the future.

Where We Are

. [2019 04 23 HaikuPrajna Day, first IG post] [2019 06 16 SM-SARA Kindle Edition] [2019 11 10 Patreon]

. [2020 04 04 Elephant in the Room First Edition] [2020 12 02 Blogspot]

. [2021 03 03 SM-SARA, Poems and Other Stories First Edition] [2021 06 13 Escape Perennial City] [2021 11 28 Fishing for Caribou]

. [2022 03 03 The Artifact . 2022 03 10 SM-SARA KID: A Edition . 2022 03 13 The Cannon . 2022 03 22 Hector Blake . 2022 04 01 SM-SARA, Poetry and Other Stories Second Edition] [2022 06 16 Together in Forever Pt. I . 2022 06 28 Pt II . 2022 07 25 Pt III . 2022 08 01 Physical Collection] [2022 09 30 Tomothy and the Overseer of the Forest] [2022 10 29 ULTRAVIOLET] [2022 12 03 Ado the Owl]

Upcoming Release Dates (may be subject to change)

. [2023 01 Falgara the Giant]

. [2023 02 Elephant in the Room Second Edition . BATT-LE Colosseum]

. [2023 03 Two Elephants in the Room . The Wisps Book’s Summond, Sol and Christmas stories . The Music List ]

Future Releases

. [Orson Tripp] [Fluke, Books I-III, including sequels to Hector Blake and KID: A . Book IV Together in Forever] [Sequels to Escape Perennial City] [Sequel to The Cannon] [More books in development featuring the Overseer]

And that concludes my 2022 Year in Reviews! April and I hope everyone enjoyed their Holiday Christmas season, and we wish all of our readers a Happy New Year and an exciting 2023; April and I are celebrating a decade anniversary this year, we visited the Ripley’s Aquarium in Toronto and will continue to celebrate well into the New Year.

Thank you for reading, I am forever thankful and grateful for you all.

Please share your thoughts in a comment.

Allen W. McLean

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Need more Bite-sized Insights to relieve your stress and suffering?

Banner: The Cannon by Allen W. McLean

Readers are gifted a Kindle eBook on Fridays and Mondays--short story selection rotates every few weeks, so follow via email or visit My Author Profile [ https://www.amazon.ca/Allen-W-McLean/e/B0867C5D24 ]

I write mindfulness meditation scifaiku and haiku poetry on my book reviews and on previews of my metaphysical stories, such as "Escape Perennial City". Learn more about my reviews here [ https://haikuprajna.blogspot.com/p/book-review-summary-study-notes.html ]

Connect with HaikuPrajna and Electric Armchair via email [ https://haikuprajna.blogspot.com/p/follow-on-social-media.html ]

Thanks to you, over 900 readers have joined us on Medium! Need to stay in the Medium Partner Program? Please follow and turn on email notifications; I'll follow you back! [ https://haikuprajna.medium.com/subscribe ]

I have free short stories available to read, right now, on Medium:

. "Ado the Owl" [ https://medium.com/haikuprajna/20221027-ado-the-owl-official-tell-a-story-day-flash-fiction-story-e4c8a8ec8563 ]

. "Hector Blake" [ https://medium.com/haikuprajna/hector-blake-second-edition-329c5c9309e7 ]

April's psychedelic music videos, art and poetry is available on all streaming platforms; Electric Armchair - Pixie Lead (Official Music Video) (Amorphous I) [ https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qIzyLZimX_I ]

Electric Armchair - Amorphous I (FULL ALBUM) [ https://distrokid.com/hyperfollow/electricarmchair/amorphous-i ]

My metaphysical short story "Ado the Owl" is available as an eBook on digital bookstores! Add to Goodreads and learn more [ https://haikuprajna.blogspot.com/p/ado-owl.html ]

Kindle ebooks can be read on any device at www.read.amazon.com

These poems will be collected in future editions of the HaikuPrajna Collection.

Read the latest Project Roadmap [ https://haikuprajna.blogspot.com/2022/12/20221230-my-year-in-reviews-project.html ]

Tuesday

20221227 - VALIS [Book Review Analysis and Summary]

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His home is no where, / He is hidden everywhere, / His home is now here.

#HAIKUPRAJNA - VALIS [Book Review Analysis and Summary]

https://haikuprajna.blogspot.com/2022/12/20221227-valis-book-review-analysis-and.html

...

Hello readers, April and I hope everyone has been enjoying the holidays! We have been celebrating our tenth year together all month long, and will continue to celebrate into the New Year.

Despite being one of my favorite books, it has taken me forever to parse my notes about VALIS by Philip K. Dick.

Like the rest of the books in the series, VALIS is a heavy Metaphysical Science Fiction story; I found it to be really reminiscent of ‘50s-’80s sci-fi TV/B-movies in a good way.

The other books that are attributed to VALIS are done so only through this book’s themes, which featured callbacks to “The Divine Invasion,” “The Transmigration of Timothy Archer,” and “Radio Free Albemuth”.

Phil related Horselover Fat’s irrational quest to bring back a series of women who had died, who had wanted to die for various reasons, all while being close to Fat, Phil and their friends David and Kevin; from the get-go, VALIS is a story about mental illness and falling into the traps of logical fallacies, and how reality manages to deal with it through insanity.

Phil, in real life and in this fictional story, was writing the story in order to unpack his spiritual experiences revolving around the Vast Active Living Intelligence System, a quasi-conscious ‘vortex’ that ‘incorporates its environment into arrangements of information’, information which is beamed to Phil or Fat via orange-pink ultraviolet light.

“I am Horselover Fat, and I am writing this in the third person to gain much-needed objectivity.”

During this quest to find God while curbing insanity, the group began to believe that the universe itself was alive, that humans should be able to hear its information as a neutral voice in one’s mind.

An interesting spoiler (but not really because Phil and Fat’s identity is disclosed at the very start) for when one wants to reread the book! One of my favorite parts of VALIS is how I can merge Fat’s abstracted and Phil’s logical points of view, where Fat talking after Phil can be seen as just the first person narrator pausing before saying the next line in the third person. By the end, it was hard to tell who was real and where Fat or Phil really was, as Phil watching TV being his mind interpreting the symbolism of Fat’s travels was just as likely to be true as Fat’s travels being a fantasy made during Phil’s vigil.

While writing to process the deaths he wished to revert, Phil described the failure of his own suicide attempts as acts of God and debated whether or not He was merciful in saving him while being Just in letting others die. While Kevin’s opinion was that the universe was hostile and ‘consisted of misery’, this dynamic can be explained: Phil, in the past, had no idea why the divine intervened in his son’s death but not any of the girls’, while Phil, narrating in the present, realized he would not have gone on his quest otherwise.

Phil, needing the logic, displayed how he was the real person (or his own demiurge or Intellect), yet Fat was the main persona and continued to meditate on death by attaching himself to dying women, but Phil instead grew to reject Fat from the bodily system (a twist on a similar plot thread in Albemuth).

Unable to trust himself, after having personified the aspect of oneself that wishes to die, Phil had become afraid of Fat.

"It is the Empire in its various disguised polyforms which tells us we have sinned."

The group decided to meet with the Lamptons who made a movie named VALIS, which was a stylizing of Radio Free Albemuth's plot (and that achieved what Saddassa Sylvia and Nick Brady’s music was made to do). If you had read that book first, you should enjoy the callback as much as I did.

The two groups meet, and Phil meets their daughter Sophia who was said to be the Saviour reborn; it was my interpretation that She and the idea of the Saviour were a manifestation of the aetheric fabric of spacetime, a single expression of the universe in itself, that by being mindful of anyone her thought-forms also became the physical forms of every point in spacetime.

The dread arose from the realization that they were being told how to escape from a prison that one had become lost within, that achieving unity with Sophia or VALIS or God meant that they would soon be freed, but that the time was yet to come and that they were still trapped; the cast began to display their failure to truly understand this soon after meeting Sophia, most evident in Phil’s failure to realize that VALIS’s immortality was an intangible one, that no real physical resurrection would occur outside of VALIS’s own.

Everyone, Sophia included, agreed that the blind-god Lamptons were crazy, but that Sophia was legitimate, however their little Society had seen themselves in the Samaels (said to be Ikhnaton's race) and realized that meant that they too were insane.

A prevalent theme is the fear that someone you love will kill you, for the greater good; Phil was attempting to heal Fat, and I found that Phil being straightaway averted toward the cure to Fat's illness foreshadowed the threat of Mini and the Lamptons toward both him and Sophia.

Sophia had healed Phil by unifying him with Fat, however Phil failed to see that God, wearing a mask of Death under another mask of Love, was ending suffering by the merciful killing of the dying individual--Phil was asking for the dead to return, which was asking for a different thing.

Sophia’s death made the Lamptons complicit, while leaving Phil's group unaffiliated and thus legally and socially protected from them, but this caused Fat to return and continue his quest to find the Saviour.

It was unfortunate that Fat's entire premise stemmed from a misunderstanding of the necessity of suffering, mistaking the Demiurge for the One, and failing to see that Sophia indeed foresaw her own death.

When Kevin relapsed into talking about his dead cat, the group started to display how they failed to realize they could just think of the question and that VALIS would answer--the past and future were real, as present as the present, as accessible as the restroom; for me, that meant physical space and time were the true Black Iron Prison, that the intangible conception of the aetheric spacetime was considered "true reality".

Fat's later quests returned fruitless because the Savior was intangible and within everyone and everything, but, despite this, Phil (his logical brain) realized he was told to keep vigil while Fat (his creative brain) continued to search the globe over.

“But underneath all the names there is only one Immortal Man; and we are that man.”

VALIS was a product of the exegesis of Philip K. Dick being turned into Metaphysical Fiction, along with the other books that are attributed to this book’s themes of the author’s interpretations of his own real life spiritual experiences.

Above all, I thought that the author wanted to teach how Pity is love, how through sympathy does one's pain become a source of love and lessen the pain by securing a loving memory; by the Spear of Longinus metaphor, the deaths of the women would be what would heal the wound their deaths had made, so by pitying oneself, one can take a dispassionate perspective to their own situation and allow themselves to love themselves instead of grieve.

According to Phil, by labelling danger as a sin within all of us, Samael promoted the use of sin before tricking us into believing that it was our fault. By allowing phenomena to pass, one allowed that which prevails to shine and destroy the prison. By appealing to intangible thoughtforms, one burned away the illusions and secured the wisdom from otherwise insane discourse.

The Living Idea was found in the lowest levels of reality, "where you will least expect to find it," which is why Phil took up his vigil at the close of the book, to find Sophia in the things we write. To him, the “supra-temporal expression” of all life is what we actually mean by the term ‘god’ and “is what we worship, without realizing it, when we worship ‘god.’”

Thank you for reading. Please share your thoughts.

Allen W. McLean

Read the rest of my VALIS reviews:

The Transmigration of Timothy Archer [ https://haikuprajna.blogspot.com/2022/11/20221120-transmigration-of-timothy.html ]

The Divine Invasion [ https://haikuprajna.blogspot.com/2022/11/20221105-divine-invasion-book-review.html ]

Radio Free Albemuth [ https://haikuprajna.blogspot.com/2022/09/20220927-radio-free-albemuth-book-review.html ]

Original VALIS review [ https://haikuprajna.blogspot.com/2020/12/20201227-valis.html ]

...

Need more Bite-sized Insights to relieve your stress and suffering?

Banner: The Cannon by Allen W. McLean

Readers are gifted a Kindle eBook on Fridays and Mondays--short story selection rotates every few weeks, so follow via email or visit My Author Profile [ https://www.amazon.ca/Allen-W-McLean/e/B0867C5D24 ]

Connect with HaikuPrajna and Electric Armchair via email [ https://haikuprajna.blogspot.com/p/follow-on-social-media.html ]

I have free short stories available to read, right now, on Medium:

. "Ado the Owl" [ https://medium.com/haikuprajna/20221027-ado-the-owl-official-tell-a-story-day-flash-fiction-story-e4c8a8ec8563 ]

. "Hector Blake" [ https://medium.com/haikuprajna/hector-blake-second-edition-329c5c9309e7 ]

April's psychedelic music videos, art and poetry is available on all streaming platforms; Electric Armchair - Pixie Lead (Official Music Video) (Amorphous I) [ https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qIzyLZimX_I ]

Electric Armchair - Amorphous I (FULL ALBUM) [ https://distrokid.com/hyperfollow/electricarmchair/amorphous-i ]

My metaphysical short story "Ado the Owl" is available as an eBook on digital bookstores! Add to Goodreads and learn more [ https://haikuprajna.blogspot.com/p/ado-owl.html ]

Kindle ebooks can be read on any device at www.read.amazon.com

These poems will be collected in future editions of the HaikuPrajna Collection.

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Friday

20221230 - My Year in Reviews (Project Roadmap 2022 12)

Following threaded / passageways, choices to choose, / forming mediums.

#HAIKUPRAJNA - My Year in Reviews (Project Roadmap 2022 12)

The Best Books Reviewed in 2022

Top HaikuPrajna Posts of 2022

The Highest Rated Books of 2022

BATT-LE Colosseum

Falgara the Giant

Elephant in the Room

Project Roadmap

Need more Bite-sized Insights to relieve your stress and suffering?

Readers are gifted a Kindle eBook on Fridays and Mondays--short story selection rotates every few weeks, so follow via email or visit My Author Profile [ https://www.amazon.ca/Allen-W-McLean/e/B0867C5D24 ]

Connect with HaikuPrajna and Electric Armchair via email [ https://haikuprajna.blogspot.com/p/follow-on-social-media.html ]

April's psychedelic music videos, art and poetry is available on all streaming platforms; Electric Armchair - Pixie Lead (Official Music Video) (Amorphous I) [ https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qIzyLZimX_I ]

Electric Armchair - Amorphous I (FULL ALBUM) [ https://distrokid.com/hyperfollow/electricarmchair/amorphous-i ]

My metaphysical short story "Ado the Owl" is available as an eBook on digital bookstores! Add to Goodreads and learn more [ https://haikuprajna.blogspot.com/p/ado-owl.html ]

Tuesday

20221227 - VALIS [Book Review Analysis and Summary]

His home is no where, / He is hidden everywhere, / His home is now here.

#HAIKUPRAJNA - VALIS [Book Review Analysis and Summary]

“I am Horselover Fat, and I am writing this in the third person to gain much-needed objectivity.”

"It is the Empire in its various disguised polyforms which tells us we have sinned."

“But underneath all the names there is only one Immortal Man; and we are that man.”

Need more Bite-sized Insights to relieve your stress and suffering?

Readers are gifted a Kindle eBook on Fridays and Mondays--short story selection rotates every few weeks, so follow via email or visit My Author Profile [ https://www.amazon.ca/Allen-W-McLean/e/B0867C5D24 ]

Connect with HaikuPrajna and Electric Armchair via email [ https://haikuprajna.blogspot.com/p/follow-on-social-media.html ]

April's psychedelic music videos, art and poetry is available on all streaming platforms; Electric Armchair - Pixie Lead (Official Music Video) (Amorphous I) [ https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qIzyLZimX_I ]

Electric Armchair - Amorphous I (FULL ALBUM) [ https://distrokid.com/hyperfollow/electricarmchair/amorphous-i ]

My metaphysical short story "Ado the Owl" is available as an eBook on digital bookstores! Add to Goodreads and learn more [ https://haikuprajna.blogspot.com/p/ado-owl.html ]

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#HAIKUPRAJNA - My Year in Reviews (Project Roadmap 2022
12)