Marcus, Luke and Andy react to an electric night at Old Trafford! And that was just because of Erik ten Hag’s roll neck.

We also contemplate buying a dog that might excrete Carabao Cup final tickets and begin to engineer Jose Mourinho’s return to Chelsea via Andy’s mates at The One Show.

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Last week, Illinois Governor J.B. Pritzker delivered his State of the State address. It is the first time a governor in the country has directly spoken about the wave of censorship, book banning, and harassment being seen by schools and libraries. While some legislators in other arenas have addressed the topic — Jamie Raskin, a Congressional Representative from Maryland, for example — it continues to be a topic that not enough of those who have the power are using to discuss. Meanwhile, over a dozen bills have been proposed across the country that would remove queer books from libraries and schools and/or actively prosecute professionals who have that material in their collections.

While Pritzker sets up the state to be a book sanctuary and model for supporting public education, it should be terrifying to consider how each state may differ in terms of what and how students have access to truth, factual history, and voices of those who are marginalized. We already know that abortion being left to the states is creating dangers and life-threatening consequences for pregnant people, and we know that state standards and funding for education are already deeply disparate, depending on where you live.

Why should a student from Illinois who sits next to a student from Florida in their college lecture halls have had radically different access to voices, stories, and information professionals?

They shouldn’t.

Here’s the excerpt of Pritzker’s 2023 State of the State speech about the current rise of dangerous nationalism and the impact it has on schools and libraries. May this be the model for other states. Read it, share it, and use it to write to your legislators about why they need to speak up against this virulent nationalism and anti-intellectualism that denies students their First Amendment Rights.

One very easy way to learn about and discover new books and authors is through the cover reveal. This was not a possible avenue of discovery before the age of book talk on the internet, and in an era where visuals are becoming more and more important — and indeed, book cover designers are taking the reality of the online world into account when determining how to create a book’s image — covers can do a lot of service for readers. In this new weekly feature, we’ll round up some of the most interesting cover reveal news from the prior week.

These cover reveal news posts will share the covers, any credits to artists and designers given with the reveal (something which should be standard practice but still is not), and then the book’s publication date and description. That information will all come from Amazon, as they have the most robust and update descriptions at the time of cover reveals. Reveals sometimes happen 6, 9, or even 12 months in advance of an actual release.

Use these reveal posts to build up your TBR, to preorder titles that catch your fancy, or to begin placing library holds/requesting titles for purchase at your library. There will be something for everyone here, crossing genres and categories of reading interests.

This week’s cover reveal roundup includes a second chance quiz show romance, gender bending body switching, a radical leprosy community, and more.

One Piece is one of the most popular anime series out now. It got its start as a serialized manga getting published in Weekly Shōnen Jump in 1997 and by 1999 it was made into an anime, and has since aired over 1,000 episodes. While it’s not quite the longest-running anime, there’s something to say about a series that can keep viewers interested past the usual dozen or so episodes anime have. Suffice to say that fans of the massive series have been rocking with Monkey D. Luffy on his quest to become the Pirate King and get the famous One Piece treasure for a while now. They’ve laughed and cried as he’s lost and gained friends, fought enemies, and avoided capture. Understandably, a series of this size inspires just as sizable a desire within fans to relive their favorite moments, and even to put out the beacon signal in the wild to other potential fans. For that, we’ve got the best One Piece merch below. In this list, you’ll find all manner of One Piece hoodies, Zoro merch, and other goodies that’ll have you thinking of the best moments in the show.

And, if you’re curious about getting into One Piece, but feel like starting it is too daunting, try this guide, then shimmy on down to this list of One Piece merch right after.

One Piece Clothing

This Zoro merch marks a time of great character growth for the swordsman. UNIQLO has it for $20.

Gain the power of devil fruit with this long-sleeved shirt. Just mark sure you stay out of the ocean. Head over to Crunchyroll for this one. $35

Rep the Straw Hat Pirates with this simple One Piece hoodie. $50

There’s something fascinating about monster tales — something that keeps us humans coming back for more. And, let’s be honest: we’re the ones creating the monsters here. So what is it about monsters that’s so fascinating?

In the late 1990s, Jeffrey Jerome Cohen wrote an essay called “Monster Culture (Seven Theses)” in the book Monster Theory: Reading Culture that kicked off the subfield of monster studies. In this essay, he posits that monsters are reflections of the cultural contexts from which they arise. So if we look at, for example, alien invasion novels from the 1950s, we can see the anxieties of the second Red Scare manifesting themselves in those oh-so-scary aliens.

Cohen also discusses how even though the monstrous might repulse us, it also attracts us so that we can’t look away. We love our monsters. We want them. And we want more of them.

If you’re interested in exploring the delightfully dark subfield of monster studies further, the recently-published The Monster Theory Reader is a smart and diverse collection of scholarly essays that’ll help you think about monsters and monstrosity in more ways than you would have dreamed of.

But if you’re looking for a good monster story, rather than theories about monsters, look no further. This list has everything from human-animal hybrids to folkloric creatures and beyond. It includes new monster novels and some which are a few years older.

With 2023 moving full steam ahead now, it’s hit me that the early 2000s occurred a solid 20 years ago. The fact that there now exists a That ’90s Show in place of That ’70s Show feels like a surreal, out-of-body experience. How has the time sped by this fast? It’s like I’ve pressed the fast forward button on my family’s VCR and accidentally skipped further ahead in life then I intended, only to want to rewind back a bit.

Despite how much each generation likes to poke fun at Millennials — we are the generation of the Facebook “poke” feature, after all — we grew up in a truly unique era. We have straddled two distinct time periods: life before smartphones and the Cloud, and life after. We are the last generation to remember the way things were before this major technological shift. As I compare the days of my childhood to my life now, I find myself casting a glow of nostalgia over my ’90s and ’00s memories. Lately, I’ve noticed this nostalgia sneaking into my reading life too.

When it came to TV, online streaming was unheard of. If I missed an episode of Sailor Moon on Toonami, I was out of luck. I’d have to leave it up to fate and hope that it would air again someday on Cartoon Network, or I’d luck out and find a Sailor Moon movie to rent from Blockbuster.

Social media back then consisted of stressing over our Top 8 on MySpace and trying to figure out how to code theme songs onto our profile pages. For reference, mine was “Friends O’ Mine” by Bowling For Soup. Along with our Myspace woes, we were also debating what our AIM screen-names should be. I settled on SoccerPenguin243 for my first in a long series of questionable screen-names over the years.

Within the broader mystery category are so many sub-genres that, in my opinion, there’s something for nearly every reader. Some, like the locked room mystery or whodunit, focus on a puzzle that the reader must untangle alongside the sleuth. Others, like hardboiled or courtroom mysteries, explore social issues and human nature in thought-provoking ways. And many mystery novels, even within these sub-genres I’ve mentioned here, accomplish both!

Whether you’re new to the genre or you want to explore it on a broader level, read on for a primer on the most popular mystery sub-genres. Along with a description of the sub-genre and its conventions, I’ve included an example recommendation with each one to get you started for sub-genres you haven’t explored yet.

As you read, keep in mind that some mystery novels may fall into multiple sub-genres categories. A book could, for example, be both a cozy mystery and a historical mystery if its set in a time period before the present day and describes no graphic violence.

But before I begin, let’s start with a quick definition of the mystery genre. Mystery novels feature stories in which the protagonist investigates a crime or unusual circumstance, usually but not always murder. They do so by interviewing suspects or witnesses and reviewing evidence, like the scene of the crime or items left behind by the culprit. The sleuth could be a professional detective, or they could be an amateur that uses seemingly unrelated skills from their personal or work lives to solve crimes.

Winter is my favorite season for reading. There’s no competition. It is also my favorite season, period, so I suppose this makes sense. I am most definitely biased. Even so, I think winter has a lot to offer readers, even if you are not a fan of cold and snow. So many of the things I associate with winter — slowing down, staying in, cozy afternoons spent under blankets — are also things I associate with reading.

I almost always read more books in January than any other month. And while (obviously!) I love reading in all seasons and in all weather, I am always more excited about books in the first few months of the year. For me, January, February, and March are sacred reading months. They set the tone for my year of reading. I feel extra enthused about all the new books I’m going to read during the year. I am still starry eyed over the various reading projects I’ve decided to take on. Everything feels possible.

I know winter is hard for a lot of folks, readers included. But it is also the best season for reading, and even if you don’t love the cold and the snow, maybe you can embrace some of the things that make winter reading so magical.

Because here’s the thing: beginnings can be super exciting! I love setting up my new reading spreadsheet. I love wandering through my house, selecting the books I’m most excited about reading, and lining them up on my TBR shelf. I love taking the time to reflect about what worked and what didn’t about the previous year’s reading, and then making adjustments — immediately.

Dungeons & Dragons, Creed III and the latest John Wick

Andy travels to the City Ground for a truly incredible atmosphere as Nottingham Forest fought back against Manchester City on Saturday.

He’s joined by lifelong Forest fan and Ramble producer Tom Whalley to find out more about what being back at the top table means to a city and a club still pining for the glory years under Brian Clough. Plus, we get a valuable education in the local Notts chants! They didn’t make much of Pep’s trainers…

Where should Andy head to next? Tweet us @FootballRamble and email us here: This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it.. 

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