Alrightreads: Various

Various, Star Trek: Deep Space Nine – Prophecy and Change

2003 / Audiobook / 448 pages

****

It's slightly bizarre that I didn't get around to this 10th anniversary anthology celebrating one of my favourite series until the other side of the 30th, but I was always lazy with the expanded universe. It satisfied the spec, filling some gaps interestingly if not necessarily.

Faves: Michael A. Martin and Andy Mangels' 'The Orb of Opportunity' (Nog story), Heather Jarman's 'The Devil You Know' (Dax story), Andrew J. Robinson's 'The Calling' (Garak story)

Various, Strange Tales

2003 / Audiobook / 295 pages

***

Experience tonal whiplash as extreme autocannibalism leads into dull romance. Something for everyone, but not a lot for the individual.

Faves: Anne-Sylvie Salzman's 'Meannanaich,' Adam Dafy's 'The Self-Eater,' Nina Allan's 'Terminus'

Various, Unexplainable Happenings: Chilling True Stories, Volumes 1–5

2023 / Ebook/audiobooks / 639 pages

****

Mostly explainable, most probably made up, but it's nice to get a set that isn't just recycled Reddit content, though each individual volume's stingily slim.

Various, Hell Season

2003 / Ebook / 166 pages

**

It hadn't clicked what guro meant when I checked out what I imagined to be a more standard horror manga, but once I realised what was going on, I had to see how far these freaks would push it. Pretty far, it turns out. I hope they're on some kind of government list.

Various, Creepypasta Collection

Collected 2013-15 / Ebook/Audiobook

***

Some kid's poorly-organised compilation of favourited short "creepy" stories, veering from tame children's ghost stories and urban legends to depraved necro incest gore, seemingly with a few hilariously inept originals mixed in too. Rarely any good, but always entertaining.

Faves: 'Gateway of the Mind,' 'Dead Bart,' 'Autopilot'

Alrightreads: TV XIX

Blaine Pardoe and artists, Star Trek: The Next Generation – First Year Sourcebook

1989 / Ebook / 64 pages

**

No productive excuses this time, just drawn by trashy nostalgia. A charming time capsule of retconned references and false assumptions in places, less so when singling out Geordi as "racially black" and thirsting over Tasha Yar.

Paul Simpson, Farscape: The Illustrated Season 4 Companion

2003 / Ebook / 160 pages

***

Not the funnest year to recap, even before the cancellation gloom.

Rockne S. O'Bannon, Farscape: Horizons

2003 / Ebook / 8 pages

**

Skips over any aborted/truncated fifth season plans and goes straight to the Babylon 5 ending, with a liberal dollop of spiritual schmaltz to make the bereaved fans feel better.

Todd Downing, Gavin Downing and Steve Hartley, Red Dwarf A.I. Screen Extra Bits Book

2003 / Ebook / 24 pages

**

These supplementary races, scenarios and items are fairly incompatible with our non-sci-fi-comedy RPG of choice, but I noted down the reminder that we could do a 'Bodyswap' story.

Marc Guggenheim and Oleg Chudakov, Star Trek: The Motion Picture – Echoes

2023 / Ecomics / 136 pages

**

It's nice to get some appreciation for an obscure era, just a shame it's more of the same old parallel universe stuff that was old even at that time.

Alrightgames: My Little Pony – Tails of Equestria – One Good Turn Deserves Another

My Little Pony: Tails of Equestria – One Good Turn Deserves Another

2017 / Roleplaying game mini-adventure / 2+ players

**

This school assembly style parable would slide easily into most wilderness gaps in stories, but we used it as a warm-up exercise en route to our call to adventure. I tried to present the scenario of the stubborn, ungrateful mare as objectively as possible, and she went for the friendship option that yielded rewards. She's seen the show.

Alrightgames: Carcassonne – Hero at the Crossroads & Baba Yaga

Carcassonne: Hero at the Crossroads & Baba Yaga

2012 / Tile placement board game mini expansion / 2-6 players

**

A "semi-official" printable expansion (which seems to mean "licensed, but Russian"), Baba Yaga's hut functioning as a sort of inverted cloister is a nice idea, now that we've crossed the magic threshold, but it's a shame the crossroads doesn't do anything special. Ultimately, neither tile proved interesting enough to permanently paste over the more useful Scrabble-style blanks. This was the point where I realised I have enough Carcassonne.

Alrightgames: Carcassonne – Castles

Carcassonne: Bridges, Castles and Bazaars

2010 / Tile placement board game partial expansion / 2-6 players

**

The only appealing part of an otherwise negative-interest expansion set, the pop-out castle tokens were also more amenable to pirating than the usual thick card stock tiles, so we didn't have to miss out on this optional rule for making a two-tile city more attractive, if not much more interesting.

Alrightgames: Forbidden Island

Forbidden Island

2010 / Cooperative board game / 2-4 players

****

This widely-recommended family-friendly cooperative game was going to end up on the shelf eventually, but it got there a little prematurely when I spotted it for under £10. Still a few years shy of the target age, she got bored as expected, though earlier than hoped, just when the incrementally-rising flood water was getting exciting, but unlucky cards and inexperience would have spelled a soggy defeat anyway.

Hopefully it'll be something we can enjoy together one day (even if it'll still be mainly for me), but for now, the creepy chaos of Atmosfear is her big-kid game of choice.

Alrightgames: Knightmare of Equestria

Knightmare of Equestria

2024 / Roleplaying challenge game / 2+ players

**

You won't find this amateur unauthorised RPG mashup in the shops, or even typed up neatly in a PDF, as it was all scribbled down on a notepad per tradition as my daughter's 5th birthday book. Along with supplementary printed templates to better visualise the perilous honeycomb paths and Corridor of Blades. That's one way to traumatise them into learning their left and right.

With no playtesting or proofreading, it was a little less smooth than I'd imagined, but I left space on the rule pages for inevitable troubleshooting. Keep arriving in the same damned place? Roll again. A descriptive Eyeshield passage is inappropriately scary, even though you wrote it and knew who you were writing it for? Improvise.

Oh well, the notebook's still mostly empty for drawing in, so it wasn't a completely duff present.

Alrightgames: Twister

Twister

1966 / Physical skill game / 2-4 players

***

She's used to ill-advised stretching from her ballet class, so this poses little challenge, until she has to stretch all the way from red to green. That's probably why the box says 6+. Though I notice it's missing an upper age limit, probably somewhere around 32.

Alrightgames: Rainbow Knights

Rainbow Knights

2018 / Speed card game / 2-6 players

**

Screen-free Snake, bought for a cheap, unicorn-featuring birthday stuffer. Overlaying transparent cards is a novelty, but we're not into competitive games, she can just let the unicorn out for a leisurely flyabout now and then. She made me be the goblin.

Babyliography CLXXXVII

Ben Clanton, Narwhal: Unicorn of the Sea

2016 / Library book / 64 pages

****

Another fun early-reader comic series we'll pursue, even if she favours the harder Phoebe and her conventional land unicorn.

Dana Simpson, Phoebe and Her Unicorn in The Magic Storm

2017 / Paperback / 160 pages

****

A break from the perpetual soap for a full-on self-contained graphic novel adventure. This change-up was a hit, as we got through it in a day.

Malachy Doyle and Andrew Whitson, Molly and the Dolphins

2022 / Library book / 36 pages

**

Pretty irresponsible, but since we don't live on the coast with access to boats, it won't do any harm.

Ben Clanton, A Super Scary Narwhalloween

2023 / Library book / 80 pages

**

Not one of the scarier seasonal books out there, and quite a step down from the funny first book, though we did skip to book 8.

Heather Amery and Stephen Cartwright, Usborne Farmyard Tales: The Grumpy Goat

1990 (updated 2017) / Library book / 32 pages

***

She was typically bored by these in the past, but school's toughened her up to tedious non-unicorn literature.

Babyliography CLXXXVI

Various, Read with Oxford: Stage 1 – Phonics – Sam's Backpack and Other Stories

2020 / Library book / 96 pages

**

So it looks like she can read now. Good job.

Sarah Rice and Anna Kazimi, Collins Big Cat Phonics for Letters and Sounds: Sit Sit

2019 / School book / 16 pages

**

Don't worry, she's continuing to read her ongoing unicorn books and comics daily too, it's not all work.

Jessica Courtney-Tickle, The Story Orchestra: Peter and the Wolf

2024 / Library book / 24 pages

***

Nicely fills the gap in the market for non-toddler, non-franchise sound books.

Josephine Southon and Paul Moran, Where's the Baby Unicorn?: An Enchanting Search Book

2024 / Library book / 48 pages

***

She prefers OG Wally to the unicorn rip-offs, but it's some novelty.

Barbara Jean Hicks and Brittney Lee, Disney Learning: Adventures in Reading – Level 1 – Disney Frozen – Meet Anna

2015 / Library book / 32 pages

*

She's got a collection of these boring things already, but it's more appealing than Ben & Lad.

Babyliography CLXXXV

J. D. Green and Amy Zhing, _____ and the Magical Unicorn

2022 / Hardback / 30 pages

*

A simpler alternative to commissioning a custom printing of your child's personalised storybook: just write their name on yourself in seamless biro! Though she preferred to make it about "Katie" instead. She's not used to first-hand books.

Caroline Green and Begona Corbalan, Collins Big Cat Phonics for Letters and Sounds: Sit Sip Nap

2020 / School book / 16 pages

**

The sad tale of a hypersomniac mother scalding herself with hot drinks as her unfeeling kids point and laugh.

Julia Donaldson and Axel Scheffler, Stick Man

2008 / School book / 32 pages

***

It's only autumn, couldn't they wait a few weeks?

Termisa Seraphini and Sophie Robin, The Secret Lives of Unicorns

2019 / Library book / 64 pages

***

Illustrations rather than photos clued her in to it possibly not being authentic zoology, but there were still good tips for wildlife spotting generally. Who knows?

Sam Hogan and Leo Antolini, Oxford Reading Tree Word Sparks: Level 1 – The Secret Life of Cats

2020 / Library book / 12 pages

**

She didn't mind doing an extracurricular school book. There were only about 10 words anyway, and most of those were "pat."

Babyliography CLXXXIV

Nick Sharratt, Ketchup On Your Cornflakes?

1996 / School book / 24 pages

****

The surprise 90s date gives this the innovative edge over all the modern equivalents, most of which are admittedly by the same author-illustrator. It made such an impression in her school book group that she talked about it all the way home.

Dana Simpson, Unicorn Crossing: Another Phoebe and Her Unicorn Adventure

2014-15 (collected 2017) / Paperback / 176 pages

****

We've synchronised on seasons again, and I appreciate the attention to details like seasonal foliage and clothing in the daily comic strip, even if the child protagonist conventionally refuses to age.

Various, My Little Pony: Adventures in Friendship, Volume 1

2013-14 (collected 2014) / Hardback / 76 pages

***

Nice character-based compilations of some of the more obscure 'Pony comic ranges, even if the mean cloud in the Rainbow Dash story might have contributed to the young reader's night terror. Bad weather.

Charlotte Raby and Beccy Blake, Big Cat Phonics for Little Wandle Letters and Sounds Revised: Pat it

2021 / School book / 16 pages

**

Jumping from wordless books to two words a page that she could read by spelling them out, this is more like it. Though I was disappointed by the poor continuity of the sandpit shape between pages.

Alison Murray, The Little Green Hen

2018 / School book / 32 pages

**

Palette-swapped fable of friendship, forgiveness and flooding that bizarrely forgets to end on a rainbow.