As we get closer to the end of the year, people usually start reflecting—or at least I do—on what they’ve accomplished over the past 12 months. I start remembering my sometimes long-forgotten New Year’s resolutions from January 1st and begin piecing together a retrospective of the year. Was it a productive year? Did I accomplish the things I set out to do? Did unexpected events take place? How close did I stick to the original plans?

Hi, everyone! This is Og Maciel from Bellwether, here with your weekly book recommendation, which comes out every Tuesday. I hope you enjoyed last week's episode. This week, I'm excited to recommend "High Fidelity" by Nick Hornby. This book was originally published in 1995, but I didn't really become aware of it until the movie adaptation came out in 2000. I ended up reading the book a few years after watching the movie, and let me tell you, the movie was really, really cool!

“A Confederacy of Dunces” is a brilliantly crafted novel that stands out for its humor, memorable characters, and satirical portrayal of society. Ignatius J. Reilly is one of the most unforgettable protagonists in literature, with his outrageous behavior, comically inflated ego, and skewed worldview providing endless amusement. His interactions with the diverse cast of characters, from his beleaguered mother to the various denizens of New Orleans, are both hilarious and insightful.

As a younger boy in Brazil, I absolutely loved comic books! I vividly remember waiting for my turn to read a freshly bought, pages-still-crisp, fresh-off-the-magazine-stand edition of “Turma da Mônica”1 by the Brazilian cartoonist Mauricio de Sousa2. Often, I would wait for one of my parents to come home with it so that I could be the first to enjoy it while lightly teasing my sisters as they waited their turn.