The past couple of weeks have gone by pretty quickly, so this week’s post is going to round up the highlights before I head out to the fair tonight to fill up on greasy food.

• Mamma Mia: Here We Go Again – It’s light on story, but the music is good, and that’s really what you go see Mamma Mia for anyway, right? All in all, I had a fun time.

• The Shadow Queen by C.J. Redwine – Snow White + Dragons is certainly a good way to get my attention, and this book didn’t disappoint. It’s pretty fast-paced (I read it in 2 days), which was good for the action, but it doesn’t leave a lot of room for character depth, though I do think Redwine was able to use each of the character’s emotional stakes to counter that a bit. Though The Shadow Queen is connected to a larger series spanning the multiple kingdoms mentioned in the story, it stands completely on its own. All in all, I give it 3 out of 5 stars. I’d like to check out the rest of the series eventually, but right now there are other books higher on my to-be-read list.

• Duolingo – I started using this website a couple of weeks ago to brush up on my Italian and give myself a fun brain exercise, and I’m really liking it. If you’ve ever wanted to learn another language, but don’t have the time for an actual class, you should check this out. They have mini-exercises that take five minutes tops, so it’s easy to fit one into your day. It’s only been two weeks, so I’m not going to be booking a trip to Italy any time soon, but I’ve been pleasantly surprised by how quickly this site’s brought it back to me.

• For those of you who were wondering, I did get my synopsis done. Actually, I have two done—the short version and the detailed version—so I’m feeling much more organized on that front.