When people ask me for recommendations of fiction to read, I almost always turn to science-fiction and fantasy. It’s not that I dislike naturalistic or other forms of fiction; I read it, and I think there are a lot of great places to get good recommendations for that work. It’s rather that I prefer stories that are both invented and not bound by any need to adhere to reality—when I fly, I’d like to fly far away.

(That said, I  re-read most of the Rex Stout “Nero Wolfe” series of mysteries in 2021 after appearing on the Like the Wolfe podcast to talk about my life of that detective.)

I’ve been reading sci-fi and fantasy since I was in my single digits, but I feel we’re in another golden age—maybe it’s lasted 20 years so far, maybe longer—in which all the

Because I have so many active books in the Take Control series, it may seem like I’m updating them all the time. It seems that way to me, too! However, I have a flurry of update activity with the release of iOS 15, iPadOS 15, and the upcoming appearance of the production version of macOS 12 Monterey. (All my books are updated with the latest public betas of Monterey, which are very close to what we’ll get in the release versions.)

The latest books, in order of newness:

• Take Control of Your Apple ID, Third Edition: This update extensively revises the Apple ID/iCloud recovery process. Apple now has three separate methods of account or data recovery, one of which has two unique options. I explain all that, plus changes in iCloud+ and other services. The book is full of troubleshooting advice for your Apple ID account.
• Take

Whenever Apple updates its operating systems, I’m there with a host of book updates—and sometimes entirely new books. I’ve got two so far this September, and more coming soon.

Take Control of Find My and AirTags gives you a full understanding of Apple’s three overlapping services for finding people (who consent to share their location), devices (like Macs and iPhones), and items (like AirTags and other trackers). Apple has richly intertwined these three kinds of tracking services across two different networks: the classic Find My Device system, which relies on Macs, iPhones, and iPads transmitted their location continuously via Wi-Fi and cellular, and the newer Find My network, which allows nearly all Apple hardware to relay its current location in a secure and anonymized way back to an owner through other people’s iPhones, iPads, and Macs.

Find My helps you coordinate with others when meeting

One of the many things I do is try to support writers I like! That occasionally leads to me leading panels or being “in conversation” with them about their work. Last night, for Copperfield’s Books (an indie chain with stores north of San Francisco) I interviewed my friend Helene Wecker about the second novel in her series about a golem and a jinni, The Hidden Palace. I loved the first book and it’s at the top of my list of several I recommend as my favorites across the last decade.

The second is a great continuation, with new themes, characters, and big, medium, and little conflicts. I loved how well she paints the inner life, and makes monsters seem human (and human sometimes monstrous). It covers a span of time of about 15 years, compared with a compact passage in the first book, and encompasses world event and