Skip to main content

what I read: Feb 2023

LHC #201: "The Lover: A Sufi mystery" by Laury Silvers. In the acknowledgements, Murat Coskun! And I thought, the drummer? What's he doing here? The writing wasn't very elegant. Too much sufi, not enough mystery, like the plot is a distribution mechanism for the research. And the dialog seemed kind of modern.

"The Essex Serpent" by Sarah Perry. I got this for Christmas, and I'd finished a hardcover from the library and had three more on the way but they hadn't arrived yet, so I picked this up to read on the bus one evening, and I was totally hooked. No supernatural to speak of, though I often expected it to veer into Lovecraft, but great just the same. 

LHC #202: "The invisible life of Addie Larue" by VE Schwab. Hard copy because the eBook had like a 16-week wait (!). As this book moved up my hold list, I was growing increasingly ambivalent to it. The boy's book club read this in the fall, and they had some issues. I remember the boy said he didn't expect so much sex, and also, if someone's going to live a really long time, he'd expect them to venture a little farther from home. But I've read five other books by her, six if you count the YA one under a slightly different name that was about a library of bodies and eyeliner? 

I did not find there to be too much sex, except when things kind of stopped working for me with respect to the relationship with Luc. Agreed about the travel thing. And I kept wondering, Addie spends a whole day with someone sometimes, or an entire evening. Do they never have to go to the washroom? Doesn't she? 

LHC #203: "The Jungle" by Upton Sinclair. AudioBook. It was published in 1906, and I feel like things haven't changed enough, or maybe are sliding back towards how things were back then? Fascinating and horrifying. Wikipedia says this book led to the Meat Inspection Act, which made me wonder if perhaps most people only read the first third of the book? US covers so much more stuff than just that. Though it really does completely abandon plot once Jurgis becomes a socialist and starts attending meetings, where endless speechifying occurs. With which I don't necessarily disagree, but still. At one point I thought the book could only end with Jurgis dying, but the author chose a different path. 

The reader did a great job, and I was highly amused to see some of the other projects he's worked on: "Santa's little yelpers"! 

Popular posts from this blog

In progress - January 2026

  Wind/Water/Salt  Chapters 39-51:   Nothing  Persephone  (probably not its real name): NOthing Vinterlys:  Worked on Chapter 2 some more.  Critted  4  Got back  1 Submissions  0  Out there   0   Rejects   0 Knitting Georgia  (Norah Gaughan). Started the month with one sleeve and half a front to go. Finished. Love this sweater.  Aberlady  (AS Celtic Collection). Did a few rows while listening to podcasts.  Summer in Tokyo  (Isager): Started. I was looking at the pictures and the charts, and the pattern as written is not what is in the pictures! So odd. I am going to finish up two cones of yarn with this project! Pretty exciting. I hope I don't run out of light blue.  I was working along on it, and if you go and look at the sweater, it's knit bottom-up, and I was at the part where I only had two colors, about 5" maybe. And I was thinking, "wow, this is pretty ugly! Maybe I should stop...
Read more

In progress: March 2026

Wind/Water/Salt Chapters 39-51 :   Nothing.  Persephone  (probably not its real name): Nothing.  Vinterlys:  Working on Chapter 3 still, though this one seems more stable. I did work on it quite a bit during Chapter 2. 1-3 are in the same locale so it made sense to work on them together. Maybe I'll continue in this vein, doing the next locale all together too.  Critted  4  Got back  3 Submissions  0  Out there   0   Rejects   0 Knitting Aberlady  (AS Celtic Collection). I added markers at each pattern repeat. Hopefully that will make it easier to work on.   Summer in Tokyo  (Isager):Started the month with eleven rows left on the second sleeve, the yoke, and the finishing to go. And as I wanted, I finished this and now I can wear it for a little while before sweater weather is over until fall. I could not follow the yoke short row instructions as written so I did my best to make it look like th...
Read more

What I read: September 2025

LHC #295: "The Last to Leave the Room" by Caitlin Starling. Audiobook. Workplace horror? Loved it.  "Careless People" by Sarah Wynn-Williams. Hard copy, for office Data Ethics book club. The stories about Sheryl Sandberg really made me like my boss better.  LHC #296: "The Fated Sky" by Mary Robinette Kowal. Hard copy. This got moved up the list because Ed had read book 1 in the series and got the rest out of the library. Loved it. He's got the next one in the series upstairs, I suppose I'll read it when he's done.  LHC #297: "Bluegrass: A History" by Neil V. Rosenberg. Hard copy. No idea why it was on my list, I don't care that much about bluegrass. Nevertheless, the second half was interesting. I guess the first half was necessary, as it described in great length the way people came and went in Bill Monroe's Blue Grass Boys band, and also how technology and social pressures affect how music is made and performed.   LHC #298: ...
Read more