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What I read: February 2024


LHC #236: "The animals in that country" by Laura Jean McKay. I thought I knew what I was getting into with this, but I did not. Wow. It's like a pandemic addiction memoir but with talking Australian animals who are not as insightful as we'd like. 

"The Power" by Naomi Alderman. I watched the TV show (season 1? will there be another?) last fall. The TV show was amazing, except the end didn't quite work for me. Alex went to a signing with the author, and I got this. I quite enjoyed it, the ending was much more satisfying. 

 LHC #236: "Armistice" by Lara Elena Donnelly. Audiobook. I found MRK's reading sort of a downer, wondering if that was on purpose. Or too wistful maybe. Also, Makricosta sounds really old as read, I went looking for fan art to get a better sense. I found surprisingly little, maybe I don't know how to search anymore. 

LHC #237: "The Marigold" by Andrew Sullivan. Near future horror set in Toronto. Needed more past perfect tense. Not sure how enjoyable it would be for a non-Toronto area person, a lot of in jokes.  It does seem appropriate that the Toronto Arts Council and Ontario Arts Council would fund a book about condo towers where the raccoons eventually win. 

LHC #238: "The Iron Dragon's Daughter" by Michael Swanwick. I'll be honest, I was guessing at this point, but I read his blog, I've never read one of his books, it makes sense I would put one on my list? Plus, everything I was more sure about had a waitlist and this did not, so here we are. I loved the language, the juxtapositions of faerie and 90's tech. 

On Feb 25, joyous of all days, I was able to look at my holds list again. #s 232, 234, 237 and 238 were not on it! I'm leaving them anyway. I did manage to read 10 books off that list in the four months it was down. 

LHC #239: "A Deadly Education" by Naomi Novik. In juxtaposition to "Fourth Wing," I'd describe this as "grumpy times at well thought-out magic school."  After the first few pages where I had to get used to the voice, I loved this book. Will totally read the sequels. 

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What I read: September 2025

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What I read -- October 2025

"The Moomins and the Great Flood" by Tove Jansson.  eBook. I read this because Marissa Lingen loves them. It was fine? This was the first one in the series and the only one available online; maybe the later ones are better. Maybe they're better if you read them as a child.  "The Relentless Moon" by Mary Robinette Kowal.  Hard copy. Read it because Ed had the whole series out of the library. It took a long time to get going, and sometimes I find MRK exhausting. Her white main characters all seem oddly aware of the Black experience.  "The Martian Contingency" by Mary Robinette Kowal.  Hard copy. Read it because Ed had the whole series out of the library. I don't often read subsequent books in a series in quick succession, and my reaction to this one is a lot of why: I found Alma's voice too similar to Nicole's -- sure, Nicole obsessed about food much more, but they both went on and on about "must support black guy in management" an...

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...