What I read: July 2024

I'm not a whiner; that's a lot of bruise

"Don't sleep, there are snakes" by Daniel Everett. Recommended to me by a translator I work with, someone gave it to me for Christmas. I found I didn't have a whole lot of sympathy for some of Daniel's situations, pretty much for the reason he expected.

LHC #256: "The Princess Will Save You" by Sarah Henning. eBook. I bet I put it on my list because it's a gender-swapped princess bride complete with pirates. What's to go wrong with that? I found the unrelenting awesome-genius-righteousness of the good guys and the endless stupid-shallow idiocy of the bad guys tedious after a while but it wasn't terrible. The plot was good, just sometimes the writing was not very subtle.

LHC #257: "The Man who was Thursday: A Nightmare" by G.K. Chesterton. eBook. It was on my list because of Neil Gaiman. Quick read, very fun. Not many women!

LHC #258: "Klara and the Sun" by Kazuo Ishiguro. Audio book because I had the eBook on hold forever and then I found the audio was going to be "soon" when the eBook still had 10 weeks wait, and I needed something to listen to while I worked on that interminable Fair Isle sweater. The wait was like 3 hours maybe. It was a little depressing but definitely good.

LHC #259: "The Four Profound Weaves" by R.B. Lemberg. eBook. It was as good as the reviews said and exactly what I wanted it to be.

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: ...

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...

Robynettely

Search This Blog