What I read: November 2024

LHC #275: "The Only Good Indians" by Steven Graham Jones. eBook. Loved it. There's another book by him on my list, and I'm not sad about it. The character development was beautiful. I think horror might be good at that! Highly recommended.

LHC #276: "The collected novellas of Stefan Zweig". eBook. Another one that I have no idea how it ended up on my list; clearly recommended by someone. The library Holds tool really needs a notes field, where I'm sure I would faithfully note "recommended by: " or some such thing. Anyway. I'm almost tempted to describe this as horror. At least for me. The character development was very rich. Not my thing maybe. So patriarchal.

"Build : an unorthodox guide to making things worth making" by Tony Fadell. This was my office book club's Autumn selection. I got it from the library in hard copy because it would be faster than waiting. Also, I feel like I might be serving the library better getting more hard copy books rather than reading everything online. So I'm going to try to have 2 books per month be hard copy to get back in the habit of that. They're better to read on the bus anyway.

The last nonfiction I read was "The last supper" and this book was really at odds with that in terms of its understanding of what it is to work.

Also, we used to have a Nest product (he goes on and on about his time at Nest and the product life cycle etc.) and my experience of the product life cycle of Nest is pretty horrific because as far as I'm concerned, Google murdered our Nest. I won't forget that. Now we have a shoddy Amazon product to replace it that keeps getting de-featured.

LHC #277: "No gods for Drowning" by Hailey Piper. eBook. The formatting was kind of annoying. There weren't proper chapter breaks, it seemed double-spaced. Nevertheless, I loved her dialog, especially. I went to her website to find out what else she'd written, only to discover that this book is somehow out of print? It was published in September 2022, how does that happen? I don't understand publishing.

LHC #278: "Ducks" by Kate Beaton. Hard copy. I prefer reading graphic novels on paper. It was amazing, heartbreaking, so well-done. I think I will buy a copy tomorrow to give away for Christmas.

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...

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