Just One Thing: Five-Minute Push

I wrote before about the strategy of doing "just one thing" and how it can help chip away at the to-do list. I am happy to report that I did a little bit yesterday in that vein, and it really felt good!

I was in my closet getting clothes for the day and it struck me how silly it was that I have all these shirts and I only ever wear the same ones. I pulled out the shirts I never choose, which was about half of them, and piled them on the bed. 

Later, after work, I took them off the hangers and folded them so they can go to the thrift store. So happy, looking at that not-crammed-in hanging space!

Then, inspired by how fricking easy that was (after I got over the mental obstacle of "but I like some of these" and reached peace with "but I never wear them"), I pulled out the stack of yoga pants, pajama pants, leggings, etc., that was toppling over, and pulled some of them into that pile to go. Now I have room on the stack and don't have to reach over the ones I never wear to get to the ones I wear.

And, seriously, it probably only took five minutes. There's still plenty to do, but just with that little bit, my closet is a happier place, which makes me a happier person. Baby steps.

Book Reviews and Mentions: Jackie Fraser, Kristin Cashore, KJ Charles

I hope this good-book streak of reading I'm in keeps going! I've been reading a lot lately, almost all winners, and it helps make up for the frustrating times when I dislike one book after another. 

I mentioned in passing a good book I read recently by Jackie Fraser, and I liked it enough to get another of hers out of the library, this one called The Bookshop of Second Chances. I liked this one as well! It's set in Scotland, and again features a character in her 40s, which I found a nice break from the young things. Turns out I like a bit of been-there done-that for a change! (I suspect I may be aging out of reading about characters who don't know who they are, if that makes sense. Or maybe this is a blip, who knows.) Her two main characters have a better idea of what they want and don't want, and I'm there for it. I'm sorry that these two are the only ones she's written, so far at least; I hope she does more.

Now, I have been able to read two more advance copies of new books, which is exciting for me, and I liked both of them--it's so nice when that happens!

The first is There Is a Door in this Darkness, by Kristin Cashore (thank you to PENGUIN GROUP Penguin Young Readers Group for the ARC); it comes out in June (I'll report this then, as a reminder).

The publisher describes it thusly: 

A magic-tinged contemporary YA about grief and hope from the acclaimed New York Times bestselling author of the Graceling Realm novels.

Wilhelmina Hart is part of the infamous class of 2020. Her high school years began with a shocking presidential election and ended with a pandemic. In the midst of this global turmoil, she also lost one of her beloved aunts, a loss she still feels keenly. Having deferred college, Wilhelmina now lives in a limbo she can see no way out of, like so many of her peers. Wilhelmina’s personal darkness would be unbearable (especially with another monumental election looming) but for the inexplicable and seemingly magical clues that have begun to intrude on her life—flashes of bizarre, ecstatic whimsy that seem to add up to a message she can’t quite grasp. But something tells her she should follow their lead. Maybe a trail of elephants, birds, angels, and stale doughnuts will lead Wilhelmina to a door?

I have read Cashore's fantasy books, the Graceling series, which I highly recommend, but this one is regular fiction (mostly: see 'seemingly magical' above), and in fact it's pandemic fiction, which I emphasize as I know it may not appeal to all readers. I do think that a year or two ago, I wouldn’t have been able to read about this time period, with first the political upheaval and then the pandemic, but at this point, though certain things made me wince in vivid memory, I was able to focus on Wilhelmina and what growing up in this time had done to her and those around her. (I wonder how readers will feel about it in 10 or 20 years?)

I liked the touch of the inexplicable—is it magic? How else to explain it?—while still feeling fully real-world. And how people you love can drive you crazy—a theme that still resonates in my life! After I finished reading this, I couldn’t stop thinking about it. Definitely recommend. 

The second book is Death in the Spires, by KJ Charles (thank you, Storm Publishing, for the advance copy), an author I was familiar with, as I mentioned last month, from seeing her on panels with other authors I love (such a good recommendation, isn't it? Hey you, next to Martha Wells and Ursula Vernon/T Kingfisher and Malka Older? Bet I'd like yours too). It officially comes out April 11, but the author reports that copies are appearing in the world now.

They describe it like this:

The newspapers called us the Seven Wonders. We were a group of friends, that’s all, and then Toby died. Was killed. Murdered.

1905. A decade after the grisly murder of Oxford student Toby Feynsham, the case remains hauntingly unsolved. For Jeremy Kite, the crime not only stole his best friend, it destroyed his whole life. When an anonymous letter lands on his desk, accusing him of having killed Toby, Jem becomes obsessed with finally uncovering the truth.

Jem begins to track down the people who were there the night Toby died – a close circle of friends once known as the ‘Seven Wonders’ for their charm and talent – only to find them as tormented and broken as himself. All of them knew and loved Toby at Oxford. Could one of them really be his killer?

As Jem grows closer to uncovering what happened that night, his pursuer grows bolder, making increasingly terrifying attempts to silence him for good. Will exposing Toby's killer put to rest the shadows that have darkened Jem’s life for so long? Or will the gruesome truth only put him in more danger?

Some secrets are better left buried…

(That's a little long, but I feel it's worth reading.)

I really liked it! I was a little concerned that it might go back into the past storyline and stay there, which seemed like it might have been heavy-handed given we know from the start that Toby will be killed, but it fact she leavened scenes from the past into Jem's present investigating in a way that really supported the plot, and I thought it was very well done.

I don't read a ton of mysteries these days, so I don't know how it stands up to the genre, but I really liked it---what more can one say?

Also, I don't think this is too much of a spoiler, but when some of the characters pile into a 'motor car' and go racing off, the line "Jem feared she was doing well over thirty miles an hour" made me laugh.

Caption This Photo

 

A) "What, I'm helping!"

B) "But I'm not ON your knitting!"

C) "Tails don't count."

D) other

Maybe Next Knitting

On Monday, a friend asked me if I knew what would be my next knitting project, as I'm close to finishing my current one, and I said that I didn't know for sure yet. (I have plenty of WIPs [works in progress] that I could pick up in the interim). But then when I was putting photos into my post yesterday about yarn, I saw the picture I took of a shawl at the yarn store on Saturday, and my mind started thinking about what yarn I could use in it, hmm...

The pattern is called Beachy Keen, and you can see better overall pictures on the Ravelry page for it, but I took a closer picture of the stitch pattern that interested me. Fun!

The color combo possibilities are endless, but it may not surprise you to learn that I'm leaning toward rainbow.

The rainbow is a Pride set, Shades of the Rainbow, that I got a few years ago from Neighborhood Fiber Co, and the natural is Anzula Squishy---I actually got a skein of white of the same yarn as the rainbow pack, but this pattern would need two*, so I looked to see what else I had on hand, and this was in the massive windfall of 2023.
*Actually, the pattern suggests using 2 background colors, but I think I want to do it all the same background.

The big question, of course, is do I want to do the rainbow stripes once, or repeating? I'm leaning toward repeating, but who knows.

As for the current project, I'm doing the edging on the Illumine shawl, which is 4 rows but can be repeated as much as you want; I've done three repeats and then I weighed the yarn and have enough for another four rows, anyway, before binding off. I'm excited to finish it, but also want to use as much yarn as I can. Without playing yarn chicken on the bind-off!

Even before blocking, I'm loving how it looks, but the blocking will make a huge difference as well. Can't wait!

More Yarn! A Coping Mechanism

I don't think I am finding life quite as madly stressful these days as I was, say, last August, when Mom had fallen for the first time and it felt like the world had landed on my shoulders. But I am, it must be admitted, buying yarn at a similar pace to what I was then. Preemptive stress reduction technique? Possibly. Well, whatever the reason, here's some new stuff.

I first bought from Dye Mad Yarns last fall, and got some more of this lovely stuff, in two colorways that go nicely together (always a relief when what you think worked on-screen works in reality as well). 

And this is some more from Blu Fiber, which I first ordered from, ah, in February. Hey, they had a sale! These two won't be used together: the grey is cashmerino in fingering weight and the multi-green-blue is DK-weight cashmerino.

Finally, on Saturday, most of my knitting group took a day trip to Sarasota for the Miss Babs trunk show there. 

I bought a few things.

The skein on the left is the one I bought this time, to go with the skein on the right, which I already had; thanks to advice from Babs herself, they go together really well. This is Sojourn, which is a divinely soft cashmere-silk blend. I'm thinking these will be a cowl.

Miss Babs Yowza, which is DK weight, don't know what these will be.

And a few Yummy 2-Ply Toes, which are small skeins of fingering weight merino. I just liked how these looked together.

Finally, a non-Babs purchase, this set is from Emma's Yarn

I took them out of the package very carefully to keep them in order, before I noticed that they are labeled that way! Great detail.

Which meant I could grab them by the handful and not fret about the way they had been laid out before.

While I was getting things entered into Ravelry on Sunday, I looked over to admire the picture:

Pretty colors, happy sigh.

As a footnote, if you were reading here last January, you may remember the massive yarn giveaway that I was the recipient of (who could forget?). Well, I saw the same woman last week, and she said ... wait for it ... that she has more yarn to give me! Can you imagine? I have so many questions!

• Did she not in fact give me all her yarn last year? The nine giant lawn-and-garden-size bags weren't ALL? Or has she bought more since? 
• If this was yarn she kept back, given how fantastic the yarn she did give me was, what did she keep? Because that was some nice yarn! Is it, as a friend suggested, spun from unicorn hair? 
• How much yarn can it be? She said that her daughter was visiting and, after asking her when the last time she knit anything was, suggested it might be time to get rid of this yarn.* So, it must be enough to be visible, right? Not just a bit stuffed in the back of a closet, I mean. 
• She said that it was in bins, and that she might give it to me in those, instead of putting it in garbage bags, was that okay. I told her honestly that whatever worked for her was fine, but afterward, I was thinking, bins? Plural? How many?!

*Rather rude of her daughter, it sounds to me, but then again maybe I should thank her

I of course will ask her none of these things. She said it might be June* before she gets things organized, which I again said was fine, whatever works for her...but every time I think of it, I wonder.
*Which is when her daughter will be here again, and can "help"

Stay tuned!

A Maggie Interlude

I went to a trunk show at a yarn store with friends on Saturday, and between that and online buying, I'll have some yarn to show, but this morning Miss Maggie demanded attention be paid to her peak adorableness.

After napping on my lap for a while, she moved onto the footstool next to me and did this:

Gotcha!

The Boarding School Story

As requested, here's the story of how I ended up doing a year at boarding school in England between high school and college. Looking back, trying to recall details, has been an interesting exercise!

My high school was a fairly small private school outside Boston (my graduating class was 62 students, for reference), and at least in the mid-80s, felt very strongly that all its students would go on to college (aka university: I at least tend to use the terms to mean the same thing). I had no idea what I wanted to do (isn't that a theme, hey?), so I was politely resisting the pressure. I guess that was part of my teenage rebellion? All I remember is that I didn't see the point, so why bother doing all the work of searching and applications. Funny story, my mother remembers them calling her in to discuss it with her--bless her, her response was why force me?

 You know, I'm a pack rat, I may still have the list I clipped out of the school paper, which said where everyone was going, and my line read:

C_______ R____ did not apply.

Ha! Sounds as if they were washing their hands of me. But they didn't quite. Like pulling a rabbit out of a hat, they found a boarding school in England that was looking for not-quite-exchange students to attend. I wonder why they were? My school suggested that this was something I could do, though again, why did that make them feel better about me not trotting off to college? I guess at least they wouldn't have to say I went from their hallowed halls to work in a McDonald's.

It's funny to look back on the facts, at least as I remember them, and wonder now about the reasons why...

I flew to London in the spring of 1986, so that the school and I could have a look at each other. You know, I see no reason not to name it: Benenden School, which is in the countryside in Kent, south of London. And if you're wondering what kind of place it is, just know that when I did an online search for it, it suggested the question, "What royals went to Benenden School?" (For the British royal family, btw, the answer to that is Princess Anne, well before my time.)

But I'm getting ahead of myself. The school and I agreed that we liked each other well enough, and in September, my mother and I flew over to get my trunk fitted out, metaphorically speaking*, with all the uniform requirements at Peter Jones (a department store, in US terms), the list for which had much amused us over the summer. (I wonder if I kept that list, as well?) I can bring a tuck box, can I? Oh, and I should pack a cagoule, should I?

*We had actually packed a trunk** full of the things from home that I thought I would want/need, and sent it across the ocean on a boat, which I thought was so crazy. But the uniform itself we had to shop for in London.
**I kept that trunk until I moved to Florida six years ago. It made a good coffee table!

There were two other Americans there when I was, one in my year (six-one) and one who got put in the year above us (six-two). But there was no American enclave: different years and/or different houses meant I was immersed in Norris House first, six-ones second. The six-ones had a hallway of little studies, so we did mingle there, and weren't only reliant on our shared dorm rooms for our stuff, as you can see.

I spy with my little eye ... the Bruins, Depeche Mode, Calvin & Hobbes, Swatch watches, books...

In the dining room, we sat by house for one meal a day (was it lunch, was it dinner? I think it was dinner), and the tables rotated so no one house complained about their spot. When I was leaving, I encouraged my friends to lift one of the blocks for me, a possession I still treasure. Whoops, here I am, admitting to the theft! I hope the statute of limitations has passed. 

But what was it like, you are probably wondering. It was overwhelming to me, and even with the shared language, the culture shock was considerable; I was badly homesick. Plus, I was both a fairly sheltered, not quite 18-year-old who had essentially been an only child since my brother moved out, and had been gaining independence, driving myself to school for a year, going into Boston with friends, etc. Suddenly I'm sharing a room (the first term I think my dormie had five of us? all ages), following so many rules, "cabined, cribbed, confined" (to quote Macbeth) .... it was a lot of change!

One of the first days I was at Benenden, a teacher saw me going upstairs and asked where I was going. I said I was going to my dorm room, and she said we weren't allowed to go to our rooms during the school day. I was baffled. Because I had to figure a lot of things out by guesswork, and I didn't always guess right. I came from a mixed-gender high school where most of my friends were boys, and we had no uniform, and I was plunked down into this:

My treasured school photo! Can you pick me out? (So hard to get a photo of it without reflections on the glass! Is there a trick to that?)

In fact, the year after I was there, my two closest friends, who were still there for their six-two year, sent me a booklet the school had put together with various rules and guidelines, and I was incensed: where was this when I needed it last year! All that time I spent reading notices on bulletin boards, trying to figure out how things worked...when the assumptions each side doesn't realize they are making don't align, it's grinding-gears time.

So, yeah, it was certainly an experience, and not one I regret having, but a lot of my memories are of frustrations and feeling in over my head. I was more comfortable going up to London for the half-term break than I was navigating the school at times! And I still shudder to think about how I was dropped in a classroom full of younger girls to supervise their prep period (aka homework) without the slightest idea how to (or, as it turned out, the ability to) maintain order. But then there are better memories:

• my two friends, who I'm still in touch with today (thank you, FB), and memories of going on walks, playing very loosely scored tennis, climbing trees, writing stories--one of my friends wrote a fabulous story that both was and wasn't about us, and I so wish I had a copy of it
• classes that went into subjects in much more depth than I was used to, so that we first read through Measure for Measure without stopping, then went through it again stopping constantly to discuss meaning; or read the prologue to the Canterbury Tales, olde English and all; or introduced me to art history or sewing or piano or or or, so much more (including acting in productions of The Snow Goose and of another play whose name escaped me, in which we had to be the least convincing middle-aged Englishmen chatting over their drinks ever [with watered-down Coke for Scotch])
• the thrill of getting letters from home; was mail ever better?
• turning 18! feeling both so grown up and not at all grown up

I went back to visit a year later, seeing the school afresh after a year at UMass (yes, I finally decided I might as well go to school and put off getting a real job, and wasn't that experience a huge change from this one). And I was back in England two years later, visiting my friends at school (Cambridge and Newcastle) before going to Rome to visit another friend doing a year abroad there. 

I did go back to Benenden one more time, in 2008, for Seniors' Day (aka reunion, for what we would call alumni, in the US), because who could resist? 

You know, a school reunion with HRH, why not? How can you miss that? I've been meaning to frame the invitation and put it up next to the photo.

So, any follow-up questions, let me know!

P.S. Following onto the idea of sheltered/protected kid I was, the summer after I got back was when I got called to jury duty, and ended up serving on that murder trial. No wonder it was jarring!

A Pressing (ha) Question

I'm working on the write-up about my experience at boarding school, but in the meantime: is anyone else a dental wimp? Can anyone explain to me why toothbrushes labeled "soft" are in fact not at all soft? My mouth is definitely a delicate one, and the new brush that I just got at the dentist's a few weeks ago, which claims to be soft, is so firm (by my standards, at least) that it's painful. And this isn't the first time I've experienced that!

Are the ones labeled "extra soft" or "ultra soft" actually any better?

I'm tempted to buy one that's labeled "firm" because I just can't believe they're that much harder. How can they be?

Please weigh in. Thank you.

Movie Ratings in 2024 So Far

There haven't been a ton of movie ratings to catch my eye so far this year, other than this handful and the one that I couldn't wait to show you, a month ago. (Here was the last longer one.) But here are a few.

Safe to say I'm not the target audience for Mean Girls. That sounds unpleasant.

Multilingual profanity, on the other hand...

I'm not sure I want to know what this is like.

Same with "explicitly" here.

No, no, no thank you. 

Ha! I like that one. Not that I plan to see the movie--I liked the first one, but I don't think I even saw 2 or 3.

In June, Mom and I will be going to see The Muppet Movie in the theater*--that's much more my style than most of these.

*Again--we saw it in 2019. Perfectly happy to see it again!

How I Read

Engie wrote about her reading habits recently, and I thought I would answer the same questions she did, so here goes!

1) How do you define mood reading and are you a mood reader?

I sometimes find I’m not in the mood to pick up one book or another at a given time, but is that what this means? I don’t think outside circumstances affect what I read, though.

2) Do you have a TBR? Do you stick to it?

I keep lists of books that are coming out soon, to request from the library, but I don’t do any of the challenges or top lists. Sometimes I’ve read about a book, sometimes someone mentions it and it sounds appealing, so I pop off to @mazon and read the sample, to get a taste of it… it’s kind of random, actually, and I often don’t remember by the time I get it where I heard about it.

3) Do you cry reading books? If so, what books have made you cry?

Almost never really cry over a book, though I might tear up a little. 

4) Do you use reading to escape, learn, or critically reflect?

Escape, definitely, that’s the main one. To learn sometimes. I don’t think I ever pick up a book to be critical.

5) What is a book that made you laugh out loud?

Ummm, nothing is coming to mind.

6) What is a book that you don't really know how to feel about?

Hmmm. The problem with this question for me is that I don't generally finish books I'm not enjoying in some way, and since I don't keep a list of DNFs, it's hard to call one to mind. I guess I'll go back in time to a book I used to own, and read multiple times, despite not liking the protagonist at all. It's called The Travels of Maudie Tipstaff by Margaret Forster, and Maudie is a bitter, narrow-minded person but yet I read the book! More than once! Why? I can't answer that.
P.S. I ordered a copy to read again, so we'll see what I think of it now.

7) Are you more likely to read on a sunny day or a cloudy day?

Weather doesn’t matter. I read, period.

8) Do you usually "set the mood" when you read? Candles, lights, etc.?

Nope. I want to be comfortable, and that might lead to a blanket on my lap (which often leads to a cat on my lap), but no mood-setting required.

9) Can you leap from book to book or do you need buffer time between books?

I wouldn’t say I need buffer time, but sometimes I want a buffer between similar types/styles of books. If I just read a great book with dragons, say, then I might not pick up another book with dragons to be next.

Any follow-up questions? Or want to answer any or all of them yourself? Have at it!

A Book Rec, and About Me

This isn't a full book review, but I just read The Beginning of Everything, by Jackie Fraser, and really enjoyed it. Not sure where I read about it, but it's a novel set in Wales that's kind of a romance but not completely, and with protags in their 40s, which was a nice change from the young ones, and I really liked the writing: more than once I stopped to read a bit aloud to myself. Two thumbs up.

As a side note, I'm really in a reading period! It's funny to me how it goes in waves, where I'm not reading much, or only re-reading, or reading/re-reading bits but not finishing books, and then there's a time like this, where I devour one after another*. Does that happen to you?
*Still not the book club book, though, so I told my friend to take me off the list. No point in feeling pressured to read what I don't want to, even if I'm the only one putting on any pressure!

~~~~~

Anyway! When I described myself in passing as an English major, Nicole said she hadn't known that about me, and Kyria also asked for more info, so hey, always glad to talk about myself!

I did not go to college (UMass Amherst) knowing I would be an English major or having any plan beyond choosing to go rather than get a job (and this after already putting things off for a year by taking an opportunity to do a year at a boarding school in England). In hindsight, of course, it was obvious: as a high school senior, I had to get permission to take three English classes at once, which apparently no one at the school had ever wanted to do before. 

English classes were certainly my favorite at UMass--I wrote a killer paper on the Critical Response to Winnie the Pooh for a children's lit class, and the lexicography* class was awesome. But practical? Not so much.
*dictionary-making

So once I had my English degree, what did I do with it? Well, worked in bookstores for some years (an independent in MA, then Barnes & Noble in NC). I finally had enough of retail and started working any old office job* I could get, still not knowing what I wanted to do.
*My supervisor at one job saw me in the break room, trying to read the first H@rry P0tter** book in French and, when I explained why***, asked not unkindly, "What are you doing here?"
**I absolutely hate what the author of those books has shown herself to be, but the books were a big part of my retail experience.
***I was trying to brush up my very-basic-level French, so thought I would try material I was familiar with.

...I may have gotten a little carried away with nesting footnotes there. Let's break it up with a photo. Have you ever noticed the big old bookcases in the background of one of my photos? Those are from my B&N days. They are solid, and I love having the adjustable shelves (I have these two and two others). 

For that matter, the Oxford English Dictionary there at the bottom, all 20 volumes? Also bought that when I was at B&N. The OUP had a sale and with my employee discount, it was almost reasonable. Fun fact: I was on the phone with my oldest friend and said, guess what ridiculous English-major thing I bought and she instantly said, the OED.

All right, so, I moved back to MA, and signed up with a temp agency. The job I got was at a medical device company, the diabetes division of Abbott Labs, and while it wasn't an editorial position, I was in the process of transitioning to their label editor position a year later when the company announced that they were moving the business to California. Whoops! Layoffs!

I didn't want to move, but I did stay with them for another year during the transition, and then got what I suppose was my first "real" editing-type job, as a proofreader for an educational company. Three years later, whoops, layoffs! 

My next job was called labeling coordinator, with a dental implant company, and wasn't officially a proofreading/editing job, but I was known as someone who could look over your thing if you needed another set of eyes on it. 

I left that job, which was increasingly oddly run*, for a temp proofreading position at a publisher, then back to the educational company as a temp for more proofreading, and then got an editorial job at a company that made training material for pharma sales companies. And eight months later, whoops, laid off again!
*Oh, the turnover was crazy there at the end

At this point, I had enough editing experience, and at enough medical-associated companies, that I was hired at my current company as a medical editor (I like to say that I'm not a medical person, but I have a good amount of familiarity with it for an English major). I was there for two years and left for a job at a small company that was expanding after being bought by a larger one; the role was deep-level content editing. A year later, the bigger company pulled the plug and, yes, laid us all off. Sigh. That's four times.

I did look around for another job, but the boss where I had worked asked if I would come back, and sweetened the deal by offering work-from-home, and I was hooked. Happily for my sanity, when I was getting ready to move myself to FL to be with Mom, I asked if they would let me work from here, and they said yes. Hooray for not having to job search on top of an interstate move! I complain a lot about work, but there are ways that they are really good--that's one of them, and also that my boss allowed all the flexibility that I needed for Mom last fall, too. 

Not that I won't ditch the job the minute I win big in the lottery, but who wouldn't, right?

So that's the work history side of the English-major thing. On the personal side? Well, there's the OED. There are my bookshelves full of books, and my marked-up, written-in books from high school:

There's my inability to read so much as a restaurant menu without noticing double-spacing between words. My friends asking if I can look over their resumes and cover letters for them. There's this blog, where I play around with words like they're legos, fitting them together this way and that to see how best to tell a story. 

So: questions? What am I not thinking to tell you?

Book Reviews: What's In a Name?

I've read two Shakespeare-related books recently (I know, such an English major), and they could NOT be more different! So different that it amuses me.

1.

The first was called Shakespeare Was a Woman & Other Heresies: How Doubting the Bard Became the Biggest Taboo in Literature, by Elizabeth Winkler, which I got from the library.

When I say that I am not recommending this book, I mean generally, because it isn't a topic that most people will be interested in such a deep dive into. No judgement, I swear! It's not for everyone, fine and valid. But if you look at it and think, oh, interesting, then I do recommend it. 

I will note that the author is not strongly pushing that a woman wrote the plays attributed to William Shakespeare of Stratford; I almost feel the title is a bit of click-bait, since the was-it-a-woman argument is probably the least developed. But she did a lot of research and talked to a lot of people on multiple sides of the argument (there's only "both sides" if you simplify it to yes-William and no-William, but there are a lot more sides than that once you're in), and I found her writing compelling me to agree with the no-William side, though not 100% convinced for any of the choices she presents. If I had to pick one, I would probably go with Christopher Marlowe, but is that just because he was the last one she digs into? Maybe? I don't know, she makes such a good case for him...

Anyway! A good book for those who are interested.*
*I once read a movie review where the reviewer's attitude was a very dismissive, almost contemptuous, 'if you like this sort of thing, you'll like this movie,' and I was incensed, so I hope I'm not striking that tone here. No condescension at all from me.

2.

The second book is one I got an advance copy* of, called Hamlet is Not OK, by RA Spratt, which is a young adult (or maybe more young reader/middle grade) book and comes out in July.
*Thank you to IPG/Penguin AU for providing this book for review consideration via NetGalley. All opinions are my own.

In the book, Selby is in trouble for blowing off her homework, and ends up with a tutor who helps her get into Hamlet--literally. (This is not a spoiler, as it's part of the initial description that they wind up within the play.) I liked Selby, even if I didn't relate to her (I mean, how much could I relate to someone who hates reading? though I appreciated the distinction she makes between reading and stories): she's written very believably, and her voice and attitude come across strongly. 

Also, the implausible plot is handled very plausibly, if that makes sense. With the caveat that I was reading this as a 55-year-old, not a teenager, and as one whose favorite Shakespeare play has always been Hamlet, so I know it very well, I absolutely enjoyed the book. There were a few plot twists that really got me, too! but I'll avoid the spoilers on that. Two thumbs up.

As a side note, both books mention a couple of things:

• Freud--I didn't know how much he was interested in Shakespeare.
• cryptic (in 1, discussion of the use of cryptic messages being common back in the day, and in 2, "And yet every line of dialogue is as confusing as a cryptic crossword."

Not groundbreaking, I know, but I wanted to point it out.

Have you ever read two books that both did and didn't tie together like this? Do you think you would have noticed if you hadn't read them one after the other? It's not quite the same thing, but I used to read a lot more mysteries, until I hit a long string of serial killers and just got fed up with it.

Book Review: In the Society of Women (Ladies Occult Society Book 3)

I mentioned in a post after the holidays that I had read some good new-to-me books:

...the last two that I read in 2023, in the Ladies Occult Society series, A Magical Inheritance and A Ghostly Request, by Krista Ball--it's basically Jane Austen but with magic, and so so so well done. I can't recall the last character I was rooting so strongly for, and please tell me at once if you read them because the third book comes out March 1 and I am really hoping for a scene where Elizabeth gets to tell her father, in front of others, just why she (redacted redacted spoilers argh).

These books are SO good, and I was very excited for the third one. I re-read the first two, a little nervous that I was overselling them in my own mind, but no, just as good.

I raced through the third, eager to find out What Happens*, and then it ended and I said, oh. Oh. This is not a three-book series. Whoops, did I know that? If so, I forgot! 

*Spoilers! So many spoilers! That I am not writing about!

Look what's coming in December. Argh. December! (At least it does spell out, The finale to the Ladies Occult Society series.)

So now I have to wait for the conclusion, which is somewhat crushing, to be honest, but at least it means I will get more of this wonderful series, right? Trying to look on the bright side.

Because they're really good. Seriously, Jane Austen but with an occult angle? And it's so plausible? (Not like Pride and Prejudice and Zombies, which was amusing but really not convincing, as I recall it.) So good. 

I'm not pushing anyone to read it if that description doesn't grab you (my motto, always, is that every book is not for every reader, and that's all right), but if it does? Read these books. And then let's talk about them.

Miss Maggie, As Promised

Here she is, the cat of the day! Today and every day, according to herself.