3 More Days ...

 It's time for Jo's annual Advent Blog Hop! I always enjoy participating, and seeing what stitchy goodness others have been up to.

Unfortunately, I haven't gotten much done this year. I've been cross-stitching my fingers off trying to finish this design for my video game-loving son, and of course I had to make it harder on myself by changing up a bunch of the motifs to match the games he plays (at least I had the sense to stitch it on white, rather than black fabric). I promise to show it off when it's done, though!

I also stitched the infamous Peeking Jesus for my brother, a Benedictine priest:

The only Christmas-themed stitching I've done is a cute advent calendar by Wandering Threads, given to me by a friend. I'm pretty far behind, though, because of the aforementioned cross stitching:

It's a fun design, though.

Jo has asked us to answer what we have for "afters" -- dessert. For us, it's Christmas cookies! The days of my baking dozens in a marathon session a few days before Christmas are long gone. Instead, every weekend of Advent I try to bake at least one batch of something, and stick them in the freezer until Christmas eve. Then I lay them on the sideboard in our dining room, and watch them disappear over a few days. If I have the wherewithal, I will also give some to our neighbors and mail some to a friend or two.

This year's selections: sparkly gingerbread, coquito lace cookies, stamped brown sugar shortbread, crushed peppermint-chocolate cookies, and if I have the time, chocolate-dipped triple coconut macaroons. 

I hope all of you have a sweet Christmas filled with peace and joy!

Book Round-up: Dark Academia Edition

 The Prime of Miss Jean Brodie by Muriel Spark: The original Dark Academia, although not actually that dark. Spark's tale of a female teacher in 1930s Scotland who has a tendency to collect students she considers special in some way has spare prose, piercing insight, and all-too-human characters.

The Plot by Jean Hanff Korelitz: a thriller (and satire of the publishing world) about a failed writer who uses his dead student's plot idea to make the bestseller list, only to have someone threaten to reveal everything. There was a huge clue that hinged on having read a certain literary novel, but figuring out the twist early on didn't lessen my enjoyment of watching it all unfold.

The Scholomance series by Naomi Novik: Novik's trilogy is set at a ludicrously dangerous wizarding school where only a quarter of the students actually survive through graduation. Galadriel is a prickly, overly verbose, but endearing character; "fated" to be the greatest maleficer ever, she is shunned by everyone, even as she steadfastly and grumpily refuses to take advantage of her dark powers or fellow students. I really appreciated how Novik does not just depict the casual cruelty of the Scholomance system while engineering a happy ending for a few characters, but instead shows those characters committing to righting wrongs for all students, present and future, and not giving up until they find a way to do so. In this way, it contrasts with The Absolute Book that was clear-eyed about the horrors of the Tithe but ultimately punted the issue. 

Special Topics in Calamity Physics by Marisha Pessl: Another re-read. Having now read Spark's novel, I can see the similarities -- a charismatic teacher encourages an almost cult-like devotion from the students she singles out. The difference -- the hidden connection between the teacher and the narrator -- provides an added complexity that ultimately results in murder. I love this book, and I find myself wanting a sequel just to reassure myself that Blue finds herself surrounded by good, honest people who care for her.

How did November Go by so Fast?

 I feel like I have nothing to show for it; my stitching has focused on two Christmas gifts, one of which I'm not entirely sure will be ready in time.

But I did do a little bit more. Like this sugar skull from Kiriki Press:

And these steampunk book charms that of course I had to turn into earrings:

It's Black Friday, and I'm out of black floss which I very much need for one of the gifts. But I don't know if I can bring myself to venture out into the rain and the crowds to get it. If only one could arrange for thread delivery like one can for pizza ...

Trick or Treat Blog Hop

 Happy Halloween to those of you coming from Jo's blog! Your letter is:

It's been kind of a terrible year, so I have gotten very little stitching done. I decided to focus on an old pattern I started decades ago (while I was in law school, I think) but never finished -- Liz Turner Diehl's Cider House Garden. I didn't manage to finish it this year, either, but I made good progress, stitching the house, one of the maple trees, and six of the apple trees:

 

I think I might finally be able to finish it next year.

I also started Wild Violet's primitive tarot set, but didn't get very far:

I dyed the aida myself, using black tea with a little baking soda to (I hope) cut down the acidity.

On to the next blog: http://guavagems.blogspot.com/  Have fun!

Earrings, Earrings, Earrings!

 I've been on a jewelry kick again.

The pair on the left started out as just the large faceted bead; I got them long ago as a subtle earring to wear when the rest of my jewelry stands out, but they were too boring. I added a glass bead under each one, and then for fun added smaller faceted beads to the ear wires. Still subtle, by my standards.

The second pair have gorgeous crystal skulls, which I got from a Halloween kit by Candie Cooper. In keeping with both the autumnal palette and the Dia de Muertos theme, I added two different gold vermeil flower beads. I absolutely love them.

The last pair have czech skull beads from yet another Candie Cooper kit. I didn't intend to make more skull earrings (I have three pairs already, including the crystal ones above), but I couldn't resist the kooky details on those beads.

 

These took longer to make; I'd been meaning to try brick-stitching seed beads around a ring, and this seed bead mix (also from the Halloween kit) gave me the opportunity. As you can see, I need more practice, but I've got all sorts of ideas percolating now.

There are lots more fun beads from the kit, but as the needs of my family go up, my crafting time goes down, so I doubt I'll be able to make much more before Halloween.

Book Round-Up

 Flying Solo by Linda Holmes: Her second novel was just as enjoyable as her first, with wonderful characters, a sweet romance, a little mystery, and an unconventional happy ending.

Just One Look by Lindsay Cameron: A fun thriller about a young lawyer who, after spectacularly blowing up her life and career, has to start over as a contract attorney doing document review. The documents she reviews, which lead to a new, dangerous obsession, are a lot more exciting than the documents I reviewed when I was a lawyer.

The Bear Went over the Mountain by William Kotzwinkle: A laugh-out-loud-on-the-subway book about a bear who finds a manuscript in the woods and decides to get it published. It's a satire not only of academia and publishing, but humanity, too.

The Inheritance of Orquídea Divina by Zoraida Córdova: Córdova's short story was one of the only good ones from Toil and Trouble, so I was excited to read its expansion into a novel filled with family legacies, art, magic, and resilience.

The Magic of Lemon Drop Pie by Rachel Linden: This was a disappointment. The protagonist, stuck in her life, is given three magic lemon drops that allow her to live out a day where she has made different choices in the past. She was far too passive and martyrish, though, and the resolution was a bit too pat. A far better novel about regrets and "what ifs" is Matt Haig's The Midnight Library.

Calico Cats

 My latest lap quilt:

It's very wrinkled, because while I waited days -- DAYS -- for the rain to stop so I could take a good picture, one of my cats claimed it. Fittingly.

The cat head pattern was from ... actually, I don't remember, and the pdf I have has no metadata. The calico fabrics, except for the border, are from the Little House on the Prairie fabric collection. The leftover squares (it was a "layer cake," meaning a set of 10-inch squares) I used for the back:

The quilting was very basic, which about all I can handle on a quilt this size -- in the ditch quilting between the blocks, diagonally through the nine-patches, an outline around each cat, and a very wide zigzag along the borders. I tried to do a swirl design instead of the zigzag, but although it seemed so simple to do in my head it was a disaster in execution. Sigh.

My husband and kids have worn out the other lap quilts I made, so this one is just for me!*

*And the cat.

Book Round-Up

The Cartographers by Peng Shepherd: This was a fascinating premise -- what if phantom settlements on maps could become real? -- but a mediocre execution. Too many of the characters made inexplicable or just plain dumb decisions, and it was far too easy to figure out the bad guy. A disappointment.

An Elderly Lady Must Not Be Crossed by Helene Tursten: A second set of stories about a murderous octegenarian from Sweden. The stories suffered slightly by trying to show us how she became so murderous, but they were delightful nonetheless. And I adore the book design!

The Singing Sands by Josephine Tey: Is it a re-read if I don't have any recollection of the first read? This is Tey's last story featuring Alan Grant and published posthumously. I wonder if she had planned for this to be the last Grant story, which might explain the bifurcated feel to the novel; the first half deals mostly with Grant's psychological recovery in the Scottish highlands of his youth, and it's not until the second half that the mystery-solving begins in earnest. Still, it's an enjoyable read, and I can add it to the list of disparate books that refer to the lost city of Wabar (see also: Declare).

Homicide and Halo-Halo by Mia P. Manansala: The second in the series, and as fun as the first. The writing wasn't as strong, but I appreciated Manansala's commitment to addressing the trauma the characters experienced in the first book, something rarely dealt with in cozy mysteries.

Jimmy Corrigan, the Smartest Kid on Earth by Chris Ware: I've been a big fan of Ware's for a long time; Building Stories was an impressive reading experience. Jimmy Corrigan is an earlier work, stemming in part from Ware's own experience with his absentee father while, like the other work, also touching on almost-crippling loneliness. Ware's artistic talent is just as impressive, but the main story left me cold, perhaps because Corrigan is simply not as engaging as the protagonist of Building Stories, perhaps because, unlike Corrigan, that protagonist actually does things rather than just allowing things to happen to her. An earlier storyine, having to do with Corrigan's grandfather as a child, was touching and heartbreaking.

The City We Became by N.K. Jemisin

N.K. Jemisin's The City We Became is both a horror-tinged fantasy response to Lovecraft and a love letter to New York City. The city, you see, is on the verge of being born when the book opens, a process only a few cities go through, and even fewer cities survive. By the end of the first chapter, NYC has survived its birth, but its avatar, a homeless, queer artist, is now in a coma from battling a mysterious entity bent on destroying cities. NYC, however, is one of those rare living cities with multiple avatars, one for each borough in addition to the primary one. These five avatars -- Bronca, Brooklyn, Manny, Padmini, and Aislyn -- must come to terms with their new status, find each other, find the primary avatar, and defeat the Woman in White.

It's a standard quest for an epic fantasy, made deeper by focusing on the diversity of the city and arguing that the city's strength comes from that. Bronca is from the Lenape tribe, the first "residents" of the land, and fittingly she is both the oldest and the one with the most knowledge of what is going on. Brooklyn is a black woman, a former rapper (possibly the most popular style of music in the world, originating in African American neighborhoods in NYC) turned politician. Padmini is an immigrant, studying hard for her own version of the American Dream. Manny is brand new to the city, having arrived at Penn Station for a job right as the main avatar collapses. I was especially delighted at this touch; Some residents, particularly Manhattanites, tend to argue that anyone not born in the city doesn't count as a New Yorker. But this city would be nothing without the newcomers who arrive every day.

And then there's Aislyn, an Irish-American woman from Staten Island -- the most isolated borough, and the most conservative. Her life has been stunted by her abusive, racist father, and she is fearful of everything. Despite that, she's on the verge of venturing out into the rest of the city (something that could help her see the world is so much bigger, and better, than her father has taught her) when the Woman in White gets a hold of her and manipulates her fear (and her second-wave feminism) to stay home. This puts Aislyn in far more danger.

Unfortunately for her, Aislyn is blind to that danger. The turning point (which she fails to see) is when she refuses to consider the warnings her own mind is giving her, because she does not want to acknowledge that her understanding of the world could be wrong. Up until then she had been a somewhat sympathetic character, someone who had the potential to transcend her small-minded upbringing. But the refusal to challenge one's own assumptions, to admit one could be wrong about something, leads to all sorts of evil. As Aislyn herself will acknowledge someday in the future, "confirmation bias is a bitch."

In this way, by highlighting the strength that comes from diversity, Jemisin is responding directly to the overt racism, fear, and conservatism of Lovecraft. The Woman in White explicitly states that it's humanity's ability to learn from each other -- ideas, viewpoints, languages, cuisines -- that makes us so strong, and allows us to continue to develop as a species. This is true, as even a cursory review of history will show. Innovations happen when cultures mix, whether by immigration, conquest, war, or trade (some of these methods being better than others). The Woman's complaint is that this growth by humanity, specifically cities, eventually harms creatures in other universes. But late in the game we learn her true identity, revealing her to be a genuine hypocrite and calling into question her previous arguments. It will be interesting to see how this tension (growth that causes destruction) is resolved, if at all, in the sequel.

Which I can't wait to read.

Cotton Quartet

 For the last few months I've been working on a delightful project by Mary Corbet:

 The outside of the sewing case is a sampler band of lots of different stitches; the inside has a bit of chicken scratch (something I haven't done in years, and I definitely want to do more) and the edge is my favorite, Palestrina knots, with beads.

Most of the stitches I was familiar with, but I'm a sucker for samplers and variety. It was also an excuse to try some new threads, cotton floche and coton a broder, in addition to floss and pearl cotton.

Corbet's directions were excellent, especially when it came to putting the case together, all stitched by hand. My instinct is to use a sewing machine, but for something like this, involving counted threadwork, hand stitching can be much more precise. I have to remember this when I finish off cross stitch ornaments.

I sure don't need yet another needle/sewing case, but how could I resist?

Confessions of an Ugly Stepsister by Gregory Maquire

 This is a moving, thoughtful novel with a terrible title. Yes, it's a retelling of Cinderella (purporting to be the real story), but instead of arguing that Cinderella is secretly a bitch and the stepsisters were the true heroines, it is a meditation on beauty, trauma, and survival.

In this sense it reminds me of Till We Have Faces, C.S. Lewis's retelling of the Psyche and Eros myth. They both deal with women who have an unearthly beauty and sisters who are labeled ugly, and they both refuse to portray any of the main female characters as villains. The stepmother in Maguire's book, the closest the story has to an antagonist, does monstrous things but is no monster; she is a mother hardened by adversity and struggling to provide security for herself and her daughters. 

It's the youngest daughter, Iris, who narrates the story, and she's caught between childhood, and the fanciful stories she tells herself, and adulthood, when she must come to terms with the strictures placed on women. She is convinced she's ugly and expects nothing of her future until her mother begins working for a master painter. He and his assistant show her other ways to look at the world, and spark in her an appreciation of the power of art.

Which is no small thing in this world (Haarlem of the 1600s). The Master laments the Protestant, business-like Dutch and their failure to appreciate the profundity of religious art. He hides his paintings of the freaks and oddities of humanity, lest they cause too much outrage amongst the conventional. And his masterwork, a painting of the Cinderella character (Clara), is able to inspire love, lust, business deals, jealousy, and artistic despair. 

Clara, meanwhile, wants nothing to do with her beauty, having been traumatized as a young child and then stifled by overprotective parents. She's not the obedient (and personality-less) girl of the original story, but simply another young woman who has been controlled and told what to do her whole life, and rebels in the only way she can. 

There's an unnecessary "twist" at the end that causes us to reconsider what we have been told about a character, but it ultimately doesn't add anything to the narrative. Overall, though, I enjoyed this melancholy tale.

Weaving Around

 Years ago I started this project, and set it aside for who knows what reason. I found it again while rooting around for something, and I was determined to finish it -- both to cross something off my list, and because I had the perfect spot for it on the wall.

It's a simple project: wrap an old cd or dvd with warp threads through the center (an uneven number), then weave over and under them on the non-label side of the disc, changing yarns as you see fit. It's a great project for leftover yarn and threads, and has a lovely texture:

The instructions (this was a project by Kristin Cleveland from an old magazine) called for attaching the cds to each other by connecting warp threads with pearl cotton, but that was too floppy to hang on a wall, so I glued popsicle sticks to the backs (you can see a bit of one in the bottom picture; I guess I wasn't careful enough butting the edges together).

I enjoyed the weaving quite a bit, especially mixing different textures and thicknesses together, but I really really really can't add another craft to my repertoire, so that's it for weaving. For now.

Sometimes You Just Want to Play with Thread

 

 This was inspired by Shikira Alleyne's work. I used some wool roving (a little goes a long way) and leftover snippets of yarns, threads, and trim, along with some beads and sequins. It was a fun exercise in texture and balance, and a nice change of pace from the intensive patterns I've been stitching.

Book Round-Up:

 Zero: the Biography of a Dangerous Idea by Charles Seife: The flip side of infinity is zero, and this is a good but brief overview of the concept, written with a layperson in mind. I do wish Seife had gone into more detail in the latter half of the book, in particular the connection between zero and infinity and the implications for quantum mechanics and general relativity.

West End Girls by Jennie Colgan: I loved the two other books I've read by Colgan, but this was a disappointment -- more stereotypical and coarse in its portrayal of characters, and even a little mean-spirited. It's one of her early works, so that could explain it.

Origin by Jennifer Raff: An engaging presentation of the latest genetic and archeological evidence about the peopling of the Americas, with a good emphasis on the way racism and other forms of bias have affected and continue to affect our understanding of the science. This makes a great follow-up to Charles C. Mann's 1491 (which I strongly recommend, even if some of the information is now outdated).

The Book of Speculation by Erika Swyler: A book about circuses, mermaids, tarot cards, curses, librarians, and rare books is right up my alley, and I certainly enjoyed it, but I didn't love it. I'm not sure why; most of the characters were endearing one way or another, and the story itself was interesting, but it didn't grab me. Maybe because the all-consuming love at the heart of the story is the kind of thing I get impatient with.

Gallant by V.E. Schwab: Schwab's gothic take on the alternate universe trope reminded me both of Neil Gaiman's Stardust and Frances Hodgson Burnett's The Secret Garden (yes, really). I like how Schwab's novels never go quite where you expect them.

Book Lovers by Emily Henry: This was a fun inversion of the typical "city girl finds love in a small town" story, with lots of meta commentary about Hallmark movies, romance novels, and the book industry. The family melodrama was a bit heavy-handed at times, but I really enjoyed this, much more than People We Meet on Vacation (but not as much as Beach Read, which is still my favorite of Henry's).

Chain Maille Funne

 I spent some time earlier this year sorting through old magazine patterns, and decided I had to make this chain maille ring by Daleann Stark:

That's an emerald crystal in there; I just could not get a good image of it.

 

 

Steel rings made this ring affordable, and it was fun, albeit super fiddly, to put together.

That wasn't enough chain maille, though! 

These earrings, made with anodized aluminum rings, were a heck of a lot easier to make. 

I'd forgotten how tactile and slinky chain maille can be. I'd also forgotten that it takes a certain amount of practice and skill to close all the rings properly. Clearly, I need to make more!

Daisy Chain

 In college, as a newish beader, I picked up a pamphlet with instructions to make different styles of daisy chain bracelets. I made a bunch, using size 11 beads and nymo thread, and wore them a lot, and eventually I stopped wearing them because the thread got loose and they felt fragile.

Last week I decided to remake them, with size 8 beads and fireline, for a sturdier and chunkier look.

Here are the old ones:

I have a mixed-media surface onto which I've been sewing beaded scraps, failed experiments, and false starts. I'll add these to that project.

Blackwork Hexagons

 The Facebook group Snarky & Modern Embroidery and Cross Stitch is hosting a blackwork stitch-along in conjunction with blackwork experts The Steady Thread. I've always wanted to do a sampler, so this was perfect.

Behold, the first seven hexagons:

The SAL is 49 weeks long, but I won't be doing all 49 hexies -- I'm already behind by several weeks, and my fabric isn't big enough. Instead I'll see how many I can do before I run out of space.

That fabric, by the way, is a basic cotton evenweave, and I hate it -- stiff, unravelly, and too easy to stain. But this will use up the last of it! You can't tell from the picture (I've yet to take one with perfect lighting), but the thread is a variegated Waterlilies from the Caron Collection, in very deep purples and teals. 

Behold, a big old error in hexie no. 8!

 I think I'll keep it. It's kind of fun,  testing others to see if they can see it. Can you? 😛

The Lady Emily Aston Series by Tasha Alexander

 There are fifteen novels and counting in this mystery series by Tasha Alexander, centered around a young (and unconventional) Victorian widow who finds herself caught up in several murders. I read the first four -- And Only to Deceive, A Poisoned Season, A Fatal Waltz, and Tears of Pearl -- and while I enjoyed them, I think I'll stop there. 

Modern historical fiction, particularly the lighter stuff, has to walk a tightrope in creating characters who have sensibilities compatible with modern viewpoints but who aren't so anachronistic as to be historically inaccurate (or worse, ridiculous). For the most part, Alexander succeeds at this. Lady Emily marries a man she didn't particularly care for because it was expected of her and he was the best of the lot; when he dies a few months later, she is thrilled to now have a freedom no single woman would have. Her status as both a lady and a widow allow her to spend her time studying antiquities and drinking port, and eventually investigating the murder of her husband. People gossip about her (and her mother nags, a whole lot), but she can afford not to care.

But in a welcome change, Alexander does allow Emily to care, at least sometimes; she is only human, after all, and a product of her times. In the second volume, especially, Emily wrestles with the loss of her reputation and just how unconventional she's comfortable being. She also must decide whether she wants to marry again; the love of her life values her freedom and intellectual pursuits, but even a modern marriage requires sacrifice and compromise.

The third volume wasn't quite as good as the first two, mainly because it relies on a trope I hate -- the bitchy ex-girlfriend. And by the fourth, I was starting to lose interest in the series as a whole.  I may return to Lady Emily someday, though; some of the later books sound quite interesting.

Desert Succulents

 Wasting time on the internet last month I found, in rapid succession, Allegory Gallery's Desert Succulent design challenge kit (sold out) and The Beadshop's Fun Times necklace design. Many weeks later -- I needed more copper chain, there were shipping delays, I ran out of jump rings, I ran out of headpins, I burned the knuckles of my left hand, I burned my right fingers -- I have a necklace, a.k.a. a "neckmess":

It's three 12-inch chains with lots of beads and charms attached, and beaded sections to complete the necklace. The three strands laid out:

The little succulent charms deserved to stand out from the rest, so they became earrings. And I loved the look of the beaded strands on each side, made from an assortment of beads roughly the same size, so I made a bracelet, too:

And look! I still have lots of beads left to play with.

Now I need to get back to stitching.

Jewelry Round-Up

 Most of these beads came from a kit from Candie Cooper, and initially I was going to add them to my collection of raku beads and make a necklace (I'm thinking on some silk sari, or an interesting novelty yarn), but the more I looked at the beads the more I liked them all by themselves. I added a few more and voila:

I used some of the raku beads I already have to make earrings:

That upside down bead was totally on purpose

But wait! I forgot to post these earrings I made last month!

 I love those pink flower beads, and I have to find a use for the rest of them.

Book Round-Up

The Word is Murder by Anthony Horowitz: a meta-ish cozy riff on the Sherlockian/Watson partnership, where a fictionalized Horowitz teams up with a disgraced former cop. I should have loved it, but I didn't; it left me cold. 

In preparing this post, I realized I never wrote about the other Horowitz book I read!

 Magpie Murders by Anthony Horowitz: I liked this mystery quite a bit more, in part because there's a mystery within a mystery -- Susan Ryeland is the long-time editor of Alan Conway, and when he dies mysteriously she must not only solve his murder but figure out what happened to the last chapters of his last manuscript. We are treated, then, to both a contemporary whodunit and a pastiche of a Golden Age cozy. Lots of fun.

D: a Tale of Two Worlds by Michel Faber: D is for delightful. This was a wonderful middle-grade novel about a girl -- Dhikilo, a refugee from Somaliland -- who is sent on a quest to return the letter D to the world. It reminded me very much of The Phantom Tollbooth, one of my favorite childhood books. A reviewer on Goodreads complained that the choice of the letter was arbitrary, but early on a politician states that "iversity [sic] was all very well, but not if it got in the way of forging a strong, safe nation." It seems quite clear to me why Faber chose D.

Arsenic and Adobo by Mia P. Manansala: Another delightful read. This is the first in Manansala's cozy mystery series, set amongst the Filipino community in a small town in Illinois. The writing was a little green, not surprising given that this is Manansala's first novel, but I loved the characters and the story. Can't wait to read the next two!

Hoop Art!

 I have a few hoop finishes to show off. 

Over the summer I picked up the book Boho Embroidery by Nicole Vogelsinger. Her style is lots of fun; she layers bright, quirky, colorful fabrics on top of each other, then embellishes them with embroidery and beads. I was excited to try the technique:

I cut out a cat face from some Tula Pink fabric and appliqued it onto a Kaffe Fassett background. Then came the fun part -- embroidering lazy daisy petals and adding beads at the flower centers. For the frame around the cat I used fringe beads, little tear drops that naturally fall into an alternating pattern when strung together. 

I'll be doing more of this; I have all sorts of ideas for the novelty prints in my stash.

For Christmas my husband gave me a Winter wreath kit from Nicky Franklin:

The vintage linen the kit came with was a dream to stitch, so soft. There was an awful lot of satin stitching, but otherwise this kit was a fun one.

This pattern, Fall Leaf by Cutesy Crafts, was supposed to be finished in November, but I ran out of the silk I was using when stitching the outline. I debated switching to a different color because I was dying to see the completed stitching, but I'm really glad I waited to get more. One variegated color was exactly the look I was going for.

When finishing the back, I tried the string art technique for the first time. It uses a whole lot of thread, but looks neat:

Finally, I did the little freebie kit that came with an issue of Love Embroidery magazine:

The bird was supposed to be stitched with long-and-short stitch in browns and reds, but I hate long-and-short even more than I hate satin stitching, so I made my bird a little more abstract.

Whew!

Emotionally Weird by Kate Atkinson

 

This was the first book I read by Atkinson and it remains my favorite of hers. It's a delightful mix of academic satire, slapstick comedy, deep dark family secrets, and post-modern metafiction.

The last bit is apparent in its structure -- different typefaces are used to convey the multiples stories we get: Effie's trials and tribulations as a university student in her last year, the truth about Nora (Effie's mother), and Effie's first attempt at writing a mystery novel; not to mention snippets from self-important literary fiction by one of Effie's professors, a romance novel by his lecturer wife, a sci-fi story by a fellow student, and several formal logic problems for good measure.

The bulk of the story is that of Effie's, but she is repeatedly interrupted mid-narrative by her mother, who complains whenever she thinks too many characters are in a scene, or there should be more plot, or that Effie is taking too long to get to the point. The irony is that Nora herself has a story to tell, about her own and Effie's origins, but she uses the same narrative tricks Effie does to avoid telling it. Effie knows this, so she manipulates her own story (introducing certain characters at particular points, pretending to know less than she does) to get a reaction out of Nora, and eventually persuade her to come clean.

There are other games Atkinson plays. One professor's name alternates between "Watson Grant" and "Grant Watson," one page has a black square on it (a callback to Tristam Shandy), and on several occasions Effie revises her story as she is narrating it, to avoid an unpleasant event. Atkinson also makes subtle but repeated use of foreshadowing, rewarding a second reading. And throughout the book there is wordplay of every kind, and not just puns and jokes; books fly out of windows and send people to the hospital and a baby chokes on a crumpled page (words are dangerous!). A manuscript page is burnt, thereby undoing a parallel, tragic event in Effie's story. Words literally fall off pages and land on the ground, or they prise themselves off and hover like flies.

With all this going on, the novel is indisputably about the art of storytelling. Effie switches genres on a whim, Nora's frequent interruptions expound on the necessary elements of a story, and the classroom dialogue Effie depicts serves as a biting satire of literary criticism. All of it serves a higher purpose, however; what Effie wants, more than anything, is to understand how she came into the world -- her own story. Once she knows it, she can finish other stories.

Modular Wrap and Stack Bracelet

 The idea came from the show Beads, Baubles & Jewels. You create segments with beads, chain, leather, really anything you like, and then connect them together. My set of six segments were inspired by the medallions with red, teal, and aqua enamel, which I had purchased somewhere, probably Michaels.

 Linked together, they weren't quite long enough to wrap around my wrist six times, so I added a roughly two-inch segment with the clasp.

This is a good way to use up odds and ends and extra beads.  I used jump rings to connect the different sections, but you could use proper clasps, allowing you to wear the segments individually or just a couple together. Fun with modules!

Crossings by Alex Landragin

 

Crossings is a historical love story with supernatural elements, but what got the attention of most reviewers was the unconventional structure. The novel consists of three parts, narrated by three different characters, that can be read in order or by jumping around from section to section, following a set order of page numbers. I think rather too much was made of this, though; were you to republish the book following the latter order, you'd have a novel that interweaves the stories of different characters in different times and settings -- a structure used all the time in fiction.

But the story itself is a good one. At it's core, it's about a Polynesian woman, a member of a tribe that can transfer souls from one body to another, struggling to find the soul of her lover (unwillingly "crossed" into the body of a European explorer). As she follows traces of him, she experiences a number of lifetimes -- a French sailor, a Louisiana slave-owner, a hideously disfigured woman, so on. Several real people get caught up in the chase, too, most notably Charles Baudelaire (providing an explanation for his real world fate) and Coco Chanel (fittingly a villain, given she was a Nazi collaborator in real life) (why aren't more people outraged by that?). The story plays with notions of gender, race, colonialism, and economic disparities, but ultimately Landragin is concerned with telling a good story. 

There are flaws; in addition to the structure not mattering as much as it seems, the aforementioned villain is relegated to the background for most of the novel, and that story line is left unresolved by the end of the novel (both ends). While I like the idea that the characters will be continuing their journeys, rather than everything being tied up in a neat little bow, I think the villain needed a to be a bit more present in the story. 

Ultimately, though, the outcome -- of either the love story or the villain's plot  -- don't matter as much. I described this as a love story initially, but really it's about the human capacity for reinvention. As Alula herself admits, as the years pass she begins to revel in the experiences she has, the places she is able to go, the people she is able to become. Her decisions are ethically questionable at times, if not outright immoral, but watching her navigate the years is entertaining. 

I was inspired by the book to make a necklace! 

Eyes are crucial to the book's method of soul migration, and as I read I kept thinking of the eye cabochons I received from a Blueberry Cove Beads box years ago. Once I was done with the book I rooted around in my stash and found a pendant with a map of Paris (a central location in the book) that I hadn't found a use for. A pink flower bead to recall the Polynesian island where the story began was the finishing touch.

Book Round-Up: Belated Christmas Edition

 In a Holidaze by Christina Lauren: This was a cute story about Mae who finds herself reliving the same family Christmas vacation over and over. The Groundhog Day element was dropped fairly quickly, but the rest of the story -- about her budding romance with a childhood friend and her relationships with different family members -- was sweet.

Christmas Pudding and Pigeon Pie by Nancy Mitford: I finally tracked down the much-recommended Christmas Pudding novella, and it lived up to the hype. This satire about English gentry (and wannabe gentry) spending the Christmas season in the country but not knowing what to do without nightclubs and champagne was laugh-out-loud funny. Pigeon Pie is another novella satirizing the wealthy and privileged as they cope with the Phoney War, but it had the bad luck to be published right before WWII started in earnest, making some of the story appear too irreverent. It's hard to laugh at some of the Hitler jokes when we know all too well the atrocities he was committing at the time.

The Christmas Bookshop by Jenny Colgan: Colgan has a thing for women reinventing themselves by selling books in Scotland, and I am here for it. This was a delightful book with a lovely romance and an even lovelier rapprochement between sisters (and nieces). I have now added Edinburgh to my list of places to visit.

My Annual Epiphany Photo Dump!

 Once all the holiday prep was over, I finally found time for stitching.

Christmas Forest and Christmas Girl by Tamar Nahir Yahai:

A second covid-themed ornament (sigh) by BeverlyStreetShop:

 Floral trees by Fabric and Ink (this was a kit to make two pink trees, but I was inspired to use green sequins for the second one):

 A kutch embroidery tree designed by Sarah Homfray for Stitch Magazine. This is a new-to-me stitch from India, and it was lots of fun to do:

Nutcracker Dancers designed by Naoko Kudo, from the December issue of Just Cross Stitch:

Santa Birdie by Bobbin and Fred, from the 2021 Just Cross Stitch Ornaments magazine:

And finally, finished in the nick of time, the indefinitely-named Applique Banner from Mollie Makes magazine:

Happy Three Kings Day!