Sunday Post – 1/21/2024

January 21, 2024 Sunday Post 11

The Sunday Post is hosted by the wonderful Kimberly, the Caffeinated Reviewer. It’s a chance to share news, recap the past week, take a look ahead, and showcase our new treasures—I mean books!

This week I’m also participating in The Sunday Salon hosted by Deb at Readerbuzz, and Stacking the Shelves hosted by Marlene at Reading Reality.

The Past Week

In real life: It was a relatively quiet week, uneventful except for a dentist appointment, a much-needed hair cut, and a couple of Zoom meetings. We did get a little snow on Monday, which made the woods look beautiful. It was followed by (barely) freezing rain on Tuesday. By barely, I mean it turned to slush rather than creating sheets of ice all over everything. Then the skies cleared and the temperatures plummeted… although nothing to what most of the country is experiencing; we had lows in the teens and highs in the 30s, for the most part. That’s still cold enough to make me want to curl up with a blanket, a book or my knitting, and a pot of tea!

Speaking of knitting, I photographed, catalogued, and stored my new yarn and fiber—Christmas gifts as well as some yarn I bought at the fiber guild sale two weeks ago.)

And after years of enjoying rooibos blends as-is (without milk or sweetener), I recently tried my favorite Rooibos Masala Chai with milk, and it was delicious! I’ll probably try using it in a chai latte next time.

Recent Posts

Looking Ahead

  • The Lily of Ludgate Hill, by Mimi Matthews – review
  • TTT – Books I Meant to Read in 2023 but Didn’t Get To – Top Ten Tuesday
  • Gabriel’s Angel, by Nora Roberts – review
  • Sunday Post – 1/28/2024

The Backlist Reader Challenge

It’s not too late to sign up for The Backlist Reader Challenge 2024! If you’re looking for a challenge to help you tackle all those books that have been languishing on your TBR pile (or list) forever, check out this challenge.

What I’ve Been Reading/Watching

Reading: I finished the ARC of The Lily of Ludgate Hill by Mimi Matthews, and really enjoyed it. Then I read Gabriel’s Angel by Nora Roberts. I’ve had it on my TBR shelves for several years, but hadn’t gotten around to it until now. Currently, I’m reading and loving The Lantern’s Dance by Laurie R. King (also an ARC; I am buddy-reading it with Sophia Rose.) And I’m reading The Lost Flock: Rare Wool, Wild Isles, and One Woman’s Journey to Save Scotland’s Original Sheep by Jane Cooper. It’s the current MAFA book club book, and the book club meets this coming Tuesday (over Zoom), so I need to finish it quickly.

Listening to: Mostly the Writing Excuses podcast (season 8.) And I started Democracy Awakening: Notes on the State of America by Heather Cox Richardson (read by the author.)

I also went back to Shattered by Kevin Hearne (read by Luke Daniels), which I had started months ago. I was enjoying it initially, but then some disturbing things happened in the book. I began to doubt things would turn out for the whole series in the way I hoped, so I peeked at the end of the last book in the series (which I have on Kindle.) Alas, I was right, so after I finish Shattered, I plan to put the rest of the series on hiatus indefinitely. This is no reflection on how good the books are, just on what I want to read at the moment!

Playing: NYT word games (Wordle, Connections, and the Spelling Bee.) Also occasionally Pokémon Go.

Watching: We finished Brokenwood Season 3, which finished off our DVDs until Season 9 (which I got for Christmas.) We just signed up for Acorn for a few months so we can continue watching them in order. We also watched the first episode of All Creatures Great and Small, Season 4, on PBS.

Added to the Hoard

For Review or Consideration

Many thanks to St. Martin’s Press for Mind Games and Writing an Identity Not Your Own!

Purchased or Free (Kindle, print, or audio)

Print: Kings and Queens of Early Britain (for research); Order from Chaos: The Everyday Grind of Staying Organized with Adult ADHD; Learning Curve (a belated Christmas gift that has been meandering around the country for weeks)

Kindle: What the River Knows; Yarn Harlot: The Secret Life of a Knitter; Seams Like Murder (free); Black Hearts in Battersea; The Stolen Lake; Dido and Pa; Midnight is a Place; The Cuckoo Tree; The Last Unicorn

(Click title for Goodreads page.)

Stay kind and hopeful… and may your books bring you joy this week!

Related Posts

11 Responses to “Sunday Post – 1/21/2024”

  1. Anne - Books of My Heart

    So are your new goodies in Ravelry? I’m wearing alpaca socks today but not ones I knitted myself. You seem to be doing much better with having a review at least each week, and reading some things you enjoy. I look forward to your thoughts on Democracy Awakening. I love HCR.

    Anne – Books of My Heart This is my Sunday Post
    Anne – Books of My Heart recently posted…The Foll Stones by Brigid Huey @BrigidHuey #MerytonPress #KindleUnlimited @sophiarose1816My Profile

    • Lark_Bookwyrm

      Alpaca socks sound heavenly! Yes, my new goodies are in my Ravelry stash (which is why I needed to photograph them.) One of these days, I need to update some of my WIPS on Ravelry, too; some are actually finished, but not yet photographed. Others are awaiting blocking, or seaming.

      I love HCR, too, and subscribe to her newsletter. I’ll probably go through the book in small chunks, though, so it may take me a while.

      Have a great week!

    • Lark_Bookwyrm

      I’m knitting socks at the moment, so there’s not much there to keep my lap warm! But I have some bigger projects on the horizon.

  3. Jenni Elyse

    I’ve never tried milk in my tea either. I usually don’t put sugar in it either. I’m a very minimalist tea drinker. Coffee, on the other hand, give me all the milk and all the sugar, lol.

    I hope all the slush melted before the temps dropped. I can deal with slush, but when everything’s been covered in ice, it’s so difficult to do anything.
    Jenni Elyse recently posted…Sunday News #52My Profile

    • Lark_Bookwyrm

      I always drink black tea with milk, but hadn’t thought to try rooibos with milk until now. I thought of rooibos more as a tisane (herbal tea), and I generally don’t put milk in those. But I’m glad I tried it, because I love it!

      I can’t drink coffee, alas. I used to, but it doesn’t agree with me anymore (even without caffeine.)

    • Lark_Bookwyrm

      I loved the Wolves Chronicles as a kid, but back then, there were only a handful – my library only had the first three (and I eventually was given paperbacks of #1 and 3, but never #2, to my dismay.) I remember being very excited when the library got The Cuckoo Tree, but had no idea it was #6, and there were two in between Nightbirds on Nantucket and The Cuckoo Tree. By the time other books came along, I had kind of outgrown my fascination with the series, but in recent years, I’ve been considering reading the entire series.

    • Lark_Bookwyrm

      I like a nice lemon-and-ginger tisane, especially when my stomach is upset or my nose is stuffed up. But I don’t usually add lemon to anything but ice water or restaurant iced tea… and I can’t drink the latter anymore because of caffeine.