Knitting.

Reading.

The Devil May Dance by Jake Tapper. I had read the author’s previous novel featuring the same protagonists, a somewhat naive new congressman and his zoologist wife. This time they are in Los Angeles in the show biz crowd. There are lots of real people in this one — Bobby Kennedy, the original Rat Pack of Sinatra, Martin, Peter Lawford, Sammy Davis Jr. A devilish plot unwinds. 3✭.

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The Pull of the Stars by Emma Donoghue. Donoghue also wrote Room, the book that everyone was reading back in the early 20-teens. Pull of the Stars is not quite as good as Room, but it is still very good. Set in 1918 in a Dublin hospital, it tells the story of three days in the life of a nurse working in the ward of near-term pregnant women with the Spanish flu. (Talk about a double whammy!) It explores the state of medicine in 1918, the treatment of women then, the deplorable Irish social system, and more. The characters are three-dimensional and interesting, which is important to me; give me fully developed characters and I will read anything. 4✭

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Another Kindle freebie, this one is the first three books in the Harry Starke series by Blair Howard. Like all the freebies, it is pretty much standard mystery/suspense fare, although Harry is not the usual loner P.I. He runs a detective agency with actual employees and everything. As an ex-cop with a long-standing relationship with a homicide detective in the Chattanooga police department, he is a consultant when she needs him. I finished the first one and am midway through the second. 3✭

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Listening.

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Still listening to Becoming Duchess Goldblatt. I suggested it to my book group, but there was only one copy, an ebook, in our library system. Much too hard to get six people to read it, darn! 4✭

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Watching.

The X Files, season 8. I think this is the season when David Duchovny (Mulder) was off doing other stuff, and Gillian Anderson (Scully) was only a minor character in one of the episodes we watched last night. In the first two episodes he has made few to no appearances. But the plots are better than those in season seven. 4✭