Joining Kat and friends for Unraveled Wednesday.

Knitting.

Boxy is progressing nicely. I finished the body last week; now I am knitting the kimono style sleeves. Visually, it is a big red blob, so not pictures this week.

Reading.

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The Plague Year: America in the Time of Covid by Lawrence Wright. Another pandemic nonfiction book. I read this author’s novel The End of October earlier this year; it was a medical thriller about a epidemiologist/microbiologist trying to avert a pandemic, and I was impressed by the author. Just started this one so no rating yet.

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Worn on This Day: The Clothes That Made History by Kimberly Chrisman-Campbell. I was looking forward to getting this book from the library, but it was a bit disappointing. Not.Enough.Pictures. If you look at the reviews on Goodreads, every single one complains about the paucity of photos. How can a person write about significant clothing… and not include a photo of each? Or at least a diagram? Only about a quarter of the entries had a corresponding photo.

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The Premonition by Michael Lewis. There is a blurb on this book saying that the blurb-er “…would read an 800-page history of the stapler if it were written by Michael Lewis.” That is my feeling exactly — Lewis is a wonderful researcher who writes about his findings in superlative prose. Counting this one I have read five of his books. Several of them are about the US financial system; as a retired CPA who worked in that field, I ate those books with a spoon.

Much of The Premonition is about the run up to the pandemic — the secretive Chinese government, the arrogant and inept Trump administration, the do-nothing-in-time CDC. Fascinating stuff! 5✭

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The Hypnotist by Lars Kepler. This is the first book in a series starring Joona Linna, a detective in the Swedish police; his claim to fame is that his predictions about any crime are never wrong (!) The author is a husband and wife team. I found it engrossing, but with a number of flaws — see the reviews at the linked Goodreads page. 3✭

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Catch Me When I’m Falling by Cheryl A Head. [from another reader’s review] “This story touched me on so many levels because it portrays the realistic and heart-breaking circumstances street people have to deal with on a daily basis. I know that I’ve probably said this before but I’ll say it again—I adore everything about Charlie because she is a down to earth and compassionate woman who will go out of her way to help anyone in need. This author did a fantastic job of capturing all the angst, elation, sorrow and terror each character experienced throughout this story.” This book is #3 in the series; I do believe I need tp seek out the previous books. 3✭

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Listening.

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The Rose Code by Kate Quinn. This is another book set during WWII with a plot that centers on spycraft, in particular, code breaking. The protagonists are three vastly different young women who are recruited to work at Bletchley Park, where a captured German Enigma machine makes the code breaking far faster and easier. Osla is from a privileged background — whenever she comes to London she stays in her mother’s suite at Claridges. Mab is an independent person from Shoreditch, which is as lowly as it gets. Beth is a 25 year old spinster who is cowed by her dominating and narcissistic mother. I am not yet halfway through, so I do not know all the plot yet, but I can recommend this book. It is so good I may read the analog version at a later date. 4✭

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Watching.

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Smokey found season nine on eBay, and we started watching last week. Muldur is in these episodes about as much as you can see him in the screen shot at left. Scully is teamed up with another FBI agent, John Doggett, far right in the screen shot, who is the epitome of the hard-nosed, just-the-facts-ma’m agent — exactly what Muldur and Scully are not. After an episode or two Scully has her baby and goes on maternity leave. She is replaced by Special Agent Monica Reyes, another agent who trusts her gut. We love to grumble at Doggett and cheer Reyes. 4✭