Here we go again...

I just read that beginning Sunday, July 12, the price of Forever stamps goes from 78¢ to 82¢.  Price increases will also affect postcards, international stamps, and several other postal products.

Eye roll and loud sigh inserted.

Carry on.

What I'm reading Wednesday...

Forty-fourth challenge finish of the year.  

I finished this last night.  Heard good things about this.  Waited on reserve list for ages.  Had high hopes.

I liked most of it, but I didn't love it.  Felt like it took forever to make progress.  It lagged, and could have used more editing.  The main character was likable and kind, but his true identity, most of his personal history, and motives were kept secret from the other characters and the reader until the last couple of chapters.

Now is where this description and review get difficult for me.  There were a few (pretty few) references to Christianity throughout the book; and at the end of the book they became more frequent and overt.  

I am a Christian, let me say that right out.  Still, I am not crazy about fiction that does not let people know that the book is written from a Christian viewpoint right from the beginning.  It somehow seems disingenuous to me to find that out halfway through the book.  I feel like people of other faiths, should be aware before investing money and time reading something that may not interest them.  

I realize that Christian fiction is one way to reach out to people.  I personally usually find it written for a lower level of reader, and I imagine that that is done to reach a wider audience of people who may need to 'hear the message.'  I just feel that people's right to choice should be respected, and that they should know from the outset what they are embarking on.

I know, and love, people who have a different point of view about this.  I continue to love them.  I hope they continue to love me.

Now I have until Friday morning to finish this month's selection for book club.

Some of the meals during the past week...

Tomatoes gone wild!  I don't like tomato slices after they have sat for awhile, so I put a whole tomatoes worth of slices on my sammy.  That's it; just tomato (salted) and mayo.  And yes, that is a lot of Cheetos, but I had to share them with Rudy.

Just kidding!  I edited in the Cheeto dust on him.  He does get a few, but never makes a mess.  😋
 

Spaghetti squash again.  This time topped with sauteed portobello mushrooms, onions, garlic, tomatoes, and a bit of cream cheese melted into the vegetables, and a little parmesan sprinkled on top.  The squash was slightly under ripe.  The vine died, so Carey harvested the smallish squash from it.  It hadn't matured enough for the fiber to form 'spaghetti strands,' but the squash roasted and tasted fine.

Sausage with Hot Potato Salad and sliced tomatoes.  The Hot Potato Salad is made with cooked potatoes while still warm, mayo, sour cream, and a little Hidden Valley ranch mix.  It was supposed to have a little cooked bacon in it too, a few chives...but I was out of both.

Tonight we had more green beans and potatoes from the garden, cooked with bacon and onion, and a little beef broth.  I made a pan of cornbread again.  (Carey likes it left over for breakfast in milk.)  This meal used up the last of the potato harvest.  

I know the meals are kind of repetative, but the garden has been a lot more productive than in the past, and I'm trying to make sure everything gets used.  Carey says it's too much work if they just go to waste.  We do share with friends.  Wish you all lived close!

What I'm reading Wednesday...

Forty-second challenge finish of the year.

This book won the Walter Scott Prize for Historical Fiction (2025), The Winston Graham Historical Prize (2025), and was shortlisted for the Booker Prize (2025).  It also was New York Times Editors' Choice, NPR Best Book of 2025, New Yorker Best Book of 2025, and the Shelf Awareness Best Book of 2025.

I rarely like prize winning books.  It always seems like I must be missing what the hype is about.  This did not change that feeling.  However, I listened to it as an audiobook, and I am almost tempted to read a hard copy just to see if that makes a difference.  I kept falling asleep, and then would have to rewind to find the spot I fell asleep, so I may have missed something important.  But I opted for the audiobook, because it was available through our library, and the library does not have the hard copy, or even ebook.  The Kindle version is $12.99, and a hard copy or paperback are priced even higher than that.  I don't want to spend that much just hoping that I might like it, when I'm pretty sure I won't.

So I'm going to call this good enough.

 

Forty-third challenge finish of the year.

I liked this more than I thought I would at the outset.  It was about an abusive marriage and the children born into it.  It started out with the abused wife being ordered to go to the registry office to add the newborn's name to the birth certificate.  The abusive husband insisted on having the baby named after him (a family name of several generations), but the mother of the child believes that the choice of name will affect the life of the child given it.  So she has a list of three possible names.  

For the rest of the book, the chapters are from the point of view of the life of the child as his life would turn out with each of the three names.  I'm probably not explaining that very well.  I don't usually like when each chapter is from a different character's point of view, but this one was interesting, as each lifetime of the three child names lays out a complete change of circumstances for each.  

I liked it very much.  Now that I'm thinking about it, I'm not even sure which name was 'actually' chosen, but I enjoyed each of the 'lives' they lived.

Half of the year has gone by!  I have nine prompts yet to fulfill for the challenge.  Eleven of the prompts completed so far were with books that have been on my Kindle for a long while, and now they are read!  It doesn't sound too impressive, but it's a full quarter of all the books I've read for the year so far.  I'm not sure how I will do at filling remaining prompts with books already on my to-be-read pile, but will continue to strive for that goal.

What I'm reading Wednesday...

Forty-first challenge finish of the year.

It may be a bit of a stretch to say this is 'Related to the Word "Nemesis" '.  My reasoning?  In the begining of the book, the main character was a professor of physics and astronomy.  She has a lifelong fascination with the stars.  Later in the book she shares her love of astronomy by helping a fellow NASA trainee to identify constellations in order to help with navigating without instruments.

They talk about the mythology behind different constellations; specifically they discuss Cygnus, the Swan.  In one myth, the goddess Nemesis was a beauty, and Zeus wanted her.  She transformed herself into different animals to escape him.  When she transformed into a goose, Zeus disguised himself as a swan and caught her.  Later he placed the constellation Cygnus in the sky to commemorate his conquest of her.

So Atmosphere is distantly related to the word 'Nemesis.'  I wish I could have worked the phrase 'in a galaxy far, far away' into this post.  Alas, Cygnus is in our own Milky Way galaxy.  ;)

I liked the book.  There were tears.  We took a little jaunt over to a somewhat nearby town today (an hour and a half one way) for lunch at a restaurant that we like.  I finished the book on the way.  It was a four-napkin cry.  Carey, very wisely, pretended not to notice the tears.  He almost cried tears of his own when we pulled into the restaurant parking lot to find a sign on the door, 'Closed Today for Family Emergency.' 

Some of the meals the past week...

I didn't have to cook much this week as we had takeout one night and ate with the family another night.  Also because we had a lot of leftovers to finish up.  But one of  the meals I cooked was Tomato Pie with a mixed salad.  We had plenty of perfectly ripe tomatoes to fill the pie.  Yum.

 

And one night I went all out with Parmesan Potatoes and Bacon Wrapped Green Bean Bundles both of which were roasted in the oven.  After they came out I put in a couple of salmon filets.  The beans got a little charred, the potatoes didn't get quite browned enough, but it was all done and delicious.  We hadn't had salmon in such a long time.  I love it, but Carey doesn't like it as much as I do.  When he was still working out of town every other week, I would make it for myself as often as I wanted.

Tonight I have another pot of fresh beans and potatoes cooking on the stove.  And we will have them with some other leftovers.  Then the fridge will be pretty much empty, and I can start cooking to refill it.  :)

What I'm reading Wednesday...

Fortieth challenge finish of the year.

Set in 1903 Canada, the main character has killed her abusive husband, and she is running from his two brothers who are intent on seeing her punished one way or another.

I found this at the library, and the cover on the copy I borrowed showed a woman leading a horse through a snowy forest.  I'm a sucker for historical survival stories, so the front cover art and the back cover blurb made me pick it up.  I had absolutely no idea how, or even if, I could make it count toward the challenge.  

I have a habit of of reading the stuff at the back of the book.  This one had the  author's acknowledgements, a conversation between the author and another author (Michael Ondaatje), and a list of books the author used in writing this one.  In the authors' conversation, Mr. Ondaatje says "...And there is a deus ex machina moment late in the book."

Well, thank you, Mr. Ondaatje, for telling me exactly which prompt I could fit this under!  And in a way that was a very 'deus ex machina moment late in the book' just for me!  Just see the definition below.  :)

Deus ex machina:  a plot device in which a seemingly impossible problem is abruptly resolved by an unexpected, often highly convenient occurrence."

By the way, I didn't recognize the event in the book that Mr. Ondaatje was talking about as deus ex machina, so it's just a darn good thing that he spelled it out for me.  LOL