Unraveled, Week 35/2021

It is a gloomy, very wet Wednesday here in Western Pennsylvania, where the remnants of Ida are moving through and causing a lot of flash flooding. I am extremely thankful to be working from home today, because I know I would have arrived at the office completely soaked through if I'd had to go in today.

A wet and dreary day is a perfect day for knitting and curling up with a good book, so it's very appropriate that I'm linking up with Kat and the Unravelers for my weekly crafting and reading check-in.

A lot of the past week has been spent trying to finish that one last spinning project for Stash Dash (it's done and it was sort of an ordeal -- I'll share more this Sunday), so there hasn't been a ton of knitting.
But I did finish the first of the socks for my sister-in-law and am cruising down the leg of sock number two, so I'm pretty confident I can finish the pair in time for her birthday. I also put in some time on my scrappy double-layer charity hat, which has eaten up nearly all of the original scraps I selected and has forced me to unearth some more.

Can you tell by the glow of the lamp how dark it is outside?

If I haven't been all that prolific in my crafting life this past week, I've more than made up for it with my reading. I finished another five books this past week:

Of the five books I finished, I think The Summer Book was my least favorite. I picked it up because Sara and Chelsey of Novel Pairings made it sound so good and at least a couple of you have read and enjoyed it, but I'm sorry to say I didn't like it much. It felt disjointed and disorganized to me. I know it's meant to be a series of vignettes rather than a cohesive narrative, but I honestly felt like some important background information had been left out and I never got a sense that I fully understood the situation or the characters. It was a quick read, though, and it's not that I hated it -- I was just unimpressed. I gave it 2 stars.

Bingo square: Modern classic

Mary recommended Interpreter of Maladies to me for the square I put it in, and while the fit for that square might be a little bit of a stretch, the recommendation was spot on. This is a collection of short stories that all have some connection to immigrants from India/Pakistan. The stories explore national identity and the meaning of home as a concept, and they're all gorgeously written. What usually bothers me most of about short stories is that they often feel incomplete, but every single one in this connection felt satisfyingly whole to me. I'll definitely be reading more by this author in the future! I gave it 4 stars (maybe 4.5).

Bingo square: About travel

When I was in need of a new audiobook to listen to on my walks, I conveniently found that The English Patient was available with no wait and fit neatly into one of my squares. I'd enjoyed Michael Ondaatje's writing previously and remembered liking the movie inspired by the novel (though the specifics and plot were lost to me). I did enjoy the writing quite a lot, but I found this one really hard to follow. I suspect that was compounded by listening rather than reading with my eyes; I just don't process information as thoroughly when I hear it as oppose to see it. But it was bad enough that after I finished, I had to look up a plot summary because I wasn't sure what I had read. I gave it 3 stars.

Bingo square: Booker Prize finalist or winner

I am gradually making my way through all of Maggie O'Farrell's backlist, and I had put I Am, I Am, I Am: Seventeen Brushes with Death on hold recently because it had a long wait and I didn't expect it to come to me that soon. But you know how the library is -- when you assume you'll be waiting a long time, you're often surprised, so I read it when it was available to me even though I didn't have a square for it on my bingo card. This is a memoir of sorts in which O'Farrell recounts instances where she's had a brush with death, some very serious (her childhood bout of encephalitis or a knife held to her throat by a robber in South America) and some less so (narrowly avoiding being hit by a car). It was a quick read and written in the same style I've come to love. I gave it 4 stars.

I have been wanting to read All Who Go Do Not Return for several years and finally borrowed my father's copy a few weeks ago. This memoir is written by a man who was raised in an ultra-Orthodox Hasidic community in New York who, in his early 30s, realized he no longer believed any of what he had been taught and that had guided every aspect of his life. When he begins, he has just learned that he has been ordered to leave his sect, and he proceeds to detail what his life was like growing up and how he got to this moment. If you watched and enjoyed Unorthodox on Netflix, you'd likely enjoy this book. It's sometimes shocking and horrifying but definitely fascinating. I gave it 4 stars.

Bingo square: Wanted to read for more than a year

Summer Book Bingo doesn't officially end until the end of Labor Day weekend, but look at this:

Click to embiggen and see all the books!

I really thought it would be a stretch to fill two cards, but I guess all the stars aligned and I was able to get it done with time to spare!

I am currently reading A Tale for the Time Being, which was another surprise from the library (I thought I had several more weeks to wait for it), and I'm thinking about what I want to read this month now that I no longer have bingo squares to consider. Thanks again to Mary for hosting this delightful summer event that pushed me to read so many good books!

What are you reading and making these days? If you were doing Summer Book Bingo, how's your card looking heading into the last few days?