Unraveled, Week 32/2025

Happy Wednesday, friends! Before I join in with Kat and the Unravelers, I have an apology. Each week for my Unraveled post, I look back at the number from the week before, and it took typing out 40 this week for me to realize that something was not right because I know there are more than 12 week left in this year. It seems that somewhere back in spring, instead of typing the number 12, I typed 20, and that set off a chain reaction of mis-numbering the weeks. I've gone back and corrected them all, but that means that if you use some sort of blog reader or subscribe to something that notifies you that I've posted, you will have seen what looks like a ton of new posts from me. I wish I had that much exciting content to share, but alas I'm just fixing my own errors. I've always maintained that my strength is in words, not numbers, and I think this just confirms it.

But enough about my typos -- let's get back to the making and the reading! Since finishing up my latest pair of socks, my afternoon puppy nap time/reading time knitting has been the hat I'm knitting using the SSK goodie bag yarn, and at present it's about the size of Ruthie's tushie:

There's obviously still a good ways to go on this, but I do like the way the colors are pooling in sort-of stripes.

I've also cast on a new project, using the free-to-me Shibui Linen yarn that I picked up from the giveaway table at SSK. I'm making Kudzu (Ravelry link), the pattern I originally bought the Miss Babs silk/linen for.

This lace is a lot less complicated than Midsommarkrans, so with any luck it will go quickly and I'll be able to speed through to the stockinette body. I did swatch for this and got stitch gauge with a US 5/3.75 mm, though this start looks awfully small. I am making a size that should give me about an inch of positive ease, assuming I get gauge in the actual piece.

Reading has been good this past week, with three solid finishes.

It's been a number of years since the last Jimmy Perez novel and I truly thought the series was done, so I was delighted to see there's a forthcoming ninth book! In this latest installment, The Killing Stones, the action has moved from the Shetland Islands to the Orkney Islands, closer to mainland Scotland but remote enough that Jimmy and his team are largely on their own when it comes to investigations. This time, the first victim is Jimmy's longtime friend Archie Stout, and the discovery of his body at an archaeological site suggests a motive related to the island's history. The murder investigation keeps you guessing and keeps the list of suspects long, but the real focus of the novel is the changing nature of life in an island community where everyone knows each other and where outsiders are suspect. It's an entertaining and propulsive tour of Jimmy Perez's new home and also serves as a satisfying update on his personal life with his new family. I gave it 4 stars. Thank you to NetGalley and St. Martin's Press/Minotaur Books for providing me with a digital ARC in return for an honest review. This book will be published September 30, 2025.

After clearing a long podcast backlog, I went looking for something fun on audio and decided on a romance that had long been on my radar. In Red, White & Royal Blue, the son of the president of the United States and a British prince are involved in an incident at a royal wedding, leading them to be forced to be together in the name of damage control and end up falling in love -- and dealing with all the complications that such a relationship entails. I thought this would be a fun little fairy tale-type romance, but it deals with some surprisingly serious issues. Clearly the author was dealing with the outcome of the 2016 election (the president in this world is the first woman elected, and there's a plot point involving a private email server), so I guess you could call it a left-wing political fantasy if you wanted. There are a few real political names dropped (and some made-up figures who are clear stand-ins for real people), but for the most part all the people are fictional, and it seems the author has also taken a few liberties with the rules of royal succession. It was fun and more serious than I expected. I do have to lodge one complaint about the narrator, who pronounced Bowie (as in David) as if it rhymes with "owie." Yikes! Still, it was enjoyable. I gave it 4 stars as well.

My most recent finish this past week was also my favorite of the bunch, but it's one that feels almost impossible to describe. The Antidote is set in the fictional town of Uz, Nebraska, in the early 1930s. It's the time of the Dust Bowl and opens as a massive dust storm moves through and wreaks havoc on this small town founded mostly by Polish immigrants a quarter-century earlier and displacing the Indigenous people who lived there. But in this version of the Dust Bowl, there exist Prairie Witches, women called Vaults who can store your memories for you and relieve you of the burden of carrying them -- at least until you decide you want to withdraw them. When the titular character wakes following the storm, she realizes that the memories she's been storing in her body have left her, leaving her effectively bankrupt. She and her backstory -- along with a farmer, his orphaned niece, and a Black female photographer working for the federal government -- form the center of the story that follows. I'm actually glad I didn't know much about this book before I started reading; in fact, I bought it when it was a Kindle deal mainly because I kept seeing it pop up all the places buzzy books do, and now I'm glad I own it because I have a feeling I will need to reread it. There is so much going on in this book and it has a lot to say about some big, important issues -- things like colonialism, the mistreatment of Indigenous tribes by the federal government, racism, memory, and climate change. This is not a book that can be rushed through, and from the material at the back, it's clear the author did extensive research to do justice to the issues she raises. It's not a book for everyone, but I know it's a book I'm very glad I read and will be thinking about for a long time. I gave it 5 stars.

What are you making and reading this week?