Unraveled, Week 12/2026

Although we had a return of winter here to start the week -- there were brief snow showers on and off on Monday, despite the fact that we hit a record high (84ºF) on Sunday -- it's been a nice start to the week. The combination of longer days and less running around because of spring break has meant that life is feeling a bit more leisurely. I spent much of Monday working my way through commencement lists, including the biggest one at 42 pages in Word, but by yesterday morning I'd gotten through all the lists I'd received and I had some time to myself again. As we've now made it to Wednesday, it's time to join Kat and the Unravelers to talk about my making and my reading.

The newest socks I've cast on seem to be flying off the needles; after starting them Sunday morning, I found myself starting the heel flap by Monday afternoon. I've now completed that, turned the heel picked up stitches, and begun the gusset.

I tried to take this photo on Ruthie for scale, but she objected.

My sweater also is moving right along. I am more than halfway through the chart and have just one increase round remaining, which means that there are a lot of stitches on the needles and each round takes a good amount of time. I'm able to get several rounds done most evenings. The circumference of the yoke is now larger than my 40 inch needle, so that's a good sign of progress!

As predicted, my reading time has been somewhat curtailed, but I still managed to finish three books this week.

The Paris Express is a fictionalized account of the real-life crash of a train at the Montparnasse station in Paris in 1895. The novel follows the course of the train throughout that day, focusing on members of the staff and passengers in turn. In many cases, the characters are people who existed and were on the train, though the author created many details of their personal lives for the purposes of the plot. It's an interesting premise for a novel, given that it's known how it will all end, but how it happens ends up being the source of the suspense. I'd picked this one up because I loved The Pull of the Stars and had heard an interesting description of this latest release, but I'll admit I was a bit disappointed. It wasn't as suspenseful as I was expecting and didn't quite capture my full attention. I gave it 3 stars.

I honestly can't remember how I first heard of This Is How You Lose the Time War, but it had been on my radar for a long time and I'd finally put it on hold at the library (but still had a long wait). Had it not been for that long wait and the fact that I was able to listen to it all in a day, this likely would have been a DNF for me. It's a science fiction novel in which two agents on opposing sides of a war write to each other in spite of their enemy status and somehow come to care for one another. My main problem was that I couldn't ground myself in the story; I just didn't understand the world in which this was taking place, who the opposing sides were, or why they were fighting. Perhaps reading with my ears was part of the problem, but I suspect this was just a bit too far outside my comfort zone. I gave it 2 stars.

I'd just heard of Kakigori Summer on a podcast last week and was happy to find it on Hoopla. This 2025 release follows three sisters, the children of a British father and a Japanese mother. Eldest Rei lives in London and works in finance, middle daughter Kiki is a single mother who lives in Tokyo and works in a nursing home, and youngest Ai is a singer in a J-pop group. When Ai becomes the focus of a scandal, her two older sisters come together to help her, and the three women (and Kiki's young son) escape to their childhood home next door to their 90-something great-grandmother. Being back in that quiet village leads all of them to reflect on their earlier lives: the effects of their parents' split, their mother's disappearance and presumed death, and how their "half-breed" status has meant perpetually feeling like outsiders no matter where they are. I thought this was a beautiful story about family and how your family can be your home when nowhere else feels like it. Although there's a fair amount of Japanese in the book, I could figure out most of it through context, and I had the benefit of a narrator who knew how to pronounce the terms. I will note that I had a bit of confusion early on, when I confused "Ai" with "I," but a reread of the synopsis cleared things up. I really enjoyed it and gave it 4 stars.

I'm still working my way through The Odyssey and am getting close to the halfway point. I've also started a memoir and a fascinating work of nonfiction about art in WWII.

What are you making and reading this week?