EPBOT Readers discussion

Hello Everyone,
Welcome to November. I am back at my elderly mother's helping her pack for her move, because why would she want to hire the movers to also pack when she's 95 and not going to do the packing herself. Sigh. The one box she packed of fragile things from her curio cabinet that she wants to take was a nightmare. We bought supplies and repacked that box. This ought to be a fun weekend...

Anyway, onto books! I finished the short story The Tasting Menu: A Short Story. For a short story it was pretty good. It was longer than the Amazon collections so it actually had the time/space to tell a full story.

I started listening to We Solve Murders. I am excited about this as I loved, loved, loved The Thursday Murder Club. This is a new series from the same author. My husband already read it and liked it better than TTMC.

I finished my kindle book When We Were Widows. I ended up enjoying this more than I thought I would at the beginning. Having it start okay and get better is a good thing.

QOTW:
What is your favorite day of the week? (If you have one)

Right now, for me it is Friday. I work part-time, not on Fridays and have a group of friends where we always do things on Friday morning. We call ourselves the Fabulous Friday Flying Friends or FFFFs. We originally met all taking a Friday morning flying trapeze class (which we still do, in season).

Someone in our neighborhood went from Halloween inflatables to evergreen swag and a tree in the window in under two days.

Most Delicious Poison: The Story of Nature's Toxins―From Spices to Vices - I decided this was seasonal by virtue of both poison and spices. It was interesting if a little scattered. The author's father died of alcohol use disorder, and that is part of the frame through which he comes to the story (the other being his research on plant-insect interactions). I did wish the spices had gotten a bit more than basically one chapter.

Her Body and Other Parties: Stories - Also for spooky season, I finally got around to this one. I feel like I didn't get a lot of it. Like at one point it says, "I don't need to tell you the moral of this story. I think you already know what it is," but, uh, no? I liked "The Resident", a sort of psychological horror in the vein of The Haunting of Hill House, possibly because it seemed like it was supposed to be ambiguous. (The worst story was absolutely the imagined synopses of Law & Order: SVU with supernatural elements. It well outlasted any interest from the premise and just went on interminably, which may well be a parallel to the show, but I had to skip to the next story and come back after I'd finished the rest of the book.)

QOTW: I mean, I work full time, so I guess it's Saturday. We usually go to the farmers market in the morning and then do something fun after lunch.

Happy November! It finally cooled down to seasonal November weather yesterday, but the first few days of the month were ridiculously warm here in New England. It was 80 on Halloween, which is just not right!

I was not in a great head space for diving into a new book last week, so I decided instead to re-read The Rowan by Anne McCaffrey and its sequels, which used to be favorites when I was younger. Vintage McCaffrey, not without flaws, but good nostalgia.

Now I'm on I'm Afraid You've Got Dragons by Peter S. Beagle, which is delightful so far!

QOTW: Saturday, definitely. I'm usually ferrying my kids around to various activities or friends' houses, but I give myself a day to ignore my work responsibilities. Sunday I spend my mornings catching up on the week's grading and planning, and I tutor two students in the afternoons, so it's not really a day off. And I teach the rest of the week. Except in the summer, when every day is my favorite day :D

Happy November!

We're not officially doing NaNoWriMo this month after the whole AI debacle, but we're going to set our own goals and do our own writing challenge. (I saw someone come up with this clever moniker on Blue Sky: "NaNoThankYou".)

Finished:
Humble Pi: When Math Goes Wrong in the Real World by Matt Parker - 4 stars - for Robot Librarian's Nonfiction: The 500s. Amusing anecdotes of disasters big and small caused by math and computer errors. As a math/comp sci person, I found it entertaining and fun. YMMV, depending on how much you enjoy math.

Comics/manga:
She Loves to Cook, and She Loves to Eat, Vol. 1
Spy×Family 12
Magilumiere Magical Girls Inc., Vol. 3
Cinderella Closet Vol. 7
Magus of the Library, Vol. 7
Daytime Shooting Star, Vol. 5
Persona 5, Vol. 12
Monthly Girls' Nozaki-kun, Vol. 15
Oshi No Ko , Vol. 7
Chihayafuru, Vol. 11
Chihayafuru, Vol. 12

Currently reading:
Ella Minnow Pea: A Novel in Letters by Mark Dunn - for Robot Librarian's book mentioned in a film, TV show, or streamed series. Apparently this was referenced on Gilmore Girls, which I've never seen. Someone posted a whole list of books mentioned on that show. Alternatively, it would also work for a book written in epistolary format.

Upcoming/Planned:
Magic for Nothing by Seanan McGuire - for Robot Librarian's book that takes place at an amusement park, theme park, fair, or carnival.

QOTW:
It's a tie between Saturday and Sunday. Mostly because I work the other days.

Saturday is usually the day when we do our grocery shopping, but then the rest of the day I'm usually free to relax.

On Sundays, we go to the gym but then we get breakfast out, which is nice. I do laundry, but I consider that a nice, easy chore. I can load it up and then go play video games or read.