What you see there, folks, is a baby blanket that’s only slightly longer than it was the last time you saw it. Is that because I’ve been slacking off and not knitting when I should? Well, yes, somewhat. However, it’s also because I was knitting on it during jury duty and made a key mistake that became obvious when I looked at it and then I had to rip back to before where I’d been to fix it. So I’ll be doubling down over the next week in order to make some serious progress.

Just before snapping this shot, I finished Phillip Pullman’s The Ruby in the Smoke, the first in a historical mystery series I picked up at our local Little Free Library earlier this year. I had watched the BBC adaptation of at least part of the series when it came out a decade ago, didn’t realize it had been a book first, and then a couple years later happened upon the Maisie Dobbs books, which I mistakenly thought was the same thing. (I am not the only person on the internet to have made this error, by the way.) I also forgot the adaptation starred Billie Piper, whom I didn’t yet know from Dr. Who or Mansfield Park, until a librarian pal in my book group reminded me. The library has the dvds; I may borrow them at some point…

I also began David Arnold’s Kids of Appetite while on jury duty, but either my headspace in that setting was wrong for the book or the style didn’t lend itself to the situation. In either case, I hope to give it another shot this weekend.

I’m about to start Amina’s Voice by Hena Khan, a friend of my friend Sarah, in honor of Ramadan. It’s gotten a great reception, so I’m looking forward to this middle-grade novel.

None of the audio books currently in my collection appealed, so I downloaded Exit, Pursued by a Bear last night thinking it was The Bear and the Nightingale. I do not know if it’s the same bear (the titles smack of wanting to be picture books in a similar vein to Jon Klassen’s Hat books), but since they’re different authors and story lines, I’m pretty sure we’re talking two different bears. Anyway, I’ll probably delete Exit, Pursued by a Bear from my phone and see if something else is available. I should get The Princess Diarist, Carrie Fisher’s final book, within the next week or so.

How about you? What are you reading? Head over to Kat’s to see other folks’ books and knitting…