sprite writes
broodings from the burrow

May 21, 2024


ten authors i’d love a new book from asap
posted by soe 1:59 am

This week’s Top Ten Tuesday topic from That Artsy Reader Girl is Authors I’d Love a New Book From. Here are ten of mine:

  1. Rainbow Rowell (This is cheating, because her next novel is due out in July, but still…)
  2. Maia Chance (It looks like she has a thriller coming out this summer, but I was really hoping for one of her mysteries.)
  3. Deanna Raybourn (I downed the latest Veronica Speedwell a few weeks ago and would be delighted with another in that series or another standalone.)
  4. Sonali Dev (I haven’t read her latest, but know I’ll devour it quickly and then I’ll want more!)
  5. Erin Morgenstern (I have, but haven’t read, The Starless Sea, but even that came out five years ago.)
  6. Grace Lin (Her middle grade novels are exquisite.)
  7. Carsten Henn (It looks like he has other books, but they don’t seem to have been translated.)
  8. Michael Scott (I want him to write something new and then come to the U.S. to promote it, because he was such a great author to hear live.)
  9. Chad Harbach (How has he never published another novel?!)
  10. Amie Kaufman and Jay Kristoff (A third series from them would be just great from my perspective!)

How about you? Are there authors you’d like to have send you a new manuscript right now?

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May 17, 2024


51, growth, and strawberry … sauce
posted by soe 1:46 am

Three beautiful things from my past week:

1. We celebrated Rudi’s birthday today at a local brewery with friends.

2. When I stopped by the garden earlier this week, the tallest pea vines were 5 feet tall and covered in flowers and the earliest pods.

3. My jam didn’t jell last night, but it made the apartment smell so fragrantly of strawberries. I may try reheating it again tomorrow and adding a little pectin to help solidify it some if I can figure out where it’s gone to. But even if it doesn’t, it will be delightful on ice cream or in yogurt.

How about you? What’s been beautiful in your world lately?

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May 10, 2024


gathering, getting to _f_o, and mobile once more
posted by soe 1:05 am

Three beautiful things from my past week:

1. We can’t quite pull off an intrasquad game, but we do pull of a team dinner on one of our off weeks. It’s a lovely night to spend with five of my teammates under the stars.

2. I have been dragging my feet on finishing a shawl for the past six months. I mean, I started it 11 years ago, so there has been plenty of procrastination built into this shawl. But six months ago, I realized that I was running a yarn chicken race that was going to depend on whether the ends of the yarn already in the shawl were long enough to fill the dozen or so rows I still had left to knit. This weekend, I decided enough was enough, so I wove in the ends, looked at what I had left, and, despite knowing there was most certainly not enough yarn left, proceeded to try it anyway. Then I ripped those all out and contemplated my options. I dug through the stash, came up with likely contenders, and, with some input from Rudi, came up with an option that I think works okay. I still need to block the shawl, but, for better or for worse, it is done. (And I have to think a finished, imperfect shawl is definitely better than an unfinished knitting project than has lingered around since I was in my 30s. Ouch.) Look for photos next week, maybe.

3. After a month without a cell phone, my mom’s is working again.

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May 3, 2024


babies, berries, and coach
posted by soe 1:29 am

Three beautiful things from my past week:

1. There are ducklings at the Lincoln Memorial Reflecting Pool.

2. Strawberries have arrived at the farmers market and also are appearing in my garden.

3. We have a new head coach for my volunteer volleyball program, and she is young and enthusiastic and receptive to ideas and feedback and just generally everything I want for the kids.

How about you? What’s been beautiful in your world lately?

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April 30, 2024


ten reasons i’ll bail on or give one star to a book
posted by soe 1:49 am

This week’s Top Ten Tuesday from That Artsy Reader Girl invites us to share the (petty) reasons we’ve lowered the rating or just failed to finish a book.

I will be honest. I start and fail to finish books all the time. The first few chapters aren’t great. (I rarely bother to enter those into Goodreads at all.) It’s in a bag I don’t pick up for three months. The book is overdue to the library. It’s just not the right fit for my mood, but is otherwise perfectly fine. Goodreads lists my currently reading total as 50 (and my “on-hiatus” tally as nearly 100) for these reasons and more. Probably maybe I’ll get back around to them.

These are not the books I’m talking about today. Today we’re talking about the books that lure me past page 50. That trick me into finishing them or that are so bad that I want people to know I could not bring myself to finish them.

Let’s look at why that might be:

  1. It didn’t seem like it would have a sad ending and then it had a sad ending. Number one reason something gets one star from me on Goodreads. (Spoiler alert.)
  2. I hate the main character. Number one reason I won’t finish a book after investing actual time in it.
  3. Appallingly bad writing, but an interesting enough story idea that I wanted to know what happens (but then didn’t think the ending was done well).
  4. A mystery where I know who does it before I even know what’s been done. (Sometimes, stories are told where you get the narrative from the perpetrator’s point of view as well as the detective. I don’t usually love those, but they are not my complaints here.)
  5. Ridiculously conventional gender roles. (See, often, romances.)
  6. There is no mystery in a mystery novel. (Like, what is this even?)
  7. The author doesn’t know how to end the book.
  8. A mystery where my solution is better than the author’s.
  9. Nonfiction where the author is a pompous ass. (On rare occasion, also true in fiction.)
  10. A romance where I don’t care if the couple ends up together or not.

How about you? What drives you bat-shit crazy about a book?

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April 26, 2024


favorite pup, take me out, and water on
posted by soe 1:49 am

Naya

Three beautiful things from my past week:

1. Rudi and I got to spend several days looking after my friend Neal’s dog, Naya.

2. We made it to our first baseball game of the season this week. The Nats were not impressed enough by this to win, but their starter did put in five solid, run-free innings before the bullpen doomed his best outing of 2024. Regardless, it was nice to be in the park with our friend Pat and his nearly 20-year-old son, Jack. (We also went with Jack to his very first baseball game oh so many years ago.)

3. The faucet at the garden had been off for the season, which means we’ve been hauling gallons of water from home in our solar shower the last few weeks. Today, after I put the last of the plants we bought two weekends ago into the ground, I found it had been turned on in the past day or so! The garden appreciated a good dousing!

How about you? What’s been beautiful in your world lately?

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