cyphomandra

Last Saturday night I was just over halfway up a grade 16 rock climb at the local climbing gym (the hardest difficulty I attempt and not one I’ve completed) and feeling mildly chuffed at reaching my highest ever point. I had my left leg tucked up underneath me and was holding on to two not terribly convincing holds so, mindful of all the advice I’ve had to climb with my legs rather than my arms, I put my full weight on my left leg to straighten up and grab for the next hold.

At which point I felt/heard a horrible ripping sound unrolling across my left calf. I let go of everything, got my belayer to lower me down into a painful heap on the floor, said a number of bad words, and checked that my Achilles tendon was still intact (when I was a teenager doing kendo, two of my class ruptured their Achilles tendons during training in the same week and one of them did the other one when he came back to training, which made rather an impression on me). It was, and as the damage was in my left calf I could still drive, although walking is somewhat difficult and I can’t put my left calf behind me and put weight on it yet. I have, according to my physio, a grade 2 calf tear, which has an excellent prognosis, and I should be walking normally in the next few days but can’t run/jump/lunge; I can start strengthening exercises next week and then possibly cautious return to climbing the week after.

Obviously I can still read.

Finished:

Life after Life, Kate Atkinson. Just pulls off the ending. I liked it a lot although the recurrence of misogyny and abuse in Ursula’s personal relationships plus current world news occasionally veered towards too much for me.

The Silence of Snow, Eileen Merriman. Jodie is a first year doctor at Nelson Hospital, struggling with the workload and her loss of love for her long-distance fiancé; Rory is a Scottish anaesthetic fellow at the same hospital who is dealing very badly with his role in the death of a former patient. ( Spoilers. )

Death Below Stairs, Jennifer Ashley. Kat Holloway is a widowed cook in Victorian England who takes a new position (I was unable to get the catch-phrase "She was a good cook as cooks go; and as good cooks go she went" out of my head when reading this) in a marginally eccentric household and, just as she is getting her new assistant trained to her satisfaction, the girl is found murdered in the pantry. This has a lot of good stuff in it (as well as a lot of Mrs Beeton) and I was well over halfway before a breakfast of hot buttered muffins sent me checking to confirm my instant assumption that the author was American, but the focus on household management does not entirely work with an ultimate plot of royal assassination (by bombs, not cookery) and there's a lot of character backstory that feels like it gets shoe-horned in. But I would read another one, because I like the concept.

WA. Novel for critique; currently on second read-through.

It’s in His Kiss, When He Was Wicked, On the Way to the Wedding, Julia Quinn. The last three of the Bridgertons – Hyacinth, Francesca, Gregory (in that order). Hyacinth is too smart and outspoken for most men, but notorious rake Gareth who needs her to translate a mysterious diary in Italian finds her increasingly attractive. Francesca wants a baby and so is finally ready to put off mourning for her husband, who died suddenly from a cerebral aneurysm, at just the same time as her husband’s cousin, who was his best friend and secretly in love with Francesca, returns to England from India. Gareth falls for the conventionally attractive but uninterested best friend of Lucy (resigned to being the less desirable friend and already promised to marry), before realising that Lucy may be exactly who he needs.

Quinn seems fond of having the first sex scene be under false pretences to a greater or lesser degree and I’m not keen on Regency men having the internal dialogue that they will ruin the reputation of their loved one before marriage so that they can’t get away. I still haven’t finished the fourth of these but although they’re readable and I do actually like reading about a group of siblings who fundamentally love and like each other, only An Offer from a Gentleman has really worked for me as a romance.

In progress:

I was most of the way through Philippa Perry's The Book You Wish Your Parents Had Read when the library whisked it back from my ereader, and I'm considering whether to reserve it again. It focuses on the parent-child relationship, and how to nurture this, acknowledging feelings, being present etc, and I do find this useful. But I've had similar from other books, and they didn't have a chunk in the middle about how you should always instantly respond to a crying infant (I note the author only had one child) and if you spend too much time on your phone your child will become a drug addict and it's all your fault. She's big on saying that things can always be repaired, which is nice, but she also says that there's no possible risk to the adult in constantly subjugating their needs to those of their child and, well, no, plus see also multiple children.

Into the Spotlight, Carrie Hope Fletcher. Modern take on Ballet Shoes. Hasn't grabbed me.

No Man's Land, AJ Fitzwater. Lesbian shapeshifters in North Otago during WWII, or at least I think that's where we're going; intriguing so far, plus gave me an idea for a completely different story.

Up next:

I want to finish Vita Nostra, I've been contemplating the third Dal Maclean book, and I really, really must finish Death Sets Sail and stop wibbling over it.

Gaming:

Have flung myself into Stardew Valley, the 1.5 update on the Switch, and trying to see if I can get an upgraded barn *and* a friendly pig by the end of winter. Also, was the Skull Cavern always this hard, or am I just far too low in combat level?

Best this month was definitely Wed Wabbit, with thanks to rachelmanija, for pointing me at it. I liked both the Westover and Bradbury memoirs but didn't love them.

A Novella Collection, Courtney Milan (title both accurate and completely unhelpful).
Lord of Scoundrels, Loretta Chase.
The Crown of Success, A.L.O.E (re-read).
Whiteout, Thaw, Heatwave, Changing Colors, Elyse Springer (the Seasons of Love series).
The Rúin, Dervla McTiernan.
Firefighter Griffin, Zoe Chant.
For the Good of the School, Doris Pocock.
Educated, Tara Westover.
The Bumblebee Flies Anyway, Kate Bradbury.
Trailer Trash, Marie Sexton.
Wed Wabbit, Lissa Evans.
Shotgun, Marie Sexton.
How to Own the Room: Women and the Art of Brilliantly Speaking, Viv Groskop.
Viscount Vagabond, Loretta Chase.
A Deeper Blue, S.E. Harmon.
Phoebe and Her Unicorn, Dana Simpson.
Becoming, Michelle Obama.
Dogfight, Hot Air, Donovan Bixley.
Roped In, LA Witt.
The Plague and I, Betty MacDonald.
Catch Me When You Fall, Eileen Merriman.

( Reviews under cut. )

Invisibly Breathing, Eileen Merriman.  NZ YA (set in Lower Hutt, for local readers :D ). Felix Catalan has few friends at school and his parents’ marriage is breaking up; he copes by listening to Green Day and obsessing over mathematical rituals. Then Bailey Hunter arrives at school: he’s the oldest of a large family with an alcoholic abusive father, he stutters, loves judo, and is bisexual. The two of them get together, but have to cope with bullying, the threat of discovery, and Bailey’s decompensating father. After a slightly rocky start (I feel that I have read more than enough children’s/YA in which the main character is quirky and has Strong Feelings about numbers, and Bailey is all too obviously a teenage problem character looking for a teenage problem novel) I got into this - the relationship develops well, the bullying isn’t totally over the top, Felix’s parents come across as actual people - but then, regrettably, the ending became more melodramatic and less believable).  

( “Spoilers.” )