Unraveled Wednesday: 3/8/23

I'm happy to join Kat and fellow Unravelers for Unraveled Wednesday, with something new and springy. I'm still knitting on the Sophie shawl, but to be honest, it's becoming a bit of a slog. There was my initial excitement when I got my yarn scale, but so far it has not yet told me that I've reached the halfway/decrease portion. I'll spare you another photo of an off-white shawl that looks fairly similar to what I showed you last week. 

But my fingers have been almost itching to work on a Hitchhiker, so I looked through my stash, found a couple of skeins that I liked, and cast on.

I meant to do a row of yarn overs every couple of teeth but kept forgetting until I had done six teeth. Now I'm doing them every six rows and calling it a design element. Many of you may be too young to remember when they used to sell pastel-dyed chicks at Easter, but that's what these colors remind me of. Hedgehog Fibers calls this colorway Foam, but I'm calling it Spring Chickens. My sister and I used to hope that the Easter Bunny would bring us cute little chicks, but thankfully he never did. This is close enough for me. 

I finished three books this week. The first was an advance reader copy of a lovely WWI story, Beyond That, the Sea by Laura Spence-Ash. In 1940, 11-year-old Beatrix Thompson's parents send her from London to the United States in hopes that she'll be safe from Hitler's bombings. Bea is lucky enough to end up in Boston with the Gregory family. She misses her family terribly and they miss her, but she quickly fits in with 13-year-old William and nine-year-old Gerald. Bea learns how to swim at the Gregory's island summer home, excels academically, and grows into a teenager. When the war ends, she is unsure about where she belongs and fearful about returning home to a different London and a much different family than the one she left. It was a wonderful four-star read told from a unique and different perspective. The book will be published on March 21. 

I loved Wintering by Katherine May but I'm afraid I didn't quite get the point of the author's newest, Enchantment. She begins this short book with a good description of how I feel post-covid, and how I think many others feel - exhausted, disconnected, and isolated. The author then goes on to try and define and search for enchantment: “small wonder magnified through meaning, fascination caught in the web of fable and memory.” This book didn't speak to me, so it was 2.5 stars, rounded up.

But I was pleasantly surprised by how much I enjoyed Maame by Jessica George. Maddie Wright is a 20-something young woman who lives in London, the daughter of Ghanaian immigrants, has a father with Parkinson's Disease, a mother who spends most of her time in Ghana, and a brother who is no help at all. Maddie is struggling, emotionally and financially, but she is dutiful and intelligent, doing the best she can working and caring for her father, all while receiving criticism from her mother. Maddie has been forced to be a responsible woman throughout much of her life, but when her mother returns from Ghana, Maddie moves out of her father's home and begins to live her own life. She experiences plenty of pitfalls but Jessica George has written an engaging character that the reader is always rooting for. The book also deals with racism, family duty, grief, and depression, with both humor and pain. I was struck by how a seemingly simple nickname can sometimes be a cruel thing.

Now I'm re-reading The Shipping News to get ready for our Read With Us blog and Zoom book discussion on Tuesday, March 21st. I do hope you'll join us!

What are you making and reading this week?