Unraveled Wednesday: 1/7/26

I’m happy to join Kat and the Unravelers today, with some (hopefully) better mittens in progress and continued Hitchhiker knitting. 

I haven't knit the thumb yet, but the Comfy Gusset Mittens are a much better fit for my hand. Jane sent me a link to a great youtube video about knitting perfect thumb gussets that I think will be helpful in knitting the thumbs without gaps. 

The gray Hitchhiker is growing slowly but surely. I'm a bit tired of mittens but i should probably finish the pair and actually knit the thumbs before I quit. But I am glad to have this Hitchhiker on the needles as it's what I've wanted to work on recently.

I caught up on some ARCs over the holidays but I'll save my thoughts on those for closer to the publication dates, especially because they aren't published for three months or more. I did read The Rest of Our Lives and found it a bit underwhelming. It begins with a genuinely intriguing premise; a man who has quietly promised himself that because of her affair, he will leave his wife once their children are grown has finally reached that moment. Instead of turning back home after dropping his daughter off at university, he keeps driving west. The first chapter is strong: reflective, restrained, and full of promise about what this reckoning might mean.

Unfortunately, for me, the novel doesn’t live up to that early potential. While the setup suggests an emotionally charged exploration of marriage, betrayal, regret, and self-deception, the story quickly loses focus. As the road trip progresses, the book devolves into something more random, a series of loosely connected visits, memories, and observations that never quite cohere into a satisfying whole. The narrative begins to feel like a string of digressions rather than a journey with momentum or purpose.

There are moments of insight along the way, and Markovits is clearly interested in the quiet textures of middle age: the ways we rationalize our choices, the things we avoid naming, and the lives we might have lived. But those ideas are often buried under rambling reflections and disconnected bits and pieces, which left me feeling impatient rather than contemplative.

This is a novel with an interesting premise and real promise at the start, but one that goes quickly downhill after that. I can see it working better for readers who enjoy meandering, introspective road trip novels, but I finished it wishing it had stayed closer to the emotional clarity of its opening pages. Two and a half stars rounded up.

What are you making and reading this week? 

 

Read With Us: Discussion Time

Today is the discussion day for our Read With Us fall book, The Antidote by Karen Russell. 

Kym, Carole, and I are each posting a discussion question or two on our blogs today, and you are welcome to respond in the comments. I would also encourage you to reply to others' comments if you choose.  This is a book discussion, after all, so there are no correct answers or right opinions. I've very much been looking forward to discussing this book. I'll be honest; I found it difficult to read, and after several false starts, I finally finished it. So I think this discussion will be valuable for me, and I hope for others of you as well. 

 

Here is my question: Prairie witches served as "vaults" for pioneers' unpleasant memories. How does this relate to what is happening today in America with the current administration, school districts, and museums removing topics like slavery, treatment of indigenous people, climate change, medical information, and more from websites and curricula?

 

I'll be glad to share my thoughts about our questions tonight during our Zoom discussion. These questions on our blogs and the Zoom discussion are your chance to express your ideas. So what do you think? I can't wait to hear your thoughts! (And I'm counting on our discussion to give me fresh perspectives in my own thinking about this novel.)

The in-person Zoom discussion will be at 7:00 pm Eastern this evening. If you haven't RSVP'd to Kym already you can send me an email (the email address is in the upper right) and I will make sure you get an invitation with the Zoom link. I hope to see you there!