Unraveled Wednesday: 1/21/26

I’m happy to join Kat and the Unravelers today, with a miniscule start to a second mitten and more of the Hitchhiker. It's been quite cold here, and temperatures in the single digits finally prompted me to start the second mitten. 

I'm just working on the ribbing but it's supposed to be cold for two weeks so there will be time to finish the pair. I'm debating knitting some fingerless mitts using the same pattern but I'm getting ahead of myself. 

 

 

I've been working on the Hitchhiker but it looks pretty much the same as last week. For some variety, this week I took my photo while I was watching The Pitt instead of All Creatures Great and Small.  

I did read two books this week. The first was The Mindful Art of Space Making. This is a refreshingly practical book about decluttering and making space, both physically and emotionally, without the usual self-help fluff. April Scott Tandy offers a gentle, compassionate approach that feels realistic rather than aspirational, and that’s what ultimately makes it effective. This isn’t about dramatic purges or aesthetic perfection; it’s about creating the conditions for true, lasting change.

What I appreciated most is how grounded the method is. The guidance is calm, thoughtful, and respectful of the fact that many of us are deeply attached to our belongings for emotional reasons. Tandy doesn’t shame that attachment; she helps you understand it and work with it. Her advice on developing your own “compass question” was helpful for me. It's a simple but powerful tool to guide decisions when you’re stuck or overwhelmed. Likewise, her discussion of how to notice and navigate difficult emotions instead of trying to bypass them made this feel like real guidance, not just tidying advice.

With April’s help, I genuinely feel like I may finally be able to deal with the photos and objects I don’t truly want but have been holding onto out of emotional obligation. That alone makes this book worth reading. It’s also a great companion to her YouTube channel; the two together reinforce the ideas in a way that feels supportive rather than repetitive.

Four stars because change still requires honest effort on the reader’s part, but this book gives you a better chance at making that change stick. Now, if I could just convince my husband to adopt these ideas, too.

The second book was an ARC; The Keeper is the final book in Tana French’s Cal Hooper trilogy, following The Searcher and The Hunter. I read the first book, somehow missed the second, and still found myself able to follow the characters and story quite well. French does a careful job of providing enough context that nothing felt confusing or incomplete.

That said, these books are likely to be even more rewarding if read in order. While The Keeper could function as a stand-alone novel, the emotional depth, character relationships, and long-simmering tensions clearly benefit from the background laid in the earlier books. Knowing the history of this small Irish community and its central figures adds layers to what unfolds here.

The characters themselves are deeply human, interesting, flawed, and multidimensional, and Ardnakelty, where the story takes place, is almost a character in its own right. The town’s residents share an unspoken understanding of how things are said and done, what questions can be asked, and which ones are best left alone. Part of my enjoyment of this novel came from trying to think like a resident of Ardnakelty, viewing events through that quiet, communal logic rather than from an outsider’s perspective.

As always with Tana French, the real strength lies not just in the mystery but in the atmosphere and the people who inhabit it. The pacing is deliberate, the setting richly drawn, and the moral questions feel grounded and human rather than flashy or contrived. This is less about plot twists and more about consequences, what people carry, what they hide, and what eventually surfaces.

A strong and satisfying conclusion to the trilogy, one that reinforces why French remains such a compelling writer of place, character, and quiet menace. Four and a half stars rounded up.

Thank you to Edelweiss+ and Viking for providing me with a copy of this book. It will be published on March 31, 2026. 

What are you making and reading this week?