Any Way the Wind Blows, by Rainbow Rowell

Posted on February 25, 2022 by Thistle

Book 3 of the Simon Snow trilogy, after Carry On and Wayward Son. I’m not going to say more, as that would give away spoilers from earlier in the series.

Quick recap of my experience with the series up until this point. I read Carry On in 2015 and loved it. I described it as a book I wanted to hug (and did hug) multiple times. It made me happy. And I thought it was a standalone. I was surprised when Wayward Son was released, and I wasn’t sure if I wanted to read on. But I did, in 2019, and honestly, I remembered next to nothing about the book except that it took place mostly in America. According to my review, I enjoyed the book. I didn’t even remember that. So I was wary going into this book. I considered not reading it at all. In fact, when it first arrived from my library last summer, I returned it, saying maybe I’ll get to it again later.

Later finally came, the book is read, and now I’m in two minds. First, the book took me all of two days to read. It was fast and fun and had a lot of the same silly feel of Carry On – for much of the book. That’s where my “second” mind comes from. The ending was…not an ending. The ending was such a non-ending that I actually went looking for other readers’ thoughts to see if I could figure out if this library copy was missing pages. I’m not talking cliffhanger; I’m talking unfinished. There’s literally a “one year later” epilogue that only addresses one of a half-dozen or so important characters. Some people speculate that there will be a fourth book, but it doesn’t feel like that to me. But hey, what do I know? I thought Carry On was a standalone. (A lot of people felt like that, too, and still feel like it should have stayed one. Honestly, I probably agree.)

I don’t know. How do I classify a book that I really enjoyed, but with an ending so unfinished that I feel like I didn’t actually read the entire book? That kinda turns me off the book completely.

Some random thoughts from my read (no spoilers):

  • I don’t buy the Niamh plotline, particularly the conclusion(ish) to it
  • The British have the weirdest sandwiches. Cheese and pickle??
  • Um, after a google search, I realize “pickle” does not mean even remotely the same thing in Britain as it does in the US (British “pickles” 😀  –> )
  • But it did make me crave pickle chips, mmm…
  • I loved Shepard and everything to do with his story
  • Smith Smith-Richards is the stupidest name ever and I love it
  • This book was a lot more Adult than previous volumes, and it feels weird to have it still shelved in the YA section of the library

That’s about all. But you’ll be happy to know that thanks to my pickle-chip-craving via the sandwich research, I did acquire some pickle chips, and I ate some while typing up this review.

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untitled

Posted on February 23, 2022 by Thistle

I feel gross.
I feel dirty.
I don’t want to be seen.

Shame.
Ugly thoughts.
Loathing and disgust.

I hurt.
I am angry.
I am too overwhelmed to be angry.
I sink into depression.

I cannot move.
I cannot act.

I want change.
I am a traitor.
To myself.
To women.
To my beliefs.

I wrestle.
Two directions, both clenched.
Paralyzed into silence.

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Love & Other Disasters, by Anita Kelly

Posted on February 21, 2022 by Thistle

Dahlia has quit her job to participate in an amateur cooking competition called Chef’s Special. Along the way, she hopes to find herself. What she doesn’t expect to find is love. London agreed to be on Chef’s Special in hopes of bringing visibility to nonbinary people, and to raise money for an LGBTQ+ non-profit. They’re also not looking for love, but Dahlia accidentally face-plants into their chest the first day on set, and there’s no question romance has just found both of them.

This was a really cute and spicy romance, complete with misunderstandings, hesitations, and some start-stop buildups. The background of the cooking show was fun too – made me look forward to the next season of GBBO! The book had a few issues – a bit more optimistic than real world when it comes to queer acceptance, a couple sections where the pacing seemed to jump through time too fast, etc – but for the most part it was a lovely and sweet read. I was happy to finally read a book with a nonbinary narrator, as I’ve been unable to find one before now. Hopefully more books will follow in the future! We need more representation out there!

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Sunday Coffee – TT Travel Destinations

Posted on February 20, 2022 by Thistle

I have a whole bucket list of places that I want to travel to. Most are long-time wishes based on random bits from my childhood. Like Indonesia, for instance. In fourth grade, we had a guest come in to teach my classroom a few phrases of Indonesian, and I’ve wanted to go to Indonesia ever since. But as you can see, that’s a very abstract way to make a travel bucket list!

Then about a year ago, my list grew less abstract. It expanded first to state parks – both parks that friends of mine had been to and raved about, and others around the state purely due to a desire to explore with my parks pass – and national parks after reading Leave Only Footprints. And more recently, I finally managed to get onto hiking- and exploring-TikTok, and I’ve started to discover the most amazing places to visit! In no particular order:

The Hoh Rainforest, PNW – Inside this temperate rainforest, there is a spot called “One Square Inch of Silence,” marked with a red stone. Very few places of absolute silence can be found in the US – I believe fewer than a dozen? – and this area of the rainforest is one.

Black sand beaches of Iceland – Or really, I suppose any black sand beaches would work, but I love that these consist of larger pebbles. The sound the waves make on the rocks as they roll in and out with the waves is just incredible.

The Ice Castles – Not a natural formation, but a business, but essentially there are five spots where this company creates winter castles out of icicles for people to walk through and they look so cool! I used to live only two hours from one of these but never knew they existed until a few weeks ago.

Desert Botanical Gardens, AZ – I’m not normally the hugest cactus fan, but this place looks awesome, combining succulents and glass-blown artwork, and it just seems like a really cool place to learn more about desert environments.

Granite Falls Fish Ladder, PNW – Again, any fish ladders would work, it doesn’t have to be these, but I’d just love to see them in the right time of year!

Lake Champlain (Vermont) when the ice has broken up and there are crusty ice waves!

Belly of the Dragon, UT – A drainage tunnel carved into rock under highways that continue on until eventually reaching a slot canyon. !!! Looks amazing…unless there’s rain, heh.

Iceland basalt columns – Really, I just need to go to Iceland, yeah? These look so amazing. I’d love to hike along them.

Old Zoo Nature Trails, TX – These ruins of a former zoo in north TX are supposedly haunted.

Willamette National Forest, OR – In particular, Tamolitch Falls (the Blue Hole) and Clear Lake, both of which are stunning turquoise waters and seem like an entirely different world!

Natural Tunnel State Park, VA – Naturally carved gigantic tunnel with an active railroad going through it and tons of wilderness to hike through. A fascinating intersection of nature and humanity.

Glass beaches near Fort Bragg, CA – I guess I shouldn’t say that it’s sad these are slowly disappearing, considering they only existed in the first place due to dumped garbage, but they look so beautiful, and like the black sand beach above, the sound of the smooth glass pebbles in the waves is just divine!

Moraine Lake, Alberta – A glacier-fed extremely blue lake bordering (possibly inside) Canada’s Banff National Park. Surrounded by mountains and just gorgeous!

Bonus: Jules Undersea Lodge, FL – This is not on my bucket list, because it sounds frankly terrifying, but it’s too cool not to mention. You literally scuba dive down to an underwater hotel room, which somehow doesn’t fill with water despite you actually swimming into it, and then after your stay, you have to reacclimatize to the decreasing water pressure slowly as you go back up to the surface. Not for me, thank you, but how cool is that??

**Pictures are from my recent hikes, not from these places. I wish I could include pictures of the locations themselves, but I don’t want to take anyone’s copyrighted work even with photo credit, and I wasn’t finding public domain photos. The links out include photos or video!

PS – This list started a week ago with half a dozen places. It has more than doubled in the last week and I expect it to continue to grow even longer very quickly…

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How to Take Awesome Photos of Cats, by Andrew Marttila

Posted on February 17, 2022 by Thistle

This is a layman’s how-to book for cat photography, including 1) working with cats, 2) photo photography, 3) dedicated cameras, and 4) editing. Everything is simplified down to non-technical terms for easy understanding even if you’re an amateur photographer. Plus there’s the bonus of many amazing cat photos along the way.

I first checked this book out from the library over a year ago. At the time, I was just starting to learn about photography from a technical point of view, and I’m not sure I even had my camera yet. It was around the same time period as learning about Understanding Exposure and trying to read that book, which is far more technical and less intuitive than this one, but also about a broader range of focus. When I tried to read this the first time, I got to the second chapter – photography 101 – where it began to discuss things I didn’t yet understand because I was very, very new to anything more than just “point my phone at subject and shoot.” I quickly got bogged down trying to understand details – not necessary, but just the way I tend to read nonfiction – then skipped ahead to the phone section. That section was great, I learned what I could, and then I spent some time enjoying all the cat photos before returning the book to the library.

Now, a year-ish later, I’ve had a dedicated camera since Feb 2021 and I’ve learned tons in that year. Some of it was technical learning through books or youtube videos or instructional articles. Much of it was practical learning through trial and error. There were a lot of things I understood intuitively without knowing the “whys,” even after reading something as in-depth as Understanding Exposure. When I saw this book sitting on a display shelf at my local library, I decided to give it a second try with a bit more experience under my belt. That turned out to be a very good decision.

Marttila also describes his entry into photography as a lot of learning-as-you-go, and strives to then turn the knowledge gained over a decade into something approachable by novices like me. Obviously, my experience of “no knowledge whatsoever” didn’t help me much on my first attempt to read this, but I’m the sort of reader that dives very deep into nonfiction and gets held up by anything they don’t understand. Now, with my very young understanding of photography, this was exactly the caliber of explanation that I needed. Some very basic points – that were technical and convoluted in other sources – were explained simply so that I could finally understand what I was just trusting before. Additionally, I learned things that those other sources never discussed (like the difference between prime and zoom lenses, when I didn’t even know there were two different kinds despite owning both), probably because they are so basic that they expect you to already know before coming to their sources. This was a true beginner’s resource, regardless of whether or not you want to take photos of cats, and I loved that.

(This is the photo I took for my book journal, using the methods learned in this book. Normally, the book is the focus of these photos, but I enjoyed switching it up here to let Nimi’s beautiful face take center stage!)

Ironically, I’ll probably need to check the book out again in the future. There was a whole section about flash that mostly went over my head because I don’t have an external flash and I never use flash at all. It would certainly help, especially when I’m trying to take indoor photos in low light (when I tend to have to use my phone), but it’s an area of photography I have yet to explore. Ditto anything more than very basic editing (mostly cropping). Learning how to edit photos properly is on my list of goals for the year, and this book actually inspired me to do something I had yet to do. I’ve been shooting in RAW format** for most of the last year, but because I don’t have any editing software, I’ve just worked with the jpg files that import into my phone. Only in reading this book did I experiment and discover that I could import and edit RAW files on my phone the same way I do the jpg versions, and holy cats the amount of extra data those files contain is incredible! So yeah, while I’ll need to reread the flash and editing sections one day when I have more experience with them, this was already worth it!

Plus, the cat photos were great even on second read.

PS. I didn’t realize Marttila was married to the Kitten Lady when I first read this book. I didn’t know who the Kitten Lady was this time last year. I discovered her through my favorite kitten rescue on Tiktok, and ended up buying my Vewy Scawy pin for my hiking bag through her site last summer. Ha!

**Technically, I shoot in RAW+jpg, so that the jpg files are quite large and contain the most data as I can get from them. I tried shooting in just RAW, and the files that would upload to my phone in jpg were these horrible low-data versions. But now that I know how to transfer RAW files, I can just shoot in straight RAW. Might save me some room, ha!

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Galentine’s Day, 2022

Posted on February 14, 2022 by Thistle

I had a lovely Galentine’s Day celebration this year! This was my first ever in-person Galentine’s. Pre-pandemic, I never had a large group of close girlfriends, and post-pandemic, well, it was post-pandemic.

The day was two-fold. The morning began with a trip up to McKinney Falls State Park in Austin, TX. I’d never been to McKinney before, so this makes my 11th state park, woohoo, and earned me a new pin for my hiking bag! The trip is about an hour from me, and it was a bit harrowing because a cold front was coming in with extremely strong gusts of wind. My car got hit with one so strong it nearly knocked me into another lane at one point! But I made it there safely and met up with my friend Sarah. In the afternoon, there was a guided Galentine’s hike scheduled through the park rangers, but Sarah and I wanted to explore the park a little beforehand. The plan was to cross the creek if it was low enough, hike for an hour or so, have a picnic lunch, and be back and ready in time for the official meet-up.

So…that plan didn’t work out at all. Heh.

As I said, a cold front was in the process of coming through. By the time we reached Austin, it was in the 40s out and super windy. The creek was probably crossable, but would have involved changing into our water shoes and getting very cold/wet feet. There was also a danger of slipping, which would have gotten our clothes wet on a cold and windy day, plus I had my dedicated camera with me. All in all, we decided not to risk it and to stay on the near side of the creek to hike. And that was okay! It was a beautiful trail that we took, with terrain that ranged from “looks like we’re on the moon” limestone formations** to rocky outcroppings. We hiked from the lower falls to the upper falls, passing a 600+ year old bald cypress tree named Old Baldy, then back around in a loop to move our cars closer to where the guided hike would begin.

It was a good thing we decided to do this last part, because the cold front reached a breaking point at that moment. We started getting a few sprinkles on us as we got to the cars, and by the time we were driving to the second location, it was pouring. Instead of a picnic, we ate in our cars, and then ran to the visitor’s center in stinging hail to see if the guided hike was still going to happen at all. Thankfully, the storm only lasted about 45 mins and ended just in time for the sun to break through the clouds at the start of the guided hike!

There were eight of us  – including six from my hiking group – plus two park rangers on the guided hike. We basically did the reverse of what Sarah and I had already done, from upper to lower falls and back. At the halfway point, we stopped on the moon-surface-rock to discuss a half-dozen famous female activists in conservationism. There were, of course, tons of photos and videos and selfies along the way. Despite all the things that went wrong, it was kind of a perfect day anyway. Plus, it left me wanting to go back to McKinney Falls under different circumstances to explore more of the park!

The day was already a two-parter for me, but to top it off, there was meant to be another Galentine’s celebration in town. A handful of friends were planning to gather at a local park for a picnic. However, that ended up delayed/postponed for several reasons, so hey, it’s another little late-Galentine’s celebration to look forward to! I like this Galentine’s thing!

**Apparently, people actually come to film at this part of the park when they need surface that looks moon-like or other-planet-like. Ha! The things you learn on a guided hike!

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Sunday Coffee – Fourteenth

Posted on February 13, 2022 by Thistle

(It’s only fitting that there was a cat hair in my coffee this morning. Yes, I discovered it before taking a sip!)

So in a small turn of irony, my 14th blogoversary is on the 14th this year, but instead of waiting until tomorrow to post about it, I’m going to post on the 13th. Heh. And honestly, I don’t have much to say about this that I haven’t said before. There are very few of us still blogging that were doing so back in 2008 when I began. To those of you who are, however infrequently, I see you! *waves* I know blogging is way behind the times now, but I love having this place to write my thoughts, even if there’s like ten people (maybe) who read my little Zen Leaf. After all, when I gave up blogging in 2013, it didn’t take long until I created a private book journal to write my thoughts down, and it only took about 18 months before I recreated TZL.

I’m not going to say anything particularly special about this 14th-on-the-14th blogoversary. In years past, I’ve given top books by year, or discoveries made through blogging, or friendships solidified, or all number of things. This year, I don’t really have anything clever to add to all that. I just want to thank all the people who have been here with me, whether that was all the way back in 2008 at the beginning or only starting recently, or anywhere in between. Cheers to another year of quiet blogging!

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The Last Anniversary, by Liane Moriarty

Posted on February 11, 2022 by Thistle

Connie, matriarch of Scribbly Gum Island, has died and left her house not to a family member, but to her great-grand-nephew’s ex-girlfriend, Sophie. For the first time in nearly a century, someone outside the sprawling family will be living on the island, privy to the island’s secrets. Scribbly Gum Island houses the famous unsolved Munro Baby mystery, and has profited quite well off that mystery. But not all is quite as it seems, and with Connie’s death and Sophie’s arrival, this 75+ year old story starts to unravel.

Let me start by saying that I was so very confused at the timeline of this book when I began. Connie is somewhere in her 90s when she dies, and yet there’s a flashback from the early 1930s, when Connie is 19 years old. The numbers added up to make this story contemporary with the early 2000s, yet 1) the book is copyrighted 2020, and 2) there’s no indication of this being semi-historical fiction. The story never deliberately says, “Oh btw, it’s 20 years ago that this takes place.” Which again, just had me really confused, until I found out that this book was only re-published in 2020, and it originally came out in 2005! Everything made a lot more sense then.

So 20 years ago is not traditional historical fiction (when written modern day), and yet, in books that do take place 10, 20, 30 years in the past, there’s a lot of shaping that corresponds more to the publishing date. There’s nothing wrong with historical fiction, but to be honest, it never feels 100% accurate to me, so I tend not to read much of it. Going back and reading books from a former time period, written in that time period, is a different story, though. That’s what this was. Apart from anything about the story itself, this is a time capsule of the early 2000s. The R-word was still in use. Cell phones and texting were very new, and conspiracy theories about cell phones being dangerous to your health were common in younger folks as well as older. Floppy disks were still a thing. Homophobia was rampant, and there was a prominent theory that bisexuality was just a cop-out for people unwilling to truly commit. And so on. None of this was scrubbed from the book when it was repackaged for re-release. It’s all there, giving a straightforward look into what life was like two decades ago.

Of course, many of us lived through those years, and we can remember all the things I mentioned in that last paragraph. But it’s interesting to look back on that time period and see the way we’ve changed as a culture. It was frankly shocking to see how much fatphobia was in this book. Some of it was purposely blatant, making a statement about the cruelty behind it, but there was far more than that, so much that it felt like something entirely subconscious – just part of the collective mindset of the time period. Much of the discussion around postpartum depression – another major portion of the book – was handled with the uncertainty of a mental health issue that was only starting to grow in public consciousness. That’s just to name a few items.

Like many of Moriarty’s books, this one affected me on multiple levels, particularly in the discussions about motherhood and how not all mothers actually feel motherly, and in the disharmonies that begin to split apart relationships. Moriarty always manages to hit home in one way or another. But I can also tell that there’s a certain early-days feel to the book – some issues with timelines, and the need for a little shocker twist at the end (which was unnecessary and kinda took away from the book, tbh). It won’t stand out among my favorites of her books, but it’s not the worse I’ve read from her either.

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Wellness Wednesday – A Day at Inks Lake

Posted on February 9, 2022 by Thistle

Two weeks ago, one of my hiker friends asked in our hiking leaders chat if anyone wanted to spend the last Sunday of January at Inks Lake with her. Periodically, we like to spend some time hiking with each other rather than leading groups, so we plan these little outings. Inks Lake is so far my favorite state park (I’ve only been to 10), and I’ve been twice. I really, really wanted to go, but I wasn’t sure if my sciatica would allow it, especially after the two hour drive to get there. I let Sarah know that I was tentatively interested depending on how my body felt that week. After a no-pain walk around the neighborhood, followed by a no-pain hike with Sarah, I decided that I could indeed make it to Inks Lake as long as I could stop to stretch my back whenever it acted up. That last part wasn’t going to be a problem, as this was a group of friends who are all super supportive when it comes to health issues!

There were three of us who ended up on the trip. Sarah drove herself as she is not yet comfortable with carpooling, and Alia and I met up to drive together. This was their second time at the park and, as I said above, my third. During Alia’s last trip, she noticed a set of trails that led to a waterfall. None of us had been on those particular trails, and we planned a 3-4 mile route.

The think I love about Inks Lake so much is that it’s such a diverse landscape. You can walk down a path lined with cactus and scrub on one side, and ferns on the other. In a quarter mile, you cross into marshland, and in another quarter mile, you’re suddenly in a burned out forested area. The elevation isn’t too heavy (about 500ft is the max I’ve done there, I think?) and it’s gradual enough that you hardly realize you’re climbing. There’s so much wildlife – we saw skunks, pelicans (!!!), lizards, butterflies, and geese on this trip. It’s just a beautiful place and I’m sad that it’s a solid two hours away.

So back to our trip. We set out on our route, making sure to start with the more gradual incline so that we could get warmed up properly. At one point, we had to gingerly pick our way over a creek crossing. It’s a good thing there hasn’t been more rain or that might have ended that section of our route, since none of us brought extra shoes! After the creek crossing, we started climbing in earnest to get some great views of the lake and waterfalls (not to mention a million photos!). We could have gone further along the lake before turning back, but at that point, the trail became more “giant steps up boulders” and I didn’t think my back was going to handle too much of that. We decided to turn around – like I said, these ladies are so wonderful at respecting each other’s physical limitations! – and it ended up being a good thing (more on that in a bit).

Another creek crossing back to the other side, and we continued with our initial loop, which allowed us to climb down to the waterfall itself! We also came across this really cool tree growing out of a giant mount of rocks over 20 feet high (you can see the rocks with the tree on top in the right-most of the collage above this paragraph). Sarah and Alia decided to climb to the top, while I stayed on the ground to film and take photos. I didn’t trust my hips to climb, nor did I want to risk it with my nice camera on a harness around my chest!! They were rockstars, though!

Not long after that, about half mile from the end of the loop, Alia’s hip began to act up and she said she was really glad we’d turned around when we did because she didn’t think she’d be able to go much further than what we had left. We made it back to the original trail, took a rest in the shade by the lakeshore, and eventually meandered our way back to the parking lot. It took us something like 2.5 hours – including all our stops to enjoy views, take photos, and soak in the beautiful weather – to hike three miles. Heh. And this is why my group talks about hiking at a “natural-admiring” pace! It’s the best.

After our hike, we drove to nearby Marble Falls for lunch, passing a Bavarian castle along the way. (One day, when it’s open again, we’re going to tour it!) The Colorado River – not the Colorado River, but a Colorado River – goes right through the middle of Marble Falls, so we found a restaurant that had patio seating overlooking the river. We’d worked up major appetites and it was 3pm before we got “lunch,” so we really enjoyed the food!!

Then it was off to head back to San Antonio. I got home not long before sunset, after leaving my house at 8am, so it really was a full girls’ day out. And it really was the best day. I’m so happy to have found such wonderful friends and to be exploring so many beautiful places!

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The Second Blind Son, by Amy Harmon (audio)

Posted on February 7, 2022 by Thistle

From Goodreads: An insidious curse is weakening the Norse kingdom of Saylok, where no daughters have been born in years. Washing up on these plagued shores is Ghisla, an orphaned stowaway nursed back to health by a blind cave dweller. Named for a mysterious god, the boy, Hod, is surrounded by prophecy. To Ghisla, he’s a cherished new friend. To Hod, the girl is even more so. For when Ghisla sings, Hod can see. Unable to offer safe shelter, Hod urges Ghisla onward to become a daughter of the temple, where all the kingdom’s girl children have been gathered. But because of a magical rune, the two cannot be separated, no matter the time or the distance. Now, subject to a ruthless king, Ghisla enters a desperate world of warring clan chieftains and catastrophic power struggles. Who among them can be trusted is unknowable. So are the sacrifices Ghisla and Hod must make to defeat the cursed forces that could destroy a kingdom and the fated bond between two souls.

Two years ago, I listened to The First Girl Child, technically the first book in this series, though the events of the two take place simultaneously with overlapping points. I loved the book, and so when I discovered The Second Blind Son, I immediately bought a copy through Audible. And then I didn’t listen to it, because I was afraid. Too often, I’ve loved a first book only to be disappointed by the second, which from time to time actually ruins the first! I didn’t want that to happen. So I put it off, and only after I went through almost the entirety of my Audible backlog did I start listening.

Oh. My. I should not have waited this long.

It’s possible that I loved this volume even more than The First Girl Child. Or it’s possible that I’d love whichever I listened to second the most. Because 1) the audio narration is so amazing (more on that in a bit), and 2) whichever book comes second only enriches the story and world of the first. It was comforting, like sinking into a hot bath or sitting down for coffee with some of your oldest friends. I haven’t labeled a book as a favorite since late 2020, until this one. I never wanted to put down the audiobook, and when I had to – sometimes for a few days at a time – I never hesitated to pick it back up. It’s perfect in just about every way.

Are any of my readers familiar with Amy Harmon’s other books? She apparently has quite a few of them out there, and these two are my first by her. I hesitate to label her as a new favorite author, since I’ve only read books set in the same world/series. Some authors write differently for each book/series they produce, and it’s possible I won’t feel the same about her others. But I’d love to have some insight, and suggestions from fellow readers if you’re familiar with her work!

I admit, I’m leaning toward the books that Rob Shapiro reads. Above, I said that the audio narration is amazing. Shapiro reads both of these books, and his voice is so resonant, calm, comforting, and perfectly fitted to the mood of this story. I tried looking up other books he’d read via Audible, but most are not the sorts of books I’d read. I saw a few of Harmon’s other books, though, and that’s persuasive. I’m always more inclined to listen to books read by my favorite narrators (like Kate Reading!), and Shapiro has catapulted to my top-narrators list!

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