Blue Moose: 03/31/24

Blue Moose by (Daniel) Manus Pinkwater (1975) is about a moose who works for a living during the cold winter months. Although the book is only two years younger than I am, I only first learned of the series last month while struggling with a painting of a moose man.

In his early career, Daniel Pinkwater was publishing under his middle name, though later books in the series go by his first name. Regardless of what nom de plume he using, Pinkwater's books all have a matter of factness to them even in the most surreal of situations.

The setting is a rural Maine town during a blizzard. Think Busman's Harbor in Iced Under (2016). Now imagine the moose from the opening of Northern Exposure walking in Gus's restaurant in the days before Julia and her boyfriend take over the restaurant in winter. Now imagine that this moose can talk and very calmly asks for a meal and then just starts working as a waiter for the restaurant owner.

The set up is ridiculous but events unfold in such an organic way to seem completely plausible. To draw attention to the absurdity of a moose being waitstaff, an animal control officer comes in one day to ticket the man and take away the moose. Moose can't be tamed and can't be kept as pets. The man explains that the moose came in of his own accord and can leave any time he wants.

The moose further shows just how wild he is by threatening the animal control guy. While drawing attention to the surreal situation it also becomes a quiet lesson on agency. The officer declares the moose wild because he he clearly isn't placid and leaves the restaurant with the moose still there.

Five stars

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You're Breaking My Heart: 03/30/24

You're Breaking My Heart by Olugbemisola Rhuday-Perkovich (2024) is a story of three teens dealing with grief. Harriet Adu is at a new school and bears the identity of the girl with the dead brother. He died in a school shooting after she had wished him dead. Now she believes she cursed him and will do anything to get him back.

I honestly wasn't expecting this novel to go on as surreal of a tangent as it does. I'm terrible about reading blurbs, especially when I'm buying a new book from an author I've already read and enjoyed. A couple chapters, in, though, Harriet sees a note in the bathroom and grabs it. After that things start getting weird.

Initially my thought was to compare the novel to a manga/anime series, Toilet-bound Hanako-kun by AidaIro except with a traditionally female toilet ghost. Except that the book is set in New York and the main characters are Nigerian-American. But the inclusion of doorways to other worlds brings to mind Seanan McGuire's Wayward Children series. In the final act, though, of Harriet, Nikka, and Luke's adventure, the book switches to a play format, bringing to mind F. Scot Fitzgerald's The Beautiful and the Damned.

What I missed, though, even with water being a major motif in this novel, is that their trip to the underground prom and the beings they meet are probably jumbies. But these are jumbies who offer Harriet a way to reunite with her dead brother at an extraordinary cost. It's a price so dear she's finally forced to face her grief head on and admit to Nikki and Luke what she has internalized.

The novel with it's quest aspect sits on the Road Narrative Spectrum. As Nikki and Luke chose to go with her on a quest that's clearly been set up to lure only one person, they are collectively marginalized travelers (66). Their destination is a utopia (FF) somewhere under New York, though clearly not our mundane New York. Their route there symbolized by the spiraling water, stairs, as well as being called outright by the monsters, is a labyrinth (99).

Five stars

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Death by a Thousand Sips: 03/29/24

Death by a Thousand Sips by Gretchen Rue and Kristin Price (Narrator) (2023) is the second book in the Witches' Brew mystery series. Phoebe Winchester wins the bid on a collection of popular fiction at an estate sale, only to have her cat, Bob, find the body of the organizer. After seven drama free months, she's back in the middle of a murder investigation.

Although the woman organizing the sale had a temper, it's clear fairly early that there's no obvious motive for murdering her. As the murder happened during the auction, the mystery is a variation on the manor party murder. There are a handful of suspects, so the puzzle is discovering their ties to the woman and perhaps to the estate.

Having just read Iced Under by Barbara Ross (2016), I was in the right mindset to figure out the puzzle before Phoebe did. However, this book takes a more conventional approach to building this mystery with the same building blocks.

Outside of the mystery, Phoebe is still learning about her skills as a witch. Her powers which are still mostly done as an instinctual reaction does give her ways out of situations that wouldn't be remotely plausible in a non-paranormal mystery. I like though that the author has set limitations on what Phoebe can do and when she can do it. This leaves Phoebe still vulnerable.

Five stars

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Festergrimm: 03/27/24

Festergrimm by Thomas Taylor (2022) is the fourth book in the Eerie-on-Sea children's series. Sebastian Eels is back and claims he is rebuilding the Festergrimm Waxwork Museum. Herbie and Violet suspect different, believing he wants to find Festergrimm's iron giant.

As much as I love this series, I am tired of Sebastian Eels being the big bad. He's tried so many different schemes and has been so thoroughly defeated that I'm shocked he's a) still alive and b) still welcome in the town by the adults in charge. But modern day series, especially those for children seem to be fixated on keeping things simple.

There's also a missed opportunity with Eel's reappearance. To prove his worth he goes to the bookshop to ask for a book from the mechanical monkey. The book that's apparently assigned to him is A Christmas Carol by Charles Dickens (1843). I really wanted Eels — this iteration of him — to be a humbug. It would have made things more interesting. Imagine having a new villain pretending to be an old one!

Instead, the children learn that the book was a plant. The actual recommended book is still on the shelves. It turns out to have some pivotal information. The children reading from it gives the author a chance to info-dump in long passages of italic text. Yawn. Honestly you can skip those pages as everything gets regurgitated in dialog.

Given my annoyance with pieces of the book, why the high rating? There's a darker side to this volume. The robot is genuinely scary. Not evil, just scary because of it's limited programming, huge size, power, obsessive directive, and the gruesome way in which it was rebuilt before being hidden.

Like the previous books, this one sits on the Road Narrative Spectrum. There's only a slight shift in position from the previous book, Shadowghast (2021). The travelers remain orphans. Their destination remains uhoria (their past and the village's past). What changes is their route: from the maze to the railway (FF) as represented both by the train that brings Eels back into town and by the ghost train ride associated with the waxworks.

The fifth book is Mermedusa (2023).

Four stars

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Murder with Ganache: 03/25/24

Murder with Ganache by Lucy Burdette and Laura Jennings (Narrator) (2014) is the fourth book in the Key West Food Critic mystery series. Hayley's cat destroying most of the cupcakes for Connie's wedding is the first in a string of bad events that leads to Connie canceling her wedding.

Other events that mar the wedding plans are Hayley's step-brother goes missing and ends up in hospital. The girl he was last seen is found dead along the mangroves. Connie's father and fiancé have a falling out resulting in her father leaving town.

On top of all of the family drama and the murder of a teenaged runaway, Hayley has a huge stack of deadlines for the magazine she works for. Her editor's boss is being worse that usual and he seems to be caving to her. It's a lot of stress for anyone to handle.

Since Rory isn't a regular character we only have Hayley and her family's assessment of his personality to go on. Is he a surely teen put into an impossible situation or did he somehow kill the girl?

Despite all of the tension and the finger pointing, I happened to spot the murderer on their first introduction. The one character with the least at stake and the least part in any of it was so clearly the person behind it all. I ended up reading Murder with Ganache mostly for the family drama instead of the murder mystery.

The fifth book is Death with All the Trimmings (2014)

Five stars

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A Quantum Love Story: 03/24/24

A Quantum Love Story by Mike Chen (2024) begins with the explosion of a particle accelerator somewhere near San Francisco in the near future. Carter is a technician at Hawke, and although this is our first time through the loop, he knows what to expect. He's been tracking it in notebooks, although the notebooks reset every time but the act of writing it down helps him remember. This time, though, he decides to take a different path, and he runs into Mariana Pinada, setting in motion something that will eventually save the world.

Mariana Pinada lives in her own time loop, a mental one brought on by the disappearance (and presumed death) of her step-sister and BFF, Shay. She can do this because she snuck herself into the memory enhancement trials. Now she finds herself thinking of how things played out at the most in opportune times.

But after meeting Carter, Mariana has a new problem. She too is now stuck in the time loop. It's a four day repeating event. Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday and Thursday. Mariana, a neuroscientist and Carter, a technician who failed out of college set upon themselves (with an AI aid named David) to understand the time loop and ultimately fix it.

Although the blurb mentions Groundhog Day (1993), the story beats remind me more of Steins;Gate, an anime from 2011 (and a visual novel before that). Both involve time travel / time loops associated with a particle accelerator. The difference though is how much access Carter and Mariana have to the accelerator. Also the focus of the events is different.

Carter is like Itaru. Although he's going through the time loop, he's a live in the moment type of person. He also is a hands on person, rather than a theorist. Miranda, though she's a neuroscientist like Kurisu, is ultimately more driven to fix things, and is more negatively affected by the loops, making her like Rintaro. Shay, though, is Kurisu.

Knowing Steins;Gate helped me know how things would turn out. The specifics were still a surprise and I thoroughly enjoyed the novel.

Like the other Mike Chen books I've read, this one sits on the Road Narrative Spectrum. Ultimately it's Miranda who is the traveler, one who must travel alone to save herself, Carter, Shay, and possibly the world. That makes her an orphan (FF) traveler. Her destination is uhoria (CC), the past to save the future. Her route there is the labyrinth in that Miranda never experiences true danger but she is transformed by the process (99).

Five stars

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The Removers: 03/22/24

The Removers by Donald Hamilton (1961) is the third book in the Matt Helm series. Matt heads to Nevada after having received a message from his ex-wife, who has remarried, asking him for help.

A notorious hitman is now working for the ex's new husband. The green recruit in charge of watching the hitman and his employer ends up dead. Matt steps in to "remove" the threat from his ex-wife, kids, and their new family.

Mrs. Logan (Matt's ex) continues to be the most fascinating character in the series. Scenes are simply better when she's in them. Although Matt discounts her abilities whenever it suits him, she always ends up outsmarting him.

Now that she's married to a racketeer her potential as a master criminal starts to come through. She ends up being behind a lot of the machinations Matt and his girlfriend for the book contend with.

The fourth book is The Silencers (1962).

Three stars

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Komi Can't Communicate, Volume 6: 03/20/24

Komi Can't Communicate, Volume 6 by Tomohito Oda (2017) spends most of its time on what if stories. The boys in the classroom spend their time playing "who would you date" and imagining scenarios. It's an entertaining diversion from the repetition of Komi trying to socialize given her anxiety.

There's also chapters of Komi and her equally silent father going shopping together. At home they benefit from Komi's mother who is outgoing and seems to understand what both need.

Oh and let's not forget karaoke. Will Komi sing? No of course not. Do the others care? No. of course not.

All in all it's a light, quick read. It's perfect reading during morning coffee and breakfast.

Five stars

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Dorothy and the Wizard in Oz: 03/19/24

Dorothy and the Wizard in Oz by L. Frank Baum and John R. Neill (1908) is Dorothy's third trip to Oz and marks the Wizard's return to Oz. Although I love the series as a whole I find myself liking this one less and less each time I read it.

Dorothy has returned to the United States with her uncle. He had been recovering from illness with relatives in Australia. Now feeling better he has gone ahead to Kansas to help Aunt Em with the farm. Dorothy meanwhile is still in the Bay Area to stay with her aunt's extended family.

Just after meeting Zeb and his horse, Jim, and introducing them to her new kitten, Eureka, the four of them and the buggy and all of Dorothy's luggage are swallowed up by an earthquake fissure. When this book was being written in 1907, the San Francisco quake of the previous year would still be fresh in people's minds, including the large fissure that opened up near Point Reyes.

In Baum's letter to readers he mentions the numerous fan letters and suggestions he had received from them. He mentions trying to accommodate them but he did so by extending Dorothy's journey to Oz through an underground landscape full of surreal landscapes and societies that don't fit into the Oz vision as it had been built up in the previous volumes.

I think the book would have been better if he had ignored his "tiny tyrants" and written what he had wanted to. That said, his health was failing and the popularity of the series had put him under a tight publishing deadline, something he didn't have with the first and second books. Baum had also moved to California for his health and was living at the Hotel del Coronado while Ozcot was being built.

While Dorothy, Zeb, Eureka, and Jim are at their first stop underground, the Wizard ends up making an appearance, his balloon being pulled into the fissure as well. From the moment he arrives he takes over the plot. Him taking center stage, isn't necessarily a good thing.

As part of his redemption arc, he takes a more active part in saving the group from problems. His approach though, is a violent one (no surprise since he blackmailed Dorothy into killing the Wicked Witch of the West on their first meeting). He kills a plant based sorcerer and later calls for the genocide of a wood based species.

Along the way we're also regaled with the Wizard's backstory including his ridiculously long name which he chose to shorten to Oz. A lot of the plot of his life America before and after his time in Oz. Much of this backstory was inspiration for the film, Oz, the Great and Powerful (2013)

The final step to Oz ends up being a magical one as Baum paints his characters into a corner. So although the underground aspects of their journey are still magical as evidenced both by the unusual creatures and civilizations but also by Jim the horse and Eureka the cat being able to talk, there's no direct evidence that Oz and the underground are actually connected. The in and out of Oz, is now controlled by Ozma by means of the former Nome King's magic belt.

Ozma isn't yet the non-violent all powerful leader she will be in later books. Here she vows to put Eureka to death when it looks like the cat has eaten her pet piglet. She has also taken advantage of her position to rewrite Oz history to remove the Wizard's part in her capture by Mombi. I take Ozma's version of things as humbug because it doesn't make sense. Why would Mombi keep three generations of royals prisoner when she could have just killed the first one and be done with the trouble? And her story of all male leaders being called Oz and all female leaders being called Ozma makes no sense when we know her father's name, Pastoria.

Finally, there are John R Neill's illustrations. This is one of two books that use watercolor illustrations in the plates. They are lovely but overall the illustrations are inconsistent. Neill can't decide if Ozma and Dorothy are teenagers or younger children. Half the time Dorothy is drawn as if she's about ten and the other times she's drawn as if she's 18. Given all the things she's gone through and Baum keeping the time in the books about the same as the time between the publishing dates, she should be closer to 18 than ten. Baum also says that Ozma and Dorothy are "about the same age" so whenever the two are together they are drawn as being about the same age, and inconsistently so.

My final thoughts on the book is that it's a hot mess. It suffers from too many cooks (in the form of fan inspired scenarios), a rushed schedule (to keep up with demand), and too much retconning (the Wizard and Ozma's backstories).

The fifth book is The Road to Oz (1909).

Four stars

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Four Leaf Cleaver: 03/17/24

Four Leaf Cleaver by Maddie Day and Laural Merlington (Narrator) (2023) is the eleventh book in the Country Store mystery series. Robbie has been wrangled into hosting a YouTube based cooking competition. Before taping can even begin, the host is murdered upstairs in the small B&B.

I'm not a regular viewer of cooking competitions and I'm finding them rather tiresome in cozy mysteries. From the sheer amount of bad feelings and murder that happens during these events, it makes me wonder why any cozy protagonist would ever say yes to participating or hosting.

The dead host turns out to have been a piece of work. She was nasty, manipulative, and short tempered. We only learn all this after her death, so it's all second hand informed attributes. I think it would have been better if her character had been better established in the first chapter or so.

Beyond the circumstances of the murder, the detail that bothered me most was the inclusion of a competitor who also happens to have a secondary gig as a drag queen performer. This character's plot seemed to be lifted whole cloth from Topped Chef by Lucy Burdette (2013).

The next book is Deep Fried Death (2023).

Four stars

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Miles Morales Suspended: 03/15/24

Miles Morales Suspended by Jason Reynolds (2023) is a follow up to Miles Morales (2017). It takes place over the course of day at school with some flashbacks to events that led to Miles and classmates being on detention. In the middle of all of that, there is a Spider-Man worthy event that needs stopping, if Miles can get away from the teachers long enough to be a hero.

It sounds good and I was expecting to enjoy the book. I loved the first book and what Reynolds did with Miles Morales and the other characters. But this time, the author decided to tell Miles's story this time in poetry divided by short sections of prose.

I'm not against novels in verse. I'm not against Spider-Man in verse should someone else want to give it a go. Here, though, the poetry and the prose don't mesh at all. That was my first reaction.

After slogging through the book, I realized what bothered me about it. This Miles Morales novel is a very awkward homage to Punching the Air by Ibi Zoboi. The stakes aren't high enough to have the same impact as the original. It just ends up feeling disingenuous and derivative.

Two stars

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The Last Word: 03/14/24

The Last Word by Gerri Lewis and Alex Raby (Narrator) (2024) is the start of the Deadly Deadlines mystery series. Winter Snow is an obituary writer in Ridgefield, Connecticut. She's hired by a wealthy recluse to pre-write her obituary. When Winter comes back to ask some questions, she finds the woman crumpled at the bottom of her stairs.

With the woman now in hospital and her assistant missing, she's now responsible for a Great Pyreneese puppy named Diva. Curious about the elusive Mrs. Arlington and well aware that someone else is interested in her and her estate, Winter decides to investigate the woman.

Much of Winter's investigation is hampered by the remote location of Mrs. Arlington's house. It's in the West Mountain Historic District, outside of reliable cell service and pressed up against the border with New York. With its remote location and old fashioned skeleton key locks, it's tempting to a variety of dangerous people and Winter seems to be in the middle of most of it.

The basic who done it is fairly easy to solve, although theb why behind it takes some extra thought / sleuthing. What complicates things, though, is the sheer number of people with their own motives and interests in the woman and her estate. All of them too seem hell bent on stopping Winter from her investigation.

My one quibble with this first book is its pacing. The opening chapters take too much time introducing Winter, her job, her location, her hobby, and her backstory. I had to back up the audiobook I was listening to in order to go back and re-listen to details I had missed.

Four stars

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Sheets: 03/12/24

Sheets by Brenna Thummler (2018) is the coming together of a thirteen year old girl and the ghost of a ten year old boy to save a laundry service being threatened by dwindling customers and a planned luxury resort.

Marjorie Glatt balances her school life and her family business as her father is too depressed to work, her brother too young to help, and her mother is dead. She has to contend with bullies at school and Mr. Saubertuck who is constantly there to push his luxury resort and nitpick Marjorie's work.

Wendell is tired of the sheet ghost afterlife and wants to find a place for himself. He's tired of the gray life, of long therapy sessions, and trying to fit in.

Through a bizarre set of circumstances, Wendell ends up in the Glatt laundry. His presence could make or break the business. It takes a while for the two plot threads to entwine enough for them to become one and finally get the graphic novel in motion towards a resolution.

Much of this graphic novel is wordless and one is left to piece together the plot based on the panels. The art on Marjorie and the other living characters is a little rough and I frankly enjoyed Wendell's half of the plot more.

The book happens to sit on the Road Narrative Spectrum, something I wasn't expecting. Wendell and Marjorie, both feeling powerless over their circumstances are marginalized travelers (66). With Marjorie trying to save her family's future and Wendell being stuck on his life before drowning, the destination is uhoria (CC) Wendell's arrival by train (another instance of a Night Train or Hell Train), makes the route the railroad (00).

The second book is Delicates (2021).

Five stars

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How the Rooster Saved the Day: 03/10/24

How the Rooster Saved the Day by Arnold Lobel and Anita Lobel (Illustrator) (1977) is a trickster tale with a rooster in the place of Raven or Coyote. The story takes place over the course of a night. A burglar tries to intimidate the Rooster from crowing to keep the sun down, plunging the land into perpetual night.

The Rooster as Trickster claims deafness and says he's gone deaf because he's mooed too loud or barked too loud, and so forth.

Each one of these stories is illustrated first with the burglar and the Rooster. Then it follows up with the Rooster among the type of animals he's claiming to be, doing the thing he claims to have done, while still being a realistically rendered chicken.

In the end, the Rooster tricks the burglar into crowing in anger, thus causing the sun to rise. Now the sun coming up could have come up on its own because the Rooster has delayed the man all night long. Or it could be the magic of human story telling, akin to Terry Pratchett's The Hogfather (1996).

Five stars

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A Call for Kelp: 03/09/24

A Call for Kelp by Bree Baker and Thérèse Plummer (Narrator) (2020) is the fourth book in the Seaside Cafe mystery series. Filming is beginning on Everly's aunt's beekeeping documentary. A famous actor has come out of retirement to host the film and she has ties to Everly's grandmother. Unfortunately before the two women can have that well needed and wanted talk, she's murdered.

By the end of chapter one, which concludes with the discovery of Mitzi Calgon's body, I was already annoyed at this mystery. Don't make grandiose proclamations of family secrets only to kill of the person who knows them before she can dish.

The rest of the book didn't fare well either. There's the on-going love triangle of Everly's ex-rodeo-boyfriend turning a new leaf and Everly's current almost boyfriend who has too much complicated family business to make a commitment. Beyond Grady's own refusal to say much more than how nice it is that his son is bonding with Everly, there's his ex-mother-in-law, the senator and her ripped from NCIS arc plot.

The senator, though, isn't where things end with Grady and his mess. Nope. Now the senator's CIA husband has appeared on scene. So now there's extra time wasted on security details and machinations and other stupid stuff that has no immediate bearing on the actual mystery.

The final misstep is the murderer revealing themselves. Everly was so preoccupied with ex-cowboy Wyatt and current sheriff Grady that she has barely scratched the surface in her investigation of Mitzi Calgon's murder. Despite that, the murderer threatens her life, murders a super fan, and ultimately reveals themself to her. Had the murderer just kept quiet they could have just gone home when the investigation had run dry.

The next book is Closely Harbored Secrets (2020)

Three stars

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Ako and Bambi Volume 1: 03/08/24

Ako and Bambi Volume 1 by Hero was published in Japan in 2022 as Ako to Bambi (あことバンビ) and released in English this year by Yen Press. Bambi is beginning his career as an author and has found one of those too cheap to be believed apartments. The reason it's so cheap: it's haunted.

Although Bambi was expecting a certain kind of ghost (because it had been a death by suicide), what he finds is a teenaged girl with amnesia. She appears at night and disappears at dawn. Since Bambi does most of his writing at night they have lots of time to spend together.

Meanwhile there's another Ako who has memories of the ghost's conversations with Bambi. Before this twist I was already enjoying the mystery behind ghost Ako. Note the many cozy mystery series I read that involve ghosts! Having her story, though, now be linked to a living girl made things extra interesting.

Volume was is primarily focused on introducing the characters and situation. Then it moves onto establishing the rules for how Ako's haunting works. Finally it begins to fill in some of Bambi's backstory.

I'm curious to see where things go in volume 2. The translated volume is expected on June 18, 2024.

Five stars

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A Man and His Cat, Volume 4: 03/06/24

A Man and His Cat, Volume 4 by Umi Sakurai (2020) continues the plot of rival musicians and the littermates. Kanade Hibino may feel slighted by Mr. Kanda but he needs his help when his mother dumps her cat on him.

People are interconnected, even in large cities. As it happens, both men now have cats from the same litter. Kanda in the since he left Hibino's concert early has come out of his shell through caring for his cat. When he sees that Hibino clearly needs help with his new pet, the men have a new way of connecting.

Hibino, still stung from the piano recital has taken up electric guitar. Here is another way for the two men to connect. Although Kanda was raised to not listen to rock and roll because his mother was a snob, he secretly like it. In his quest to expand his horizons, he attends a show where Hibino is performing.

I'm not entirely sure how their tentative relationship will play out but I'm curious to see where it goes. In between these arc plots are more of the four panel humorous pieces that focus on life with a cat.

Five stars

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Just Shy of Ordinary: 03/05/24

Just Shy of Ordinary by A.J. Sass (2024) is about a 13 year old non-binary kid trying to get their life under control while suffering through undiagnosed anxiety. Their plan involves going to public school, making new friends, and sharing with them about being non-binary.

Shai lives with their mom at a family friend's house to save money while mom looks for work. Although they got into public school after a lifetime of being homeschooled, their first plan is upset slightly because they are promoted from eighth to ninth grade. Interestingly, though, ninth is still at the middle school (as it had been when I was in that grade).

While Shai does well in their classes, the one that has their attention (good and bad) is the VIP essay assignments for English. For that Shai has to write a series of essays on a personal topic. Shai decides to write about gender expression in Judaism which means asking their mother some uncomfortable questions because Mom gave up going to temple before Shai was born.

Shai's story was interesting and I especially liked the found family bit of the two families living together. With so many classes, outside events, and family drama, I felt that sometimes the story lost its focus.

Three stars

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Witches in the Kitchen: 03/04/24

Witches in the Kitchen by Danielle Garrett and Amanda Ronconi (Narrator) (2023) is the start of the Magic Inn paranormal mystery series, a companion series to the Beechwood Harbor Magic mysteries. Blair lives a simple life full of routine and a dead end job in a call center, similar to Lucy Stone's job in Mail Order Murder (1991).

Things forever change for Blair when she witnesses a murder from her apartment balcony. What she can't believe is that she had seen a vampire attack and drag off a victim.

Later she's spotted by the same vampire. Rather that fall for his mesmerizing charms, she runs for her life. In doing so, she ends up in the body of a black cat. And she, as a cat, ends up in protective custody in a magical suburb of Seattle, Beechwood Harbor.

My initial reaction to Blair turning into a cat was a giggle snort. I think this is the first time I've read a book where the protagonist transforms into the cute cat character that so often graces the cover of the cozies I read.

I haven't read the progenitor series, although I probably will. The overall vibe of this book is the Good Witch meets Bewitched. There are magical police and magical neighborhoods which are traveled to via portals. There a good magic users and bad ones and the dividing line isn't by species — meaning there are good vampires too.

As the inciting event is the witnessing of a vampire attack, I expected Blair to be cornered by him in the final act. She isn't. The police do their job and track him down and she's able to identify him from a mug shot.

Instead, there's a lower stakes mystery involving what's to be Blair's new life. She finds work at a potions shop (run by the owner of the inn). It's at the shop that the mystery happens (a break in). It's not a murder and fairly low key, giving the story more time to focus on Blair adjusting to her new life and learning about powers she didn't know she had. The second book is Fairies in the Foyer (2023).

Four stars

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What an Owl Knows: 03/03/24

What an Owl Knows: The New Science of the World's Most Enigmatic Birds by Jennifer Ackerman (2023) is a survey of our current understanding of owls. The audiobook is read by the author.

Like The Genius of Birds, Ackerman divides up her chapters by very focused topics. Each one walks through a sample of owls where the science currently is. Often the chapter will include an exception or two. Despite owls being known for certain features and behaviors, there's plenty of diversity among the species and plenty of oddballs.

Along with the science, there are also chapters on human interactions and human perceptions and misconceptions of owls. In one of those chapters I was pointed to a delightful Instagram account, Owls at the Met which showcases art that includes owls.

Five stars

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Little Boy with a Big Horn (2008): 03/02/24

Little Boy with a Big Horn by Jack Bechdolt and Dan Yaccarino (Illustrator) (2008) is one of Golden Books's recent(ish) re-issues with new illustrations. I thought it would be fun to compare it to the 1953 edition.

Dan Yaccarino's illustrations bring Ollie's story forward a few decades from the turn of the 20th century into something reminiscent of the 1950s or 1960s, with some nods to the early 21st century. The mother is now in striped capris and a button up shirt. In town the grocery clerk wears the paper hat and bowtie of a 1950s clerk. Among the townsfolk is a tall woman who bears a strong resemblance to Edith Head.

It's an interesting choice to modernize the story without fully modernizing it. Yaccarino's illustrations brings the book to the same distance in time between the 2008 reader and Ollie's world as the 1953 reader and Ollie's original world. The late 19th/early 20th century aesthetic of the original ties the book to the song which Ollie plays throughout.

Yaccarino's illustrations, while in keeping with the style of his other books, separates the Ollie from his music. Already, a book that references a song that at reissue was 111 years old was already asking the book to do more heavy lifting than perhaps it had to do in

1953. What's left is the repetition of Ollie being asked to move on and the satisfying resolution when he's able to save the ship.

That's not to say that Yaccarino's version is worse than Battaglia's. There are some noted improvements: greater diversity in the people, a wider range of costumes, and rocks that read better. Yaccarino's rocks are gray and his harbor is more understandably a harbor.

Five stars

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February 2024 Sources: 03/02/24

I am still busy at the Sun Gallery so I save my art for my days off, or I work on it in the mornings before going to the gallery. I read primarily at night, although I do listen to audiobooks sometimes at the gallery.

In February I read 15 TBR books, up from the previous month's 10 TBR. No books were published in February. Five books were for research. None were from the library. My ROOB score for December was -4.5, down from February's -3.11. Surprisingly it was my best February.

I predicted a -3.0 and was too high. For March, I'm going with -4.0.

My average for February improved from -2.65 to -2.78.

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February 2024 Summary: 03/01/24

My art and my archival project at the Sun Gallery continue to keep me busy but I am finding time to do some reading.

I read more books in February than in January, 20, up from 18. Of my read books, 14 were diverse and five were queer. I reviewed 2- books, down two from the previous month. On the reviews front, 14 were diverse and five were queer.

I have 1 book left to review of the books I read in 2024 and 14 books of the 38 read in 2024.

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