What Happens in Vegas...
...won't be as scandalous as I'd like it to be
On Wednesday, I’m headed to Vegas, baby! I’ll be attending the Historical Novel Society Conference, which is held every other year in the U.S. (other years are in the U.K.). Lucky me gets to go for the first time when it happens to be in Vegas.
The conference doesn’t start until Thursday, but I’m heading on Wednesday morning (which also happens to be my birthday). My baby boy is going to drive out for the day/night to hang out with me, and while you’d think that’d temper any mischief on my part, that baby boy is now old enough to drink and gamble.
While one might think I’m going to have to remain alert, reminding my baby boy to drink and gamble responsibly, I trust we all know who the adult in this situation is. Hopefully the boy won’t have too much difficulty keeping me from the ATM/prying that drink from my hand/telling me it’s time to leave the blackjack table, but honestly? I wouldn’t want to be him on Wednesday.
I’ll think of something…
about crochet
I crochet. Yes, I do. In case you haven’t heard, crocheting isn’t just for grandmas anymore.
My TBC (to be crocheted) pile is almost as long as my TBR (to be read) pile. I crochet pretty much everything that can be crocheted. Scarves, hats, totes, sweaters, amigurumi, blankets… whatever!1 I have boxes of yarn around the house and a more-than-healthy stockpile of patterns on my computer. I have unfinished projects by the boatload (“I’m going to finish this swea… Ooh! Look at this pretty pattern that needs to be made immediately!”)
This is all fine and dandy, but I fell down a crochet rabbit hole. While searching for a cookbook with advice on cooking with WW1 rations (for my work-in-progress), I came across a whole bunch of old crochet books/magazines. How old? Here’s one from 1800. I don’t want to admit how long I spent paging through them.
I read mostly the ones from the early twentieth century, since that’s what I like to write about. My favorite find is The Utopia Yarn Book from 1919. The crochet patterns are amazing, and I want to make all of them!
So many of the projects are so telling of the time periods: what people wore, what fashions were popular, what people used to decorate their homes. Things I found: An auto scarf from 1912. Slumber slippers from 1908. A buffet set from 1928. A chicken pot holder from 1946. Egg warmers from 1949. A top knot turban from 1954.
I am going to finish what I’m working on. No, really (this is me trying to convince myself). But the crochet archives may be too much of a temptation. I’m thinking my next project will be either the Ladies' Utopia Filet Crochet Sweater No. 853 or the Pansy Hat. I will be stylin’!
about dystopian worlds
I have no idea how this novel got on my radar (I hear it was all over BookTok, but I don’t watch BookTok), but I Who Have Never Known Men by Jacqueline Harpman, translated from the French by Ros Schwartz, blew me away. When I read it (or rather listened to it—yes, I think audiobooks count as reading, and I don’t feel like fighting anyone on this), I didn’t know anything about it, not that it was originally published in 1995, nor that the author was displaced during WWII, as her Jewish family fled Belgium for Morocco.
The story takes place at some time, at some place (neither is known), when 39 women and one child (the narrator) are prisoners in a bunker. They don’t know why. They don’t remember being captured. All except “the Child” (as she is called throughout her life) have memories of the world before the bunker, which don’t sound so different from out world.
Early in the novel, an alarm sounds, the guards leave, and the prisoners are able to escape, but the world they escape into is desolate and empty.
This is one of those novels in which not a lot happens and yet everything happens. This novel is about so many things—what it means to be human when you are the only human; the experience of loneliness; what gives a life meaning; what is time—in such a beautiful framework. This book is both deeply satisfying (gorgeous language, a fascinating main character) and deeply unsatisfying (so many questions remain unanswered). We are with the Child throughout, discovering with her, not understanding what she cannot understand.
Once I learned that the author was a refugee, another layer of the novel seemed to open up.
Sometimes, I used to sit under the sky, on a clear night, and gaze at the stars, saying, in my croaky voice: “Lord, if you’re up there somewhere, and you aren’t too busy, come and say a few words to me, because I’m very lonely and it would make me so happy.” Nothing happened. So I reckon that humanity—which I wonder whether I belong to—really had a very vivid imagination.
Is Harpman writing about this strange world the Child is on? Or her own circumstances, her own loss of faith?
All this is to say, I recommend this book. And if you’ve read it, I’d love to know your thoughts on it.
about Bailey
This is the “I’m too hot to move to a comfortable space and this hardwood floor is cool enough after sunning myself in the 90 degree heat” pose.
Until next time, make good choices.2
jennifer
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Always happy to take suggestions on something new to crochet!
Hypocritical of me to say, considering I’m sure Vegas will be filled with plenty of bad choices.
Actually, I have instructions for your baby boy (pssst, you know those nice ladies with nice sparkly short dresses and very high heels? I bet one of them has handcuffs you can borrow...jes sayin') :-)
Tell us more about your next book. It took so long between Modern Girls and The Whisper Sister, I am awaiting the next one - soon I hope.