A road less traveled and a universe less traveled

A Universe Less Traveled (Book 1 of Intersecting Worlds) ~ by Eric von Schrader, 2020, science fiction (Missouri), 384 pages

Kirkus Reviews: Von Schrader's debut novel should especially captivate readers familiar with St. Louis, but even those unacquainted with the city will find this parallel-worlds yarn worth a visit. ... Von Schrader's prose is butter smooth, and the chronological jumps the narrative makes back and forth throughout history (in both universes) are never tangled or confusing.  An enjoyable, gentle fantasy that gives new meaning to the phrase "Spirit of St. Louis."

 

St. Louis Post-Dispatch:  For St. Louis sci-fi buffs, "A Universe Less Traveled" amounts to Must Reading — and then some.

This book's title is obviously derived from "The Road Not Taken," a Robert Frost poem that I've written about before on this blog (click on the title below to go to one of those times):

The Road Not Taken

by Robert Frost

Two roads diverged in a yellow wood,

And sorry I could not travel both

And be one traveler, long I stood

And looked down one as far as I could

To where it bent in the undergrowth.

Then took the other, as just as fair,

And having perhaps the better claim,

Because it was grassy and wanted wear;

Though as for that the passing there

Had worn them really about the same.

And both that morning equally lay

In leaves no step had trodden black.

Oh, I kept the first for another day!

Yet knowing how way leads on to way,

I doubted if I should ever come back.

I shall be telling this with a sigh

Somewhere ages and ages hence:

Two roads diverged in a wood, and I —

I took the one less traveled by,

And that has made all the difference.

 
Deb at Readerbuzz hosts Sunday Salon.

Walking and other ways of exercising

I've been walking up and down my hall every day, since it's been either too cold or too rainy to walk around the neighborhood.  Since I usually do it late in the evening, I'm the only one in my hallway.  So I've been adding a few things, like shrugging my shoulders up and down as I walk (which would look pretty strange if I were passing others along the way).  I have added moves like that one on the right, with my forearms up and pressing inward and back to the side as I walk along.  In other words, I'm trying to move various parts of my body while also getting in something like 5,000 steps a day, or more if possible.  I could go to the weekly 30-45 minute group that exercises together while sitting in chairs.  Or I could try to get in more of those moves in the drawings above.  Today, I found this drawing of exercising in a chair that I had used in a blog post back in 2020 and decided to put it here so I'd remember it.

A traffic sign for Caturday

This is #48 in a long post found HERE.  I think it's cute, so enjoy.

Two senior sleuths for TWOsday

Armed and Outrageous (Book 1, Agnes Barton Senior Sleuth Mystery) ~ by Madison Johns, 2011, 2014, cozy mystery, 269 pages

This cozy mystery was a USA Today Bestseller in 2013.  Senior sleuth Agnes Barton is not your typical senior citizen living in Tadium, MI, on the shores of Lake Huron.  She drives a red hot Mustang, shops at Victoria's Secret, rankles local police officials, and has a knack for sticking her nose where it doesn't belong.

What does a murder that happened forty-three years ago have to do with missing tourist Jennifer Martin?  Agnes makes it her personal mission to find out, and she's not letting the fact she's seventy-two get in the way.  Butting heads with Sheriff Clem Peterson is something she's accustomed to, but lately Clem seems to be acting even more strange, making Agnes wonder what he may be hiding about the Martin disappearance.

Agnes' partner in crime, Eleanor Mason tags along, the Watson to her Sherlock Holmes. Together, they unearth clues.  If only Eleanor would behave; although lovable, she has a knack for getting into trouble by tangling with her rival, Dorothy Alton, or flirting with anyone — male or female — and gossiping!  She's incorrigible, but she does carry a Pink Lady revolver in her purse, one that has proved useful at times.

Life for Agnes and Eleanor is shaken up when Agnes' former boss and secret crush comes to Tadium. Before long, the lady sleuths have more on their hands to contend with as goons roll into town and bullets begin to fly.

Senior Snoops (Book 3, Agnes Barton Senior Sleuth Mystery) ~ by Madison Johns, 2013, cozy mystery (Michigan and Florida), 219 pages

Hilarious sleuths Agnes Barton and Eleanor Mason head to Florida for the winter.  True to his words, Sheriff Clem Peterson sends Agnes Barton and Eleanor Mason packing to Florida via a Cessna, but things go haywire when during a fuel stop, two men shoot the pilot.  Agnes springs into action slamming the door just as shots are fired while Frank Alton jumps into the cockpit flying them out of there.

When they land in Florida, they’re asked tough questions by Putner and Palmer from Homeland Security. They keep asking if they found a packet on board the plane, a packet that Agnes has tucked in her purse, but they never mention what’s in the packet. She decides to hold onto it; after all, it contains twenty-five thousand in cash.

Sheriff Calvin Peterson, Sheriff Clem Peterson’s brother, picks them up from the airport in Florida, but tells them the bad news.  His brother Clem made arrangements for them to stay at Sunny Brooke Retirement Village and work as the hired help to pay for their room and board.  They go unwillingly, but discover in town that two maids have disappeared at Sunny Brooke.

It’s a race against the clock; will Agnes and Eleanor solve the case of the missing maids and finally figure out what happened to their pilot before they also show up on a milk carton?

Beginning ~ on a cruise

Beginning ~ Prologue

I couldn't help but reflect back on the day I married my Andrew, and Eleanor also married her Mr. Wilson, in a double wedding at the lighthouse on the point in Tawas.

High Seas Honeymoon ~ by Madison Johns, 2015, cozy mystery (Michigan and Florida), 204 pages

Agnes and Eleanor embark on a honeymoon cruise with their new husbands, Andrew and Mr. Wilson.  There are plenty of other Tawas residents along for the ride, although the newlyweds don’t realize this until they set out to sea.  But the presence of the locals sets the stage for much drama to unfold.  For instance, there’s a crime.  Agnes and Eleanor find the body of a woman, but wait.  The body disappears before the ship’s security and Captain Hamilton show up.  To further complicate matters, there’s a question of whether the woman was even really dead.  But none of these details detour Agnes and Eleanor as they hone in on some very goon-like men, Ricky and Leo, to help them get to the bottom of what really happened.  Will the women ever be able to figure out what really transpired, or will this be the one case they won't be able to solve?

=========================================================

I found this on the Kindle that my friend's sister let me have after she died.  I was looking for something mindless to read because I just want to zone out right now, and this looked like one that would do that.  I've never been on a cruise -- why not go via cozy mystery?

Rose City Reader hosts

Book Beginnings

With unread books on my shelves, should I get another?

Life Worth Living: A Guide to What Matters Most ~ by Miroslav Volf, Matthew Croasmun, and Ryan McAnnally-Linz, 2023, self-help, 352 pages

What makes a good life?  The question is inherent to the human condition, asked by people across generations, professions, and social classes, and addressed by all schools of philosophy and religions.  This search for meaning, as these Yale faculty members argue, is at the crux of a crisis that is facing Western culture, a crisis that, they propose, can be ameliorated by searching, in one’s own life, for the underlying truth. 

In A Life Worth Living, named after the highly sought-after undergraduate course taught by the authors, they provide readers with jumping-off points, road maps, and habits of reflection for figuring out where their lives hold meaning and where things need to change.  This is a guide to life’s most pressing question, the one asked of all of us:  How are we to live?

Thoughts about history and paper money

The Irony of American History ~ by Reinhold Niebuhr, 1952, history, xiv + 174 pages

Niebuhr examines America's role in the world community in the light of our political history and moral responsibilities.  Drawing from the ironic contrast between the "innocent" nation our forefathers hoped to build and the superpower America became, Niebuhr clarifies the relation of power to justice and virtue, as he discusses the moral responsibility of the United States as a leader of the free world.

$100 bills in 1977, 2003, and 2017

Here are the fronts and backs of $100 bills issued decades apart.  Someone left a comment saying that when these $100 bills were new, they could pay:

1. pay the 1977 monthly mortgage, 
2. pay the 2003 weekly groceries, and 
3. pay the 2017 weekly Starbucks budget.