🚆🛤️ Train Travel, More T. Kingfisher, and Lifting the Mental Load

 

    It's time for March's travel book for book club, and it's Around the World in 80 Trains by Monisha Rajesh. Rajesh is a British travel journalist who has an affinity for train travel--the pace, the people, the scenery. She convinces her fiancee to travel by eighty different trains for seven months. The experience was diverse. Some trains were luxurious, and some were rolling port-a-potties. She shares her research in the regions she travels through in a natural, exciting way. I enjoyed hearing how train experiences differ between Russia, Europe, North Korea, and North America. Taking a train across Canada sounds delightful. Her book is well-researched and balanced.

Here is a link to a map and list of her route and the trains she took: https://unselfishtravel.blog/around-the-world-in-80-trains-by-monisha-rajesh/ 

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    Have I mentioned lately how much I enjoy T. Kingfisher?

Here is a link to my many blog posts about her: https://barbpruittwrites.blogspot.com/search?q=T.+Kingfisher

    After being on a waitlist for several weeks, I finally read  A Wizard's Guide to Defensive Baking by T. Kingfisher. The protagonist is 14-year-old Mona, a baker's apprentice for her aunt. Mona has a unique magical affinity for dough, creating an unstoppable sourdough starter and a fierce gingerbread companion. Her city is reasonably tolerant of magical folks, but then they start disappearing. One early morning, Mona finds a dead girl on the floor of her bakery and is arrested for her murder. I enjoyed this rollercoaster of a story. She assembles a diverse, imaginative cast and several evil villains. Kingfisher's books are well-written and humorous, but she also addresses valuable themes, like being different, a minority, or outside of the mainstream, with understanding and kindness. Not to be trite, but she calls me to be empathetic and generous.

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    Paladin's Hope is the third in the Saint of Steel series. This one features Paladin Galen and his attraction to the Lich doctor (coroner) Piper. It is an LGTQ love story. Every book in this series is wrapped around the formula of a mystery and a reluctant romance. Galen and Piper, with help from Earstripe the Gnole, an intelligent badger creature, who brings comic relief between two earnestly avoidant but still attracted men. Of the three books I've read in the series, this one referred back to previously written books I haven't read. At times, I was lost in a history that informed the current story, but still mostly understood everything. 

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    I saw The Wife App by Carolyn Mackler, recommended at Park Books (https://www.parkbooksmd.com/), and I borrowed it from Libby. Three women find themselves divorced single moms in NYC and, one tipsy night, decide to create an app that charges for the mental load women usually shoulder. Think insurance forms, shopping, appointments for everyone, etc. This book is an empowering romantic comedy. 

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