Weekly Update for August 10, 2025

Welcome to my weekly update for August 10, 2025!

Why, hello there! I have disappeared for five months, as seems to be my habit in the summer. We get busy exploring wherever we are and other things, including my blog, fall by the wayside.

When I last posted on March 23, we were near San Diego, California with my husband’s job (He’s a traveling healthcare professional and works a contract at a different hospital around the country every three to six months). We arrived in Glenwood Springs, Colorado on Memorial Day weekend for his summer contract. This part of the state is more of a high desert than an alpine area, which surprised us, but it’s still beautiful in a very different way. Of course we’ve traveled widely across the state by now so we’ve seen those iconic high peaks and cooler temperatures too.

My (current) local library had a class for page end painting a few weeks ago. I’m a shy introvert so classes aren’t usually my thing but I screwed up my courage and went. I had a great time! I know I’m not Picasso but I’m still happy with how my page ends turned out (you can see pictures in my slideshow, below).

There were only three “students” in the class but all of us, including the librarian, were fantasy readers. The others veer more toward romantasy than I do, but it’s close enough. They decided to start a romantasy book club and invited me to join them. We’re meeting every other week so I’ve been reading all three published books in The Empyrean series by Rebecca Yarros for our first two meetings. These are a lot spicier than I normally like, and I have some complaints about them, but I have to admit they are page turners!

For my travel slideshow I’ll start with our most recent trip, which was out to Dinosaur National Monument on the border between Utah and Colorado. The Colorado side is more focused on the canyons and the Green and Yampah Rivers and the Utah side is more focused on fossils.

Slideshow:

All images © Jennifer G. at Introverted Reader 2025

1. This may be impossible to see, especially if you’re on your phone, but there are so many fossils jumbled together below these windows. Paleontologist Earl Douglass had the idea of leaving one hill in his excavation area partially exposed like this and building a visitor’s center around it so that tourists could see dinosaur fossils in situ. It was really cool!
2. The Green River in an area that John Wesley Powell (who led the crew of the first Europeans to boat the Colorado River through the Grand Canyon) called Whirlpool Canyon.
3. My page end painting. I took the crab on the cover (next picture) and went with the theme. I was trying to do different layers of the ocean, with the top being closer to the surface and the bottom being deep, where the anglerfish are.
4. The cover of the book I painted, Aru Shah and the Song of Death (Pandava #2) by Roshani Chokshi. It’s one that the library had available for painting and I chose it because I tend to like “Rick Riordan Presents” books. I haven’t read this one but I will.

Posted:

Down the Great Unknown: John Wesley Powell’s 1869 Journey of Discovery and Tragedy Through the Grand Canyon by Edward Dolnick–Book Review–4 Stars

Read:

I’ve read 36 books since I last posted! I won’t list them all here but I will link to my read_in_2025 shelf on GoodReads. I downloaded these graphics from my StoryGraph account.

A few standouts (Links go to the book’s GoodReads page. I haven’t been reviewing books either):

A Walk in the Park: The True Story of a Spectacular Misadventure in the Grand Canyon by Kevin Fedarko–I wasn’t sure what to think of this memoir at the beginning. The author and his friend were almost fatally unprepared for their trek through (not across) the Grand Canyon. But they learned from their mistakes and I enjoyed it from that point on. It was a great complement to Down the Great Unknown by Edward Dolnick.

Half a Soul (Regency Faerie Tales #1) by Olivia Atwater–The tone and humor of this book reminded me a lot of The Cecelia & Kate series by Patricia C. Wrede and Caroline Stevermer, which I love.

“The Skull: A Tyrolean Folktale” by Jon Klassen, read by Fairuza Balk–A deliciously creepy little morsel, perfectly narrated.

This Was a Man (The Clifton Chronicles #7) by Jeffrey Archer, read by Alex Jennings–I’m only mentioning this one because I finally finished this series. It was probably my least favorite of the seven books.

The Secret Book of Flora Lea by Patti Callahan Henry might make my list of the top ten books of the year. As a reader who loves both Narnia and historical fiction, I truly enjoyed it. There aren’t any fantasy elements but it is a great novel about sisters and loss and the power of story.

The Thursday Murder Club (#1) by Richard Osman, read by Lesley Manville–I loved this for a lot of reasons. The mystery was solid but the aging protagonists and the way they refuse to be put out to pasture by a society that seems to only value youth were inspiring. I listened to this after watching A Man on the Inside on Netflix, which has a similar premise and I also highly recommend.

Founding Mothers: The Women Who Raised Our Nation, written and read by Cokie Roberts–The feminist movement did not spring forth fully formed after World War II, as many of us might think. Even back at the founding of the United States (and back until the beginning of time, I feel sure), women had opinions about politics and current events and they freely expressed them in letters, journals, and sometimes other writings. Cokie Roberts finds the most delicious tidbits of history and shares them with her own witty observations. I’ve also read Ladies of Liberty by Ms. Roberts and I highly recommend both books.

Currently Reading:

O Pioneers! by Willa Cather

The Lost Art of Mixing (The School of Essential Ingredients #2) by Erica Bauermeister, read by Cassandra Campbell

The Collapse: The Accidental Opening of the Berlin Wall by Mary Elise Sarotte

Up Next:

My next book club meeting is Tuesday and we’ll be discussing books two and three of The Empyrean series. We’ve already chosen The Serpent and the Wings of Night (Crowns of Nyaxia #1) by Carissa Broadbent for our next meeting in two weeks so I’ll start that one soon.

What did your week look like?

Hosts:

Deb Nance at Readerbuzz hosts The Sunday Salon and Kimberly at Caffeinated Book Reviewer hosts Sunday Post. Kathryn at Book Date hosts It’s Monday! What Are You Reading?

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