Well, so much for taking my time reading An Echo in the Bone. I finished it yesterday!

I discovered that the thing on the cover that sort of looks like a chicken foot is actually a caltrop, a weapon used to disable cavalry. It always has a spike aiming up, no matter which way it lands. The four points represent the 4 strands of the story.

I do have to say this was not my favorite book of the series. Because of the 4-stranded story, there was a lot more plot than usual (and the book was only just over 800 pages, not 1,000). I do enjoy the Lord John mysteries, but I just can't get enough of Jamie and Claire, and I felt that was the story-line that was most neglected. There was really no day-to-day life, and I missed it.

DD2 was laughing at me as I was finishing the book. I was about 20 pages from the end, and none of the story lines was wrapped up; I was afraid all four of them were going to be left hanging and was panicking a little bit. I was glad though, that 3 of the four stories got wrapped up. With just one hanging I can manage (I hope) for the next year until the next book comes out.


One of the fascinating (to me) parts of these books are the descriptions of the clothing, both men's and women's. Just today I found a website that talks about 18th century clothing! She talks about gowns, shifts, petticoats, and stays and adds a few pictures to help. She's working on a fascinating project, making these clothes while wearing these clothes (totally by hand).

My temari class went so well that there is another one scheduled for December 5. There were ten lovely ladies in the class; nine of them were well on their way to having a finished temari by the time they left to go home, and eight of them purchased supplies to make more temari in the future. (The shop owner was very pleased!) I don't think I convinced them, though, that making their own mari is an important part of the process.



I did get a little stitching done, but not enough to finish anything.