The City of the Hand

hurtcomfortex released today! I happened to be driving a backcountry highway with no cell service at the time (coming home from Mom Things), but it was lovely to find my gifts waiting for me when I got back.

Hold a Candle To (MASH, 3400 wds, gen) delivered some lovely Charles drug withdrawal h/c with teamy affection, and A Way Out (Biggles, 4400 wds, gen) let me roll around in excellent Biggles & von Stalhein enemies-era reluctant cooperation and sympathy. Truly a lovely haul!

Technically this was yesterday, but I climbed a hill and had an eagle fly past me. (The hill is the Bodenburg Butte in Palmer, AK.)



I realize the eagle is more like a dot, but if you've tried to take a quick photo of a bird, this is without zoom (I was just trying to snap a fast shot without completely losing the experience of having an eagle flying in front of me) so it is actually very close! After it flew past, I turned around and two teenage guys were standing above me, having just descended from the top and watched it too. "Sick," one of them said in obvious delight, and we nodded at each other.

I'm down in Southcentral doing Mom Things. Mom has been moved out of the rental where she was living since last August, and she was supposed to go home via helicopter today, but the weather was a problem. But that's why I reserved two extra days at the Airbnb beforehand, just in case. Tomorrow we try again! She was very respectful of my space today - I think she recognized that I was planning on having the evening to myself tonight and it didn't happen - and I wrote both fanfic and original fiction, and took a long walk to sort some plot things out in my head. Thursday I go home, and perhaps drive the Denali Highway on my way, if the wildfire smoke isn't too bad.

Okay, the previous post has the non-spoilery intro to the series, so this is the one with all the spoilers. I finished book 3 this evening (of seven books so far), and I'm still having a terrific time.

( Spoilers )