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So yes, I made more truffles this weekend. They both turned out amazing. Here’s a picture of the ganaches that I made.
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The top ganache is a bittersweet chocolate with orange, the bottom is a semi-sweet chocolate with passionfruit.
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The top ganache, as you may or may not be able to tell from the picture, was slightly broken. I ended up using more orange oil in it, and so the ganache isn’t as smooth.
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The bottom ganache was absolutely perfect. Shiny and smooth. Melts on your tongue. You can’t really taste passion fruit per se—it’s more like a really bright, fruity chocolate.
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I have Thoughts on what to make next. They include a brown butter, strawberry, raspberry, and lemon truffles. I’ll also be making a chocolate ganache for a pie for my birthday. Stay tuned!
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As y’all may or may not realize, I read a lot of books. I made a conscious decision to start reading a lot again when I found myself too addicted to games on my phone. I still play games on my phone, but I try to be aware of it, and to put the phone down and pick up a book instead.
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However, I don’t finish every book I start. There are too many good books out there for me to read. I don’t have to slough through something I’m not enjoying.
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When I notice myself slowing down, I always spend some time trying to figure out why. Is it just not the right book at this time? That’s happened more than once. I’ve started a book, then Life Happened, and I can’t keep reading whatever it was. I will go back and finish the book later when my life has calmed down again.
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There are other times, though, when it’s the book.
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Recently, I started an author’s first novel. Sometime after the sample, the POV character left a room, continued to have a conversation in said room, then left the room a second time.
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That threw me out of the story because it took me some time to figure out where the character was and what had just occurred.
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Once I figured it out, I shrugged. Eh. Stuff like that happens. I’ve done it in my writing, though hopefully, either my first reader or my editor caught it.
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Then it happened a second time. The character entered a room twice.
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Uhmmm, someone should have caught that. As this was a traditionally published book, I knew that the editing probably wasn’t going to be great, but I was still disappointed.
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When it happened a third time, before I was even a third of the way into the book, I put the book down and walked away. Because that last time, the author didn’t just lose track of the character physically, but emotionally.
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At that point, in my head, the POV character has just become unreliable. And that is one of my anti-reader cookies. (Reader-cookie—something you love to read about, like cool magic systems and great banter, in my case. Anti-reader-cookies are the opposite, and I will go out of my way to avoid reading books with those things in them.)
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Should I give the writer (and the book) another chance? I tried to talk myself into that, but I just can’t. There are too many other books that are better written that I get to read. Plus, the next time it happened in that book (because I don’t trust the writer any more, and I’m fairly certain it’ll happen again) I’ll get completely disgusted and walk away again.
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Moved on to the next book which I’m really enjoying.
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So how about you? What are you anti-reader cookies?
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Hey! It's November! Ice & Berries is coming out SOON. If you get it from the KRP store, it'll be available on November 10th. Everywhere else, it won't come out until November 21st. So get yours today!
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A cozy fantasy tale of friendship, work, and going out into the world. Oh, and snow cones!
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When the Ice Elf Elbriarien Itamar—or just El, for short—fails to get her Mage Mark after her apprenticeship, she decides to leave the frozen north and head south.
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Someplace where snow doesn't stay piled up in corners during the heat of summer. Maybe walk barefoot in the sand next to the ocean. Perhaps even chuck out all her learning and take work in a bar. (A fate worse than death, at least according to her parents.)
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However, without her Mage Mark, El cannot legally practice spells or do complicated magic. Just little things, cantrips native to her Ice Elf heritage.
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Join her as she makes her way in a new life and a new city, finding friends, business opportunities, a love of snow cones, and perhaps, if she's lucky, a sapphic love as well.
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To celebrate the publication of my new cozy fantasy novel, my first cozy fantasy novel is now on sale for $0.99!
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The spell to transform Killian the champion fails. Instead of a worm, he’s transformed into a wyrm. Swell. Now what? Thus begins the story of Talon the dragon and his eventual battle with a god. Or something like that. It’s a lovely cozy fantasy filled with humor, found family, gods and myths, and breaking of the fourth wall.
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