2014 - Book 43

"Everneath" - Utah

Hooray, I found another book that I enjoyed. :) It was a modern retelling of the Persephone myth, but since I didn't know what that myth was about, it didn't give away the story for me. I wasn't entirely happy with the ending, but I suppose if you are retelling a myth you can't completely change the story line. It's a very fantasy genre book in which there are the "Everliving" who once a century must convince a human to be their "forfeit" and give them their energy and then the Everliving live for another 100 years. Usually they find their forfeits because the initial energy they take is the outer emotions, the bad feelings, so it feels good for the forfeits, but eventually they are left as just shells of themselves. The main character volunteered to be a forfeit because her life was falling apart but during her time in the netherworld, she could only see the face of her boyfriend, and returned to the surface to try and have another chance to say a proper goodbye before returning to the endless tunnels of the underworld to power the Everliving forever. Sorry, I know that probably sounds really confusing, but the author does a good job of introducing everything that happens and making sense of it all.
The book chronicles the six months the main character spends back on the surface, and all that happens during them. It's a rather interesting, albeit rather strange, concept. If that's something that sounds interesting to you, check this book out . . . I thought it was pretty good.

As for my desserts this week, I have Frosty S'more Cups and After Dinner Mint Triangles.

The frosty s'more cups were a big hit with my Bible study group. They were a bit difficult to eat with a utensil since the crust got rather hard in the freezer, but they were still tasty. I think they would be great in a mini muffin tin so they could be bite-sized. I made them in a lined, regular muffin tin since I didn't have the pan that the blogger used, and then I just removed the liners before serving . . . I think it worked out pretty well.

The after dinner mint triangles were made using an old Pampered Chef recipe. I know I'd had them before and I liked them, but I think my baking tastes have evolved. They are made with so many processed ingredients (pre-made mint cookies, almond bark, cream cheese), that they just didn't taste very homemade to me. They were still tasty, but I was frustrated with how sticky the crust was (Tip: pat it into the pan using the butter wrapper . . . that's the only way it worked) and my chocolate drizzle was too thick and didn't look as nice as the picture. Also, I think 6 drops of food coloring was too much, my green color was much darker than the picture, and didn't look quite as appetizing. So, not a winner in my book . . . just buy the mint cookies from the store and eat them plain ;)

Okay, that's all for my short post today, hopefully I'll have more to share next time. Have a great day!