Story for the Week
If you don’t know the definition of “bussin’,” you are not alone. No cap. 🫣 For those of you who are old like I am, “bussin'” means very good. “No cap” means something is the truth. But the meaning of “very good” morphed over the years with almost every generation—cool, awesome, sick, lit, fire. A few years from now, kids will use a totally different word or phrase to mean very good.
Language evolves constantly, and kids always come up with terms that make no sense to adults but somehow make their way into everyday vernacular. We did it. Our parents did it. Our children do it. And 15 to 20 years from now, they will be shaking their heads at the things coming out of the mouths of their own children.
(And before I get too far, Corinne will be ridiculously embarrassed by this post but probably no more than my generation was by our own parents. First, she will hate the headline. Second, she will very much dislike me talking about how great Gen X is. Carry on. 😉)
I was a teenager in the 1980s. One of the oldest of the Gen Xers, I wholeheartedly believe we grew up in the best time. We spent all day outside in the summer, rode our bikes around the neighborhood without supervision, and all of the parents kept an eye out for everyone else’s kids. Cameras captured nothing (thankfully), but it didn’t matter because the memories last a lifetime. Ours was the best music.
We experienced the advent of home computers, the Internet, mobile phones, video games. We updated music collections through every format from radios to vinyl to 8-tracks to cassettes to CDs to streaming. I still remember the army green hand-held transistor radio I had, complete with a wrist strap so I wouldn’t drop it. I still own a couple dozen vinyl records, but as I write this, I am listening to a playlist on Amazon Music that I started from my mobile phone and cast to one of the five Alexa Echo Dots we have throughout our home.
We’ve learned all of the different ways to photograph people and events and record video. My dad still has home movies and a movie projector taking up space in his attic. At the same time, my mobile phone currently holds more than 22,000 images and videos, and we own a nearly full 1 terabyte hard drive of family photos and videos comparable in size to the transistor radio I owned as a kid.
The first television set I remember was a console black and white that sat on the floor like a cabinet. One television was a big deal. I’m certain my dad remembers growing up without television at all. In my early 20s, I bought a portable color television with a four-inch screen. I vividly recall taking it to church one Sunday because there was a lunch after the service, and I didn’t want to miss the Chicago Bears game. It had an extendable antenna, and the picture was grainy, but I got to “see” the game.
Now when we watch older movies or videos on the 55″ television in the living room (small by many standards considering what’s available), I’m still amazed at the resolution we used to think was fantastic.
The world has changed at a crazy pace, and language changes with it…way faster than it used to I think. I like to tease Corinne sometimes about the slang terms floating around. She gets a little defensive when I sound off with some Gen Alpha term knowing that she doesn’t use it.
So for Corinne’s birthday last October, I bought her a card that claimed to be Gen Z slang. It caught my eye because it started with “Happy 20th Birthday Pookie,” and Corinne calls people “pookie” a lot. But I gave it to her knowing full well that a lot of the terms were Gen Alpha versus Gen Z. I also didn’t know what most of them meant (she knew all of them), but it definitely made her laugh.
A couple of weeks ago, Corinne and I were sitting in the drive-through somewhere. Neither one of us can remember what we were talking about (she says she was so traumatized, she blocked it out). But we both remember I responded to her by saying something was “fire.” It caught her off-guard because, while she uses that word all the time, I had never used it. What was more shocking to her was that I used it correctly. 🤣
It got me thinking about phrases that didn’t exist when I was Corinne’s age. We didn’t call anything bussin’ or lit or sick. I don’t even know how those terms came to mean something is very good. We didn’t talk about rizz (charisma) or say anything was sus (suspicious), but at least those terms make sense. We do still call things awesome when we like them, despite that not being the original meaning. I still regularly say “dude.”
Then there are the terms that you hope don’t make a comeback—gnarly, gag me—although there’s a part of me that wishes the 🤮 emoji would come up when I type “gag me” in the search bar. A girl can dream.
I started telling Corinne about the book I was reading at the time (reviewed below). One of the characters is an eight-year-old boy who uses a lot of slang that his mom has to learn and then explain to other people. It feels like he’s copying older kids because I don’t know many kids that age who would walk around calling their mom “bruh” or “bro.” But I could be wrong.
I might have to ask my grandson, who is a few years older than the character in the book. But I’m afraid that might make me feel really old, and that would not be bussin’. Not bussin’ at all. 😁
Book Review
⭐⭐⭐½
3.5 Stars for Across the Vanishing Sky by Catherine Cowles
432 pages
Publisher: Sourcebooks | Bloom Books
Publication Date: March 3, 2026
I received an advance copy of this title from NetGalley and Sourcebooks | Bloom Books.
Publisher’s Description
Braedyn Winslow never expected to return to Starlight Grove—the town that took everything from her. Not after her best friend, the one who’d sacrificed so much for her, vanished without a trace. But with a young son to raise and a past that won’t stay buried, Brae is back…and determined to uncover the truth.
She just didn’t count on the brooding, reclusive mountain man living next door.
Dex Archer is the stuff of local legend—silent, rugged, and surrounded by whispers of his and his brothers’ violent father. But Brae sees through the scowl and his parentage to the man beneath: fiercely loyal, unexpectedly kind…and just dangerous enough to protect her when someone starts warning her off her search.
The closer she gets to the truth, the harder it is to stay away from Dex. And as things get more perilous, Brae realizes the only person she can rely on is the one man who swore never to trust again.
Only someone isn’t happy that Brae has been digging, and they’ll do anything to stop her. But Dex? He’ll do anything to save her, even slip back into the dark.…
************
Main Characters:
- Braedyn (Brae) Winslow – single mom to eight-year-old Owen, her best friend Nova vanished while she and Brae were trail hiking in Starlight Grove the previous year, moving with Owen and their search dog Yeti to the small town to continue her search for Nova, previously worked as an office manager at a small accounting firm in Oakland
- Dexter (Dex) Archer – professional hacker, moved back to Starlight Grove after a 10-year stint with the FBI that was his deal to avoid serving time after being arrested, renting a cabin next to Brae while he waits for his house to be built on his family’s ranch property, second youngest of the Archer brothers
- Waylon Archer – Dex’s great uncle, took in Dex and his brothers after their father was killed, obsessed with cuckoo clocks and Bigfoot
- Wylder Archer – recovering alcoholic, owns a bar called the Boot, lives above the bar, the oldest of the Archer brothers
- Kol Archer – works as an investigator for the Forest Service, single dad to seven-year-old Skylar, the second oldest of the Archer brothers
- Orion Archer – works remotely from home making custom maps, only leaves his house for family meetings, speaks using sign language, hasn’t spoken since their father was killed, the middle of the Archer brothers
- Maverick Archer – currently works as a smoke jumper for the fire department, chooses jobs that Dex sees as reckless, participates in extreme sports, the youngest of the Archer brothers
- Roger Oakley – sergeant for the sheriff’s department in Starlight Grove where he started working right out of high school, has asked out Brae multiple times in the past year while she looked for Nova, he and Travis have tried to help under the radar of the sheriff
- Travis Moore – also works for the sheriff’s department, he and Roger are best friends, just engaged to his high school sweetheart Cora who works at Wylder’s bar
- Ezra Miller – sheriff of Starlight Grove, believes that Nova was attacked by an animal or fell into the river and was swept away, sidelined her case as cold
- Vincent Faber – Brae’s wealthy ex-boyfriend who wanted nothing to do with her or Owen once he found out she was pregnant, he stalks Brae online and creates new accounts every time she blocks one
This was my first read from the prolific Catherine Cowles. I am honestly undecided whether I will read her again. Brae and Dex’s story is a solid suspenseful romance. I’m just not sure her writing style meshes with my reading preferences. More about that below.
The book itself is the first in what I expect will be a five-book series since there are five brothers. Told from the dual points of view of Brae and Dex, we learn pretty early on that both of them are emotionally broken. Both have lost loved ones in traumatic fashion, and neither of them wants to get close to anyone as a result. Perfect setup for a romance.
In addition to the romance aspect, Brae is on a mission to find her best friend (more like a sister) Nova who went missing a year ago. When Brae got pregnant with Owen, everyone dropped out of her life. Her only help was Nova, who moved in and helped Brae raise Owen. While out hiking in Starlight Grove a year before the story begins, Nova vanished off the trail. Convinced Nova is still alive, Brae spent the past year on her own investigating, bugging the local sheriff’s department, and working to train her search and rescue dog Yeti.
And who might be able to help her find Nova? The sexy, former FBI hacker renting the cabin next to hers, of course, who she meets just as he’s getting of her shower. He also happens to have four brothers and a great uncle who offer their own talents to finding missing persons. As Dex finds himself more drawn to Brae and she gets a job at his brother’s bar, we see the family really embrace her.
This story includes plenty of suspects, and I was pretty sure I figured out early who’s responsible for Nova’s disappearance. I was disappointed that it was so obvious, and I was kicking myself for being so wrong. The author does a really good job of throwing me off the trail (pun intended).
If it weren’t for the writing style, I would gladly jump on the bandwagon for the next book. By about a quarter of the way through the book, I was rolling my eyes at the number of references to EVERYONE’S eye color—104 references to be precise. (Yes, I highlighted them to count.) I love a great description of someone so that I can form a picture, but I don’t want or need a reference to eye color every four pages.
Some of the narration and the dialog made me cringe. I get it. It’s a romance, but I feel like the dialog should still be realistic. “Please. You’re everything that isn’t cold. You’re warmth. You’re fire. You’re life.” No one talks like that…and it is definitely not my cup of tea.
On the flip side, there are moments that made me smile.
“A low moo sounded, and my gaze snapped over to the mini-Highland cow standing by the back doors—but most definitely inside—and the goat next to her.
“‘Seriously?’ I asked Waylon.
“‘You want me to be safe. That’s my attack cow and my goat of protection.’”
“‘How do you know her,’ I asked.
“Dex’s mouth twisted into a grin. ‘I heard the podcast. Could tell she was doing it to help people, not to make a buck. So I offered my services.’
“My jaw dropped, ‘You hack for her.’
“‘I can neither confirm nor deny.’
“I shook my head. ‘Hacker with a heart of gold.’
“‘Don’t ruin my rep,’ Dex muttered.”
The kids are great characters. Close to the same age, Owen and Skylar become fast friends and imbue the story with lots of laughter. Owen uses a ton of Gen Alpha slang, which is realistic in the sense that it sounds like he’s mimicking older kids. But it almost becomes his entire personality.
And finally…the names. Seriously, the names. As if the names are not unique enough, there are nicknames. Brae constantly calls Dex “Buttercup,” which is cute the first couple of times, but not cute after a while. Dex calls Brae “Hellion,” even when he’s being romantic. 🤨 Nova is “Supernova.” Maverick calls his ex “Ice Queen” and calls Brae “Little Badass.” One of the locals calls all of the Archer brothers “Little Dude,” even as adults. Nicknames are a great way to demonstrate chemistry between characters when used the right way. I didn’t get that feeling here.
Like I said, solid storyline, great setup for the rest for the series. I’m just not sure whether this particular author is for me.
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