art·sy-fart·sy/ˌärtsēˈfärtsē/adjective INFORMAL•DEROGATORY 1. associated with or showing a pretentious interest in the arts. No one would ever call me artsy fartsy. This, despite the fact that my father was an architect and a watercolorist. Let’s just say I didn’t get his art gene! Mind you, I love visiting the Chicago Art Institute–but mainly because I …
What I read Roy Hamilton and Celestial Davenport are on their way up. College educated young professionals in Atlanta they are confident and accomplished–Roy, in the business world; Celestial in the arts. Theirs would be a good life, stepping from one rung on the ladder of success to the next. Their marriage isn’t perfect: there …
What I read Alice McDermott is one of my favorite writers. I haven’t read all her work, but That Night and Charming Billy are books that have stayed with me. McDermott’s characters are finely drawn and her sense of what it is to be human is spot on. The Ninth Hour is no exception. It’s …
What I read I’ve been glancing over Lillian Boxfish Takes a Walk for over a year now. The book’s cover showed up in New Yorker ads for a time and on my Amazon “Customers who bought this also bought” feed and on the digital galley platform to which I belong. I’ve passed it on the …
Birds of a FeatherJacqueline WinspearSoho Press (2004) If Maisie Dobbs had had a child, she would have been Flavia de Luce. Now, I know, I know–Flavia has had a perfectly good mother in Harriet. But, readers, really! Last week I read the second in the Maisie Dobbs series, Birds of a Feather. And while I …
The Monk of MokhaDave EggersVintage (2019) I marvel at my own coffee evolution. Nearly forty years ago as a brand new bride I started with a percolator–Corning Ware in the ever-popular butterfly gold–and made one pot each week on Saturday morning. Several years later I moved up to a Mr. Coffee and what followed were …
The Elephant in the RoomTommy TomlinsonSimon & Schuster (January 2019) I just got back from WW, formerly known as ‘Weight Watchers’ but now marketed as a wellness workshop. I tell people that over the last ten years I have gained and lost the same 35 pounds twice. And I don’t ever intend to do so …
For someone who reads as much as I do, I struggle with contemporary poetry. What should be a pleasure–me! lover of word-craft and all that is story–is more often a frustration. I find most of it arcane. Baffling. And, dare I say, way too self-absorbed. I want my poetry rich with images that I can …
We are expecting a big storm here in the Great Lakes starting midnight Sunday. Forget about the local TV weather forecasters who yell “SNOWMAGEDDON!” at the first flake–even the U.S. National Weather Service in our area says that between tonight and Wednesday we are due for 11″ of snow and the wind chill will be …
Once Upon a RiverDiane SetterfieldSimon & Schuster (December 2018) It was a dark winter night. The solstice, to be exact. A man, face battered and bloodied, bursts in the door of the Swan Inn holding a small limp body. He collapses. When the village nurse Rita Sunday arrives to care for the man, she first …
This is my symphony 