Great Pause #5 A few months ago, I took my embroidery hoop in hand again after putting it down nearly thirty years ago. I’m not quite sure why I put it aside. Probably something to do with the fact that I was a single mom finishing my degree part time. That I had three kids …
What I read I’m a little late to the party judging from the nearly 13,000 Amazon reviews for Sue Monk Kidd’s Invention of Wings. The historical novel provides an imaginative back story for the Grimke sisters, Sarah and Angelina, Southern aristocrats turned Abolitionists and feminists. Kidd adds to their story a difficult and demanding mother, …
What I read I finally read the book everyone (as in nearly 20,000 reader reviews on Amazon) has been talking about–Delia Owens’ Where the Crawdads Sing. And, oh my goodness. It’s worth every bit of the chatter. You certainly don’t need me to give you a synopsis–and I won’t. Except to say it’s the story …
What I lived and what I read Last week I took my first journey out on my own in the little trailer I call Bag End. I needed to see if the story I’ve been writing was actually set in southern Ohio (it is!) and I also visited a few historical sites: Grant’s birthplace and …
I Was AnastasiaAriel LawhonDoubledayrelease date: March 27, 2018 I read Robert K. Massie’s Nicholas and Alexandra in high school when I measured books by length–the longer the better–and by heft. At nearly 700 pages (Amazon tells me the hardcover weighs just shy of two pounds) the book kept me captivated for at least a few days. …
A Piece of the World Christina Baker Kline William Morrow Christina Baker Kline’s Orphan Train made me curious to read more about the orphans shipped cross-country at the turn-of-the-century. So when I read about her latest novel A Piece of the World and it’s subject–the painting Christina’s World by Andrew Wyeth–I immediately put the book on my wishlist. …
Girl Waits With Gun Amy Stewart Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Constance Kopp and her sisters Norma and Fleurette manage the farm just fine, thank you very much. They garden, raise chickens (and pigeons!), and, since their mother died, have successfully rebuffed brother Francis’s pleas to come live with him and his family in town: “You can’t …
To Capture What We Cannot Keep Beatrice Colin Macmillan Beatrice Colin’s new title To Capture What We Cannot Keep tells the story of the building of the Eiffel Tower and a love that almost wasn’t. Caitriona Wallace, a young widow, is forced to find employment after her husband’s estate dwindles, and it’s either work or …
All the Light We Cannot See Anthony Doerr Scribner It won the Pulitzer. Was shortlisted for the National Book Award. Spent 118 weeks on the New York Times Bestseller list. Wiser readers than I have written more eloquently about Anthony Doerr’s magnificent All the Light We Cannot See, so there’s no reason to write what you …
Amy Snow Tracey Rees Simon & Schuster Life just seems to move at a slower pace in the summer. Afternoons are hot and humid, the evenings languid. We spend a lot of time on the deck and not so much time in front of the television. It’s a time when we try to break free from …
