I’ve dipped my sneaker in the Mississippi. I was almost nine and my mother, brother, and I were on a month-long Greyhound bus trip across the United States. We stopped in Memphis, Tennessee so we could see the mighty river. I remember a lot of cobblestones leading down to the water and my blue denim… Continue reading More than an Adventure: Huck, Jim, & James
Her shiny blond hair brushes the black leather of her bomber jacket.Her browline glasses say smart but stylish.Her voice is enthusiastic but precise.Her grade in school? Sixth. Aria Storm Partridge holds The War That Saved My Life and its equally exciting sequel, The War I Finally Won Aria Storm Partridge goes to Sullivan West Elementary… Continue reading The Girls Who Got Me to Read This Book
There are many stories of earth’s creation, but the one an Ojibwe father tells his son in Louise Erdrich’s The Night Watchman is one of my favorites. “In the beginning,” the father says, sitting outside in the autumn sun, “the earth was covered with water . . . “ And when the Creator decided there should be… Continue reading Good People in the Bad Lands
On the drive home from the Barbie movie not long ago, my niece and I cranked up the volume on songs by Beyoncé, Rihanna, and Taylor Swift, letting their powerful voices swirl around us. My niece had her hands firmly on the wheel, but with the sunset glow in our windshield, we felt like we… Continue reading “Every night is girls night”
The woman seated next to me at the book group describes almost word for word the image I’ve been trying to put out of my thoughts since reading it a few days earlier. It is worse than grim, but part of me is glad that we cannot forget it. So many stories move quickly in… Continue reading Escaping Underground and into the Clouds
Reading In the Catskills 