Editors' Picks
See the eight reviews our editors have chosen this month:
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Atherton Drenth, a clairvoyant, medical intuitive and holistic energy therapist in Guelph, Ontario, has written Following Body Wisdom for people who are interested or curious about "energy medicine." It can be helpful to those who have tried it and still have unanswered questions, as well. I have experienced this energy wisdom, in fact, with Atherton Drenth herself, and have found her book to be clearly written about a subject that is not easy to describe.
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I did a double-take when I read the subtitle of this book, "A Mother-Daughter Journey Beyond Death." Its promise of recounting communication through the dimensional veil was too good to pass up. Over the past several years I've become hooked on material of this sort. Various forms of speculation based on semi-tangible evidence intrigue me. Equally intriguing was the promise of a tale of mother-daughter reconciliation, another topic I've been involved with. I was eager to compare her experiences with mine.
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The Pull of the Moon is a coming-of-age novel for a fifty-year old woman, Nan.
The main character in the story (actually the only active character) is Nan. She narrates her story using two points of view—her entries in a new journal and her letters to her husband Martin. As a writer and a journal keeper myself, I found this not only an interesting way to approach the narration; I also wanted to see if it worked. It did.
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Charming, whimsical and full of mystery, The Darling Dahlias and the Cucumber Tree is the first book in a new series by the prolific and always readable Susan Wittig Albert. It is set in the time of the Great Depression, and Darling, Alabama is struggling, along with the rest of the country. Nevertheless, the indomitable women of the Darling Dahlia Garden Club are enjoying their legacy—a new clubhouse and gardens they inherited from one of the founders of the group.
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It's been a long time since I have so reluctantly put down a book upon completion, not simply because the story was so compelling but also the writing. Opening the pages of Lily's Odyssey has been a sacred activity that I have mindfully measured out in small, savored doses.
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"Those who cannot remember the past are condemned to repeat it." American philosopher George Santayana's quote would be a perfect epigraph for Ann Vileisis' careful and fascinating look at the history of food and eating in America. (The quote is part of Santayana's theory about how knowledge is acquired, making it especially relevant to Vileisis' examination of how we've lost the stories we once knew of our food.)
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The style of Aimee Bender's new book The Particular Sadness of Lemon Cake has been described as magical realism. It is that and quirky, ambiguous, and entertaining as well. Here thoughts run together into dialogue without quotations, descriptions are often sparse and pointed (e.g. "...their smiles sewn up with an edge of fishing line."), and the characters rich. Rose's father won't go into hospitals, her aging grandmother sends Rose's mother packages of chairs and stale crackers...
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When Courtney E. Martin and J. Courtney Sullivan sent an email asking, "What was the moment that made you a feminist?" they got some passionate and powerful results. Some answers were predictable: listening to "the screech of misogynist lyrics," watching Anita Hill testify against Clarence Thomas, and reading Charlotte Perkins Gillman, Susan Faludi, or Katie Roiphe.
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Review of the Month
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A Fierce Radiance, by Lauren Belfer, pulls the reader deep into the realities of the 1940s, when people in the U.S. lived with war, rationing, and too much death. Many younger readers only remember this era from a history textbook, while others lived through it and remember the patriotism and challenges. Belfer transports the reader into the daily lives of doctors, soldiers, government officials, and reporters—the people who make history and record it.
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Reviewed by Penny Leisch
Penny J. Leisch is a writer, author, and resume specialist who lives in Austin, Texas. Her clients include the City of Tempe, Walsh America, Camping & RV Magazine, Warner Wrangler newspaper, Loving Pets Magazine, Garden and Hearth, Adams Media (Cup of Comfort anthology series), and many more.
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Our Favorite Authors
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Read Susan Ideus's interview with Daphne Kalotay, author of Russian Winter.
A New Jersey native, award-winning author Daphne Kalotay grew up in a multi-cultural family—a Canadian mother and a Hungarian father, a fact which no doubt influenced her writing. She attended Vassar and went on to earn a Ph.D. in Modern and Contemporary Literature at Boston University. While at BU, she won the school's Florence Engel Randall Fiction Prize and a Transatlantic Review Award from The Henfield Foundation.
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We're getting up close and personal with our favorite writers. Check out our author interviews to read what these great writers have to say.
Now you can listen to interviews with authors as well. Linda Wisniewski, previously on the editorial staff at StoryCircleBookReviews, talks about her memoir, Off Kilter. Go to our podcast page for the link, and check out all the other interviews there.
We have reviews of books by over seven hundred authors. You're sure to find your favorite here. If not, contact us and request a review or, better yet, join our team and write one.
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You can read our winning
Memoir Challenge reviews here.
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Join Our Review Team
We're looking for strong reviews of books by, for, and about women. If you'd like to join our review team, check out our review guidelines.
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