Editors' Picks
See the reviews our editors have chosen this month:
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Nancy Saltzman had it all: a handsome, athletic husband, two equally handsome and bright sons, a career as an educator that brought her immense satisfaction, a loving, supportive extended family, and friends who were the kind you could count on in tough times.
And there were tough times. In the midst of her wonderful life, Nancy was diagnosed with breast cancer—not once, but twice.
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A spy thriller intertwined with a romantic triangle, set in Regency England, with a peek into high society, a whiff of the gutters, and a dollop of blackmail. Such a recipe couldn't fail but produce an engaging tale of history and mayhem.
The heroine, Charlotte, was the daughter of a prostitute. The girl worked as a chimney sweep since she was four, but at twelve, luck smiled on her: she was adopted by Lady Catherine.
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Maggie Lane's latest book, Jane Austen's World, arrived in my mailbox just as a new musical based on Austen's Sense and Sensibility was premiering in my home city of Denver. The synchronicity whetted my appetite. Lane's book was produced to commemorate the 200th anniversary of the publishing of another Austen classic, Pride and Prejudice. And the author's work not only details Austen's life and the lifestyle of landed gentry in England during her time, it also demonstrates what a popular phenomenon Austen has become...
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When I started reading On Our Own: Widowhood for Smarties, my husband quipped that it made him nervous, especially since three of my friends had lost their husbands in the past year and a half. The loss of a spouse is not something any of us wants to think about, but the truth is that most of us will have to deal with it sooner or later, especially since most women in our country outlive their husbands.
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In her fourth book of poetry, Sunday Rising, Patricia Clark masterfully weaves together many different threads of one great, universal story, one that I found myself listening to with my heart as well as my ears. She captures the bone-deep relationship between nature and humanity which, it seems, so many no longer understand..
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Review of the Month
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When We Were the Kennedys, by Monica Wood
Monica Wood's writing is simply luminous as she magically conjures up a lost place and time—a small industrial Eastern town on the eve of the Kennedy assassination. The story of her father's sudden, shattering death and her family's attempt to cope with the incomprehensible loss is brought to vivid life through her precise and poetic prose. Her skill at characterization is so refined that I felt as though I really knew each member of the family personally...
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Reviewed by Lisa Shirah-Hiers
Lisa Shirah-Hiers holds a Bachelor's Degree in Music Composition, summa cum laude from Lawrence University and a Masters in Composition from UT Austin. A one-time classical radio announcer for KMFA in Austin, Texas, she now pursues a double career as a private piano, theory and composition teacher and freelance writer. She has published profiles and travel pieces in the Hill Country Sun, austinwoman and Austin Monthly and is a contributing editor of the Story Circle Journal. Her essay "Spinning Water into Gold" was published in What Wildness is This: Women Write About the Southwest (March 2007 UT Press) and reprinted in Desert Call Magazine (2008).
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Our Favorite Authors
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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Briefly Reviewed...
We receive more wonderful books than we can possibly review. Here is a selection of titles, briefly described, that represent the wide range of recently-published memoirs written by strong women who have been there, done that, and lived to tell the tale. Recommended!
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Reviewers' News
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Congratulations to Lynn Goodwin & Lisa Shirah-Hiers for their promotion to STAR reviewer status! We always enjoy reading their reviews & interviews.
Editor Susan Albert announced the upcoming author-publication of her new novel, A Wilder Rose, the story of Rose Wilder Lane, Laura Ingalls Wilder, and the writing of the Little House books.
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 guidelines.
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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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Have a Book You'd Like Us to Review?
We review books written by women, for women, with an emphasis on women's lives. Check out our guidelines before you query us.
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We do not accept payment for book reviews.
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About Story Circle Network
This book review site is sponsored by the Story Circle Network, a non-profit membership organization that serves women who want to tell their life stories in diaries, journals, personal essays, poetry, and memoir. The Network is for every woman who aims to claim the power of her experience, who wants to map her journey, and who is determined to name herself. If you're that woman, please join us.
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