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Mailbox Monday #611

December 28, 2020 by
Mailbox Monday has become a tradition in the blogging world, and many of us thank Marcia of The Printed Page for creating it.

It now has it’s own blog where book bloggers can link up their own mailbox posts and share which books they bought or which they received for review from publishers, authors, and more.

Leslie, Martha, and I also will share our picks from everyone’s links in the new feature Books that Caught Our Eye. We hope you’ll join us.

Here’s what we received:

Randolph the Christmas Moose by Gerry Gibson for review.

Randolph the Moose lives with his mother in the Great White North. After a chance encounter with the reindeer from Santa Claus’ sleigh-pulling team, Randolph finds new joy in trail running as he trains to join the reindeer in Santa’s flight school. But when the head elf places him at the workshop loading dock instead (due to his tremendous bulk), Randolph has to use his brains and work ethic to earn respect at his new job… and even save Christmas.

Imagine Rudolf the red-nosed reindeer, except…

  • Randolph has a healthy self-image
  • Randolph has a more positive outlet for his feelings
  • Randolph runs, but not away from his problems
  • Randolph is pro-active, refusing to let Santa’s workshop define him as a moose

BE YOUR OWN MOOSE!

The Magic Home by Isabella Cassina for review.

The Magic Home is a story for those who believe in magic, to turn fear into bravery and let fantasies run wild! This is a tale of a little boy that lives with his family, plays happily in the courtyard with his brother, sister, a brown dog and a fluffy white rabbit, and cannot wait to start school. Suddenly he has to leave for an unpredictable journey…

The Magic Home offers psycho-educational support for children, parents and childhood professionals who are assisting children through the difficult transition of displacement. The author presents a guide for caregivers grounded in the principles of Play Therapy that allows children to be engaged in a dynamic and engaging process based on their capacities and the objectives defined by a caring adult. The book is ideal for easy reading with individuals and groups, and the suggested activities can be used between parent and child, at school, in a healthcare agency or any other place where children spend time.

Dos Idiomas, One Me by Maggy Williams for review.

Dos Idiomas, One Me is the story of a young girl who feels torn between two languages. At home, she speaks Spanish, at school, she speaks English, and she finds herself resenting the fact that she has to translate her thoughts and feelings. Then, she realizes that being bilingual is a gift. She begins to have fun navigating the space of inclusivity and starts to relish the role of teacher and translator.

By equally incorporating Spanish and English, Dos Idiomas, One Me promotes biliteracy. As young readers see their experiences reflected in the story of another dual-language speaker, they can feel encouraged to embrace all aspects of themselves.

Lucky G and the Melancholy Quokka by Amy Wilinski-Lyman for review.

This book grabs you from the outset and takes you on a hopeful journey: A colorful, spunky raven (with a Ph.D.) travels to Australia to meet a quokka who has lost his true smile, finds it hard to move and isn’t hanging out with friends anymore. Dr. G knows that depression is the culprit, and extends a listening ear and helping hand, all the while reassuring the quokka that lots of adults and kids feel depression, too!

We’re All Not the Same, But We’re Still Family by Theresa Fraser and Eric E. Fraser for review.

This story was written for adoptive families to explore the benefits of adoption openness. The main character, Deshaun, loves his family but always wondered about his biological family. Does he look like them? Did they love him? With the support of his adoptive parents, Deshaun gets to meet his biological family. They develop an ongoing relationship, so Deshaun feels more stable in his adoptive family, but also develops a comfortable relationship with his birth family. Deshaun and his family are reminded (as we all are) that family can include biological, adopted, foster and kin members.

What did you receive?

Filed Under: mailbox monday, meme Tagged With: , , , , , , , , , , , ,

Merry Christmas & Happy New Year

December 25, 2020 by

Winter Lights in Gaithersburg

I know many of you have already celebrated Hanukkah this year, and I hope you enjoyed a blessed season.

For those celebrating Christmas and Kwanzaa, I wish you the best this holiday season.

We did find time to go skating outdoors with our daughter’s best friend’s family, see the winter lights in the car, and have some fun with Elf on the Shelf. It’s been a unique year for celebrations, but we’ve made it work as best as we can. My daughter will do her annual gift opening with her friends via Zoom this year, but they will still see each other.

I’m looking forward to a little bit of down time at the end of the year. But I’ll be happy to see my daughter open her presents.

I’ll post my Best of List next week.

If you missed the annual Poetry Reading Challenge, you can find that here.

Filed Under: announcements Tagged With: , ,

Poetry Reading Challenge 2021

December 23, 2020 by

In 2020, I read 21 books of poetry and listened to one collection on audio. Some were published last year, but some were languishing on my bookshelf for no good reason. All of these books were 4 and 5 stars.

I think last year’s challenge went well, so the options will remain the same:

  • One of the easiest, and possibly most difficult, will be getting people to sign up to read a poem-a-day through the Academy of American Poets Poem-a-Day service. The challenge is to read a poem-a-day for a week once per month and write about which poems were your favorite and why. You can write up a short blurb on your Facebook page, Twitter, Instagram, or your blog. I’d love for you to share your experience in the comments each month.
  • Second, read at least 1 book of poetry (doesn’t have to be cover-to-cover) and write about your favorite poems and what you learned about yourself while reading those poems.
  • Third, if you want to go all out, feel free to read as many books of poetry as you can in one year and link to your reviews in the comments.

If you accept one of the options or the whole challenge, leave a comment with where you will be posting about your year in poetry.

If you want to leave your blog link, sign up in a post and leave your blog URL to your post below:

Don’t forget to grab the image!

Filed Under: announcements, challenges, Poetry Reading Challenge Tagged With: ,

Mailbox Monday #610

December 21, 2020 by
Mailbox Monday has become a tradition in the blogging world, and many of us thank Marcia of The Printed Page for creating it.

It now has it’s own blog where book bloggers can link up their own mailbox posts and share which books they bought or which they received for review from publishers, authors, and more.

Leslie, Martha, and I also will share our picks from everyone’s links in the new feature Books that Caught Our Eye. We hope you’ll join us.

Here’s what we received:

Suburban Souls by Maria Espinosa for review.

Against the vibrant and liberated backdrop of 1970’s San Francisco, a husband and wife-both Jewish immigrants indelibly traumatized by their childhoods in Nazi Germany-face the turbulence of an increasingly sterile marriage. Saul, an emotionally withdrawn scientist, escapes into New Age mysticism with Shivaya, a self-styled clairvoyant Danish healer. Gerda drifts in and out of psychiatric care as her loosening grip on reality leaves its mark on their teenage daughter, Hannah. In this unflinching portrait of a woman’s downward spiral into the nightmare of modern domesticity, Maria Espinosa weaves a deceptively simple tale about the terror of abandonment and the mysterious nature of suffering.

What did you receive?

Filed Under: mailbox monday, meme Tagged With: ,

Who’s Your Daddy by Arisa White

December 16, 2020 by

Source: the poet

Preordered book, 138 pgs.

I am an Amazon Affiliate

Who’s Your Daddy by Arisa White, on tour with Poetic Book Tours, is a poetic memoir in which the poet explores the absence of her father in her life, how it has impacted who she has become, and how she can reconnect with her absent father in adulthood.

“When it came to the conjunction “and” I was illiterate. For it makes you larger, more. Expands into distances beyond my eyes.” (pg. 124)

White articulates deftly the nuanced feelings of a desire to belong and the sense that belonging requires the reconnection with an absent father. While she has others in her life who love and care for her, there are traumas that she faces while her father is absent. But reconnecting with a man ejected from the United States and back to Guyana and who fails to even write a letter or call her is a tall order.

“Am I a site of abandonment?” (pg. 97)

“Guyana is abandonment from my father. I feel the weight of the people in me and I in them, guilt I carry myself alone.” (pg. 108)

The poetic memoir begins at home in the United States, as Arisa grows up in a broken home, a home of harsh realities. These realities are not my own, but this collection creates a palpable reminiscence of sorrow, anger, confusion, absence, and more. Despite these trials and her struggles with connections, she is a strong woman — caring for herself, willing to reach out to someone who abandoned her, and seeking self-care and healing.

What she finds in this journey is a man incapable of giving her a sense of belonging — a man who rambles just to hear himself speak, to make him relevant to those who hear him.

“Breaks my heart along the same fault lines that ache for him.” (pg. 83)

Who’s Your Daddy by Arisa White is a journey into the poet’s past as she reconciles the abandonment of her father and her struggles with connecting to others. The poetic memoir is beautiful and the landscapes within it (emotional and physical) are tumultuous and heartbreaking. White is a deft storyteller, and readers will be emotionally spent by this poetic memoir.

RATING: Cinquain

Follow the rest of the blog tour with #WhosYourDaddyMemoir #ArisaWhite

Photo Credit: Nye’ Lyn Tho

About the Poet:

Arisa White is a Cave Canem fellow and an assistant professor of creative writing at Colby College. She is the author of four books, including the poetry collection You’re the Most Beautiful Thing That Happened, and coauthor of Biddy Mason Speaks Up, winner of the Maine Literary Book Award for Young People’s Literature and the Nautilus Book Award Gold Medal for Middle-Grade Nonfiction. She serves on the board of directors for Foglifter and Nomadic Press. Find her at arisawhite.com.

Filed Under: ARC, challenges, memoir, poetry, Poetry Reading Challenge, Read in 2020, reviews Tagged With: , ,

Nerdlet: Animals by T J Resler

December 15, 2020 by

Source: Media Masters Publicity

Paperback, 216 pgs.

I’m an Amazon Affiliate

Nerdlet: Animals by T J Resler is another fun and fact-packed book for kids to learn about the animal kingdom. The book includes some fun and unusual facts about animals, including spiders (which we are not too fond of). The pictures are gorgeous as always. Even though we’ve seen some of these animals in other books before, this little gem includes some quirky and fun facts about these animals. You’ll learn about why lemurs sit up and stretch their arms wide and how the cute faced platypus can be dangerous.

One of our favorite parts of the book are quizzes that you can take to find out what superhero you are based on animal characteristics, what species of fox you are based on how you like to play, and what kind of pet is best for you. These are the types of quizzes we love to take and enjoy as a family. We learn how we’re similar and different, but sometimes the choices are hard, especially for my daughter who definitely wanted the pet quiz to demonstrate to her parents that she was best suited for a pet cat.

Nerdlet: Animals by T J Resler can be read together as a family or dipped into occasionally on your own. What we love is that this is a book for sharing. We love animals and this is definitely something we’ll enjoy on more than one occasion. The only thing we wanted more of were those quizzes. We had a blast with those and would have liked at least 3 or 5 or 10 more. A good gift for the animal lover in your life.

RATING: Quatrain

Filed Under: challenges, New Authors Challenge, nonfiction, Read in 2020, review copy, reviews Tagged With: , ,

Mailbox Monday #609

December 14, 2020 by
Mailbox Monday has become a tradition in the blogging world, and many of us thank Marcia of The Printed Page for creating it.

It now has it’s own blog where book bloggers can link up their own mailbox posts and share which books they bought or which they received for review from publishers, authors, and more.

Leslie, Martha, and I also will share our picks from everyone’s links in the new feature Books that Caught Our Eye. We hope you’ll join us.

Here’s what we received:

A story of THE WORLD before the FENCE by Leeya Mehta, which I purchased from Finishing Line Press.

A Story of The World Before The Fence is a lush, lyrical study of memory and history.  These poems move deftly between the mystical and the known, inviting readers to travel backwards in time and forwards into themselves.  Each of us struggles with the heavy-handedness of the past: its merciless shaping of the larger world and, of course, its unrelenting squeeze on our individual lives.  Through intense reflection and beautiful invention, Leeya Mehta’s poems offer a kind of second sight.

–Tim Seibles

Whether tracing the 10th century journey of religious refugees from Persia to a tender but continually ambivalent asylum in India or dwelling in the complicities and solidarities of our own era, this is a troubled look at belonging, where belonging is ever “like loving a corpse” among “history’s sad funerals”. Mehta’s compassion and clear, unhurried tone leaven the seriousness and ambition of the work’s intellectual horizons, and an emotional power and turbulence as deep as that in certain moods of its Anacostia River: “brown knot of sludge, // a dragon aching.”

–Vivek Narayanan

Through centuries and across continents, Leeya Mehta evokes the transgenerational trauma of her ancestors, the Zoroastrian Parsis, to narratively structure an intimate, feminocentric experience of cultural and personal displacement. Her haunting poems, with their hard-won wisdom and exquisite imagery, serve as “a warning that the screws of love sit deep in the bone” despite—yet, perhaps, because of—the various forms of exile that complicate identities, relationships, and senses of place.  A Story of the World Before the Fence acknowledges “how barriers can keep / wandering spirits separate from those they love,” but it nevertheless consoles us with the miracle that is laughter: a universal language that can still anchor us to one another and help us learn to forgive ourselves for what we have lost along the way.

–Randi Ward

Warbler by Jane Schapiro

Steeped though it is in grief and loss, glory shines through in Jane Schapiro’s new poetry collection, Warbler. As she writes in the book’s epigraph, Tears are the soul bathing itself. There is much melancholy beauty in the book’s dirges, and toward the end, splendor has the last word. In the book’s penultimate poem, azaleas bloom in an explosion of color, from the dark “tangle of shrubs / that spawned such a glorious sight.”

—Rennie McQuilkin, CT Poet Laureate (2015-2018)

Warbler, Jane Schapiro’s new book of poems, is an achingly beautiful paean to family, friendship, love, and memory. It is also a searing reminder that loss, illness, and grief must play their parts as well.

The book has an organic feel, from line to line, from poem to poem. We are pulled into human connection and human frailty. We hear the rabbi say, “Even the blank spaces / are God given” so we keep looking as we move into middle age for peace, for less anxiety, for less pain. Some days “in the mirror, / she’ll spot her former self like a star, / reflecting a fire long since burned out.” And then, “the veil lifts, / reveals the world as a luminous bride . . . / Ah, sweet life. Sweet, inviting life. ”These poems stay in the mind and heart and invite rereading again and again. Warbler sings of hard and beautiful truths in a singular voice.

—Deirdre Neilen, Editor The Healing Muse

What did you receive?

Filed Under: mailbox monday, meme Tagged With: , , ,

COVID Chronicle #3

December 11, 2020 by

I shared some good things last time. I’m not sure I have any to share today.

It’s been a struggle with virtual school, particularly math. My daughter is struggling, the extra help is not helping much and honestly listening to her math teacher day in and day out — I can see why she’s not learning as she should. This teacher honestly has no patience and she speeds through the lessons and it is clear my daughter is not comfortable asking questions. This is not the ideal environment for learning long division or even multiplication. School is on my mind. I want her to do well, but if I push her like her teacher does, I suspect the learning will completely stop.

I did find a multiplication game website to help her learn her multiplication facts, so they come quicker to her. That I hope is helping and feels a little less like school and pushing her. We also found another website with similar lessons to help supplement her lessons in math — thanks to her reading teacher. Yes, I asked her math teacher for help, but received zero response other than get her flash cards. Yes, you heard that right. Very frustrating.

Reading for pleasure has been very slow, but I managed to finish 2 audiobooks this week. I have a ton of poetry submissions to read through for the Gaithersburg Book Festival and the high school poetry contest is getting entries, but at a slow rate. I’ll have to do more outreach soon. Probably this week.

With a long weekend and a couple days off from work, my plans are minimal. I am hoping to resubmit some poems to journals, since i received 3 rejections this week. No new acceptances, and an acceptance from a few months back was never published and it seems the lit mag is MIA — having not published the last 7 months. I signed a contract so now I’m wondering what is to become of the poems they accepted, since they were not published. I’ll have to review that too to find out what the next step is.

This seems like a super long post already, so perhaps I’ll end with this light of my weeks. We were able to go to Gaver Farm and cut down our tree, which I wasn’t expecting because of COVID, and it is now decorated. I feel a little more in the spirit. And our Elf on the Shelf, Spark, has been roaming around the house and getting into some high places this year.

Please share your struggles and your light. I’d love to share and support you.

Filed Under: announcements Tagged With:

Greenlights by Matthew McConaughey (audio)

December 10, 2020 by

Source: Purchased

Audible, 6+ hours

I am an Amazon Affiliate

Greenlights by Matthew McConaughey, narrated by himself, is a look at his 50 years of life and his outlaw code and how he’s lived his life and what he’s learned by living it. If you’re looking for gossip, this is not the book for you. I did like his approach to Hollywood and rebranding himself as an actor — that was definitely a risk and it panned out for him.

His career is one of luck, perseverance, hard work, and self-examination. Unlike many people, he pauses to think about where he is in life and analyze why he feels stagnant or unsatisfied when he seemingly has everything he could ever want. Like those of us who strive to learn and grow, he pauses to examine his life and make changes he thinks will lead him where he wants to go. As he says, sometimes there are red lights in life and sometimes there are yellow and green lights — he notes that a red light at one point in your life might turn green eventually later on. You have to be aware enough to know why the lights are red, move forward and return to those lights to see them turn green when it is the right time.

His early years with his family and his stay in Australia were very eye opening and I can say I applaud him and his upbringing for tolerating that Australian family like he did. I think I would have lost it. He does include some “prescriptions,” bumper stickers, and poems. These are what he considers some insightful advice, which it could be for those who haven’t experienced these teachable moments or who need something to articulate what they’re feeling in a succinct way. It seemed like he was shouting these sections at you in the audio, which got more obnoxious as I listened (but it might be less annoying if you don’t listen to it too long in one sitting). My one main issue here is people will probably take this as life lessons for them, and these will not work in every day people’s lives because they have obligations that are bigger than these seemingly easy fixes he talks about.

Greenlights by Matthew McConaughey is a series of stories that are likely a bit inflated (at least one had to be hyperbole). It was entertaining, but not life affirming or life changing. And while the stories are fun and sometimes outrageous, they are by no means that deep and tell us little beyond what we know about McConaughey and his “outlaw” look at life. I use the “outlaw” term very loosely here. Judging on his performance alone (which was stellar) would be a disservice to the content. I do admire his self-awareness, and that’s something others should take note of and try to incorporate into their lives.

RATING: Tercet

Filed Under: audiobooks, challenges, memoir, New Authors Challenge, purchased, Read in 2020, reviews Tagged With: , ,

Elizabeth: Obstinate Headstrong Girl edited by Christina Boyd (audio)

December 9, 2020 by

Source: Publisher

Audiobook, 10+ hours

I am an Amazon Affiliate

Elizabeth: Obstinate Headstrong Girl edited by Christina Boyd, narrated by Elizabeth Grace, is a delightful collection of short stories written by some of the best Jane Austeneque writers — Joana Starnes, Amy D’Orazio, Jenetta James, Karen Cox, Christina Morland, Elizabeth Adams, Beau North, J. Croft, and Leigh Dreyer. From historic pieces and those set during the time of Austen’s Pride & Prejudice to modern stories in which Elizabeth is an electrical engineering student in a male-dominated field, these authors explore the inner workings of Elizabeth. We see her prejudices and preconceptions, but we also see her flaws, as well as her self-analysis of her own actions and those of others.

Elizabeth Grace is a wonderful narrator, breathing light into each of these Elizabeths and situations. She’s an admirable narrator who becomes a one-woman cast.

“Resistive Currents” by Karen M Cox is one of the more modern tales. Here, we see conundrum of a teaching assistant Mr. Darcy drawn to an intelligent electrical engineering student, Elizabeth, bent on proving to the male-dominated field that she’s a capable student who just wants a fair shot — the same as her male colleagues. First, the title of this story is brilliant given the content, and I love how it plays on the electricity between Elizabeth and Darcy as they navigate the relationship of student and TA in a world where Elizabeth feels she has to continually prove herself worthy. Like this story, Christina Morland’s “Atmospheric Disturbances” explores the tensions that are bound to rise up between two passionate and strong-willed people in love. Every moment of the drawing room is meant to build the tension between these characters that barely know one another — a tension borne of a lack of knowledge between them.

Elizabeth Adams’ “Something Like Regret” brings to life the thoughts of Elizabeth on her visit to Pemberley after her rejection of Mr. Darcy’s proposal at Rosings. It’s a time when many have speculated that she would accept Darcy because of his fortune or because his housekeeper praised his disposition, but as a rational and passionate creature, Elizabeth must make a more intelligent and deeper examination of her rejection of him and many of their exchanges. I love this introspection as she walks about the house and the gardens and how Darcy appears. It is a beautiful story. I love her observations of the changes in him upon first seeing him. She’s so observant here, despite the shock of seeing him. “The Last Blind Date” by Leigh Dreyer is a delightful modern story that reminded me of those awkward dates you have and the tentative exchange you have as strangers until you realize there could be something more. Darcy is not talkative, and Elizabeth is quick to judge, but rather than call the blind date quits, they move ahead with it, tentatively.

Elizabeth: Obstinate Headstrong Girl edited by Christina Boyd, narrated by Elizabeth Grace, is another anthology winner, hitting the stories out of the park with a range of angst, love, prejudice, and pride, but what I loved based about these sweet stories is that we see Elizabeth in all her turmoil and introspection. She’s forced to rethink her past actions, her current actions and behavior, and she forces herself to apologize on more than one occasion. These stories are deep, emotional, and about the roller coaster ride of young love when it is first budding.

RATING: Cinquain

Filed Under: audiobooks, fiction, historical fiction, Read in 2020, review copy, reviews Tagged With: , ,