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Fixed Star by Suzanne Frischkorn

November 16, 2022 by

Source: Purchased
Paperback, 72 pgs.
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Fixed Star by Suzanne Frischkorn is an amalgam of found poetry and structure poems mirroring the culture and identity that many of us have over time. We find that there are fixed points in our culture and identity and that there also are found parts of those segments of ourselves that we incorporate willingly. There’s a deep restlessness in each of these poems as they deftly move from one to the next, when reading in succession, and it is a skill to be admired.

Frischkorn’s opening poem, “Cuban Polymita,” begins the collection with: “Birth cleaved me in half” If that line alone doesn’t give you a sense of restlessness, the rest of the collection certainly will. It is from this instant of birth in which the narrator begins to move away from her origins: “A lace dress. A first language./All myths once we move north./” (“II”, pg. 2) In these earlier poems, the narrator is looking for the truth in those myths, unraveling the mystery of her heritage. But the narrator is keenly aware that to unravel these hidden pasts is also likely to reveal “what is tarnished,” and to question is it worth the risk?

Once I Dove Into the Caribbean Sea (pg. 36)
Isla de Cozumel, ’93

Cuba, its tide strove to draw me towards you and failed. I departed with a smooth shell and wisps of surrogate sky. How cool marble caressed my bare soles, how heat plied my skin bronze. Not until I slide the silver bracelets from my wrist will the strains of your shore ebb.

Frischkorn’s Fixed Star is an attempt to excavate the movement from past to present to pinpoint the evolution, to understand something that was lost. In that adventure toward discovery, a restlessness propels each of these poems forward and back into the past again, signaling the push and the pull of who and what has birthed us to who and what we become.

RATING: Cinquain

Other Reviews:

About the Poet:

Suzanne Frischkorn is the author of Fixed Star (JackLeg Press, September 2022) as well as the books, Girl on a Bridge, and Lit Windowpane (both from Main Street Rag Press), and the chapbooks American Flamingo, Spring Tide, Red Paper Flower, Exhale, and The Tactile Sense.

She is the recipient of The Writer’s Center Emerging Writers Fellowship for her book Lit Windowpane, the Aldrich Poetry Award for her chapbook Spring Tide, selected by Mary Oliver, and an Individual Artist Fellowship from the Connecticut Commission on Culture & Tourism.

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Brave Like Mom by Monica Acker

November 3, 2022 by

Source: Media Masters Publicity
Hardcover, 32 pgs.
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Brave Like Mom by Monica Acker, illustrated by Paran Kim, is a story of two young girls whose mom is battling cancer and her girls see her as strong and brave. They want to be like her and not shed tears. But these girls are strong when they strive to climb walls, ride horses, and so much more. But their mom reminds them that it is ok to be scared and to cry.

Acker does a good job of showing how mom is brave for her girls, but also how neighbors, their dad, and others help her every day. What the girls see is the actions of their mother, not the helping hands. The illustrations are simple and colorful.

What I wanted was less telling and more showing of this relationship between the kids and the mother and the family in general. Brave Like Mom by Monica Acker, illustrated by Paran Kim, does have a great story with advice for young children of parents struggling with illness.

RATING: Tercet

About the Author:

Monica Acker is a writer and educator. She holds a BA in creative arts and a MAT degree in childhood education. Monica is a member of SCBWI, 12×12, and Children’s Book Insider. She lives in Reading, Massachusetts, with her family.

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Why We Never Visited the Elms by Marianne Szlyk

November 2, 2022 by

Source: Purchased
Paperback, 37 pgs.
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Why We Never Visited the Elms by Marianne Szlyk are poems that explore what could have been to what is now. Each poem is a journey, a microcosm of the larger journey the collection takes the reader on. The journey begins with the narrator and her mother and why they never visited Our Lady of the Elms, where her mother went to college. She reminisces about the stories she heard and how the college was nestled into a neighborhood. There’s almost a romanticism in these stories, but Szlyk reminds us that not all is rosy in that past, just like it isn’t in the present. “Every Friday the cafeteria would serve/slices of greasy hamburg pizza/that Mom would have pretended to eat//had we stopped by her old school.//” (pg. 3-4)

Just as in “Fishing,” the narrator says, “The surface hides mud, weeds, a murder victim./No one fishes now …” (pg. 5) We look back on our own histories with fondness, even if there is darkness in those old streets and rivers. We can look at those places now with a distance, glossing over a darkness and lifting out the good parts. Szlyk has a knack for exploring the what ifs and that what weres and the what ares. Time slips easily in these poems, and readers can slip behind the curtains to explore places in different times to see change and what stays the same.

Why We Never Visited the Elms by Marianne Szlyk is a time slip. Readers will love the optimism Szlyk imbues her poems with, reminding us that we should focus on the light we have and not the darkest parts of our lives.

RATING: Quatrain

Other Reviews:

About the Poet:

Marianne Szlyk’s most recent book is Poetry en Plein Air (Pony One Dog Press, 2020). Her poems have appeared in Verse-Virtual, the Red Eft Poetry Review, the Trouvaille Review, and other journals/websites. Some poems have been translated into Polish, Italian, and Cherokee. She lives in the D.C. area with the wry poet and flash fiction writer Ethan Goffman and their elderly cat.

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Love the Dark Days by Ira Mathur

October 27, 2022 by

Source: the author
Paperback, 232 pgs.
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Love the Dark Days by Ira Mathur is a surreal memoir that weaves between a distant past in post-colonial India and ancestral stories and a married woman looking for guidance on writing her own memoir. The narrative digs deep into the past of her ancestry pulling the thread of pain forward into her present. Mathur says in more than one place that she doesn’t feel like she belongs. She’s looking throughout the memoir for her place in the world.

This sense of drift carries readers through the memoir, which reads like a nightmare in places. Her grandmother Burrimummy has fits of anger and sadness, and her rages seem like a woman battling mental illness, though that isn’t outwardly articulated. Shifting from India to Trinidad and other places, Mathur is weaving place with family history, much of it violent and abusive. Whether subject to emotional abuse and dejection or the physical abuse her mother felt as a child at the hands of her own mother, these instances reverberate throughout the female line in the family. These women are damaged and traumatized, but it is unclear if these women  ever sought help or tried to break the cycle.

“When she is angry like this, I don’t know what to feel. I hate it when she thrashes me but am sadder when she doesn’t notice me at all.”

“The servants, sensing my lower status, are careless with me.”

“I’m too dark, too rebellious.”

Mathur’s view of herself is skewed from an early age, and she carries that doubt with her as she matures. She is never good enough. She even says, “Twenty-four years, and in some ways, nothing had changed for me.” But later as she’s seeking to understand this generational violence and neglect, she absolves everyone of responsibility.

“They are like Russian dolls. I understand now. Mummy blames Burrimummy for being unkind. Burrimummy blames Mumma for ill-treating her, and Mumma blames Sadrunissa for thrashing her. They all took out whatever anger they felt over their own lives on their daughters. no one is responsible.”

The sections when Mathur is interacting with poet Sir Derek Walcott are overly long and fawning of a poet whom she admits was accused of harassing women. Her admiration of his poetry is clear, and she does recognize his faults, but if these scenes were meant to tie in with her family’s saga, they did not fit seamlessly into the narrative. They often pulled me out of her story and made me wonder when she would get back to her family. When she does get back to her family, there are still questions that linger about her husband’s behavior, his family’s acceptance/rejection of her, and her relationship with her own children that remain unanswered. Perhaps that’s a future memoir?

In many ways, this memoir is about a woman still coming to terms with her trauma. Intimate, harrowing, and sad, Mathur’s memoir reminds us that “when brutality is normalized, it is passed on, like a legacy, like DNA.” Love the Dark Days by Ira Mathur is most engaging when she speaks about her family and its legacy and its impact on her as a woman and successful journalist.

RATING: Tercet

About the Author:

Ira Mathur is an Indian born Caribbean freelance journalist/writer working in radio, television and print in Trinidad, West Indies. She also is currently a Sunday Guardian columnist and feature writer. Follow her on Instagram, Twitter, and LinkedIn.

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Nothing You Build Here, Belongs Here by Sara Cahill Marron

October 25, 2022 by

Source: Purchased
Paperback, 44 pgs.
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Nothing You Build Here, Belongs Here by Sara Cahill Marron is a collection that explores the need to mark our presence in this life, even as we know that it is all impermanent and often fades.

The opening poem “The Three Shades” reflects this impermanence and the unpredictability of what stays and what fades into the dark. Amid the detritus of modern life (Styrofoam cups et. al.), there is still life here, and we are watching it fade, struggle, and die. It’s a sad emptiness to see life dissipate even in anonymity.

The pandemic clearly influences many of these poems and the desire to save others is prevalent in some, but there’s also this commentary on the disconnect from others. “Please/please stay … drown out news,” the narrator in “An Infant Died Today in Illinois” says, but it is clear that the news cannot be ignored and the inevitability of death is ever present.

Marron is exploring the disconnect between us during the pandemic in the tension with our need for connection. Whether it is an overly sharing email to a hiring manager or an imagined conversation with our eavesdropping cellphone (which I suspect sent her on a journey that culminated in her newest book, Call Me Spes), Marron gives readers a lot to think about in terms of the inevitability of death, our desire for connection and to be seen, and the absence of humanity.

Nothing You Build Here, Belongs Here by Sara Cahill Marron reminds us that many times “the enemy is internal,” whether it is the virus that can infect and kill us, the inequality we propagate, or any other selfishness that infects society and its ability to grow and evolve together in divine love and connection. There is so much to love about this collection.

RATING: Cinquain

About the Poet:

Sara Cahill Marron, native Virginian and Long Island resident, is the author of Reasons for the Long Tu’m (Broadstone Books, 2018), Nothing You Build Here, Belongs Here (Kelsay Books 2021), and Call Me Spes (MadHat Press 2022). She is the Associate Editor of Beltway Poetry Quarterly and publisher at Beltway Editions. Her work has been published widely in literary magazines and journals; a full list is available here. Sara also hosts virtual readings for Beltway Poetry Quarterly with her partner in poetry, Indran Amirthanayagam and teaches poetry in modern discourse programs for teens at the public library in Patchogue, NY. Follow her on Facebook, Twitter and Instagram.

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The Wehrwolf by Alma Katsu (audio)

October 20, 2022 by

Source: Purchase
Audible, 2+ hrs.
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It’s been a Grimm’s Brothers kind of month of reading for me.

The Wehrwolf by Alma Katsu, narrated by Jim Boeven, weaves in myth from Germanic folklore about wolves and sets it just nearing the end of WWII.

Even as Berlin tries to tell its people that the war is not over, even the villages outside the cities can sense the tide is not in the motherland’s favor.

Uwe Fuchs has always considered himself a weakling and unworthy as he was unable to serve for the Reich and stayed behind to care for his own ailing mother. Despite his lot, he cared for his daughter and loved to share with her the dark fairy tales of the wood and wolves, though he feared she missed the point that the wolves represented the bad in the world. But in many ways it seems he missed the point as well.

The narration by Boeven was a bit stilted in the audio, which kept me from really falling into Katsu’s story fully. That was a real drawback for me. But the story itself is definitely a reaction to the political climate we find ourselves in and how it mirrors that of Nazi Germany with its fervor and us vs. them focus. The story itself is a cautionary tale that has roots in reality.

Katsu has knack for creating characters who are flawed and find themselves in otherworldly situations. Uwe is definitely flawed and those flaws are amplified by what happens to him, especially when he takes matters into his hands with the village fighters against the Allies in an effort to be part of the community. Will he be a man who cannot return to his former life?

The Wehrwolf by Alma Katsu, narrated by Jim Boeven, is a short story set in a historical period that highlighted much of the worst in humanity from eugenics to mass extinction efforts. Uwe is a man who is struggling with his own place in society and his community until he finds his pack. But will his one decision to join those working against the allies at the end of the war ruin his life forever?

RATING: Quatrain

Other Reviews:

About the Author:

Alma Katsu is the author of The Taker, The Reckoning, and The Descent. She has been a signature reviewer for Publishers Weekly and a contributor to The Huffington Post. She is a graduate of the Master’s writing program at the Johns Hopkins University and received her bachelor’s degree from Brandeis University. Prior to the publication of her first novel, Katsu had a long career as a senior intelligence analyst for several US agencies and is currently a senior analyst for a think tank. She lives outside of Washington, DC, with her husband.

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Fairy Tale by Stephen King (audio)

October 19, 2022 by

Source: Purchased
Audible, 24+ hrs.
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Fairy Tale by Stephen King, narrated by Seth Numrich and a bit by King himself, is a dark Gothic story in the tradition of the Brothers Grimm. In a parallel world beneath an Howard Bowditch‘s shed, Charlie Reade‘s worldview and his promise to be a better man if only his father would stop drinking alcohol. Reade’s blossoming relationship with Mr. Bowditch is touching and odd all at once, but I expect nothing less. But the fairy tale doesn’t begin until Reade learns about what’s in the shed and what it could possibly mean for the dog, Radar, they love.

In an adventure that Reade never expected to have when he sought to save the life of an old dog, he learns a great deal about human frailty and how dreams and ideals do little in times of crisis. Even Mr. Bowditch was aware of those failings, noting that cowards bring gifts. King is so adept at creating flawed characters and adventures to strange worlds where young men must test their metal against the deep dark evil of an unknown and scary place.

Reade comes of age in this story and he is not as too-good-to-be-true as he seems. He faces untenable situations and tough choices throughout his travels. I don’t want to give too much away, but the character not only evolves but even more clearly understands his own limitations. Dark and horrible things happen here, and are their moments of crassness from the evil characters that make you cringe, of course. These elements make this dark world seem even more real.

Anyone who knows me, knows I love reading Stephen King’s books. Not all of them capture my full attention, even if I love them. I even conned my friend Anna (aka Diary of an Eccentric) to read my favorite King book (IT) in a read-a-long. But some of King’s books have not totally absorbed me from start to finish like IT. Fairy Tale is an exception and has entered the pantheon of King favorites.

RATING: Cinquain

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About the Author:

Stephen King is the author of more than fifty books, all of them worldwide bestsellers. His recent work includes Doctor Sleep and Under the Dome, now a major TV miniseries on CBS. His novel 11/22/63 was named a top ten book of 2011 by The New York Times Book Review and won the Los Angeles Times Book Prize for Mystery/Thriller as well as the Best Hardcover Book Award from the International Thriller Writers Association. He is the recipient of the 2003 National Book Foundation Medal for Distinguished Contribution to American Letters. He lives in Bangor, Maine, with his wife, novelist Tabitha King.

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A Beginner’s Guide to Being Human by Matt Forrest Esenwine, illustrated by Andre Ceolin

October 18, 2022 by

Source: Media Masters Publicity
Hardcover, 32 pgs.
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A Beginner’s Guide to Being Human by Matt Forrest Esenwine, illustrated by Andre Ceolin is a book for ages 4-8, but I bet there are some adults who could use this lesson in empathy and compassion. I loved that this picture book opens with a discussion of what it means to be human. It also explains what family means and that it doesn’t necessarily have to mean you are only related by blood. This opens the door to children, allowing them to see that adopted children and more are families, too.

Esenwine offers “pro tips” throughout the book to help kids navigate their emotions and social situations in which they normally would just react on instinct. He demonstrates how sometimes situations arise because of emotion and that we have to be able to recognize it and adapt to help others when we can. This ability to empathize will enable kids to show compassion for others. Compassion is something every child should learn at a young age, and some adults should be re-taught the concept.

The illustrations show a diverse group of students, which is another fantastic way to bring home the diversity of humanity. The Golden Rule is mentioned about mid-way through the book, but it does seem to come out of nowhere. So a little more contest or a child talking to a family member or a teacher about it, might have been less awkward in the narrative.

Overall, the illustrations where the kids are working out differences or situations themselves after learning these terms are the most effective. A Beginner’s Guide to Being Human by Matt Forrest Esenwine, illustrated by Andre Ceolin, definitely provides young kids, their parents, and teachers with tools they will need to help children navigate social interactions and other situations.

RATING: Quatrain

**Be sure to enter the author’s giveaway***

About the Author:

Matt Forrest Esenwine is an author and poet from Warner, New Hampshire. His debut picture book, Flashlight Night (Boyds Mills Press, 2017) was selected by the New York Public Library as one of the Best Books for Kids of 2017. His picture book Once Upon Another Time (Beaming Books, 2021), co-authored with Charles Ghigna, was deemed “a necessary addition to picture book collections” by ALA’s Booklist. His poetry can be found in numerous anthologies including The National Geographic Book of Nature Poetry (National Geographic Children’s Books, 2015) and Construction People (Wordsong, 2020).

About the Illustrator:
André Ceolin studied at the School of Visual Arts in New York City. He has illustrated over twenty books for children. André lives in Brazil with his family.

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Rooted and Winged by Luanne Castle

October 13, 2022 by

Source: Purchased
Paperback, 68 pgs.
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Rooted and Winged by Luanne Castle, on tour with Poetic Book Tours, speaks to the human condition, a need for feeling rooted to a home and the need to expand our wings and fly beyond what we’ve known and experienced. The tension of this is felt throughout the collection, but as the poems evolve there’s a sense that both things are possible even if we stay rooted in our families and communities.

One of my favorites in this collection is “How to Create a Family Myth” in which a grandfather seems like he’s larger than life building cities, but in truth, the narrator who looks like her great-grandmother is fascinated by a story in which she takes a whip from a man who is beating a horse and whips him. I love that there’s this magical quality of traveling through time to see this young, brave woman empathizing with the pain of the horse and teaching a man what it is like to be beaten. So many wider implications of this bravery, and how we all wish to be that brave in our convictions.

Birds are prominent as are the poet’s family members. The narrator is building her nest with these twigs of stories and she’s holding those ancestors close, even though many have flown away in death. Like these birds the saguaro is mentioned multiple times, and in reading these poems the candelabra shaped, tree-like cactus (mostly found in Arizona’s Sonoran Desert) is symbolic. It can be prickly, but it bears a sweet fruit, and isn’t that what family and family stories and memories are — bittersweet.

In “Why We Wait for Rain,” the poet says, “We wait to run through wet branches and shake/drops from our shoulders, caught/in the sharp unmistakable fragrance//wanting it to pool inside us in reservoir.” When looking back on the past, we can feel the joy of those moments running through rain with siblings or friends, but as life has moved forward, those memories also can be sad because they are in the past and perhaps we have lost touch with those we loved or they have passed away, or their loss is from some argument.

Whatever the loss may stem from, it doesn’t matter because our memories of them always speak to us from the deep well of our emotion. “if I haul memory from this grave/the transmigration into pulp continues” (“Into Pulp”, pg. 27)

Rooted and Winged by Luanne Castle is a gorgeous collection rooted in the Arizona desert and the past, but it also takes flight on the wings of memory and hope. Don’t miss this collection.

RATING: Cinquain

OTHER Reviews:

About the Poet:

Luanne Castle’s new poetry collection is Rooted and Winged (Finishing Line Press). Kin Types (Finishing Line Press), a chapbook of poetry and flash nonfiction, was a finalist for the Eric Hoffer Award. Her first collection of poetry, Doll God (Aldrich), won the New Mexico-Arizona Book Award for Poetry. Luanne’s Pushcart and Best of the Net-nominated poetry and prose have appeared in Copper Nickel, American Journal of Poetry, Pleiades, Tipton Poetry Review, River Teeth, TAB, Verse Daily, Glass: A Journal of Poetry, Saranac Review, Grist, and other journals.

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Summonings by Raena Shirali

October 12, 2022 by

Source: Caitlin Hamilton Marketing & Publicity
Paperback, 122 pgs.
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Summonings by Raena Shirali is an urgent calling of female personas in an effort to highlight the continued practice of daayan (witch) hunting in India. But even as Shirali conjures the spirits of these women, she is also summoning her own power as a westernized Indian woman to empathize and call attention to this practice and the unfair targeting of women.

As she points out in the foreword, “India is the world’s most dangerous country for women … The only Western nation in the top 10 was the United States…”

Shirali is fully aware that as a westernized Indian woman there is “distance/between self & subject.” (“on projection,” pg. 12) Her poems aim to bring these women into full-bodied poems based on what she knows about these “witches,” but it is hard to be a spirit without the lens of one’s own culture and upbringing. This mirrors her poem “ojha : rituals” where she questions what “truth” is, especially when it becomes subjective.

These poems are multi-layered and the longer you sit with these lines and images, the more you realize these stories are a conjuring of female power from ancestors and modern women who face oppression. Even as there is a reach for feminine power, there’s also a self-hatred Shirali struggles with: “i was shit & wanted/to be shit. & then i swallowed pretense. swallowed/countries” (“at first, trying to reach those accused” pg. 27) and in “summoning : retreat” (pg. 31) “digging in/the old-world soil/for common root.”

Shirali offers a “different way to look at the same/old face.” (“daayan gets her name” pg. 35) In summoning the spirits of these women, these so-called witches, she’s rewriting the narrative to include their truth, not just the stories that have been told about them. Her poems are when “the earth began to shift”(“daayan & the mountains : ii pg. 58-9). Summonings by Raena Shirali is asking us to reexamine who gets to ask, who answers, and who tells the story.

RATING: Quatrain

About the Poet:

Raena Shirali is the author of two collections of poetry. Her first book, GILT (YesYes Books, 2017), won the 2018 Milt Kessler Poetry Book Award, and her second, summonings (Black Lawrence Press, 2022), won the 2021 Hudson Prize. Winner of a Pushcart Prize & a former Philip Roth Resident at Bucknell University, Shirali is also the recipient of prizes and honors from VIDA, Gulf Coast, Boston Review, & Cosmonauts Avenue. Formerly a Co-Editor-in-Chief of Muzzle Magazine, Shirali now serves as Faculty Advisor for Folio—a literary magazine dedicated to publishing works by undergraduate students at the national level. She holds an MFA in Poetry from The Ohio State University and is an Assistant Professor of English at Holy Family University. The Indian American poet was raised in Charleston, South Carolina, and now lives in Philadelphia.

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Dear Wild Child by Wallace J. Nichols and Wallace Grayce Nichols, illustrated by Drew Beckmeyer

October 11, 2022 by

Source: Media Masters Publicity
Hardcover, 32 pgs.
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Dear Wild Child: You Carry Your Home Inside You by Wallace J. Nichols and Dr. Wallace Grayce Nichols, illustrated by Drew Beckmeyer, is based on a letter from a father to a grown daughter after the 2020 CZU Lightning Complex Fires destroyed her childhood home on the Slow Coast north of Santa Cruz, California, following a brilliant lightning storm.

The book opens before the birth of the child in the story, as the parents are planning and designing their home in the redwoods. The illustration of the house as a patchwork of trees is beautiful and abstract. Opening up to the inside of the home, it’s cozy and filled with books and music and love. Like the strength of the trees making up the floors and walls of the house, the young girl grows stronger each day, learning to sing, and enjoy nature, and explore all that the woods has.

Beckmeyer lends his skills as an imaginative artist with crayons (or at least it gives that child-like impression). His illustrations are deep and textured, resembling the crayon wax that is left behind on the page when a child colors. This effect ensures readers will see the trees as three-dimensional and coarse with bark.

Dear Wild Child: You Carry Your Home Inside You by Wallace J. Nichols and Dr. Wallace Grayce Nichols, illustrated by Drew Beckmeyer, shares the beauty of a home filled with love, and though it may no longer exist in physical form, all of that love and those memories are carried inside that “wild child.” While loss can be extremely devastating, this books illustrates the beauty of memory and love, as well as that beauty in destructive forces.

RATING: Cinquain

***To help those communities impacted by these destructive wildfires, please consider helping After the Fire.***

About the Authors and Illustrator:

Wallace Grayce Nichols is a student of sustainable design, problem solver, and water lover. Her father, Dr. Wallace J. Nichols, is a marine biologist and the author of the bestselling book Blue Mind: The Surprising Science That Shows How Being Near, In, On, or Under Water Can Make You Happier, Healthier, More Connected, and Better at What You Do. Home is the slow coast of California. Drew Beckmeyer is a fine artist, illustrator, and elementary school teacher. He lives in Northern California.
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The Attic on Queen Street by Karen White

October 5, 2022 by

Source: Publisher
Paperback, 416 pgs.
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**don’t read this one until you’ve read the others**

The Attic on Queen Street by Karen White is the seventh and last book in this ghostly mystery series. Melanie and Jack Trenholm are not in a good place at the start of this one. He’s no longer living in the Tradd Street home and they are sharing custody of their twins, while his daughter, Nola, stayed with Melanie. It’s clear that there is some tension between them, but the love they share and the heat are still present, even if they choose to ignore it.

“…faces of my children and Jack stared out at me from the computer’s background wallpaper, a reminder of everything we had lost. Or maybe we had just misplaced it.” (from ARC)

In this story, Melanie is trying to help Veronica, an old friend, solve the murder of her sister, which has been a cold case since their college days. Veronica’s husband, however, is eager to move out of their house and into a new place, as well as close the book on his sister-in-law’s unsolved murder. As with all other books, ghosts are showing up, leaving things in places they shouldn’t, and making things a little difficult for Melanie who is a reluctant communicator with the dead.

In the midst of this mystery, Marc Longo makes another appearance, and desperation has Jack and Melanie agreeing to be under the same roof and allow filming on the book Marc stole from Jack to begin in their house. You can imagine what kind of tension there will be.

The Attic on Queen Street by Karen White has everything I’ve loved about this series from the beginning – ghosts, mysteries, and complicated relationships. I’m so glad this ended happily, and I cannot wait for the New Orleans spinoff series to begin.

RATING: Cinquain

Other Reviews of the Series:

Other Books by Karen White:

About the Author:

Karen White is a New York Times and USA Today bestselling author and currently writes what she refers to as ‘grit lit’—Southern women’s fiction—and has also expanded her horizons into writing a mystery series set in Charleston, South Carolina. Karen hails from a long line of Southerners but spent most of her growing up years in London, England and is a graduate of the American School in London. When not writing, she spends her time reading, scrapbooking, playing piano, and avoiding cooking. She currently lives near Atlanta, Georgia with her husband and two children, and two spoiled Havanese dogs.

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