Recently I was lucky to get my hands on a copy of Nancy Kilgore’s latest novel, Bitter Magic (in 2011 RCWMS published her novel Sea Level). I’ve long been fascinated […]
Books
Women Rise Up
Bodies that menstruate, birth, nurse. Bodies that grieve and sacrifice. Bodies that are infertile. Bodies that are taken advantage of and mistreated. Bodies fighting for survival. Bodies that are broken […]
Marcy Litle reviews Thick by Tressie McMillan Cottom
Tressie McMillan Cottom is a black sociologist and public intellectual. I had never heard of her—which, it turns out, is a significant theme in her book—until I read a review […]
Across the Great Lakes
“Haunting” is a word that comes to mind as I reflect on Lee Zacharias’ new novel. Set largely in the mid-1930’s on Lake Michigan and the harbor town of Frankfort, […]
Events for The Last Straw by Bryant Holsenbeck
As I moved through my friend Bryant Holsenbeck’s new book, The Last Straw, I was struck by its accessibility. The book, ostensibly about Bryant’s journey to rid single-use plastic from […]
Territories of the Soul
Nadia Ellis’ Territories of the Soul: Queered Belonging in the Black Diaspora brilliantly articulates how black diasporic belonging transcends dominant understandings of identity based on locality/time/space. By analyzing the modalities […]
An evening of storytelling with Nancy Corson Carter
On Wednesday, June 27th, I attended a reading by Nancy Carson Carter on her new book, The Never-Quite Ending War: A WWII GI Daughter’s Stories. Nancy illuminated stories of her […]
Swimming Between Worlds
I confess, much as I’m drawn to a bottle of wine with a provocative label, I’m also attracted to a book with high-profile accolades. So, when I was handed a […]
Art-Party and Fundraiser for Bryant Holsenbeck’s Book, “The Last Straw”
When people are gathered for an art party, one may imagine paint, canvases, and brushes, or at least some paper and scissors. Since Bryant Holsenbeck was involved, something would be […]
Saving Bobby
On average, 115 Americans die every day from an opioid overdose.[1] That is one American every 12.5 minutes, a staggering statistic. As a public health professional with over a decade experience […]
Ursula K. Le Guin
Once upon a time I used Ursula K. Le Guin’s A Wizard of Earthsea in a first-year writing class centered on the theme of what makes a hero. I loved […]
Whiskey & Ribbons: A Novel
Click here to read RCWMS Communications Director Meghan Florian’s review of Whiskey & Ribbons for The Englewood Review of Books. Whiskey & Ribbons, Leesa Cross-Smith’s first novel, is a love story folded inside […]
The Middle of Things: Essays
In the tradition of classic essayists from Virginia Woolf to Annie Dillard, Meghan Florian combines personal narrative with careful analysis, taking the ordinary material of undramatic daily life and distilling […]
I Await the Devil’s Coming
When a friend handed me I Await the Devil’s Coming, a slim and red-covered volume, she was fairly reticent about its content. “Looks cool,” I commented. “What’s it about?” She […]
From #BlackLivesMatter to Black Liberation
One of the most useful terms I’ve learned, passed on to me by Kari Barclay, is “Kingsplaining.” It’s a verb that describes the process by which people in power use […]
Young Adult Lit
I don’t believe in guilty pleasures. I used to defend myself when caught on my university campus with a book marketed to teenagers propped in my lap, but honestly, who […]
Wild Mountain
In Wild Mountain, Mona Duval has concocted a tidy life for herself in the rural town of Wild Mountain, Vermont. Escaped (mostly) from a bad marriage, she runs a general store […]
The Handmaid’s Tale
I recently found a used copy of The Handmaid’s Tale at a local library book sale. In preparation for Hulu’s television adaptation I decided it was finally time to fill […]
Women’s Bodies as Battlefield
I was speaking with a friend last week about watching the third presidential debate. She remarked that she wanted to skip it, but would probably watch to remind herself that […]
Faithfully Feminist
“Survival is a creative act,” Erica Granados De La Rosa writes in her essay, “What Has Remained.” Survival is a creative act. And it is from such creation, and Creation, […]
Something New
I love food. Growing it, cooking it, eating it, sharing it with friends. I also love to read, so it should come as no surprise that when I came across Lucy […]
The Humble Essay
As memoir has surged in popularity, this other beloved nonfiction form, the essay, seems to go in and out of style. Critics alternately lament the demise or herald the resurgence […]
Summer Reading Retrospective
This summer I set out to read only books by women. This was not hard to do, though I struggled once or twice to maintain my commitment when I came […]
Searching for Sunday
In the 70’s, we boomers raged and sneered about the Generation Gap. Those we now call ‘the greatest generation’ appeared to us youngsters as blind to the present and busy […]