I didn’t expect to like this book. I started it only because the author is a fellow board member at RCWMS and reading it seemed like the congenial thing to […]
Books
God’s Hotel
I wish God’s Hotel were a book with pictures. No matter how precise Victoria Sweet’s descriptions, the world her words conjure is difficult to imagine. A hospital that looks more like a […]
On Immunity: An Inoculation
It seems like every time I turn around these days I run into another story about vaccination. To me the message seems clear: everyone without a contraindicating medical issue should […]
Wild: From Lost to Found on the Pacific Crest Trail
I’m usually skeptical about film adaptations of my favorite books, but after laughing and crying my way through reading Wild last fall, I was thrilled to learn the film was coming out […]
Citizen: An American Lyric
Those unfamiliar with the breadth of contemporary poetry may be surprised when they crack the cover of Claudia Rankine’s Citizen: An American Lyric. A collage of prose poems, short essays, and images, Citizen often […]
Imaging My Inner Fire
If any of your New Year’s resolutions include creative and artistic pursuits, you’ll find a welcome companion in Martha Jane Petersen’s Imaging My Inner Fire: Finding My Path Through Creating Art. […]
The New Jim Crow
Last fall, a small group of women at RCWMS read The New Jim Crow together over several weeks. This was after the shooting of Michael Brown, before decisions by grand juries not […]
Bad Feminist
“In embracing the messiness of feminism as a lived, embodied thing, rather than stopping short with an abstract concept or ideology, Gay creates space to embark on a wider conversation, […]
The Empathy Exams
Lately, every time I go online I see another article by or about Leslie Jamison. Her essay collection, The Empathy Exams, which won the Graywolf Press Nonfiction Prize, was released this […]
The Faraway Nearby
I just finished Rebecca Solnit’s luminous new book, The Faraway Nearby. It is so brimming with breathtaking passages that I am tempted to just line up quotations so that you can […]
Love Has No Borders
Rev. Angie Wright’s Love Has No Borders: How Faith Leaders Resisted Alabama’s Harsh Immigration Law is a visual and written record of public protests by Alabama faith leaders after their state legislature […]
Dog Songs
“What would this world be like without dogs?” asks Mary Oliver in her newest collection of poems, Dog Songs. I, for one, do not wish to ever know the answer to […]
Ann Patchett
I first encountered Ann Patchett when my book club chose her third novel, The Magician’s Assistant, for our monthly conversation. This quirky novel about Sabine, the widowed assistant to her magician […]
Sustaining Simplicity
In terms of possessions and money, what do you really need to live a good life? How much is enough? If you have less stuff, can you do more with […]
Black Milk: On the Conflicting Demands of Writing, Creativity, and Motherhood
What is necessary for a writing life? This is the question that Elif Shafak, one of Turkey’s most celebrated authors, wrestles with in her spiritual memoir, Black Milk: On the Conflicting […]
The Sapphires
“It’s 1968 and four young, talented Australian Aboriginal girls learn about love, friendship and war when their all girl group The Sapphires entertain the US troops in Vietnam.” (IMDB) The Sapphires, […]
Pastrix: The Cranky, Beautiful Faith of a Sinner and Saint
“It’s small, it’s surprising, and it’s a little profane, but it’s the real thing” (p. 162). Lutheran pastor Nadia Bolz-Weber uses these words to speak of the way that the reign of […]
Take This Bread: A Radical Conversion
Food and faith are a natural combination. A central element of Christianity, after all, is taking communion, eating bread and drinking wine. This eating and drinking is embraced by Jesus […]