Awards!

I was very fortunate to receive five awards recently which I would like to acknowledge. I received this Heartfelt Award from Sheila at Bookjourney. Sheila is one of those bloggers whose energy could power up a major city. Here’s what it says: Do you reach for a cup of cocoa or tea when you’re relaxing, [...]

Sunday Salon – Review of “The Girl With The Dragon Tattoo” by Stieg Larsson

This book was originally published in Sweden with the more appropriate title, “Men Who Hate Women.” Sexual and physical abuse of women play a significant part in the story. While the abuse is not quite as central as in, e.g. The Blue Notebook, it is not a minor element of the plot. Mikael Blomkvist, 42, [...]

August 29, 1920 – Birthday of Charlie Parker

Charles “Bird” Parker, Jr. was an American jazz saxophonist and composer who is considered one of the most innovative and influential jazz musicians in American history. He began to play the saxophone at age eleven, and by age twenty was redefining modern jazz through the development of bebop. Apparently he could memorize an arrangement after [...]

August 28, 1963 – Martin Luther King, Jr. Delivers His “I Have A Dream” Speech

I have a dream that one day this nation will rise up and live out the true meaning of its creed: “We hold these truths to be self-evident: that all men are created equal.” I have a dream that one day on the red hills of Georgia the sons of former slaves and the sons [...]

Weekly Geeks 2009-32: Why Haven’t I Read This Yet?

This week’s meme from Weekly Geeks is “Why Haven’t I Read This Yet?”: I think just about every reader has a least one book that they’ve been meaning to read for awhile (months or even years) but, for one reason or another, they just haven’t gotten around to it. Maybe it’s a book a friend [...]

Getting Shortlisted for Awards: The Upside (e.g., Using the Authors’ Portapotty) and The Downside (e.g., Not Winning)

Last week, I featured a guest post by author Linda Gillard, “Always A Bridesmaid….” . In that post, Linda wrote about her book STAR GAZING being shortlisted for the inaugural Robin Jenkins Literary Award, the UK’s first environmental book award. She was to find out if her book won at this week’s Edinburgh Book Festival.… [...]

Review of “Cotton Comes to Harlem,” by Chester Himes

This book, published in 1965, was listed by Newsweek as one of the fifty books that “define our times.” The article, “What to Read Now. And Why,” explains: “What we do need, in a world with precious little time to read (and think), is to know which books—new or old, fiction or nonfiction—open a window [...]

Review of “Savvy,” by Ingrid Law

This engaging book for young adults is a coming of age story narrated by Mississippi, or “Mibs,” Beaumont, who is about to have her thirteenth birthday. Thirteen is the age when her family members find out their “savvies,” or special talents. This talent is more than just a knack, however; her brother Rocket activates electrical [...]

Sunday Salon – Thoughts About The People of Color Challenge, Bebe Moore Campbell, and Me

Yesterday I posted a review of a memoir by Bebe Moore Campbell in which I wrote that I enjoyed it because we seemed to share so many memories. I didn’t find worth mentioning that Bebe Moore Campbell was black and I am white. Here is why. So much of what she wrote was about being [...]

Review of “Sweet Summer: Growing Up With and Without My Dad,” by Bebe Moore Campbell

Bebe Moore Campbell, who suffered an untimely death from brain cancer in 2005, was from my same generation. Thus in reading her heart-warming memoir, I found that many of her memories of growing up were similar to mine. This made the book very fun for me to read. She also had an engaging way of [...]