🌟🌟🌟🌟💫 Are we exposed by, defined by, the worst thing we’ve ever done? Do our actions teach the world how to label us, hate us, mistrust us — or are we better than that, all of us, people who are struggling, who mess up (often royally), who often mean well,…
🌟🌟🌟🌟🌟 This powerful book is written by a self-proclaimed (admittedly tongue-in-cheek) “Master of Feelings”, Dr. Marc Brackett, a professor focusing on Emotional Intelligence, and in particular, the perhaps lesser-known practice of emotional regulation. We cannot control the situations we find ourselves in, but we can learn to manage (that is,…
🌟🌟🌟🌟🌟➕ Finally getting to this incredibly well-received book, it’s clear what all the praise was about. This is an incredible read — a saga really, about love and loss and what a human can bear. When the absolute worst is your new reality, how does one envision hope, then reach…
🌟🌟🌟🌟💫 A true story, based on the fascinating life story of Anna, a Norwegian woman, now seventy years old, who for decades has spent each spring-time tending to the nesting needs of eider ducks on the remote island of Fjærøy, off the coast of Norway, just south of the Arctic.…
🌟🌟🌟🌟🌟 The second book I have read from this author, each of which I have loved. “Needle Lake” is surprisingly tender, intensely atmospheric, and utterly compelling — with a main protagonist as heart-tuggingly authentic as an imagined character can possibly be. Based in a small town north of Seattle, Washington,…
🌟🌟🌟🌟🌟 An utterly charming and mostly unexpected treat, best described as the love child of ‘The Durrells’, ‘Pride and Prejudice’, and an add-your-own-favorite cozy mystery. Set on the idyllic island of Corfu in the year 1898, the story is told by Minnie Harper, a smart and restrained thirty-three year old…
🌟🌟🌟🌟🌟➕ A memoir unlike any you will read, this is a gorgeously written, unputdownable look at the life of Maggie O’Farrell, one of my favorite novelists, and in particular, the seventeen times this particular life has almost ended. If Maggie appears to have more than the “normal” amount of brushes…
🌟🌟🌟🌟 A lively cozy mystery featuring the colorful cast of characters introduced in the first Meredith Island mystery, “Secrets in the Water”, also reviewed by this reader. The series is set amidst a charming Welsh remote island inhabited by a tight knit community, including Kate Galway, a retired teacher and…
🌟🌟🌟🌟🌟 Filled with passion and angst, this is a book tailor-made for anyone who has ever aspired to write - or rather, to be a “writer” — a seemingly innocuous label that, for those in the literary “know”, carries an inordinate amount of weight. A label that can invoke literary…
A memoir and a somewhat complicated review — for a story beginning with horrific child abuse and leading to what will become a life-long adult search for healing — that could not help but raise all sorts of emotions in this reader. Empathy, pain and compassion. Curiosity and hope. Wonder,…