Betty Smith gave simple advice to writers: “First: Be understanding always. Keep the understanding you have and add on to it.” As the author of A Tree Grows in Brooklyn (1943)—a best-selling novel that challenged the myth of poverty as a choice, and allowed low/no-wage characters to demonstrate courage
I’m even more likely to pick up dark and disturbing stories when the sun is beating down. This stems to my “discovery” of Stephen King in a teenaged summer, beginning with Night Shift and Skeleton Crew. There I was: lying on my back in the grass behind the rented
When variations on the 30-something-°-day populate the ten-day forecast, summer reading is ON. (That’s 80s and 90s, for those of us who still get hotter in °F.) Books like Daven McQueen’s The Invincible Summer of Juniper Jones and Taylor Hale’s The Summer I Drowned rise to the top of
Everything I knew about cities, when I was a girl, I learned from stories. One novel that stood out for me was Marilyn Sachs’ Amy Moves In, a story which has a family moving into an apartment in a city, where Amy has to start at a new school
Despite the rather long title, the core idea of this novel is succinct: “Your truth is not more fucking true than my truth.” Megan Gail Coles situates her story around a downtown restaurant in St. John’s Newfoundland. There, a handful of characters, who are navigating the daily grind, present
