First Draft Fiction: A Living Hand, part 3
Read part 1 and part 2. Collin blanched at the sight of the empty sleeve. Standing next to his mother, Jane who […]
First Draft Fiction: A Living Hand, part 2
Read part 1 here. The car lurched over the crest of a hill on a winding road, the lights illuminating a stretch […]
First Draft Fiction: A Living Hand, part 1
In a world crying out for stories, this author makes an attempt. Unrefined and unedited, we make no promises of high quality, […]
Time and eternity in Astrid Lindgren’s “The Children of Noisy Village”
Astrid Lindgren’s memorable narrator, nine-year-old Lisa, in The Children of Noisy Village, conveys the childlike security of traditions. Lisa explains that Christmas […]
A prison of our own making: the toxic femininity hiding in plain sight
Feminism means nothing other than human equality we are told. Women should be “supporting” other women and “fighting” for equal rights. Ah, […]
Grace Lin’s perfectly silly “Ling and Ting” series
There are great masterpieces of the written word and artistic expression worthy of veneration. There are also wonderfully fun books that provide […]
The indulgence of self-loathing and William Blake’s “mind-forg’d manacles”
Recognizing oneself as inadequate and unsatisfactory has an appealing allure of maturity and self-awareness, but it is childish indulgence. Everyone knows people […]
In a family you may be misunderstood but rarely not known
In the course of family life, children grow and separate from their family. This development can lead to a feeling of estrangement. […]
Practically Speaking: St. Edith Stein on the Emotional Power of Objective Work
Edith Stein, also known by her religious name Saint Teresa Benedicta of the Cross, offered penetrating observations about women—with their capacity for […]
Novelist Elizabeth Strout and the rhythm of work in motherhood
For many women, motherhood is a brief hobby in a life full of other interests and occupations. It can be startling to […]