The days are growing shorter, the trees on the land across the way will soon shed the last of their leaves, and I have been reading the poems of W.S. Merwin and the fiction of Lauren Groff, and teaching myself how to write essays again.
Supply chain issues are hitting books hard, and if there are new ones you’d like to order for yourself or as gifts for the holidays, it sounds like it would be a good idea to place the orders now. Here are a few of the new books I love (and have mentioned in recent newsletters), if you’re not sure where . . .
Some letters we found in my granny’s papers after she died record the fallout from my grandfather Robert’s affair. Ultimately, Robert was said to have married thirteen times. Granny’s marriage to him, his fourth of those I’ve found, lasted about four and a half years. Knowing her later intolerance for foolishness, I’m surprised she put up with him for that . . .
This website has undergone a complete redesign for the first time since it launched in 2002, almost two decades ago. Eep! I adore this iteration so much that I’m hoping to blog more often, if only to spend more time looking at it. All thanks to Lorissa Shepstone and Gordon Clemmons, the brilliant Being Wicked team. Late last week I . . .
For anyone pondering ancestors and their significance for us, I wanted to mention the giveaways I’ve started doing on my newsletter every month, in thanks for Ancestor Trouble pre-orders. I’m giving away two or three books that, in one way or another, fed into or inspired mine. Last month’s mini-library was: Ancestors: The Story of China Told Through the Lives . . .