Reviews
The Body At A Loss by Cati Porter
Review by Mindy Kronenberg There is a considerable and influential archive of women’s writing detailing with journeys of terminal illness, as evidenced in the raw and honest work of poets Audre Lorde, Carol Snyder Halberstadt, and Kate Fox, whose…
The Singer of Alleppey by Pramila Venkateswaran
Review by MaryAnn L. Miller Pramila Venkateswaran, in addition to The Singer of Alleppey, has had six other books of poetry published and has won many awards. Raised in Bombay, Venkateswaran lives in New York and teaches English and Women’s…
Reckless Steps Toward Sanity: A Memoir by Judith Sara Gelt
Review by Kelly Bargabos When I travel through neighborhoods at night, I become a voyeur, desperate to see into other homes through the big picture window with the curtains left open, lit up from the inside. I suppose that…
Feminine Rising – Andrea Fekete & Lara Lillibridge, Eds
Review by Christine E. Salvatore Feminine Rising is a testament to the power of story, how telling a story can be as powerful and healing as hearing one with which we identify. The essays and poems within got me…
Mothershell by Andrea Potos
Review by Julia Lisella This ninth collection of poetry by Andrea Potos begins, appropriately, with breakfast, perhaps the most mundane meal of the day, but also the most celebratory for its steady rituals. So, too, the poet’s relationship…
Sarah Cannon On Writing “The Shame of Losing”
Author’s Note – Sarah Cannon On Writing The Shame of Losing I wrote the memoir The Shame of Losing while I was falling out of love with my spouse. I fell out of love with him for many reasons –…
Sweet World by Maureen Seaton
Review by Lisa Hase-Jackson Sweet World by Maureen Seaton illustrates the absurd and often contradictory aspects of mortality through irreverent humor and wry observation. Her poems speak frankly of the physical manifestation of disease and considers closely the many mixed…
The Risk of Us by Rachel Howard
Review by Emily Webber “It starts with a face in a binder, CHILDREN AVAILABLE, reads the cover” (1). This is the first sentence of The Risk of Us, Rachel Howard’s remarkable debut novel. In the novel’s opening scene, the unnamed…
Came Home to Winter by Judith Skillman
Review by Tina Kelley I always felt, after reading What to Expect When You’re Expecting, that the sweet little book we’d used as a bible while gestating had left us all completely underprepared for parenthood. Now that I’ve gotten two…
Author’s Note – Lara Lillibridge
Lara Lillibridge On Writing Mama, Mama, Only Mama Lara Lillibridge on her memoir, Mama, Mama, Only Mama: An Irreverent Guide for the Newly Single Parent—from Divorce and Dating to Cooking and Crafting, All While Raising the…
Squeaky Wheels by Suzanne Kamata
Squeaky Wheels: Travels with my Daughter by Train, Plane, Metro, Tuk-tuk and Wheelchair by Suzanne Kamata Review by Lara Lillibridge Suzanne Kamata grew up in Grand Haven, Michigan. She went to Japan to teach English, fell in love,…
Cracked Piano by Margo Taft Stever
Review by Barbara Ellen Sorensen A definitive theme in Margo Taft Stever’s new volume of poetry, Cracked Piano, is the mercurial role of mothers. That motherhood is both a terrifying and transcendent time in many women’s lives is not…