Mary Daniels Brown

My mother always insisted that, as soon as I was old enough to sit up, she’d find me in my crib after my nap babbling away, with a Little Golden Book on my lap. I’ve had my nose in a book ever since. I grew up in a small town, with the tiny town library literally in my backyard. As an only child in an unhappy home, I found comfort and companionship in books. As an adult I wanted to be Harry Potter, although I admit I’m more Hermione. My life has been a series of research projects. Reading has taught me that human lives are deliciously messy and that “it’s complicated” isn’t a punchline.

The Shirley Jackson Awards » 2015 Shirley Jackson Awards Nominees

In recognition of the legacy of Shirley Jackson’s writing, and with permission of the author’s estate, The Shirley Jackson Awards, Inc. has been established for outstanding achievement in the literature of psychological suspense, horror, and the dark fantastic. Source: The Shirley Jackson Awards » 2015 Shirley Jackson Awards Nominees

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woman reading

Books I Finished in April

11/22/63 by Stephen King Recommended Jake Epping is a 35-year-old high school English teacher in the small town of Lisbon Falls, Maine. To earn some extra money, he also teaches English to adult GED students. The only other activity in his life is moping around and lamenting the recent divorce from his short-term alcoholic wife.

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Read Books

The Classics Spin #12: “Darkness at Noon”

Related Post: The Classics Spin #12 Koestler, Arthur. Darkness at Noon Translated by Daphne Hardy Original publication date: 1940 Rpt. New York: Bantam Books, 1966 ISBN 0–553–26595–4   Originally written in German and translated into English by Koestler’s companion Daphne Hardy, Darkness at Noon was first published in 1940. Set in an unnamed country, the

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Last Week's Links

Last Week’s Links

I’m trying out something different this week. I have three blogs: Notes in the Margin: about books, authors, reading, and all things literary Change of Perspective: about psychology, life stories, memoirs, and writing Retreading for Retirement: my personal blog about retirement, aging, and moving to a new city Because of these wide-ranging interests, I often

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bookshelves: Literature and Psychology

8 Literary Websites I’ve Discovered Recently

My explorations for Literature & Psychology have recently led me to these eight websites: Modern Mrs. Darcy I’ll let Anne explain the purpose of her blog: I started this site to explore what it looks like to be an accomplished woman in our modern world. In Jane Austen’s day, when Elizabeth Bennet became the original

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Viet Thanh Nguyen, William Finnegan Among Pulitzer Winners

The winners of the 2016 Pulitzer Prizes were announced on April 18, in a ceremony marking the centennial of the awards.In fiction, Viet Thanh Nguyen won for The Sympathizer (Grove Press), which the judges called “a layered immigrant tale told in the wry, confessional voice of a ‘man of two minds’—and two countries, Vietnam and

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My TBR shelf: nonfiction

On Reading

ON FINDING YOURSELF IN THE WORK OF JHUMPA LAHIRI Nandini Balial riffs on reading In Other Words, the latest book by another Bengali woman, Jhumpa Lahiri. This is a beautiful musing on how language and literature have helped shape Aalial’s life and sense of identity as a writer. Do Teens Read Seriously Anymore? Critic David

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Iles, Grisham, Eubanks, Reed, Smith, Stockett, Laymon, Tartt Among 95 Mississippi Writers Opposing Anti-LGBT Law | Jackson Free Press | Jackson, MS

Gov. Phil Bryant and the Mississippi legislators who voted for HB 1523 are not the sole voices of our state. There have always been people here battling injustice. Source: Iles, Grisham, Eubanks, Reed, Smith, Stockett, Laymon, Tartt Among 95 Mississippi Writers Opposing Anti-LGBT Law | Jackson Free Press | Jackson, MS Read the authors’ statement

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‘All the King’s Men,’ Now 70, Has a Touch of 2016 – The New York Times

I reread “All the King’s Men” recently, in the wake of the Ohio and Florida primaries. It remains a salty, living thing. There’s no need for literary or political pundits to bring in the defibrillators. It is also eerily prescient, in its portrait of the rise of a demagogue, about some of the dark uses

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man reading a big book

2 Big Books That Disappointed Me

Related Posts: 10 Big Books I Have Read & Loved 6 Big Books I Keep Meaning to Reread 6 Big Books on My Reading List I’ve been writing a lot about Big Books lately. Since I no longer continue to slog through books that don’t engage me (although I’ll give a Big Book, one of

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