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.

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Penguin Classics and Others Work to Diversify Offerings From the Canon “Across the industry, publishers are releasing titles by authors who were previously marginalized or entirely lost to history.” The critical and commercial success of these titles is a result of a combination of factors: initiative on the part of writers’ families or estates; changing […]

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recommended reading

5 Books to Keep You Company During Isolation

I recently came across the article “Kristin Hannah Recommends 5 Books to Keep You Company During Isolation.” Since I’ve been having trouble writing much of anything at all, I decided to use the format of this post as a template for my own recommendations.  Here are the categories, Kristin Hannah’s recommendations, and my own suggestions.

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The Curious Creation of Anna Kavan Although I’ve heard of Anna Kavan—mostly through occasional references to her works—I know nothing about her. But I’ll have to change that, after reading this profile in the New Yorker. She examined the nature of identity, both in her writing and in her personal life. Not long after being

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Reading & Blogging in the Time of COVID-19

Related Posts: Life in an Independent Bookstore Near Seattle Some of the Less Obvious Effects of the Coronavirus Pandemic Book-Related News for Self-Isolation and Social Distancing More Arts-Related Pandemic News All of my recent posts have been lists of COVID-19—related links. I just kept collecting these links, almost obsessively. Now that we’re approaching the end

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woman sitting & reading in front of book shelves

More Arts-Related Pandemic News

More Book-Related Pandemic News Luckily, books still exist, and can be their own vehicle for connection. And what better reading material for right now than books where the characters are, in some way, alone? None of these are dystopian (at least not in the traditional sense), but are instead characterized by protagonists with complex interior

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I’m Not Feeling Good at All “The perplexingly alienated women of recent American fiction” Jess Bergman writes, “the new heroines of contemporary fiction possess a kind of anhedonic equanimity, more numb than overwhelmed.” Doing No Harm: A Look at Writing Suicide and Self-Harm in Fiction Alice Nuttall makes the case that “Suicide and self-harm are

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stack of books with green covers

St. Patrick’s Day Reading

7 Books With Striking Green Covers to Read This St. Paddy’s Day My own stack of green books appears at the top of this post. 15 IRISH CRIME WRITERS YOU SHOULD BE READING RIGHT NOW This is reprinted from 2018. 8 Irish Writers We’re Lucky to Have on Our Shelves 10 Audiobooks with Incredible Irish

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Book-Related News for Self-Isolation and Social Distancing

B&N, BAM Remain Open Publishers Weekly reports that Barnes & Noble and Books-A-Million are currently staying open. I would imagine, though, that this situation could change at any time, so you’d probably want to check with your local store. A dystopian reading list: books to enjoy while in quarantine The U.K.’s Guardian advises that, in

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“What Do I Know To Be True?”: Emma Copley Eisenberg on Truth in Nonfiction, Writing Trauma, and The Dead Girl Newsroom Jacqueline Alnes talks with Emma Copley Eisenberg, author of true-crime book The Third Rainbow Girl, “about what it means to seek truth in nonfiction, and how writing the personal can allow for more complicated

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stack of books next to open notebook with pen

Some of the Less Obvious Effects of the Coronavirus Pandemic

We’re all a bit frazzled about the current health pandemic and the mammoth amount of information out there for us to process. Like you, I’m concerned about the health of my friends and neighbors here in the retirement community where I live, as we’re all over 60. But once we get past all the health

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