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I had to leave, but I couldn't tell her why, not if I wanted to keep my skin....

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I’ll admit we'd have been smarter to quit right there, but "smart" wasn't in our vocabulary back then....

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There are always tributes to male parents close to Father’s Day. Check out Social Media and you’ll see all kinds of posts commemorating the sweetest, the bravest, the kindest fathers, etc. I’m sure all of those plaudits are true. But, when it comes to titles and “Greatest” plastic championship cups, I know which one belongs to my Dad. He was the first and best Storyteller I ever knew. My Dad loved a laugh more than anything else and his...

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I know this post is late and this excuse sounds weak but my story is absolutely legit, and it started last Friday when Darling Husband asked for the new WiFi password. Now, some would think that’s a reasonable question, given that I’m the closest thing we have to an IT department. (Terrifying thought!) On the other hand, as the household IT rep., I never change the passwords without warning. So if Darling Husband suddenly can’t ...

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At the Other End of the Timeline: Tensy Farlow & the Home for Mislaid Children
I know a Good Story / November 10, 2014

I like literary archetypes.   To me, they’re the puzzle pieces a person can assemble to understand the canon of Western Literature.   Anti-heroes, tricksters, mentors and shadows are all wonderful but my favorite is the orphan-hero.   His search is for home, his judgments are his own and like all archetypes he/she morphs to reflect the values of whatever era he’s created in.**  If yesterday...

The Villans of Oliver Twist

Full disclosure:  I love the novel Oliver Twist but I can’t say I love the title character.  He cries far to easily for my taste and he’s altogether too sweet for words.   Dickens wanted to show Oliver’s basic gentle nature couldn’t be corrupted by the environment he lived in but basically his protagonist is a Casper Milquetoast.  When people are kind to him, he laps it up and soaks them ...

Lest we forget: Taylor Caldwell’s The Balance Wheel
I know a Good Story / November 8, 2014

Veteran’s Day is coming up and I can’t help thinking about a poem called “Ode of Remembrance” by Laurence Binyon.   It reads (in part) They went with songs to the battle, they were young.Straight of limb, true of eye, steady and aglow.They were staunch to the end against odds uncounted,They fell with their faces to the foe. They shall grow not old, as we that are left grow old:Age shall not weary them, ...

Growing up with a Gem: The Domestic Novels of Shirley Jackson
I know a Good Story / November 7, 2014

Readers love a seldom-read story or an under-praised author.  To appreciate a less-known work or author is the a mark of a book connoisseur and readers delight in being seen as connoisseurs.    Without knowing it, my sister and I trained to be gourmet readers when we grew reading  the work of an under-appreciated writer.  You may  or may not have heard of Shirley Jackson but do you know about  her...

There’s Always been Starkadders at Cold Comfort Farm
I know a Good Story / November 6, 2014

So intones Judith Starkadder, at the beginning of Stella Gibbon’s comic masterpiece Cold Comfort Farm.  To Judith Starkadder this statement is a curse and a warning but it’s more of an opening salvo in the war of English novel types.   On one side are the moor, mud and fen school of Novels where the clouds are always lowering, the males are always glowering and life is eternally soiled.  Opposing this school o...