In which Serena Agusto-Cox of Savvy Verse and Wit discovers the breadcrumb clues I've been leaving for readers all along, book to book. So many thanks for this truly gorgeous review of
This Is the Story of You.
From the end of the review:
This Is the Story of You by Beth Kephart will astonish you with the resilience of young people, their drive to make things right, and their ability to withstand more than expected, but it is in the final pages that the true mystery is resolved. I will say this, I’m not often surprised by book endings or mysteries, but Kephart exceeded my detective skills for the first time in a long while. (I had suspicions, but not a fully formed conclusion.) Readers who love to immerse themselves in realistic places and explore humanity won’t be disappointed. Kephart is a talent at creating places that come alive and characters that grab hold of us emotionally.
**You’ve probably already suspected this is a contender for the best of 2016 list at the end of the year!**
Last night I saw a movie ("The Danish Girl") I have long wanted to see, and it was gloriously visual and terribly heartbreaking and genius acting, and it was good. Afterward, my brother called and we talked for a long time (I talked to his daughter, too) and all of that was good.
In the dark hours before this dawn, I began to read the memoir
The Hare with Amber Eyes, and it is good. I set the
Hare aside to sketch out the outline for a new and interesting (to me) nonfiction book, and I think it will be good.
After the sun rose I added fresh mint to the strawberries, the banana, and the coconut water, spun the Ninja, and that breakfast smoothie was good. I went online and found a very generous
LOVE citation on Savvy Verse and Wit Best of the Year round-up (thank you!) AND ALSO an uber kind citation for ONE THING STOLEN, and that was good and very good.
Today we will see dear friends in a new place, and it will be (it always is with them) good.
This is the last day of an old year. The sun (which hasn't made much of an appearance lately) has decided to show up, and I'm hoping that augurs something new, something good, for all of us. I'm hoping that the unsettling headlines dim, that our planet is respected, that terror is abated, that homes are found for those seeking homes. I'm hoping that more people do happy things. I'm hoping the people I love get good news, have good health, have good dreams come true.
I'm hoping that for strangers, too.
To the new good, for all of us.
Ikebana Workshop
For this she has clipped the wings
Of Jane’s tree and bucketed monks head
And stolen rose hips from a mass of vines
On a roadside stretch while her husband
Perpetuated the crime. Beauty being in
The bend of things and in the wide
Omnivorous eye
Of a bloom.
We are to watch for thorns,
She says, and for architecture.
We are to turn the subject back
On itself and lift the object’s chin
And make room for spaces in
Between, and nothing is lovelier
Than the odd one thing, and turgor
Is a word she’d buy, a word she gives away
For free. Herbest friend died this summer,
And in the earthen room
In which we work, there are
Her best friend’s things:
Pods and kenzans and ceramic half moons and the name
Helen, which shejoins with honor
And stem.
We are women working in shadow
And with inversions and toward the faith
She teaches us to have
In the line between the lines
Of stolen hips and wings.
I am having a small dinner party this evening—an early Thanksgiving Day meal with friends. That means that I spent much of yesterday polishing things, trying to see my house the way others might see it. I realized, as I worked, that my little house is lit by trees. (Later in the afternoon the house was lit by Kelly Simmons, who stopped by with a manuscript in progress I have been begging to read and a bunch of autumnal calla lilies.)
This morning I did not turn the computer on at once—wanted a few spare moments of quiet to reflect and think before I got into the business of the day. When I did dial into the world, I discovered a most outrageously compassionate, well-written, and
deep-thinking review of You Are My Only, penned by Serena Agusto-Cox, a reader, writer, poet, and mom who advocated so fiercely on behalf of this book, even long before she had read it. True faith—oh so rare, and so appreciated. Serena was one of the YAMO Treasure Hunt winners, and so I have had the pleasure now of reviewing her own work. She has Facebooked and believed and conducted giveaways—even invited me to participate in a YAMO interview—the only YAMO interview on record (please check back later today for that).
I don't have the capacity to fully state how much this kind of support has meant to me—how much it means to any author. But I will share just a few words of Serena's review here, with the hope that you will visit her
blog and find out more about what she reads and how she sees:
You Are My Only is an emotional powerhouse drawing redemption out of the shattered pieces of lives rendered asunder by a single event. Through faith and love these characters can begin the heal, rebuild, and flourish. What more could readers ask for? Stunning, precious, and captivating from beginning to end.
Thank you so much, Serena.
In the midst of launching new books or struggling to write them, we are reminded, by gracious souls, of stories that did once make their way into the world; we are reminded that that is possible. Serena Agusto-Cox affords me that gift this morning, with
her kind review of Undercover, my first novel for young adults, and the most autobiographical of them all.
Thank you, Serena.
So here I am, scrubbing bathrooms, dusting shelves, sweeping floors, arranging flowers, buying the ingredients for butternut squash soup, citrus salad, cranberry sauce, my mother's brownies, and thinking: Oh, Thanksgiving. Soon my son will be home.
But friends out there have conspired to make this an even greater holiday (Christmas in November) by yielding space and time to Nothing but Ghosts. Sara of the very sophisticated YA book site, The Hiding Spot, has adorned Ghosts with beautiful commentary, asked me some great questions, and posted a Ghosts giveaway contest. I hope you will spend some time on her site (and I hope Sara will always know how grateful I am, especially since she had to persevere through some rather nasty e-mail problems on my end).
Meanwhile, over at Savvy Verse & Wit, Serena has given Ghosts the deeply thoughtful eye of someone whose book review and interview list reveals a reader who is committed to doing justice by fine books.
I am thankful.
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Beautiful, I love the bit about lifting the chin--and everything else too.
OMG, this is got to be one of the most powerful endings to a poem I've read in a while:
"We are women working in shadow
And with inversions and toward the faith
She teaches us to have
In the line between the lines
Of stolen hips and wings."
Thanks for joining the blog tour. I appreciate your kind friendship and dedication to poetry always.
Very nice. I enjoyhed the poem together with the photo.
This is really beautiful. I like to be with your words :)
Yes, I like to be with Beth's words, too, Melissa. Anywhere. Anytime.
This is lovely food for thought.
Yeah I like this, thanks.
A Constant.
The light had away of
painting in the shadows
Labyrinthine corridors
that the mind skirts
with peril. To Borges
Light was a refracted tale.
expelled from some prism
like shotgun pellets, or
trapped a bug glued
in amber. Neither
Was true, time was
the only constant
or prison cell