Sandcastle Girls by Chris Bohjalian

The Sandcastle Girls by Chris Bohjalian


My rating: 5 of 5 stars


I LOVED this book. I attended a launch luncheon with Chris Bohjalian a couple years ago, and it's been on my to-read shelf ever since. I finally read it, and it's spectacular. It brings to life a little-known black mark on the history of mankind: The Armenian Genocide at the beginning of World War I. The way Bohjalian weaves his characters together in connections and twists makes the story unforgettable and heartbreaking. His prose is consistently beautiful, and this is my favorite of his books so far. I'm going to seek out the others.




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Medusa Tells All: Beauty Missing, Hair Hissing

Yesterday, a box of books arrived on my porch, covered with a light dusting of snow.

Very exciting moment in an author's life to open the box of complimentary brand-new copies and hold the baby in your hands for the first time.

Check it out:


You can buy it here...

OR go directly to Capstone Books for young readers:
Beauty Missing, Hair Hissing at Capstone Books for Young Readers

Thanks to my editor and friend, Jill Kalz, you can enter promo code 6027 at checkout and get 30% off plus free shipping.

Kobus van Wyk

Today--well, Thursday in South Africa--marks the funeral for one of the most amazing people I have had the privilege to know personally.

This is the last photo taken of a gentle giant of a man who changed his world, and changed our world.


Kobus van Wyk, we will NEVER forget you.

This was Kobus van Wyk, talking to our American students from SCC and MSU, explaining the need for a change in housing development to end the legacy of apartheid in South African Townships. In spite of the chair blocking the view, I like this picture because his passion shows so clearly. He spoke quietly but with a gentle force you couldn't ignore. We all fell in love with him.

Kobus had spent the last twenty years building the Human Settlement Development Management Degree program at Nelson Mandela Metropolitan University. This week, the program launches its first group of students.  His dream is becoming reality.

His legacy will live on.

Happy news and poetry to make you laugh from Richard Meyer

My friend Richard Meyer, who taught Humanities in high school to both my kids (and they adore him), retired a few years ago and has immersed himself in one of his primary passions: poetry. He's getting quite a pile of publications, and here are two of his most recent ones.

I sat at the kitchen table, reading them, belly laughing all by myself. Freya wondered what was so funny. So I read them to her.

Richard Meyer's poems in the Journal "Light" (Can't italicize in a link here)

Read them and smile!