Tag Archives: Book Review

March 8, 2025 · 4:45 pm

Surviving Sue Review and Traces in the Snow

Today in the Reese River Valley. My photo.

Two consecutive snowstorms, and the sun sparks diamonds on the snow-hushed surfaces here in Austin and in the Reese River Valley just below us, giving us time to read, to wander, to cook, and to write.

Walking after a snowstorm is one of my favorite activities, along with walking in a warm rain, or on a starry night, or along a tree-lined lane at the height of autumn. It’s like walking inside a dream, a vision, a movie . . . all of it a magical changing work of art. This has been that kind of a weekend. An appreciated and needed balm for the eyes, ears, heart, mind and soul.

Our footprints going down our driveway last winter after a similar storm in Austin, NV. My photo.

After today’s walk, I finished reading Dr. Vicki Atkinson’s memoir, Surviving Sue: An Inspirational Survivor’s Story About a Daughter and her Life with a Mother Who was Riddled with Alcoholism, Alzheimer’s, Anxiety, Depression, and Munchausen’s. Vicki is a fellow blogger, one I follow and read with pleasure, always knowing I will find something positive, real, and insightful in her posts. Vicki is generous with her readers, sharing of herself, her humor, her highs and lows with an empathic interest in our perspectives.

This is Vicki’s voice, and it shines on the pages of her book. She is a profoundly kind-spirited woman who grew up learning how to turn the injury and injustice of her mother’s mental illness into something bigger than her own pain. With keen intelligence, her father’s and sister’s love, and later through her own family and probably also due to her dedication to her studies, Vicki survives and thrives, and she does it without ever compromising her own values.

Vicki’s Wonderful Memoir

Vicki’s compassion for her mother is more than challenged over the years, but somehow, she stays the course of doing what she believes is best for everyone concerned. For those who don’t know Vicki or haven’t read Surviving Sue, I’d like to stop here to encourage you to read it for yourself. This story is worth your time. It may even affect the ways you view some of your own experiences, past or present. It may soften your heart. It’s a beautiful book, and an engaging read.

Surviving Sue, Eckhartz Press, Chicago. Copyright © 2023. Vicki’s Blog is victoriaponders.com. Vicki also shares a podcast with her friend and colleague, Wynne Leon of Surprised by Joy (Blog). Their podcast, The Heart of the Matter can be found at sharingtheheartofthematter.com.

Now it’s time for the cooking part of the day. I’ve got an eggplant, lots of spices, cheese, pasta, greens, and tomatoes. Oh, and wine.

Should be a beautiful night.

Photo by Pixabay on Pexels.com

26 Comments

Filed under Books, Commentary, Nature, Reading, Seasons, Uncategorized, Voice, Winter, Writing

Tagged as , , , , , , , , ,

March 18, 2024 · 3:25 pm

Gone to Soldiers

a short review

pexels photo

I finished several books recently, one of which I had been reading for months in between other, less hefty titles. The hefty one is an older release (c1987), WWII historical fiction, Marge Piercy’s Gone to Soldiers. A wonderful book—rich in authentic detail—an amazing amount of research had to have gone into this devastating and sweeping novel. Having written two (as yet unpublished) WWII era novels, myself, I am beyond impressed with everything Piercy brings to life here.

Gone to Soldiers tells the stories of ten men and women who served in America, Europe, and the Pacific in vastly different ways: a war correspondent, an intelligence office for the OSS, a Japanese code breaker, a Women’s Airforce Service Pilot, an artist who fights with the Resistance in France, a woman who leads Jewish children to safety over the Pyrenees, a Marine struggling to stay alive in the Pacific, a Jewish teen from Paris sent to America before France fell, and her American cousin.

I have read a lot of WWII and Holocaust related fiction and nonfiction over the years, but somehow I missed this one. My brilliant friend, Sandy, sent me a copy, and I am so glad she did. It is not an easy book to read. Many of the scenes are incredibly vivid and tragic. Some of them were known to me from other sources, but a couple of them depicted battles or situations of which I was not aware.

I was particularly affected by the scenes in the Pacific, I believe, because my father served in the Pacific theatre, but talked about it so little that I never had a clear picture of what he went through. This book made me more aware of the horror he faced and makes me want to know more about his service.

I recommend Gone to Soldiers for its unblinking portrayal of the realities of war, ignorance, prejudice, love, and loss. It is an important book for men and women who seek to understand and remember our shared history—to mourn and honor those lost, to refuse to fall back into dangerous patterns of racism, prejudice, and misogyny, and to continue to work toward the vision of a safe, equitable, and free land for everyone.

“TODAY THE GUNS ARE SILENT. A GREAT TRAGEDY
HAS ENDED. A GREAT VICTORY HAS BEEN WON. THE SKIES
NO LONGER RAIN DEATH – THE SEAS BEAR ONLY COMMERCE –
MEN EVERYWHERE WALK UPRIGHT IN THE SUNLIGHT.
THE ENTIRE WORLD IS QUIETLY AT PEACE.”

GENERAL DOUGLAS MACARTHUR


Radio address to the American people from the USS Missouri, following the Japanese surrender ceremony, September 2, 1945  (FROM WWW.NPS.GOV)

2 Comments

Filed under Books, HIstorical Fiction, Reading, World War II

Tagged as , ,

December 3, 2023 · 3:17 pm

Book Review: Driving Dad Home

Having dedicated a great deal of time, energy, effort, and money–but mostly dreams and heart–to writing throughout my life, I’ve always longed for close relationships with other writers. People who would “get me” in a way that I didn’t feel “got.”

So it was with great pleasure when I learned that my dear friend Jan married a man who wrote. This was many years ago, and, like mine, John Halter’s career was varied and interesting. In my own case, I would add soul affirming, which is probably the case for John as well, but I have never asked him. Anyway, we both did something other than write to earn our livings, but we both always wrote. I worked in flower shops, and libraries, and taught school, while John was a professional sailor, riverboat pilot, and marine mechanic.

Driving Dad Home is John’s first published book, a memoir. It is published by Nodin Press, LLC out of Minneapolis, MN and is available on Amazon. Bravo, John!

John Halter’s Driving Dad Home is in part the story of John and his father, Russ, and their road trip from Arizona to Wisconsin where Russ’s family has procured a place for him in a memory care facility. That, in itself, provides more than enough to immerse the reader. A 96-year-old father who doesn’t want to leave the home where he chose to live out the remainder of his long life “hoodwinked” by his family, the dying alcoholic second wife they wish to save him from, the terror, anger, and anguish of Russ’s dementia—all told in the author’s particularly engaging style—would be plenty. But Halter gives us more.

In his attempts to placate his agitated father and make it to their destination safely, he learns that getting his dad to talk is the best remedy. As the miles unfurl, so too do Russ’s recollections about everything from his childhood on a South Dakota farm, to his years serving in the Navy in WWII, to his years as a husband and father living in Minneapolis, and to the years that followed, when John and his siblings were all grown, when their mother died, and the life their father made for himself afterward—all of which is as important to the author as it is to his dad. I don’t want to give anything away, but it was an excellent read, and I was left with a renewed appreciation and understanding of the generations before us. And I also came away believing that love is often a silent force swirling around us that we do not know and cannot recognize.

For some of us, thankfully, there comes another chance. This is a story about one of those chances.

Leave a Reply

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *

6 Comments

Filed under Uncategorized

Tagged as , , ,