READ ALL ABOUT IT
Since 2012, I’ve been writing about books. And the act of reading. And the importance of story and narrative. But, mostly, the underlying theme of all I write is how taking a moment to stop and digest some longform text — instead of scrolling, instead of watching a video, instead of multitasking — can be one of the most grounding things we can do for ourselves. Here’s the one-stop online home for all this writing.
You can read more about me and my work by moseying over here. Want to peruse periodic “essay drops” — excerpts from my work-in-progress essay collection about Homesickness? Here ya go.
Book Club Crashers: The Authors
The Sudbury Town Crier
“Having an author drop in to your meeting takes your gathering to a new level: It allows you to get answers and insights to very specific questions, and hey, it might give you the extra nudge to make sure you actually finish the book..”
Mountain Reads
The Sudbury Town Crier
“...I’m more of a ‘mountain person,’ so I’ve decided to coin the phrase ‘Mountain Reads.’ These books might still be relatively fun and breezy — I mean you’re presumably on vacation after all — but Mountain Reads require just the tiniest bit more effort than a traditional beach read.”
Buying Novels in Our Pajamas
The Sudbury Town Crier
For Library Lovers’ Month, a heart-shaped letter to all the libraries I’ve loved before.
Libraries: Not Just for (Book) Lovers
The Sudbury Town Crier
For Library Lovers’ Month, a heart-shaped letter to all the libraries I’ve loved before.
Reading the Room: The Role of Readers in our Literary Landscape
Literary Boston
Challenging what a “book event” might look like, published in Literary Boston (formerly known as Boston Book Blog), the hub of Boston’s literary community.
Read Here or at LiteraryBoston.com
In ‘La La Land,’ Cameo Appearances with Mom
The Boston Globe
A serendipitous encounter with a home on stilts in the Hollywood Hills for “My First Home,” formerly a longstanding column in The Boston Globe.
Read Here or at Boston.com
On Doyle’s Dialogue
The Curator
An exploration of Irish author Roddy Doyle’s work, in-group communication styles, and now-ubiquitous emojis.
Read Here or at CuratorMagazine.com
Neither Here nor There
Dublin Review of Books
An exploration of Irish author Roddy Doyle’s work, in-group communication styles, and now-ubiquitous emojis.
Stories for Social Change in ‘Flight Behavior’ and ‘The Line
The Curator
An exploration of personal storytelling using Barbara Kingsolver’s novel Flight Behavior as a framing device.
Read Here or at CuratorMagazine.com
Ambiance: Where Details are Everything,
The Curator
The importance of setting — and when to generalize and when to particularize, using my experience in an international book club and its selection of the novel The Yacoubian Building (Alaa Al Aswany) as a starting point.
Read Here or at CuratorMagazine.com
The Sense of Redemption
The Curator
How important is “redemption” in a novel — or a life? An exploration of redemption and The Sense of an Ending by Julian Barnes.
Read Here or at CuratorMagazine.com
And Then Came Sebastian Barry
The Curator
Can language – our lives – instead of an actual event, stir up as much emotion in one’s soul? Is it the plot, or is it the words? My encounter with Annie Dunne by Sebastian Barry.
Read Here or at CuratorMagazine.com
Cat’s Eye
The Curator
How social media might have changed a later version of Margaret Atwood’s novel Cat’s Eye.
Read Here or at CuratorMagazine.com
