Do you remember those colorful pictures of the Puritans that appeared every November on the bulletin board of your third-grade classroom? Dark suited men with buckled shoes and tall black hats and docile women with bowed heads were depicted celebrating the harvest with agreeable, feathered ... [Continue Reading]
First: Sandra Day O’Connor by Evan Thomas
When Justice O’Connor, the first female Supreme Court justice, arrived at the Supreme Court in 1981, one of the first things she did was establish an early morning aerobics class for her female clerks; attendance was mandatory. It was held in the basketball court above the courtroom and open to all ... [Continue Reading]
The Barbizon: The Hotel That Set Women Free by Paulina Bren
Although there had been residential hotels for bachelors and families for decades (see The Thin Man movies), until the early twentieth century there were no residential hotels for women because there was no need for such a thing. American women stayed home. But in 1903, recognizing a nascent ... [Continue Reading]
While Justice Sleeps by Stacey Abrams
While Justice Sleeps is not Stacey Abrams’ first work of fiction, but it is her first legal thriller. The former Minority Leader of the Georgia House of Representatives, 2018 Democratic nominee for governor of Georgia, and founder of Fair Fight, Fair Count, and the Southern Economic Advancement ... [Continue Reading]
Bridge of Sighs by Richard Russo
Last month I had dinner at The Palm with a dozen or so women. Toward the end of the meal I asked (apropos of what I can’t remember), “By a show of hands, how many of you were homecoming queen?” Rita Mitchell, our esteemed host, looked vaguely irritated, because this is not at all the sort of ... [Continue Reading]
Finding Oz by Evan Schwartz
For those of you who are only familiar with the works of L. Frank Baum through the MGM movie, The Wizard of Oz, I must correct a terrible misconception. Dorothy didn’t dream Oz. Oz is real. 26 novels real. And The Wonderful Wizard of Oz on which the MGM extravaganza is based isn’t even the best ... [Continue Reading]
The Guernsey Literary and Potato Peel Pie Society by Mary Ann Shaffer and Annie Barrows
How could I resist a book with such an unusual title set on an island about which I know nothing (cows, right?) The Guernsey Literary and Potato Peel Pie Society is a charming novel of 1946 London and Guernsey, one of the Channel Islands. London based writer Juliet Ashton receives a letter from a ... [Continue Reading]
Loving Frank by Nancy Horan
In 1903, Mamah Borthwick Cheney and her husband commissioned their neighbor Frank Lloyd Wright to design a home for them in Oak Park, IL. By 1909, Mamah and Wright had departed for Europe leaving behind two spouses, eight children, and an outsized scandal. Although Loving Frank is a work of ... [Continue Reading]
Free Food for Millionaires by Min Jin Lee
How do you select a good read? Recommendations from friends and book reviews are two popular sources. But sometimes nothing beats a leisurely stroll through your local bookstore. I can spend hours perusing the stacks of bright, attention- grabbing covers wondering what lies beneath. Is the novel ... [Continue Reading]
The Blind Sideby Michael Lewis
A year or so ago, I read an article by Michael Lewis in The New York Times entitled “The Ballad of Big Mike.” The article, which was adapted from Lewis’s book, The Blind Side: Evolution of a Game, concerns a poor, black teenager adopted by a white family in Memphis. The story, while interesting, ... [Continue Reading]