Keep checking here on my blog and on my Instagram account…
The winner of the autographed copy of FROM THE ASHES by JESSE THISTLE will be announced on Saturday.
Winner of the FROM THE ASHES Giveaway will be announced on Saturday.
Month: February 2020
BITCHMEDIA Has Released Their List of 17 Memoirs Feminists Should Read in 2020
BOOKS,CULTURE,BITCH READS and MEMOIRS
BitchReads: 17 Memoirs Feminists Should Read in 2020
Article by Evette Dionne
Published on January 3, 2020
(Photo credit: Graywolf Press, Farrar, Straus and Giroux, and Viking)
I love a good memoir. Though the ever-expanding genre has been criticized over the decades by people who view them as egotistical and insular, memoirs can be transformative.
Tapping into a person’s unique experience and seeing the world through their eyes for a few hundred pages can expand our individual worldview, help us better understand our own experiences with broader issues—including grief—and introduce us to powerful voices who articulate and excavate their lives in ways that so few of us can.
Among the many memoirs slated for release in 2020, these 17 represent the very best of the genre.
Want more seasonal reads? Make sure to sign up for our email list and we’ll send you a new BitchReads list, every quarter, in partnership with Powell’s Books!
By: Adrienne Miller{ Ecco }RELEASED: FEB. 11, 2020 $28.99 PreOrder It Now
If you love fascinating memoirs about women navigating male-dominated industries, then Adrienne Miller’s book should already be in your cart. Miller began her career in media as an editorial assistant at GQ magazine in the 1990s before becoming the first woman to serve as Esquire’s literary editor. Given that media is still an industry run by men—many of them white, many of them powerful, and way too many of them drunk on their own power—Miller’s 30 years’ worth of reflections show, alas, just how much hasn’t changed for women finding their footing in an industry that allows only a few of us to break through.
Strung Out: One Last Hit and Other Lies That Nearly Killed Me By: Erin Khar{ Park Row Books }
RELEASED: FEB. 25, 2020 $27.99 PreOrder It Now
Stephanie Land, author of the bestselling 2019 memoir Maid, says that Strung Out “will change how we look at the opioid crisis and how the media talks about it.” I agree.
Often, media stigmatizes the very people it aims to cover because there’s still so much we don’t understand about the development and impact of addiction. Erin Khar’s gift of a memoir examines her 15-year journey as a heroin user—and, perhaps more important, what brought her to drugs. Addiction stories are often linear (got hooked, hit bottom, got clean), but Khar instead offers a humanizing portrait not just of her own experience but of an issue that impacts more than two million people in the United States.
Recollections of My Nonexistence: A Memoir By: Rebecca Solnit
{Penguin Random House }RELEASED: MARCH 10, 2019 $26.00 Buy It Now
Prolific essayist Rebecca Solnit has long written about pop culture, politics, and mansplaining by weaving together her personal experience with a broader analysis, but it seems that Recollections of My Nonexistence is her first full-on memoir. Solnit brings readers to 1980s San Francisco for a comprehensive look at how she found her voice and her feminism amid discovering punk rock, witnessing rampant gender-based violence, and negotiating a culture of disbelief about everything from street harassment to rape. Recollections of My Nonexistence is also a memoir about writing, which is a gift from a writer as talented and transformative as Solnit. What shaped her perspective? How did she find the confidence to write with such stark honesty? These questions and more are answered.
Rust Belt Femme By: Raechel Anne Jolie
{Belt Publishing }RELEASED: MARCH 10, 2020 $26.00 Buy It Now
Raechel Anne Jolie (who has contributed to Bitch) grew up in Cleveland, Ohio, in the 1990s, finding herself amid an alternative subculture of “race cars, Budweiser drinking men covered in car grease, and the women who loved them.” After her father is killed by a drunk driver, Jolie and her mother struggled to stay afloat: facing eviction, going days with electricity and water, and hurting each other to escape the pain of financial uncertainty. Rust Belt Femme follows Jolie as she leaves the neighborhood she called home for Cleveland Heights where a subculture with a lot of personality welcomes her, helping to define who she is and where she’s headed next.
Assume Nothing: A Memoir of Intimate Violence
By: Tanya Selvaratnam {Henry Holt and Co. }RELEASED: APRIL 7, 2020 $27.99 Buy It Now
According to the National Coalition Against Domestic Violence, nearly 20 people per minute in the United States are physically abused by their romantic partner, which breaks down to more than 10 million people suffering abuse in the course of a single year. It never becomes easier to read about intimate-partner violence, but it’s always necessary. Tanya Selvaratnam’s heart-wrenching memoir explores her volatile relationship with former New York State Attorney General Eric Schneiderman, which included controlling behavior, death threats, and violent sex that she felt powerless to stop given that her partner was the state’s top-ranking law officer.
Assume Nothing isn’t an easy read, but it’s an important window on how power insulates even the worst among us.
FROM OUR SPONSORS
Diary of a Drag Queen By: Crystal Rasmussen with Tom Rasmussen {FSG Originals}RELEASED: APRIL 14, 2020 $17.00 Buy It Now
Crystal Rasmussen, born as Tom, never knew a life before drag queendom. Even as they grew up in northern England, Rasmussen knew they weren’t meant to blend in—standing out was a given. By the time Rasmussen leaves London for a fashion job in New York, they’d come into their own, and this hilarious memoir follows them through a year of adventures, from being onstage to being in bed to realizing the fashion world is even more cutthroat than pop culture portrays it. Diary of a Drag Queen is equal parts inspiring and funny as hell.
This Is Big: How the Founder of Weight Watchers Changed the World—and Me
By: Marisa Meltzer {Little, Brown and Company}RELEASED: APRIL 14, 2020 $28.00 Buy It Now
According to the Boston Medical Center, an estimated 45 million adults in the United States embark on a diet every year, and for an increasing number of adults, an obsession with losing weight begins in childhood. Marisa Meltzer, a contributor to the New York Times and the New Yorker (who has contributed to Bitch), began her first diet at the age of 5, and since then has been on the familiar rollercoaster of losing and gaining weight. When Meltzer read the obituary of Jean Nidetch, the Queens housewife–turned–flamboyant founder of Weight Watchers, she realized how much her own journey ran parallel to that of the woman whose business became an emblem of our culture’s quest for thinness at any cost. This Is Big is an inventive memoir that examines Meltzer’s own experience with weight loss alongside Nidetch’s lucrative belief that community, not secretive shame, could transform people’s bodies and lives.
Missed Translations: Meeting the Immigrant Parents Who Raised Me
By: Sopan Deb
{Dey Street Books}RELEASED: APRIL 21, 2020 $27.99 Buy It Now
There comes a moment in many people’s lives when they realize that their parents or other guardian figures have lives, dreams, hopes, and goals outside of raising them and/or being a spouse. Comedian Sopan Deb’s revelation came as he approached his 30th birthday: He knew the basics about his parents, who’d immigrated, separately, from India to the United States in the 1960s and ’70s. He knew their marriage was arranged, and that his father returned to India several years into their marriage, leaving his children and his wife in suburban New Jersey, but he didn’t know much else. After the 2016 election, which found Deb juggling stand-up comedy and covering the Trump campaign for the New York Times, he decided to journey to India to reconnect with his father and in the process reconnect with himself.
All Boys Aren’t Blue By: George M. Johnson
Farrar, Straus and Giroux }RELEASED: APRIL 28, 2020 $17.99 Buy It Now
Award-winning journalist and activist George M. Johnson is one of my favorite people to follow on social media. His insights about everything from representation in pop culture to sexuality and health keep myself and many others engaged, and he brings that same level of introspection to his powerful memoir-manifesto. Johnson’s book is geared toward young adults—a market that needs this level of realness about everything from finding and harboring joy to bullying to navigating queerness. All Boys Aren’t Blue is a game changer.
Good Morning, Destroyer of Men’s Souls: A Memoir of Women, Addiction, and Love By: Nina Renata Aron {Crown}
RELEASED: MAY 5, 2020 $27.00 Buy It Now
When Nina Renata Aron began dating her boyfriend, K, it didn’t take long for him to relapse. Addiction is a disease; it can come upon those who are afflicted without warning and the effects are felt by the person addicted as well as those who love them. Good Morning, Destroyer of Men’s Souls explores how addiction transforms K, transforms their relationship, and transforms Aron’s relationship to herself and to her childhood. It’s difficult to tell someone else’s story of addiction with empathy and understanding, but Aron balances it all beautifully.
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Fairest By: Meredith Talusan {Viking}
RELEASED: MAY 26, 2020 $27.00 Buy It Now
I first learned about journalist and author Meredith Talusan in 2016 when she spearheaded Unerased, Mic’s award-winning multimedia project that chronicled the crisis of transgender women in the United States being murdered. Talusan has since been an integral part of them’s inaugural editorial team, where she still works as a contributing editor, and has been one of the strongest voices holding newsrooms accountable when they offer lip service to inclusivity but do not actually prioritize it. In Fairest, Talusan brings that same determination and brilliance to her own story, with recollections of immigrating to the United States, unlearning the gender binary, and, most important, coming into her own.
In Open Country By: Rahawa Haile {Harper}RELEASED: JUNE 2, 2020
Buy It Now
On October 3, 2016, Rahawa Haile announced on Twitter that she’d successfully hiked the Appalachian Trail from Georgia to Maine with a photo that captured the triumph. Since then, she’s published a canonical piece in Outside that detailed her experience and an incredible essay in BuzzFeed about leaving books by Black authors for other hikers to discover. Her upcoming memoir considers “what it means to move through America and the world as a Black woman.” Though there aren’t too many details on In Open Country, we know what Haile is capable of as a writer—and that alone has us thirsting to dig into this book.
The Dragons, the Giant, the Women By: Wayétu Moore {Graywolf Press}RELEASED: JUNE 2, 2020 $26.00 Buy It Now
Is it possible to find home again after being unexpectedly uprooted during a political upheaval? That’s one of the questions at the center of Wayétu Moore’s second book, which chronicles one of the most difficult experiences of her young life. At the age of 5, the civil war in Liberia forces Moore and her family—minus her mother, who’s studying at a university in New York—to flee the country. After a three-week journey on foot, Moore and her family are smuggled to the border of Sierra Leone and, from there, travel to the United States to reunite with her mother and begin a brand new life. The Dragons, the Giant, the Women is a beautifully written book about the experience of migrating—a story, particularly in this moment, that can never be told enough.
The Groom Will Keep His Name By: Matt Ortile
{Bold Type Books}RELEASED: JUNE 16, 2020 $16.99 Buy It Now
Recent years have brought us an array of memoirs and essay collections that specifically center the experiences of gay men negotiating the tenacious homophobia of the United States: Michael Arceneaux’s I Can’t Date Jesus: Love, Sex, Family, Race, and Other Reasons I’ve Put My Faith in Beyoncé, Darnell L. Moore’s No Ashes in the Fire: Coming of Age Black and Free in America, and Saeed Jones’s How We Fight for Our Lives come immediately to mind. The success of these books feels like an assurance that we’ll continue to see stories like theirs move out of the margins of the literary canon. In The Groom Will Keep His Name, Matt Ortile, managing editor of Catapult, offers up his unique experiences as a Filipino immigrant figuring out how to date in a world where we’re all encouraged to be curated versions of ourselves. The book’s clever title reflects its witty and captivating takes on everything from one-night stands to dating apps and beyond.
By: Lacy Crawford
{Little, Brown & Company}RELEASED: JULY 14, 2020 $28.00 Buy It Now
Many of us have fragmented memories that cause us to question what’s real and what we’ve imagined. But when St. Paul’s School, an elite boarding school in Concord, New Hampshire, was deemed a “haven for sexual predators” in a May 2018 lawsuit filed by two of the school’s alumnae, Lacy Crawford realized that her hazy recollection of being assaulted at age 15 by two fellow students many years earlier—and the efforts of the school’s administration, including faculty and clergy, to shield her attackers from consequences—wasn’t something she’d invented or imagined. Once St. Paul’s extensive history of burying crimes and harming victims became national news, Crawford got access to files about her case that she’d never seen before; her experience of revisiting the trauma, realizing just how far the school had gone to protect her assaulters, and coming to terms with the cost of that injustice is the foundation for this incredible memoir.
Memorial Drive: A Daughter’s Memoir
By: Natasha Trethewey {Ecco}
RELEASED: JULY 28, 2020 $27.99 Buy It Now
Pulitzer Prize–winning poet Natasha Trethewey has long said that her mother’s 1985 murder at the hands of her ex-husband propelled her into the art form and has continued to haunt her even as she’s found extraordinary success that includes being named U.S. Poet Laureate in 2012 and 2013. Trethewey told the Chicago Tribune in November 2018 that she thinks of herself as “someone who has lived in a state of bereavement my whole adult life,” and in Memorial Drive, she explores the loss and lingering grief that has shaped so much of her work. Trethewey’s heartbreakingly beautiful memoir honors her mother, Gwendolyn, while also indicting a culture that fails to protect abuse victims as they try to retrieve their lives from the clutches of their abusers.
By: Alisson Wood
{Flatiron Books}RELEASED: AUGUST 4, 2020 $26.99 Buy It Now
Since the #MeToo movement spotlighted predators in Hollywood, journalism, and beyond, a number of memoirs have taken stock of how power dynamics can shape—and exploit— an array of relationships, including platonic ones between teachers and students (Donna Freitas’s Consent: A Memoir of Unwanted Attention) and those where the boundaries of friendship are betrayed by rape (Jeannie Vanasco’s Things We Didn’t Talk About When I Was a Girl). Allison Wood, winner of the inaugural Breakout 8 Writers Prize and a creative writing teacher at New York University, adds to this growing canon with a chronicle of her two-year relationship with her high-school English teacher.
There’s more…
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Read this Next: No More White Girl Tales
by Kristin SandersNovember 13, 2017Myriam Gurba’s criticism of white America’s racial myopia couldn’t be better timed.
BY EVETTE DIONNEView profile »
Evette Dionne is Bitch Media’s editor-in-chief. She’s all about Beyoncé, Black women, and dope TV shows and books. You can follow her on Twitter.
THANKS TO BITCH MEDIA’S SPONSORS
Email address *© 2020 BITCH MEDIA | PRIVACY POLICY
THE EAGLE MOTHER written by Indigenous Author and HETXW’MS GYETXW (BRETT D. HUSON) with illustrations by award-winning Métis Illustrator NATASHA DONOVAN – A Feast for the eyes and the soul
Title: THE EAGLE MOTHER
Series: MOTHERS OF XSAN SERIES – BOOK THREE
Author: HETXW’MS GYETXW (BRETT D. HUSON)
Illustrator: NATASHA DONOVAN
Genre: NON-FICTION, MIDDLE GRADE NON-FICTION, MULTICULTURAL INTEREST, INDIGENOUS NON-FICTION, CHILDREN’S NON-FICTION
Length: 32 PAGES
Publisher: HIGHWATER PRESS – A Division of PORTAGE AND MAIN PRESS
Received From: NETGALLEY
Release Date: APRIL 28, 2020
ISBN: 9781553798590 (Hardcover)
Price: $23.00 USD (Hardcover)
Rating: 5+ OUT OF 5 STARS ⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐
DESCRIPTION:
Return to the valleys of the River of Mists with award-winning author Hetxw’ms Gyetxw (Brett D. Huson).
Nox xsgyaak, the eagle mother, cares for her brood in the embrace of a black cottonwood with the help of her mate.
Will both eaglets survive the summer in an environment that is both delicate and unforgiving?
Learn about the life cycle of these stunning birds of prey, the traditions of the Gitxsan, and how bald eagles can enrich their entire ecosystem.
Evocative illustration brings the Xsan’s flora and fauna to life for middle years readers in book three of the Mothers of Xsan series.
*A Note From the Publisher *
Other Titles in the Mothers of Xsan series include:
The Wolf Mother [forthcoming]
The Frog Mother [forthcoming]
.
MY REVIEW:
THE EAGLE MOTHER is a stunningly beautiful illustrated non-fiction book.
THE EAGLE MOTHER is a feast for the eyes and for the soul.
It is the story explaining the life cycle of a female eagle as well as the story of how everything is connected.
An example of what I mean by that is that both the words and the illustrations show how the fish caught by the mother eagle is brought by her to the nest to feed her babies, the bones and other detritus are discarded on the ground around the trunk of the cottonwood tree holding the nest. This in turn leads to a rich mixture of soil encouraging plant growth. There are several other examples of the circular cycle of life detailed in the text, as well as in illustrated form.
Where words appear that may be new, or unfamiliar, included on that page is a box containing the words and their definitions. This is a wonderful touch.
The only area I could possibly come up with as needing improvement would be the inclusion of a text box, similar to the one containing definitions, that listed the Gitxsan words alongside how to pronounce them phonetically. I would love to know that I am reading the words correctly when reading this book to my children and/or grandchildren.
This book is available in eBook format as well as in printed form. I based my review on the eBook version, but the illustrations are so gorgeous that I have decided to purchase it in printed form as well.
I have not yet had the pleasure of reading the other two books in the MOTHERS OF XSAN Series, but I plan to read and review each of them. Also, coming soon are two more book in the series. Their titles are: THE WOLF MOTHER and THE FROG MOTHER.
This book (in fact, the entire ‘Mothers of Xsan’ series) should be available at every Canadian library, and in every Canadian school. Parents who want their children to learn about the animal kingdom as well as learn about different cultures should order this book immediately.
I rate this children’s non-fiction book as 5 OUT OF 5 STARS ⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐
**** Thank you to NetGalley and the Publisher for providing me with a free copy of this book.****
P.S. Since I READ CANADIAN DAY is only two days away, this book series would be perfect as your choice for that day.
.
ABOUT THE AUTHOR:
HETXW’MS GYETXW also known as Brett D. Huson (he/him/his), is from the Gitxsan Nation of the Northwest Interior of British Columbia, Canada.
Growing up in this strong matrilineal society, Brett developed a passion for the culture, land, and politics of his people, and a desire to share their knowledge and stories.
Brett has worked in the film and television industry, and has volunteered for such organizations as Ka Ni Kanichihk and Indigenous Music Manitoba.
The Sockeye Mother (winner of The Science Writers and Communicators Book Award) was Brett’s first book for children.
To learn more about this author, visit the following links:
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ABOUT THE ILLUSTRATOR:
NATASHA DONOVAN (she/her/hers) is a freelance artist and illustrator from Vancouver, British Columbia.
Her sequential work has been published in The Other Side and This Place: 150 Years Retold anthologies.
She is the illustrator of the award-winning graphic novel Surviving the City, as well as the award-winning children’s book, The Sockeye Mother (shortlisted for the Norma Fleck Award for Canadian Children’s Non-Fiction), the first book in the Mothers of Xsan series.
Natasha is a member of the Métis Nation of British Columbia.
To learn more about this Illustrator, visit the following links:
ABOUT THE PUBLISHER:
Portage & Main Press (PMP) is an educational publisher of K-12 resources including the curriculum-based Hands-On series and professional resources for inclusive and diverse classrooms.
HighWater Press (HWP), an imprint of PMPM, publishes a wide range of award-winning Indigenous-authored stories. These authentic stories, told by some of Canada’s most recognized Indigenous writers, include globally relevant social justice themes and the re-telling of historical events. HWP’s vibrant and thought-provoking books include a rich mix of non-fiction, novels, graphic novels, and children’s literature.
To learn more about this Publisher, visit the following links:
“I Read Canadian Day” and you may win a bookish prize.
#mothersofxsan #NetGalley #theeaglemother #eaglemother #indigenous #childrensnonfiction #kidlit #brettdhuson #hetxwmsgyetxw #natashadonovan #illustrated #illustratedbook #multicultural #diversity #diversebooks #noxxsgyaak #Gitxsan #gitxsannation #culture #indigenousculture #eagles #xsgyaak
#youngadultbooks #indigenousstorytelling #indigenousbooks
We, The Wildflowers by L.B. Simmons – NOW AVAILABLE
Title: WE, THE WILDFLOWERS
Author: L.B. Simmons
Release Date: February 11, 2020
“Their strength and ferocity stem from below the surface where their roots are forevertangled, interwoven in such a way that for the remainder of time they bloom together, and when winter finally prevails, they perish as one…until spring brings them to life once again.”
DESCRIPTION:
Genesis
Adam
Chloe
Lukas
No one loves them, no one cares about them, no one even sees them until they end up in Mary Rodriguez’s home, an outpost for Sacred Heart’s Troubled Youth Program. It is within these walls that the four teens forge unlikely friendships. They experience the intensity of first loves, share secrets, and suffer losses, vowing to make the world a better place in spite of their personal battles with addiction, depression, loneliness, and abuse. But when the unthinkable happens, those friendships are tested in ways they never could have imagined.
Will they find strength enough to survive or will their bonds be too fractured to heal them yet again?
Get your copy HERE:
MY REVIEW:
In WE, THE WILDFLOWERS, readers will meet four teenagers whose lives will intersect and even though no familial blood runs through their veins, they will nevertheless become a type of family.
Tackling issues such as suicide, depression, addiction and abuse, this book is one which young adults should identify with.
Finally, the world is ready to talk frankly and honestly about mental health issues and this book tackles them with unfettered honesty. Even though the story is fiction, the issues that Genesis, Lukas, Chloe and Adam have faced in their pasts are very real.
The one thing that I disliked was the use of profanity. I don’t mind when characters swear normally, but in this case, the swearing seemed like it was only included as a way to try to make the teens sound more authentic, but in my opinion, it does the opposite. However, that is a small issue and can be easily overlooked by the reader.
I rate WE, THE WILDFLOWERS as 4 OUT OF 5 STARS ⭐⭐⭐⭐
**Thank you to the Author and to Wildfire Marketing Solutions for providing me with a free copy of this book.**
Check out the trailer HERE:
ABOUT THE AUTHOR:
After graduating from Texas A&M University, L.B. Simmons did what any biomedical science major could do. She entered the workforce as a full-time chemist. Years later, never in her wildest dreams would she have imagined herself a USA Today Bestselling contemporary romance author as well.
What began as a memoir for her children, ended up being her first self-published book, Running on Empty. Initially it was written to chronicle their actions, their phrases, and their silly arguments so that when they were older, they would always have those memories. The memoir soon began to take on a life of its own, morphing into the story of a single mother with three little girls finding love when she least expected it. Soon after, her girls were given reoccurring roles in the remainder of what became the Mending Hearts series.
That’s how her journey as an author began, and she hopes to God it never ends.
L.B. Simmons doesn’t just write books. With each new work, she attempts to compose journeys of love and self-discovery so she may impart life lessons to readers. Several novels later, she’s tackled suicide, depression, bullying, eating disorders, as well as physical and sexual abuse, all the while weaving elements of humor into the storylines in effort to balance the difficult topics. Often described as roller coaster rides, her novels are known for eliciting a wide range of emotions in each story she tells.
Connect with L.B. Simmons
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BOOK LAUNCH ON THURSDAY NIGHT – COME OUT WITH ME for the LAUNCH OF “DISFIGURED” by AMANDA LEDUC in Hamilton, Ontario
Exciting News
DISFIGURED
By: AMANDA LEDUC
Book Launch for Disfigured: On Fairy Tales, Disability and Making Space by Amanda Leduc.
Join Amanda Leduc for the launch of Disfigured: On Fairy Tales, Disability and Making Space. Sarah Jama co-founder of the Disability Justice Network of Ontario (DJNO), an organization committed to building the political and community power of people with disabilities, will be moderating.
Disfigured challenges the ableism of fairy tales and offers new ways to celebrate the magic of all bodies. In fairy tales, happy endings are the norm – as long as you’re beautiful and walk on two legs. After all, the ogre never gets the princess. And since fairy tales are the foundational myths of our culture, how can a girl with a disability ever think she’ll have a happy ending?
By examining the ways that fairy tales have shaped our expectations of disability, Disfigured will point the way toward a new world where disability is no longer a punishment or impediment but operates, instead, as a way of centering a protagonist and helping them to cement their own place in a story, and from there, the world. Through the book, Leduc ruminates on the connections we make between fairy tale archetypes – the beautiful princess, the glass slipper, the maiden with long hair lost in the tower – and tries to make sense of them through a twenty-first-century disablist lens. From examinations of disability in tales from the Brothers Grimm and Hans Christian Andersen through to modern interpretations ranging from Disney to Angela Carter, and the fight for disabled representation in today’s media, Leduc connects the fight for disability justice to the growth of modern, magical stories, argues for increased awareness and acceptance of that which is other – helping us to see and celebrate the magic inherent in different bodies.
Amanda Leduc’s essays and stories have appeared in publications across Canada, the US, and the UK. She is the author of the novels The Miracles of Ordinary Men and the forthcoming The Centaur’s Wife . She has cerebral palsy and lives in Hamilton, Ontario, where she works as the Communications Coordinator for the Festival of Literary Diversity (FOLD), Canada’s first festival for diverse authors and stories.
Event Details:
Wednesday, February 12 7 p.m. to 9 p.m.
First Unitarian Church, 170 Dundurn Street South, Hamilton, ON
Admission is free, all are welcome
The Unitarian Church has wheelchair accessible entry and wheelchair accessible washrooms. Accessible parking is available on either side of the entrance doors. For more accessibility information on the venue, please visit their website.
https://uuhamilton.ca
Please note that the venue is a nut-free and scent-free space.
………………..
PARKING
Ample car parking is available for most people in our own parking lot with additional space available at the Fortino’s plaza nearby at Dundurn and Main.
Parking spots for differently-abled are reserved near both doors.
……………………………
CLICK HERE TO BOOK YOUR FREE TICKETS FOR THE BOOK LAUNCH.
To learn more about Amanda Leduc, visit the following links:
SPLIT TOOTH by TANYA TAGAQ on Audiobook is a sensory experience not to be missed
Title: SPLIT TOOTH
Author: TANYA TAGAQ
Narrator: TANYA TAGAQ
Genre: NON-FICTION, BIOGRAPHIES AND MEMOIRS, INDIGENOUS PEOPLES, DIVERSE NON-FICTION, THROAT SINGING, ABUSE
Length: 5 HOURS and 43 MINUTES
Publisher: VIKING AUDIO
Type of Book: AUDIOBOOK
Release Date: SEPTEMBER 25, 2018
Rating: 5 OUT OF 5 STARS ⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐
DESCRIPTION:
From the internationally acclaimed Inuit throat singer who has dazzled and enthralled the world with music it had never heard before, a fierce, tender, heartbreaking story unlike anything you’ve ever heard.
Fact can be as strange as fiction. It can also be as dark, as violent, as rapturous. In the end, there may be no difference between them.
A girl grows up in Nunavut in the 1970s. She knows joy and friendship and parents’ love. She knows boredom and listlessness and bullying. She knows the tedium of the everyday world and the raw, amoral power of the ice and sky, the seductive energy of the animal world. She knows the ravages of alcohol and violence at the hands of those she should be able to trust. She sees the spirits that surround her and the immense power that dwarfs all of us.
When she becomes pregnant, she must navigate all this.
Veering back and forth between the grittiest features of a small arctic town, the electrifying proximity of the world of animals and ravishing world of myth, Tanya Tagaq explores a world where the distinctions between good and evil, animal and human, victim and transgressor, real and imagined lose their meaning, but the guiding power of love remains.
Haunting, brooding, exhilarating, and tender all at once, Tagaq moves effortlessly between fiction and memoir, myth and reality, poetry and prose, and conjures a world and a heroine listeners will never forget.
.
.
…..
https://player.vimeo.com/video/348888772
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MY REVIEW:
**TRIGGER WARNING **
This book contains descriptions of child sexual abuse. If this topic is a trigger for you, I suggest you give this book a pass.
***************************
I purchased a copy of this audiobook from Audible and now that I have finished listening to it, I believe audio is the best way to experience SPLIT TOOTH.
I feel so privileged to have listened to author Tanya Tagaq read her book aloud. Traditionally, the Inuit people passed down their stories and traditions in exactly this manner. Oral storytelling was the norm.
Not only does the author read this book with emotion and depth of experience, she also includes quite a bit of Throat Singing which is incredible to listen to.
The sounds are somehow both ethereal and haunting and despite the lack of lyrics, or maybe because of it, the meanings behind the sounds are quite clear.
Poignant. Visceral. Heart-breaking and real. Tanya Tagaq manages to convey her story in such a unique fashion that it is impossible to ever forget. Despite the heaviness of some of the subject matter, there are many moments of joy, happiness, peace, and a sense of belonging to something greater than herself.
The unfortunate details of abuse, both physical and sexual that Tanya endured as a child were perpetrated by those who should have been her protectors.
No matter what she endured, she knew that she was capable of survival.
The evils of the Canadian Residential Schools had so thoroughly erased her native language that hardly anyone in her ‘town’ knew how to speak it anymore. Not only that, but unthinkable abuses – sexual, physical, cultural and mental were forced upon Residential School “students,” (who were actually prisoners, since neither the children, nor their parents had any choice about attending.)
Make no mistake – these “schools” were an attempt at genocide of the Inuit and of all Indigenous people. There is no excuse or apology that can be adequate enough to erase the damage they caused. And, that damage has reached across the hands of time and affected many children of subsequent generations, including Tanya herself.
Don’t mistake my description to mean that Tanya Tagaq’s memoir is a litany of anger and complaint. It is anything but. Her writing is akin to reading her diary. Listening to the audiobook, I feel as though I have seen inside her very soul. If that sounds over dramatic, I apologize, it is truly the way I feel.
This audiobook is not to be missed. I am sure that just reading the book would be a terrific experience, but as I said above, audio format makes this book not just a story, but also an experience.
I am rating SPLIT TOOTH by TANYA TAGAQ as 5 OUT OF 5 STARS ⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐
Tanya also has many music albums available for purchase and after hearing some of her traditional throat singing, I will be downloading her music as well.
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QUOTES:
“… pain is to be expected, courage is to be welcomed. There is no choice but to endure. There is no other way than to renounce self-doubt. It is the time of the Dawning in more ways than one. The sun can rise, and so can I.”
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“In the spring you smell last fall’s death and this year’s growth as the elder lichen shows the young how to grow.”
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“We are product of the immense torque that propels this universe. We are not individuals but a great accumulation of all that lived before.”
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ABOUT THE AUTHOR:
Author, Throat singer, artist. Tanya Tagaq is multi-talented.
To learn more about this author, visit the following links:
OFFICIAL WEBSITE
http://tanyatagaq.com
AWARDS WON BY THIS BOOK:
Longlisted for the 2018 Scotiabank Giller Prize
Shortlisted for the 2019 Amazon First Novel Award
Shortlisted for the 2019 Kobo Emerging Writer Prize
Winner of the 2019 Indigenous Voices Award for Published Prose in English
Winner of the 2018 Alcuin Society Awards for Excellence in Book Design – Prose Fiction
Longlisted for the 2019 Sunburst Award
SMACKED by Eilene Zimmerman RELEASES TODAY
THE PATIENCE OF A DEAD MAN by Michael Clark will keep you reading long into the night and will make you terrified to be alone. This is Horror exactly how horror should be written
Title: THE PATIENCE OF A DEAD MAN
Series: THE PATIENCE OF A DEAD MAN SERIES: BOOK ONE
Author: MICHAEL CLARK
Genre: FICTION, HORROR
Length: 369 PAGES
Publisher: SELF-PUBLISHED
Received From: THE AUTHOR
Release Date: APRIL 15, 2019
ISBN: 9781733790420
Rating: 5 OUT OF 5 STARS ⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐
DESCRIPTION:
Tim Russell had it all: A successful contracting business with eight employees, two beautiful daughters, and a pretty wife…but it all fell to pieces when she asked for a divorce.
Now a year later, he’s a free man with nothing to do but try and pick up the pieces. His company has been liquidated and he’s down to one employee. He rents an apartment and is bored with the prospect of starting over; having to build his business from the bottom up…
…all over again.
Left with a dwindling bank account and searching for inspiration, he invests in a fixer-upper farmhouse in New Hampshire. Betting on himself and his construction background, the plan is to work on (and live in) the house for a year, then sell it for profit.
But who is the woman he sees in his field? And who flies the red kite from the middle of the forest? Does it have something to do with the fact that the previous owner was found dead in the master bedroom three years back? Or is that just the tip of the iceberg?
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MY REVIEW:
Firstly I want to mention the exquisitely terror inducing cover of this book. The color scheme along with the inclusion of buzzing flies instantly tells the potential reader this is a horror story. The shadowy figures that are slightly blurred adds to the sense of impending doom. Even the choice of font is perfect. The cover of THE PATIENCE OF A DEAD MAN is exactly the type of cover that would catch my eye and would prompt me to pick this book up in a bookstore and/or library.
When our protagonist (Tim Russell) is being shown the fixer-upper farmhouse in New Hampshire, he asks the realtor for information about the former owner who’d died in the home. However, he quickly realizes that his questions might be in poor taste and hurriedly tries to reassure his realtor, Holly Burns, that the woman’s death and his interest in the details is because he finds it “morbidly fascinating.” I absolutely love this phrase. I often read horror, true crime and biographies and I now have the perfect way to answer those who ask why I read books of those genres. From now on I am going to tell anyone who asks, that I read these books because they are “morbidly fascinating.” A big thank you to the author for providing me with this new, and succinct phrase.
The storyline of a haunted house is not new, but I would be willing to bet money that this book is unlike any other haunted house book readers have experienced so far.
THE PATIENCE OF A DEAD MAN is wonderfully twisted and tangled and readers cannot help but be caught up in it’s web.
So, Tim, the newly divorced Contractor decides to purchase the house and to live in it while he fixes and improves it. After that he will sell the property along with the upgraded house for (hopefully) a tidy profit.
There is only one flaw in the plan … Tim had no idea that the house’s original owner had never left and her antics are starting to scare him.
To find out why I say THE PATIENCE OF A DEAD MAN is unlike any other haunted house book, you need to buy a copy and find out for yourself.
With a wickedly spooky atmosphere, a dose of a secretive past, a hint of romance and enough unexpected elements to keep you intrigued, THE PATIENCE OF A DEAD MAN needs to be on your TO READ list. If you do not pick up a copy of this book, you will truly be missing out. Who knows? You just might be reading the first book written by the next Stephen King.
Luckily, DEAD WOMAN SCORNED, which is the next book in the series is already available and I can’t wait to dive into it.
I rate THE PATIENCE OF A DEAD MAN as 5 OUT OF 5 STARS ⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐
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***Thank you to Michael Clark for providing me with a free copy of this book.***
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QUOTE I LOVED FROM THE BOOK:
“He imagined when the seasons changed, he might lose some sleep to horny bullfrogs calling out for a mate.”
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ABOUT THE AUTHOR:
Michael Clark was raised in New Hampshire and lived in the house The Patience of a Dead Man is based on.
The bats of the barn really circled the rafters all day and there actually was a man-made grove hidden in the forest.
He now lives in Massachusetts with his wife Josi and his dog Bubba.
The Patience of a Dead Man is his first novel. Dead Woman Scorned is his second with more to come.
To learn more about this author, visit the following links:
FACEBOOK
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TWITTER
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REDDIT
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AMAZON
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MY REVIEW OF THE SECOND BOOK IN THIS TERRIFYING HORROR SERIES IS COMING SOON…
THE GOOD HAWK by Author JOSEPH ELLIOTT is now Available. I challenge everyone to read this Dystopian novel. You just might find a hidden message inside
Title: THE GOOD HAWK
Series: SHADOW SKYE – BOOK ONE
Author: JOSEPH ELLIOTT
Genre: FICTION, SCIENCE FICTION AND FANTASY, YOUNG ADULT FICTION, DIVERSE FICTION, DISABILITIES, LGBTQ, MIDDLE GRADE FICTION
Length: 358 PAGES
Publisher: CANDLEWICK PRESS
Received From: NETGALLEY
Release Date: JANUARY 21, 2020
ISBN: 9781536207187
Price: $17.99 USD
Rating: 5 OUT OF 5 STARS ⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐
DESCRIPTION:
Agatha is a Hawk, brave and fierce, who protects her people by patrolling the high walls of their island home. She is proud of her job, though some in her clan whisper that it is meant to keep her out of the way because of the condition she was born with.Jaime, thoughtful and anxious, is an Angler, but he hates the sea. Worse, he’s been chosen for a duty that the clan hasn’t required for generations: to marry. The elders won’t say why they have promised him to a girl in a neighboring clan, but there are rumors of approaching danger.When disaster strikes and the clan is kidnapped, it is up to Agatha and Jaime to travel across the haunted mainland of Scotia to Norveg, with help along the way from a clan of nomadic Highland bull riders and the many animals who are drawn to Agatha’s extraordinary gift of communication. Thrilling and dark yet rich with humor and compassion, this is the first book in the Shadow Skye trilogy, written by a wonderful new voice in fantasy and introducing a welcome new kind of hero.
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MY REVIEW:
What a rare gem is THE GOOD HAWK. The two protagonists are unlikely heroes. They know they have face their fears and use any and all gifts they may have to survive in this unique work of Dystopian Fiction.
Agatha has Down Syndrome (in the book there is no official diagnosis, but it is obvious to informed readers.) When was the last time you read a book, or even a short story, where the protagonist is a person with a “DisABILITY?”
Kudos to Author Joseph Elliott for challenging stereotypes and showcasing the fact that people are just people, and that everyone is different and every individual has a variety of things to offer the world.
This book is set in a world that is vaguely medieval and definitely dystopian. Agatha lives with her tribe in an enclave on an island reminiscent of those off the coast of Scotland. Even though Agatha has been assigned to be a “Hawk”, which is an important position in the tribal hierarchy, there are still many people who treat her with contempt and loathing because she is not like everyone else. The author does a terrific job depicting the discrimination Agatha faces on a daily basis.
Jamie is a young man who has recently been told that his permanent profession is to be an Angler. To say he is disappointed is an understatement. He does not like boats and has no interest in catching fish, but he has no choice. He will do what the Elders tell him, just like every other tribe member.
To add insult to injury, Jamie has also been told that he is to be married to a member of another tribe. He is horrified. No one in the tribe is married. They believe marriage is an archaic and unnecessary institution.
When their tribe is threatened, it is up to Agatha and Jamie to save them, but they are only two people, and young people at that. The task in front of them is momentous, it is daunting, and it would be much easier to just give up.
So, what do they do? How do they even begin? You will need to read the book to find out.
The action is unrelenting, and the surprises are continuous.
Agatha turns out to be special in many ways, and Jamie will confront not only physical dangers, he will also meet other people and other tribes and ultimately come to realize that many of the ideas and attitudes he has been taught since childhood are discriminatory. He will have to decide what he believes deep in his heart.
I read this book over a two day period and enjoyed every minute of it. This story will touch readers and will hopefully open their eyes to the fact that just because someone is “different” does not mean they are ‘lesser than.’
Yes, there are quite a few lessons to be learned from reading this book, but it is also a fantastic story that grabs the reader’s attention from the very first chapter. The characters are brilliantly depicted and the world is one which our world could easily become.
I am excited that the second book in the series is already being written and I will be eagerly awaiting it’s publication.
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TO LEARN MORE ABOUT DOWN SYNDROME VISIT THE FOLLOWING LINK:
http://www.dsrf.org
Click HERE to download the Winter 2020 Down Syndrome Magazine FREE.
ABOUT THE AUTHOR:
Joseph Elliott is a writer, teacher, and actor known for his work in children’s television. The Good Hawk is his first book. He lives in London.
To learn more about this author, visit the following links:
PUBLISHER’S WEBSITE – CANDLEWICK PRESS
@WalkerBooksUK
#TheGoodHawk #NetGalley
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Amie's Book Reviews 