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Dystopian America
The Handmaid’s Tale is informed by the Puritanical thread that still knits through American culture and Old Testament history of handmaids: Jacob, father of the Twelve Tribes of Israel, in a story of betrayal and jealousy, marries his cousins Leah and Rachel, and in turn, Jacob is offered his wives’ handmaids, Bilhah and Zilpah as surrogates—without their consent.
Fried Green Tomatoes
I wondered what movies these young women had seen that conjured up images of ladies in aprons, so I asked.
Read the First Chapter of Stony Kill
Not long before my mother died, she told me a story I’d never heard before. It was 1965, the year before she married my father. Spring had come to the Northeast nearly a season ahead of itself.
Memorial Day
Today, amid the parades and family gatherings, I recall the many Memorial Day services I attended, often in churches and at cemeteries where clergy, local veterans, and officers from the VFW and the American Legion Post spoke about hometown heroes lost in past and current wars. I always think of my father on this day. […]
Wisewomen and Trauma
My novel Stony Kill tells the story of a complicated family, opening with the revelation of a family secret—the tragic story of a long ago shooting. The protagonist Joss Ryckman, a thirty-something Brooklyn baker, copes with the mystery of this shooting— was it accidental or not? This revelation soon follows the sudden death of […]
Allure of the Woods
“When I was in high school, I used to pilfer cigarettes from my grandmother’s pack—Lark filters—and sneak off into the woods to smoke them one after the other.”
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