When I taught LGBTQ+ Literature this past fall, many students were so locked in on queer oppression and trauma that they overlooked queer hope and joy. Their negative focus was partly because of the pandemic and political climate, but also because of my text choices and teaching strategies. So I wrote a post about the … Read more
This past Friday, I laughed hard and thought hard at Prairie Lights. I was part of an enthralled inter-generational crowd listening to Lyz Lenz discuss her debut book, God Land: A Story of Faith, Loss, and Renewal in Middle America. The book combines the personal and the political. Lenz analyzes the cultural work performed by … Read more
Good news, bad news. Both inspired my women’s basketball mystery, Murder by Mascot, when Alyson first published it in 2006. And both are on my mind as I publish a third edition of the novel and reflect what has changed since then. This post will focus on good news, on activism and progress, on the … Read more
I believed in the transformative power of literature years before I had the words to say so. But it turns out, I had no idea how much the right novel at the right time could change me. The novel is Richard Powers’ beautiful, sprawling eco-fiction, The Overstory. The time is now, my third sabbatical. Let … Read more