Mary Odden’s Blog
Date: June 4, 2020
https://www.maryodden.com/neighborsblog
Date: June 4, 2020
https://www.maryodden.com/neighborsblog
Date: June 3, 2020
My new novel Glorious Boy began with a dream. On a tropical island during an emergency evacuation, a young girl was hiding in a dense rainforest with a small, mute white boy […]
Date: June 3, 2020
Aimee Liu talks about GLORIOUS BOY, the excruciating process of writing, creating a memorable silent character, her shapeshifter dad, and so much more.
Date: June 3, 2020
Some 30 years ago, an established nonfiction writer and a screenwriter decided to write their first novels. They met in a fiction writing class, and have been friends ever since, […]
Date: June 3, 2020
Featured mentioning of Percival Everett’s Colonel Hap Thompson!
Date: June 3, 2020
Presented in five poetic sequences, the poems in Hold Me Tight by gay poet Jason Schneiderman focuses the reader’s attention on the subjects of anger, real and metaphorical wolves, the work of the late […]
Date: June 3, 2020
At 15, Plum Valentine is banished from her Brooklyn home and sent back to Jamaica by parents nervous about the pernicious effects of the American lifestyle. Once there, her trust […]
Date: June 3, 2020
In the bedroom of Harlem Renaissance poet Anne Spencer, there’s a mural depicting a well-dressed crowd at a cocktail party pasted to the wall. Spencer’s granddaughter, Shaun Spencer-Hester, points to […]
Date: June 3, 2020
Family relations can be fraught in the best of times, even when people care deeply for one another. So what happens when you throw those family members into a situation […]
Date: June 3, 2020
It’s Detroit, 1968. Sisters Rosa and Esther march against the war in Vietnam with their best friend, Maggie. As they reached the rally site, double rows of blank-faced National Guard […]
Date: April 1, 2025
I have a bad habit when reading books – always starting by opening the last page and reading the last line, then closing the book to see what my mind […]
Date: April 1, 2025
Andrew Lam’s Stories from the Edge of the Sea is reviewed by Paul Christiansen in Saigoneer, an English-language publication based in Saigon. The review highlights Lam’s focus on “desire, generational […]
Date: March 18, 2025
Poetry collection We by April Ossmann is reviewed by Rena Mosteirin in Daybreak. “Inside this collection, the poet succeeds in showing us what beauty means to tell us, through small, […]
Date: March 12, 2025
Nancy Kricorian’s The Burning Heart of the World is reviewed by Susan Cox in Library Journal. “This is a fast-moving, relatable story that would be a good addition to a […]
Date: March 4, 2025
Short stories examine lives shaped by the Vietnamese refugee experience. Lam and his family fled Vietnam in April, 1975, when he just 11 years old. While the stories in this […]
Date: February 26, 2025
Kim Dower’s latest poetry collection What She Wants is reivewed by Vick Mickunas in Journal-News. In the review, Mickunas highlights the collection’s ability to provide a literary refuge, stating: “Whenever […]
Date: February 24, 2025
Even when the return is to unlivable conditions with no protection from any type of law, displaced people returning home is something to celebrate. The connection one has to one’s […]
Date: February 3, 2025
Between its quiet swells of suspense, Blood on the Brain is an interior and intimate story about a young woman navigating identity and adulthood. Bediako concludes this strong and spirited […]
Date: January 29, 2025
Eleanor J. Bader recommends The Burning Heart of the World by Nancy Kricorian, describing it as “a beautiful, sad, and timely look at the aftermath of war and its lasting […]
Date: January 28, 2025
Blood Wolf Moon reflects a poet at the height of her powers, yet it remains accessible to a wide audience and will especially be valued by Osages. Readers will find […]