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        • MCFL Blogs
        • Neshama Franklin
        27
        Mar 2023

        Categories

        • View all cards in Adults
        • View all cards in Biography & Memoir
        • View all cards in Books
        • View all cards in Fiction
        • View all cards in Mystery & Thriller
        • View all cards in Parenting & Relationships
        • View all cards in Social Issues & Civil Rights

        More Posts

        • Neshama’s Choices for May 29th

          May 29, 2023

        • Neshama’s Choices for May 22

          May 22, 2023

        • Neshama’s Choices for May 15th

          May 15, 2023

        • Neshama’s Choices for May 8th

          May 8, 2023

        • Neshama’s Choices for May 1st

          May 1, 2023

        Neshama’s Choices for March 27th

        by Neshama Franklin March 27, 2023

        The titles and links below will direct you to print copies when available.  Click on the title to see all available formats, including recorded versions and eBooks.

        You can learn more about using eBooks and eAudiobooks on our blog, and contact us if you need assistance. *Restrictions to using Hoopla apply based on your home address.


        How Not to Drown in A Glass of Water

        We meet Cara through a series of interviews with a social worker who’s trying to help her get employment. The factory where she worked has closed and she’s pretty desperate but also has lots of conditions.  Which we learn about fully since she spills everything in a delightful dizzying rush of Spanglish—she’s from the Dominican Republic. Life is tough. Her biggest sorrow: her gay son Fernando has pulled completely away from her. With great verve and generosity she helps relatives, friends, and neighbors in increasingly gentrifying Washington Heights, which is one of the reasons the job offers are untenable. I don’t speak Spanish but I loved hanging out with Cara so I just got most of the words in context. A refreshing delight!  

        If A Tree Falls

        Subtitled A Family’s Quest to Hear and Be Heard. Sophie was born deaf. Rosner was devastated. How would they communicate? So many decisions.  Then their second daughter Juliet had even more severe hearing loss. They found a good school, moved from California to Massachusetts, and made good choices which wasn’t easy. For instance, Juliet got cochlear implants, quite controversial. Rosner plunged into murky family history and discovered many deaf relatives. She creates a narrative to convey what it must have been like for them back then in Galicia in the late 1800s. Rosner’s own mother was very hard of hearing but tried to cover it up by appearing “normal” but this made her emotionally unavailable.  She was determined to change that pattern with her daughters and it seems to be working. Candid, thoughtful—a beautiful book. 

        Deer Creek Drive

        Subtitled A Reckoning of Memory and Murder in the Mississippi Delta.  When the author was 10 years old, a very bizarre killing happened in her hometown. Dutiful daughter Ruth appeared to have stabbed her mother many times over with garden shears.  Ruth described the Black man who “did it,” but no evidence turned up and she was eventually incarcerated in the notorious local penitentiary known as Parchman Farm.  However, as an upper-class white woman she got preferential treatment and was even pardoned down the line. This all happened in 1948 and Lowry uses it and her own experiences as a lens to focus on racism, “justice,”  and folly in the deep south—then and now. Powerful!  

        The Island

        Heather really wants to do better with new husband Tom’s fractious kids which is how they end up on said island off Victoria in Australia, on a family vacation where there’s a promise of viewing animals. It’s a tiny, strange place, already inimical, and when Tom runs over a woman on a bicycle, things get very scary indeed. I had to suspend disbelief periodically but got very caught up in the desperate action.  Helps that Heather had training as a wilderness guide. Lots of suspense.  

        View all cards in Neshama's Choices
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