Monthly Archives: August 2023

“Then she leaned over and bit him hard on the cheek.”

Posted on August 31, 2023 by Kate Stover

Even though this biography of novelist Barbara Pym was picked as a “Best Book of the Year 2021” by the London Times, the Guardian, and the Daily Telegraph, I was initially reluctant to read it. I didn’t want to learn … Continue reading →

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“I expect you to beat the odds. That’s my gift to you, in fact, that gift of expectations.”

Posted on August 17, 2023 by Kate Stover

At the end of this novel, Peter Sullivan tells the hard-scrabble students in his English class that he believes in them and expects them to succeed, even if no one else has ever had faith in them before. What a … Continue reading →

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“I have learned,” said the Philosopher, “that the head does not hear anything until the heart has listened, and that what the heart knows to-day, the head will understand to-morrow.”

Posted on August 4, 2023 by Kate Stover

Interesting ideas sparkle throughout this novel. Here are two examples: “Curiosity will conquer fear even more than bravery will” and “…for life may not be consecutive, but explosive and variable, else it is a shackled and timorous slave.” It was … Continue reading →

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