Tina Janz feels torn between her parents’ wishes that she marry an upstanding (but boring) Mennonite boy and her desire for the man she loves—Frank Warkentin, the son of a Mennonite father and Gypsy mother. But the tug-of-war in Elma Schemenauer’s novel Consider the Sunflowers is more than between just Tina and her parents. For… Continue reading Consider the Sunflowers (review)
Secrets and Lies: A Redemption's Edge Novel by Janet Sketchley My rating: 5 of 5 stars Carol Daniels has moved with her 16-year-old son Paul from Calgary to Toronto at the beginning of Secrets and Lies, Janet Sketchley’s second book in the Redemption Edge Series. It wasn’t a move of choice but of necessity, to… Continue reading Secrets and Lies (review)
Man Overboard: A Tale of Divine Compassion by David Denny My rating: 5 of 5 stars You have probably heard the story of Jonah, but never like David Denny tells it in Man Overboard: A Tale of Divine Compassion. In 24 poems capturing the voices of Jonah, God, sailors, wind, whale, people of Nineveh, their… Continue reading Man Overboard (review)
Posting my Limp sequence has been interrupted by a project that is now all but done. So it's back to these poems about the mishap I had this spring. If you've ever experienced one event, followed by another, and another, you'll recognize the feeling of a domino train. This was my experience way back in… Continue reading Domino train (Limp – 4)
The Daughter of Highland Hall: A Novel by Carrie Turansky My rating: 3 of 5 stars It is April of 1912 and Katherine Ramsey has come to London to do the “season.” Under the sponsorship of her aunt, Lady Louisa Gatewood—her own parents have both died—it is her goal to come out as a debutante,… Continue reading The Daughter of Highland Hall (review)
October Fashion Morning wears crisp cotton and smoky tulle woven through with gold light. North Shore mountains are sensibly dressed in darkest denim, their tops hidden, cozy under unrolling bolts of blue- and grey-tinged fleece. The park has thrown on a shawl of embroidered leaves in tangerine, scarlet, yellow wine, olive. Even dwarf cedar has… Continue reading October Fashion
This is Thanksgiving Weekend in Canada and I should probably be posting an overtly thankful poem. Let this be its substitute, for it sings the praises of some of the things for which I am most thankful: the ability to walk, beautiful places to walk, someone to walk with, fall colours, fall mists, the Creator… Continue reading The sun dreams palely down
Thief of Glory: A Novel by Sigmund Brouwer My rating: 5 of 5 stars “There (in a village on the island of Java, Dutch East Indies), a marble game beneath the branches was an event as seemingly inconsequential as a banyan seed taking root in the bark of an unsuspecting tree, but the tendrils of… Continue reading Thief of Glory (review)
Two weeks after surgery (March 17, 2014) Why does it hurt so far from the incision? My muscles are a straitjacket of pain to natural walking unseen, inner prison. Will I ever walk easily again? Deep in my hip a tremolo of weakness that frightens me when stepping with a cane. At physio a modicum… Continue reading Two weeks after surgery (Limp – 3)
Membrane "The membrane between the normal and unthinkable is exceedingly thin" - mother of an autistic child fall, fracture pops rainbow bubble thin unseen fragile skin between normal everyday and life ever changed disappeared flight 370 Oso Slide membrane slashed now mud, rubble, tears, searching no going back © 2014 by Violet Nesdoly (all rights… Continue reading Membrane (Limp – 2)
Violet Nesdoly 