Julie’s Journal
A Class Act
Luke leaned over and whispered, “You get the medal, not me, OK?”
We had been sitting at a banquet table for about two hours, watching as nervous book authors waited for their category to be called and to learn if they’d won an award…
Seeing Zoe
She was much taller than I expected. With the thinness of an athlete, a runner’s build. But she still had the freckles I remembered when I first started writing about her, and that same porcelain-doll skin. I also recognized that serious, almost introspective look that surfaced whenever she put her hands on Rikki.
Stepping Into the Danger Zone (and Finding Myself Aloft)
In a story that ran in Oxford American late last year, author Patsy Sims recalls meeting a man accused of being a ringleader with the Ku Klux Klan, as well as organizer of the murders of three civil rights workers in Mississippi. “I realize now…that choosing to interview him in my motel room was not the smartest thing I’ve ever done.”
The Keeper of the Pieces
I’ve been re-working some personal essays recently for a series of books under the title Storybook Tallahassee. These stories are like a folding table in the living room corner covered in puzzle pieces. That’s been my life: the keeper of the pieces…
“Excuse me, General McChrystal, could you write us a blurb?”
Authors occasionally find themselves in an awkward position during the publishing process. Most of us are good with capturing the story, researching and writing. But then you have to do things like convince someone to look at an advance copy of your book and review it…
My Year With Marie
“I didn’t have but one bath for three months last summer,” the old woman announces, a few minutes after we’ve met. Marie sits in a black chrome wheelchair dressed in a pale violet jogging suit with blue flowers embroidered across the chest. Her feet are covered in...