Best Of 2024: January–June

As we do at the very beginning of every year, this week we’re offering you an assemblage of favorite questions and responses from the previous year’s fifty-plus interviews between reviewers and authors. Please give this an attentive read—we know you’ll find a few nuggets of wisdom to help make 2025 a year of great gains and growth.

Jessica Young, Author of Find Your Flow, Talks about Unlocking Creativity through Intuitive Fluid Art

Reviewer Kristine Morris: What are some of the changes/growth/awakenings you see in others as a result of including an art practice in their healing journey?

In my work as a therapist and mentor I have seen art-making provide a language to communicate what otherwise may never be said or known. When you learn how to create art with emotion, or even just view art with an appreciation for the emotion that went into creating it, you empower the creative healing process. Art-making has directly impacted my clients who have experienced trauma and/or deep emotional turmoil and given them a way to communicate what they’ve been through and how it’s impacting them without actually having to use words.

Words can feel extremely scary for traumatized folks or for people who are struggling with their emotions. Therapy clients who had been labeled as “resistant” by other therapists would invite me into their world through the art I prompted them to make. Hesitantly, they would put pen, paint brush, or crayon to paper and we would go on a slow and compassionate creative journey over the weeks that followed. Sometimes I would just sit and witness, with no words exchanged for the entire therapy hour. But they would emote through textures and colors and sometimes even the words they would write. When you throw out the fear of making bad art and just allow yourself to utilize art as a form of expression, you witness people open up in ways that will truly inspire you. I have seen struggling addicts put down their addiction in exchange for what they call an “addiction” to art-making. I have seen a little girl who was considered non-verbal tell me about her entire world just through the pictures she would draw for me. I have seen “criminals” choose the straight path forward in exchange for recognition of their disregarded talent. Art truly has the power to change the healing trajectory for people who are otherwise perceived as the most helpless, but only if we allow it to.

Kengo Kurimoto Discusses Wildful, His Magisterial New Graphic Novel about Rediscovering Nature

Reviewer Peter Dabbene: The final scene in Wildful is a two-page spread that depicts a grand chorus of birdsong, visualizing the acoustic differences among different species, while conveying the overwhelming experience of hearing them all together. How did you decide on how best to illustrate such a non-visual concept?

I have always liked the idea of depicting sounds visually and it made sense for the birdsong. I started off almost like a spectrum analyser, left to right with high notes shown high and low notes low. But the more I listened, there was an incredible variety of textures, like sharp, staccato, meandering, or vibrating sounds. The robin’s song is just incredible in its complexity with a cascade of notes rivalling even the most experimental of jazz saxophonists.

I wanted to record it as accurately as possible whilst keeping in mind it needed to look nice on the page. For this, I was very much inspired by the elegance and articulation of Islamic script.

For the crescendo, I spent a number of mornings out at 4am listening to the Dawn Chorus. It is spectacular; the way it builds into a continuous soundscape where every moment is filled by the song of a bird, possibly miles away. I imagined it almost like a net of scripts, spreading far into the distance.

A Few Minutes with Ellen Bernstein, Author of Toward a Holy Ecology: Reading the Song of Songs in the Age of Climate Crisis

Reviewer Kristen Rabe: We see so much broken-ness in our world today, including environmental devastation, the impact of climate change, and the tragedy of global conflict. How can the message of The Song of Songs foster healing and wholeness?

If you recognize that our broken-ness arises out of our alienation from the land—from the source of life that nourishes us—then the Song acts as a balm. It celebrates the fundamental connection between people and land.

On a soul level, we know that a good life means living in harmony with the natural world—our life support system. But, unfortunately, we live in a state of forgetfulness. The Song can awaken us from our slumber and help us remember and re-ignite our connectedness to the natural world.

In my tradition, the ancient rabbis called the Song of Songs the holy of holies—that is, the holiest book of the Bible. They said that it provided a handle on reading the Torah. I understand this to mean that we are to read the Hebrew Bible through the eyes of the Song. Just imagine the ramifications if we brought the Song’s perspective on wholeness and intimacy with a life-giving land to our reading of the Bible!

Words of Nourishment from Tomáš Halík, Author of The Afternoon of Christianity: The Courage to Change

Reviewer Jeremiah Rood: I think a key point that people need to understand is the distinction you draw between faith and belief, with faith being a “certain attitude of life, an orientation, a way of being in the world and how we understand it, rather than mere ‘religious beliefs’ and opinions.” I think people in the west get caught up in this trap about belief often. Can you explain why that distinction matters?

Faith is a lifelong process of existential transformation: the transition from the “little ego,” from life on the surface, to a deeper centre; St. Paul expresses it in the words “I no longer live alone, Christ lives in me.”

Faith is the courage to enter the cloud of mystery and to live with the mystery. Belief is the effort to reflect faith intellectually and to articulate it with words, concepts, images, theories. This is important so that we can communicate about faith to others, so that we can share and celebrate faith with others. But at the same time, we must be free from our concepts and religious ideas and theories. St. Paul reminds us that we see everything here only as in a mirror, in a puzzle, in part.

There must always be room in our faith for mystery, further searching, new interpretations. The Bible and dogmas can be taken either literally or seriously. A literal, mechanical understanding means turning faith into idolatry, fundamentalism—into the opposite of faith.

If “belief” loses its relation to the deeper dimension of faith, to its existential-spiritual dimension, it degenerates into ideology, losing vitality and persuasiveness.

Rania Hanna, Author of The Jinn Daughter, Imagines Death as Incarnate, a Realm of Its Own

Reviewer Karen Rigby: Death is a mother here, with her own yearning, too. She’s made more than only an adversary because of it. Would you speak about the myths, stories, or inspirations behind her?

Death as a goddess, and as a mother, was born out of parallels to Nadine. Kamuna (Death) grew into her role as a nurturer, partially because I did not want her simply to be a power-hungry goddess. She needed to have a reason for wanting the things she does, and she needed to have a driving factor for eventually accepting things. I don’t know that I necessarily pulled from specific myths or stories, but I do love books like Sabriel by Garth Nix, which focuses on death as a realm. I wanted death to be incarnate, and Kamuna grew out of that desire. At the core, I wanted to humanize death, since it’s such a central piece of the narrative.

Foreword’s Science Fiction-Loving Editor-in-Chief Interviews Natasha Pulley, Author of The Mars House

Michelle Anne Schingler: Mammoths on Mars were a delight that it seems no reader can stop raving about. What was the impetus behind their inclusion for you?

I wanted Mars to be in the process of terraforming, so I was researching cold weather species that might be okay in Arctic conditions (Mars is/would be, even if it were terraformed, very cold). Polar bears went in, and then I thought, why not resurrect extinct species too? Mammoth herds would be a great tourist attraction! But also, I wanted something wild, and different to humans, but which could communicate. Something that could show what any thinking things have in common, human or not, and by extension, how little the differences between January and Gale really matter. The mammoths in the story have language: that’s based on real studies done with elephants. I thought that was unbelievably wonderful, so in it went.

Interview with Manni Coe, Author of brother. do. you. love. me.—A Down Syndrome Song of Praise

Reviewer Rebecca Foster: brother. do. you. love. me. found a home with independent publishers better known for nature writing (Little Toller in the UK and Greystone Books in North America). What do you think this says about the book? (e.g. that it was difficult to pigeonhole, or that place-based writing should be a broader umbrella?)

I think it is difficult to pigeonhole, yes. It’s a memoir that covers a wide array of issues: brotherhood, mental health, Down syndrome, and family to name just a few. The narrative unfurls during twenty-six very quiet weeks, on a very quiet country lane, in a very quiet part of Dorset. There is a strong sense of place explored through our daily walks and contact with the natural world. Unbeknownst to us, all through those gruelling months, Little Toller were four miles away, suffering their own lockdown in a neighbouring village. Our meeting seemed meant to be. It was a beautiful moment of serendipity and they decided to give our story a voice. Little Toller, in turn, sold the North American rights to Greystone, convinced that the united passions would serve well to launch the book in the USA and Canada.

Reviewer Interviews Jennilee Austria-Bonifacio, Filipino Author of Reuniting with Strangers: A Novel

Reviewer Eileen Gonzalez: What do you hope people who are not immigrants get out of the book?

For non-immigrant readers, my main goal is the same one that I have when I facilitate Filipino Talks professional development sessions for educators and frontline workers: to build empathy.

I want to show them everything that could be happening behind closed doors: custody battles over text messages and e-mails, the rich heritage and language that many newcomers leave behind in the Philippines, the impact on a storied family when there is no one to inherit a legacy, and so much more. I want them to see my community and our non-binary youth; our experiences with anti-Black racism; our reaction to often being seen, first and foremost, as workers; and more.

Lastly, it was important to me to bring readers into Filipino homes in different parts of the world: from a cliffside town on the Tagaytay Ridge to the closed OFW apartments of Riyadh to our communities in the desert of Osoyoos, the Arctic world of Iqaluit, the suburbs of southern Ontario, Sarnia’s Chemical Valley, Montréal’s Côte-des-Neiges, and Toronto’s Little Manila.

As someone who was born and raised in the diaspora, I hope that Reuniting with Strangers finds a warm place in hearts across the globe.

Talking Orchids and Biases Against Mothers in Research Labs with Erin Zimmerman, Author of Unrooted: Botany, Motherhood, and the Fight to Save an Old Science

Reviewer Meg Nola: How has Charles Darwin been a continuing source of inspiration for you?

Charles Darwin is pretty unique among the people we think of as explorer-naturalists in that, after his single big adventure aboard the Beagle, he never left the country of his birth ever again. His poor health and introverted nature kept him tied to his rural home. Yet he made his greatest contributions from that place. He reached out to the world through his letters, corresponding with other scientists and arranging for specimens to be sent to him, but he made his scientific observations and developed his theory from home. I think a lot of people, as they get older and take on family and work responsibilities, feel they aren’t as free to see the world and chase their goals as perhaps they once were. I find it inspiring to look at Darwin and think that it’s possible to do amazing things and change the world even if you’re not able to go on these daring adventures. It’s comforting.

Breaking the Lock of Heartbreak with Sara Avant Stover, Author of Handbook for the Heartbroken

Reviewer Kristine Morris: What do you find to be the biggest obstacles to healing from heartbreak? What are some of the best resources to help overcome these?

The biggest obstacles to healing from heartbreak are not being willing to feel the feelings that come with it, not taking the time needed to heal, and not having the support from community that will help us to do this. I created this book to be a resource to help overcome all of these! I also recommend attending community grief rituals if they’re available in your area and exploring Internal Family Systems (IFS), the cutting-edge psycho-spiritual model that I weave throughout this book and that played a significant role in my healing.

Queering Contemplation Author Cassidy Hall Discusses the Joyful Union Between Queerness and Her Contemplative Life

Reviewer Kristine Morris: Please describe your own spiritual/contemplative practices and how your queerness is reflected in them. What benefits have you experienced in life and contemplative practice as a result?

When I engage in my contemplative practices I release control, I remove my agenda, I soften every muscle in my body––often to the point of tears. Contemplative practice is where my roots of compassion deepen. It is where I meet my true self, in all of its ugliness and beauty. We could say that I queer my own contemplative practice by simply being a queer woman, lucky enough to be comfortable in my own skin. But I’d also add that I queer my contemplative practices by embracing the strangeness, oddity, and even weirdness they bring into my life.

Lessons for Saving the Free World from Stuart Eizenstat, Author of The Art of Diplomacy

Reviewer Willem Marx: At the end of the book, you lay out a few avenues for resolving the war in Gaza that erupted on October 7, 2023. Do you see the fact of ongoing conflict today, so many months later, as, at least partially, a failure of negotiation? At a diplomatic level, what, if anything, might have been done differently since October to end the fighting?

Gaza presents a situation in which military force must be combined with political negotiations from the outset of the war. Hamas must be disabled as a fighting and governing force, although it will be difficult to totally eliminate them. It is impossible to negotiate with a governing force deeply committed to a country’s total eradication, as Hamas is to Israel’s extinction. However, there were failures of intelligence and negotiation:

• The Israeli government systemically weakened the already weak and corrupt, but more moderate Palestinian Authority, while allowing Qatar to finance them and Iran to arm them. They tried to “domesticate” Hamas by allowing 18,000 Gazans to work in Israel daily.

• The Israeli government failed to learn from the mistakes we the United States made in Iraq and Afghanistan, by not having a postwar political plan and wartime humanitarian plan in place before they commenced negotiations. General Petraeus turned around the Iraq war by a policy of clear, hold, and build. The last component was to show the Iraqi civilians that the US was committed to defeat the radicals but to [also] build a better life for the non-combatants.

• Their failure of intelligence was profound, not simply on the day of the attack, October 7, but by failing to understand that Hamas in a few years had morphed from a terrorist group to a full-blown terrorist army with over 30,000 well-trained, well-armed, and disciplined soldiers buried in over 300 miles of tunnels, some up to 80 meters deep.

• The war in Gaza cannot be resolved by military means alone. It will require a diplomatic solution, as well. This must be done by Israel becoming a part of a coalition of moderate Sunni Arab countries—with most of whom Israel already has peace agreements—along with the US and European Union, to combat the Iranian-led radical Axis of Evil. For this positive coalition to be created, there will have to be difficult negotiations to have some timetable for a demilitarized, non-violent Palestinian state. The Biden administrations’ three phase program, which the Israeli war cabinet seems to have adopted, would be the beginning of the negotiated process.

Matt Sutherland
January 3, 2025

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