Book Review
Birth of the Chosen One
by Karen Rigby
The serene picture book "Birth of the Chosen One" retells the Christmas story from a Native American perspective. Terry Wildman’s reverent picture book "Birth of the Chosen One" adapts the story of Jesus’s birth for an Indigenous...
Book Review
All Mixed Up
by Karen Rigby
In Raj Tawney’s perceptive novel "All Mixed Up", a multiracial boy contends with bullying and finds friendship in the aftermath of 9/11. Kamal’s father is from India. His mother is a New Yorker with Italian and Puerto Rican roots. At...
Book Review
The Raven’s Nest
by Karen Rigby
Visual anthropologist and filmmaker Sarah Thomas’s eloquent memoir-in-essays "The Raven’s Nest" covers her time in Iceland, where her views about people’s relationships to land and to each other sharpened. The book draws contrasts...
Book Review
The Moonstone Covenant
by Karen Rigby
Formidable wives contend with persecution and past treacheries in Jill Hammer’s intricate fantasy novel "The Moonstone Covenant", set in a cosmopolitan principality. Moonstone is a place marked by simmering religious and cultural...
Book Review
The Evolution of the Gospelettes
by Karen Rigby
In Tammy Oberhausen’s piercing, entertaining historical novel "The Evolution of the Gospelettes", a religious Kentucky family spends decades performing together. In the 1970s, the Holliman patriarch, Garland, is inspired by his...
Book Review
The Twelve Ravens
by Karen Rigby
A classic fairy tale is refreshed in the picture book "The Twelve Ravens", about a girl’s persistence in saving her brothers from their wicked stepmother’s curse. In Diana Kizlauskas’s lavish picture book "The Twelve Ravens", a...
Book Review
What the Callen Women Know
by Karen Rigby
An affectionate tribute to one plucky immigrant’s struggles, "What the Callen Women Know" is an inspiring biographical novel. In Karen Anne McCullough’s historical novel "What the Callen Women Know", a resilient Irish Catholic...
Book Review
Silenced Whispers
by Karen Rigby
Iran’s turn-of-the-century transformations spur a young couple to risk their lives in the gripping historical novel "Silenced Whispers". In Afarin Ordubadi Bellisario’s intriguing historical novel "Silenced Whispers", a teenager...