Many of us have read Laura Ingalls Wilder books as children or watched the wildly popular TV show in the 1970s but I don’t think many of us fully know the real story behind the life of Wilder, her parents, Caroline and Charles, her siblings, Mary, Carrie and Grace, and most especially her only child, Rose. It’s a story spanning so much American history including the prairie homestead farmers being thwarted by grasshoppers, blizzards, fires, disease and crippling debt again and again. Caroline Fraser’s epic story of the life and autobiographical stories of Laura Ingalls Wilder deserves high praise.
This could be one of your favorite D.C. memoirs if you are not into reading about policy decisions but instead tend to enjoy 21st century Peyton Place antics set in the Old Executive Office Building. The author answers an ad on Craigslist and, as luck would have it, becomes a White House stenographer traveling all over the world with “44” and witnessing history. Aside from the fact that there is way too much cheating and way, way too much drinking and that all I wanted to do was shake some sense into Stein, her writing redeems her. This memoir was so entertaining and hard to put down…enjoy!
If there’s ever a time when a comic novel should be in your “to read” pile it’s now, and I’ve got just the book for you. In The Shakespeare Requirement by Julie Schumacher we return to some characters you will recognize from Schumacher’s hilarious novel, Dear Committee Members. Professor Jason Fitger is now the besieged head of the English Department at Payne University. His fellow faculty, students and university administrators are undoubtedly recognizable, whether you are an academic or not. Clever, smart and good for giggles, this novel is sure to be one you come back to again and again when a good laugh is in order.
