My Puritan story at CT...

Charis has clambered on top of the new-and-noteworthy reviews at Christianity Today. I'm very glad to have that attention, and happy for the words of reviewer and novelist Heather Cross. 

Charis in the World of Wonders

Marly Youmans (Ignatius Press)

Set in Massachusetts Bay Colony during the 1690s, Charis in the World of Wonders plunges us into the mind, language, and worldview of a young woman struggling to survive yet finding grace in unexpected places. Youmans’s lush prose evokes a preindustrial, perilous, socially connected world in which the Divine has sovereign reign over outcomes both joyous and sorrowful. Reading it feels like traveling through time and space to experience reality laid bare: Life is fragile, humans need each other, and the created world is shot through with beauty, fear, mystery, and God.

Read more of the list HERE.

Sun and Moon etc.

Sun and Moon.
Taken near the side door by Michael.

WV

After returning from a six-day jaunt in West Virginia (and a bit of Virginia), where we pondered retirement possibilities for the still-distant future and met up with Progeny no. 3, I have been rather lukewarm about all things social media-ish and the blog. Also lazy about submitting anything.... and the only new publications are print-on-paper, so nothing to report and link to online.

Nevertheless, here I be!

RIP

You might like to read Aaron Belz's piece on Norm MacDonald at Front Porch Republic, HERE. Twain, comedy, manner-of-telling, death-mindedness, and more.

Norm Macdonald: You know, I think about my deathbed a lot.

Vulture: What do you think about it?

Macdonald: I think I never should have purchased a deathbed in the first place.

PJP

And I'm grateful to Paul Pastor for mentioning me along with some fancy names in a brand new interview from Michael Wright's Still Life newsletter.  Several mentions there could make me big-headed were it not for my Southern ancestors, who squashed humility into me when I was but a wee aspiring child poet. Suggestion: how about you read the interview and then (later this fall) go and buy his upcoming book, Bower Lodge, forthcoming from Fernwood Press?

More WV

If you're ever in Lewisburg, WV, don't forget to eat dinner at Stardust! What else did I find out in the Virginias? Well, I still like Lexington and Shepherdstown and Harpers Ferry. And Bolivar and Charles Town are lovely. Also rambled around at Grandview in the New River Gorge National Park.

And just to bring up the tone, here's George Washington's bathtub from Berkeley Springs, WV... Actually most of it doesn't show--looks a bit like a watery stone grave. Just a tad creepy. Sadly, the presidential site turns out to be a fake--he did hang out in one of the stone tubs at the not-all-that-sizzling hot springs, but we don't really have his personal slot in stone. Be sure and bring a big ole bottle if you go to the state park, and maybe even your swimsuit.