I love this book of historical fiction that begins with a little girl, Esme, watching and listening under the table where her father and other male academics discuss what words are acceptable for the first edition of the Oxford English Dictionary.
The words that catch Esme’s attention are the slang references to women’s bodies, considered unworthy of inclusion. Readers follow Esme through the personal growth and tumult that includes encounters with the women’s suffrage movement and the pain of living through World War I.
Ultimately, I take satisfaction that her daughter has become an accomplished linguist. Esme’s life story lingers with me, from childhood innocence to supreme sacrifice as a wise woman, triumphing over life’s disruptions and losses.
'An enchanting story about love, loss and the power of language' Elizabeth Macneal, author of The Doll Factory
Sometimes you have to start with what's lost to truly find yourself...
Motherless and irrepressibly curious, Esme spends her childhood at her father's feet as he and his team gather words for the very first Oxford English Dictionary.
One day, she sees a slip of paper containing a forgotten word flutter to the floor unclaimed.
And so Esme begins to collect words for another dictionary in secret: The Dictionary of Lost Words. But to do so she must journey into a world…
This non-fiction book has been valuable to me as I consider my own aging. Thoughtfully written by a medical doctor, the book can prepare anyone for life choices in their own living and dying.
As Gawande writes about the experiences of his parents and patients, I recognize myself adjusting to physical and mental changes in my body, struggling with less independence, and accepting that my death will be a natural part of my life.
I like Gawande’s emphasis on developing skills to keep meaning in our lives and to accumulate and accomplish less while paying more attention to our connections with people of many ages and cultures.
'GAWANDE'S MOST POWERFUL, AND MOVING, BOOK' MALCOLM GLADWELL
'BEING MORTAL IS NOT ONLY WISE AND DEEPLY MOVING; IT IS AN ESSENTIAL AND INSIGHTFUL BOOK FOR OUR TIMES' OLIVER SACKS
For most of human history, death was a common, ever-present possibility. It didn't matter whether you were five or fifty - every day was a roll of the dice. But now, as medical advances push the boundaries of survival further each year, we have become increasingly detached from the reality of being mortal. So here is a book about the modern experience of mortality - about what it's…
Agnes and Polly have been best friends for 80 years, making very different life choices and spending summers at their private compound on the Maine coast. Maud, a 26-year-old single mother who aspires to be an editor, enters this narrative world and uncovers the secret origins of Agnes’ successful children’s books.
I’m drawn into the multi-layered complexity of these Quaker family stories from the early 1960s and early 2000s and captured by the mysterious unfolding of events and identities.
The driving issue for Agnes and Polly is to limit the material development at Fellowship Point and keep the area habitable for eagles and trees. It’s easy for me to treasure that spirit, once shared by Native peoples and Europeans, as a place to develop stewardship, not ownership.
The masterful story of a lifelong friendship between two very different women with shared histories and buried secrets, tested in the twilight of their lives, set across the arc of the 20th century.
Celebrated children's book author Agnes Lee is determined to secure her legacy-to complete what she knows will be the final volume of her pseudonymously written Franklin Square novels; and even more consuming, to permanently protect the peninsula of majestic coast in Maine known as Fellowship Point. To donate the land to a trust, Agnes must convince shareholders to dissolve a generations-old partnership. And one of those shareholders…
Set amidst the backdrop of three major American Civil War battles at Antietam, Vicksburg, and Gettysburg, the same five narrators return to tell what happened in their communities of conscience.
Members of churches that hold to the traditional belief of not participating in warfare must decide against the demands and drafts of Union or Confederate forces and government leaders. The menfolk might hide, flee, pay a fee, or dissent from faith and join up. But the women and children are left at home in the upheaval and resistance, to raise crops and protect themselves.
Hear these civilian voices from the summer of 1862 through January of 1864: a child, a mother and wife, an ambitious young man in Chicago, ministers, and farmers.
