This Memorial Day weekend, I’m remembering my dad, my uncle Gary, my grandpa Clifford,* my great aunts Nannie and Mary and Etta, my great grandma Bessie, my step-grandpa Herb, my grandpa Ray, my great-grandpa Red (Ernest), and my great uncle Dutch.
Grief/healing books that I recommend include: The Color of Absence: 12 Stories About Loss and Hope edited by James Howe (Atheneum, 2001) and This Book Is For All Kids, But Especially My Sister Libby. Libby Died. by Jack Simon, illustrated by Annette Simon (Idea University Press, 2000)(link includes interview with Annette).
I’ve written a grief/healing book myself, Rain Is Not My Indian Name (HarperCollins, 2001), which has generated a lot of email from ‘tween girls who’ve lost a friend. I’m honored that they found some comfort in Rain’s story.
*Grampa Clifford has a walk on in my short story “The Naked Truth,” from In My Grandmother’s House: Award-Winning Authors Tell Stories About The Grandmothers, edited and illustrated by Bonnie Christensen (HarperCollins, 2003).
Cynsational News & Links
2005 Texas Book Festival Author List Released from Austin360.com. Note, though, the subhead “confirmed at this time.” I’m not recognizing any children’s/YA author/illustrator names, so unless our section of the program has been cut (which I doubt), that announcement is still forthcoming.
And old one but a goodie that I myself return to again and again is the “Secret Garden,” to study as a writer as well.
I’m a terrible gardner, but I love what happens in my yard with living things year after year.
This year, after four years of losing a well-loved neighbor to a permanent move far away, her black iris popped up in my yard for the first time, huge and utterly gorgeous….
Rinda