Season of good reads, part 2
By P. Stinson
Sun contributor
What follows is part two of our short survey of adult books by, or including, area authors, poets and essayists, as well as books with a connection to the area. From first-time to familiar authors, their ability to harness words will impress you and leave you impatient for more. Grab the woolen blanket and come along for the ride. Read part one of our two-part series here.
In the nonfiction collection Fracture: Essays, Poems & Stories on Fracking in America (Ice Cube Press, 2016) longtime environmental activist-essayist-author Stephanie Mills of Maple City shares her family’s connection to the mining industry, her connection to nature and why it’s important to reconnect with our neighbors in her forward-thinking essay, “Last Call: Frack Wells, Wood Frogs, and Leopold’s Ethic.”
Pure mind-bending magic is the only way to describe Stephanie Carpenter’s first short story collection, Missing Persons (Press 53, 2017). The Traverse City born-and-raised author teaches creative writing and literature at Michigan Tech in the U.P. Reading these fiction stories is like putting your brain on the rack, stretching that space between your synapses … jolting you out of your comfort zone.
Uncomfortable but compelling, author Jim Harrison’s final works rip the sheen off the Golden Years with his tales and poems of physical deterioration, pain and loss. Yet, his knack for pointing out the absurd and poking fun is ever present, especially in the poetry collection, Dead Man’s Float (Copper Canyon Press, 2016). His self-described memoir novella, The Ancient Minstrel, (one of three in a collection by the same name, Grove Press, 2016) contains truths among many apparent falsehoods. As he explains in his Author’s Note, “I couldn’t bear to lapse into any delusions of reality in nonfiction.” Harrison’s latest collection of food essays, A Really Big Lunch, (Grove Press, 2017) continues the unabashedly, self-indulgent, bawdy tone found in earlier food pieces (The Raw and The Cooked). Warning: Don’t try to read it without at least a glass of really, really good red wine.
Shenandoah Chefalo settled in Traverse City after a most unsettling childhood (traumatic by anyone’s standard) in the foster care system, which she recounts in her memoir, Garbage Bag Suitcase (Mission Point Press, 2016). Her honesty will leave you feeling sad for her but impressed by her resilience and insight, disgusted at her supposed caregivers and angry at a system that allows our most vulnerable, our children, to be so mistreated and then abandoned (no plan, no safety net) once they reach what the system deems “adulthood.” Married and a mother, Chefalo does not report that all is perfect for her today. She shares her continuing emotional struggles as an adult, describes models that work for foster children (if only we will recognize and use them), and offers resources for others who are struggling as well as for those who want to take steps to make changes. It’s a call to action that cannot be ignored at a time when many people, including the young, are clearly broken.
Things that go unnoticed or are dismissed is the theme of retired biology teacher and naturalist Richard Fidler’s extraordinary compilation of short essays, Of Things Ignored and Unloved (Mission Point Press, 2017). Fidler has written four other books on the history of the Grand Traverse area. In this one, he explores the world of the teeny snowflea to horsetail ferns to the mystery surrounding the seasonal arc of the moon. Fidler points out where and why they fit in a sometimes foreign-feeling or crowded northern Michigan landscape. The book, loved by poet Fleda Brown and writer Anne Stanton, finds connections with its lowly subjects and their greater environment and, in doing so, also connects with that place in our hearts we reserve for the unloved.
Looking for more titles to warm your senses during the bitter winter? Dream of future outings with Great Lakes, Island Escapes (Wayne State Univ. Press) by Maureen Dunphy or Inside Upnorth: The Complete Tour, Sport and Country Living Guide to Traverse City, Traverse City Area and Leelanau County (Mission Point Press, 2017), by a who’s who of area writer-contributors: Heather Shaw, Jodee Taylor, Bob Butz, Stephen Lewis, Glenn Wolff, Michael Delp, Tom Carr and others.
As a wise person once said, there is no reason to be bored. Ever.
