2017 March, from Dee

Dee Abrahamse, March 2017
 …I attended Literary Women, the Long Beach women authors festival  – 800 women in the convention center…  Books I liked are:   Jill Leovy, of Ghettoside, a non-fiction book by an LA Times reporter … about the police who were determined to bring gang murders to justice, and support the terrified inhabitants of the neighborhood.  Cathleen Schine’s book They May Not Mean to But They Do is about aging, taking care of a spouse with dementia, and relations with adult children and their families, done with some Jewish humor and general warmth … and might be a good book group book:  http://www.cathleenschine.com/ .   Mia Alvar is a young writer whose short stories about the Philippines and Filipinos living and working around the world – fascinating for information, and excellent writing – I realized I didn’t know much about the Philippines at all. .  https://miaalvar.com/  I also liked Nadia Hashimi’s book When the Moon is Low, tracing and Afghan refugees family’s journey to Europe. She has written two other books about women in Afghanistan… Andif you like Anthropology,  Lily King’s book Euphoria, based on Margaret Mead’s romance with Gregory Bateson while doing research with her husband Reo Fortune in New Guinea is also a very good portrait/discussion of anthropology and the dilemmas of research on tribal cultures.  Here’s a link: http://www.lilykingbooks.com/ .