All posts tagged: current-events

What do we do when it all goes wrong? we can read books about home; AND YET THEY WERE HAPPY by Helen Phillips & Virginia Lee Burton’s THE LITTLE HOUSE can help us find the light

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By Leslie Lindsay  Home. It’s a place we go back to again and again. And it’s always open.  ~WEDNESDAYS WITH WRITERS|SPECIAL EDITION~ As I write this, on a blistering day, one in which the sky burns blue and the walls provide structure and stability, I am shaken. The events of the last several months have been enough to stun and awaken. The last few days have ripped the floor from under me, taken my breath away. My children have opened delicate conversations seeking solace and understanding. Social media is revealing a surge of activity in movements and messages. In the global world, protests are happening. You know this. I’m not sure I can possibly say anything that hasn’t already been said. Do I share another author interview? Normalcy, escape, reliability, there’s a value in that, right? But the world is hurting. When we hurt, we seek comfort. For many of us, that is home. In my town, the curfew for all individuals has been extended another night.  We all must be tucked safely in our …

Best-selling author Sally Hepworth is back with her best yet, THE MOTHER-IN-LAW. It’s a fragile bond, but could you kill her?

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By Leslie Lindsay  A twisty, compelling novel about the fragile bonds of women–particularly the wife and mother-in-law dynamic–ending, or rather, beginning, in a mysterious death.  I am so intrigued with Sally Hepworth’s ‘darker’ women’s fiction and I think THE MOTHER-IN-LAW (St. Martin’s Press, April 23 2019) might be her best yet. From the moment Lucy met her mother-in-law, Diana, things had been rocky at best. Diana told her friends (and son) after that first meeting that Lucy was “just fine,” and well…Lucy wasn’t all that taken with Diane, either. She was polite and properly friendly, but guarded, cold. Having lost her own mother at a young age, Lucy was expecting a bit more…still, she wanted so much to please her new mother-in-law. That was a few years ago. Now, Lucy is mother to three and a stay-at-home mom. Things with Diana haven’t exactly been unicorns and rainbows, but Lucy has managed just fine. But, now, Diana is found dead in her home. There’s a suicide note near her body. Diana claimed she no longer wanted to live because she …

The Teacher is Talking: Seven Men and the Secret of their Greatness

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By Leslie Lindsay You may be thinking red, white, and blue this time of year in light of American Independence Day (better known by the familiar moniker, 4th of July).  But, have you ever stopped to think about the qualities within Americans that make the USA truly great?  In New York Times Bestselling author’s Eric Metaxas’s recent book, we delve right into that.  While there are gads of influential women, this one focuses on seven widely known–but not well understood men.  Each exquisitely crafted short portraits of these men showcase a commitment to live by certain virtues found in the gospel.  Of course you are curious–just who are these great men and what can I learn from them?  Within the covers of this beautifully written, highly engageable book is seven men from all walks of life–politicians, founding fathers, baseball all-stars, athletes, and men of faith…George Washington, William Wilberforce, Eric Liddell, Dietrich Bonhoeffer, Jackie Robinson, Pope John Paul II, and Charles W. Colson. While not all of these individuals are American, we can certaintly see how their impact on …

In My Brain Today: Who Invented Valentine’s Day, Anyway?!

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By Leslie Lindsay This was a question that my 2nd grader posed to me in the school drop-off line this morning.  And it got me thinking…I knew there was a St. Valentine who did…what…good deeds? But of that I wasn’t even sure.   How then, did the day become such a romantic commercialized holiday?  I told her I would do a little research on the subject while she was at school and report back.  (see, this learning thing…it lasts forever). According to an article by NPR today, the origins of the cute, cozy, lovey holiday can be attributed to the ancient Romans.  Why not?  They seem to have started everything else.  Seems in those very early days of  Roman culture, men would ‘hit on women’ by doing just that–hitting them.  It was a brutal way of saying ‘I love you,’ but well…the theory was beating woman made them more fertile, and after all, populating the empire was of utmost importance.  In another theory of Roman love, men would pull a woman’s name at random from a jar in a sort of …