Book Review: TWICE LIVED by Joma West

Cover of Twice Lived by Joma West, featuring half a yellow flower flecked with red, joined to half a red flower. Cover design by Fort; Photo © Getty

“… (T)he story of Twice Lived rests on readers’ empathic connection with its major characters and the bittersweet nature of life: the haphazard fortunes it throws upon us, or the random situations it thrusts us into, often without control, powerless.”

Bedtime Stories: Alma and How She Got Her Name

Bedtime Stories highlights Children’s Books with a diverse, global perspective. If you ask her, Alma Sofia Esperanza José Pura Candela has way too many names: six! How did such a small person wind up with such a large name? Alma turns to Daddy for an answer and learns of Sofia, the grandmother who loved books […]

Book Review: Cuckoo Song by Frances Hardinge

It is England during the reign of King George V. The Machine Age is at its peak, and human society is in flux, becoming increasingly urbanized, secular. The Great War has come to a close, but the traumatic devastation it has wrought echoes on in family’s lives. Nations struggle to recover and political/economic turmoil presages […]