 | Don't forget—no one else sees the world the way you do, so no one else can tell the stories that you have to tell. —Charles de Lint |  |
| Everything we experience—no matter how unpleasant—comes into our lives to teach us something. —Iyanla Vanzant | |
| The greatest gift you can give others is your best you—your healthiest you.—Joseph J. Sweere | |
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| Photo: Marvin Shaouni |
"There's a fierce inventiveness to Detroit," says artist Kate Daughdrill. "People here take ownership of a problem and work to find solutions." In order to help Detroiters keep doing just that, Daughdrill and a friend cofounded Detroit Soup, a philanthropic supper club. Each month four local groups present ideas to diners who pay $5 to attend; the crowd then discusses the ideas over soup, salad, bread, and pie, and decides which project will receive the evening's proceeds.
Since 2010 Detroit Soup has raised from $700 to $1,000 per dinner for more than 20 community projects—like a bicycle education workshop, or the design and manufacture of a coat for the homeless that converts to a sleeping bag—and the typical number of diners has grown from 20 to 200. "Right now Detroit feels like an underdog," says Amy Kaherl (below), Detroit Soup's current coordinator. "Someone needs to care for it, and that someone could be any one of us."
Each week, we'll be letting you know about the new releases the editors of O and Oprah.com couldn't stop reading. This week, we're obsessing over the short-story collection:
The News from Spain
By Joan Wickersham
A woman who's been married for 26 years—and whose husband has just had an affair—connects with an old friend on the eve of his wedding to a woman he doesn't love. The middle-aged owner of a bookstore tries to balance two deep and demanding attachments: a feverish reconnection with her elderly, ailing mother and a wild romance with a male customer. In each of these seven piercing stories, author Joan Wickersham reveals uncanny and complex parallels that occur when very different people love each other under very similar circumstances. What ostensibly links the tales is that somewhere along the line, the characters receive news from Spain. That news can be metaphorical (one twosome receives theirs via the wind rushing through a seashell on a beach) or realistic (a young bride is informed of her husband's death in Madrid). Furthermore, the stories all feature the same title, "The News from Spain," because each one is—in subtle, structural ways—a retelling of the previous tale. This tight organization displays a virtuosic control by the author, but the more compelling triumph is Wickersham's emotional cannonball into every single one of her characters. The masterpiece of the collection comes on page 79, when she explores the relationship between a paralyzed ex-ballerina and her gay caretaker, Malcolm. Malcolm's boyfriend is working in Europe, and so is the ex-ballerina's husband. Neither Malcolm nor his charge is sure whether his or her respective partner still wishes to be with him or her. The doubts and tenderness they share with each other as they stay at home, monitoring the mail without ever openly discussing their private feelings, are excruciating—in the best ways, ones that only the finest fiction can create, because you, the reader, feel as much or more than anyone on the page, be it the private, searing heartache or the over-the-top, sloppy happiness that so often happens in real-life love.
Read More
Write your own life story
17 unforgettable books to read this month
The News from Spain
By Joan Wickersham
A woman who's been married for 26 years—and whose husband has just had an affair—connects with an old friend on the eve of his wedding to a woman he doesn't love. The middle-aged owner of a bookstore tries to balance two deep and demanding attachments: a feverish reconnection with her elderly, ailing mother and a wild romance with a male customer. In each of these seven piercing stories, author Joan Wickersham reveals uncanny and complex parallels that occur when very different people love each other under very similar circumstances. What ostensibly links the tales is that somewhere along the line, the characters receive news from Spain. That news can be metaphorical (one twosome receives theirs via the wind rushing through a seashell on a beach) or realistic (a young bride is informed of her husband's death in Madrid). Furthermore, the stories all feature the same title, "The News from Spain," because each one is—in subtle, structural ways—a retelling of the previous tale. This tight organization displays a virtuosic control by the author, but the more compelling triumph is Wickersham's emotional cannonball into every single one of her characters. The masterpiece of the collection comes on page 79, when she explores the relationship between a paralyzed ex-ballerina and her gay caretaker, Malcolm. Malcolm's boyfriend is working in Europe, and so is the ex-ballerina's husband. Neither Malcolm nor his charge is sure whether his or her respective partner still wishes to be with him or her. The doubts and tenderness they share with each other as they stay at home, monitoring the mail without ever openly discussing their private feelings, are excruciating—in the best ways, ones that only the finest fiction can create, because you, the reader, feel as much or more than anyone on the page, be it the private, searing heartache or the over-the-top, sloppy happiness that so often happens in real-life love.
Read More
Write your own life story
17 unforgettable books to read this month
| For everyone, well-being is a journey. ... The secret is committing to that journey and taking those first steps with hope and belief in yourself.—Deepak Chopra | |
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It's Friday! This week we're oh-so-grateful for...
Dads sing "Little Mermaid" song at the requests of their daughters
8-year-old dresses as a different historical figure every day [via Omaha.com]
Extraordinary story about breast cancer survivor groups in areas with major ethnic conflicts [via Tablet Magazine]
Dads sing "Little Mermaid" song at the requests of their daughters
8-year-old dresses as a different historical figure every day [via Omaha.com]
Extraordinary story about breast cancer survivor groups in areas with major ethnic conflicts [via Tablet Magazine]
| To achieve your goals, make the right thing to do the easy thing to do.—Dr. Oz | |
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