Ann S. Epstein writes novels, short stories, memoir, essays, and poems. Please use the links or site menu to go to the HOME PAGE; learn about her NOVELS, SHORT STORIES, MEMOIR, ESSAYS, and POEMS; find interesting facts in BEHIND THE STORY; read REFLECTIONS on writing; check NEWS for updates on publications and related events; see REVIEWS; learn about her END-OF-LIFE DOULA credentials and services; and CONTACT US to send webmail.
50 Give or Take published another piece of my microfiction, titled “Exhuming Laughter.” The idea came to me during a discussion with my fellow end-of-life doulas about what happens to our “essence” after we die. Sign up to receive and submit your own ultra-short stories, free, at 50 Give or Take.
You never know what a writer’s creative mind will dig up
Why writers write: “Logic will get you from A to B. Imagination will take you everywhere.” – Albert Einstein
Escape artist Houdini gave silent film actor Keaton his stage name. Houdini, who co-owned a traveling show with Keaton’s father, saw little Joseph Frank Keaton fall down the stairs. Houdini admired how well the baby took a “buster” and the nickname stuck. Read The Sister Knot about two resilient women, orphaned in WW2, who defy fate to sustain a lifelong friendship. A compelling novel about the power of sisterhood. Learn more about the book in NOVELS.
How Harry Houdini nicknamed “Buster” Keaton
Two resilient women, two separate journeys, one lasting friendship
Founding Fathers, Washington and Hamilton, fought for U.S. independence and worked to build a stable country. They also became friends who shared the federalist view that Americans should have a strong central government as opposed to Thomas Jefferson who favored a decentralized (states’ rights) model. Read The Sister Knot about two resilient women, orphaned in WW2, who defy fate to sustain a lifelong friendship. A compelling novel about the power of sisterhood. Learn more about the book in NOVELS.
Washington and Hamilton: Political allies and friends
Two resilient women, two separate journeys, one lasting friendship
My Goodreads and Amazon review of Intermezzo by Sally Rooney ((Rated 5) – The Roz Chast of Prose. Sally Rooney’s Intermezzo is the first book by this acclaimed author that I’ve read. Suspicious of hype, I heretofore resisted, but now conclude the praise is justified. “Rooney reading” is slow going. I mean this literally but not at all negatively. Her writing is intense, characterized by what my fellow fiction writers and I call “interiority.” (See my Amazon author page and Goodreads author page.) Rooney readers don’t zip through pages of dialogue or plot points. Rather, from the perspectives of the novel’s three neurotic protagonists, she takes us inside their heads to eavesdrop on their jumbled, obsessive, occasionally self-content, but more often self-doubting, ruminations. Rooney is the Roz Chast of prose. We recognize ourselves in her characters. We too have felt insecure, fearful of judgment, wronged by others, and guilty about how we’ve wronged them. Delving into the antagonistic relationship between two brothers grieving their father’s death, and the murky entanglements of their respective romantic affairs, Rooney sets our neurons atingle. Intermezzo is a quiet book about the cacophony inside our heads as we strive to appear capable to the outside world. That is, until an intermezzo — a threatening move unexpectedly played in the middle of a chess game — disrupts our defenses. The novel’s endgame isn’t obvious, but it’s very satisfying.
Unrelenting and absorbing internal monologues
Why writers read: “You can never get a cup of tea large enough or a book long enough to suit me.” – C. S. Lewis
In Mark Twain’s The Adventures Of Tom Sawyer, orphan Tom and vagrant Huck get up to no good but are an inventive and entertaining team of mischief-makers in this satirical novel. Read The Sister Knot about two resilient women, orphaned in WW2, who defy fate to sustain a lifelong friendship. A compelling novel about the power of sisterhood. Learn more about the book in NOVELS.
Huck Finn and Tom Sawyer are entertaining mischief-makers in Twain’s classic
The friendship between King and Shabazz grew from tragedy — the assassinations of their husbands, civil rights leaders Martin Luther King Jr. and Malcolm X. More than widows, the women were activists in their own right and spiritual sisters in the fight for social justice. Read The Sister Knot about two resilient women, orphaned in WW2, who defy fate to sustain a lifelong friendship. A compelling novel about the power of sisterhood. Learn more about the book in NOVELS.
King and Shabazz, friends in tragedy, sisters in social activism
Two resilient women, two separate journeys, one lasting friendship
Kennedy’s father, Joseph, was a friend of Chicago mafia boss Sam Giancana, who helped secure union votes for JFK in the 1960 presidential election. Sinatra, the go-between, became friendly with JFK. The friendship ended when Attorney General RFK (JFK’s brother) ordered the FBI to go after the Mob. Read The Sister Knot about two resilient women, orphaned in WW2, who defy fate to sustain a lifelong friendship. A compelling novel about the power of sisterhood. Learn more about the book in NOVELS.
JFK and Sinatra were friends until RFK went after the Mob
Two resilient women, two separate journeys, one lasting friendship
Anne in L. M. Montgomery’s Anne of Green Gables longs for “a really kindred spirit to whom I can confide my inmost soul.” She finds one in Diana. Their opposite temperaments – adventurous and imaginative vs. down-to-earth and realistic – cause tension, yet they remain lifelong friends. Read The Sister Knot about two resilient women, orphaned in WW2, who defy fate to sustain a lifelong friendship. A compelling novel about the power of sisterhood. Learn more about the book in NOVELS.
Anne Shirley and Diana Barry: Temperamental opposites and lifelong friends
Two resilient women, two separate journeys, one lasting friendship
My Goodreads and Amazon review of The Sparkler by Alan Humm (Rated 5) – Dancing with Dickens. Some authors claim their characters write themselves. In The Sparkler, by Alan Humm, Charles Dickens’s characters write the famous author. Dickens takes on the personae of the figures — especially the colorful lower class ones — that he strives to put on paper. They bring him to life as much as he gives life to them. Humm’s entertaining fictional biography takes an imaginative dive into the head of the esteemed writer who wants to add “sparkle” to his own circumstances as he navigates the seedy streets of London, juggles his responsibilities to his expecting wife and her younger sister, and indulges his obsession with his mistress. In scenes as vivid as Dickens’s writing, Humm evokes a character who is often clever, sometimes pitiable, and equally baffling to himself and others. As an author myself (see my Amazon author page and Goodreads author page), who has also written fictional biographies, I admire Humm’s ability to create a false yet wholly believable narrative about a public figure. The Sparkler will delight readers and, were Charles Dickens still alive, the novel would greatly amuse him too.
A “sparkling” fictional biography of Charles Dickens
Why writers read: “Readers live a thousand lives before they die. Those who never read live only one.” – George R. R. Martin
Keller met Twain (the pen name of Samuel Clemens) when he was in his late 50s and she was 14, the same age as his youngest daughter. Twain was impressed by Keller’s wit and intelligence and described her as “the eighth wonder of the world.” They loved to swap stories and exchanged many letters until Twain’s death 15 years later. Read The Sister Knot about two resilient women, orphaned in WW2, who defy fate to sustain a lifelong friendship. A compelling novel about the power of sisterhood. Learn more about the book in NOVELS.
Helen Keller and Mark Twain enjoyed each other’s wit and exchanged many letters
Two resilient women, two separate journeys, one lasting friendship