Category Archives: Good Reading

Jambusters

Over a year ago PBS had a Sunday night series called Home Fires.   It was part of the BBC Masterpiece series.    The show was cut short and not renewed (that was irksome) so I started looking for the book that it was based on.    It is called “Jambusters” by Julie Summers.    At first I was disappointed as it is not a story at all but a historical narrative of the work of the Women’s Institute (WI) in the era of World War II.

Originally I’d got the book from the public library; but I did not read it thoroughly, so I bought it on Audible.   As I said, first I was terribly disappointed but at a low point when I had nothing to listen to or to read, I started listening to Jambusters.

It went from very dry to being very interesting and the lives these women led and the responsibilities they were given by the government during WWII is nothing short of a miracle.     They gathered around the cause coming together across party and social lines.

As Julie Summers writes ” They ran canteens for troops, baked pies for farm workers, and collected hundreds of tons of rosehips and herbs for the pharmaceutical industry. By their joint effort, members contributed millions of knitted garments to keep troops and refugees in Europe warm. They made 12,000,000 lbs (5,445,000 kilograms) of jam and preserves, helped to set up over 1000 pig clubs and made more than 2000 fur-lined garments for Russia. And in amongst all this major activity they sang, put on plays and organised parties to entertain their villages and keep their spirits up. The Second World War was the WI’s finest hour.”

Can you imagine?    And they continued after WWII…how about the featured act in this WI event?

This is a book you can leave and return to from time to time.     It’s on my phone so I Bluetooth it to the car’s audio and listen to it when I’m driving.   In our nation today, we are so divided.  While I would never wish a war to bind us together to support a cause, but it would be nice if there was a reason that we could all work together for the good of something.   These women are a shining example.  Heck…I want to join the WI.

The Women’s Institute still has a presence and is still advocating for women.

Loading

Reading Serafina and The Black Cloak

For those that know me well, you probably know that one of the reasons I wanted so badly to return to Southwest Virginia…Mendota, actually, was because I loved my childhood here.     When we first started looking for land, I still thought we would have children or we would adopt.  I was 35 and still young enough by most standards.   However, it did not happen.   I am okay with that now.

I wanted to have children here because I remember what it was like to play among giant mountain laurel (the wild version of rhododendrum) by a creek and string the leaves together to make a skirt, which never stayed quite right.   On the small hill called “the Knob” that seemed so big, there were ravines and shadows and smells all contributing to an active imagination.    My cats would hunt on “the Knob” but I was certain they were  heading out each day to an alternative life where they worked, attended school and had a whole social structure similar to the world I knew.

I believe that is one of the reasons I enjoyed the Juvenile Fiction book Serafina and the Black Cloak by Robert Beatty.  Serafina is the cat that I wanted to be as a child.

serafina cover

I’m not going to spoil the book for you, but I will encourage you to read it.  It’s very good.

There’s other things I like about the making of this book.   It is set at Biltmore.   There is a book trailer out and it has the author’s daughter dressed as Serafina.

Look at Serafina’s pretty dress.  The author’s wife made it.   I read about the Beatty’s.  They’re wealthy.  They could have asked a seamstress to make the dress, but that is not what occurred.   Jennifer Beatty, Robert’s wife, made the dress at their kitchen table.  I can imagine her listening to his description of how the dress looked “in his head” and the two of them and perhaps their daughters planning the dress.  He talks a little about the dress on his blog which is here

Disney is promoting the book, and I would not be surprised or one bit unhappy if Serafina becomes a movie and little girls everywhere will want a Serafina doll, with her cat-like eyes, wearing a red taffeta dress–just like the one Jennifer Beatty made.

If you haven’t read this book, please do.  Middle-school aged children on up to….well…their 60’s….will find it very good.

 

 

 

Loading