Beth Kephart's Blog, page 292

Together

One white, one black, and always together.  They waited for the sun to set.  Then they flew.

a happy-making photo

This photo, taken by Tiff Emerick and passed on to me by Holly Cupala, makes me happy.  I had the privilege of sitting with Elizabeth Law through much of the YALSA coffee klatch at the ALA.  This is proof that it wasn't a dream.

Girl in Translation/Jean Kwok: Reflections

Oh, how I wanted to love Girl in Translation, the semi-autobiographical first novel by the entirely graceful-seeming Jean Kwok.  Girl is an assimilation novel, a tale of a young immigrant.  Kimberly Chang is eleven when she arrives to New York from Hong Kong with her mother.  She lives in an abominable apartment, helps her mother after school in a Chinatown sweatshop, and relies on her native intelligence not just to get through, but to be selected as a full-scholarship student at an elite pr...

High, Above

I like to fly about as much as I like to sit on a boat, but this time I wasn't dizzy.  This time I could look out above the horizon, or toward the horizon, I'm not sure which, and watch the purple clouds collect over the last light of the day.  Home.

Aunt Beth

In the raw, stormy world that has been the Cayman Islands these past few days, brightness defied.  I have had time with my siblings' children—Julia and her coconut shrimp, Daniel and his snorkeling enthusiasms, Claire and her solo version of synchronized swimming, Owen, with his quiet, witty presence (somehow Owen was endowed with great calm and great wit, in perfect proportions; plus, he only beat me at bike riding when I let him).

These kids are dear to me.

Dizzy

As much as I love the architecture of boats and the idea of float, I have a terrible time staying right upon a watery vessel.  "Keep your eyes on the horizon," my husband says, but by then, I'm already done in for, already looking for an out.  There are none.  I'm reminded of that every single time.  "Julia," I told my niece, not turning my head, not lifting my eyes, "I am not being rude when I talk with you like this, but can I ask you for a favor?"

"Yes?"

"Tell me when you see land."

She nodde...

Small headed

There I was, renting a snorkeling mask, standing among adults and near adults, waiting my turn.

When it came time to "fit" me, the snorkeling dealer took just one quick look.  "You have a really tiny head," she said.  "I'm recommending baby size."

"A baby-sized snorkeling mask?" I repeated.  "Really?"

"Tiny," she said, with her Caymanian accent.  She handed me a mask from the lowest nail on her long wall.  She asked me to try it on.  It fit.  "I have a baby-sized head," I told my husband, and l...

Of iguanas and parrots

Between tropical downpours and gale-ing winds, we walked through the Botanic Gardens, encountering these blue-faced iguanas, who were out in search of sun.  It is a raw place, an island upon which the legacy of a once-ago hurricane is still read in the twist of palm trees and the discouraged fronds.  Cayman parrots, high in trees, depart in arresting twosomes of brilliant green and beak orange.

In my mind, all this time, I am reconfiguring a novel.  Finding my way back in.  There are editors w...

I sat at the edge of a dock

waiting for sunrise.  But the clouds were a shroud, protecting the memory of a storm.  So pewter became old sepia became the sweat heat of morning, and the day began before I could mark its start.  I took this picture anyway.

The Report/Jessica Francis Kane: Reflections

I took just one book home with me from this year's BEA, Jessica Francis Kane's first novel, The Report.  It's a Graywolf Press title—Graywolf, a first-rate house responsible for such first-class books as Alyson Hagy's latest, Ghosts of Wyoming.  I don't think you can go wrong with a Graywolf book, and I can say, with absolute confidence, that you will not go wrong with The Report.  Smart, compelling, riveting, whole, The Report is a book about history and those who write it, about blame and t...