A sampling of snail-mail Book Talk letters I’ve received with my replies and the books they recommend for us to read.

Hello MaryJane. The book I have just read is Braiding Sweetgrass by Robin Wall Kimmerer. The reason I liked this book was because it explained that it is important that we treat the Earth with honor and we need to protect nature. Plants can be our teachers. The author has made this book so interesting, it was sad when the book ended. Robin Wall Kimmerer is a professor of Botany and a member of the Potawatomi nation. Highly recommend! -Vicki Dieter, Wisconsin

Dearest Vicki, Thank you for your book recommendation, Braiding Sweetgrass. I’ve posted it on my journal for others to enjoy. I read Braiding Sweetgrass a couple of years ago. I liked it so much that I also listened to the audible version when driving to town. It was an important book for me because I manage a 115-acre native plant prairie and wildlife preserve. Her words are with me daily as I consider my challenges and make decisions. With love and admiration, MaryJane

Hello! MaryJane! I just decided to subscribe to your magazine. I’ve seen it on display at the grocery store for years. I thought maybe it was a “hokey” text when I bought it, but it only took a quick scan before I decided to also give it as a surprise subscription to a lady I’ve known since the ’70s, as a thank you to her. She’s an avid horsewoman in her ways (as is her husband she married 40+ years ago as an older individual). It’s not often you find something so unique. I’m looking forward to my new publication! I recently decided to try, at 75 years of age, to grow something I’ve always loved – TOMATOES! Not just any tomato though. I am looking for seeds that grow at the foot of Mt. Vesuvius in Italy – PIENNOL. I haven’t yet found them, but I will. They are PULPY, and that’s what intrigued me to read your magazine (“Coat from the Storm,” MaryJanesFarm Feb/Mar 2024). I started perusing your letter about WORDS! And saw your gracious comments about if one reads this or that, you’ll donate a free book! I’m SOLD! I’ve been letting all my magazine subscriptions expire because I’m moving to try to grow – TOMATOES and LAVENDER – but not for 2 years. It looks like your “print” is a flashback to when I started to read in 1951 as a 3-year-old. I still love Little Women by Louisa May Alcott as my favorite book and the movie – the original one with June Allyson and Peter Lawford. Something about how you lay out your stories, the whole magazine, gave me a ‘warmth’ in my heart. And when I saw the picture of the 100-year-old ‘mom’ sent by Debbie through email, I knew why she was so engrossed with it! You’ve hit a GOLD MINE, not for money though you’ll undoubtedly always be in PRINT, but you’ve found a way to CAPTURE that unique USA hopefulness we felt as citizens in the 50s right after WWII.  I thank you and think all those other previous editions I’d seen on the magazine rack made me a bit sad in my tummy that I hadn’t read them. But you’ve got a lifer NOW! Thank you, for keeping the feeling of life learned, earned, and lived – at least for me. And I was touched by your story on WORDS. In 7^th grade Latin, an obnoxious teacher (at least to me, a 7^th grader) freed me to be in a Latin Fair in the Spring of 1961. I would have preferred to do the Science Fair on weather. Anyway, what a wise lady she was. She came to me after class, when I had received a superior medal from the fair, and she smiled widely. I wasn’t her pet; the 2 boys were – both named JOHN (but one spelled his name JON) and they both were so handsome and smart. We used to talk before and after class. I had moved from Michigan at age 11 to Utah and didn’t know anyone. In 1960-1961, these two boys liked that I was smart and were congratulating me on the superior medal I had won, when the teacher came up to the three of us and said WORDS have ROOTS that basically come from ancient Greek and Roman Latin. She told us we would be very successful in life. We were just 7^th graders and wondered why she had picked us out. She told us that words, knowing what they mean, where they come from, and how to use them correctly in our written homework, and in life, would allow us to OWN the WORLD! I, and the two boys (JOHN/JON) were only able to nod. We were just 3 little kids who were barely able to pay for lunch in 1960. There wasn’t a system then to make sure children could eat. No lie, she said OWN the WORLD! It meant nothing to any of us at that time. Your article about words brought back how much I’d ‘fallen in love’ with education. Both boys left school after the 7^thgrade, and I don’t know where they moved to, but they were gone the following year. I’ve always wondered where they went because strangely, even being a new child in the West, the kids I went to school with in junior high, high school, and college, meant something to me. I still love those students, even the ones I didn’t get to know. Strange how something you read, put out as a publication by a stranger, can help you close a gap. Well, again, I still need to read your publications and they are something I will look forward to for many years to come. You truly touched not just a nerve, but my heart! So, happy day to you and your staff!  I’ll read one of the books from the Salvation Army and let you know what I think of it. I’m so glad you’re in Moscow, Idaho! So Close! I do not own a computer or cell phone – I’m OLD school – but I will eventually – maybe later when I am OLD. HAH! Thank you! -Pat Gormley, Utah

Dearest Pat, Thank you so much for taking the time to write. I am so happy that you decided to thumb through my magazine at the grocery store and you will now be a MaryJanesFarm “LIFER!”  Thank you for sharing your stories of 7^th grade; your teacher, the Latin Fair, and the two handsome young John/Jon classmates. I agree with your teacher that words allow us to OWN the WORLD! I can tell you have a huge heart, and your stories have certainly warmed “my” heart. With love and admiration, MaryJane

Dear MaryJane, Hello from the NC Coast! I absolutely love your magazine!! Our Book Club (called WWF-not wrestling, but Wine, Women & Fiction) recently read Black Cake by Charmaine Wilkerson. It’s an excellent book about family secrets, the strength of women, and love. Siblings Byron and Benny experience their mother’s wild journey from childhood through her death due to a puzzling inheritance. The picture on this notecard is an actual Black Cake made by Cathy (book club member who hosted the meeting and led our discussion). It was delicious!! This traditional Caribbean family recipe reminded me of my family traditions – all those good PA Dutch foods I grew up with in PA. I think you will enjoy the book – make sure you have some cake!! Our book club has been together for 24 years. It’s an amazing group of women – actually we are more like a circle of sisters. We meet monthly (even met during COVID – setting up an outdoor circle with our chairs 6 feet apart! 😊) We’ve read so many good books over the past 24 years. I enjoyed your article on reading the book Breath. I love every page of your magazine. Hugs & Blessings, Karen Cartlidge, North Carolina

Thank you for your book recommendation, Black Cake. It sounds like a wonderful book! I am impressed to learn that your book club (Wine, Women & Fiction) has been going strong for 24 years – even during COVID! That’s quite an accomplishment. Isn’t it wonderful to have a group of women who are like sisters to you? I enjoyed reading that Cathy made an actual Black Cake for your meeting and I appreciate that you sent me a photo of the cake. Thank you! With love and admiration, MaryJane

Reading this book will make your day. And if you give it as a gift, you’ll be doing the same for others, and then when your recipients call to tell you it made their day, you’ll get a made day all over again. It’s the applause kind of ripples-on-a-pond story (actually the Spokane River in Washington) that we can’t seem to get enough of. Thank you to the banker, who in real life rescued the paddling of ducklings, catching them one by one midair, and the onlookers who cheered him on. Thank you to the author, an attorney, who decided to rally his mother, age 79, and his daughter, age 12, to help him illustrate it. And if you’re a boomer like me, who raised a brood of children reading them the classic 1941 Make Way for Ducklings book about a pair of mallards who raised their brood in the Boston Public Garden and a police officer who stops traffic for them, you’ll probably still remember reading this out loud hundreds of times: Jack, Kack, Lack, Mack, Nack, Quark, Quack, and Pack. And you might even remember that the bronze statue of the ducks that was erected in the Boston Public Garden took on global ramifications when Barbara Bush gave a duplicate statue to Raisa Gorbechev as part of the START treaty. Now we’re talking world diplomacy, which is exactly where The Downtown Ducks is headed, because the event has already made front-page news in the UK and none other than the Whitehouse called to congratulate all involved for such a positive story. During the past few weeks, I’ve taken my morning tea in the company of a Mallard couple, this year’s residents on my pond. For me, they represent all that’s right in the world and rightly so. The Downtown Ducks does likewise; it encourages us to continue paddling against current strife and angst, underwater, just beneath the surface, as fast as we can. 

By Roberta Simonson

In May 2008, Spokane banker Joel Armstrong had been keeping tabs on a mother duck and her 10 eggs, nested on the concrete awning outside his second-floor downtown office window, for weeks.

One morning, Armstrong watched as the mother mallard flew down to the sidewalk and started quacking up at her day-old ducklings, at least 10 feet above. The first fuzzy bird waddled to the ledge’s edge and leapt.

Normally, Armstrong said, he doesn’t interfere with nature.

“But then I saw one hit (the concrete) and bounce … my heart just opened and I had to go out and help.”

Armstrong ran outside, stood under the awning and caught the ducklings one by one before setting them on the sidewalk with their mother. Then he escorted the entire duck family – the first duckling was stunned but lived – to the Spokane River.

Nearly 16 years later, in 2024, another Spokane man, attorney Richard Repp, has preserved Armstrong’s 2008 heroics in a children’s book, “The Downtown Ducks.”

“I just always thought it was such a cute story, I just thought, well, that’s a perfect children’s story,” Repp said. “The building where it happened, the Cutter Tower, my office was in the US Bank building right next door … everyone was talking about it at the time.”

Indeed, after an email chronicling the event went viral, Armstrong’s actions, which he repeated when the mallard nested there for a few more years, received national and even foreign attention.

“A lot of people just were enthralled by the story,” Armstrong said. “It was during a tough time in the banking industry, and it was some really good, positive news just to make people happy.”

Repp referenced 2008 and 2009 Spokesman-Review stories about Spokane’s “duck guy” when creating “The Downtown Ducks.” In 2009, the ducklings hatched on the same day as the Lilac Parade.

“2009 was the year that the parade was involved; 2008 was the year that it first happened. I took some artistic license and I tried to just combine the two years into one story,” he said.

Though Repp wrote the book alone, he illustrated it with the help of his mother Mary, 79, and daughter Anya, 12.

“I wanted my mom to be involved as a sort of a legacy for my mom because my mom was an artist that really contributed to my interest in art and books,” he said.

Growing up, Repp wanted to be a cartoon artist.

As for his daughter, “she already enjoyed doing art and so this was kind of fun for us, to be sitting at the kitchen table together, doing it together,” Repp said. “She was one of the ones that kept sort of egging me on, like, ‘When are you gonna finish your book, Dad? When are you gonna finish your book? I want to see it.’ ”

Repp wrote and illustrated the book over several months starting in winter 2022. When he made some copies via Shutterfly and distributed them to friends and family in 2023, “they loved it.”

“A lot of people were surprised to have learned that I could even draw because I haven’t really used my drawing in years,” he said. “Initially this was just a gift for family, but it was so well received, and people embraced it and I was like, ‘OK, well, if people enjoy it, let’s share.’ ”

Repp reached out to Armstrong in the fall and told him about the book. Armstrong bought copies for himself and his family.

“I thought it was a great job just telling the story, but I loved his artwork because he did it himself,” Armstrong said. “He’s a great artist.”

In writing “The Downtown Ducks,” Repp hopes to ensure the survival of Spokane’s duck story.

“Over time people forget about news stories, but there are certain children’s books that last forever,” he said. “I read ‘Curious George’ to my children and Dr. Seuss to my children. It was the same books that I read when I was a child.

“For me, creating a children’s story was a way to preserve the story and to pass it on to my children. It’s just such a fun, heartwarming, happy, feel-good story. I think it’s important to preserve it.”

“The Downtown Ducks” can be purchased online at Barnes and Noble, Amazon, Walmart or ThriftBooks.

Roberta Simonson’s reporting is part of the Teen Journalism Institute, funded by Bank of America with support from the Innovia Foundation.

How about this book? Does it interest you? Maybe you’ve read it already. If so, let us know what you thought about it! Because I’m old enough to remember the impact of polio before there was a vaccine (two of the boys in my neighborhood were stricken), I’m not sure I want to revisit this topic, especially since we’ve just been through a modern-day pandemic. On the other hand, history is a great teacher and often helps broaden my perspective, while allowing me to cancel out all the current noise and notions that have a tendency to be politically motivated.

In the fall of 1918, 13-year-old German immigrant Pia Lange longs to be far from Philadelphia’s overcrowded streets and slums, and from the anti-German sentiment that compelled her father to enlist in the U.S. Army, hoping to prove his loyalty. But an even more urgent threat has arrived. Spanish influenza is spreading through the city. Soon, dead and dying are everywhere. With no food at home, Pia must venture out in search of supplies, leaving her infant twin brothers alone . . .

I haven’t read this book yet, but historical fiction is a genre I’m drawn to. How about you?

Sage Winters always knew her sister was a little different even though they were identical twins. They loved the same things and shared a deep understanding, but Rosemary—awake to every emotion, easily moved to joy or tears—seemed to need more protection from the world.

Six years after Rosemary’s death from pneumonia, Sage, now sixteen, still misses her. Their mother perished in a car crash, and Sage’s stepfather, Alan, resents being burdened by a responsibility he never wanted. Yet despite living as near strangers in their Staten Island apartment, Sage is stunned to discover that Alan has kept a shocking secret: Rosemary didn’t die. She was committed to Willowbrook State School and has lingered there until just a few days ago, when she went missing.

Sage knows little about Willowbrook. It’s always been a place shrouded by rumor and mystery. A place local parents threaten to send misbehaving kids. With no idea what to expect, Sage secretly sets out for Willowbrook, determined to find Rosemary. What she learns, once she steps through its doors and is mistakenly believed to be her sister, will change her life in ways she never could imagined . . .

“Powerful. Grounded in historical fact, it ends like a fast-paced thriller.” – Historical Novel Society

Most children love a good fairy story, and even us adults have been known to belt along to the songs from the Disney versions. Let It Go, am I right? But most of us only know the watered-down version of the original tales: the beginnings of these stories were much darker … and quite frankly, more than a little strange, they are downright dark.

Sleeping Beauty by Henry Meynell Rheam (1859 – 1920) via Wikimedia Commons

First of all, children’s books didn’t actually exist back when fairy tales started being written down, so they were clearly aimed at an adult audience when Charles Perrault, the Brothers Grimm, Madame d’Aulnoy, and even Hans Christian Andersen took up their pens. Want to hear some of the stories behind the stories? If you’re sure …

• Snow White and the Seven Dwarves. Supposedly based on Margarete von Waldeck, a 16th century Bavarian noblewoman, whose tale inspired this well-known story. Living alongside her brother (other reports say her father) at his copper mine, the labor was provided by children, who became deformed at the result of the all the work in the mine. They were referred to as dwarves, and the brother was known to poison with apples anyone caught stealing. Margarete was also poisoned to death, after being sent away by her stepmother to live in Brussels. She became embroiled with Prince Philip II of Spain, to the chagrin and rage of his father, the King. Let’s just say she did not live happily ever after. When the Grimm brothers wrote their tale of Snow White, they likely pulled from this story, adding in their own bits that Disney and other children’s books later left out: the evil stepmother demanding and then eating what she believed were Snow White’s lungs and liver (eww!), and how Snow White was saved, not by a kiss, but by the prince tripping and dropping her casket, which dislodged the piece of apple in her throat (which, if you think about it, is a better lesson to teach the youngsters: if someone is choking or poisoned maybe kissing them isn’t the answer. Try the Heimlich maneuver, boys and girls).
• The Little Mermaid. In Hans Christian Andersen’s tale, we find a much sadder and tragic ending for little Ariel. When she gets her new legs from the sea witch, the punishment is that walking around on them will be horribly painful, like knife wounds to her feet. She even leaves behind trails of blood when she walks. Naturally, she makes the deal anyway, determined to win the love of the prince. Sadly, while he finds her nice enough, he falls in love with someone else. The sea witch tells the mermaid if she stabs him to death, she’ll turn back into a mermaid and can forget all about this unfortunate teenage mistake. Unable to do so, she throws herself into the sea and becomes foam. Probably not the feel-good story of the year, Hans.
• The Sleeping Beauty. Giambattista Basile’s tale is so weird and dark, it’s hard to know why Charles Perrault adapted it later, and why Disney liked it, too. In the original, a king wanders by a castle and enters it, only to find the sleeping beauty, who is in some sort of coma. He doesn’t wake her, and he doesn’t just kiss her either. That’s right, in this twisted tale, Sleeping Beauty wakes up nine months later to twins. The messed-up romance doesn’t stop there: the king is already married, and when the queen finds out about what’s happening, she tries to burn Sleeping Beauty at the stake and plans to feed the babies to the king. She is unsuccessful, which is about the only decent thing in this tale! We’ll stick to Walt’s version, thanks.
• The Lion King. Shakespeare lovers figured it out pretty quickly, but the rest of us took some time to put two and two together: the Lion King is based on Hamlet. At least in the singing animal version, a few survive to tell the tale, not like the Bard’s original, where basically, the entire cast of characters dies.
• Rapunzel. There are a few versions of this strange tale of the well-tressed girl in a tower, but one is based on the tale of a 3rd century A.D. woman. Sheltered by her father, who absolutely refused to allow her any suitors, she was locked up in a tower whenever he had to travel for business. Praying loudly throughout the window, annoyed Father Dear eventually decapitated her (later, he was struck and killed by lightning). She became the martyr, Saint Barbara, revered by the Eastern Orthodox Church. When the story morphed into a fairy tale, it got even stranger by adding in the long hair and some darker elements: having twins out of wedlock, the witch blinding the prince by plucking out his eyes, and Rapunzel wandering for years with her babies until the lovers meet again. Which, as we’re learning, is a surprisingly happy ending for these types of tales!
• Hansel and Gretel. Most likely based off the story of Katharina Schraderin, a 16th-century baker. She made such a delicious gingerbread cookie house that her rival, a man who was a baker himself, accused her of witchcraft. The townspeople, loving a good mob and BYOP (bring your own pitchfork) party, burned her to death in her own oven. Feeling warm and fuzzy yet? Me neither.
• Pinocchio. Carlo Collodi’s version of the tale of the walking, talking marionette, ends with Pinocchio accidently killing the wise cricket and himself being strung up and hung. Gulp.

Knowing all this makes me even more grateful for modern-day children’s books that are what they are, with most of them being downright wonderful, clever, and full of goodness and light. Have you read any good children’s books lately? You might want to try Something to Tell the Grandcows by Eileen Spinelli and Bill Slavin. Or, Tell Me Something Happy Before I Go To Sleep by Joyce Dunbar. In the adult genre, Bill Gates said, Enlightenment Now: The Case for Reason, Science, Humanism, and Progress by Steven Pinker is “my new favorite book of all time.”  Is the world really falling apart? Is the ideal of progress obsolete? Cognitive scientist and public intellectual Steven Pinker urges us to step back from the gory headlines and prophecies of doom, and instead, follow the data: In seventy-five jaw-dropping graphs, Pinker shows that life, health, prosperity, safety, peace, knowledge, and happiness are on the rise.

And there you have it! No need to throw yourself into the sea. We really have come a long way.

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