Spotlight

Indie Corner – Emma Reynolds

Back to the Indie Corner series I was thrilled to talk with Emma Reynolds, author of the just-out children’s book Amara and the Bats, a beautifully written and illustrated story that reminds us of the determination of youth and the importance of bats. Emma Reynolds is an illustrator and author […]

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Spotlight – Matt Bell, Appleseed

Click here to return to the series I was happy to reach author Matt Bell to talk about his new novel Appleseed (Custom Press, July 2021), a highly anticipated novel that takes our world eco-fiction series to the United States, where the story takes place in three timelines, across the […]

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Orleans, Sherri L. Smith

Orleans by Sherri L. Smith Young Adult Fiction Reviewed by Kimberly Christensen Reading novels about the environment requires a certain amount of getting comfortable with potential dystopian futures. For example, it would be extremely difficult to avert a climate crisis without thinking through the logical outcomes of the current course […]

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Spotlight – Neus Figueras

Click here to return to the series I’m rebooting an indie corner interview I had with author Neus Figueras, whose children’s book Lorac is beautifully illustrated and written. Inspired by the coral reefs near Myanmar, where Neus spent time doing restoration, this story is aimed toward the younger generation but […]

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Spotlight – Yaba Badoe

Click here to return to the series About the Book This book is told in beautiful, lyrical prose that swept me away … This book has great diverse representation and shows three girls standing up for what they believe in. This novel doesn’t lament what we have lost as much […]

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Indie Corner – Anne Coray

Back to the Indie Corner series I’m thrilled to introduce author Anne Coray to the Indie Corner spotlight. As a lifelong Alaskan, place has always helped define Anne. Born in a log cabin on Lake Clark (first named by the Dena’ina Athabaskans Qizhjeh Vena), she spent her first two years […]

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Spotlight – Diana McCaulay

Click here to return to the series About the Book This month we travel to a fictional island in Jamaica–Bajacu–to talk with author Diana McCaulay, whose novel Daylight Come was published in September 2020. It is 2084. Climate change has made life on the Caribbean island of Bajacu a grueling […]

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Depart, Depart, Sim Kern

Depart, Depart by Sim Kern Young Adult Fiction Reviewed by Kimberly Christensen The boy first appears to Noah in the moments before Noah’s Houston neighborhood is engulfed by catastrophic flooding. He leads Noah to the relative safety of a parking garage, then disappears. In the wake of the flooding, Noah […]

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Indie Corner – Claire Datnow

Back to the Indie Corner series I’m delighted to present Claire Datnow as this month’s Indie Corner author. Claire was born and raised in Johannesburg, South Africa, which ignited her love for the natural world and diverse cultures. Claire taught creative writing to gifted and talented students in the Birmingham, […]

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Spotlight – Tlotlo Tsamaase

Click here to return to the series Intro This month we travel to the world of Motswana author Tlotlo Tsamaase, whose short story “Eclipse Our Sins” rocked me in a good way. You can read the story at Clarkesworld. I featured this story in my last article at Medium, Part […]

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Indie Corner – Ryan Mizzen

Back to the Indie Corner series February’s Indie Corner looks at the amazing Ryan Mizzen and his children’s fiction Hedgey-A and the Honey Bees! Mary: Tell us about yourself–your life so far and how you got started in writing. What else have you written or published? Ryan: My childhood was […]

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Strange Birds, Celia C. Perez

Strange Birds: A Field Guide to Ruffling Feathers, Celia C. Perez Middle Grade Fiction Reviewed by Kimberly Christensen In Sabal Palms, Florida, many girls join the Floras, a service organization begun in the early 1900s by some of the founders of the city. Even though her grandmother was a proud […]

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Spotlight – Christiane Vadnais

Click here to return to the series We’ll end the crazy year of 2020 on a positive note, with a look at the lyrical novel Fauna by Christiane Vadnais. Here, we travel to the Arctic Circle (as indicated by Ursus maritimus), but the novel’s setting is fictional and inspired by […]

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Dig Too Deep, Amy Allgeyer

Young Adult Fiction Reviewed by Kimberly Christensen During junior year of high school, Liberty expects her focus to be on doing well in school and getting ready for college. Then her mom gets convicted of ecoterrorism and sent to jail, and Liberty finds herself moving to a rural mining town […]

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Blaze Island, Catherine Bush

Click here to return to the series About the Book It’s my pleasure to talk with Catherine Bush, fellow Canadian and author of the new novel Blaze Island. It’s just a coincidence that we moved to the Maritimes and experienced our first hurricane shortly after Catherine and I began talking. […]

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