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My Aunt Lucy

 My Aunt Lucy      Aunt Lucy was a large woman who wore dark print winter dresses and thick spectacles. In the summers, she  wore cotton print dresses with aprons that did not necessarily match.  She taught nine and ten year olds, and in the summer, when her sisters came to visit her, they slept late, then sat over brunch in their bathrobes talking about school until two or three in the afternoon, when it would be time to think about supper.      At nineteen, in November 1924, she wore a shapeless black coat on the train to a remote school district near Parry Sound where she’d been belatedly hired to teach.  She was met during a blizzard by a burly fur-coated man who looked like a buffalo driving a horse and sleigh. Twenty years her senior, he was the school board chairman. Though she  was afraid of him at first, two years later they were married.  He earned a living as a resort owner and hunting guide for tourists.  She c...
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A review of "Capitalism and its Critics" by John Cassidy, in "Compulsive Reader"

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Book Reviews ,  Non fiction reviews A review of Capitalism and its Critics by John Cassidy November 2, 2025 Reviewed by Ruth Latta Capitalism and its Critics: A History from the Industrial Revolution to AI by John Cassidy Farrar, Straus and Giroux May 2025, 624 pages, ISBN-13: 978-0374601089 John Cassidy’s examination of capitalism from its origins to the present day is a big book, the size of  The Dawn of Everything  by David Graeber and David Wengrove. The “two Davids’ book, about the cooperative nature of early indigenous societies, was abbreviated and summarized in a shorter volume. Should Cassidy’s book be summarized to make it more digestible to a public that likes a quick read? No. Cassidy’s book is a reader-friendly book that takes readers on a journey from the Levellers and Diggers of the English Civil War, to Trump’s America.  By selecting an historical figure as the focus of each chapter, he gives readers a human story and makes the past come alive. Cassid...
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  Fwd: Beautiful! Thank you to you both RE: Alighting in Time - Lynne Wycherley - with all my thanks Inbox Magdalena Ball Wed, Oct 15, 5:09 AM (1 day ago) to  me Some nice feedback for you :-) - thanks again.  Begin forwarded message: From:  "Lapwing" < lapwing@far-light.co.uk > Subject:  Beautiful! Thank you to you both RE: Alighting in Time - Lynne Wycherley - with all my thanks Date:  15 October 2025 at 8:18:43 pm AEDT To:  "'Magdalena Ball'" < maggieball@compulsivereader. com > Heartfelt thanks Magdalena, and especially to Ruth (Latta)  ~ it’s so kind of her to have taken the time, I feel from her words she is something of a kindred spirit, sensitive to Nature and the feminine ... Radiant leaves are peeping through my small window here, as if Nature would like me to send some of Her inner brightness to you both… Warmest wishes,  Lynne   Sent using cable   From:  Magdalena Ball [ mailto:maggieball@ compulsiveread...
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Review of "Alighting in Time" by Lynne Wycherley

  My review of Lynne Wycherly's poetry collection, Alighting in Time , is at this link:   https:// compulsivereader.com/2025/09/ 28/a-review-of-alighting-in- time-by-lynne-wycherley/
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The Art World of my novel-in-progress, "Forty Mermaids."

  My new novel, Forty Mermaids , to be published in 2026, is about a fictional Montreal artist’s development as a painter during the first half of the 20th century. My central character, Merle, faces obstacles to her work. Like many “women artists,” she struggles to carve out time from homemaking to pursue her painting. Her work is misinterpreted by art critics. Friends advise her to concentrate on domestic life. Like many innovators, she runs into conventional notions about what art is. As well, the Great Depression of the 1930s was not a good time for those in the arts.          While the administration of U.S. President Franklin Roosevelt  provided opportunities and funding for American artists through the Works Progress Administration, Canada had no such program. During World War II, however, the Canadian  government funded artists to work on pictures about the  war effort.           I have always li...
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The Uses and Abuses of History

 This oldie but goodie is my review of The Uses and Abuses of History, b y Margaret (MacMillan Viking, 2008), which appeared in Briarpatch in 2009. I thought about it recently while researching the historical background for my new novel-to-be, Forty Mermaids , and thought I would share the review with you. The Uses and Abuses of History,b y Margaret (MacMillan Viking, 2008),  in   Briarpatch, May June  2009, reviewed by Ruth Latta What does “history” mean to you? A list of names and dates? Great deeds of long ago? “History,” says historian Margaret MacMillan, is something we all do.” Formerly at the University of Toronto, now at Oxford, Professor MacMillan is well-known for her Governor General’s Award-winning book, Paris 1919 , and, more recently, for Nixon in China . These thoroughly researched, academically respected books are entertaining reads. Similarly reader-friendly is her latest book, The Uses and Abuses of History. MacMillan finds it natural that we...
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So Bad it was Good!

 SO BAD IT WAS GOOD! Researching for an historical novel can be frustrating. People edit their diaries. Historians and biographers settle on an approach and omit other interesting areas of their subject’s life.  They are also territorial, unwilling to share their insights and impressions with a mere novelist.  After all, novelists apply their imaginations to what they are writing, while historians and biographers are like the detective Joe Friday in Dragnet;  “They just want the facts, Ma’am.” Not long ago I got hold of a transcribed interview from some fifty years ago that was unhelpful and disappointing in some ways, but informative and hilarious in others.  A researcher was interviewing a married couple who were part of a progressive, political, arty circle in the 1930s and ‘40s.  The researcher was particularly interested in the wife’s career, but the husband joined in halfway through, because he’d been part of the same scene as she had. She was in her ...
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