Ruth Anne Latta

 In connection with my work-in-progress, I am reading the 19973 autobiography of Florence Bayard Rhein Bird, better known as Anne Frances, the name she used in her broadcasting and writing career.   Florence Bird headed the Canadian Royal Commission on the Status of Women, created in 1967, when I was just a mere girl, and given the mandate to inquire into and report on the status of women in Canada and to  recommend what steps might be taken by the federal government to ensure equal opportunities for women in all aspects of Canadian Society. Researching for my 2023 novel, A Striking Woman,   I found that when the commission reported,  one of its recommendations was that an advisory council to the federal government be established.  My central character says in that novel, "What we need is  not a council responsible to the federal government, but a federal government responsible to Canadian women,"  and as a result of the more radical women wh...

      For the past year I have been researching and writing a new novel about an artist's life in Montreal in the turbulent 1930s and 1940s.  I've written earlier Canadian historical novels set during the Great Depression of the  1930s, and enjoyed revisiting this decade (and the following one) through the eyes of a fictional woman painter busy juggling art and motherhood.     I haven't yet decided on a title for the novel, but think it will be either "Forty Mermaids" or "Beax,Arts."     I will call the excerpt below, "A Father-in-law's Visit." A Father-in-law's Visit. (c) Ruth Latta, 2025           Luke and his sisters called their father “Papa” and deeply respected him, so much so that the phrase “As Papa always says,” came to irritate Merle. Many people found Rev. Mr. Howard Croft profound, witty and wise, but to her he was a bore, and although he always treated her kindly, she doubted that he had the wisdom o...

 A LIFE IN FRAMES by Leonora Ross reviewed by Ruth Latta      Halfway through A Life in Frames , the central character, Lejf Busher, meets a physician who shows him around his orchard in a village near Mount Sinai. As they get to know each other, the doctor suggests that Lejf is searching for something, but that his camera allows him to keep a distance from what he wants yet fears.  When Lejf confides his pain over two unsatisfactory relationships, the doctor says, “Suppose what you are giving them is not what they need from you. Maybe they need something else.”      A Life in Frames , Leonora Ross’s third novel (www.leonoraross.com, 2025, ISBN 9781-0690828-00) is a portrait of an artist as a young man, a spiritual and geographic journey to unique parts of the world.  When the story begins, ten year old Lejf  is sleeping under the African night sky in his back yard in Otijwarongo, Namibia.  Earlier his father, Lawrence Busher, a wil...

                                   Won’t You Be my Teddy Bear? by Ruth Latta When I was sixteen, I went with my mother and sister to the church portion of a classmate’s wedding. The bride, whom I will call “Ellie,” had been in the same grade as I throughout elementary school, and although we were not best friends, we liked each other.  Everyone liked Ellie, the happy-go-lucky middle child in a family of seven. She and one of her sisters used to sing popular songs at the Friday afternoon concerts at our school, with other students, sometimes myself, making the group a trio.  Our repertoire included Elvis’s “Won’t You Be My Teddy Bear?” and Hank Williams’s “Hey, Good Lookin.’” High school, with three hundred students instead of fifty, offered us a greater academic challenge and more social opportunities. I seized the former, while Ellie got caught up in the latter....

                           Won’t You Be my Teddy Bear? When I was sixteen, I went with my mother and sister to the church portion of a classmate’s wedding. The bride, whom I will call “Ellie,” had been in the same grade as I throughout elementary school, and although we were not best friends, we liked each other.  Everyone liked Ellie, the happy-go-lucky middle child in a family of seven.She and one of her sisters used to sing popular songs at the Friday afternoon concerts at our school, with other students, sometimes myself, making the group a trio.  Our repertoire included Elvis’s “Won’t You Be My Teddy Bear?” and Hank Williams’s “Hey, Good Lookin.’”      High school, with three hundred students instead of fifty, offered us a greater academic challenge and more social opportunities. I seized the former, while Ellie got caught up in the latter.  A year older than I, she dropped...

 IF YOU BUILD IT, THEY WILL COME The saying, “If you build it they will come,” originated in Field of Dreams, the baseball movie starring Kevin Costner.  The film was Iowa farmer who hears a mysterious voice one night in his cornfield saying those words to him, and  feels the need to act. Though others think he has looped the loop, he builds a baseball diamond on his land, with his wife's encouragement, and the ghosts of great players appear on the field.      Some years ago a fellow-writer said that authors who intend to self-publish their books believe too much in “If you build it, they will come.” A writer should have a marketing plan, instead of taking the attitude that once the book is written, fate or luck will help them sell copies. Of course she was right. And yet... Sometimes the universe unfolds as it should. I haven’t been posting on my blog for a while because I’ve been researching and writing a novel set in 1940s Montreal about a woman wh...

 BEING OLD by Ruth Latta “The first time I realized I was old,” said my friend Alma, years ago, “was when I was the only customer in a boutique. At the cash I had a  pleasant exchange with one of the clerks, but when I was halfway out the door I heard her say to her friend, ‘Isn’t she cute!’  I thought, ‘Oh, my God, I’m so old I’m cute!” At the time, when I was middle-aged, I thought it would be nice to be considered cute, but now, at the age Alma was then, I’m still waiting for someone to say that to me.  I first realized that I was old about fifteen years ago when a bank employee was explaining the difference between two kinds of accounts. “Now, Mrs. Latta, suppose you want to write a cheque for your granddaughter for her birthday,” she began.   For a few minutes I was confused and disconcerted.  Not only did she think I was old enough to have a granddaughter, she also assumed that it was a granddaughter old enough to have a bank account a...