Playing Poker with Nana

Published: August 2008

Publisher: Veritas Books

ISBN:

ISBN 13: 9781847301208

Paperback: 78 pages

To read a review of this book by Kathy Pozos, click here.

Buy now from:

Center for Creative Alternatives

(201) 393-7617

CCAMcK@cs.com

$15 + shipping

Description:

This book is a collection of memories and glimpses of an extraordinarily down-to-earth and insightful woman, my Nana. It looks back and forward – piecing together words, images and experiences of growing up and spending Summer holidays with her in New York, where she sourced, and seeded hope, vitality and sage advice in me. Now in my sixties, I am passing on that wisdom.

Everyone loves a grandparent, or wishes they had one to remember and be loved by – perhaps this collection of short stories, flashes of insight, moments that stayed and grew into knowledge and understanding, will give them a Nana to cherish, or add to the memories of their own wise ones, who have gone before them in faith.

These memories are funny, truthful, probing, realistic; laced with grief, awe, and grace. She lived for eighty-six years; an immigrant, widowed young. I knew her and yet barely knew her as only a child knows, remembers, pieces together and then realizes there are huge pieces missing. The book is short, but layered – a book to be savored, shared, and passed around.

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NEW BOOK REVIEW!

THE POOR SAVE US

BY DAVID HASS, MUSICAL COMPOSER AND AUTHOR

There are Christian storytellers who have some background in theology, and there are some theologians who understand and communicate the important scared role of stories. Megan is both Here stories become theology, and theology becomes proclaimed in real life adventures of humanity. As always, and once again, taps into the human condition and announces holiness at the same time. As with her other books, this one belongs in your hands to read, and in your hearts to transform you. Do not hesitate to drink in the gift of this book.

BOOK REVIEW BY JUNE SAWYERS

THIS WILL BE REMEMBERED OF HER - STORIES OF WOMEN RESHAPING THE WORLD (August 2010.210p. Eerdmans, $15(9780802864697). In this illuminating work, McKenna discusses three topics that she believes are closely linked: memory, women, and resistance. She has chosen these ideas because each is found at the heart of a story in Mark's Gospel: that of the unnamed woman who anoints Jesus with perfumed oil. This brief tale forms the center of this book's reflections and commentaries as McKenna looks at stories of children and women and their traditions from around the world. "Who and what we remember," she writes, "is a revelation of who and what we are and hope to be." Combining memory with the stories associated with women is a potent idea because traditionally women are the ones who do much of the remembering while their own stories are often forgotten. Thus, many of the stories recounted here comprise acts of resistance and, by their very nature of remembering, acts of political courage. An important and thought-provoking book about women, both sung and unsung, from Iran to the American Southwest and beyond.

Megan McKenna