All posts filed under: Columns

ORDINARY LOVE

As new parents, Dia and Neel had often heard from older couples in their families that the early years of marriage are rosy rosy rosy. True colors of a couple come out once they have a child. That’s when you have to adjust adjust adjust. This last line, aunties recycled more often, eyeing Dia. Adjust, she told herself while locking the seatbelts around their one-year-old daughter, Taarini, in her child seat. Neel’s dad’s cousin brother was hosting the Diwali party for all of her extended families-in-law, the Samskaras, at his house in Mission Viejo. Dia and Neel hadn’t recovered from their fight over their vacation plans for Hawai’i but it was their first Diwali outing with Taarini so they decided to play social that evening. While driving, Neel turned on the sports channel. He knew how much Dia disliked the male anchor’s whiny voice alternating between a commentary on sports and politics with predictable quips on women celebrities. While driving in their pre-baby days, they’d mostly talk about their day at work, their latest with …

Claire Jiménez on the Interiority of Puerto Rican Motherhood. In Conversation with Amaris Castillo.

By Amaris Castillo

In Claire Jiménez’s debut novel, What Happened to Ruthy Ramirez, we meet a Puerto Rican family from Staten Island. It’s 2008 and Dolores Ramirez and her daughters, Nina and Jessica, have been living with a gaping hole for more than a decade. Ever since Ruthy – Dolores’ headstrong middle child – disappeared after school at just 13 years old. Then one day, Jessica notices a woman on a reality TV show who looks just like her long-lost sister. Could it be the real Ruthy? As I read this novel, I was struck by the deep care the Puerto Rican author took in building the alternating voices of the Ramirez women. They are unflinchingly honest, funny, and loyal. The matriarch Dolores, in particular, stayed with me. She is a mother who exercises tough love on her daughters, but also questions many of the decisions she’s made as a parent. A mother who, in all of her chapters, speaks directly to her Lord. And she’s a mother crippled by guilt over her missing daughter, yet has hope …

Dr. Anna Malaika Tubbs | Mama’s Writing

By Sherisa de Groot

Mama’s Writing is Raising Mothers’ monthly interview series, curated by Starr Davis. What recent writing accomplishment(s) are you most proud of? Was this accomplishment shared and supported by your children? I recently signed a major two-book deal for my next two non-fiction works with Flatiron Books and I feel so proud because it really feels like I’m officially a writer now, I don’t only have one book out there but this is now my career. It means I make enough to just focus on my writing and to have the flexible schedule I have always wanted. My children are very young so it’s hard to say that they “support” my accomplishment but they are certainly very adaptable and understand that when I head out to my studio, I’m doing my work and that my work contributes to the life they get to live. Tell about a time mom-guilt emerged (or emerges) in the midst of your writing process. While I love my flexible schedule I also have a hard time prioritizing my writing as a result. …

Ten Questions for Grace Talusan

By Sherisa de Groot

RAISING MOTHERS: What inspired you to tell this story? GRACE TALUSAN: I wrote this book out of an urgent desire to not be alone with my story. Over many years, I wrote short essays and pieces that eventually became my first book, THE BODY PAPERS, and it has been wonderful to connect with readers of my writing, but even before I had readers, I felt less alone from the act of writing itself. I also felt an ethical responsibility to tell the truth. RAISING MOTHERS: What did you edit out of this book? GRACE TALUSAN: Because I was writing memoir, I wanted to be careful when I was writing about other people, especially the children in my life. I would ask myself what was really necessary in order to tell my story. If I was going to reveal a detail about someone else, how did that work in service to the story I was telling? I also asked myself why I was telling a certain story. There …

Behind the Book with Cherise Fisher

By Sherisa de Groot

Behind the Book is an exploration into the other side of publishing; we speak with agents, editors, publicists, and other members of the publishing industry whose hard work contributes to the wonderful material we are able to read and recommend daily. It’s an open conversation on their individual careers, the state of the industry and its future potential. Our first installment is with Cherise Fisher, literary agent at Wendy Sherman. Her career spans over 25 years, including her time as Editor-in-Chief of Plume (an imprint of Penguin Random House). She has ushered into print such recent notable books as Rachel Rickett’s international bestseller Do Better (2021), Tia Williams’ novel Seven Days In June (2021), Maya-Camille Broussard’s Justice of the Pies (2022), Diane Marie Brown’s novel Black Candle Woman (2023) and a host of other spectacular authors. What was your first job in publishing? My first job in publishing was as the Assistant to the Editor of Chief of Delacorte/Dell. I started about two weeks after my graduation from college. Can you walk us through your publishing …