Ladies and Not-So Gentle Women by Alfred Allan Lewis Reviewed by Connie Nordhielm Wooldridge

Ladies and Not-So-Gentle Women;Elisabeth Marbury,Anne Morgan, Elsie de Wolfe, Anne Vanderbilt, and Their Times by Alfred Allan Lewis.  Penguin, 2000.  540 pages; $18.00 (paperback).  Reading level:  adult. Four big-spending Gilded Age women would seem to have nothing to contribute to the rough and tumble politics of women’s rights near the turn of the 20th century. … [Read More]

Duck, Duck, Moose! Reviewed by Connie Nordhielm Wooldridge

Duck, Duck, Moose! by Sudipta Bardhan-Quallen; illustrated by Noah Z. Jones; Disney/Hyperion, 2014. 32 pages; $16.99 (hardcover); reading level: ages 2-5. The text on each page of this story about three friends – two ducks and a moose – couldn’t be more spare: You guessed it – “Duck, Duck, Moose.” The illustrations tell the tale… [Read More]

Canada Reviewed by Connie Nordhielm Wooldridge

Canada by Richard Ford. Ecco/HarperCollins, 2012. 420 pages; $15.99 (paperback). Reading level: adult. When sixty-six-year-old Dell Parsons looks back on the six weeks that changed his life back when he was fifteen, he begins his story this way: “First I’ll tell about the robbery our parents committed. Then about the murders, which happened later.” It… [Read More]

Did You Know Connie Speaks and Presents For School and Community Programs?

Connie is an experienced speaker and presenter who enjoys sharing her passion for writing and her experiences as a writer with audiences of all ages. She has been invited to speak to K-12 and college students, educators, writers’ groups, community, civic and professional organizations, library audiences and seniors – wherever book lovers gather! Connie presented… [Read More]

Connie’s Winter Reading List. What Are You Reading?

Our snowy winter here in Indiana is slowing me down and providing an opportunity to make a dent in the pile of titles stacked on my nightstand.   Canada by Richard Ford.  Besides the author’s credentials (he won a Pulitzer for his novel Independence Day), the first sentence has me hooked:  “First, I’ll tell about the… [Read More]

The Children’s Literature Network is Now Offering “Mentors for Rent!”

The Children’s Literature Network has a unique offering called “Mentors for Rent,” a consulting/coaching/critiquing service for writers of children’s or Young Adult books.  Mentors for Rent is … A consulting/coaching/critiquing service for those who write for children or young adults. Two award-winning children’s book writers who have long-term experience as writing teachers and coaches. Happy… [Read More]

Creative Writing Now is Offering a 5-part Audio Course on Writing and Publishing Children’s Books

Interested in starting a career as a children’s book author? Then check out this 5 part audio course. Connie lead the course on writing non-fiction, and the other courses are taught by accomplished writers Linda Leopold Strauss, Sally Derby, Emma Carlson-Berne and Mary Kay Carson. >> Learn More / Purchase the Course Course Contents Write and… [Read More]

Connie is Committed to Providing Great Resources for Educators, Librarians, and Writers. See Connie’s List…

Lesson plans for Just Fine the Way They Are Two education instructors from Earlham College created these 3 lesson plans in Comprehension, Social Studies-Transportation, and Writing to accompany my book about the National Road. >> View/Download lesson plans & resources Just Fine the Way They Are is available as a Book, CD, or Cassette Two education instructors from Earlham College created these… [Read More]

Behind the Beautiful Forevers; Life, Death, and Hope in a Mumbai Undercity Reviewed by Connie Wooldridge

Behind the Beautiful Forevers; Life, Death, and Hope in a Mumbai Undercity by Katherine Boo.  Random House, 2012.  256 pages;  $27.00 (hardback).  Reading level:  adult. In 1991, when a band of laborers was trucked in from Tamil Nadu to repair a runway at the Mumbai Airport, they decided to stay. They draped empty cement sacks… [Read More]

The Allure of the Archives

There’s a misconception out there that everything worth knowing is available online. Not true! There are whole worlds of information only accessible to those willing to take a journey, brave the sometimes intimidating protocol of an archival collection, open boxes or folders full of random papers, and dig into material that very few people may… [Read More]