part memoir, part spiritual, part writing book

Once Upon a Time: Discovering Our Forever After Story by Debbie Macomber
My rating: 4 of 5 stars

Macomber's book is part memoir, part spiritual, part writing book.

I didn't know what to expect when I opened this book. I've read quite a few of Macomber's books and enjoyed them immensely, but this nonfiction titled held more of Macomber than her novels do. Intensely Christian, she begins each chapter with a verse from the bible (both old and new testaments). She frequently injects faith into her chapters and sometimes gets a bit preachy, which at times was a just a bit off-putting. I've never felt comfortable with books that preach too much. She also explains in this book why her fiction is not preachy, which I believe opens her beautiful fiction to a broader audience.

As I said, this book is part memoir (parts left me teary-eyed), part spiritual (parts that became too preachy were skipped over), and part writing book. This book was more of a window into what makes Debbie Macomber tick since none of the three dominate the book.


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One book had a tremendous impact on two branches of the family tree

A Genealogist's Guide to Discovering Your Irish Ancestors: How to Find and Record Your Unique Heritage by Dwight A. Radford
My rating: 5 of 5 stars

This book had a tremendous impact on my genealogy research. I learned quite a few interesting things from this book.

First, while searching for my paternal great-grandmother, I kept coming across the name Delia in reference to the known marriage and children of Bridget and Martin. Delia? I figured this had to be the wrong family… just how many Bowmans were there in New Bedford anyway??? One of the things I found out from this book was that Delia was a nickname for Bridget; I can’t imagine for a moment how Delia relates to Bridget, but this has opened up a whole world of census records that I now know I can use. The elusive Bridget Kerrigan Bowman isn’t so elusive anymore!

I’ve been doing my husband’s genealogy as well. One of the family names in his lineage is Cawley. I kept hitting a wall on the state and federal census records because I kept coming across McCawley in census records with the same relatives listed as those for the Cawley clan. How could this sparsely populated area have two separate family names that were so similar? This book said that in the early immigration days some Irish families dropped the Mc and O’ in their names. It was like a light went on! Cawley and McCawley are one and the same family.

The impact on both branches of the above families is tremendous. Now I can proceed with confidence that Delia is Bridget and McCawley is Cawley. Pretty awesome!


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Lighthouses - a cool close up

Lighthouses: A Close Up Look: A Tour of America's Iconic Architecture Through Historic Photos and Detailed Drawings (Built in America) by Alan Giagnocavo 

This book is not just beautiful to look at, but is also filled with a lot of substance and historical information. A book that all ages can study and enjoy.

See my review on Amazon or on this blog on in the reading and reviewing section.

Writing adventures

So, grad school started up again in September. I have two writing projects underway already:

• Fiction: A new novel - have less than 2,000 words right now – I just started it. This project may give way to another novel idea I have brewing
• Nonfiction: Master's thesis - a creative nonfiction account of my genealogy search and experiences (see my genealogy blog)

It’s not easy to manage two blogs. The genealogy blog will contain random genealogy-related posts. This blog will focus on the two writing projects noted above.