Tayé Foster Bradshaw's Bookshelf

The day was just waking up from her night rest when there was first a post, then another, and finally a flooded space of the news. Dr. Maya Angelou, poet, activist, memoirist, professor, feminist, mentor, silently and sweetly left the world she so changed with the magic of her pen. News reports, postings, pictures, quotes, connections, a lifetime of a generation or two fondly remember where they were when they first read her transformative words or heard that bass in her musical cadence. I first encountered her book, I know why the caged bird sings, when I was a young woman seeking to free myself from my own sea of questions.  Her words invited me to be authentic and encouraged me to find healing in the power of writing. Throughout my now 50 years, she, along with her literary sister, Toni Morrison, have been the black women literary giants at the background of my chorus, encouraging me to etch what I could not say and be released in what I could not sing. The feeling was a m

When I think of Paris, I think of cafés, pastries, love, and the arts. These all come together in an unexpected coming of age novel, Passing Love by Jacqueline E. Luckett.   Two things immediately drew me to this book, the first was the softness of the cover, the second was the intermittent French, and the third was the protagonist is somewhat a woman like me - of the diaspora, older, always wanted to visit Paris, and a bit sheltered.   Nicole, even her name is oh-so-French, felt familiar to me, like we grew up together in the same time period.  The novel, set in contemporary times as well as the times of WWII.  Both eras are tumultuous with incidents of racial unrest, uncertainty,and the dawning of a new civil rights movement.  Her experiences, as well as those of the other fully-realized women in the book, are known to us, we have lived through the angst of growing up with a mother who wants to keep us virtuous, the heartbeat of new love, the disappointment of failed relat