Mary helen stefaniak biography of barack

summary

This collection of short essays delivers more joy than many books twice its size. Culled from two decades’ worth of Mary Helen Stefaniak’s “Alive and Well” column in the Iowa Source, each essay invites readers into the ordinary life of a woman “with a family and friends and a job . . . and a series of cats and a history living in one old house after another at the turn of the twenty-first century in the middle of the Middle West.” One great aunt presides over nineteen acres of pecan grove profitably strewn with junk. A borrowed hammer rings with the sound of immortality. Famous poets pipe up where you least expect them. Living and dying are found to be two sides of the same remarkable coin.

What’s more, writing prompts at the end of the book invite readers to search their own lives for such moments—the kind that could be forgotten but instead are turned, by the gift of perspective and perfectly chosen detail, into treasure. The Six-Minute Memoir encourages people to tell their own stories even if they think they don’t have the kind of story that belongs in a memoir.
 

The novel has five point-of-view characters—Foster, Laverne, Dakota, Kitty, and Mary McIntyre. Whose perspective was the most interesting to you? Were there any other characters you wished you could have heard from?

Were there any characters you found it hard to sympathize with?

Which character's life situation struck you as the saddest? 

Of all the characters, which one do you like best?

Do you identify with any of the characters in the novel?  Which one(s)? Do any of them remind you of someone you know? 

What do you think of Dakota's decision to switch from pursuing a career in medicine to becoming a teacher? Is the switch an act of courage or of cowardice? Do you think he'll become a teacher? Or will he change his mind and return to medicine? Which career path do you think he should choose?

If you were in Laverne's place, would you have decided to seize "the opportunity of a lifetime"? What happens to Laverne in the end? Would you call her fate "a happy ending"?

The words "lost her baby" mean a lot of different things when it comes to Mary McIntyre. Were you surprised when you learned the actual cause of her