Tuesday, September 12, 2023

Short in stature; tall in brilliance

    Mrs. Loggins taught English at a high school in rural North Carolina where I grew up. If she had stood on her tiptoes, she might have barely stretched past the five-feet mark on a door jamb. She was pleasingly plump and wore her dark hair in a cute pixie cut. As one of the younger teachers, she connected well with 16-year-olds. I had the luck and privilege of being one of her tenth-grade students.

Trumpets and Swans and Summers

      T he Summer of the Swans by Betsy Byars is mostly about a teenaged Sara and her ten-year-old little brother, Charlie, who is mentally...