Richard W. shared a page on November 17, 2022
The Purple Wind Sculpture!

The Purple Wind Sculpture!

Estimated reading time: 1 minute, 26 seconds

Jan LilienThe outdoor lighting for the Wind Sculpture in Jan’s Memorial Triangle Garden in Hanson Park has been installed.

Purple was one of Jan’s favorite colors and is also the color of domestic violence prevention.

We have done as much work as possible before the winter. Other plants and a drip irrigation system will be installed next spring.

Carolle Huber Landscape Architecture’s re-imagination of the Hanson Park Triangle has proven to be a design that will bring decades of pleasure to the greater Cranford community.

Jan was and still is the love of my life.

Together we choose to light one candle. Like love, the candle never died and still guides me on my grief journey.

The lyrics for the opening stanza of Light One Candle by Peter, Paul, and Mary.

Light one candle for the Maccabee children
With thanks that their light didn’t die
Light one candle for the pain they endured
When their right to exist was denied
Light one candle for the terrible sacrifice
Justice and freedom demand
But light one candle for the wisdom to know
When the peacemaker’s time is at hand

Jan is still with me, and I know she is happy with the garden, the wind sculpture, and the benches. Our love will never die!

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The Jan Lilien Education Fund sponsors ongoing sustainability and environmental awareness programs. Gifts made this month; I will match dollar-for-dollar. All donations are tax-deductible.

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Jan the Gardener

Jan’s Memorial Garden

Working with the Hanson Park Conservancy, we have taken significant steps in building Jan's Memorial Triangle Garden at Hanson Park including installing the Wind Sculpture.

Richard W. Brown November 8, 2022

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Richard W. Brown
The Purple Wind Sculpture

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The Hunter: A Novel

Read: March 2024

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The Hunter: A Novel

by Tana French

Today, I began reading “The Hunter: A Novel” by Tana French, often called the Queen of Irish crime fiction. The story takes place in a small village in the West of Ireland during a hot summer. Two men arrive, one returning home and the other seeking riches. However, one of them is also seeking death.

Cal Hooper is a retired Chicago police officer who moved to rural Ireland for a peaceful life. He has built a relationship with a local woman named Lena and has been mentoring Trey Reddy, a troubled teenager on a better path. But when Trey’s long-lost father returns, accompanied by an English millionaire and a plan to find gold in the townland, everything they have built is threatened. Cal and Lena are willing to do whatever it takes to protect Trey, but Trey is not interested in protection. What she wants is revenge.

This novel, written by the acclaimed author described by The New York Times as “in a class by herself,” tells a nuanced and atmospheric tale about what we are willing to do for our loved ones, what we will do for revenge, and what we may have to sacrifice when the two collide.

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Fair Play

Read: June 2025

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Fair Play: A Novel

by Louise Hegarty

“Fair Play” by Louise Hegarty is a captivating and playful novel that is both insightful and profoundly moving. It delves into the complexities of the human heart while challenging our perceptions of a beloved genre. Fans of Anthony Horowitz and Lucy Foley will appreciate this wonderfully original and genre-defying debut from Ireland. The book pays tribute to the brilliant detective novels of the early twentieth century but with a modern twist that will keep readers on the edge of their seats.

A group of friends, each with their quirks and secrets, gathers at an Airbnb to celebrate New Year’s Eve. It’s Benjamin’s birthday, and his sister, Abigail, is hosting a Jazz Age Murder Mystery-themed party. As the night unfolds, they enjoy champagne, devour hors d’oeuvres, and form or strain relationships. Someone kisses the wrong person, and someone else’s heart breaks. The setting, a grand mansion with its mysteries, adds an extra layer of intrigue to the story.

By morning, everyone wakes up—except for Benjamin.

As Abigail struggles to come to terms with her brother’s death, an esteemed detective arrives, determined to find Benjamin’s killer. The mansion is now filled with a butler, gardener, and housekeeper, making everyone a suspect, and nothing is quite as it seems. The detective’s arrival not only adds a layer of suspense but also brings a sense of hope as the characters cling to the possibility of justice and closure.

Will the culprit be revealed? And how can Abigail, feeling lost and alone, begin to piece her life back together in the wake of this tragedy?

Gripping yet playful, sharp yet profoundly moving, *Fair Play* explores the depths of the human heart while subverting one of our most beloved genres. It’s a twisty murder mystery that’s both classic and contemporary, along with a poignant exploration of grief and loss.

Louise Hegarty‘s work has appeared in Banshee, The Tangerine, The Stinging Fly, and The Dublin Review. It has also been featured on BBC Radio 4’s Short Works. She was the inaugural winner of the Sunday Business Post/Penguin Ireland Short Story Prize. Her short story “Getting the Electric” has been optioned by Fíbín Media. Louise resides in Cork, Ireland.

When you purchase a book through one of my links, I earn a small commission that helps support my passion for reading. This contribution allows me to buy even more books to share with you, creating an incredible cycle of discovering great reads together! Your support truly makes a difference!

Enjoy a limited-time offer of 20% off your next book purchase at Bookshop.org!

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All Fours: A Novel

Read: May 2024

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All Fours: A Novel

by Miranda July

Today, I started reading All Fours: A Novel by Miranda July. A semi-famous artist announces her plan to drive cross-country from LA to NY. Thirty minutes after leaving her husband and child at home, she spontaneously exits the freeway, checks into a nondescript motel, and immerses herself in an entirely different journey.

Miranda July’s second novel, a testament to her unique approach to fiction, confirms the brilliance of her storytelling. With July’s wry voice, perfect comic timing, unabashed curiosity about human intimacy, and palpable delight in pushing boundaries, All Fours tells the story of one woman’s quest for a new kind of freedom. Part absurd entertainment, part tender reinvention of the sexual, romantic, and domestic life of a forty-five-year-old female artist, All Fours transcends expectation while excavating our beliefs about life as a woman. Once again, July hijacks the familiar and turns it into something new and thrillingly, profoundly alive.

When you purchase a book through one of my links, I earn a small commission that helps support my passion for reading. This contribution allows me to buy even more books to share with you, creating an incredible cycle of discovering great reads together! Your support truly makes a difference!

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Mercy Street: A Novel

Read: February 2023

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Mercy Street: A Novel

by Jennifer Haigh

Mercy Street: A Novel by Jennifer Haigh is a tense, riveting story about the disparate lives intersecting at a Boston women’s clinic. The novel was named Best Book of the Year by the Washington Post, the New Yorker, and the Boston Globe. Mercy Street is a novel for right now, a story of the polarized American present. Ms. Haigh is a gifted storyteller who has written a very readable book. I highly recommend it. 

I truly enjoyed Mercy Street. I read her short story Zenith Man and enjoyed her storytelling skills. I wanted to read her most recent novel. Until the last few pages, I was unsure how Ms. Haigh‘s intricate storylines could conclude the story. Usually, I can predict how a story will unfold well before I finish reading it. Mercy Street was a rare exception to that rule.

I have never had to run the gauntlet in front of a women’s clinic, but Ms. Haigh has made that experience so real that I could taste it. The day-to-day work of the staff and the clients was detailed and believable. The male characters, Timmy, the affable pot dealer; Anthony, a lost soul; and Excelsior11, the screenname of Victor Prine, were drafted credibly.

As stated earlier, I highly recommend this book.

Jennifer Haigh is the author of seven best-selling, critically acclaimed works of fiction. Her first, Mrs. Kimble, won the PEN Hemingway Award for debut fiction. Her latest, Mercy Street, was named a Best Book of 2022 by the New Yorker and won the Mark Twain American Voice in Literature Award. A Guggenheim fellow and Iowa Writers’ Workshop graduate, she lives in Boston.

When you purchase a book through one of my links, I earn a small commission that helps support my passion for reading. This contribution allows me to buy even more books to share with you, creating an incredible cycle of discovering great reads together! Your support truly makes a difference!

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Look What You Made Me Do

Read: May 2026

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Look What You Made Me Do

by John Lanchester

“Look What You Made Me Do” by John Lanchester is a darkly comedic tale that delves deep into the intricate web of love, trust, resentment, and entitlement. The narrative weaves the lives of two women from contrasting generations, drawing them into a thrilling conflict where wits and wills are tested to the limit. As tension mounts and secrets unravel, only one will rise to claim victory in this captivating showdown.

“Every successful marriage has its own private language.” So it is for baby boomer Kate and her beloved architect husband Jack, thirty years into their seemingly idyllic life in metropolitan North London. And so it is for spiky millennial screenwriter Phoebe and her charming loafer of a partner, Tony.

But when Phoebe’s steamy television series, Cheating, becomes the year’s most talked-about show, Kate thinks she sees details and intimacies of her marriage in it that only she and her husband could have known. Who has betrayed whom? Who has stolen whose story―and why?

John Lanchester is the author of five novels, including the best-selling *The Debt to Pleasure* and *Capital*. His works have received several accolades, including the Hawthornden Prize, the Whitbread First Novel Award, and the E. M. Forster Award. His books have also been longlisted for the Booker Prize and translated into more than twenty-five languages. Lanchester is a regular contributor to The New Yorker and The New York Review of Books. He resides in London.

Discover your next favorite book and dive into a world of curated, exciting reads by purchasing through my links. You’ll have access to a diverse selection of books I’ve personally vetted for quality and enjoyment. Supporting these selections not only helps me continue to provide you with personalized recommendations but also ensures you have access to meaningful stories that enrich your life. Your support truly makes a difference in helping me share more books and insights with you!

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The Time Traveler's Wife

Read: May 2021

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The Time Traveler’s Wife

by Audrey Niffenegger

My wife had asked me to read – The Time Traveler’s Wife by Audrey Niffenegger – on several occasions. When we first met, we both liked to read fiction and non-fiction. As we aged, I focused almost exclusively on non-fiction, and she focused on fiction. Since her passing, I have started reading more of both genres. We could now have a book club!

Both Jan and I have always enjoyed books and movies about time travel. If I could travel back in time, there are tens of thousands of days I would love to spend with her again. But time travel is not possible. Or is it? Her spirit returns to me whenever I am paralyzed and encourages me to dust myself off and keep going. Maybe one day we will time travel together!

I enjoyed reading this book, even if it was difficult to keep track of the periods. It is very much the type of time-traveling book that both of us would have liked to read, and it has helped me to imagine a world in which Jan and I will meet again.

But what if it is not time travel as imagined by H. G. Wells. As the Hasidic story foretold, God split our souls at birth and placed one part of my soul in her body and placed the rest into my body. Very few people are lucky enough to find the person who has the other half of their soul, and Jan and I did.

When my life ends, what if God takes a portion of our two souls and places them into new bodies. Each of their souls would include a part of each of us. Those two new people would have to find each other in the future to connect as we did. They might not see each other and forever hunger for true love. Whatever happened, they would not know that they once were very much in love.

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