War in Real Time

Horrific headline news from 2022 focusing on Mariupol during the early months of the ‘special military operation’ is the backdrop to Marsha Forchuk Skrypuch's new middle grade novel, Kidnapped from Ukraine. As the main character, 12-year-old Dariia, shares her fear, her courage, her passion for Ukraine the reader follows her beyond the headlines into a bizarre world of lies.

The only drawback is that this war story is NOT historical fiction. The middle grade kids in this story are inspired by real events happening NOW and that’s absolutely terrifying. I appreciated how deftly the author incorporated modern technology into the story.  It's 2022 and the children use their savvy computer skills to stay connected with each other and to channel their hope for the future.

My favourite character might be Anton—the brainwashed Russian boy. The author shows us how powerful the media can be in shaping a country’s people. It’s really important for youth to learn to be critical of news whether in school, on TV, or online. Who’s telling the story? 

A sub-story to Anton is his mother's greed ... another important aspect of how Putin succeeds to influence Russians, along with his father's perspective from the front lines. I really appreciated how Skrypuch gives young readers a view of both sides of this conflict. Plenty of discussion points here.

Novels like this one are great openers to discuss the power of propaganda, of the lure of money, and of the reality of war.

Favourite line, spoken by Daryia’s friend, Vadim on page 215, reads: “Not all soldiers hold guns.” Marsha Skrypuch is a soldier for Ukraine. 

Reunion and Memories

I’m preparing for a trip to Mexico next month. This will be different than my time last year because it includes a family reunion. My nuclear family here in Winnipeg lived quite isolated from the pack of cousins out west in BC or back in Europe. Perhaps that’s why I’ve been drawn to writing family stories … I’ve always lacked that connection.

On the Baltic

Growing up without grandparents or cousins, I got used to having no extended family and now I don’t miss having them in my daily orbit. You can’t miss what you’ve never had. Great friends more than make up for lack of family.  

On the Pacific 

But I am curious. How have the cousins dealt with family history? We share grandparents murdered under Stalin’s regime. We share lost windmills, East Prussian cooking, and folksongs. We’ve inherited unresolved trauma from war, homelessness, hunger, rape and guilt. These were our mothers, aunts and cousins who didn’t want to talk about what happened. These were our uncles who killed under Hitler’s orders. 

This family reunion will be interesting. As we walk the beaches of Mexico’s Pacific coast I’ll be thinking of the beaches I biked beside the Baltic … of the beaches near Palmnicken (now Yantarny) where Stuffhof prisoners were forced into icy waters … nothing like the sun-kissed sands of Mexico. Family reunions are for survivors. 

Baltic memorial to victims of death march

Imagine 2025!

IMAGINE my word for 2025. Thanks to John Lennon for saying it so succinctly, back in 1971. Imagine a world of peace. And let’s never stop sharing our imaginations through novels, song, dance, art and theatre. Imagine.

I guess that’s why I’ll continue to write. It’s my way to imagine. 

Grateful to have ‘imagined’ the five books that I’ve written over the last ten years. They’ve helped me to understand my family’s past in order that I could better understand my own present. And I guess that’s why I write and why I read … to understand. It’s through research and imagination that I’ve been able to create. 

10 years of imagination

Red Stone (aka The Kulak’s Daughter) focused on an 11-year-old kulak girl exiled from her family farm in present-day Ukraine. The series goes full circle in Waltraut when an 11-year-old immigrant girl in Canada finds the courage to tell her story.

We’re all stories. We all have inciting incidents, page turning plots or sagging middles, and we’re all searching for that soul-satisfying conclusion. 

Wishing us all understanding through imagination. 

 Imagine there’s no countries … 

Nothing to kill or die for

                

And no religion, too

Imagine all the people

Livin’ life in peace

You

You may say I’m a dreamer

But I’m not the only one

I hope someday you’ll join us

And the world will live as one

                                                                                                     John Lennon, 1971

A Magic Portal?

Hag stone necklace 

I’m not in the habit of wearing jewelry. Probably stems from my many years of working outside. But this season, I gave myself some jewelry and I’m actually feeling more comfortable with it on than without it. It’s hag stone, picked up along the west coast of Lake Winnipeg during one of my many beach strolls. I have bigger hag stones but they’d be too heavy to wear around my neck. 

So what is a hag stone?  It’s a ‘holey’ stone and some folklorist theory suggests that the hole is a portal to fairylands. I love that whimsical notion. It’s also suggested that a hag stone can ward off evil spirits, keep bad dreams away and offer protection against sickness. 

Hag stone pen holder?

I like wearing mine mostly because it represents the rocky beach where I found it. It’s solid rock, yet somehow vulnerable enough to become holey. 

Like any stone, it’s ancient like the moon. I like to think that this particular stone was waiting for me to find it. And perhaps someday I’ll figure out how to enter through its fairy portal into another world.  Right now, I'm holding it tight for a secret wish. But my other, not-so-secret wish is HAPPY NEW YEAR of PEACE to our world. 

Hag Stone Beach?

Gaslighting our Memories

The other day, while dog walking I listened to The Eurasian Knot, a podcast discussing Soviet history,  The affable hosts were interviewing Tyler Kirk, an American scholar based in Alaska, about his 2023 release, After the Gulag, A History of Memory in Russia’s Far North. While his book focuses on the Komi region and my relatives were closer to Novasibirsk, nonetheless, I found the discussion fascinating because it made me reflect on the differences between history and memory.

AI quickly sums up the differences as follows: History is an interpretation of facts and depends on multiple points of view. Memory is limited to one point of view and not necessarily accurate. 

Memorial, the international human rights organization dedicated to collecting memories of those repressed under the Stalin regime, is banned in modern Russia. History is being re-written by Putin.  Political gaslighting thrives, making it more important than ever to focus on memories. 

Family get-togethers over the holidays are a great way to hear stories, share memories and to not let them get buried by time and political agendas. Our memories deserve to be the building blocks of our histories— not the other way around.  Happy Holidays. 

Circled area shows where my
grandmother died in transit camp in 1931

Happy Holidays to my Amazing Writing Group

Looking forward to a lively, in-person, holiday celebration with my writers’ group next week. We’ve been meeting mostly online since the pandemic and I know we’re all craving an in-person event. We’re going to eat, drink and be merry … together.

by Marianne Gopalkrishna

Only other writers can empathize with the ups and downs of this arduous profession. We get to hear each other's stories when they're just ideas twinkling from a distance ... not sure of whether they'll turn into a real published story. 

Thanks to each of them for sharing with me this long-distance marathon of words. So proud to consider these creative, determined and talented group of writers my friends. Goodwill wishes to

  Jodi Carmichael, as unique and lively as the protagonist of her most recent middle grade novel, The Unique Lou Fox. She's always got more award-winning stories under construction.

MaryLou Driedger, teacher, traveller, blogger, best-selling author of Lost of the Prairie, and the most energetic person I know. Her most recent middle grade novel Sixties Girl is a multi-generational experience. 

Deb Froese, writer, teacher, and amazing editor. Her editing skills are like those of an empathetic surgeon ... precise and gentle. Author of the young adult novel Out of the Fire, also available in German, along with a more recent picture book. 

Interlake Magic by Christina Janz

Christina Janz, writer, and multi-talented artist. She can refinish furniture into pieces of art.  It's just a matter of time before her adventures of two crazy old women bumbling about rural England find a home. 

Mel Matheson, artist, book designer, author and soon an MFA graduate.  Her picture book, Hokey Dowa Gerda and the Snowflake Girl, received Manitoba's best picture book award back in 2015.

Pat Trottier, teacher, writer and advocate for epilepsy support. Pat's tenacity shines in her non-fiction support book for new teachers, Relationships Make the Difference.

Larry Verstraete, teacher, non-fiction author and middle grade novelist. He's also a dog-lover as his two most recent novels featuring a dachshund named, Coop.

 Coop for Keeps came out in this past spring.  Coop's first adventure story, Coop the Great, got picked up by Germany's Little Tiger Verlag. 

Write on!

Ambivalence

Christmas seems mostly about nostalgia and it’s the traditions that help keep the magic going.  I admit that my Christmas flame is flickering on low this year. Family illnesses and other struggles have kept spirits down. But we have snow, we have darkness and we have cold. All necessary ingredients to let Christmas lights shine. 

I visited a Christkindlmarkt here in Winnipeg last weekend. Our local market is nothing like the European open-air events. It’s simply too cold for outdoor kiosks. This indoor market is basically a craft fair dressed up in Christmas colours. I went to get some holiday necessities … spices to make Glühwein and candles for my Advent centre piece.

I’m sure I’ll perk up as the season progresses. After all, the joy and gratitude that my immigrant friends exude might be contagious. An Iraqi family (Christian Kurds) I hope to share time with spent four years in a Turkish refugee camp. Their young children remind me of how wonderful it is to be in Canada … while my Ukrainian friends show me that home and family, electricity and water, peace not war, must never be assumed. Life itself is a reason to celebrate. 

Here I am, ambivalent about Christmas and yet it is the season of peace and goodwill. How dare I take it for granted?  Perhaps the scent of the Christmas tree will revive me.  Time to go tree-hunting! 

Just jotting down these thoughts has put some of Dickens’ Tiny Tim attitude into my season. “God bless Us, Every One!”