Blank Pages Read Out Loud: Thresholds to the Unseen

Carmen Tolivar’s book is a memoir of stories set in her native Puerto Rico and Los Angeles. The pieces are not only about her own life, but also about the generations before hers, with a touch of historical references and spiritual awakenings, as well as her own path through the loss of her husband. Her poetic and lyrical prose is a delight to read. From the author: I think about my writing as a recording of the unsayable. I am called to tell the stories of unnoticed happenings, of people, animals, a bud as it opens. Stories of the ones who couldn’t participate because they had been turned to stone, enslaved, burned, made voiceless, or had married the wrong person generations back. I am called to tell the stories older than my birth, by now impatient to be released. They say they could be medicine to many. It would have been so for me.