Last night I had the pleasure of attending an event for You Could Make This Place Beautiful, the newest book by Maggie Smith. Maggie is a poet, and this memoir is the most poetic prose. The epigraph is the quote below by Emily Dickinson. And it very much sets the stage for her writing - both the story and the framework.

My Goodreads review for the book reads: “Raw. Beautiful. Like the quartz stone she rolls around in her hand rubbing with her thumb, this memoir takes a series of moments and rolls them around different metaphors and frameworks. A very engaging structure of vignettes and poems and snippets of thought. Though unabashedly (actually almost belligerently) an incomplete story. Clearly prose written by a poet.”

At last night’s event, Maggie was interviewed by my favorite local author, Megan Stielstra. Megan is a master writer, editor, educator, so hearing her thoughts on the book and its construction was enlightening. I was also able to reintroduce myself to her, as my book club once invited her out to drink and talk books with us - it was unforgettable!