Linda and Anne-Marie presented their PowerPoint program of The Lake Huron Mermaid on Zoom for the national series Poetry Vespers. The presentation was recorded. Click on the links below to see: 1) the main program and 2) a short video epilogue that highlights the roles of Jack Ridl and of his daughter Meridith, as illustrator of the Great Lakes Mermaid books. Links for purchasing the books are also included.
Main Program – Zoom Recording
https://drive.google.com/file/d/1wmGjCcgEorZTfCjj-hSEvPsPzeBwl0vG/view?usp=drive_link
Epilogue: Miracle of the Ridls – Zoom Recording
https://drive.google.com/file/d/1Pwfe4Zy60b4qaW2Ybg7eYa1Sxi4kFCtE/view?usp=sharing
Join Linda Nemec Foster and Anne-Marie Oomen
on
First UU Detroit Poetry Vespers
Join us on Zoom (link below)
“The Gift of Collaboration: Poetry, Art, and Family”
With this PowerPoint program, co-authors Linda Nemec Foster and Anne-Marie Oomen share their work featured in the new book, The Lake Huron Mermaid (Wayne State University Press, 2024). A short story totally narrated through poetry and illustrated by artist Meridith Ridl, the book is a dazzling tale of sisterhood and the healing power of nature embodied in the Great Lakes.
A young girl faces turmoil when she must rise to the challenge of caring for her sister suffering a long-haul case of COVID-19. Brooding over her sister’s precarious condition, Dawn seeks solace in free diving in Lake Huron, where she discovers a presence in the gray-blue waters who also knows the pain of loss and loneliness and the power of family bonds.
A new tale in the spirit of the award-winning The Lake Michigan Mermaid, this collection of poems introduces another beautifully illustrated freshwater mermaid to the world, fluidly shifting between Dawn and the mermaid’s voice. Their voices resonate with a parallel sense of longing, isolation, hope, compassion, and restoration found in kinship.
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Linda Nemec Foster is the founder of the Contemporary Writers Series at Aquinas College and has taught poetry workshops throughout Michigan (K through college classes) since 1980. She is the author of fourteen collections of poetry and served as the inaugural Poet Laureate of Grand Rapids, Michigan (2003–05). Her poems have been widely published, praised and awarded nationally and abroad, including first prize in the Allen Ginsberg Poetry Awards, second prize in Ireland’s Fish Publishing Poetry Prize, and Pulitzer Prize nominations for Bone Country and The Blue Divide. www.lindanemecfoster.com
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Anne-Marie Oomen teaches in the Solstice MFA program at Lasell University and at Interlochen College of Creative Arts and lives near Traverse City, Michigan. She has written eight books and is winner of the Association of Writers and Writing Program’s Sue William Silverman Prize for Creative Nonfiction for As Long as I Know You: The Mom Book. She has written seven plays, and she is founding editor of Dunes Review; former president of Michigan Writers; and recipient of the Michigan Author Award for 2023–24.
https://anne-marieoomen.com/
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Join us on ZOOM or in person (local Dearborn).
Zoom Event URL
https://zoom.us/j/99979852182?pwd=SW5ueTQyMnQxbjgwWVR1NWJ1QUJnUT09
Phone: 312-626-6799
Passcode: 178251
[In person Vespers may be available at Allegria Village , 15101 Ford Road Dearborn, MI 48126, in Dearborn. Stay tuned for details. Text or call Lencha Acker with any questions at 313-274-5797].
Hope to see you, Thursday, April 24 at 7 p.m. Eastern, 6 p.m. Central!
Contact Nancy Owen Nelson at [email protected] or 928-308-3785 for more information.