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Betsy’s 2024 Year in Books
Take a look at Betsy’s Year in Books, including some fun facts about their reading.
Betsy Robinson’s Followers (1,224)
7,245 books
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4,999 friends
516 books
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71 friends
1,639 books
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107 friends
4,125 books
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166 friends
2,399 books
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85 friends
3,126 books
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431 friends
17,810 books
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218 friends
1,678 books
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860 friends
More friends…
Betsy Robinson
Goodreads Author
Born
in New York City, The United States
Website
Twitter
Genre
Influences
Member Since
March 2011
URL
https://www.goodreads.com/betsy_robinson
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The Trouble with the Truth
by
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published
2015
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5 editions
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The Last Will & Testament of Zelda McFigg
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published
2014
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6 editions
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Cost of Care
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published
2021
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Plan Z by Leslie Kove
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published
2001
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4 editions
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Conversations with Mom: An Aging Baby Boomer, in Need of an Elder, Writes to Her Dead Mother
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published
2011
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4 editions
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The Spectators
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Cats on a Pole
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Jakey, Get Out of the Buggy
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Girl Stories & Game Plays: an anthology of stories and plays
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published
2005
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5 editions
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LEARNING TO THRIVE: Begin by Recognizing Your Trauma
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Regular Substack Posts
I'm writing columns on Substack.
https://betsyrobinson.substack.com/
Subscribe (free) to get a potpourri of political, funny, and personal stories (nonfiction and occasional fiction) as well as book reviews. I’m interested in material that helps me and everybody grow and become more self-aware. And I’m always hungry to laugh.
Read more of this blog post »
https://betsyrobinson.substack.com/
Subscribe (free) to get a potpourri of political, funny, and personal stories (nonfiction and occasional fiction) as well as book reviews. I’m interested in material that helps me and everybody grow and become more self-aware. And I’m always hungry to laugh.
Read more of this blog post »
Betsy’s Recent Updates
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I read Cannery Row years ago and didn't know there was a sequel. Thanks, Diane.
...more
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Betsy Robinson
wants to read
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Betsy Robinson
started reading
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Betsy Robinson
wants to read
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Liz wrote: "Interesting that you consider this “mass appeal, commercial” lit. I wouldn’t have classified it that way. But I hope it does reach the mas
...more
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Betsy Robinson
made a comment on
her review
of
Nobody's Girl: A Memoir of Surviving Abuse and Fighting for Justice
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KathyTap wrote: "Thanks for the heads-up about Bookshop ebooks and Audiobookstore. I had not heard of them and will now buy from them. Bookshop.org al
...more
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Diane wrote: "I never heard of Oh Reader magazine Betsy, but I'll check it out. Thanks."
They sell it at your old job, B&N. ...more " |
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Wonderful summation, Bruce. Thanks.
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Betsy Robinson
rated a book it was amazing
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| This book gave me just what I needed—it swept me away with a great plot and depth of content. | |
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Betsy Robinson
wants to read
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“Dear Mom,
I'm as tight as a girdle. How do I accept love?
--B
Dear Potato Face,
Just say 'thank you,' then shut up.
--M”
― Conversations with Mom: An Aging Baby Boomer, in Need of an Elder, Writes to Her Dead Mother
I'm as tight as a girdle. How do I accept love?
--B
Dear Potato Face,
Just say 'thank you,' then shut up.
--M”
― Conversations with Mom: An Aging Baby Boomer, in Need of an Elder, Writes to Her Dead Mother
Topics Mentioning This Author
| topics | posts | views | last activity | |
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Edelweiss & Netga...:
What's on your July 2021 TBR List?
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4 | 12 | Jun 25, 2021 11:00PM | |
| Book Nook Cafe: The Book Salon ~~ July 2021 | 223 | 54 | Jul 30, 2021 06:30AM | |
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Cozy Mysteries :
When You're Not Reading a Cozy
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1892 | 658 | Jul 31, 2021 09:13AM | |
| Vampires, Weres a...: July Reading | 124 | 41 | Jul 31, 2021 11:19PM | |
| The Reading For P...: What's On Your Monthly TBR-July 2021? | 37 | 36 | Aug 27, 2021 11:03AM | |
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Aussie Readers:
Share Your Reviews (and Thoughts) Here - 2021
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3359 | 358 | Dec 31, 2021 03:47AM | |
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You'll love this ...:
What are you reading? - 2021
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1104 | 145 | Dec 31, 2021 07:48AM |
“When I see heavy dramas with no comic relief, I don't think they're honest. I don't think people go through life miserable all the time; in fact, if you're very miserable, you giggle a lot at the oddest things."
--Carl Reiner in "The Trib”
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--Carl Reiner in "The Trib”
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“I mean, if you have any idea of any kind of complexity or immensity or destiny, of general order, you're put in a position of nothingness. And I think this is true. I don't think I'm anything; I never have thought that. Whatever it is that activates it is a certain kind of energy that goes on. But the effect is ridiculous; it's absurd."
--Lincoln Kirstein in "The New Yorker”
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--Lincoln Kirstein in "The New Yorker”
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“The longer I am a writer--so long now that my writing finger is periodically numb--the better I understand what writing is; what its function is; what it is supposed to do. I learn that the writer's pen is a microphone held up to the mouths of ancestors and even stones of long ago. That once given permission by the writer--a fool, and so why should one fear?--horses, dogs, rivers, and, yes, chickens can step forward and expound on their lives. The magic of this is not so much in the power of the microphone as in the ability of the nonhuman object or animal to BE and the human animal to PERCEIVE ITS BEING.”
― Living by the Word: Selected Writings, 1973-1987
― Living by the Word: Selected Writings, 1973-1987
“The spiral is a spiritualized circle. In the spiral form, the circle, uncoiled, has ceased to be vicious; it has been set free.”
― Speak, Memory
― Speak, Memory
“You must remember what you are and what you have chosen to become, and the significance of what you are doing. There are wars and defeats and victories of the human race that are not military and that are not recorded in the annals of history. Remember that while you're trying to decide what to do.”
― Stoner
― Stoner
What next, now notifications are much reduced, and GR is dying?
— 261 members
— last activity Nov 08, 2025 08:59PM
On 20 September 2024, Goodreads removed the option for email notifications, without even bothering to tell users (unless they looked at the "help" pag ...more
Goodreads Librarians Group
— 300539 members
— last activity 1 minute ago
Goodreads Librarians are volunteers who help ensure the accuracy of information about books and authors in the Goodreads' catalog. The Goodreads Libra ...more
Comments (showing 17-66)
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Betsy,Thanks for the lovely note. So happy to be friends and looking forward to sharing book together!
Sara
Anne wrote: "Hi Betsy,Well, this is embarrassing. Yeah, I deleted the comment because you don't know me but I have a sense of knowing you based on following your reviews.
Anyway, now that we're GR friends I..."
No problem, Anne. I'm grateful for all Goodreads friends--old, new, and as yet unknown.
Hi Betsy,Well, this is embarrassing. Yeah, I deleted the comment because you don't know me but I have a sense of knowing you based on following your reviews.
Anyway, now that we're GR friends I look forward to chatting books and won't delete anymore comments. :))
Paul wrote: "Hi Betsy,Caught your cameo in Secaucus 7 today. Very cool. I hope you had a good time doing it.
I was surprised that the film held my interest after all these years. Some of the dialogue was awkw..."
Hi Paul, glad you enjoyed it. I had a great time doing it. A bunch of those people were my college time friends.
Hi Betsy,Caught your cameo in Secaucus 7 today. Very cool. I hope you had a good time doing it.
I was surprised that the film held my interest after all these years. Some of the dialogue was awkward but, overall, it came across as more than just a product of its time.
I was also surprised to see an interview with John Sayles on the DVD in which he said that he didn't think that The Big Chill ripped off Secaucus. I always felt that Kasdan took the premise of Secaucus, slicked up the characters, gave them higher financial status, and ran with it.
Paul wrote: "Hi Betsy,Thanks for the friend request. Good to know that we share a love for A Confederacy of Dunces and Percival Everett's books. Our opinions on Stoner differ, but that's ok. A number of my ot..."
Paul wrote: "Hi Betsy,
Thanks for the friend request. Good to know that we share a love for A Confederacy of Dunces and Percival Everett's books. Our opinions on Stoner differ, but that's ok. A number of my ot..."
Thanks for accepting the friend request, Paul. I grew up in Briarcliff Manor, NY, and I have friends around where you are. One of the actors in Secaucus (we share my one scene in that movie--a bar scene; I'm the girl who's not so bright) lives in New Paltz, and he has a new poetry collection out which is pretty good. I'm not a poetry reader, but I liked this little book. It has a sense of humorA Swindler's Grace. I look forward to sharing more Percival Everett with you. --Betsy
Hi Betsy,Thanks for the friend request. Good to know that we share a love for A Confederacy of Dunces and Percival Everett's books. Our opinions on Stoner differ, but that's ok. A number of my other Goodreads friends love it, and that's part of why we're here - to share opinions.
Interesting that you grew up in the Hudson Valley. I've lived in the Hudson Valley for most of my life.
Also, I saw Return of the Secaucus 7 years ago in a theatre in New Paltz and liked it very much. I'll have to watch it again and see what my present day reaction is.
Happy reading (and writing).
Regards, Paul
Big Brother wrote: "Hi Betsy, thanks for the friend invite. Looking forward for the friend-invite. Love the dog in comment 65 below ."We can name the dog "Loki"! Nice to make your acquaintance, Big Brother.
Hi Betsy, thanks for the friend invite. Looking forward for the friend-invite. Love the dog in comment 65 below .
Mike wrote: "Thanks for the friend invite the other day, Betsy. Looking forward to perusing your book shelves and future discussions. Happy reading in the mean time."Same to you, Mike.
Thanks for the friend invite the other day, Betsy. Looking forward to perusing your book shelves and future discussions. Happy reading in the mean time.
James wrote: "Hey Betty,Thanks for the friend request"
Thanks for accepting, James. --Betsy
I've added "Read Book" excerpts to all my books. Just discovered this nifty feature. I'm a little slow.
I took my dead mother, author of
The Trouble with the Truth to BookExpo America this year, and I wrote about it: http://www.fiftyisthenewfifty.com/a-c... 
If anyone is coming to BookExpo America, please visit me. I'll be manning the Editorial Freelancers Assoc. booth on 5/28 from 1 to 5. It's booth # 2732.
I watched an episode of Younger where the protagonist, who works in publishing, takes a book from the slush pile, reads it, likes it, shares a PDF with her book club, who then write about it on Goodreads! Where did the book cover come from? How come nobody asked the author -- whose name does not exist in this plot -- about permission?
Just published an essay on RewireMe.com. My Dogged Life. All about what I learned from my maltese Rosie, who used to be my mother's dog and therefore my sister, but then came to me, so she was my baby. Complicated relationship...
The Trouble with the Truth: It's impossible to hold in one tiny human brain.
"We are the one part of creation that knows what it's like to live in exile and that ability to turn your face toward home is one of the great human endeavors and great human stories." —David Whyte15% discount for first person to enter code RCSFQ1VV9FLTP on http://www.barnesandnoble.com/w/the-l...
25-yr anniversary of Edna's death—from Editor's Note to
The Trouble with the Truth: The visions of my mother perched on a black iron chair with a quilted back, in the upstairs “study” of our custom-designed Ed Barnes house, are burned into my childhood memory. The flat-roofed, square-box, unheatable construction, with huge picture windows, no curtains, and a kitchen the size of a closet bore no resemblance to the traditional homes on our dead-end street.
Life changed, jobs changed, sickness came, and on March 26, 1990, my mother succumbed to leukemia and emphysema. She never got to publish this novel, or the one she was working on when she died. She left all her manuscripts to me…
All these comments are about the same book and character
:
From
The Last Will & Testament of Zelda McFigg: Walt Edelman was shorter than I, a gnome-like thing with over-sized bleached teeth protruding from a flaccid, ever-flapping behemoth mouth. Imagine that over-rated ingénue Julia Roberts’s mouth on a four-foot boy with an under-sized cantaloupe head, topped by spiky, over-processed brown hair and tortoise-shell eyeglasses. This is what I had to contend with every day in seventh-grade English class. Is it any wonder I lost control? 
I have always wanted to own a bookstore. I worked in one during high school. I have transcended my bias against the amazonians and have used their tool to finally have my dream: a teeny tiny shoppe.
Betsy's Books
: books by authors who write funny, well, movingly, authentically, or are just plain entertaining
Some really fun questions in this interview at AndiLit: What role, if any, did books, writing, and reading play in your childhood? What is the hardest writing critique you ever received? How did you respond?
From
The Last Will & Testament of Zelda McFigg: “All right, class, will you please step down from your desks and windowsills?” I implored my third period class. “Be seated please!”
These look like our TV in 1958 when Edna Robinson wrote
The Trouble with the Truth. First person to use code KGKQ9V2EE1B93 on BN.com will get 15% off the book. On your mark, get set: http://www.barnesandnoble.com/w/the-t... 
From
The Last Will & Testament of Zelda McFigg: After eight years of temp work to pay for my own tiny apartment and my no-longer-free acting classes with Matilda’s ex-boyfriend; after a string of successful performances as all manner of creatures and sentient inanimate objects in the ex-boyfriend’s experimental avant-garde showcase (no pay) theatre productions; after acting daily in this adventure called life, I just knew I was ready for Broadway. 
From
The Trouble with the Truth: “I’m not sure there is an accurate term to describe what my father did professionally. ‘Art-objects-investor-dealer-junkshop-keeper’ might be near. Or ‘one-man-mobile-Tiffany & Company-Bettman Archives-Wildenstein Gallery-and any side-street antique shop’ could be nearer.”
From
The Last Will & Testament of Zelda McFigg: “Tilt the head back and pull your partner’s jaw up,” I directed the adolescent anarchists. “Open your suffocating victim’s mouth. Take a deep breath, open your mouth wide, and PRETEND to place it over—” In hindsight I should have known what would happen.
If Norman Rockwell only knew he was illustrating nine-year-old Lucresse Briard, from
The Trouble with the Truth:“‘Believe,’” Miss Lyle said distinctly.
Convulsively, I began. “B-E-” in a tone that would dispel any doubt that the word began with those letters.
From
The Last Will & Testament of Zelda McFigg: “Our Christmas play—my own adaptation, avec song and dance, of the classic Grimm’s fairytale, The Frog Prince: A Metaphorical Play with Music—starred Donny Sherman, and I’d been aiming for a heart-rending work of staggering genius.” 
From
The Trouble with the Truth: “I placed my hands in the familiar position of the opening notes, and as if they weren’t attached to me, they began to move. They played measure after measure, and most of them sounded unfamiliar. It wasn’t until the closing chord, when I took a good look at them, that I realized I had played the entire piece in a different key from the one it was written in.” 
At a Center for Fiction reading, a writer said that anybody who is married to a fiction writer should expect to be eaten—everything’s material. True. But no real humans consumed in
The Last Will & Testament of Zelda McFigg. Only architecture. When Zelda runs away from home in 1975, she resides at the Embassy hotel, a dive on the corner of West 70th Street and Broadway, NYC. In real life, I lived there for one Nonresident Term when I was at Bennington. There was a fat nail hole in the middle of my door. I put a piece of masking tape over it at night, and every morning the tape would be punched through. The building is now a luxury residence. 
From The Trouble with the Truth
: “With my first date, I was curious, slightly on guard. But after a few experiences, I learned how to handle the customary good-night kiss, affectionately, if not passionately.”
From
The Last Will & Testament of Zelda McFigg: “Lurleen Lagerfelt, the Moose Country guidance counselor and home ec. teacher, was, in my opinion, certifiably demented.” 
Ah, acting and actors! Ever wonder who first said Jon Lovitz’s catchphrase “Acting!”? When the very young, very dramatic Ben Briard is rejected by the woman of his dreams (in
The Trouble with the Truth), this 1928 song and monologue are his anthem: “Even though you’re only make believing, laugh, clown laugh ... I must keep on acting, acting, acting!” (You have to listen to the end of the song.) https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JGz3Q...
From
The Last Will & Testament of Zelda McFigg: “Although I had to go to the bathroom, I decided to forego relief; I could see the outhouse up the hill, adjacent to the shack. It looked like an oversized telephone booth with the same leftward lean as the shack, and I was not about to suffer the humiliation of being rescued from a collapsed toilet.” 
Book: The Trouble with the Truth
/ Place: Miami, ca. 1930 / Temperature: hot. “Felicity Gorham appeared at my side from somewhere way down the beach. Ben was bobbing up and down. ‘What the devil is that dope doing?’ she said in a voice almost as low as Ben’s.”
A reader says: “Reading
The Trouble with the Truth is like having a delicious piece of cake every night! I enjoy reading it so much! I see Edna - and hear her laughing - the spelling bee - the piano playing - the sibling back and forth. Just great!”
From
:"Although I knew nothing about education, I seemed to have a gift for teaching." 4 left in stock at Amazon. Let's wipe 'em out!
Edna Robinson (1921-1990), author of
The Trouble with the Truth, is my mother. I edited her book, just published by Infinite Words. Here's the story of our post-death relationship. www.betsyrobinson-writer.com/marbles_...
Through Feb 16, get 15% off
The Last Will & Testament of Zelda at Barnes & Noble, where the book is already selling at 5% off. Use coupon code FBC7MVF2EPBCS at checkout. http://www.barnesandnoble.com/w/the-l...
What a cosmic joke that Edna Robinson's book,
--once dumped by Harper & Collins after they'd optioned it, because of the faintest resemblance to To Kill a Mockingbird--should once again share a year with Harper Lee. Edna would laugh. Her author page is up. Take a look: http://authors.simonandschuster.com/E...
Through Feb 1, get 15% off The Last Will & Testament of Zelda at Barnes & Noble, where the book is already selling at 5% off. Use coupon code 6RKFQMP6GJD5L at checkout.http://www.barnesandnoble.com/w/the-l...
Or, if you’ve already read Zelda, you can pre-order The Trouble with the Truth (due out Feb. 10), selling at a whopping 21% off, at http://www.barnesandnoble.com/w/the-t...
What it feels like to be in competition with another writer--and she's your mother! A blog about launching two books at the same time:
and
http://www.betsyrobinson-writer.com/b...#
STARRED Booklist review for The Trouble with the Truth: “…the story takes the reader from childhood to adulthood with intelligence, humor, and pathos, and a cast of characters worthy of Frank Capra. This is a little gem of a book.”
http://booklistonline.com/The-Trouble...
