A reader’s attention and empathy are gifts. I strive as I write to be exact, clear and engaging. It takes work, as Ralph Ellison knew.

Knowing your audience makes it a little easier.

I’d been hoping to leave without tears.

My Granddaddy was a practical man.

The right word can heal. The wrong one can destroy.

My book’s cover features a quote by Archbishop Emeritus Desmond Tutu: ``Forgiveness is not for sissies.’’

Julie Duffy, founding director of a Denver shelter for women and transgender individuals, has walked alongside so many women, supporting them as they lived their truths.

Years after my mother’s death, I was sitting with the daughter of a friend who had just died and remembering:  A house of loss is a hungry house.