Joan L. Cannon

"A marriage would be a partnership in the profoundest sense. It would be the most welded commitment possible. It would presume without doubts ultimate mutual trust. It would be physically passionate, emotionally profound, mutually dependent, fully understanding of differing opinions but pliable and accepting and curious, respectful and humorous, and above all, appreciative. Maybe that is simply an annotated statement about love."  more »

Joan Cannon wrote: As one advances in years, one accumulates possessions the way a caddis fly larva accumulates grit. The glue that makes us carry it all along with us is in a way self-secreted as well. However, it's psychic rather than physical — emotional rather than material. Perhaps the most obvious example is a wedding band. There's a string of coral beads that belonged to a great-grandmother, samplers made by an ancestress of my husband’s in 1813, the parchment doctoral degree awarded to my father, the unsigned portrait of a three times great-grandfather and his wife, the wedding presents, military medals, camp swim trophies and school athletic medals. more »

Joan Cannon wrote: An editor no longer can browse the slush pile for something that might be to his or her individual taste and take a flier on it. As for fiction: the formulas for success (read enormous sales) have multiplied. Does the story have a thriller pace? Check. Plenty of sex, preferably explicit and at least somewhat unconventional? Check. Violence? Check. Shocking characters, scenes, plots? Check. Or, perhaps to fit into another category, it may need to be gently bland, without a suggestion of the unpleasant realities of life and certainly no more than a hint of sex, and make every character call regularly and verbally on the Almighty. Even the category romances of my day have become less rather than more convincing. more »

Editor's Note: We found ourselves considering a copy of Knit Your Own Dog that we had acquired some years ago but hadn't followed through on that order. Beyond that our grandchildren may be of the age that this might no longer have an appeal in their dorm rooms. But for Joan Cannon the subject held appeal: "My son-in-law is allergic to cats. I don't know about his sons, who are polite to our dogs. No one in that group seems ever to have wished for a pet. It makes me nervous about their children, should they ever have any ... "Reams have been written about how animals — pets, in most cases — contribute to the comfort of human lives. Most of us have wept over Flag in The Yearling, Black Beauty, Old Yeller, and many more." more »