book recommendations for widows
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Inspirational Book Recommendations for Widows on Grief, Resilience and Healing

We’re back with the second part of our discussion on inspirational book recommendations for widows. You can find the first part here where we talk about how books validate your feelings and struggles as part of a larger, collective journey of healing.

In your quest for some semblance of understanding in the crazy, confusing, and chaotic grief world you’ve landed in, you’ll found some real gems tucked away in the pages of a few special books. These are the books we’ve read, passed on to friends, and flipped back through whenever we needed to remember that we’re not going it alone, and that it’s totally okay, and normal, to feel the way we do.

Even though some of these books don’t directly talk about widowhood, they’re packed with big life lessons that hit home for anyone dealing with loss or trying to find their footing again. They’re all about growing through what you go through and reminding us of that inner strength we all have but sometimes forget in our grief.

Key topics in this episode include:

  • The value of learning how other people overcome significant battles
  • The therapeutic and healing effect of reading and sharing stories
  • How reading fosters personal growth, perspective shifts, and a deeper understanding of life’s bigger questions

These books are a reminder that healing is within reach. Remember to take moments to connect with your own story, welcoming the path to self-discovery and recovery that lies ahead.

Listen to the Full Episode

Links + Resources From This Episode

“We’re all about sharing those stories that make us feel a bit more connected, a bit more understood.”

Melissa Pierce

Episode Transcript

Melissa: Hey, everyone. Welcome back to the Widow Squad podcast. If you caught our last episode, you know, we started chatting about some pretty impactful books for anyone navigating widowhood. Today, we’re here with more must reads that promise to touch your heart, maybe challenge your thoughts, and hopefully bring a smile to your face. If you’re looking for a bit of encouragement, a sign, or just feeling like you need someone who understands, you’re in the right spot. We’re all about sharing those stories that make us feel a bit more connected, a bit more understood.

So let’s dive into today’s picks. You might just find the book that feels like it was written just for you.

Good Morning, Monster

Kim: We were talking before about how everybody is fighting battles we know nothing about. I gravitated towards books that talked about other people’s stories. I don’t know if you’ve ever heard of the Moth radio show? It’s where people get up on a stage and tell their stories. It’s a radio show so you can listen to it, but there’s also a book.

I bought the moth book because I’m more of a reader than I am a listener. I listen to podcasts and I do watch videos, but I’d rather read something than watch it or listen to it. So, I bought the Moth book. This is not the one I’m recommending, but I was drawn to those kinds of books where it was just people’s stories because, like I said, everybody’s fighting battles you know nothing about. I was in the bookstore last year because I had a gift card for Christmas, and I was in the self-help section because I’m a self help junkie.

I saw this book on the shelf and the title struck me because it was called Good Morning, Monster. And I was like, what the heck is that? This is a book by a therapist who shares her most memorable patients from her long career as a clinical psychologist. She shares the stories of these patients who were facing their own unique and really heavy struggles. It’s a fascinating title; Good morning, Monster.

So, I picked it up, and I was like, I must read this book. I am very drawn to stories of other people, not widows specifically, but people who have gone through some major struggles that I can’t even comprehend, because then I can look at my situation and go, girl, you ain’t got it bad at all. Right? Like, these people have it way worse than I could ever imagine.

In this book, these are not your everyday problems from people. She was a psychologist for 25 years and these are her five most memorable patients. We’re talking about serious, life-changing challenges. I’m not going to tell you what the challenges are because some of them you cannot even wrap your head around, but I’m just going to read the back cover and that’ll tell you a little bit more about this book.

In this fascinating narrative, therapist Catherine Gildiner presents five of her most heroic and memorable patients. Among them, a successful first generation Chinese immigrant musician suffering from sexual dysfunction; a young woman whose father abandoned her at age nine with her younger siblings in an isolated cottage in the depth of winter; and a glamorous workaholic whose narcissistic, negligent mother greeted her each morning of her childhood with “Good morning, Monster.”

Each patient presents a mystery, one that will only be unpacked over years. They seek Gildiner’s help to overcome an immediate challenge in their lives but discover that the source of their suffering has long been buried. Good Morning, Monster offers an almost novelistic, behind-the-scenes look into therapist’s office, illustrating how the process can heal even the most unimaginable wounds.

I’m telling you, these stories are…I cannot even describe. They’re crazy. I would just have to talk about the pages I was reading to anybody that would listen. I couldn’t actually believe that these things happen to people.

So when I’m thinking about my widowhood story, I’m like, nope, I’m good. Everything’s good. I’m fine. When people say to you, “I can’t imagine what you’re going through,” they actually can’t imagine what you’re going through. I can’t imagine what these people went through because the stories are heartbreaking. Inspiring, but heartbreaking.

The book also talks about the therapist’s role in helping you uncover your deep-seated feelings. Most of these patients went in with a problem that they thought was the problem. Well, lo-and-behold, that wasn’t the problem. They had to unpack some serious years of whatever to get to the core of it. Some of these patients were with her for years.

But I don’t even know what to say. There are no words to describe these stories, but it really does show you the power of the human spirit to kind of overcome the darkest of times. If you were to read these stories, you would see that we can overcome anything. It’s going to take some work. It’s not an easy path, but you can overcome anything. I need reminders sometimes in the big picture of my life that my struggles, even though they’re mine and they’re my feelings, I’m reminded that there are some people who have it much, much worse.

Melissa: And you’re like, thank you. I’ll keep my story. I don’t want your story. I don’t know if I want to read that book. I don’t know if I want that darkness in my head. But I do love the fact that you’re like, we get caught up in our own suffering, and it just puts you outside of that and makes you realize other people have it pretty rough and have their own pain and suffering to manage.

Kim: And they come out on the other side. Not everybody, but a lot of them come out on the other side. And it takes work. And I think that’s the biggest misconception we have that somehow this is supposed to be easy. It’s not. It’s really freaking hard. Grief and loss and death and is really hard.

We move forward, we can overcome, we can do all these things, but it takes work to get there. That’s what these people went through. They went through lots and lots of struggles. So if you’re not into the darkness, then don’t read it.

But if you’re intrigued like I was, I couldn’t put it down. I mean, I probably read this book in a day or two. I couldn’t put it down.

Melissa: Yeah, it might be a good escape book because sometimes you just want to get out of your head. Like, watch Netflix or whatever, and sometimes just escaping into a good book. I love that feeling of, oh, where am I? I get lost in a book and I’ll look up from the page and realize I’ve just been lost in another world.

Kim: Which is a great point. I used to read tons of fiction in my younger years. I’m more drawn to nonfiction now. I’ve tried to do fiction, but these real stories, are what takes me into another place, too. So, yeah, it’s a good point. You do get to escape your own reality for a little bit, and there’s nothing wrong with that. We all need that on occasion.

Melissa: Oh, my gosh. When you just said that it’s like widowhood has changed my reading habits. I used to read nonfiction. I would get into personal development every once in a while, when a book would come across my path, but I was fiction all the way. And then after widowhood, now it’s personal development.

Kim: What’s your next recommendation?

Widowed Parents Unite

Melissa: I could go into another memoir, but I do want to plug a book that you and I were part of, because we’re widowed parents. Jenny Lisk gathered together 52 solo parents and we each wrote a piece of advice about our only parenting adventures, to help other solo parents. It’s called Widowed Parents Unite. Jenny Lisk put it together. You and I both have a piece in this.

It just felt like just sitting around with a bunch of friends talking about only parenting issues, and we’ve all been there and either moved through it or are moving through it, and it’s just packed with real talk and heartfelt advice.

Kim: When we’re talking about people saying things that we’re thinking in our head, and then we read about it, and that gives us permission to think or feel or say what we want to say. That’s kind of like this. Can you imagine if we had this book when we were newly widowed and solo parents?

Melissa: I know.

Kim: We could read this and be like, oh, my gosh, she said what I was thinking. I’m not a bad parent, and I’m not doing this wrong. I mean, talk about a gold mine for solo parents who really need that extra nudge. To be able to relate to this and be like, yeah, I get it. I get all of this.

Melissa: Yeah. So many moments of oh, my gosh, me, too, yes, I felt that.

And then I was also thinking that, damn, I wish I would have had something like this, that there were actually 52 people out there that were moving through or had moved through the same thing. That just blew my mind. It’s a very quick read. It’s about a page and a half per person. And I’m just so glad she put this together and that she thought to include us in this book. So young, solo only parents out there, we highly recommend getting Widowed Parents Unite by Jenny Lisk.

Kim: If you’re just opening the book up to a random page, you’re probably going to find the message that you need to hear for that day.

Melissa: Yeah. And it’s written by men and women, so you have widowers’ and widows’ perspective.

Kim: That’s a great recommendation. Thank you for that. That was a good one.

Melissa: What other books do you have on your list?

The War of Art

Kim: This one I love. And again, not specifically for widows, but you’ll understand why I picked it. It’s called The War of Art by Stephen Pressfield. This is kind of a kick-in-the-pants pep talk book for artists and writers and anyone else who’s ever really felt a creative pull, but their creativity is blocked by what he calls resistance with a capital R.

It’s a very easy read, very short. But what’s so fascinating about this is the way he talks about resistance with a capital R because it’s capitalized throughout the book. Resistance is capitalized, because he personifies this resistance as the enemy within all of us that stops us from doing our work and achieving our dreams.

It’s kind of like that inner critic that’s telling you that you’re not good enough, that fear of failure or even the fear of success, that keeps us from sitting down and getting our job done. He dives into how resistance manifests in procrastination. I am the ultimate procrastinator and resistance and I have had a sordid relationship for a very long time. So, he dives into how resistance manifests in procrastination, self-doubt, and various forms of sabotage. Okay, so queen of procrastination and queen of self-sabotage here. This book really spoke to me, because he lays it out straight.

If you want to conquer resistance, you have to treat your art, your writing, or any creative endeavor like it’s a war. And you show up, you do the work, you fight the battles day in and day out.

Now, how does this apply to widowhood? Well, pretty much every way. Right? Because we are fighting the resistance to feeling our feelings or feeling whatever we want to feel about death and grief and our new reality. We fight that all the time. So the book is for artists, and it’s for creative endeavors.

But I think it also applies to widowhood, because even if you’re not in a creative pursuit, you’re likely suffering from resistance to feeling your feelings or accepting the grief or death or believing that life exists beyond what you can control. So I love it.

It’s very easy to read. Super short. I like that it’s super short, and just a couple of sentences on each page. I love how he talks about resistance. You don’t think about it in this way until you read this book, and you’re like, now I understand. I have been resisting whatever it is I’m resisting, and I do this in my creative endeavors, too. So, again, this spoke to me on two different levels, but I was just like, this really does apply to widows, too, because resistance is whatever it is that you’re resisting. It will open up your mind or your brain to other possibilities of way this could be affecting you in your life.

The message is really clear. The only way out is through. You’ve got to fight this resistance. You’ve got to push through it. We have to push through our feelings. We have to push through our grief. This resistance, you have to push through it. You have to persist, and you have to fight it every day.

If that doesn’t sum up grief, I don’t know what does. So, it’s just a different way to look at it, a different way to understand why you’re resisting and what to do about it.

Here’s a quote from the book that I wanted to share with you.

Are you paralyzed with fear? That’s a good sign. Fear is good. Like self-doubt, fear is an indicator. Fear tells us what we have to do. The more scared we are of a work or a calling, the more sure we can be that we have to do it. Resistance is experienced as fear. The degree of fear equates to the strength of resistance. Therefore, the more fear we feel about a specific enterprise, the more certain we can be that enterprise is important to us and to the growth of our soul. That’s why we feel so much resistance. If it meant nothing to us, there’d be no resistance.

Steven Pressfield

Again, grief, widowhood, life, all of it. This is what we have to do. These are the important things that we have to do as widows, to move forward and to make peace with that grief and to break through that resistance to allow our soul to grow

That’s the meaning of life. Wrapped up in a little simple book called The War of Art.

Melissa: Wow, that’s a deep cut. You wouldn’t think specifically, oh, this is a widow book. So, I like that you brought it to the table. And this can help anybody in any situation. And particularly grief.

Kim: Particularly grief. I mean, grief can be terrifying. I was, and if I’m honest, kind of still am, sometimes terrified of grief. And I resist all of that. I still do. So, I pick up this book and flip to a page and go okay, this is what resistance is doing to me today. But you have to understand it, recognize it, to understand it.

He’s got a couple of other books, too, so I have several of his books. He’s one of my other favorite authors. But the one thing he said that I like the the most is, the more fear we feel about something, the more certain we can be. It’s important to us and the growth of our soul. We’re afraid of grief. We’re afraid of those feelings. But that’s what makes us human, and that’s what makes us grow.

Melissa: I’m going to get that. Plus, you said it’s a quick read.

Kim: So what else do you have coming up on your list?

Widowish

Melissa: Melissa Gould, a fellow widow wrote this awesome book called Widowish. I read it in one night, and it’s a legit book. It’s 200 plus pages and I read it in one night. She‘s dealing with solo parenting, the death of her husband, the weird world of sympathy and what people say and do and then flirting. She talks about finding new love and letting love in without feeling like she was moving on too fast. It was really raw and honest.

Kim: All the typical feelings that we go through.

Melissa: Yeah. So she’s talking about grief and her child was a similar age to my kids. It was such a good read. And she was a TV writer. I think she wrote for. She wrote TV episodes like 90210 and Lizzie McGuire.

There’s just a lighter way to her writing. I laughed, I cried. It had all the things. It should be a Netflix show.

Kim: The relatability, like you said, of something not so heavy. Like the message is still probably clear and profound, but the delivery isn’t as heavy as some of those other books that we’ve read.

Melissa: Yeah. And then I got to meet her. We were at Camp Widow together a couple of years ago, and I got to hang out and chat with her.

Kim: How fun.

Melissa: I think we might have skipped a session because we were just tired or whatever, and we saw each other and ended up talking for an hour. It was really nice to get to know her personally.

Kim: I have to read that one. I have not read that.

On Living

Kim: There’s a book that I’ve gifted many times. It’s called On Living by Kerry Egan. Again, it’s talking about other people’s stories that are not necessarily about widows, but about people who have different situations than we do and different struggles than we do. That seems to be a common theme in my recommendations.

This book is by a hospice chaplain. So she spent, obviously, a lot of time with people who were dying and at the end of their lives. But instead of getting clinical or preachy, in her book, she shares the stories that she heard from these people, along with her own takeaways on life, love, and regret. So, imagine being a hospice chaplain and hearing all of these things from people over however many years she was doing what she did.

You kind of come up with a recurring theme of people who get to their end of their life and they have a lot of regrets. I don’t want that to happen to me. So, I’m always reading stories about how other people got there, and I want to try to avoid that, right? So I’m always reading books and things about, well, how can I prevent this from happening to me?

Melissa: Like, let me get ahead of this.

Kim: Exactly. So let me read the back of the book, and then I’ll tell you more about why I give this to people.

As a hospice chaplain, Kerry Egan listened to stories of hope and regret, shame and pride, loyalty and betrayal, and secrets held too long. Most of all, she listened as they talked about love. Love they gave unconditionally. Love they didn’t know how to offer or wish they’d received. Love they belatedly learned to grant themselves. With each story she was graced with the chance to witness firsthand what she calls the spiritual work of the dying. The work of finding or making meaning of one’s life.

On Living isn’t a book about dying. It’s a book about living, about making whole the brokenness we all share by finding courage in the face of fear, the strength to make amends, and compassion for others and for ourselves. In this profound and beautiful book, Egan passes along these precious, necessary gifts.

So, again, I think about widowhood in those terms of compassion for ourselves and finding the courage to face fear and strength to make amends if we need to, or whatever else the case may be and making meaning of your life. I struggle with that question a lot. Like, what’s my legacy going to be? What am I going to leave behind? Those are the kind spiritual questions that I think about a lot. But this isn’t a book about dying. It’s a book about living. We have to go on living because we’re still alive.

In the beginning of widowhood, we’re so overwhelmed with grief and loss, we just kind of exist. We’re not living. We’re just existing. So when you read stories like the stories in this book, they’re about living while you’re still alive, because you’re going to get to the end at some point. We’re all going to get there at some point. What’s it going to be like when you’re there? Don’t do what these people did. Don’t hold in these stories. Don’t feel these regrets. Don’t not make up with that person or whatever the case may be.

It’s a very important book for widows because it’s just a reminder to look at your own life and the stories that you tell yourself about grief, what you hope to leave behind. These kinds of stories just give me that comparison to be like, well, I don’t want to do it that way, so I have to make a conscious choice to do it this way instead.

She also talks about how sharing our stories can actually help us heal. When we’re not that inclined to want to share our stories, then I say, “well, try anyway.” Because as we said before, once you open that door and share something with somebody they’re like, oh, my gosh. I’m not the only one feeling that way. Or “thank God you said that, because let me tell you what happened to me.”

Those kinds of stories connect us in ways we don’t really expect until we share them. I’ve gifted this book several times to people, and it’s weird because they’re like, “why is this hospice chaplain book on people dying coming to me?” Because it kind of makes you look at your own life. Like, what am I doing? Why am I doing it? And where am I headed?

Melissa: Yeah. Like, you could have two minutes, or you could have 70 years in front of you. But what are you doing right now?

I mean, what you said about sharing your stories. Like, sometimes we’re hesitant to share our stories. After Dave died, I was like, what’s my purpose? Of course, I’m a mom. I was a wife. I’m a sister. I’m whatever. But really, what lights me up? What’s my purpose? And for me, it’s sharing my experience with whoever wants to hear it or whoever I feel needs to hear it. And also, kind of one of the tenets I’m trying to live by is, am I giving more than I’m taking from this world? So hopefully, when I leave this world, I will feel like I gave more than I took from it.

Kim: I love that.

Melissa: I want to get that book.

Kim: Well, let me share a quote from the book, too, because it’s a really profound quote.

When you talk to hundreds of people who are dying and looking back over their lives, you come to realize something startling. Every single person out there has a crazy story. Every single person has some bizarre, life shattering, pull the rug out from under you story in their past or will experience one in their future. Every shopper in the grocery store, every telemarketer on the phone, every mother at school pickup, every banker striding down the sidewalk. Money, faith, popularity, beauty, power – nothing prevents it. Every one of us will go through things that destroy our inner compass and pull meaning out from under us. Everyone who does not die young will go through some sort of spiritual crisis where we have lost our sense of what is right and wrong, possible and impossible, real and not real. Never underestimate how frightening, angering, confusing and devastating. It is to be in that place. Making meaning of what is meaningless is hard work. Soul searching is painful.

Kerry egan

It’s painful. It’s hard work. But when you do it and you can look at this whole big picture in a new and different way, it’s life changing. Like you actually go, okay, I get to make this what I want. I get to make my life what I want and make the decisions that I want and do and say what I want. And when you’re thinking of it in terms of the end, then you’re working towards that goal. It changes everything.

Melissa: That’s a powerful book. I’ve never heard of it, but I’m getting it.

Kim: Get it and gift it. I gave it to a friend to read who never returned it to me. So I went out and bought another copy. That’s how much I love this book.

The More or Less Definitive Guide to Self-Care

Melissa: This has nothing to do with widowhood or anything, but it’s called The More or Less Definitive Guide to Self-Care by Anna Borges. This is one of those books that you can just pick up, flip to a page, and do whatever it says.

Kim: Intriguing.

Melissa: When I am feeling like I’m not taking good care of myself, I’m forgetting I’m in low energy. I’m feeling drained and I know that I’m not taking care of myself. This is kind of like, oh, okay, I’m going to pick this book up, think of a letter and flip to it. So what letter of the Alphabet should we choose?

Kim: Let’s choose K for Kim.

Melissa: Ok, K for Kim. Let me flip to the K section. There are several under K. Okay. One of them is knit, knit, knit. Okay. So underneath it, there’s just a small picture. And it says that “knitting dims the roar of anxiety, of sadness, of anger, of any unsavory feeling that needs smoothing over.” She writes, crafting is a lot like yoga, how it shrinks your immediate world down to this cozy, manageable size, where all you have to focus on is what’s right in front of you.

And at the end, you get a new pair of socks or a coaster. I love that. I used to knit, but in that act of knitting you’re present, you’re focusing, not dropping a stitch. You’ve got these two knitting needles and your yarn, and that’s all you get to think about at that time. You’re not future tripping.

Kim: Let’s see what is says for M for Melissa. What does M say?

Melissa: Make your bed.

Kim: That’s a good one.

Melissa: Simplest things you can do to feel in control. It’s easy. It’s quick. It’s like, okay, I can make my bed. I can do this for me. I mean, it sounds simple, but it really gets me back into that self-care mode of just filling up my own bucket.

Kim: I love it. Great suggestion.

Melissa: Do you have any more books?

Filled with Gold

Kim: I have one more book, and I saved the best for last. We’re going to talk about Melissa’s memoir called Filled with Gold by Melissa Pierce.

Melissa: Oh, my gosh.

Kim: Melissa’s blushing. I saved this to the end because I didn’t want to trip you up during our conversation and have you thinking any thoughts about your book or what you were going to say or anything. So I saved the best for last.

Did you guys know that Melissa wrote a memoir? Her book is called Filled with Gold, a Widow’s Story. And it’s a testament to the resilience and fortitude it takes to not only grieve your partner’s death, but to solo parent kids after their parent dies.

I’ve read it. It’s an excellent book. I’m going to read what the back of the book says first, and then we’ll get into a little more. So this is what the back of the book says:

It had been only five years since Melissa Pierce and her husband Dave adopted two boys from the foster care system when the unimaginable happened. Not long after moving to a remote Oregon mountain town to raise their sons, Dave died. Melissa was suddenly alone, a widow and single mother, forced to find a new future for herself and the two boys who were counting on her. In Filled with Gold, Melissa shares her transformative journey through shock, grief, and, ultimately, acceptance. She candidly details the challenges she faced as a newly single mother and the moments of both frustration and healing that every family member shared. Melissa’s story will inspire and comfort anyone who has lost a loved one or faced the difficult challenges of parenting alone.

Halle-frickin-lujah. Solo parenting is no joke. What I loved about this story is it’s like having coffee with a friend. That’s what Melissa’s memoir is, you know, very open and vulnerable. This is what happened, and this is how I dealt with it. But not preachy or anything like that.

Not clinical preachy, nothing. Just like having coffee with a friend and just openly sharing your journey and what happened and how you dealt with it and what it’s like to lose your person and your foundation, your partner, and the challenges that come with parenting grieving children.

I recommend it because we know you, obviously, and we’ve heard your story. But to read it, the whole thing from start to finish, not that your story is over yet, but the start to finish of that point in time is a great read. And I appreciate that you shared that with us and were vulnerable enough to tell us your stories in that way, because I haven’t gotten there myself yet. So I keep thinking about it. And then, of course, my self-sabotage, my resistance with the capital R jumps in. So I appreciate that you were able to do that with us.

I know we’ve talked about it being a cathartic experience for you and writing about it and just getting that out there. I want to share a quote from the book. This is after you were questioning if Dave would like who you were becoming and the decisions that you were making, etc. You were talking to your therapist about how unfair everything was and how she reminded you to stop beating yourself up and how to give up what you couldn’t control. And you said, this is the quote.

After Dave died, I asked him to put the right people in my path. At the same time, I learned that if I trusted my gut, I could draw those people near me on my own. I could, in fact, live without Dave. It still stings to say that, but there is no sense in denying ourselves the love that exists beyond a spouse’s passing

melissa pierce

This is powerful because we get to go on living because we’re still alive. So you, in your book, are giving us permission that it’s okay to find love again. You did it. You’re questioning, what would he think about this? What does he think about other decisions that I’m making? But then you decided that it was okay to do what you needed to do for Melissa. So thank you for giving us all permission to do the same.

Melissa: Oh, gosh. Well, thank you. Yeah, it was cathartic. At the point that I was writing it, I was like, I don’t care who knows what about me.

Kim: It was Melissa during that point in time. All of it. The good, the bad, the real, the raw.

Melissa: Well, thanks for the plug. I appreciate was I’ve never had anything quoted back to me.

Kim: How exciting is that? I highly recommend this book, too, because you know Melissa from the podcast, from the membership. So it’s just nice to get another glimpse into your life, know the kind of a bigger, fuller story of what you went through.

Melissa: These books should keep you all pretty busy for a while. Wow.

Wrap Up

Melissa: We hope these books offer you the same kind of warmth and understanding they’ve given us. Remember, your journey through grief is your own, and sometimes a book can be a really nice companion along the way.

If there’s a book that’s touched your heart, we’d love to hear about it. Your recommendations are invaluable to us in our community.

And if you could take a moment to drop us a review on Apple Podcasts or your favorite place to listen, that’d be amazing. It means everything to us, and it helps more folks just like you find us, those who are walking through their own journeys of love and loss. It’s a small thing, but your words might just be the light someone needs in a really tough time.

So until next time, keep finding those little moments of connection in the stories you read.

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