The Hands of Strangers by Michael F. Smith
My rating: 5 of 5 stars
In this gripping tale of a child’s abduction and the struggles of one couple to hang on to hope despite all odds, Michael F. Smith evokes the darkest fears a parent can imagine. His prose is clean and spare, his eye for detail, impeccable. The reader is transported, not to the Paris seen by tourists, but to the small streets and back alleys, the metro stations and small cafés.
I am a poet, translator, and professor of literature and creative writing at Mississippi University for Women, where I direct the Low-Residency MFA in Creative Writing, the undergraduate concentration in creative writing, and the Eudora Welty Writers' Symposium. I am Chair of the Department of Languages, Literature, and Philosophy, and I have published four collections of poetry, Tree Fall with Birdsong, Barrier Island Suite, Time Capsules, and Landscapes and Architectures, as well as a collection of translations of the Belgian poet Paul Snoek, Hercules, Richelieu, and Nostradamus, and the textbook A Writer's Craft: Multi-Genre Creative Writing. I was born and raised in Osage, Iowa, and have lived for over thirty years in Columbus, Mississippi, where my wife Kim and I let wildflowers grow in our yard to the delight of spring polinators and only some of our neighbors. View more posts
Kendall Dunkelberg