Life Lessons
 When writer Bob Katz went looking for true tales of inspiration from teachers, he found Elaine Moore, a retired fourth-grade teacher in Eagle River, Alaska, who believes, above all, that a classroom is a community. But, in 1993, when one of her students, eager and spirited Seamus Farrell, fell ill with terminal brain cancer, that notion was put to the test. In Katz's uplifting book, Elaine's Circle (Marlowe & Company), he recounts how, despite her administrator's reluctance, the teacher organized regular lunchtime, peer tutoring visits to the Farrell home so Seamus could keep on learning—and, for a while, keep on living. Through interviews with Moore, as well as Seamus' parents, neighbors, and now college-age classmates, Katz reconstructs an unforgettable year that celebrates kindness and community in the face of life and death. "'What do you think heaven's like?' [Seamus] finally asked, with eagerness and sincerity. 'Do you think there'll be pets in heaven?'"
Be warned: You will cry. |
