Chapter 28 Summary

Reta writes another letter, the fourth in the series. This time it is to a writer called Emily Helt of the Chicago Tribune. The subject concerns the writer's review of a book by a female author. Reta takes issue with Helt's thesis that women writers are only concerned with feelings and that all relationships are interpreted through "the lens of sensual yearning." She does agree, however, with Emily Helt's assessment of her first novel. Reta assents to the judgment that it was quickly written and a light read, but she has great problems with the idea of being placed in the shadows and disregarded as a serious writer. Reta tells her that in literature class in high school, she had learned that the great themes of literature were birth, death, love, connections, work, and understanding. A confinement to those themes was definitely not...