Ford-Grabowsky (Prayers for All People) has produced a rich anthology of spiritual writing by women. The product of the editor's decades-long journey into feminist spirituality, this collection is distinguished by its dizzying breadth. It includes both medieval mystics, such as Julian of Norwich, and contemporary memoirists, like Kathleen Norris. Christians, like nun Joan Chittister, are side-by-side with Vodou practitioners (Karen McCarthy Brown) and pagans (Starhawk). Ford-Grabowsky has even made sure to include many different genres: poetry, like Emily Dickinson's "I Had Been Hungry All the Years," complements excerpts from novels by Amy Tan and Virginia Woolf. She is to be commended for her choice of distinguished translations: poet Jane Kenyon translates Anna Akhmatova, and Langston Hughes eloquently renders Chilean poet Gabriela Mistral's "Prayer." One only wishes for a few more conservative voices. Jewish renewal rabbi Tirzah Firestone is here, but where is Orthodox Jewish Torah teacher Avivah Zornberg? Mainline Protestant (and scholar of Hinduism) Diana Eck writes an essay called "Encountering God in Other Traditions," but where is Frederica Mathewes-Green on her conversion to Eastern Orthodoxy or Ruth Bell Graham on evangelism? Ford-Grabowsky has provided concise, informative and lively biographical sketches of each contributor, and she concludes the book with a useful guide to further reading. This lovely collection will make an excellent gift, an inspiring bedside companion or a handy resource for preachers, writers and spiritual dreamers. (Mar.)
