Betty Frankel Kirschner succumbed to emphysema one day in June. She had been a long-term professor at Kent State University, founding member of the feminist caucus in sociology, a political activist, a chain smoker. Close friend Laurel Richardson, a key figure in literary turn in ethnographic writing, kept a daybook, relating their conversations and interactions over Betty's last few months. Rich in memory, emotion, dreams, and life-and-death decisions, the daybook chronicles the ups and down of a terminally ill woman and the impact that illness has on friends, colleagues, and family alike....

Betty Frankel Kirschner succumbed to emphysema one day in June. She had been a long-term professor at Kent State University, founding member of the feminist caucus in sociology, a political activist, a chain smoker. Close friend Laurel Richardson, a key figure in literary turn in ethnographic writing, kept a daybook, relating their conversations and interactions over Betty's last few months. Rich in memory, emotion, dreams, and life-and-death decisions, the daybook chronicles the ups and down of a terminally ill woman and the impact that illness has on friends, colleagues, and family alike....

For renowned sociologist and writer Laurel Richardson, a broken foot led to a month as a patient in an extended care facility. In this compelling description of her lived experience in one of these institutions, she addresses key questions of health delivery and behavior: nurses who can be angelic or cruel, institutional policies often structured to maximize income over care, and patients whose behavior often does not mirror the severity of their condition. She points to inequality of treatment of patients of different ethnicities, genders, and classes, and to an underclass of health...

For renowned sociologist and writer Laurel Richardson, a broken foot led to a month as a patient in an extended care facility. In this compelling description of her lived experience in one of these institutions, she addresses key questions of health delivery and behavior: nurses who can be angelic or cruel, institutional policies often structured to maximize income over care, and patients whose behavior often does not mirror the severity of their condition. She points to inequality of treatment of patients of different ethnicities, genders, and classes, and to an underclass of health...

Seven Minutes from Home: An American Daughter’s Story is a collection of linked stories written chronologically from 1980–2015. They create a multifaceted narrative of how the public and the private, the past and present, the local and global, intersect. With earnest reflection, modesty and humor, Laurel Richardson introduces the reader to her Ohio neighborhoods, friends, family, writers and therapy dogs. She ages, retires and frets over her droopy eyebrow. Her town’s local stores close; police bust heroin dealers; September 11th happens; universities corporatize; poetry venues...

Seven Minutes from Home: An American Daughter’s Story is a collection of linked stories written chronologically from 1980–2015. They create a multifaceted narrative of how the public and the private, the past and present, the local and global, intersect. With earnest reflection, modesty and humor, Laurel Richardson introduces the reader to her Ohio neighborhoods, friends, family, writers and therapy dogs. She ages, retires and frets over her droopy eyebrow. Her town’s local stores close; police bust heroin dealers; September 11th happens; universities corporatize; poetry venues...