Me and the Grandmas of Baghdad

Book excerpt: An accomplished writer and ardent activist, Martha Stephens has never been afraid to ruffle feathers, whether it's marching with Occupy protests or exposing an unethical human radiation study. Her memoir, Me and the Grandmas of Baghdad, is an examination of the human spirit and a meditation on the many injustices of the world. Her prose will take you from her girlhood in Waycross, Georgia, to her garden in Cincinnati, Ohio, and her winters spent in Las Cruces, New Mexico. But no matter where this grandma roams, she is always thinking, writing and reflecting on how her life is so different - and yet not so different - from those of the grandmas of Baghdad. Martha Stephens is a professor emerita of the University of Cincinnati's English department and the author of Cast a Wistful Eye, Children of the World, Women and Men and the Spaces In Between and The Treatment: The Story of Those Who Died in the Cincinnati Radiation Tests.