Compositions: A Memoir in 42 Essays by 1 Kid On Her 8 years in Catholic School, Handed in 60 Years Late

With Compositions, Suzanne Strempek Shea has chiseled an extraordinary memoir about her early years in a close-knit 1960s and '70s Polish-American Massachusetts grade school and community. Life revolves in a circle of faith and family. Fine societal distinctions are made: Polish Catholics and French-Canadian Catholics, the two majorities, each have their own churches and their own schools, even their own funeral homes. At Strempek Shea's school - known in the village as "Polish school" - the most important grade is for conduct.

Written in the author's voice and point of view in her first eight years of school, the humorous and poignant essays show a past still fully present. At school, eighth-grade graduation photos lining the walls include that of her mother and the parents of so many of her 29 classmates. She and her friends sit in the same classrooms with the same wooden desks, same windows, same blackboards, and some of the same nuns those parents had. Strempek Shea lets us eavesdrop as she learns new words --- bubbler for water fountain, sodality for club, lavatory for bathroom, Father for priest even if he wasn't her dad. One snowy afternoon, looking at all the familiar faces, companions from early morning to afternoon, Monday through Friday, from for as long as she can remember, she realizes she likes school, thanks in part to the nuns who taught patiently, sang folk songs beneath a tree, and danced the hula, and despite the ones who wielded a croquet stick or hurled textbooks.

In this world, the first whiff of spring air is drinkable, and Strempek Shea races to her beloved woods upon getting home from school. She navigates fishing holes and family outings with friends or cousins whose fathers, like hers, work mainly in factories. Adults are in charge, although when her grandfather dies suddenly, she sees for the first time that they can wobble.

Reverence is everywhere: dropped bread receives a kiss, swimmers bless themselves before diving, parishioners walk on their knees each Good Friday. The miracles in Compositions that Strempek Shea prays for-a horse or at least a pony, her grandfather's health-never take place. Yet something no less tender and beautiful does as she engraves childhood moments like running past nylon stockings dangling from the clothesline; hoping to escape the fate of adults who prefer constricting clothes to soft corduroys; seeing for the first time the new classmate who'll become a best friend; looking out from the other eighth-grade graduates on stage and imagining the future.

Compositions is a kaleidoscope of close-to-the-bone observations and stories written as energetically as if the author had always been waiting to tell the world all she knew. Read them and realize you've always been waiting for that, too.

Author: Suzanne Strempek Shea
Publisher: Paha Books
Published: 09/01/2026
Pages: 228
Binding Type: Paperback
Weight: 0.68lbs
Size: 9.00h x 6.00w x 0.48d
ISBN: 9798234148308

About the Author
Strempek Shea, Suzanne: - Suzanne Strempek Shea has written six novels and six works of nonfiction. Her freelance journalism and fiction have appeared in magazines and newspapers including Yankee, The Bark, Golf World, The Boston Globe, The Irish Times, The Philadelphia Inquirer, Brevity, Down East, Organic Style and ESPN the Magazine. Awards for her books include the New England Book Award and the Oskar Halecki Prize. Her journalism was shortlisted for the Penney-Missouri Awards, and her creative writing was recognized in Best American Fiction. Suzanne's career as a writer began with reporting for newspapers, beginning with the Springfield (Massachusetts) Newspapers, going on to The Providence (Rhode Island) Journal and ending in Springfield when her career as an author took off with the first of five novels. Set in her native Polish America, the books were featured in national and international media including twice on NBC's Today; on The Late Late Show with Tom Snyder, NPR and Voice of America; and in major newspapers and magazines in both the United States and Poland. Suzanne taught fiction and nonfiction at the University of Southern Maine's Stonecoast MFA program in creative writing for 18 years and for 12 years was inaugural Writer-in-Residence and Director of the Creative Writing Program at Bay Path University in Longmeadow, Mass., where she created the university's MFA program in nonfiction. She also was on the faculty of the MFA programs at Emerson College and the University of South Florida. She co-directs the annual Dingle Writers' Workshop in Dingle, Ireland, and the annual Iota Short Forms Writing Conference on the easternmost coast of Maine. She's married to lifelong journalist Tommy Shea, to whom, as a high school junior, she wrote a letter of complaint when his coverage of high school hockey failed to include the team she was covering in her first newspaper beat, for The Palmer (Massachusetts) Journal and Monson Register. They live in Bondsville, Massachusetts.Jackowski, Karol: - Karol Jackowski is a New York City writer, teacher, and public speaker. Ten Fun Things To Do Before You Die, a national bestseller, and Sister Karol's Book of Spells, Blessings, and Folk Magic are two of her eight published books, which have been featured in The New York Times, People, ELLE and Rosie, and on CNN, NPR and The Early Show. She holds a Bachelor of Arts degree in sociology from Saint Mary's College in Indiana, a Master of Arts in theology from the University of Notre Dame, and a Ph.D. in higher education administration from New York University. Karol has taught writing in Bay Path University's MFA in Creative Nonfiction program for a decade, with courses in Spiritual Writing and Nature Writing. As a public speaker, she gave the opening lecture, "Holy Friendships" at Chautauqua's 2023 Winter Session, and led a two-hour workshop on How to Make Magic for the international conference Witchcon 2024. Karol is a member of the Sisters for Christian Community and lives a blissful solitary life on the Lower East Side of Manhattan. Karol has taught writing in Bay Path University's MFA in Creative Nonfiction program for a decade, with courses in Spiritual Writing and Nature Writing. Karol is a member of the Sisters for Christian Community and lives a blissful solitary life on the Lower East Side of Manhattan.