Oh the Places You'll Go!

Natural history museum with blue whale skeleton (Pixabay)

When my daughter was little, we visited big and small museums, aquariums, science centers, historical places, zoos and farms, art galleries, children's museums, attractions, and more. We used museum passes from our local library to try new experiences, and purchased memberships of favorite places, especially ones that included special perks (like discounted parking) or reciprocal and affiliate programs. We still do.

It pays to shop around when buying a membership. As a mid-level member, you pay a higher annual price, but get so much more in return. For example, in Massachusetts:

Worcester Art Museum's Level 3 membership for two members ($125) includes free year-round admission to the museum and all exhibits, free tickets to programs and events, unlimited free admission for a guest, plus discounts at the shop, cafe, and studio art classes. Your WAM membership also includes reciprocal membership at 1,400+ museums through NARM, MARP, and ROAM programs.

Historic New England's Contributor membership ($148) provides unlimited free tour admission to all 38 HNE sites for three adults plus the primary members' children or grandchildren under age 18, free or discounted admission to HNE events, discounts at the museum shop and plant purchases, discounts on summer camp programs at two sites, and reciprocal admission to 1,400+ NARM museums and cultural sites.

Old Colony History Museum's Supporter membership ($100) includes free admission for up to four adults to the museum and library, special pricing on OCHM experiences, invitations to member-only events, discounts at the gift shop and select local businesses, and two member cards with NARM benefits.

So what do those acronyms mean? 

ACM: Association of Children’s Museums (look for a red R button for ACM Reciprocal Network): https://findachildrensmuseum.org/

AHS: American Horticultural Society: https://ahsgardening.org/ahs-garden-network/

America the Beautiful—the National Parks and Federal Recreational Lands Pass: https://www.nps.gov/planyourvisit/passes.htm

ANCA: Association of Nature Center: https://natctr.org/membership/reciprocal-program

ASTC: Association of Science and Technology Centers: Passport Program: https://www.astc.org/membership/find-an-astc-member/passport/

AZA: Association of Zoos and Aquariums: https://www.aza.org/reciprocity/

CAMM: Council of American Maritime Museums: https://councilofamericanmaritimemuseums.org/membership/reciprocal-admissions/ 

MARP: Museum Alliance Reciprocal Program: https://sites.google.com/view/marplist/list-by-state 

Museums for All: an initiative of the Institute of Museum and Library Services for free or reduced admission to more than 1,600 museums throughout the United States simply by presenting your EBT card and a photo ID https://museums4all.org/

NARM: North American Reciprocal Museum Association: 1,400+ art museums and galleries, historical museums and societies, botanical gardens, children’s museums, zoos, and more https://narmassociation.org/ 

ROAM: Reciprocal Organization of Associated Museums: 500+ institutions: https://sites.google.com/site/roammuseums/home/reciprocal-benefits-and-guidelines?authuser=0 

Smithsonian Affiliations: https://affiliations.si.edu/affiliate-directory/ 

Smithsonian Institution: https://www.si.edu/ 17 free museums and the National Zoo in Washington, DC

Other tips

Check with your town or city to learn about free admissions or special pricing for locals. For example, people who live or work in Salem, Massachusetts, receive free admission to the Peabody Essex Museum. Boston has free residents' days at local institutions. And whenever you travel, check out free and discounted pricing at the welcome center or city website.

Your local library may offer free or discounted museum passes for cardholders.

AAA and AARP memberships offer discounts to museums, zoos, attractions, events, and travel.

If you have other suggestions, let me know!

Book review: The Lost Mary: Rediscovering the Mother of Jesus

In college, I took a year-long Biblical Literature course. Like my professor, author James D. Tabor also traveled many times to the Holy Land and worked on archaeological excavations there. Besides following the literary legacy of Mary, mother of Jesus, they both followed her historical footprints, from the rooms she lived in to the journeys she took. That insight makes the Bible and religion more alive.

In The Lost Mary: Rediscovering the Mother of Jesus, Tabor strips away what we think we know about Jesus and his family. Then, using his background in ancient Judaism and early Christianity, the Bible, history, and archaeology, Tabor rebuilds the puzzle, making the pieces fit into a more cohesive whole.

More than 100 sects formed in Jesus’ name,* with a wide variety of stories and beliefs that either died out or were subsumed by what became the Roman Catholic Church. The Bible then became the official arbiter of what was gospel truth, and if not for the discovery of the Dead Sea Scrolls and other hidden treasures, we would not have such a clear understanding of the original Jesus—or of Mary.

Structured and ruled only by men, and celibate ones at that, the Christian church ignores and later vanishes the importance of the matriarch Mary. It’s her doubly royal bloodline, of Davidic lineage and priestly pedigree, that recalls ancient prophesies and threatens the power of established governments. Instead of being foundational to the building of Christianity, she is idolized as the Virgin Mary and seen as a mere follower of her son. Yet she is neither.

In the Bible, it's Peter and Paul who appear as co-leaders of the religious movement. But historically, Tabor writes, it was Jesus’ blood brothers who led the church. James takes over after Jesus’ crucifixion until he himself is stoned to death in 62 AD. Then Simon leads until he is crucified under Trajan in 106 AD. Why did they die? Jesus and his siblings were a threat to power—through their mother Mary, as the Old Testament proclaimed.

Tabor clearly explains how the written word and the historical record help readers understand and appreciate Mary, the mother of Jesus, and her role in the founding of Christianity. 

Thanks to Knopf for the ARC.

Rating: ⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐

The Lost Mary: Rediscovering the Mother of Jesus
by James D. Tabor
Knopf, 2025

* As Lance Grande described in his book, Evolution of Religions.

Book review: When We Spoke to the Dead: How Ghosts Gave American Women Their Voice

In Europe, 1848 was the year of revolutions, where people in more than 50 countries were engaged in socioeconomic conflicts. In the United States, the revolt may have started slowly, with a mysterious knocking sound in rural western New York, and lasted longer. Out of weird rapping noises—that supposedly allowed the dead to speak—came the Spiritualist movement. And it was mostly controlled by women.

Ilise S. Carter, author of When We Spoke to the Dead: How Ghosts Gave American Women Their Voice, takes a historic look into the movement and what it begat.

Spiritualism’s central idea is that the human spirit lived on after the mortal remains died and that spirits could communicate with us through mediums. In an era of high mortality rates and the horror of the Civil War, the movement flourished. With its popularity on the stage circuit in the late 19^th century, however, fraudulent actors tarnished the movement’s reputation. That led to the defining doctrine, the Principles of Spiritualism. About 100 Spiritualist churches and camps still exist in the United States.

Carter’s book covers spiritualism’s connections to reform, including anti-slavery, women’s rights, and suffrage. She includes stories of known spiritualists (Maggie & Kate Fox, patent medicine maker Lydia Pinkham, Mae West), believers (First Lady Mary Todd Lincoln, author Sir Arthur Conan Doyle), and critics (Harry Houdini), as well as trivia about Disney’s Haunted Mansion and the Ouija board.

Thanks to Sourcebooks for the ARC.

Rating: ⭐⭐⭐⭐

When We Spoke to the Dead: How Ghosts Gave American WomenTheir Voice
by Ilise S. Carter
Sourcebooks 2025

Book review: The First Witches: Women of Power in the Classical World

With a background in ancient history and literature, author Alexis Hannah Prescott explores how Greek and Roman gods and folklore transcend time and place. 

The western world so admired the classical arts, culture, and history that centuries later schoolboys applying to the newly founded Harvard College in the 1630s had to be well versed in Latin grammar. And once enrolled, they studied Latin, Greek, and Hebrew. 

Curiously, students were reading classical texts imbued with the power of witches and witchcraft, which is incompatible to the Bible’s warnings. The Bible mentions forbidden practices such as divination, consulting with mediums or familiar spirits, interpreting omens, casting spells, and necromancy, though without much detail. The problem with witchcraft is in trying to manipulate spiritual forces instead of asking God for help. And the punishment for contacting demonic spirits is not being able to inherit the kingdom of God. 

In case you’re not a classical scholar, Prescott provides synopses of major works—like Homer’s Odyssey, Virgil’s Aeneid, Ovid’s Metamorphoses, and Lucan’s Erichtho—to explain the archetypes of Greco-Roman witches. As they transform from the strong, attractive but vindictive Greek witch to the bitter, haggard Roman one, Prescott mentions how dramatic social and political changes affected witches (and women’s) roles in society and in literature. 

The author also makes the point that witch hunts in Britain and the 13 Colonies were not based on the King James Bible (1611). Being able to read and have access to the Bible was mostly limited to the upper classes and to clerics. King James himself was extraordinarily concerned about witchcraft—believing witches caused the tumultuous seas that delayed his bride Anne of Denmark’s arrival in England—so much so that he wrote Daemonologie (1597). 

At the Salem witch trials in 1692, judges and some of the jury attended Harvard. They studied Greco-Roman literature featuring attractive, alluring Greek witches with deadly streaks of hostility, and Roman hag witches who torture, maim, and sabotage men. Classical witchcraft, mixed with regional folktales and backed by the Bible, was real in the dark woods and villages of Massachusetts Bay. A cursing beggar woman, a healthy cow that suddenly drops dead, sleep paralysis while dreaming of your neighbor, or shapeshifters in the shadows—what else could it be except witchcraft?

Prescott covers the witch’s metamorphosis from classical antiquity to the modern day, using literary characters we may be more familiar with, like Snow White’s wicked stepmother, Dr. Frankenstein, and Shakespeare’s weird sisters in Macbeth. Since the 1960s, she notes, Wicca and other trends have changed the classical witch dynamic. 

Or maybe it’s the women taking back their power.

Thanks to Pen & Sword History for the ARC.

Rating: ⭐⭐⭐⭐

The First Witches: Women of Power in the Classical World

By Alexis Hannah Prescott

Pen & Sword History, 2025

Book review: William Phipps and the Diving Bell Bubble

Before reading William Phipps and the Diving Bell Bubble by Leon Hopkins, I considered Phipps a shadowy figure in the Salem witch trials. He wasn’t actively involved and yet his arrival with the new Charter led to the formation of the Court of Oyer and Terminer, followed by guilty verdicts and the deaths of 20 innocent people. 

In October 1692, Phipps closed the court, tossed out spectral evidence, and in January 1693 opened the new Superior Court of Judicature. Within days, Phipps decisively shut down the witch trials after Judge William Stoughton issued execution warrants for several women whose earlier trials resulted in guilty verdicts that relied on spectral evidence.

Hopkins’ book showed Phipps (1651-1695) had the strength of character to get into situations which, in many cases, were beyond his experience and training. For an unschooled Maine backwoodsman, he fraternized with powerful men, even royalty. 

For a person with no military experience, he was hired to lead military campaigns in Acadia and Quebec. And for a non-government man, he ended up as a royal governor. Some would say these leaps in prospects happened because Phipps discovered the rich treasures of a Spanish galleon, and being required to share a percentage of that loot with the English monarch, earned a knighthood from King James II. 

But that’s not giving credit where credit is due. Phipps rescued his neighbors during an Indian raid in 1676, sailing them into Boston harbor on a ship he built. He attracted wealthy supporters through joint-stock companies to finance his treasure hunting. He married an enterprising widow who could hold her own while he was at sea or in England for months or years at a time. And he won the admiration of Rev. Cotton Mather, who wrote his biography.

At times, the book gets bogged down in tangential topics like the English Civil Wars and Cromwell or John Eliot (1604-1690), the Puritan missionary to the American Indians, and the Pequot Wars (1636-1638). Still, those topics connect to later events and people in Phipps’ life. Hopkins also drops curious historical tidbits—like the imposter royal heir, a secret deal between two monarchs on a Catholic conversion—that especially American readers may not know.

Thanks to Pen & Sword History for the ARC.

Rating: ★★★★

William Phipps and the Diving Bell Bubble 
by Leon Hopkins
Pen & Sword History, 2025

Book review: Miracles and Wonder: The Historical Mystery of Jesus

In Miracles and Wonder: The Historical Mystery of Jesus, Elaine Pagels delves into the Gospels, the first four books of the New Testament (Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John). Based on critical literary and historical analysis, these books were written anonymously 40 to 70 years after Jesus’ death. But, Pagels says, their intent was not to document history or write a biography but to “spread good news about faith in Jesus.”

With Sunday school, an illustrated Bible, hymns and Christmas songs, children learn about Jesus’ life from start to finish. But the Bible isn’t so linear. It was “a huge effort to pull all four Gospels together, as if they tell a single story,” Pagels explains. These books have some similarities and curious differences. For example, Matthew and Luke mention the birth of Jesus, but Mark and John do not. Matthew says the Magi follow the new star that proclaims the birth of the new king. Luke has no star and no Magi, but local herdsmen visit baby Jesus asleep in the manger.

Matthew, Mark, and Luke share similar content, order of events, and wording, which suggests they may have used common sources. However, the authors and the audiences were different. Mark, who wrote the earliest surviving account, was a devout Jew who believed in one God. Luke was a Gentile and became a (Jewish) convert. John, who Pagels calls the “radical revisionist writer,” is the one who explicitly says Jesus is the Son of God, whose sacrificial death atoned for the sins of the world. All of them use words of the Jewish prophets and the Psalms to prove Jesus’ life was foretold in Scriptures.

In 325 CE, Emperor Constantine gathered 300 bishops to formulate the Nicene Creed, the core Christian beliefs about the nature of God and the divinity of Christ—the basis of the Gospel of John. Over the decades that followed, church leaders and councils decided which doctrines and stories fit this overarching message. Of the many stories of Jesus that existed, few were chosen as scripture; the rest were destroyed.*

The Gospels remind us how Jesus lived, with love, compassion, and support for everyone. And, as Pagels declares, “In a world filled with challenge, oppression, and suffering, their stories shift—often suddenly—into hope.”

Miracles and Wonder is both the keystone and cornerstone to Pagels’ other books on early Christianity and the Gnostics. As a historian and religious scholar, she thoughtfully considers the historical mystery of Jesus and his message while adding personal stories and reflections on her life’s work.

Thanks to Doubleday for the ARC.

Rating: ★★★★★

Miracles and Wonder: The Historical Mystery of Jesus 
by Elaine Pagels
Doubleday, 2025

*Despite the decree, monks from Nag Hammadi hid some of the forbidden texts in caves. In 1945, these early Christian and Gnostic texts were discovered in a sealed jar. 

Book review: Cleavage: Men, Women, and the Space Between Us

In her first memoir, She’s Not There (2003), Jennifer Finney Boylan takes us from childhood through the process of transitioning into a woman. And in the end, the reader is left with the same question that faces Jenny: What about her marriage?

In Cleavage, the author is in her 60s and looking back at her life, as a boy, man, husband, father, trans woman. The memories are so vivid and perfectly preserved in two genders. The disassociation of being a girl in a boy’s body somehow does not destroy or diminish those experiences, like attending an all-boys private high school, dating, marrying Deedee and having two children, living by the lake in Maine, and making bread. Boylan is surrounded by a supportive community and loving family and friends.

As a professor and public figure, there’s little sense of conflict, antagonism, or anti-trans sentiment. It made me wonder, was Boylan holding back negative moments? Or was this book’s intention a celebration of their life? But then, there’s this line that echoes through me, especially now: “I am practicing how not to get beaten within an inch of my life.”

Boylan writes about the societal pressures of being a woman, of being lesser than: the voice of uncertainty, the immature vocabulary, the salad instead of steak. It’s oddly disconcerting when she starts obsessing over weight. Boylan also covers trans conventions, voice lessons, passing as female, that in between space, and the privilege of being trans—the expensive surgeries and procedures available only to people above a certain tax bracket.

In the end, I felt like I was invited into Jenny’s world, though I also wanted to sit at the counter to watch the breadmaking and then bite into a slice.

Thanks to Celadon Books for the ARC.

rating: ★★★★

Cleavage: Men, Women, and the Space Between Us
by Jennifer Finney Boylan
Celadon Books, 2025