Poem: To Help Her Move
To Help Her Move She is told I’m like an elephant and calls on me to help her move, to burden her dressers and boxes to the [...]
Essay: The home we own that doesn’t belong to us
My wife Cathy and I have been in our two-flat on Paulina Street since 1984, and, even though the bank has always had its portion, we think of [...]
Book review: “Grant” by Ron Chernow
Ron Chernow’s 2017 biography of Ulysses S. Grant, military victor of the Civil War and a middling American president, contains much of value but is ultimately disappointing [...]
Book review: “The Reptile Room: A Series of Unfortunate Events” by Lemony Snicket
The Baudelaire orphans find themselves yet again in an unfortunate event — in the clutches of Count Olaf. Midway through The Reptile Room, they are discussing the sad [...]
Essay: The twelve best books of 2018
Here are the twelve best books that I read in 2018: “Advice for Future Corpses (And Those Who Love Them): A Practical Perspective on Death and Dying” by [...]
Book review: “Being Dead” by Jim Crace (2019)
Just before the first page of Jim Crace’s 1999 novel Being Dead, Joseph and Celice, zoologists married to each other, have been murdered in a clumsy, random [...]
Book Review: “Being Dead” by Jim Crace (2012 review)
When she and her husband Joseph were murdered on an isolated stretch of beach, Celice's body fell onto the sand, upending a dune beetle and trapping him in the [...]
Book review: “Moving Pictures” by Terry Pratchett
As Terry Pratchett created his series of 41 Discworld novels, he took his world from a fairly medieval place into modernity through his introduction of a variety of civilization’s [...]
Book review: “Eric” by Terry Pratchett
Thirteen-year-old Eric Thursley conjures up demons. Except, in this case, his first successful conjuration, he gets the hapless wizard Rincewind. The result — detailed in Terry Pratchett’s ninth Discworld [...]
Six Feminist Books
When I use the term “feminist book” here, I’m referring to strong, muscular books written by strong, muscular writers who happen to be women. To me, these books [...]