Book review: “Harriet the Spy” by Louise Fitzhugh
The plot of Louis Fitzhugh much-loved Harriet the Spy doesn’t yield a moral. But the life of Harriet does. What I mean to say is that some schools and libraries [...]
Book review: “Spoil of the Violent” by Emmanuel Mounier
There are two types of Christians, according to French philosopher-theologian Emmanuel Mounier. There are those who see their faith as an adventure, a lively zestful engagement with the fullness of [...]
Poem: “Elect”
Elect By Patrick T. Reardon Toast with choice wine the elect. Toast the vampires, bad boys, hyenas, stone-cold demons and assholes strolling the halls of heaven, side by [...]
Book review: “Voorloper” by Andre Norton
Andre Norton’s science-fiction novels tend to be adventures in which a central character, usually a young man, sometimes with a friend or two, goes on a journey to discover the [...]
Book review: “Badge for a Gunfighter” by Clair Huffaker
Some writers have a huge hunger to write and publish. Others, it seems, don’t. For instance, Evan Hunter, who started life as Salvatore Lombino and employed several pseudonyms, started his [...]
Book Review: “Hawk” by Vivian Ayers
When Hawk was in the process of becoming a hawk, a man walked by and looked up into the tree and yelled, “What you need is to go get your-self [...]
Poem: In those days
In those days Patrick T. Reardon In those days, the self-afflicted were loud like a rat caught in the dark pipe. In those days, the dead buried the [...]
Book review: “The Judgment of Paris: The Revolutionary Decade That Gave the World Impressionism” by Ross King
In the summer of 1874, Edouard Manet visited the home of Claude Monet in the Paris suburb of Argenteuil, and, as Ross King recounts, he began painting The Monet Family [...]
Book review: “’Til Death” by Ed McBain
On what should be the happiest day of his life — the day of his marriage to Angela Carella — the shy and affable Tommy Giordano is the target of [...]
Book review: “Alone of All Her Sex: The Myth and the Cult of the Virgin Mary” by Marina Warner
Ten or twelve years ago, here in Chicago, I was on an archdiocesan committee and was duly invited to an afternoon Christmas reception at the Cardinal’s mansion. There was a [...]
