Poem: “Blame it on the radio”
Blame it on the radio By Patrick T. Reardon . That I drove my semi through motel wall. . That bomb went off in grocery cart. . That I sowed [...]
Book review: “The Bible Unearthed: Archaeology’s New Vision of Ancient Israel and the Origin of Its Sacred Texts” by Israel Finkelstein and Neil Asher Silberman
A single paragraph about two-thirds of the way through the book exemplifies the strength and clarity of Israel Finkelstein and Neil Asher Silberman’s The Bible Unearthed: Archaeology’s New Vision of [...]
Book review: “Death Comes to Pemberley” by P.D. James
Technically, Death Comes to Pemberley by P.D. James is a pastiche inasmuch as it’s a literary work, written in the style of another author, in this case, Jane Austen, that [...]
Book review: “My Favourite Manson Girl” by Alison Umminger
Okay, Alison Umminger had me at the title. I’d read her witty little essay in Fast Funny Women, a book of witty little essays, edited by Gina Barreca. I liked [...]
Book review: “The Pearl” by John Steinbeck
On the very first page of The Pearl, John Steinbeck signals that this short, tense novel is a parable. In the context of the story, he explains that it is [...]
Interview: Sparrows, Hutches and Growing into an Ending, Sandra Cisneros Discusses Her New Novella
As Sandra Cisneros’s new gem-like novella Martita, I Remember You opens, Corina is using a scraper and a blowtorch to strip generations of varnish off a dining room hutch in [...]
Book review: “Martita, I Remember You” by Sandra Cisneros
Corina is eating her sandwich in the sculpture garden of the Art Institute across the street from the gas company office where she works. A sparrow flits down near her [...]
Book Review: Visualizing and Honoring Black America: Two books about the Story W. E. B. Du Bois told at the 1900 Paris Exposition with Data Portraits
W. E. B. Du Bois, the brilliant Black scholar and one of the most consequential Americans of the 20th century, operated on an international stage where many people had a [...]
Book review: “A Month in the Country” by J. L. Carr
Near the very end of J. L. Carr’s exquisite short novel A Month in the Country, Moon finds the missing 400-year-old grave where, all along, he knew it would be. [...]
Book review: “A History of the Chicago Portage: The Crossroads That Made Chicago and Helped Make America” by Benjamin Sells
Let me tell you: I’m a huge Chicago history nerd, and I just gobbled up Benjamin Sells’s new book A History of the Chicago Portage: The Crossroads That Made Chicago [...]