Book review: “Jingo” by Terry Pratchett
Midway through Terry Pratchett’s 1997 novel Jingo, a conversation takes place between Captain Carrot Ironfoundersson and Corporal Delphine Angua von Überwald. He is a 6’6” dwarf (by adoption) who’s the [...]
Poem: “Marriage Song”
Marriage Song Patrick T. Reardon . We exult at the joining of young lives. We dance the dance of joy. . This is a time of merriment. This is a [...]
Book review: “The Hunted” by Elmore Leonard
The shoot-out that ends Elmore Leonard’s 1977 novel The Hunted is just like those in the westerns he was still writing back in those days. Three heavily armed bad guys, [...]
Book review: “Gislebertus: Sculptor of Autun” by Denis Grivot and George Zarnecki
After nearly 60 years, Gislebertus: Sculptor of Autun by Denis Grivot and George Zarnecki remains the best book on the astonishingly vivid, highly original art of the medieval French master. [...]
How to pre-order “The Loop” at local bookstores
Publication of my new book The Loop: The “L” Tracks That Shaped and Saved Chicago is set for Thanksgiving Day. If you’d like to preorder the book, you can do [...]
Book review: “Columbus: The Four Voyages” by Laurence Bergreen
As the title of his 2011 book indicates, Laurence Bergreen has a tight focus to his storytelling in Columbus: The Four Voyages. He provides very little about the first 41 [...]
Two poems about McDonald’s at 56th Street and Eighth Avenue in Manhattan
Two poems about McDonald's at 56th Street and Eighth Avenue in Manhattan By Patrick T. Reardon Three hundred and sixteen days later The man [...]
Book review: “Quartet in Autumn” by Barbara Pym
It’s the mid-1970s, central London, and four people in their 60s, two men and two men, have been working together for two or three years in a small office doing [...]
Book review: “The Skull Beneath the Skin” by P.D. James
In the dark night and under the icy water, Cordelia Gray, lungs bursting, is swimming for her life. She knows that the sea is death if she cannot find the [...]
Book review: “A Girl Named Zippy: Growing Up Small in Mooreland, Indiana” by Haven Kimmel
Haven Kimmel’s 2001 memoir A Girl Named Zippy: Growing Up Small in Mooreland, Indiana is a rollickingly funny entertainment about the childhood of a strange child in a strange family [...]