June Sawyers has published more than 25 books. Her work has appeared in the Chicago Tribune, New City, San Francisco Chronicle, and Stagebill. She teaches at the Newberry Library and is the founder of the arts group, the Phantom Collective.
Dave Hoekstra has loved newspapers since his boyhood in west suburban Naperville. He understands the important role newspapers play in the life of a community, and how a newspaper—the best […]
Last Call Chicago is not a narrative book. Rather it is an extensive listing with brief descriptions of 1,001 LGBTQ and LGBTQ-friendly bars and such. But it is also a […]
It happened in Ferris Bueller’s hometown In the Mayberry of the Midwest I first heard about it while listening to WXRT When Terri Hemmert played “All You Need Is Love” […]
Bob Dylan is having a bit of a late-career cultural moment. His most recent album, Rough and Rowdy Ways, was released in June 2019, and the featured single, “Murder Most […]
June Sawyers wrote this poem—as a way to record her experience— after listening to a musician named Andrew perform in Printers Row. It came out of nowhereAt first we barely […]
It’s the same reaction most every time I tell someone I am an indexer. Blank stare. “You know, the thing at the end of a book,” I offer helpfully.Then, a […]
There is a street in the South Loop—Dearborn from Polk to Harrison is only one block long—that is one of the most charming blocks in the city. I say the […]
When most people hear the word “cabaret” they likely think of Berlin and the Weimar republic and, of course, the theatrical musical and film Cabaret. But Chicago also has a […]
One Sunday afternoon a number of years ago I found a finger puppet lying outside Maclean House, the former dormitory (now apartments) named in honor of the late Norman Maclean, […]
For the Love of Cod: A Father and Son’s Search for Norwegian Happiness Eric Dregni University of Minnesota Press Eric Dregni is only partly Norwegian but that hasn’t stopped him […]
It begins with the familiar refrain, arguably the three most famous words in American literature. “Call me Ishmael.” But the voice of this Ishmael is different. The voice is unmistakably female […]
Towards the end of the plague year we learned that someone somehow transported a ten-foot high silvery metal object to a remote canyon in the Utah desert drilling […]