Patrick T. Reardon is a Chicago historian, essayist, poet and writer who was a Chicago Tribune reporter for 32 years. He is the author of nine books including the forthcoming The Loop: The ‘L’ Tracks That Shaped and Saved Chicago (SIU Press).
Cities of the American West A History of Frontier Urban Planning By John W. Reps Princeton University Press, 827 pages, available on the internet starting at $40 Part One of […]
Dorothy Day: Dissenting Voice of the American Century By John Loughery and Blythe Randolph Simon and Schuster Dorothy Day—that radical of 20th century radicals, that voice of conscience in the face of a […]
Roots of the Black Chicago Renaissance: New Negro Writers, Artists and Intellectuals 1893–1930 Edited by Richard A. Courage and Christopher Robert Reed University of Illinois Press, 296 pages, $28 In […]
Blessed Blessed are the dead and the dying. Blessed, the mourn-filled good-byes to loves behind glass, behind walls. Blessed, neighborhoods of pain, grief communities, lightning-struck homes, annunciations […]
The Jungle by Upton Sinclair, adapted and illustrated by Kristina Gehrmann, translated by Ivanka Hahnenberger Ten Speed Press, 384 pages, $24.99 Kristina Gehrmann’s graphic novel version of Upton Sinclair’s 1906 […]
Cathy gave me a haircut today on the back porch. In our 37 years of marriage, that hasn’t happened before, but we’re not leaving the house for haircuts or much […]
Many very good and even great books have been written about Chicago, and, based on my half century of writing about the city, here are the 10 that, at the […]
When you’re looking for a good novel about Chicago, you’re most likely to turn to those writers identified as Chicago writers, such as Saul Bellow (The Adventures of Augie March), […]
It’s pretty clear now that my wife Cathy and I—both over that red-alarm age of 60—are going to be spending basically all our time in our home for what could […]
Note: Sharyn Skeeter will discuss Dancing with Langston at 6:30 p.m. on Thursday, February 27, at City Lit Books, 2523 N. Kedzie Blvd., Chicago, in an appearance with Judith Krummeck, […]
Note: Deborah Kanter will speak about Chicago Catolico at 2 p.m. on Saturday, February 8, at the National Museum of Mexican Art, (1852 W. 19th St., Chicago). Chicago Catolico: Making […]
The World of Juliette Kinzie: Chicago before the Fire Ann Durkin Keating University of Chicago Press, 280 pages, $27.50 When 27-year-old Juliette Kinzie settled with her husband John, the local […]