Review: Byronic Heroines, Mad, Bad & Dangerous to Know, by Samira Ahmed
Mad, Bad & Dangerous to Know by Samira Ahmed Penguin Random House Reviewed by C.E. Archer-Helke I don’t often find a book that simultaneously transports me to the best parts […]
Poem: The Queen of Brooklyn—R.B.G. (1933–2020)
She was the queen of Brooklyn although she wore no gold crown except in the public’s imagination and on t-shirts. Instead her apparel of choice was a white frilly lace […]
Interview: VGA Gallery’s Brice Puls and Eleanor Schichtel on Going Virtual, Future Plans and VGA Zine
The last time we saw the gang from VGA Gallery, things were a lot different. It was January 2020 and we were crowding the VGA Gallery’s small space on Bloomingdale […]
Review: The Joy and Bother of City Streets, The Streets of Europe: The Sights, Sounds, and Smells That Shaped Its Great Cities, by Brian Ladd
The Streets of Europe: The Sights, Sounds, and Smells That Shaped Its Great Cities By Brian Ladd University of Chicago Press, 320 pages, $30 I’m having a difficult time deciding […]
Review: Murder Most Female—He Had It Coming, by Kori Rumore and Marianne Mather
He Had It Coming Kori Rumore and Marianne Mather Midway: An Agate Imprint A crime only gains sex appeal after it’s been committed, and it’s usually an ingredient added by […]
Essay: Racial Injustice Themes in Pop Culture Shine a Light on the Change We Must Demand
We’re living in a strange period of horror shows in politics, health and racial injustice. You never know what type of abomination you’ll find when you turn on your phone, […]
Review: The Very Near Future—Midwest Futures, by Phil Christman
Midwest Futures By Phil Christman Belt Publishing The Midwest is a deeply mysterious place to the coastal essayists, pundits, and politicians. Rarely visiting, save to write clunky closed factory and […]
Book Review: Relentless, Raw Outrage, Valentine by Elizabeth Wetmore
Valentine by Elizabeth Wetmore Harper, 306 pages, $26.99 Elizabeth Wetmore’s Valentine, set in 1976 rural West Texas, is a novel of relentless and brutally raw outrage. A fury-filled howl of […]
Rubbernecking Rich Living, Chicago Apartments: A Century and Beyond of Lakefront Luxury
Chicago Apartments: A Century and Beyond of Lakefront Luxury By Neil Harris with Teri J. Edelstein University of Chicago Press, 364 pages, $85 Reading Neil Harris’s Chicago Apartments: A Century […]
Interview: “Wait for the Empire to Come Home.” We Talk With Michael Zapata on His Debut Novel
Michael Zapata is a founding editor of the award-winning MAKE Literary Magazine. He is the recipient of an Illinois Arts Council Award for Fiction; the City of Chicago DCASE Individual Artist Program […]
Review: The Skin You Live In Is a Kids’ Book for Today by Two Chicagoans
The Skin You Live In By Michael Tyler Illustrations by David Lee Csicsko Chicago Children’s Museum The Skin You Live In, a book targeted to 4- to 8-year olds, can […]
Dialogs: Two Screenwriters Talk About Their New Novels—Utopia Avenue and Antkind
It was just serendipity that the Chicago Humanities Festival scheduled two screenwriters with hot new novels two weeks in a row for their livestream show. Well, serendipity and the fact […]