Compliments of Chicagohoodz: Chicago Street Gang Art and Culture James “Jinx” O’Connor & Damen “Mr. C” Corrado Feral House Al Capone’s Chicago Outfit gets most of the attention, but the […]
Trust Exercise Susan Choi Henry Holt and Co. If high school didn’t exist, writers would have to invent it. A writer’s job is to articulate what others feel; and what […]
Up Jumped the Devil: The Real Life of Robert Johnson By Bruce Conforth and Gayle Dean Wardlow Chicago Review Press Robert Johnson is a definitive legend, though the dead-at-27 bluesman […]
Chicago is home to 200 to 250 theater companies, depending on who’s counting. Most of them are what we might call traditional theaters that stage scripted productions, both new works […]
Mike “McBeardo” McPadden is truth in human packaging. A beard is indeed present, bristly, with streaks of grey—suggesting wisdom in matters strange and arcane. I’ve seen McPadden in action as […]
Chicago Treasure by Larry Broutman, Rich Green, and John Rabias Lake Claremont Press Is Chicago a fairy-tale city? Wait a minute. I’ve asked that before. But it’s a question worth […]
The Three Escapes of Hannah Arendt: A Tyranny of Truth By Ken Krimstein Bloomsbury Publishing Am I intelligent enough to critique the life’s work of philosopher and political theorist Hannah […]
Chicago: From Vision to Metropolis By Whet Moser Reaktion Books Ltd. Does full-disclosure apply to Twitter acquaintances? If so, I know Whet Moser from the internet. I don’t follow many […]
Born to Be Posthumous: The Eccentric Life and Mysterious Genius of Edward Gorey by Mark Dery Little, Brown and Company If cartoonist Edward Gorey didn’t exist, we would have had […]
Ohio Stephen Markley Simon & Schuster Reviewed by Carr Harkrader Ohio, the debut novel by Stephen Markley, is a bumpy journey that doesn’t quite reach its destination. It starts with […]
The Capitol building in Washington DC is sometimes referred to as the People’s House, a great gathering place where the exchange of ideas (some new, some radical, some contradictory) is […]
Chicago has had its share of dynamic duos: Adler and Sullivan, Jordan and Pippen, Bozo and Cooky, Moo and Oink… Less dynamic and more demonic were Chicago killers Nathan Leopold […]