Chicago Lit/Arts Zine The Ground Is Uneven Seeks Contributors
When it came time to choose between literature and the law, Adam Kaz went with the written word. Now the writer, editor, and critic (and regular contributor to Third Coast […]
Review: Location, Location, Location…and Boosters, Chicago before the Fire, by Louis P. Cain
For much of Chicago’s history, its strident boosters with their overblown assertions of the city’s present and, even more, its future greatness have been a subject of ridicule. In 1952, […]
Review: Ever So Slow Integration, Justice Batted Last, by Don Zminda
Ernie Banks and Minnie Minoso are the headliners in Don Zminda’s book Justice Batted Last: Ernie Banks, Minnie Minoso and the Unheralded Players Who Integrated Chicago’s Major League Teams. But […]
Review: His Mind Constantly on the Go, Lincoln the Citizen, by Henry C. Whitney, edited by Michael Burlingame
Abraham Lincoln’s friend and courtroom colleague Henry Clay Whitney remembered him as a man with an agile and restless mind, as “a versatile genius, whether as a man or boy. […]
Review: Nina Mukerjee Furstenau Cooks Up Nostalgia with The Pocket Rhubarb Cookbook
Bookstore cookbook aisles are lined with images reflecting our very online, very visible lives. Curated photos of perfect dishes and happy, beautiful chefs and cooks and influencers spooning sauces or […]
Review: Sadness at the End of a World, Unstaged Grief: Musicals and Mourning in Midcentury America, by Jake Johnson
The title of Jake Johnson’s latest book—Unstaged Grief: Musicals and Mourning in Midcentury America—is more than a bit jarring. It’s that part about “Musicals and Mourning” that seems so odd. […]
Book Smarts: Secret World Books of Highland Park—Third Space for the North Shore
Capitalism abhors a creative gathering place—otherwise auto dealerships would put on poetry slams and hardware stores would host book clubs, wouldn’t they? While coffeehouses and restaurants often step up to […]
Review: Scream of Protest, Cry from the Heart, For Gaza’s Children: Black, Brown and Jewish Writers and Poets Speak Out, edited by Marc Lamont Hill, Haki Madhubuti, and Keith Gilyard
For Gaza’s Children is a scream of protest against the oppression of Palestinians by those who have suffered oppression themselves. It is a cry from the heart against the destruction, […]
Review: A Spirit of Discord, Reform and Unorthodoxy, The English Soul: Faith of a Nation, by Peter Ackroyd
Peter Ackroyd’s The English Soul: Faith of a Nation, is a rich and odd book. Rich because of the author’s storytelling skill and odd because it doesn’t tell the story […]
Review: The How, When, and Why of Rail Lines, A History of the Railroad in 100 Maps, by Jeremy Black
The 1897 image on pages 110 through11 of Jeremy Black’s A History of the Railroad in 100 Maps is a striking bird’s-eye view of Chicago, looking across downtown to the […]
Review: Learning to Love the Feel of Words in The Braille Encyclopedia
“I grew up in a nest feathered with words, texts, and books,” Naomi Cohn writes in the first essay of her lyrical debut memoir, The Braille Encyclopedia: Brief Essays on […]
Review: The Harder I Fight the More I Love You: A Memoir, by Neko Case
Before a full house at the Fine Arts Building’s Studebaker Theater, singer-songwriter Neko Case appeared on stage in conversation with Lior Phillips, a Chicago-based South African music journalist. Case received […]