Bites: What Author S.L. Wisenberg Eats in a Day
S.L. Wisenberg’s The Adventures of Cancer Bitch came out this month in paperback from Tortoise Books to celebrate the 15th anniversary of the original release. Her hilarious tackling of serious […]
Chicago Is Lit: August Live Literature Events and Readings
This month’s column explores another reason Chicago’s literary scene is “lit”: the wide variety of live literature events held in neighborhoods across the city. From conversations with award-winning authors to […]
Review: Iliana Regan’s Fieldwork Digs Down to the Root
Iliana Regan is a Michelin-starred chef and owner of Milkweed Inn deep in the Hiawatha Forest. Regan’s memoir, Fieldwork, recently celebrated its paperback release. It couldn’t have come at a […]
Interview: Ananda Lima Launches Fiction Debut With Craft: Stories I Wrote for the Devil
Ananda Lima’s fiction debut, Craft: Stories I Wrote for the Devil, launches at Women and Children First this Friday, June 21. Filled with double meanings, a very meta perspective, rebellions […]
Review: A Dazzling Debut—The Divorcées, by Rowan Beaird
No-fault divorces are currently legal in every US state, making it relatively easy to end an unhappy marriage. It may be hard to imagine how recently “irreconcilable differences” were not […]
Interview: Columnist Georgia Garvey on Her Greek Heritage and New Book, Everything Is Going to Be Okay (Until It’s Not)
The phrase “it’s all Greek to me” is often used to refer to complicated things people cannot understand. Yet for award-winning columnist and former Chicago Tribune editor Georgia Garvey, her […]
Interview: Kathleen Rooney on Silent Film Stars, Fairies, and Her New Book From Dust to Stardust
I first encountered Chicago author Kathleen Rooney years ago at The Neo-Futurists’ funky New Year’s Eve bash, where her collective Poems While You Wait was delightfully typing up custom poetry […]
Interview: Pigeon English: A Talk with Author Kathleen Rooney
Chicago writer Kathleen Rooney recently released her latest novel, Cher Ami and Major Whittlesey. A fictional retelling of the true story of World War I’s “Lost Battalion” (though mostly regarding […]
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 […]
Fresh Local Lit: “Tabernacle for Drinkers” from Iggy Aloysius’ Fishhead. Republic of Want
Fishhead. Republic of Want is an experimental novel by Ignatius Valentine Aloysius. It’s a layered metafictional work in the style of Cervantes and Borges, where Fate (Destiny) is the story’s overarching narrator, […]