Fictional lives that strikingly ring true
One of the great mysteries of the human species is how the arrangement of letters on a page — and then letters into sentences, sentences into paragraphs, paragraphs into novels...
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In small-town Illinois, a story of youth and pain
If Holden Caulfield had been Helen Caulfield, the result might be a little something like "In Zanesville" (Little, Brown), a fierce, funny, brave and bracingly honest new novel by Jo...
In small-town Illinois, a story of youth and pain
If Holden Caulfield had been Helen Caulfield, the result might be a little something like "In Zanesville" (Little, Brown), a fierce, funny, brave and bracingly honest new novel by Jo...
History-based whodunit hits high mark
Just as youth is wasted on the young, history is wasted on historians. It ought to be the exclusive property of novelists - but only if they are as clever...
Lineup of great new sleuths
Philip Kerr's Bertie Gunther, Michael Connelly's Harry Bosch, Henning Mankell's Kurt Wallender and Dennis Lehane's Patrick Kenzie are all terrific, but the roll call of top-flight fictional crime-solvers seems to...
Bryan Gruley wrestles with next book in series
You'd think he'd have the hang of it by now, wouldn't you? Yet Bryan Gruley, who just finished the first draft of the third novel in his Starvation Lake mystery...
The same old story
Getting old is no picnic — although as the aphorism reminds us, it's better than the alternative. Perhaps, but just barely. Aging turns hair gray, limbs rickety, minds mushy. Even...
Interviewer’s opinion: Julia Keller on Joyce Carol Oates
When you regard an author as the best of her generation, and among the best of any generation, and you read just about everything she's ever written - which includes,...
Earth to Tim Flannery: Thank you
The 1985 celebrity-studded charity ditty written by Michael Jackson and Lionel Richie had a simple title and refrain: "We Are the World." The line, it now turns out, is more...
Elmhurst College celebrates grad Reinhold Niebuhr
Elmhurst College brought him his first taste of the world of ideas. It is only fitting, then, that Reinhold Niebuhr return the favor: He's bringing the world to Elmhurst College....