Gino is one of those troubled young men who might be called wayward, but that implies he’s strayed from a path he can see, when it would be more accurate to say he’s way-free, adrift, rudderless. In his early 20s, he returns home to the Abruzzo region of Italy. At loose ends, and spurred on […]
As Lucy Cooper delivers the eulogy at her father’s funeral on Winthrop Island, a Northeast vacation spot where her dad lived year-round, she can’t believe he’s gone. It’s been years since she’s seen him, both because of her relocation to Europe and her dad’s embarrassing obsession with chasing pirate treasure. Lucy is surprised to discover […]
Jane Trevally is at a crossroads of sorts. After a traumatic childhood, she sought safety and solace in marriages with wealthy men. Now twice divorced and living with her four dogs in the crumbling English country mansion that is her birthright, she’s feeling the need to do something, to take a job, when one day […]
Political science professor Williams (City of Ambition: FDR, LaGuardia, and the Making of Modern New York, 2013) focuses this new exploration of New York City’s modern development on three key areas that “embody the tensions…at the heart of political life in a democratic capitalist city”: housing, schools, and policing. Williams’ analysis of these issues inarguably […]
Sisilla, the narrator of Kraus’ first foray into SF, is a Niffakoq, one in a line of golden children selected for special missions, their brains enhanced with six “niks,” small implants that bestow deeper reserves of intelligence and empathy. These are effectively suicide missions—Niffakoqs traditionally die before their teens. But of course Sisilla isn’t traditional, […]
Do you know that you shouldn’t order fish on Monday? Have you enjoyed The Bear, the collected works of David Chang, or food memoirs like Blood, Bones, and Butter and Crying in H Mart? If so, you owe a debt of gratitude to Anthony Bourdain. Bourdain wasn’t trying to change restaurant culture when he wrote […]
Middle school hasn’t been easy for Izzy. Her twin, Ari, chose to attend a prestigious performing arts academy, leaving Izzy to navigate Kagan Middle School on her own. Ari has countless after-school commitments, practices her violin constantly, and, in a move that breaks Izzy’s heart, decides she wants her own room. Izzy, stinging from the […]
Jonas Salk developed the first effective polio vaccine, but Albert Sabin (1906-1993) developed the only vaccine that can eradicate polio from the planet. Speaking Yiddish when he arrived to the U.S. in 1921, Sabin was a brilliant student, accumulating honors, scholarships, and positions at the prestigious Rockefeller Institute and University of Cincinnati, where he made […]
Solis and Dougherty aim their skillfully written and smartly designed primer at “experts who are writing—or exploring the idea of writing—a nonfiction book.” Whether the reader is an educator, consultant, academic, or simply someone with a wealth of knowledge and “something useful and important to say that will impact readers’ lives in a transformative way,” […]
In his well-crafted debut collection of linked essays, Trinidad, a Filipino Kiwi writer, considers family and identity; the richness of Filipino culture and the challenges of immigration; and gay awakening and queer adulthood. A graphic recounting of catching, gutting, defeathering, and butchering a chicken turns into a warm portrait of his feisty grandmother, a college […]