Would We Recognize Alien Life If We Saw It?

    I had pretty well decided we were alone. Surely life from another part of the universe would have shown up by now? But maybe it already has. In the way that a constellation’s points of light connect into a picture once you know what you are looking for, clues have been popping up. […]

Emotions at the Impeachment

  The genuine emotion on the first day of the impeachment trial, today, came from US Representative Jamie Raskin, of Maryland’s 8th District, who is the lead manager for the second impeachment of Donald Trump. Raskin’s opening statement was calm, succinct, and plainly-worded. “Because I’ve been a professor of constitutional law for three decades, I […]

Eat Your Spinach

  When I was a kid, in the Midwest, spinach was obviously good for you because it came hygienically frozen in blocks straight from the factory and was bitter as sin in the pot. Who would ever have eaten that boiled mush if it did not provide the iron we were all supposedly lacking? (Braunschweiger, […]

Zero Zone: Artful Noir That Asks a Serious Question

      Some books capture your imagination; Zero Zone locked mine in an art gallery. An adroit literary thriller, its prose has a clean, well-lit spaciousness, yet the sensory images are so rich that every page is splashed with color. Scott O’Connor’s main character, Jess Shepard, is an artist who has been through her […]

The Dig and Drama

      The problems for writers of historical fiction may be little different from those of anyone using “true events” as the basis of their stories. Sources may be more distant, but the real issue remains: which drama, among the welter of life, historical accounts, and potential metaphors will be portrayed? The Dig, a […]

When Barbie Is Reimagined as Maya Angelou …

    I never had a Barbie doll, no doubt because she was pricey. My mother would have shrewdly eyed all those accoutrements, separately packaged, and nipped that problem in the bud. My friends had Barbies, though, and mainly what I remember is seeing them carried upside down, blood rushing to their ponytailed scalps. We […]

On Conscience and Cowardice

    The other day, I found myself skimming through Shakespeare’s Richard III, the tale of a king who was vainglorious, scheming, and amoral. Breaking the fourth wall to confide in the audience, Richard makes a shudderingly fine villain. Breathless, we follow his Machiavellian rise to power and short, destructive reign. The opposite of a […]

The Year We Made No Resolutions

In the third week of January, it struck me that I had heard virtually nothing about New Year’s resolutions. Nobody was cleansing or purging or making extravagant promises to themselves or anyone else. The few people who dared to vow a dry January poured themselves a strong whiskey five days later, after the Capitol was […]