Tag: non-fiction

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Interview with Author Mary Kennedy Eastham

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West Coast author Mary Kennedy Eastham has been quite busy lately.  Her book of poetry, the Shadow of a Dog I Can’t Forget, was one of my first review copies I received.  I talked with her via an email interview.  Here is what she had to say about her recent projects, the art of writing, her love of dogs, and her favorite writers. WHAT ARE SOME OF YOUR CREATIVE PROJECTS? I am trying so hard to finish my novel NIGHT SURFING.  Writing a novel is very different from writing a short story or writing a poem.  There are so many more … Continue reading Interview with Author Mary Kennedy Eastham

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Play Fair! The Art of Friendship and Relationship by Kimberly A. Taylor

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    One doesn’t have to walk far into a bookstore to get assaulted with self-help books and memoirs.  Much like people with blogs, everyone thinks they have something valuable to say.  In addition to memoirs by randomly generated Kardashians the upcoming election season brings with it the fatuous “campaign biography” ghostwritten by the candidate’s staffers not currently concocting an attack ad or planting a piece of journalism with a compliant member of the Fourth Estate.  It is with relief that Kimberly A. Taylor’s hybrid memoir/self-help book is available.  Play Fair! The Art of Relationship and Friendship presents the reader with … Continue reading Play Fair! The Art of Friendship and Relationship by Kimberly A. Taylor

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My Business Is to Create: Blake’s Infinite Writing by Eric G. Wilson

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Within the confines of 85 pages, Eric Wilson’s My Business Is to Create: Blake’s Infinite Writing offers a cornucopia for the aspirant writer.  The tiny book defies conventional categories, much like its subject, William Blake (1757 – 1827).  A Blake biography, a creative writing manual, and a map of influences, epigrams, and philosophy all come into play. William Blake was a poet and artist living in the Britain, who, like his contemporary the Marquis de Sade (1740 – 1814), lived between the Age of Enlightenment and the Romantic Era.  Blake grew up as a Christian Nonconformist and struggled with making … Continue reading My Business Is to Create: Blake’s Infinite Writing by Eric G. Wilson

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Digging Deeper: A Memoir of the Seventies, by Peter Weissman

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Peter Weissman’s I Think, Therefore Who Am I? took place during the Summer of Love.  It was an intimate exploration of the Sixties, the most glorified or vilified decade in recent history, depending on how far one lives from Real America™ (patent pending).  His second volume of memoirs, Digging Deeper: a Memoir of the Seventies, chronicles Weissman’s life during a decade not liked by anyone, except perhaps the occasional roaming hipster burnishing his or her sense of ironic superiority. The memoir begins with Weissman crawling from the muck of hallucinogenic incoherence.  Weissman’s inability to speak to others provides a dark … Continue reading Digging Deeper: A Memoir of the Seventies, by Peter Weissman

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Brothers in Arms: The Story of Al-Qa’ida and the Arab Jihadists by Camille Tawil

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“I want you to remember that no bastard ever won a war by dying for his country. He won it by making the other poor, dumb bastard die for his country.” Patton (1970), screenplay by Francis Ford Coppola. “Mubarak has been an ally of ours in a number of things … I would not refer to him as a dictator.” Vice President Joe Biden (2011) “God is the immemorial refuge of the incompetent, the helpless, the miserable. They find not only sanctuary in His arms, but also a kind of superiority, soothing to their macerated egos: He will set them … Continue reading Brothers in Arms: The Story of Al-Qa’ida and the Arab Jihadists by Camille Tawil

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Oldest Chicago by David Anthony Witter

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David Anthony Witter puts a new spin in the crowded field of travel guides.  Oldest Chicago offers the reader a guide to the oldest places in Chicago and its suburbs.  The guidebook encompasses everything from the commonplace (oldest school building: St. Ignatius College Prep, 1869) to the esoteric (oldest tamale shop: La Guadalupana, 1945).  From the oldest church to the oldest magic shop to the oldest slaughterhouse, they are all in here and much, much more. Witter seamlessly blends the historical, the informative, and the personal into a unique take on the travel guide.  Throughout the guide, the dark undercurrents … Continue reading Oldest Chicago by David Anthony Witter

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Contracts: the Essential Business Desk Reference by Attorney Richard Stim

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Contracts are everywhere.  Richard Stim makes this obvious in the introduction to Contracts: the Essential Business Desk Reference. Enumerating everything from employment contracts to those involving insurance, credit cards, toll roads, and music and book downloads, contractual relationships are everywhere and nowhere.  Because of this situation, Contracts is an essential tool for navigating the occasionally intimidating aspect of signing the dotted line.  Following or breaking contracts have real consequences for all involved. The book organizes the various terms associated with contracts in alphabetical order.  Aided by cross-references, it provides easy navigation of topics.  Nolo, the publisher, also boasts dictionary definitions … Continue reading Contracts: the Essential Business Desk Reference by Attorney Richard Stim

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Years of Upheaval (1981) by Henry Kissinger

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A Second Term and a Third-rate Burglary Now Watergate does not bother me Does your conscience bother you? Tell the truth. “Sweet Home Alabama,” Lynyrd Skynyrd (1974)   Years of Upheaval, the second volume of memoirs by Henry Kissinger, continues his personal account of public service, spanning the time of Nixon’s re-election to Nixon’s resignation following the Watergate scandal.  The memoirs record a short span of time although it encompasses a plethora of geopolitical, domestic, and personal events.  In the words of Homer Simpson, this volume has it all, “the terrifying lows, the dizzying highs, the creamy middles.” Riding on … Continue reading Years of Upheaval (1981) by Henry Kissinger

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The Road by Vasily Grossman

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Best known for his novel Life and Fate, Vasily Grossman also wrote short stories and worked as a war correspondent in the Second World War.  A Ukrainian Jew with parents who worked as urban professionals, Grossman did not represent the common stereotype of the Eastern European Jew living in a “Litvak shtetl.”  The Road, a collection of short stories, journalism, and letters published by New York Review Books, provides a useful jumping off point for anyone interested in the life and work of Vasily Grossman.  It includes his earliest stories and his last short story he wrote.  “The Hell of … Continue reading The Road by Vasily Grossman

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Fidel by Néstor Kohan and Nahuel Sherma

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Fidel distills the life of Fidel Castro into less than two hundred pages.  Written by Néstor Kohan and illustrated by Nahuel Sherma, the book functions as a short biography and a primer on such topics as Latin American politics, South American fascism, and anti-globalism.  (The hyperventilating political discourse of today has reduced the term “fascism” to an empty meaningless term.  For an academic investigation, one should consult Stanley Payne’s A History of Fascism: 1914 – 1945.  For a more literary examination, one should read Robert Bolaño’s Borges-esque Nazi Literature in the Americas.)  Kohan writes about Leftist topics and Seven Stories … Continue reading Fidel by Néstor Kohan and Nahuel Sherma

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