I recall with much clarity when, as an eighth-grader being taught by the Sisters of St. Joseph, it was announced in class that the Jesuits were coming to town. The…
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BOOK REVIEWS
This is the second book I have read by Xinran, a Chinese woman journalist and broadcaster who now lives in England. The first one was about just one Chinese…
The God Biz is a marvelous enterprise. All other economic enterprises employ some earthly resources—raw materials, finished goods, knowledge and service—but religion turns nothing(that which cannot be known) into something through the catalyst…
There is a young computer engineer, in his early thirties perhaps, who comes to the café I frequent. He’s a stoner, but has managed to get by the drug tests…
Even though I recently published a book about how I enjoy being a stranger when I travel abroad (detect a shameless plug for my book here? [1] ), the sentiment is often…
When I first began foreign travel over thirty years ago I brought with me a bottle of aspirin. I do remember using them. These days It looks like my suitcase…
Islands have always figure prominently in my readings, or maybe just my “escapist” readings. I remember the first book I read, and it wasn’t a comic book, but a…
William Holden (nee William Beedle of Franklin, Illinois)) always seemed to me to be playing men who were not necessarily who they wanted to be—always stuck in a persona and…
Not many American writers took up the roman-fleuve with the consistency of James Michener. His fictional characters may never have been around long enough to develop much depth, but then they…
Darfur, Somalia. How many of us can explain to anyone, mush less ourselves, what all the mayhem and human carnage is about? You can’t even tell who the…