Books and recipes share a secret: both are meant to be savored. I’ve always loved reading cookbooks, treating them almost like memoirs, full of a chef’s memories, family traditions and […]
Book Reviews
Posted inBook Reviews
Fully Booked at ICPL: Help yourself to self-help books
I’ll start by saying, we’ve all been there. We’ve all had to ask for a little help at one time or another. While the library can’t make your stressors disappear, […]
Posted inBook Reviews
Book Review: ‘Dreams of Fields: Memory Traces of Iowa’s Past’ by Roy R. Behrens
As a born-again-Iowan, I delight in Iowa trivia and the relaying of impressive and surprising Iowa facts that challenge perceptions of a so-called flyover state. To me, these bits of […]
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Book Review: ‘Groceries’ by Nora Claire Miller
Groceries by Nora Claire Miller spills into the hybrid terrain to challenge expectations of mixed-genre. It opens a narrative sentence and bulldozes parts of speech to reach its own truest conclusion. It forces its audience to re-learn how to read.
Posted inArts & Entertainment
Book Review: ‘Burnt Mountain’ by Emily Wilson
The most prominent, consistent feature of these poems are the heady — even baroque, indulgent — descriptions of the natural world. (I wrote “descriptive” three separate times in my notes.) […]
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Book Review: ‘Midwest Futures: Poems & Micro-Stories From Tomorrow’s Heartland’ edited by Randy Brown
Midwest Futures (Middle West Press) is a short, albeit stout collection of poems, short essays and stories that encapsulate the Midwest across time and various corners of our region. The […]
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Book Review: ‘13 Notes from Napoleon, Iowa: Musings on the Edge of the French Empire’ by Anna Barker
For several years, University of Iowa literature professor Anna Barker has produced a steady blizzard of commentary on classic French literature: Hugo, Stendahl, Dumas, Balzac. In her debut book, 13 […]
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Book Review: ‘The Black Superwoman & Mental Health: Power & Pain’
Toni Morrison once said, “For me the history of the place of Black people in this country is so varied, complex and beautiful.” I read the influence of Mother Morrison’s […]
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Book Review: ‘Malleable and True: A Hybrid Craft Anthology from BRINK Literary Journal’
I have read many craft books, taken gobs of writing classes and read all manner of literature. In my personal time, I tend toward writing that challenges me as a reader […]
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Book Review: ‘More Hell: Stories, Tilled and Driftless’ by Adam Al-Sirgany
The book oozes with palpable Midwest dread, as I like to call it, with nods to Iowa City and the Quad Cities tossed in. It also helped me reflect on my own Midwestern background.
Posted inArts & Entertainment
Book Review: ‘The People are Kind: A Religious History of Iowa’ by Bill R. Douglas
As a student of history, political activist and an award-winning freelance historian, Bill R. Douglas brings his diverse, rich background to bear on a question that tugged at his soul: […]
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Book Review: ‘The Monsters We Make: Murder, Obsession, and the Rise of Criminal Profiling’ by Rachel Corbett
All through college, and for several years after, I was a self-professed true crime girlie. I suspect my interest sprung from watching CSI with my parents growing, nestled up in […]
