“I once heard that most people die with music in their heart,” said cello teacher Biana Kovic. Wanting to do something about it, the young woman sought volunteers for a project she had in mind: to find out if older people could learn... Read More

In her elegant, short volume of essays, Patricia Vigderman asks questions about possibility and its opposite. These are complicated essays to read, not in the sense that they are difficult to understand, but because the author makes a... Read More

In this revealing analysis of the legal profession, researcher Susannah Sheffer interviews long-time capital defense attorneys with the goal of answering this question: How does it feel to know that your job is to save a person’s life?... Read More

Since umbrellas normally are not difficult to operate, they seldom come with instruction booklets. This "Umbrella", however, could well use a warning: Notice—what follows is not your usual novel. There are 448 pages with no chapter... Read More

Helena Goscilo, Chair and Professor in the Department of Slavic and East European Languages and Literatures at Ohio State University, has edited a remarkably satiating, intelligent anthology featuring short stories by twenty-three of... Read More

Ben Miller’s "River Bend Chronicle" contains 472 pages of circuitous, dense, and nonchronological essays harboring geodes of insight carried along by a cast of characters ranging from riotous to pitiful. Framing this autobiographical... Read More

When it comes to the cultural revolution of the ’60s and ‘70s, the hippies get the lion’s share of attention. However, it was the Beat Generation of the ’50s that actually pioneered the drug and sex culture that later grew into... Read More

Although the seven chakras are now accepted concepts among yoga practitioners and those who study and engage in meditative or other “alternative” spiritual practices, they were exotic when C. W. Leadbeater set pen to paper in the... Read More