We close with a breathtaking collection of poetry: "Practice on Mountains", by David Bartone, the most original, expressive thinker and writer we’ve encountered on this rollicking university tour. (An understatement, to be sure.)... Read More

In 1861, knowing full well we Americans had our hands full fighting ourselves, the clever French made an all-out bid to annihilate the regime of Benito Juárez and claim Mexico, gaining a prized place in North America. With the 150th... Read More

In 1532, when Christianity first came to the Andes, Spanish colonizers translated Christian texts and music into the native languages and did their damnedest to open the hearts of Andeans to the message of Christ, virgin birth, and the... Read More

Jim Lichatowich’s "Salmon, People, and Place" is written with such a steady, knowledgeable hand that readers may get the false impression that salmon prospects in the Pacific Northwest must be improving if someone as qualified as... Read More

Sitting down and enjoying a good, tight essay, we can confidently say, is an acquired taste. Moreover, essays are terribly difficult to write, and publishers will tell you essay collections are second only to poetry in sales ineptitude.... Read More

Little did we know that Ohio University Press has a series of books on race, ethnicity, and gender in Appalachia. The latest, "Shake Terribly the Earth", is a tightly connected collection of essays from Sarah Beth Childers’s rural,... Read More

To understand Julian Hoffman’s goals in "The Small Heart of Things", you must consider two ideas from his preface: 1) “Awareness is becoming acquainted with environment, no matter where one happens to be,” in the words of Sigurd... Read More

Sara Elinoff Acker has been studying relationships, albeit the violent type. In "Unclenching Our Fists", she explores a litany of depressing questions, beginning with why some men become abusive and leading to the eyes-wide-open... Read More