‘America’s Final Beginning’ a clumsy, preachy novel written by a beginner. I offer this review as a good definition of what is commonly known as a “program novel” or a “propaganda novel”: a novel that is written to portray a message but that forgets the first requirement of a novel is to tell a good […]
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Why fiction is good for you Jonathan Gottschall is getting a lot of mileage from the recent publication of his book The Storytelling Animal: How Stories Make Us Human. In this piece he addresses the issue of whether fiction in all its forms—TV shows and commercials, religious beliefs, and social commentary as well as novels,
“writing and reading can allow people to live other lives and to try things out symbolically so that we can make better decisions about what we value and do. There is no guarantee, of course, that reading and writing make people act more wisely. But, writing and reading, by expanding our experience and repertoire of
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If you were holding your breath in anticipation of HBO’s series based on Jonathan Franzen’s novel The Corrections, it’s time to exhale. Despite a stellar cast, the series has been scrapped: the decision came down to adapting the book’s challenging narrative, which moves through time and cuts forwards and back. While that works in the
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The high temperature today here in St. Louis is supposed to hit 90, with mid to high 80s forecast for the next week. Summer is setting in, and it’s time to begin lining up summer reading choices. Matthew Irwin of the Santa Fe Reporter offers up his choices in SFR’s incomplete and totally biased guide
Pekkanen, Sarah. The Opposite of Me: A Novel Simon & Schuster, 2010 Kindle Edition: ISBN 978-1-4391-3475-7 Former journalist Pekkanen’s debut novel presents a full-life makeover. Lindsey Rose has spent her entire adult life climbing the corporate ladder. At age 29 she’s on the brink of a big promotion at her high-level ad agency
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Gottschall, Jonathan. The Storytelling Animal: How Stories Make Us Human Houghton Mifflin Harcourt, 2012ISBN 978-0-547-39140-3 Recommended “We are, as a species, addicted to story. Even when the body goes to sleep, the mind stays up all night, telling itself stories,” declares Jonathan Gottschall in the preface to his recent book The Storytelling Animal. Gottschall, a member
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The Truth Versus Twilight This site, a collaboration between the Burke Museum and the Quileute Tribe, aims to set the record straight about the culture that forms the backdrop for Stephanie Meyer’s Twilight saga. Made famous by the recent pop-culture phenomenon Twilight, the Quileute people have found themselves thrust into the global spotlight. Their reservation,
About 10 years ago I read the book Woman as Healer because that is a topic I’ve long been interested in. A couple of years later I decided to go back to school to study for a doctorate in humanistic psychology. I had already enrolled at Saybrook before I realized that the author of Woman
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Edgar Nominees and Winners. Congratulations to all the nominees and winners of the Edgar Awards.
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