The University Bookman

Reviewing Books that Build Culture

Defending the Christian Faith

“In 100 Tough Questions For Catholics: Common Obstacles To Faith Today… David G. Bonagura, Jr. gives bite-sized answers to dozens of big questions about the faith.”

Geopolitics and the Making of the Modern World

“Brands’s book should find a ready audience among those interested in developments in the international scene over the last century. It is particularly effective in dealing with the threat that China’s emerging power and influence pose to the West today…”

The Context for Human Dignity

“While the twentieth century was still sporadically marked by remnants of Christian influence and dominance, the twenty-first has seen the final divorce of the secular and sacred, and the consequences are evident. What Leo XIII warned of, the evils he battled, have been let loose, paradigmatically captured by Artificial Intelligence which poorly imitates and devalues that which makes us essentially human… We would do well then to read Hittinger’s book in reflecting on how to face these challenges.”

Between Greatness and Hubris

“At the core of [the book] is the notion that while America is an exceptional nation, we are not immune from the perils that beset past countries and empires.”

Budziszewski Lecture in Grand Rapids

by Staff | Oct 12, 2017

The Society for Law and Culture is joining with the Christian Legal Society in sponsoring a lecture by J. Budziszewski titled “Natural Law: Why and So What?” The event will be held at Cooley Law School in Grand Rapids, MI, on Thursday, November 2, 2017, beginning at...

Which Alexander?

by Staff | Oct 8, 2017

The First European: A History of Alexander in the Age of Empire by Pierre Briant, Translated by Nicholas Elliott. Harvard University Press, 2017. Hardcover, 496 pages, $35. After Alexander the Great died, a wilderness of legends about the boy-conqueror flourished. In...

Reclaiming Corrington

by Daniel James Sundahl | Oct 8, 2017

The Southern Philosopher: Collected Essays of John William Corrington edited by Allen Mendenhall. University of North Georgia Press, 2017. Paperback, $30. I’m guessing it was spring of 1991; Andrew Lytle was on my college campus to receive an honorary Doctor of...

Attack of the Theses

by Staff | Oct 1, 2017

Remembering the Reformation: An Inquiry into the Meanings of Protestantism by Thomas Albert Howard. Oxford University Press, 2016. Hardcover, 216 pages, $40. Even if a person somehow did not know 2017 marks the quinquennial of the Protestant Reformation, she soon...

Sharing Nixon’s Ear

by Chuck Chalberg | Oct 1, 2017

Nixon's White House Wars: The Battles That Made and Broke a President and Divided America Forever by Patrick J. Buchanan. Crown Forum, 2017. Hardcover, 436 pages, $30.To read Pat Buchanan’s memoir of his tour of duty during President Richard Nixon’s White House wars...

Bridging the Gap to Patrick Henry

by Staff | Sep 24, 2017

Patrick Henry: Champion of Liberty by Jon Kukla. Simon & Schuster, 2017. Hardcover, 592 pages, $35.Judging by the local Barnes & Noble, the success of Hamilton: An American Musical has brought about a Federalist renaissance. Two years after its debut, as...

The Happy Skeptic

by Staff | Sep 24, 2017

Benjamin Franklin: The Religious Life of a Founding Father by Thomas S. Kidd. Yale University Press, 2017. Hardcover, 288 pages, $30. John Adams once commented of his senior colleague, Benjamin Franklin, that “the Catholics thought him almost a Catholic. The...

Transylvanian Dreams and Nightmares

by Staff | Sep 17, 2017

Powers of Darkness: The Lost Version of Dracula by Bram Stoker and Valdimar Ásmundsson, Translated by Hans Corneel de Roos. Overlook Press, 2017. Hardcover, 320 pages, $30.Dracula appeared first in a dream. In a journal entry dated March 8, 1890, Bram Stoker writes,...

A French Murder and Its Aftermath

by Staff | Sep 17, 2017

Laëtitia ou la fin des hommes by Ivan Jablonka. Paris: Le Seuil, 2016. Paperback, 400 pages, €21.On the night of January 18, 2011, Laëtitia Perrais, an eighteen-year-old French girl, was brutally murdered near the village where she lived in the Nantes region. She’d...