by Joshua Hren | Nov 1, 2020
What Happened to Sophie Wilder: A Novel by Christopher R. Beha. Tin House Books, 2012. Paperback, 253 pages, $16. Reviewed by Joshua Hren In his new novel The Index of Self-Destructive Acts, Harper’s editor Christopher Beha makes grace a noisome concern, not least...
by Carl Rollyson | Oct 25, 2020
The Zealot and the Emancipator: John Brown, Abraham Lincoln, and the Struggle for American Freedom by H. W. Brands. Doubleday, 2020. Hardcover, 464 pages, $30. Reviewed by Carl Rollyson H. W. Brands has written perhaps his most fluent book, a constantly engaging study...
by Alfred Nicol | Oct 25, 2020
In Code: Poems. by Maryann Corbett. Able Muse Press, 2020. Paperback, 92 pages, $20. Reviewed by Alfred Nicol Maryann Corbett spent thirty-five years working for the Minnesota Legislature in the Office of the Revisor of Statutes. Here is how she describes the...
by William F. Meehan III | Oct 25, 2020
By William F. Meehan III The first of the original thirteen states to ratify the federal Constitution in 1787, Delaware occupies a small niche in the Boston–Washington, D.C., urban corridor along the Middle Atlantic seaboard. It is the second smallest state in the...
by Bruce P. Frohnen | Oct 18, 2020
Bruce P. Frohnen For decades, now, many among that ever-shrinking group of centrist and conservative academics have engaged in sometimes acrimonious debates over the sources and nature of our constitutional order. The debate centers on the question whether the United...
by Dan Rattelle | Oct 18, 2020
Wonder and Wrath by A. M. Juster. Paul Dry Books, 2020. Paperback, 85 pages, $14.95. Reviewed by Dan Rattelle It is difficult to imagine a more upstanding literary citizen than A. M. Juster. His work as an editor, lately of First Things and now at Plough,...
by Jeffrey Folks | Oct 18, 2020
Leading a Worthy Life: Finding Meaning in Modern Times by Leon R. Kass. Encounter Books, [2017] 2020. Hardcover, 407 pages, $21. Reviewed by Jeffrey Folks Leading a Worthy Life is in large part the intellectual and spiritual autobiography of one of America’s leading...
by Casey Chalk | Oct 11, 2020
The Napoleonic Wars: A Global History by Alexander Mikaberidze. Oxford University Press, 2020. Hardcover, 960 pages, $40. Reviewed by Casey Chalk Many, I’d imagine, would be intimidated by a 960-page book on the Napoleonic era. Or perhaps they’d be uninterested,...
by Matt Miller | Oct 11, 2020
Virgil Wander by Leif Enger. Grove Press, 2018. Paperback, 320 pages, $17. Reviewed by Matt Miller Small towns in American fiction have a history as varied as the landscapes they inhabit. Often stifling or enervating, as in the work of Nathaniel Hawthorne, Sherwood...
by Jason Jewell | Oct 11, 2020
The Bible and the Ballot: Using Scripture in Political Discussions by Tremper Longman III. Eerdmans, 2020. Softcover, 310 pages, $24.99. Reviewed by Jason Jewell The political involvement of American Protestant evangelicals has ebbed and flowed in the past century....
