Tag Archives: nonfiction

Various authors: An Omnibus Review Of Books About Christmas In History And Tradition

Tony von Renterghem’s When Santa Was a Shaman (Llewellyn Books, 1995) Clement Miles’s Christmas Customs and Traditions: Their History and Significance (T. Fisher, Unwin, 1912; Dover, 1976) John Ashton’s A Righte Merrie Christmasse!!! The Story of Christ-Tide (Benjamin Blom, 1968 … Continue reading

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Philip Saville’s Hans Christian Andersen: My Life as a Fairytale

Andrea S. Garrett wrote this review. Hans Christian Andersen: My Life as a Fairytale is a made for cable production specifically created for the Hallmark Channel. I can think of very few good things to say about this movie. It’s … Continue reading

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Kenneth J. Bindas’s All of This Music Belongs to the Nation

The Federal Music Project was designed in 1935, as a part of the Works Progress Administration (WPA), to employ musicians who had been hard-hit by the Great Depression. (Roosevelt’s social programs formed a model for similar Canadian programs that are … Continue reading

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Robert S. Koppelman’s Sing Out, Warning! Sing Out, Love! The Writings of Lee Hays

You all recall Mister Lee Hays: the bass singer from The Weavers. He was last seen in the Weavers reunion film Wasn’t That a Time. He passed away shortly thereafter. Robert S. Koppelman, assistant professor of English at Broward Community … Continue reading

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Stephen Gammond’s Woody Guthrie: This Machine Kills Fascists

Woody Guthrie was truly a legend in his own time. Nearly 40 years after his untimely death, the legend continues to grow, as does his influence on American music. Bob Dylan and Bruce Springsteen, to name just two popular singer-songwriters, … Continue reading

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Douglas Adams and Mark Carwardine’s Last Chance to See

Reading Last Chance To See is a bit of an odd experience these days, what with the much-loved primary author having gone prematurely extinct himself. That being said, Last Chance To See is a joy, a reminder of what we’ve … Continue reading

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Joe Sacco’s Palestine: the Special Edition

This lovely edition of Joe Sacco’s classic graphic novel Palestine is being promoted as “celebrating fifteen years of … Joe Sacco’s groundbreaking work of comics journalism.” So, it’s not a graphic novel? It’s “comics journalism.” OK, I’ll buy that. Whatever … Continue reading

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J. K. Van Dover’s Making the Detective Story American

The past decade has witnessed a dark flowering of detective stories in genre fiction, from the Harry Dresden series to the more recent “weird-boiled noir” of Paul Tremblay’s The Little Sleep and China Mieville’s The City & the City, not … Continue reading

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Gail Holst-Warhaft’s Road To Rembetika

Judith Gennett wrote this review. Sometime during the late nineties our radio station in Texas received an archival rembetika CD from Rounder Records. It all sounded Greek to me, but then I began to read the lyrics. Pick-pockets, jail, knife … Continue reading

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Jeff Evans’ Midsomer Murders: The Making of an English Crime Classic

As I noted in my review of the first set of Midsomer Murders DVDs, which Acorn Media has released here in the States: Midsomer Murders series is based on the novels by Caroline Graham, with scripts written by some of … Continue reading

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