Book review Tuesday: Wolf Hall, by Hilary Mantel

I never thought I was a historical fiction lover until I discovered Hilary Mantel. She is a master at resurrecting worlds from the past, breathing life into them, and making well-told stories compelling in new ways. Wolf Hall is the first in a series of historical novels by Mantel focusing on Thomas Cromwell, who was […]

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Sound advice Thursday: To Long Distance or Not to Long Distance?

Dear Steph, I’ve been dating a great guy for about six weeks. However, he is about to leave town for about a year, traveling around the country for his job. We really like each other, and he keeps telling me about his plans to come visit, and has requested that we keep talking, emailing, and […]

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Book review Tuesday: Detroit, An American Autopsy, by Charlie LeDuff

I grew up eight miles north of Detroit – eight miles north of Eight Mile Road, the dividing line between the city and the suburbs – in a comfortable, cute, safe, suburban city called Birmingham. Our little city’s neat streets were lined with trees, kids played outside, and everyone drove an American car. Birmingham was […]

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An adventure in the Free State

Yesterday, Al and I and two of his work friends, Ash and Sarah, spent the day in the Free State, one of the provinces bordering Gauteng, where we live. Free State is a province that’s known in South Africa for being pretty boring and solidly Afrikaans, even though white Afrikaans people make up only 10% […]

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Book review Tuesday: Philida, by Andre Brink

In my effort not to be a complete ignoramus about the country I’m living in, I’ve been trying to read some South African literature and journalistic non-fiction. Being me, I’m doing much better with the fiction than the non-fiction. Whereas I haven’t been able to pick up Country of My Skull – a harrowing account […]

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iMadeFace

I’m sure I’m way late to this party, since I am, as we’ve established on many occasions, old, but I just discovered the iPhone app iMadeFace and it is SO FUN, you guys. It’s an app that lets you make portraits of people, real or imaginary, by choosing from an array of facial features, hair […]

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