In his latest, journalist and creative nonfiction professor Jobb richly embellishes his grim central tale with carefully researched setting, detail, and social mores of the late Victorian era, elegantly contrasted with his eponymous fiend, Thomas Neill Cream (1852-1892), “a doctor from Canada” and “a new kind of killer, choosing victims at random and killing without remorse.” Read more
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Twain, whose given name was Samuel Langhorne Clemens, built “Stormfield” in 1908 in the style of a Tuscan villa and named it after his short story “Captain Stormfield’s Visit to Heaven,” according to the listing with Laura Freed Ancona of William Pitt and Julia B. Fee Sotheby’s International Realty, who brought the home in Redding to the market on Saturday. Read more
At long last, Paulo Coelho’s The Alchemist—international bestseller, Guinness World Record holder (for most translated work by a living author), inspirational parable, and um, favorite novel of everyone you know who doesn’t really read novels—is coming to the big screen. Read more
…dictators sense the danger of poetry, which is why poets in their regimes are routinely imprisoned, tortured, killed or forced into exile. Read more
Women love true crime. While certainly not a universal truth, it’s a generalization that feels apt enough that even SNL has noticed. On February 27, the song spoof “Murder Show,” aired to general acclaim — if the women I follow on Twitter are any indication. As the skit begins, Nick Jonas leaves his girlfriend alone for an evening of unwinding and self care. Bubble baths and sheet masks come to mind. But as soon as he shuts the door behind him, she curls up on the couch, opens Netflix, and breaks into song about the specific delight of watching murder shows. Read more
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What initially looks like a collection of loosely linked short stories reveals itself to be an expertly constructed house of mirrors. Read more
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In this important work of biographical history, novelist Sohn traces the career of Anthony Comstock (1844-1915), special agent to the U.S. Post Office and secretary of the New York Society for the Suppression of Vice. For more than 40 years, Comstock, a deeply Christian dry goods seller from Connecticut, harassed and imprisoned many of the important pioneers in the birth control movement. Read more
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Like many writers, García Márquez began in newspapers. Aficionados and newbies alike should consider “The Scandal of the Century and Other Writings,” a wide-ranging collection illuminating the real-life political concerns and characters that shape his celebrated fiction. Read more
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A scholar of totalitarianism argues that new laws restricting the discussion of race in American schools have dire precedents in Europe. Read more
Mr. Vance, 36, enters the campaign as a well-known and well-financed first-time candidate facing an open field. The Republican incumbent, Senator Rob Portman, is retiring after two terms. The race is one of a few in next year’s midterm elections that could determine which party controls the upper chamber of Congress, which is now split 50-50. Read more
