What price a good meal? The question posed in the preface of The American Home Cookbook of 1932 is readily answered by its publishers: “Barring the obvious cost of materials, there is that priceless ingredient—interest.” Oh, those sage prophets of cookery books replete with gems like deviled sardines and jellied venison. They had no idea … Read more
I’ve been to a few weddings this summer, and it’s interesting. It seems that most of my generation waited until our late twenties, even our thirties, to get married. Then we’re waiting another ten years to have kids—right when a woman is up against the wall, biologically speaking. Forty is when doctors really start to … Read more
The other day, President Bush came to town to preach to a carefully preselected choir. Democrats and other issue pushers were exiled to a station about eight lanes of traffic away from the Xcel Energy Center’s sidewalk. The lefties chanted agendas and invited passing SUVs to honk. They carried signs that said things like “Kerry,” … Read more
There is a Gresham’s Law in music; bad tunes drive out good. On Sunday you hear a competent choir render a subtle and melodious anthem by Herbert Howells. You are then obliged to join in a repetitive praise chorus of the sort whose words and tune suggest that the righteous are those who have enjoyed … Read more
Jann WennerPublisher, Rolling Stone Dear Mr. Wenner, My name is Keith Pille. I am here to rescue you. Your magazine has become an atrocious ball of doo-doo, and I believe that nothing short of a top-to-bottom overhaul can restore it to its former glory. Please let me know a good time for me to show … Read more
If you can’t see the page below, click on the PDF (Acrobat) file at the bottom of the page to see Minnesota’s best babysitters.
In more than thirty books, Fisher, christened by John Updike as the “poet of the appetites,” changed the way Americans understood the art of eating. A self-made career woman and trail-blazing writer, Fisher served it up with style, whether the topic was her husbands, her lovers, or the fried-egg sandwiches she toted in her pockets … Read more
Don’t try to play the “my family are freaks card” with Burroughs. You ain’t gonna win, unless of course you too had monthlong family sleepovers on the front lawn or a physician-assisted faked suicide attempt to get excused from school forever. In his New York Times best-seller, Running with Scissors, Burroughs recounted a bizarre childhood … Read more
Writers familiar with the slow burn caused by repeated rejection will be delighted with this new novel, centering on just that. Evan Ulmer, one of many writers whose creative efforts go unappreciated, reaches his breaking point and takes matters into his own hands. After kidnapping an accomplished book editor and setting him up in a … Read more
Williams takes her time turning out masterful fiction—these twelve short stories comprise her first collection in more than ten years. The title story concerns a teenage girl who is coming to terms with the imminent death of her mother, and who is reluctantly suicidal herself (but “suicide was so corny and you had to be … Read more