Louise Erdrich

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Our lady who art in Kenwood seems to have an endless supply of spooky and captivating tales that read like campfire legends. Her Native American characters often have one foot in the modern world and the other in a misty, spirit-populated Indian landscape that is quickly disappearing. The heroines in her latest book are a … Read more

Subderma: Paintings by Chris Mars

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Did Chris Mars live through (or die from?) the Black Plague in a former life? His paintings of ghoulish, skeletal crowds and beseeching wraiths, set in gloomy environments that hark back to medieval villages, seem too vivid to have come purely from the imagination. Cruel and creepy, yet with a visceral beauty, Mars’ storytelling on … Read more

The Ruin

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If you were seeking God, you probably wouldn’t think to look in Inver Grove Heights. The fast-growing St. Paul suburb is a good place to buy a fleet of used Cessnas, or a truckload of corn chips, potash, or mechanical heart valves. At the town’s center stands a massive petroleum refinery—a strange, stippled city of … Read more

Cabo De Roca, Portugal

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Enjoying the most recent issue of the Rake at Cabo De Roca in Portugal, the western most point of continental Europe. “where the land ends and the sea begins” (and people read the Rake). Author(s) and Location: Mark and Deb Skoine

Playa del Carmen, Mexico

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Nick writes: This is my beautiful wife Shelley on our honemoon in Playa Del Carmen, in Mexico. She loves the Rake and not just for the articles. Keep up the great work. Author(s) and Location: Nick Reetz

Seal Beach, CA

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Nora Wilson and her mother Tracy take a break from giving birth (and being born) to read a first bedtime story. Author(s) and Location: Tracy and Nora Wilson

It's after Labor Day. What would Scott Seekins wear?

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This season, as you know, black is the new black. That puts local artist and object d’art Scott Seekins in a bit of bind. A sartorial and tonsorial marriage of Tom Wolfe and Marsden Hartley’s Adelard the Drowned, Seekins has long stood out here in the land of the bland, with his trademark seasonal shift … Read more

Water of Life

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Every time I take the boat down Stranraer Sound, I think of Saint Brendan. A Celtic monk, Brendan set sail toward the setting sun with fourteen of his confreres in a whimsical endeavor to find the Island of the Promise of the Saints. Spoilsports (i.e., my academic colleagues) tell you his charming tale is an … Read more

Stronger Vines, Tastier Wines?

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The tradition of growing grapes is almost as old as the hills on which they’re planted. But when we picture those vine-covered hills, most of us would sooner conjure Tuscany, Bordeaux, or the windswept Carneros Valley of California than Hastings, Minnesota. Yet increasingly, places like Hastings, Putney, Vermont, and Long Island, New York, are being … Read more