Bradbury’s “Something Wicked This Was Comes” Wows Audiences at The Barter

#BarterTheatre #RayBradbury #SomethingWicked Breathtaking production values are both the strength and the weakness in The Barter’s current presentation of Something Wicked This Way Came. The costumes transport the audience beyond the nostalgic world of the 1950s, the time period for the play, into a fantasy world full of amazing and frightening creatures. Act I begins…

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Michael Sears “Saving Jason” Doesn’t Raise the Bar

#michaelsears #pennystock Saving Jason by Michael Sears is a fast-paced, contemporary mystery that most readers will find hard to set aside. Sears covers all the bases for the genre in this, his fourth novel. Jason Stafford, his hero, is a wealthy New Yorker with a tragic past. His first wife, a model (of course), was…

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Helicopter Parenting – Overparenting an Epidemic

#overparenting #childrearing #parental Helicopter parenting is the term for it. In The Overparenting Epidemic, George S. Glass, MD and David Tabatsky cast a wide net. The authors want to engage parents in an examination of their own parenting practices. Toward that end, the authors gently guide readers with self-assessment exercises and oblique anecdotes about some…

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Powerful, Profound Novel Looks at Racism in America Today

#leonardpittsjr #grantpark #racism Malcolm Toussaint is a haunted man. He was in position to save Martin Luther King from assassination but failed to move fast enough to get the civil rights leader out of harm’s way. Only nineteen years old on that fateful balcony in Memphis in April, 1968. the tragedy lodges in his subconscious.…

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Mystery Writing at its Best — The Collector by Steven M. Moore

Steven M. Moore’s most recent mystery novel, The Collector, is an impressive addition to the author’s Castilblanco-and-Chen series. The book is out is of the gate on the first page as a narrator awakens to find herself bound, gagged and locked in the truck of an automobile with another unknown female companion. The trunk opens…

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Pearl Harbor Galvinized the Nation and Brought the U. S. into the War

Seventy-three years have passed since the Japanese surprise attack on Pearl Harbor The attack took place during the early morning hours of December 7, 1941. President Roosevelt declared it “A date which will live in infamy” in his memorable speech to Congress just hours after the devastation was reported.  News of the attack galvanized the…

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Paperbacks Reshape American Culture

Ah, the lowly paperback. It has had a powerful impact on American culture. Author Paul Rabinowitz delineates the role it has played since first appearing for sale on American newsstands, drugstores, and coffee shops in the 1930’s. Her book, American Pulp: How Paperbacks Brought Modernism to Main Street, examines the often overlooked influence that the…

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Barter Theater Stage II “Driving Miss Daisy” is a Must See!

Barter Theater’s Stage II performances of Driving Miss Daisy continue through November 15. Go see the show!. If you have other commitments, cancel them. Driving Miss Daisy at The Barter Stage II is a once in a life time opportunity not to be missed. You may think you know the story from the movie starring…

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