Book review: Border, by Kapka Kassabova (Amazon / Book Depository) This book tells the human story of the last border of Europe. It is where Bulgaria, Greece, and Turkey converge and diverge, borders being what they are. It is also where something like Europe begins and something else ends which isn’t quite Asia. This is... Continue Reading →
A Sociologist Explores “The Science of Fear”
Book review: Scream: Chilling Adventures in the Science of Fear, by Margee Kerr (Amazon / Book Depository) Last year I'd read enough spooky nonfiction to make a list for October, but this year I didn't have enough appropriate titles to compile one (though you can also terrify yourself by just browsing the "true crime" tab). But the positively wonderful... Continue Reading →
The Roadside Culinary Culture of the American South
Book review: Road Sides, by Emily Wallace (Amazon / Book Depository) There are miles left to go, meals left to eat, junque left to buy, stories left to collect. Folklore historian Emily Wallace writes that "roadside hyperbole is a thing I tend to heed": she can't see a sign proclaiming the best, or occasionally the worst, of something... Continue Reading →
Tracing Cryptids and Culture in the Great Bear Rainforest
Book review: In the Valleys of the Noble Beyond, by John Zada (Amazon / Book Depository) I owe so much to Last Podcast on the Left. If I hadn't started listening to it, with its frequent hilarious dives into the world of cryptids, I never would've considered picking up a book about Sasquatch. Horizons, consider... Continue Reading →
Advice From The Forests of Russian Fairytales
Book review: Ask Baba Yaga, by Taisia Kitaiskaia The Hairpin is one of those sites I always mean to read, then don't. I've read some great pieces there, also some that are too hipster for my taste. Apparently one long-running feature of the site was an advice column, featuring the typical everyday problems of life,... Continue Reading →
How a World Meets Its End
Book review: At the End of the World, by Lawrence Millman (Amazon / Book Depository) In the winter of 1941, when most of the world was concerned with the Second World War raging in Europe, a different drama was unfolding on the remote Belcher Islands of Canada's Hudson Bay. In a religious frenzy, three Inuit... Continue Reading →