reviews

Stranger in a strange land... Author:  Shulem Deen The best memoirs take you inside a life completely unlike your own.  That’s what Shulem Deen does so effectively in his personal tale of transformation.  In All Who Go Do Not Return, he tells of his life as a strict orthodox Jew and his painful metamorphosis into a secular individual.  It’s an astonishingly powerful testament to the power of belief and individualism. Raised as an orthodox Jew, in the Satmar tradition, Deen rebelled a bit as a teen and chose to join the more restrictive Skver sect, eventually moving to New Square, [...]

Greek Mythology Meets Modern, Gut-Wrenching Fantasy Author: E.J. Wenstrom Mimicking the brutal and the strange of ancient mythology alongside the high fantasy and gut wrenching action of desperate warfare, Wenstrom does it again in her sequel to Mud. Rona, regretfully retrieved from the underworld through the lies of a fallen angel and the desperation of a guilt-ridden golem (Adem) seeking a soul, wants nothing but to die again. Yet the characters around her and the peaceful village with its strange militaristic preparations for an impending and long predicted Armageddon slowly work the ember in her soul to a blazing fire. The [...]

Nice threads... Authors:  Leslie Brunetta and Catherine L. Craig It may be the most amazing protein in the history of life on Earth.  Gradually modified over the past 400 million years, spider silk is renowned for its remarkable strength, its light weight and its incredible versatility.  It’s also completely recyclable.  Over the millennia, this unique biological tool has allowed spiders to achieve astonishing diversity, filling countless ecological niches across the globe.  In Spider Silk, journalist Leslie Brunetta and arachnologist Catherine L. Craig tell the story of this amazing substance. Eriophora transmarina, an Australian garden orb weaver, shows off her [...]