Miss Osborne’s Dream — All these things had worked strangely on Miss Osborne’s mind. That night her sleep was restless. She dreamed that she was home in Winthrop, and everything was as it had been before. In the dream, she thought that the trip to Ome had been a dream. Then she found herself…

Review of memoir by Stefan Zweig History as it was lived through (c. 1900–1942), with hindsight stripped away. E.g., the relief and jubilation when Chamberlain delivered his peace-in-our-time speech). Zweig is great at presenting the pre-WWI world view of well-off residents of Vienna, the hopes and fears of the international anti-war community during WWI, the challenges…

Excerpt from the unpublished book Grandad Jokes, So Bad They’re Good, Section — Speaking in Tongues 1 What do you say when someone dies in Venice? Gondolences 2 What illness is unique to gentiles? Goy-ter 3 What is COBOL? An ancient geek language. 4 The concord grape’s ambition was to become the raisin d’etre. His brother just wanted to be raisin’ hell. 5 What do rich Italians say to their babies?

Excerpt from the unpublished book Grandad Jokes, So Bad They’re Good 1801 In his dream a genie told him, “Catch fish.” He bought a fishing rod but couldn’t catch a thing. That night the genie told him, “Get reel.” 1802 The bug was proud that a town was named for her — Miss Tick, Connecticut. 1803 She was so upset to learn that her…

Review of novel by Olga Tokarczuk This book might be categorized as a “mystery,” because there are murders which are solved at the end. But what draws the reader in is the twisted mind of the narrator — a recluse who believes in astrology and loves animals and does good things for strange reasons. In fact…

Excerpt from the unpublished book Grandad Jokes, So Bad They’re Good. 1776 The sweet-tempered cow was always kine. 1777 Jack was a has-bean, before he got arrested for stalking. 1778 James Joyce was ahead of his time. Finnegan was woke. 1779 Snow White should have had sense enough not to eat an apple. Computers taste terrible. 1780 The author liked his steak done meme. 1781 The stealth…