‘Some fires can’t be contained . . . ‘
“The first installment in Hot in Chicago, a brand-new, sizzling series from Kate Meader that follows a group of firefighting foster siblings and their blazing hot love interests!”
Posted on October 17, 2016
Dirty Waters: Confessions Of Chicago’s Last Harbor Boss
By Steve Rhodes
“In 1987, the City of Chicago hired a former radical college chaplain to clean up rampant corruption on the waterfront. R. J. Nelson thought he was used to the darker side of the law – he had been followed by federal agents and wiretapped due to his antiwar stances in the sixties – but nothing could prepare him for the wretched bog that constituted the world of a Harbor Boss,” the University of Chicago Press says.
Go on.
Posted on October 7, 2016
Upton Sinclair’s Hell
By The Accidental Shakespeare Theatre Company
The Accidental Shakespeare Theatre Company presents Hell, a Verse Drama and PhotoPlay (1924), a fiery, humorous staged reading directed by Chris Aruffo. This rarely seen verse play by Upton Sinclair will be performed Saturday at 2 p.m. at the McKaw Theater, 1439 W. Jarvis Avenue.
After exposing the evils of the meat-packing industry in his Pulitzer Prize-winning novel The Jungle, Sinclair set his sights on militarism, jingoism, and capitalism itself.
Posted on October 4, 2016
Don’t Let U.S. Prosecute Professor Over Book About Computer Security
By The Electronic Frontier Foundation
The Electronic Frontier Foundation has asked a court for an order that would prevent the government from prosecuting its client, security researcher Matthew Green, for publishing a book about making computer systems more secure.
Green is writing a book about methods of security research to recognize vulnerabilities in computer systems. This important work helps keep everyone safer by finding weaknesses in computer code running devices critical to our lives – electronic devices, cars, medical record systems, credit card processing, and ATM transactions. Green’s aim is to publish research that can be used to build more secure software.
But publishing the book, tentatively entitled Practical Cryptographic Engineering, could land Green in jail under an onerous and unconstitutional provision of copyright law.
Posted on October 3, 2016
A Journey Into The World Of Chicago’s Feral Cats
With An Assist To Chicago’s Rats
“It all started when a rat ran over author Anne E. Beall’s husband’s foot outside their Chicago home.”
Posted on September 30, 2016
The Homesick Phone Book
By SIU Press
Terrorist attacks, war, and mass shootings by individuals occur on a daily basis all over the world. In The Homesick Phone Book, author Cynthia Haynes examines the relationship of rhetoric to such atrocities.
Aiming to disrupt conventional modes of rhetoric, logic, argument, and the teaching of writing, Haynes illuminates rhetoric’s ties to horrific acts of violence and the state of perpetual conflict around the world, both in the Holocaust era and more recently.
Posted on September 28, 2016
Donald Trump And The Return Of Seditious Libel
By Richard Tofel/ProPublica
In 1733, New York printer John Peter Zenger began publishing the eighth newspaper in the American colonies, and the first willing to venture criticism of the government. The New-York Weekly Journal was the second paper in a city of 10,000 or so people, 1,700 of them slaves.
As we are reminded in Richard Kluger’s comprehensive new book, Indelible Ink, the first full-length account of Zenger’s travails, by 1735, Zenger (and the likely editor of his paper, James Alexander) had so offended Britain’s royal governor of New York and New Jersey, William Cosby, that Cosby brought suit against Zenger for seditious libel – the crime of criticizing the government.
Under the law then in effect in Britain and its colonies, truth was not a defense to this charge. The leading legal treatise of the day explained that “since the greater appearance there is of truth in any malicious invective, so much the more provoking it is.” And: “The malicious prosecution of even truth itself cannot . . . be suffered to interrupt the tranquility of a well-ordered society.”
This was deemed especially the case with true attacks on those in power, as they would have “a direct tendency to breed in the people a dislike of their governors and incline them to faction and sedition.”
Posted on September 26, 2016
Meet Chicago’s Newest Vampire*
Mayor Creates Office Of Supernatural Affairs
“Merit, Chicago’s newest vampire, is learning how to play well with others. Other supernaturals, that is.
“Shapeshifters from across the country are convening in the Windy City, and as a gesture of peace, Master vampire Ethan Sullivan has offered their leader a very special bodyguard: Merit.
Posted on September 20, 2016
The Wrigley Riddle
Who Would Want To Sabotage The Stadium?
“Next up to the plate: book six in our early chapter book mystery series, where each book is set in a different American ballpark!
“Ivy-covered walls – they’re the most famous part of the Chicago Cubs’ historic ballpark, Wrigley Field. Mike and Kate can’t wait to get down on the field to see the ivy for themselves.
“But when they do, they’re horrified to discover patches of the ivy have been ripped away! Who would want to sabotage the stadium? Is it someone trying to curse the Cubs? Or is the rumor of a treasure hidden under the ivy tempting greedy fans?”
Posted on September 19, 2016
Casey, Illinois Just May Be The Guinness World Record Capital Of The World
By Deb Bohannon/Bolin Enterprises
It’s not every day that a small town of 3,000 receives national attention. However, Casey, Illinois has done just that with the help from Guinness World Records. Each year, thousands of travelers from Interstate 70 get off Exit 129 to see the unique attractions that have made it into Guinness’ world-famous book.
To understand Casey’s success, it’s best to look back to June 22, 2012. On that day, Jim Bolin received the record title World’s Largest Wind Chime from Guinness World Records. What started out as a dream to build something from his childhood memories and become a record holder ended up inspiring the addition of even more BIG things.
Since that day, Bolin and his team have created and achieved seven more World’s Largest record titles: the golf tee, knitting needles and crochet hook, pitchfork, wooden shoes, rocking chair and mailbox.
Posted on September 14, 2016