For this year’s gift giving, enterprising shoppers might skip the malls and hit the Wintertime Farmers Market at Hope Artiste Village, where local, healthy, and tasty meet. It’s the place to go to make a colorful, fresh dish for tonight’s party, but the offerings extend beyond the fresh vegetables and fruit. Just ask Mark Kavanagh, […]
9 a.m., wolfing down a breakfast burrito, rushing over the suspension walkway toward the San Diego Convention Center, I end up standing in line outside for 4 ½ excruciating hours futilely trying to catch the coveted panel for Peter Jackson’s The Hobbit at the 2012 San Diego Comic-Con (SDCC). Alas, it was not meant to […]
“Tell me a story.” Put on the spot like that, one’s mind tends to go blank. Based on the context, and the identity of the person demanding the story, you might dust off your hazy recollection of Cinderella, Jack and the Beanstalk, or perhaps something more along the lines of Fifty Shades of Grey (no, […]
Somewhere, the spirit of Douglas Adams is crying foul over Sam Leith’s new novel The Coincidence Engine. Lifting from the Hitchhiker books Adams’ infinite improbability drive is a far more venial sin than abandoning the promising screwball comedy of the novel’s first half for a much deeper, darker, and incongruous exploration of the characters that […]
A female acquaintance of mine once complained about baseball that “All it is, is a bunch of guys standing around grabbing themselves and spitting for an hour, moving for maybe two seconds, then standing around grabbing themselves and spitting for another hour.” While this characteristic of baseball cannot be denied, there’s a lot more to […]
Film Festival Brings French Culture to Newport Salve Regina U brings a taste of French culture and film to Newport with their seventh annual French Film Festival. This excursion into Gallic culture includes dance, music, food and wine at opening and closing events, and features 6 films over two weeks, from Sunday, March 18 through […]
Two books take place simultaneously within the slim confines of Stewart O’Nan’s new novel The Odds. One tells the story of a failed marriage, its two unhappy principals not filled with hate for each other, but worn down by their own and their partner’s mistakes and weaknesses. The other explores how desperation can drive people […]
Derby#: 420 Team(s): The Rats, The Killah Bees, and I am playing in my first Riveters bout this month..I’m so excited! Tagline: “Watch out or you’ll get hooked!” I got involved in derby because I thought it looked like a moshpit on rollerskates..awesome. I like that derby gives me an aggressive, positive outlet with the […]
From art & existential films to rock ‘n’ roll to lesbian vampires, Brown U continues bold programming As it enters its 19th year, Providence’s French Film Festival brings a greater variety of French-Language films to Rhode Island for local audiences. “We try to get films that can’t be seen here, but we’re also lucky to […]
There’s an iron fist inside the velvet glove that is Amy Franklin-Willis’ new novel, The Lost Saints of Tennessee, a story that, though it strays into sentimentality now and again, nevertheless depicts the small everyday challenges, successes and failures that define most lives with both empathy and unblinking realism. Ezekiel Cooper, 40, divorced, owner of […]