Saturday Good Reads - August 28, 2021

You might think it was a story from The Babylon Bee or The Onion, but a writer for New York Magazine (we’re not talking conservative media here) took a look at the major news coverage of Afghanistan and discovered that the media are biased and routinely insert editorial judgments into their news stories. My question is, where has he been for the last 20 years?

 

Philip Caputo has written numerous novels, memoirs, and non-fiction books (including one that won the Pulitzer Prize); one of his best-known works is A Rumor of War, about Vietnam. He was among the last people evacuated from Saigon by helicopter in 1975. Caputo considered Kabul in 2021 and realized it was no Saigon. It’s worse.

 

Hilma Wolitzer lost her beloved husband to COVID-19. She did what many do when they experience a tragedy and try to make sense of it – she wrote a novel about it. Wolitzer is 91.

 

William Kent Krueger has written a long-running mystery series as well as several coming-of-age novels (I’ve reviewed three of them). Writing for CrimeReads, he explains that he doesn’t consider himself a mystery or crime writer, but a storyteller.

 

More Good Reads

 

Afghanistan

 

9 Things You Should Know about the Taliban – Joe Carter at The Gospel Coalition.

 

Did WhatsApp just cost America Afghanistan? – Preston Byrne at The Critic Magazine.

 

What collapse of the Afghan gov't means for Christians and other religious minorities – Bobby Ross Jr. at Get Religion.

 

Rough statecraft: Biden’s Machiavellian moment – Patrick Porter at The Critic Magazine.

 

Poetry

 

“The Secret Garden” and “A Hawthorn Leaf” – Brian Yapko at Society of Classical Poets.

 

Writing and Literature

 

The Turning Point review – how Charles Dickens built Bleak House – Anthony Quinn at The Guardian.

 

Life and Culture

 

Considering the forthcoming metaverse – Neville Hobson.

 

Society, Change, and Covid19 – Andrew L. Gardner.

 

The last Everly brother: Don Everly’s death officially marks the day the music died – Jordan Tyldesley at The Critic Magazine.

 

Classical patricide – Victor Davis Hanson at The New Criterion.

 

Faith

 

When It Feels Like Evil is Winning – Andrea Sanborn at A View of the Lake.

 

Bearing Burdens, Being Gods – Chris Martin at Terms of Service.

 

American Stuff

 

Family Reconstruction – Katy Berman at Emerging Civil War.

 

What America Is – C. Bradley Thompson at The New Criterion.

 

Here I Am, Lord – Choir & Orchestra of St. Lillian

 Painting: Portrait of a Man Reading, oil on canvas on board (1922) by Barnett Freedman (1901-1958).