Some Wednesday Readings - Sept. 2, 2026

Wendell Berry’s Affections – Gary Houchens at The Imaginative Conservative. 

Wendell Berry (1934-2026) – Jeffrey Bilbro at Front Porch Republic.

 

The Witness of Wendell Berry – C. Christopher Smith at Cultivating Communities.

 

The Swap Not Heard ‘Round the World: Ordering the Declaration’s Grievances – Rpbert Parkinson at The Journal of the American Revolution.

 

The Highdays & Holidays of Old London – Spitalfields Life.

 

Your Guide to Dolly Parton’s Crime Movies – Olivia Rutigliano at CrimeReads. 

 

Photograph: Wendell Berry (1934-2026).

Some Wednesday Readings - Aug. 19, 2026

The Joy of Baseball – Daniel Darling at One Little Word. 

Know your rights as an author and don’t get scammed – Nathan Bransford.

 

Submerged memory: C.S. Lewis and the art of forgetting – Henry Oliver at The Common Reader.

 

Remembering Blaise Pascal’s Night of Fire – Emily Kleinhenz at The Imaginative Conservative.

 

On the third day: On the religious illiteracy of college students – The New Criterion. 

 

Child – poem by Sonja Benskin Mesher.

 

Britain: How taboos have stifled truth – Guy Dampier at The Critic Magazine.

 

Short Story, Deep Treasures: Biblical Allusion in “The Gift of the Magi” – John Savoie at Literary Matters.

 

Flashback: The Uses of a Novella – my post at the American Christian Fiction Writers blog.

 

Painting: Blaise Pascal about 1691.

Some Wednesday Readings - June 24, 2026

Great Americans: ‘We’re Going to Take Back the Airplane’ – Colleen Shogan at The Free Press. 

There Are More than Five POVs – Lincoln Michel at Counter Craft.

 

Murder in disguise – Carl Trueman at World Magazine.

 

“The Moonlight,” poem by Yvor Winters – Joseph Bottum at Poems Ancient and Modern.

 

Move Over, Mario Puzo – Dwight Longenecker at The Imaginative Conservative.

 

Charlie Jones, Photographer – Spitalfields Life.

 

A.R. Ammons and arts patronage – Henry Oliver at The Common Reader.

 

The Hardest Part of Fatherhood – Chris Martin at FYI.

 

Writers and Their Houses – Jay Parini.

 

Photograph: poet and writer A.R. Ammons (1926-2001). 

Some Wednesday Readings - April 29, 2026

Language matters: On the media’s anti-American animus – The New Criterion. 

Churchill and the Debt Battle That Made America a Superpower – Amity Shlaes at The Coolidge Review.

 

How Lewis and Clark Invented the Western – Craig Fehrman at Literary Hub.

 

Does reading do us any good? – Flora Champy at Aeon.

 

“Raining cats and dogs,” and other sayings with critters in them – Anthony Esolen at Word & Song.

 

I’m Not a Content Creator. I’m a Writer – Samuel D. James at Digital Liturgies.

 

The Mersey Funnel: Liverpool Metropolitan Cathedral – Andrew Eberlin at Photos, photographers and photobooks. 

 

The Great Lost Gothic Novel of Italian Romanticism – Idara Crespi at CrimeReads.

Illustration: Meriwether Lewis and William Clark. 

Some Wednesday Readings – April 1, 2026

On Judging Books – Matt Reynolds at Mere Orthodoxy. 

Waking Up Chancellorsville – Chris Mackowski at Emerging Civil War.

 

Canada wants to make quoting the Bible illegal – Jane Stannus at The Spectator.

 

What Memoir Scandals Tell Us About Two LLM Writing Scandals – Lincoln Michel at Counter Craft.

 

The Abolition of the Hereditary Lords & the Death of England – John Horvat at The Imaginative Conservative.

 

Activism, Uncensored: No Kings in LA – Ford Fischer at Racket News.

 

Traveling America and Lecturing Like a Madman – Bradley Birzer. 

 

What Are Iran’s Centers of Gravity and How Are They Being Attacked? – John Spencer at Urban Warfare. 

 

Photograph: A hall in the Palace of Westminster in London, home of the House of Commons and House of Lords.

Some Wednesday Readings

The Nobody Inn and Radical and Dissenting Newington Green – A London Inheritance. 

Warch Pakistan Closely: The Other Front in the Iran Crisis – John Spencer at Urban Warfare. 

 

Why Movies Suck – Andrew Klavan at The New Jerusalem.

 

In Praise of Poetry and Form – Steven Knepper at Kirk Center.

 

British Culture Under Attack – By Its Curators – Joanna Williams at City Journal.

 

Saint Patrick’s Breastplate – Anthony Esolen at Word & Song.

 

Splendour of Fire, Speed of Lightning: Learning from St. Patrick – Paul Kingsnorth at The Abbey of Misrule.

 

“We had a great time here on St. Patrick’s Day” – Bert Dunkerly at Emerging Civil War.

 

St. Patrick – a sonnet by Malcolm Guite.

 

A Booster Dose of COVID White Pills – Yuri Bezmenov at How to Subvert Subversion.

 

Photograph: Statue of St. Patrick by Rashmi via Unsplash. Used with permission.

Some Wednesday Readings

Love Along the Raid: A Morgan’s Raiders Love Story – Caroline Davis at Emerging Civil War. 

Old Tom’s Ash Wednesday – Bradley Birzer.

 

T.S. Eliot’s Long Lent – Dwight Longenecker at The Imaginative Conservative.

 

Britain: Westminster is running out of time – Lee Cain at The Critic Magazine.

 

The Vikings of Orkney – Warren Frye at The New Criterion.

 

Concerning Kipling – poem by George Bradley at Literary Matters.

 

Photograph: Ring of Brodgar Stone Circle and Henge, Orkney Islands, Scotland – Maxwell Andrews at Unsplash. Used with permission.

Some Wednesday Readings

  

The Beauty Around Me – Brian Miller at Notes from an East Tennessee Farmer.

 

The Forgotten Battle of Menotomy – Michael Ruderman at American Heritage.

 

Freedom is still the Revolutionary War’s legacy – Michael Aulin at The Spectator.

 

John Adams and the Rubicon of Lexington / Concord – Chris Mackowski at Emerging Revolutionary War Era.

 

A Phone that Does Not Ring – David Bannon at Front Porch Republic.

 

250^th Anniversary: Benedict Arnold’s War Begins, April 22, 1775 – Emerging Revolutionary War Era.

 

Agrippa Hull: A Revolutionary Story – Talya Leodari at The Journal of the American Revolution. 

Drama at the Old North Bridge - Rick Atkinson at American Heritage.

Painting: John Adams about 1775. 

 

Some Wednesday Readings

Things Worth Remembering: America is an Invention – Dominic Green at The Free Press. 

Wokeness as a Tax on Human Nature – Samuel D. James at Digital Liturgies. 

 

On Teaching Fairy Stories by Junius Johnson – review by Aimee Davis at Story Warren.

 

What a Victorian Novel Teaches About Friendship and Civil Order – Eric Malczewski at Front Porch Republic.

 

The New York Times and the Case of the Missing Knife – Mike Pesca at The Fre Press.

 

Ten Years After – Greg Sullivan at Sippican Cottage.

 

Trouble, Trials, and Vexations: The Journal and Correspondence of Rachel Perry Moores, Texas Plantation Mistress, edited by Thomas Cutrer – book review by Greg Romaneck at Emerging Civil War.

 

The remarkable journey of George Foreman – Edmond Davis at Baptist News Global.

 

Two Christians Made a Show about Jews. It’s Phenomenal – Batya Ungar-Sargon at The Free Press.

 

How Artists Communicate: A Look at Johannes Vermeer – Sara Swacina at Faith on View.

 

Painting: Woman Holding a Balance, il on canvas (1662-1663) by Johannes Vermeer (1632-1675), National Gallery of Art, Washington, D.C. 

Some Wednesday Readings - March 12, 2025

Britain: Multiculturalism contra justice – Sam Bidwell at The Critic Magazine. 

Shrouded Veterans: Destitute Cavalryman Plagiarizes Mark Twain – Frank Jastrzembski at Emerging Civil War.

 

Hermitess and Green Man – Paul Kingsnorth at The Abbey of Misrule.

 

Time Keeps on Slippin’ – Joe Duke at Front Porch Republic.

 

What’s a Trade War and How Did We End Up in One? – Tim Challies.

 

We’re All George Smiley Now – Ana Siljak at Mere Orthodoxy.

 

After Romanian Election Mess, The West’s Foundation is Crumbling – Matt Taibbi at Racket News.

 

25 years on: how Somerset House became a center for contemporary art – Martin Bailey at The Art Newspaper.

 

March 11: The Telegram That Won the War – Lincoln Demotes McClellan – Jason Clark at This Is the Day. 

 

Photograph: Somerset House in London by Robert Bye via Unsplash. Used with permission.

Some Wednesday Readings

I really didn’t think politicians were giving substantive speeches of ideas anymore, the kind with thesis statements, the marshaling of evidence, and a compelling call to action. Whether you’re a supporter or not, that’s what Vice President J.D. Vance has been doing. He gave two speeches in Europe that are still ricocheting back and forth across the ocean – one at the AI conference in Paris and one at the security conference in Munich. Weeks later, people are still talking about them. Christian Hacking at The Critic Magazine says Vance was right about free speech in Britain; Madeleine Kearns at The Free Press interviews the grandma arrested by Scotland’s speech police. N.S. Lyons at The Upheaval says Vance’s real message to Europe was give up the information war. And he’s continuing to speak; at a recent National Catholic Prayer Breakfast in Washington, D.C., he said that “foreign misadventures” have sometimes led to the eradication of historic Christian communities. 

Mad Monks and Alchemists – Paul Kingsnorth at The Abbey of Misrule.

Murders for March – Jeremy Black at The Critic Magazine.

How Movie Theaters Got Their Start in America – Dave Roos at History.

Data and Social Media Effectiveness – Chris Martin at FYI.

Sewing Kit Save: Clement Evans – Phil Greenwalt at Emerging Civil War.

Civil War Era Themes in Mardi Gras Celebrations, 1880-1940 – Neil Chatelain at Emerging Civil War.

The American West – Writing Advice from John Steinbeck – William Groneman at Cowboy State Daily.

Photograph: John Steinbeck.

Some Wednesday Readings

The Most Valuable Class I Ever Had – Chris Martin at FYI.

The Nazis Did Not ‘Weaponize’ Free Speech. They Crushed It – Andrew Roberts at The Free Press.

Catchin’ Sheeps: The Value of Hard Work – Kirk Brooks at Front Porch Republic.

No winners in Germany – Elisabeth Dampier at The Critic Magazine.

Bedazzled by Brainwork – Andrew Klavan at The New Jerusalem.

Here and There: Reading Hannah More – Joseph Bottum and Karen Swallow Prior at Poems Ancient and Modern.

A BBC Documentary – Brought to You by Hamas – Adam LeBor at The Free Press.

Lydia Maria Child and the Anguish of War – Frank Cirillo at Emerging Civil War.

“End of Winter,” poem by Luise Gluck – Andrew Roycroft at New Grub Street.

The Jumblies Sail Again – poem by Jennifer Trafton at Rabbit Room Poetry.

Engraving: Lydia Maria Child.

Some Wednesday Readings

The speech Vice President J.D. Vance gave at the Munich Security Conference last week continues to reverberate. I don’t think I can recall a recent speech that has had as much reaction and response as this one, and it was on top of the one Vance gave at the Paris meeting on artificial intelligence. The Critic Magazine in the UK said Europe deserved it; The Spectator says it sent shockwaves across the continent. Matt Taibbi at Racket News looked at the reaction and said the mask has dropped. 

To prove Vance wrong, CBS followed German police who made arrests for violations of speech, and somehow managed to prove Vance right. Ben Domenech, a former CBS newsman, wonders why CBS has developed a penchant for censorship. 

Meanwhile, the new Administration in Washington makes its first move against sex trafficking. Oliver Wiseman at The Free Press describes what’s happening overall in Washington as the “everything is broken” administration. 

More Good Reads

Patrick Colquhoun and the Thames River Police – A London Inheritance.

Mud – Brian Miller at Notes from an East Tennessee Farmer.

The (British) police are ruining their reputation – Fred de Fossard at The Critic Magazine.

5 Tips for Writing Page-Turning Historical Fiction – Julie Hartley at Writer’s Digest.

“Street Light,” poem by John Crowe Ranson – Sally Thomas at Poems Ancient and Modern.

Photograph: Poet John Crowe Ranson in 1941.

Some Wednesday Readings

How Novels Carried Me Through Suffering – Lara D’Entremont at A Faithful Imagination.

Gustav Klimt – Painting the Land – George Bothamley at Art Every Day. 

 

How American Educators Are Conning Kids – Frannie Block at The Free Press.

 

The Civil War Diary of Emma Mordecai by Diane Ashton – reviewed by James Hill Wellborn III at Emerging Civil War. 

 

One of the Best Fiction Books I’ve Read – Erik Raymond at The Gospel Coalition

 

Face of a Saint: Thomas Aquinas’ Appearance Revealed After 750 Years – Alyssa Murphy at National Catholic Register.

 

The Ruthless Elimination of Paragraphs – Samuel D. James at Digital Liturgies. 

 

The Prophet of Trump’s Second Term – Matthew Continetti at The Free Press.

 

The Codevilla Tapes – David Samuels at Tablet Magazine (from 2019; related to The Free Press article immediately above).

 

Vision in February – poem by Daniel Mark Epstein at The New Criterion.

 

Painting: Church in Unterach on the Atttersee, oil on canvas (1916) by Gustav Klimt (1862-1918). 

How My Novel Originated in the Family Bible

When I was young child, I asked my father what the package was that sat on a shelf in his closet. It was wrapped in brown grocery bag paper and tied with twine. “That,” he said, “is the family Bible, and one day it will be yours.” 

That day came during a visit home to New Orleans about 25 years later. Apologizing for the sorry state it was in, my father thought I might find someone in St. Louis to restore it. Instead, I did the time-honored thing and put in on a closet shelf. I did find a conservation box to store it in, and I did handwrite a copy of the four pages of family records. But it sat on the shelf, just as it had sat before.

 

But as I studied the family records, I noticed that the entries for births, deaths, and marriages were all in the same hand, presumably that of my great-grandfather Samuel. He’d even signed his name on an inside cover page. Samuel was something of a family legend, a legend which my later research showed was almost entirely untrue. But he’d certainly written all of the entries.

To continue reading, please see my post today at the ACFW Blog.

Some Wednesday Readings

 

What Socrates Teaches Us About Love, Politics, and Death – Agnes Callard at The Free Press.

 

5 a.m. – Brian Miller at Notes from an East Tennessee Farmer.

 

The Terrorist Who Murdered My Cousin Now Walks Free – Gideon Black at The Free Press.

 

Matter Matters – Paul Kingsnorth at The Abbey of Misrule.

 

Blood, squalor, and a taste of things to come: 4 literary adventurers on Japan’s invasion of China – Jeffrey Meyers at The Critic Magazine.

 

AI Can Replace Work, But Not Worth – Cameron Fathauer at Digital Liberties.

 

Hugh A. Garland Jr. and the Old South – Joseph Ricci at Emerging Civil War. 

 

Our National Precipice – poem by Kenneth Horne at Society of Classical Poets.

 

Virgil and the Christian Imagination – Paul Krause at The Imaginative Conservative.

 

The Lord’s Corner – poem by Tyree Daye at South Writ Large.

Some Wednesday Readings

Why Literature Still Matters – Louis Markos at The Imaginative Conservative. 

Horrific Price: The Unlimited Courage of Apollo 1 – Jason Clark at This is the Day.

 

When art goes to war – James Panero at The New Criterion.

 

Spin – artwork by Sonja Benskin Mesher.

 

Walking the Fault Line – Srikanth Ready at the Poetry Foundation.

 

Immigration – Kit Swartz at Gentle Reformation.

 

Book Interviews: Iron Harvest by Mick Jenkinson – Paul Brookes at The Wombwell Rainbow. 

 

On Courage – Adam Smith at Front Porch Republic. 

 

Going Medieval – Andrew Klavan at The New Jerusalem.

 

“A Flower Given to My Daughter,” poem by James Joyce – Joseph Bottum at Poems Ancient and Modern.

 

The Biggest Policy Change of the Century – Christopher Caldwell at The Free Press. 

 

Photograph: James Joyce (1915) by Alex Ehrezweig.

 

Kindness on the Mountaintop

The Winter 2025 edition of Cultivating Oaks Press is now online, and the theme of this issue is kindness. You can read a number of essays and articles on the subject, and the authors include Annie Nardone, Amelia Friedline, Tom Darin Liskey, Rob Jones, Amy Malskeit, Lara d’Entremont, Matthew Clark, Christina Brown, Junius Johnson, Kirk Manton, Sam Keyes, Sheila Vamplin, and several more. 

I have a short story on the theme, “Kindness on the Mountaintop,” and you can read it here.

 

Photograph by Jess Zoerb via Unsplash. Used with permission.

 

Some Wednesday Readings

 

Things Worth Remembering: The Zionism of Martin Luther King, Jr. – Douglas Murray at The Free Press.

 

Onward – artwork by Sonja Benskin Mesher.

 

Winter’s Cold and Storms in Civil War Art – Brian Swartz at Emerging Civil War.

 

Diaspora 64 – poem by Oliver de la Paz at Literary Matters.

 

Trump is Uncool. And That’s a Good Thing – Peter Savodnik at The Free Press.

 

“I Sought the Wood in Winter,” poem by Willa Cather – Sally Thomas at Poems Ancient and Modern.

Some Wednesday Readings

Papa’s Century – David Warren at Essays in Idleness. 

“The Sensation of Seeing”: How T.S. Eliot Defamiliarizes the Christmas Story – Carter Johnson at Front Porch Republic. 

 

“Twelfth Night,” poem by Sally Thomas – Joseph Bottum at Poems Ancient and Modern.

 

Inside Columbia University’s ‘Museum of Terror’ – Maya Sulkin at The Free Press.

 

Sherlock Holmes vs, the KKK: Sir Arthur Conan Doyle, the Civil War, and Slavery – Kevin Donavan at Emerging Civil War.

 

Faith on the Hill: The religious composition of the 119^th Congress – Jeff Diamant at Pew Research Center.

 

Lincoln’s Conservative Advisor: Attorney General Edward Bates by Mark Neel – review at Civil War Books & Authors.

 

In the Winter Garden – Spitalfields Life.

 

Poet Laura: New Year, New Lists – Dheepa Maturi at Tweetspeak Poetry.

 

Je suis Charlie, ten years on – Freddie Attenborough.

 

Top photograph: Edward Bates, Attorney General under Abraham Lincoln. 

Some Wednesday Readings

Thou shalt not pray? – Lois McLatchie at The Critic Magazine. 

What Salman Rushdie Doesn’t Want to Talk About – Douglas Murray at The Free Press.

 

Writing in Spare Moments of Life – Terry Whalin at The Writing Life.

 

Confederate Guerillas: Effective Commands or Detrimental Service? Part 1 and Part 2– Daniel Welch at Emerging Civil War. 

 

Morphing: Lessons from Year of the Monarch – Dheepa Maturi at Tweetspeak Poetry.

 

Bookish Diversions: Lewis and Tollkien, Pen Pals – Joel Miller at Miller’s Book Review.

 

3 Goals for Writing Great Historical Fiction – Ryan Coleman at Writer’s Digest.

 

“I, Being a Woman and Born Distressed,” poem by Edna St. Vincent Millay – Sally Thomas at Poems Ancient and Modern.

 

Generations by Jean Twenge – book review by Samuel D. James at Digital Liturgies.

Photograph: Mosby's Rangers during the Civil War, with John Mosby in the center wearing a feathered hat.

Some Wednesday Readings

Massacre at St. Louis: The Road to the Camp Jackson Affair and Civil War by Kenneth Burchett  - review at Civil War Books and Authors. 

What does it mean to be Christian? – Steve Dew-Jones at The Critic Magazine.

 

My Journey From a Jerusalem of Ghosts to the Living Jerusalem – Niall Ferguson at The Free Press.

 

“Digging,” poem by Edward Thomas – Joseph Bottum at Poems Ancient and Modern.

 

The Ironclad St. Louis at Lucas Bend, Missouri – Greg Wolk at Emerging Civil War.

 

Letter #140: The Great Remarriage – Spencer Klavan at The New Jerusalem.

 

Why Gen Z Men Like Me Are Staying in Church – Luke Simon at The Gospel Coalition.

 

Is The Book of Common Prayer Still Useful Today? – Michele Morin at Living Our Days. 

 

Illustration: A contemporary drawing of the St. Louis Riot, also called the Camp Jackson Affair, on May 10, 1861.