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Literature

What’s behind our love-hate relationship with football?

By Mark Athitakis
Jan 23, 2026 3:06 pm - Though its release is timed to the height of the NFL postseason, Chuck Klosterman’s “Football” often seems inclined to put you off watching the sport. He muses at length about classic players and statistics, only to lament the dead-endedness of the debates they inspire.
‘Crux’ is a ferocious, poetic look at two teens drawn to danger

By Joan Frank
Jan 19, 2026 5:28 pm - Gabriel Tallent’s “Crux” is difficult and ferocious. Pushing through these pages — echoing its characters’ ordeals — requires resolve and stamina, but certain rewards abide.
A groundbreaking writer finds a novel way to air her grievances

By Hamilton Cain
Jan 19, 2026 5:04 pm - There’s ample polemic in Jeanette Winterson’s genre-bending “One Aladdin Two Lamps,” channeling her anger at patriarchy in a reimagining of “One Thousand and One Nights,” which she refers to simply as “Nights.” Hers is a disquieting book, awash in Jenny Holzer-like slogans, memories of a strict evangelical childhood, stories jigsawed together and sudden, breathtaking insights.
The perfect little book to get you through winter’s doldrums

By Laurie Hertzel
Jan 13, 2026 2:42 pm - Winter, Val McDermid writes in her new book of short essays, “Winter: The Story of a Season,” is a time of energy, bonfires and holidays.
‘Homeschooled’ recalls a formidable mother and a vexed education

By Becca Rothfeld
Jan 05, 2026 1:01 pm - When the novelist Stefan Merrill Block moved from Indianapolis to Plano, Texas, at age 8, he struggled to fit in. “I try to call it ‘home,’” he recalls in his absorbing new memoir, “Homeschooled,” but “the word feels pasted on with a glue stick.” From fourth through eighth grade, Block was a victim of a 1987 Texas court ruling that legalized home schooling.
Daytime star Susan Lucci appearing in Naperville Feb. 9

By Alicia Fabbre
Dec 31, 2025 12:01 pm - The queen of daytime television will be in Naperville in February to promote her new memoir, “La Lucci.” Anderson’s Bookshop will host a Q&A with the Emmy-award winning actress best known for her role as Erica Kane on “All My Children.”
A pop-culture skeptic on the 21st-century works that really matter

By Jacob Brogan
Dec 30, 2025 9:23 am - In his new book, “Blank Space” — one of Book World’s 50 notable nonfiction books of 2025 — the critic and historian W. David Marx argues that the last quarter-century has...
Artists, writers living in Dist. 214 invited to enter Arts Unlimited contest

Submitted by District 214
Dec 29, 2025 11:00 am - Northwest Suburban High School District 214 has announced its call for submissions to the annual Daily Herald and District 214 Arts Unlimited Art and Writing Contest. Submissions will be accepted through Feb. 13, 2026.
Please don’t call fangirls silly. They have more power than you think.

By Sibbie O'Sullivan
Dec 19, 2025 12:24 pm - Superfans, in particular fangirls, are nothing new. Think of the photographs of young women screaming and fainting at the sight of the Beatles or Elvis. In her exuberant historical romp, “Swoon,” Bea Martinez-Gatell goes back even further, to the overheated admirers of the attractively unavailable Lord Byron.
How Christmas traditions help spark holiday spirit

By Dave Heun
Dec 17, 2025 12:39 pm - It has seemed a little tougher to muster up the holiday spirit this year. Reflecting on Christmas traditions and seasonal events may help to get us in the right frame of mind.

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