A fictional wartime journey from Carbondale to Cambodia and back

The third book in Mike Shepherd’s historical fiction trilogy of Mick Scott’s adventures as a soldier and a spy has an Illinois flavor, like the others, though it ranges to distant Cambodia

Get your kicks... on Springfield Stories and Route 66

When people think of Springfield history their minds usually turn to its favorite son. Thousands of books have been written about Abraham Lincoln, but there is much capital city lore to be brought to

Murder, intrigue, history, war & politics

Our annual book issue featuring local books and authors

This year’s crop of Illinois books and Illinois authors is particularly rich and interesting.To put Illinoisans in the spirit of the season, University of Illinois Press offers Christmas in Illi

The Angel of Death Row

Putting a face on corruption in Illinois courts

Angel of Death Row: My Life as a Death Penalty Defense Lawyer. Andrea D. Lyon. Kaplan Publishing, 2010. Hardcover. $24.95. Kindle edition $9.99, contains only “A Mother Accused,” a single

The glories of Illinois high school football

During the first days of September, as temperatures across Illinois remain in the 80s, it is difficult to think about the cool weather of fall and the excitement of Thanksgiving weekend when high scho

Medicine meets literature

SIU’s literary magazine brings together the best of both worlds

A humorous quote by author and physician Anton Chekhov is on the introduction page to SCOPE, SIU School of Medicine’s 17th annual literary magazine: “Medicine is my lawful wife and literat

Late-in-life journey

A novel of rejuvenation in old age

In an old Cher movie called Moonstruck, Olympia Dukakis is talking to her 40-plus-year-old daughter (Cher) about getting married and having a baby. Cher protests that she’s too old for a baby. O

All the Midwest’s a Stage

St. Louis author will sign books in Springfield on May 18

If you were to stop four random strangers on a St. Louis street and ask for their opinion of William Stage’s book Fool for Life (Floppinfish) the question might elicit the following responses:&b

Chicago political conventions, stories from Lincoln to Clinton

Chicago alderman to discuss his book at presidential museum May 10

Chicago Alderman Edward Burke’s career as an author had an unlikely beginning. “I was sitting at a table with a writer and professor named Craig Sautter,” recalls Burke. “We we

The epic labor struggle in the ‘Decatur war zone’

As the 19th century prepared to turn into the 20th, a cataclysmic confrontation between labor and management occurred in the steelmaking town of Homestead, Pa., pitting the wealthy Carnegie Steel Co.