Activity

The year before Denise met Robin, Billy was released on parole and attended a ribbon-cutting ceremony for a Community Computing Center in the poor near-north neighborhood of Nicetown. One of the many policy coups of Mayor Goode's popular two-term successor was the commercial exploitation of the cit…

a career of teaching high- school social studies in the city district, daring principals to fire him for his ebullient Trotskyism

He was remembering the nights he'd sat upstairs with one or both of his boys or with his girl in the crook of his arm, their damp bath-smelling heads hard against his ribs as he read aloud to them from Black Beauty or The Chronicles of Namia. How his voice alone, its palpable resonance, had made th…

[...] "Folks," the tour guide urged, "just sit back and drink it in." But that which can be drunk can also drown. Enid had slept for six of the previous fifty-five hours, and even as Sylvia thanked her for inviting her along she found she had no energy for touring. The Astors and the Vanderbilts, t…

Enid spoke first to her left-hand neighbor, Mr. Soderblad, a reassuringly ascoted and blue-blazered older Swede. "What's your impression of the ship so far?" she asked. "Is it really super authentic?"

"Well, it does seem to be floating," Mr. Soderblad said with a smile, "in spite of heavy seas."…