Adam Cohen is a journalist, lawyer, and author of a handful of American history books, generally with a legal and ethical focus. He’s written about eBay, FDR, the Supreme Court, and most recently, a famed shipwreck.

If you missed my review of his excellent book, Captain’s Dinner, check it out now:

I was glad to be able to interview Adam about the book, shipwrecks, and some of his favorite history reads.

1. I’ve read a lot of shipwreck books, and plenty featuring cannibalism, but I haven’t read any that spent so much time on the (fascinating) philosophical and legal repercussions. Why do you think that dimension has been largely absent from historical disaster/tragedy books? If it’s covered at all, it’s often in a single chapter or epilogue.

In most shipwreck stories, people do what they want (or need) to do, and they are never held accountable. They kill people, they eat people — if they run out of food — and if they survive in the end, they simply return to their lives. The Mignonette shipwreck is different because when the survivors were rescued, they thought they would simply be allowed to go home — but instead, they were arrested and put on trial for murder, for killing the cabin boy and eating him.

Their murder trial became one of the great criminal cases in British legal history — and one that is also widely studied in America. So, this story of the killing and eating of Richard Parker, the cabin boy, is both an adventure story and a story about justice — about what is the fairest thing for society to do to the men who killed and ate him.

2. What surprised you the most about this story once you got into the research? Did you have any preconceptions that got thrown to the wayside?

I began with a strong sense that it was wrong for the captain the kill the cabin boy so that he and the other adults in the lifeboat should survive. I didn’t change that view, but it took on a lot more nuance for me when I read the grim details of what life was like in the lifeboat, and read up on the biology of thirst and starvation. The men’s mouths were so parched that they were making guttural, barking noises. They were so weak they could barely function. The more I read about what it actually felt like, the more I understood what the captain did — even if I still cannot approve of it.

3. Is the law around “the custom of the sea” still debated? Is it different from country to country, or do legal systems tend to agree on what’s right and wrong these days?

The truth is, this issue has largely faded away due to advances in technology. In the Age of Sail, the era in which my story occurred, shipwrecks were common. Being stranded without food or water was common. Cannibalism at sea was, if not common, not all that unusual. But 1884, the year the Mignonette was lost, was toward the very end of the Age of Sail. Steamships quickly replaced sailing ships. Ships soon had radio equipment to summon help.

So the “custom of the sea” was not needed. But the issue of whether killing one person to save several people remains a lively issue in philosophy and law school classes, and it is greatly debated there. The opinion of the Lord Chief Justice in this case has been very influential — it changed not only British law, but American law. I don’t want to say more, though, so as not to give away what happens.

4. Any recommendations for folks who want to further explore this niche subject area of law, ethics, and disaster?

A few things. There is a famous Harvard Law Review article from the 1949 called “The Case of the Spelucean Explorers” that reimagines the Mignonette case as the case of stranded cave explorers in the distant future, who kill and eat one of their fellow explorers, and are put on trial for murder. It offers five possible court rulings. It’s a classic inquiry into the moral issues of the case.

There’s also an essay called “Why Kill the Cabin Boy” from 2020 in which a British medical ethicist applies the lessons of the Mignonette case to the debate at the start of the Covid-19 pandemic about how to allocate ventilators when there are not enough to go around.

For people looking for something lighter, there is a much-loved episode of the TV show The Good Place on “The Trolley Problem,” which raises the same ethical issues.

In addition to my book, I wrote an article for Harvard Magazine called “The 1884 Cannibalism-at-Sea Case that Still Has Harvard Talking” that explores some of the key issues.

5. Legal writing is not exactly known for its page-turning qualities. How did you learn to spin such a readable yarn? Are there any particular authors or books that model what you try to do with your writing?

I actually think there has been so much great writing about the law and legal cases. When I was growing up, my parents had a classic two-volume collection by Ephraim London called The Law in Literature and The Law as Literature. One volume was particularly literary writing in the law — opinions, transcripts, and so forth. The other volume was legal subjects written about in great literature — short stories, excerpts from novels, and so on. It’s great, and I read it a lot as a child. I’ve also enjoyed many of the great books about the law — Harper Lee’s To Kill a Mockingbird, Truman Capote’s In Cold Blood, Richard Kluger’s Simple Justice — and so many more.

6. Beyond being just an interesting tale, how do think this story and subject matter can still speak to us? What does it have to say to modern readers?

The moral dilemma at the heart of the book is whether the captain was justified in killing one innocent person, the cabin boy, to save three other people, himself and the other two crew members. That issue is timeless. In philosophy, it is the debate between utilitarians and those who believe in rights-based theories of justice.

The utilitarians say a bad act can be justified if it avoids greater harm — kill the cabin boy to save three lives. The rights-based people say that some acts, like murder, as simply wrong — the cabin boy has a right to live, even if his death could save more lives. This question about utilitarianism is very alive today. If you read the essay I recommended about allocation of ventilators, you’ll see that it applied very directly in emergency rooms in England during the Covid pandemic.

7. Do you have any personal favorite shipwreck books?

There are so many great ones, including some recent ones, like Julian Sancton’s Neptune’s Fortune. But Robinson Crusoe will always be my favorite.

8. More broadly, what have you read and enjoyed lately?

It’s not a shipwreck story — except allegorically speaking — but I’ve been enjoying Maggie Haberman and Jonathan Swan’s book Regime Change about President Trump’s second term. I was also deeply affected by The Pope at War: The Secret History of Pius XII, Mussolini, and Hitler. I’m currently reading Stefan Zweig’s classic memoir The World of Yesterday, a great writer’s reflection on the world he loved, which was wiped away by the Nazis. I think I need to look around for some more cheerful subjects.

9. Do you have a Mt. Rushmore of history books or authors? (Or a few options, if you can’t nail down four.)

There are so many. I really like books that wrestle with America’s great promise, and the ways in which we fall short. One that is at the very top of my list is J. Antony Lukas’s Common Ground, which I regard as an almost perfect work of history. I am also a huge Studs Turkel fan, and I cannot recommend his majestic oral history Working highly enough. In a completely different vein, I keep finding myself going back to Ernest Hemingway’s A Moveable Feast. Pure pleasure. I’m listening to the audiobook (again) now.

Thanks so much for reading! Who would like to see next in my interview series? Let me know!

-Jeremy

Less than two weeks ago, in my review of Eric Jay Dolin’s The Wreck of the Mentor, I wrote:

“No matter how many shipwreck books I read (Endurance, Into the Raging Sea, The Wager, In the Heart of the Sea, The Gales of November, The Perfect Storm . . . ), I can pretty much guarantee I’ll also want to read the next one that comes out.”

Turns out, there’s one that came out in late 2025 that escaped my attention until I interviewed author James Donovan. Adam Cohen’s Captain’s Dinner has everything I need in a book: a shipwreck, murder, cannibalism, and just enough moral philosophy to make you think without bogging the story down.

I was absolutely hooked on this thing from start to finish. Before diving in, though, let’s start with a joke:

You’re welcome.

The Wreck

Similarly to The Wreck of the Mentor, the actual shipwreck featured in Captain’s Dinner occupies a rather small portion of the narrative. That’s just fine, because the rest of it is fascinating. In 1884, Captain Tom Dudley and a crew of three other men were tasked with delivering a small yacht, the Mignonette, from England to its new owner in Sydney, Australia. Even if you aren’t geographically inclined, you’ll know that’s a long voyage. Really long. And this 50-foot boat was not made for ocean crossings.

As the Mignonette was rounding the southern tip of Africa, it encountered a wicked storm and sank. Thankfully, there was a small lifeboat for the men to hop into, which kept them afloat and alive for another few weeks. And that’s where things got really interesting.

The Custom of the Sea

Cannibalism has had a prominent place in survival narratives for as long as humans have existed on this planet. (Even earlier, when you consider cannibalism among animals.) In the most dire situations, it has indeed been necessary to consume human meat and blood in order to stay alive. In many cases, the person being eaten was already dead; in some situations, however, a sacrifice has been required.

On the ocean, where food and water are especially hard to come by, this scenario has not been uncommon. Crews of shipwrecked men would agree (theoretically) to draw lots, with the loser being summarily killed and consumed. This practice came to be known as “the custom of the sea.”

What makes the case of Captain Dudley and the Mignonette unique is that they didn’t follow that custom. When their food was gone and the fresh water (in the form of rain) disappeared, Dudley unilaterally decided that poor Richard Parker, the inexperienced 17-year-old, would have to be killed for the sake of the others’ survival. I’ll let you read the book to learn the details of how that scene transpired.

After the three remaining men were rescued just days later, they freely admitted what happened on the lifeboat. Nobody had ever been tried or convicted for this type of murder and cannibalism, so the crewmen had no reason to hide their actions.

From Barbary to Human Rights

The problem, for the men of the Mignonette, was that the Victorian Era was changing how the world viewed barbarism, morality, and human rights. The most prominent thinkers and writers, including the likes of Charles Dickens, were highlighting the welfare of children and preaching that humans deserve equal treatment and dignity, regardless of their station in life. That’s a big “duh” for us moderns, but was fairly revolutionary back then.

So Dudley and the others were pretty shocked when they were arrested and tried for murder upon their return to England. The legal case that followed marked a line in the sand, after which human rights would forever be legally enshrined. At its core, the case became a debate between the pragmatic view of human worth and the view that says every life, by its nature, is just as valuable as every other.

Why This Book Matters Today

Shipwrecks and murder and cannibalism always make for compelling narratives, but I really appreciated the unique angle of Captain’s Dinner. It elevated the story from just a grisly tale to one that can still speak to us today — in fact, this case is still taught in law schools. While not exactly the same, similar moral debates could be found during COVID: When ventilators ran short, would they be taken away from older folks and given to younger people? And with the advent of AI the question continues to pop up, like if a self-driving car has to determine the worth of a pedestrian’s life vs. that of its occupants.

Though admittedly not every reader will be as interested as me in discussions of utilitarianism vs. deontology (basically, “the ends justify the means” vs. “there is an absolute right and wrong, regardless of outcome”), the author deftly handles the debate without getting too philosophically detailed. This book is always very accessible because Cohen is just a hell of a storyteller.

Captain's Dinner is one of the best histories I've read this year. If you're drawn to shipwreck stories, or simply love books that force you to wrestle with difficult moral questions, it’s a must-read.

Get the book

Thanks so much for reading. Be good to each other. Don’t eat anyone.

-Jeremy

James Donovan is a best-selling author of American history books, covering a broad range of subjects from the American West to Apollo 11 to World War II.

If you missed my review of his great book, A Terrible Glory, check it out now:

I was glad to be able to interview James about the book, Custer, and some of his favorite American history reads.

1. What first drew you to studying and writing about Custer and Little Bighorn? (For me, simply being in the Black Hills — an incredibly beautiful and underrated part of the country — was enough to want to dive into learning about the people and events of that landscape.)

In 1998, a friend of mine who had written several books of history asked me if I wanted to do a coffee-table book about Custer and the Little Bighorn with him. I had only done a couple small books at the time, and I wanted to tackle something larger, so I said yes, and started reading up on the subject.

I got hooked on the story, which I think is one of the great American sagas, with a fascinating cast of characters on both sides, white and Indian, that is unparalleled. My co-author ended up bowing out of the project, but I finished the writing myself, and found a publisher, Voyageur Press, who agreed to publish it. A coffee-table book by nature can’t be an extensive account of its subject, so the result, Custer and the Little Bighorn, was fairly perfunctory—though I was quite happy with it at the time, especially since it included hundreds of images.

But my experience writing the book, and reading up on the subject, made me realize that there had been quite a bit of new research and analysis on the subject in the previous 20 years—John Gray’s ambitious time-motion studies, Douglas Scott and Richard Fox’s archaeological work and artifact pattern analyses, and Gregory Michno’s reinterpretation of the Indian testimony about the battle. But I couldn’t find a book that had put all these new findings together in a lively narrative history. So I took almost a year to craft a book proposal and found a literary agent who sold it to Little, Brown. I’ll always be grateful to the editor-in-chief there, Geoff Shandler, who believed in it and did a great job of editing the book, A Terrible Glory.

And to your point about that part of the country: I’ve visited the area many times since I began working on that first book, and like you, I fell in love with it.

2. Why do you think the Indian Wars — particularly on the Western frontier in the second half of the 19th century — remain so captivating for authors and readers alike?

If the United States is known for one thing around the world, it’s the Old West—men (mostly) on horseback (mostly), in conflict over many things. It’s a major part of our origin story. And of course there are some great stories and unforgettable characters, too.

3. It’s been 20 years since you researched and wrote A Terrible Glory. Have you kept up with Custer studies? Are there any addendums to this story? How has his reputation changed, for better or worse?

I try to keep up with the new information coming out, but I don’t think there’s a lot. A recent book entitled Custer’s Last Stand Demystified, by Phil Guarnieri and Bill Rini, is the best thing I’ve seen on the battle in a long time. It’s not a narrative of the battle. They address 16 topics and do an exhaustive and enlightening deep dive on each one, and in the process supply fresh and often intriguing answers to questions that have long been open to interpretation.

As far as Custer’s reputation, it’s been eroding for almost a century—since his wife Libbie, who worked hard to burnish his memory for almost sixty years after the battle, died in 1933. A year later a very biased biography about him was published—Glory-Hunter by Frederic F. Van de Water, and the title tells you the tack the author takes. But I do think some of the criticism is unjustified. Some people have turned him into a power-crazed monster who sacrificed his men in his quest for advancement and fame, and that’s just not accurate. Yes, he had a healthy ego, and he could be arrogant, but he had far more friends than enemies; he was quite possibly the most popular cadet ever to attend West Point.

He’s a classic example of the American success story—he was the son of a blacksmith who quickly rose to the top through great effort and ability, and married a smart, beautiful high-society woman. He loved her and his family more than anything; as a grown man, he would cry when he left his mother after a visit. But immediately after the battle, there was a disinformation campaign against him that largely worked, due to the simple fact that he was dead and easily blamed; facts were distorted by officers eager to avoid association with such a debacle.

What happened on the banks of the Greasy Grass on June 25, 1876, was a perfect storm of a defeat—just about every single thing that had to go wrong did, and there’s a lot of blame to go around.

4. Your other books feature the Alamo, Apollo 11, and a little-known D-Day mission. Is there a through-line that you return to? What types of stories pique your interest?

After the first three books—on the battles of the Little Bighorn and the Alamo, and on Apollo 11, one editor I know pointed out that they were all about men on the frontier. True, but Nothing But Courage doesn’t fit into that pattern. I only want to take on a subject if I can bring something new to it, and I think I have with each book.

5. What are you reading and enjoying lately?

I like a narrative work of history that reads like a thriller—like these recently published books:

• Say Nothing by Patrick Radden Keefe

• The Siege by Ben Macintyre

• The Gales of November by John U. Bacon

• Captain’s Dinner by Adam Cohen

• The Wide Wide Sea by Hampton Sides

6. Do you have a Mt. Rushmore of American history books or authors?

That’s a very tough question, and I’m not sure I can answer it . . . But: David McCullough was the gold standard, of course. And Walter Lord—author of A Night to Remember, Day of Infamy, Lonely Vigil, and many other excellent works—was a pioneer in using interviews to tell a riveting story. Finally, Samuel Eliot Morrison, author of Admiral of the Ocean Sea and several other books, was one of our greatest masters of narrative nonfiction. There are many others, of course, but those three should be on any Mount Rushmore of American nonfiction history writers.

Thanks so much for reading! Any authors you’d love to hear from? Let me know!

-Jeremy

• Published: 2008

• Pages (not including notes/index): 398

There’s no history subject more quintessentially American than the study of our Western frontier. From the earliest days of European settlement in America, there was a westward longing and a psychological pull towards new land. Contentment has never been part of our collective psyche. When those white settlers started acting on that longing, conflict with this land’s indigenous groups became inevitable.

Though it’s not a single war in the strict sense, the North American battles between whites and indigenous people, roughly between the 1620s and the 1890s, easily constitute America’s longest-lasting military engagement. One of the most interesting periods of that century-spanning conflict is the tail end, when some incredibly charismatic personalities clashed in a verdant valley in eastern Montana.

You probably know the names Custer, Crazy Horse, Sitting Bull, and Little Bighorn. But you may not know the full complexities of the battle that marked the beginning of the Indian War’s final phase.

James Donovan’s excellent book, A Terrible Glory, brings all those characters — and their final clash — into stark relief. Let’s explore.

Setting the Stage

A book like this — and there are many of them — is a challenge to write for many reasons. The context alone of U.S.-Indigenous interactions could take hundreds (if not thousands) of pages. A biography of one of the primary characters is likely easier; there’s a clear start, end, and point of view to keep the story focused. Donovan wisely used the first ~100 pages to set the stage and get us up to speed on the main characters as well as the immediate backstory for both the Plains Indians (largely Lakota) and the U.S. government/military.

On one side stood Lt. Col. George Armstrong Custer, a Civil War hero and a bit of a dandy whose appetite for glory was matched only by his confidence. Opposing him were two of the most influential Lakota men of the era: Sitting Bull, a spiritual leader whose vision helped unite factious tribes, and Crazy Horse, the brilliant (and also somewhat dandyish) warrior whose courage in battle had already become legendary.

Looming above all that — and above the entire 250-year history of this fight — was a collision of irreconcilable worldviews. The U.S. government sought to force American Indians onto reservations so that settlers and land-grabbers could stake their ownership. Unsurprisingly, the Lakota, Cheyenne, Crow, and others didn’t even understand that concept and simply wanted to preserve their sovereignty and way of life — which, to be clear, included copious warring, land theft, rape, and terrible violence between tribes.

An Inglorious End for Custer

It’s impossible to recap the entire story in a couple paragraphs. It’s simply too complicated and there are too many threads to follow. Plus, a short YouTube video does the trick as well as anything:

The beauty of a good book, though, is that it’s so much more than just a recap of what happened. Donovan’s detailed but propulsive battlefield narration put me right in the middle of that valley.

What stood out from the whole thing was that Custer’s end — the murder and mutilation of 268 United States soldiers, including Custer himself, at the hands of the Plains Indians — was the exact opposite of what he expected and most desperately desired. Custer’s hubris had him believing that no contingent of American Indians could be big enough, strong enough, or strategic enough to defeat even a small group of soldiers. No matter how many history books I read, I’m always amazed at how many defeats and downfalls started with hubris. (Most of them.)

Donovan did an excellent job showing that the battle was almost apples and oranges: the war aims and means for soldiers and Plains Indians was so different as to hardly be comparable — it generally worked in America’s favor, but not always.

Of course, what was considered a ghastly defeat for the U.S. military was a rollicking victory for the Plains Indians. But, it was a victory that would lead to their eventual demise. The entire ordeal is a tangle of eventualities and inevitabilities that can make your head spin.

The Lure of the West

Put simply, I can’t get enough American West stories. It’s a landscape I deeply love and its past is chock-full of some of the most colorful characters in our nation’s history. The West was, and still is, a place where America’s worst traits and most vitalizing ideas come to a head. Even if I got a touch bogged down in some of the militaristic details, Donovan did an excellent job setting the scene and capturing the complicated witch’s brew of the people and specific circumstances that led to the gruesome results at Little Bighorn. I have plenty more to read about this battle — A Terrible Glory was my first foray into it — but I can confidently say I’ll be recommending this book as an excellent starting point for anyone interested in the subject.

Thanks for reading. Be good to each other.

-Jeremy

• Published: 2026

• Pages (not including notes/index): 206

No matter how many shipwreck books I read (Endurance, Into the Raging Sea, The Wager, In the Heart of the Sea, The Gales of November, The Perfect Storm . . . ), I can pretty much guarantee I’ll also want to read the next one that comes out. It’s a feeling shared by plenty of readers — especially guys. There’s something uniquely terrifying and thought-provoking about the idea of being in a survival scenario at sea rather than on land — if you can survive that, you've proven your mettle in a whole different way.

You might think that shipwreck stories start to blend together after a while, but they’re all genuinely unique in some way. I can tell you exactly what happened in those books I listed above — even if the circumstances are broadly similar, the ships, the people, and the aftermaths are different enough to be memorable.

A Wreck in the Remote Pacific

In Eric Jay Dolin’s new The Wreck of the Mentor, the shipwreck itself was really just the introduction to the larger narrative. The heart of the story is how this whaling crew encountered, adapted, and survived — or not — landing on a remote Pacific archipelago called Palau. (It’s best known for being the site of 1944’s Battle of Peleliu.)

In 1832, the American whaleship Mentor was in the midst of a multi-year, round-the-world voyage when it wrecked on a reef in the remote reaches of the ocean. They knew roughly where they were, and that contact with indigenous people was their only hope of survival. The problem was that those interactions were impossible to predict. Dolin did an excellent job showing how different groups of people responded to white men on their shores — sometimes they rolled out the red carpet and other times . . . they didn’t. In the case of the Mentor’s survivors (there were 11 at the time of the wreck), there were actually multiple groups of people to contend with at different times.

Over the course of multiple years, the crewmen tried to get back to America, wrecked again on another island, and even ended up in forced servitude. It won't surprise you that far fewer than those 11 men ultimately made it home.

Every time I read a well-done history book, I’m impressed by the complexity of human nature. No situation is predictable and those who survive are those who can adapt and respond when expectations have gone sideways. In any survival story, there’s a blend of luck, skill, and sheer endurance — if the luck has broken your way, a lot of it simply depends on human will, which is always fascinating to read about.

What Worked and What Didn’t

Dolin hits on a lot of different threads in just over 200 pages: the history of Palau, the background of whaling/whalers in this era, previous shipwrecks in the region, white men who survived those previous shipwrecks and lived for decades with the native people . . . at some points, it actually felt like Dolin was digging too much into the context rather than keeping the main story moving (especially since the book is on the short side).

The Wreck of the Mentor wasn’t my favorite book in this sub-genre that I love, but it’s absolutely worth a read if you enjoy shipwreck/survival stories — especially because it doesn’t require much of a time investment.

Further reading: Dolin’s history of whaling, Leviathan, is excellent; Fur, Fortune, and Empire, a history of America’s fur trade, is also high on my list.

Thanks so much for reading. Be good to each other.

-Jeremy

Louis Sachar made an indelible impression on me as a young reader with his absorbing and wonderful children’s novel Holes. I regularly cite it as the story that turned me into an incurable reader. Nearly thirty years later, Sachar has once again left a mark on me.

In 1978, twenty years before Holes hit my bookshelf, Sachar published Sideways Stories from Wayside School. It’s a series of connected stories about an elementary school that was accidentally built sideways — the 30 classrooms are stacked atop each other rather than occupying a single floor.

I had no familiarity with this book until my lovely 8-year-old daughter asked me to read it aloud to her this week. She knew it from school and we recently snagged a free copy of it from . . . somewhere (I can’t keep track of all the places I acquire books). Each story is just a few pages and we breeze through a couple each night.

The story of Bebe, “the fastest draw in Mrs. Jewls’s class,” left me gobsmacked. I was moved by its playfulness and wisdom and I felt the need to share it with all of you. It may just change how you see art, creation, and doing good work — any good work, not just art. It’s especially poignant for the age of AI.

Bebe was a girl with short brown hair, a little beebee nose, totally tiny toes, and big brown eyes. Her full name was Bebe Gunn. She was the fastest draw in Mrs. Jewls’s class.

She could draw a cat in less than forty-five seconds, a dog in less than thirty, and a flower in less than eight seconds. But, of course, Bebe never drew just one dog, or one cat, or one flower. Art was from twelve-thirty to one-thirty. Why, in that time, she could draw fifty cats, a hundred flowers, twenty dogs, and several eggs or watermelons. It took her the same amount of time to draw a watermelon as an egg.

Calvin sat next to Bebe. He didn’t think he was very good at art. Why, it took him the whole period just to draw one airplane. So instead, he just helped Bebe. He was Bebe’s assistant. As soon as Bebe would finish one masterpiece, Calvin would take it from her and set down a clean sheet of paper. Whenever her crayon ran low, Calvin was ready with a new crayon. That way Bebe didn’t have to waste any time. And in return, Bebe would draw five or six airplanes for Calvin.

It was twelve-thirty, time for art. Bebe was ready. On her desk was a sheet of yellow construction paper. In her hand was a green crayon. Calvin was ready. He held a stack of paper and a box of crayons.

“Ready, Bebe,” said Calvin.

“Ready, Calvin,” said Bebe.

“Okay,” said Mrs. Jewls, “time for art.”

She had hardly finished her sentence when Bebe had already drawn a picture of a leaf.

Calvin took it from her and put another piece of paper down.

“Red,” called Bebe.

Calvin handed Bebe a red crayon.

“Blue,” called Bebe.

He gave her a blue crayon.

They were quite a pair. Their teamwork was remarkable. Bebe drew pictures as fast as Calvin could pick up the old paper and set down the new — a fish, an apple, three cherries, bing, bing, bing.

At one-thirty Mrs. Jewls announced, “Okay, class, art is over.”

Bebe dropped her crayon and fell over on her desk. Calvin sighed and leaned back in his chair. He could hardly move. They had broken their old record. Bebe had drawn three hundred and seventy-eight pictures. They lay in a pile on Calvin’s desk.

Mrs. Jewls walked by. “Calvin, did you draw all these pictures?”

Calvin laughed. “No, I can’t draw. Bebe drew them all.”

“Well, then, what did you draw?” asked Mrs. Jewls.

“I didn’t draw anything,” said Calvin.

“Why not? Don’t you like art?” asked Mrs. Jewls.

“I love art,” said Calvin. “That’s why I didn’t draw anything.”

Mrs. Jewls did not understand.

“It would have taken me the whole period just to draw one picture,” said Calvin. “And Bebe would only have been able to draw a hundred pictures. But with the two of us working together, she was able to draw three hundred and seventy-eight pictures! That’s a lot more art.”

Bebe and Calvin shook hands.

“No,” said Mrs. Jewls. “That isn’t how you measure art. It isn’t how many pictures you have, but how good the pictures are. Why, a person could spend his whole life just drawing one picture of a cat. In that time I’m sure Bebe could draw a million cats.”

“Two million,” said Bebe.

Mrs. Jewls continued. “But if that one picture is better than each of Bebe’s two million, then that person has produced more art than Bebe.”

Bebe looked as if she was going to cry. She picked up all the pictures from Calvin’s desk and threw them in the garbage. Then she ran from the room.

“I thought her pictures were good,” said Calvin. He reached into the garbage pail and took out a crumpled-up picture of an airplane.

Bebe walked outside into the playground.

Louis, the yard teacher, spotted her. “Where are you going?” he asked.

“I’m going home to draw a picture of a cat,” said Bebe.

“Will you bring it to school and show it to me tomorrow?” Louis asked.

“Tomorrow!” laughed Bebe. “By tomorrow I doubt if I’ll even be finished with one whisker.”

Each story in the book is a delight. If you haven’t read it yet, now’s the time.

-Jeremy

We’re halfway through 2026! Somewhere around the summer solstice, I like to take stock of my reading year: what were the highlights, lowlights, trends, gaps, etc. This year, I made the family participate as well. Here are everyone’s favorites so far.

JEREMY: My reading year has been heavily marked by diving into the vast world of Star Wars books. I’ve read about 15 this year, including some adjacent non-fiction titles. Brian Jay Jones biography George Lucas: A Life was a compelling, eye-opening look at the creator of the franchise; Lost Stars by Claudia Gray mixed coming-of-age, romance, moral complexity, and adventure. I really enjoyed both of them.

Taylor Jenkins Reid’s Atmosphere was also on my shortlist, along with my re-read of The Dog Stars.

JANE: Amity Gaige’s Heartwood was a favorite for both of us earlier in the year and has steadily held its place. It combined an outdoorsy survivor tale with an intense, unpredictable mystery, and added a lot of beautiful psychological depth and insight as well. Great stuff.

GRAHAM (11 years old in a week): Seemingly out of left field (for me), the eldest kid picked one of my favorite YA books of all-time. I hardly even knew he read The Giver, let alone enjoyed it, outside of a passing mention that his class went through it towards the end of the school year. Excellent choice, son.

WILLA (8 years old): The middle kiddo’s reading has been all over the board this year, but there’s been a constant as of late: constant re-reads of Vera Gosgol’s Be Prepared. Seems we have another one in the family who can’t resist an outdoorsy coming-of-age story. Good for her.

BO (5 years old): Willa has been reading to Bo a couple nights per week (so cute!) and apparently he has really enjoyed Super Pancake. I had no idea. Seems fun though!

Your turn! What’s been your favorite read of the year?

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It’s time, once again, to chat about our favorite reads of the previous month.

JEREMY: David McCullough gets the nod for the second month in a row; after a few months, I finally finished his magisterial Truman. Great stuff. On the fiction side, I re-read Tolkien’s The Two Towers. As good as ever and LOTR as a whole remains one of my all-time favorites.

JANE: My wife was riveted by Caro Claire Burke’s Yesteryear. The reviews have been fairly mixed, but Jane thought it was well done from start to finish and she tore through this story of a time-traveling tradwife.

GRAHAM (almost 11 years old): Our eldest really enjoyed Project Nought by Chelsey Furedi, a debut graphic novel that includes a bit of time travel. Cool.

WILLA (8 years old): Ever since our family stayed in Moss Landing, California (near Monterey) for a vacation a couple years ago, the middle kiddo has been obsessed with otters. We saw dozens in the wild and it was awesome. So it was really fun to read Odder together; Katherine Applegate weaves together a really creative story and Moss Landing even makes an appearance. I highly recommended this one as a family read.

BO (5 years old): Towards the end of Bo’s school year, local Duluth illustrator Jordan Sundberg visited his class to read a new book she illustrated called Northwoods Lullaby (written by Mary Casanova). It’s beautifully done and Jordan is a talented, delightful human — we own a number of her prints. Grab a copy for any little ones in your life!

Your turn! What was your favorite May read?

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Hello, readers! In today’s edition, I’m giving you short and sweet reviews of the handful of books I read in the last month. I also did some writing for the Art of Manliness (my day job) . . .

• Homemade Yogurt: Cheaper, Better, and Easier Than You Think

• A Field Guide to Common Edible Plants

• How to Use an Elevator Like a Gentleman

. . . as well as for Dad of All Trades (the ~100 subscriber newsletter I write with with my buddy ):

• Maypocalypse Now (essay by Jonny)

• Enough With the Subscriptions (essay by me)

To the books!

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This Story Might Save Your Life by Tiffany Crum

I flew through this mystery/thriller as eagerly as just about anything else I’ve read this year. Mega successful podcasters Benny and Joy (best friends, not lovers) are on the cusp of a media deal worth millions. But then Joy goes missing, old secrets come out of the woodwork, and nobody can be trusted to be telling the truth. Told in alternating chapters of character POVs and Joy’s unpublished memoir, Crum weaves together the past and present in a way that’s incredibly compelling, even if it ends up a touch outlandish by the end. I loved this one and am recommending it far and wide to mystery fans!

The Searcher by Tana French

I really enjoy Tana French but hadn’t read her for about a decade before grabbing The Searcher this month. Kicking off a trilogy featuring Cal Hooper, a Chicagoan ex-pat in rural Ireland, this book typifies a slow burn mystery. We don’t even find out the central plot until about 100 pages in. That doesn’t always work, but French is such a good writer that I had no problem getting to know the characters and landscape before settling into to the meat of the story. There are some great twists, a satisfying ending, and it’s all very believable — I can’t wait to read the rest of the series.

The Brief Wondrous Life of Oscar Wao by Junot Diaz

After taking a few months off from my Pulitzer Project, I dove back in with Junot Diaz’s 2007 prize-winning novel. Woof — I did not like this one. It was really horny (culos and tatas everywhere) and really bleak, which made for a very strange combination. I actually didn’t mind the writing style (which is why I finished it), but I hated the story. Your mileage may vary, of course, but this lauded book was not even close to my cup of tea.

History Matters by David McCullough

I’ve been a huge fan of David McCullough for most of my adult life. He had a way of making history come alive in a way that few other historians could match. I’m finally reading (and loving) Truman, a biography that many folks consider his masterwork. While slowly making my through it (I’m about halfway now), I decided to also read his small collection of essays called History Matters. It offers lovely chapters on the importance of history and storytelling, McCullough’s favorite authors and books, some writing tips, and more. If you’re a fan of his, it’s well worth reading.

Comedy Sex God by Pete Holmes

I really enjoy smart comedy — stand-up and sketch shows (SNL, Key & Peele, etc.) have always been part of my media diet. And comedian memoirs, when done well, are so easy to listen to, especially because they’re almost always narrated by the author. Unlike other types of celebrities, successful comedians are generally good writers and storytellers; it’s kind of a core part of their job. So I wasn’t at all surprised by how much I enjoyed Pete Holmes Comedy Sex God — I think he’s one of the smartest in the biz. I was surprised, in a good way, by much philosophy and spirituality Pete got into. For example, I didn’t expect to find the great Richard Rohr in this book. Great stuff, but probably only if that mix sounds fun to you like it did to me.

Everything Is Tuberculosis by John Green

Many authors in recent years have taken a niche topic and used it to explain how that thing has had an outsized impact on world history. Salt, soccer, maps . . . and now tuberculosis. It makes for a compelling cover description, but I’ve found it doesn’t always work as tidily as the author hopes. John Green is obviously passionate about tuberculosis and gives readers an interesting history of the disease and its treatments. I just wasn’t as convinced or as eager to keep reading as I was hoping; this one was more in the 3-star range for me.

Thanks for reading and be good to each other. Until next time,

Jeremy

It’s time, once again, to chat about our favorite reads of the previous month.

JEREMY: I’m finally reading David McCullough’s Truman (which will surely be a favorite in a month or two) and decided to pair it with his short and delightful collection of essays called History Matters. Loved it. McCullough’s books are an American treasure. I also really enjoyed Taylor Jenkins Reid’s Atmosphere — great space action, touching romance, and oodles of heart.

JANE: My wife enjoyed the unique premise and solid execution of Tiffany Crum’s debut thriller, This Story Might Save Your Life. She especially appreciated the unforeseen ending, which feels especially rare these days.

GRAHAM (10.5 years old): Our oldest continues to tear through YA mysteries at a prodigious clip. Very Dangerous Things by Lauren Munoz was his favorite this month. In his words: “It was a really exciting mystery and I kept wanting to read it!”

WILLA (8 years old): The middle kiddo has discovered Shel Silverstein, and I am here for it. That dude rocks, and going through A Light in the Attic together in just a handful of nights was a delight.

BO (5 years old): Nature school keeps the youngest kiddo very well-verse in what’s going on in the natural world. He’s noticed the birdies coming back for spring, so it makes sense that Lucy Cousins’ Hooray for Birds was a favorite this month.

Your turn! What was your favorite April read?

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Hello, readers! It’s been a while. In this edition of the newsletter, I’m giving you quick hits about what I’ve read in the last 5-6 weeks and which hasn’t already been featured. Let’s get right to it!

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—FICTION—

Atmosphere by Taylor Jenkins Reid

Most of the women I know have read some Taylor Jenkins Reid books; most of the men I know have not. Well, let me say to those men: read her books! Taylor is a damn good storyteller. I started with Atmosphere simply because I can’t resist a NASA story, especially on the heels of the wildly successful and inspiring Artemis II mission. Atmosphere has tense space action, a touching romance story, and a lot of great relational psychology. Loved it.

A Psalm for the Wild-Built by Becky Chambers

I’m not generally into “cozy” sci-fi or fantasy — nice stories with low stakes — but the heart of this novella by Becky Chambers gets into themes that I can’t resist: What is it that makes us human, what is it that gives life meaning and fulfillment, and how should we spend our days in light of those answers? Through conversations between a tea-slinging monk and a friendly robot, Chambers guides readers into a gentle fable that explores these ideas. A lovely, life-affirming story all around.

An Absolutely Remarkable Thing by Hank Green

I’ve long been a fan of the Green brothers, but until this month I hadn’t read any of Hank’s books. An Absolutely Remarkable Thing has a fairly silly premise: a young tech employee, memorably named April May, makes a video about the sudden appearance of a statue in New York City. Turns out, similar statues popped up all around the world and they have physical properties that should not be possible. Alien contact, online life, the perils of fame and wealth, deep friendship — the stakes are both high and low, and Hank balances humor with earnestness in a very satisfying way. Excellent book!

A Simple Plan by Scott Smith

I only recently learned that A Simple Plan, the fantastic 1998 movie, was actually adapted from a 1993 novel of the same name. I’ve come to really like rural thrillers, so I decided to give this one a listen — and I thoroughly enjoyed it. First-person narration always works well on audio, and it’s a classic story about greed and how the best laid plans can quickly crumble. There were some pretty ridiculous plot points, but I never struggled to keep going. If you want a slippery slope of a thriller, this is a good one.

Thrawn trilogy by Timothy Zahn

Star Wars fan boys tend to loooove Timothy Zahn’s dozen or so books featuring Thrawn — a blue-skinned Imperial admiral who routinely outsmarts his opponents. While the original trilogy from the 90s gets more adoration, I started with a newer trilogy, published between 2017 and 2019. They were . . . fine. As a character, I actually found Thrawn rather one-dimensional, and the plots were a bit convoluted for me. By the end of the trilogy, I found it to be a bit of a slog to finish.

—NON-FICTION—

Ordinary Time by Annie Jones

This was a really nice little book, mostly chronicling Annie’s experience as a bookshop owner in the small southern locale of Thomasville, Georgia. It’s also about small town living, what it means to be rooted, and the joys of ordinary life. Ordinary Time wasn’t a life-changing read, but I rather enjoyed it — it would pair especially well with a nice cup of coffee on the porch.

This Vast Enterprise by Craig Fehrman

I *loved* Craig’s 2020 book, Author in Chief, so when I found out he had a new one coming about Lewis and Clark, I knew I had to get my hands on it ASAP. Given how impactful Lewis and Clark’s explorations were to the field of American history and science, there are surprisingly few books about their long expedition. Stephen Ambrose’s page-turning Undaunted Courage graced many a dad’s bookshelf in the 90s and 00s; This Vast Enterprise is just as compelling and does a much better job covering the context and scope of their journey, particularly in regards to the numerous other people who played a major part in their story. A must-read for any fan of American history.

The Way of Excellence by Brad Stulberg

Brad Stulberg has become one of my go-to authors and recommendations in the field of psychology and self-improvement. It’s a genre I tend to avoid, honestly, but his stuff cuts through the clutter and, mercifully, avoids the bloated page counts you often find when authors wax on and on about the same things. This book offers a fresh take on the idea of excellence; Stulberg’s best moments are when he encourages a strong self-examination about “shitty flow” (losing time and attention in the algorithm) and when he talks about the power of earnest enjoyment.

Thanks for reading and be good to each other. Until next time,

Jeremy

Happy Friday, readers!

This week I’m (metaphorically) visiting Los Angeles — a city I’ve never actually been to in person. I know plenty of people who love the place, but honestly I don’t even have a desire to visit. Based on what I’ve read about LA, it’s mostly a seedy, murdery place full of awful, fake people (I’m joking, of course (sort of…)). Regardless of your feelings re: the City of Angels, the books featured today are great.

Before we jump in, be sure to subscribe to a newsletter that I’ve recently taken up co-writing with my best pal Jonny: The Dad of All Trades.

Dad of All Trades

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By Jonny and Jeremy

Every other week we bring you a short essay and a handful of interesting links. And that’s about it! It’s free and you’ll never be sold anything. You probably don’t have extra room in your inbox, but if you do, we (maybe) won’t let you down.

To the books!

A Violent Masterpiece by Jordan Harper

The cast: A concierge of illegal goods and services for the ultra wealthy. A defense lawyer who works with some less-than-savory characters. A live-streamer who hunts down the most sordid scenes he can find in LA’s dark underbelly.

The crimes: a powerful Hollywood producer is exposed as a pedophile, women start turning up brutally murdered, and some very powerful people are sure their wealth will protect them.

These threads are separate at the start — first, we have to get to know the characters and understand the foundation of the plot. With fast-paced, sometimes even staccato sentences, Harper quickly gets us up to speed. In addition to the humans, the city of LA itself becomes a starring player too. In any dark noir, the setting has to feel real and gritty; Harper knocks it out of the park on that front.

Working from three perspectives is not easy, especially when they don’t obviously connect right away. But Harper astutely manages these different voices and weaves them together at just the right time. It makes for the kind of satisfying result that makes you go, “Ah, that’s how this all fits together.”

The title of this book is certainly accurate: there’s a lot of hard-to-stomach violence in these pages. But it all serves the larger purpose of the story — and for what it’s worth, I think it’s better to consume this kind of content in book form vs. in a visual format on a screen.

Harper is definitely working in the vein of violent but wildly compelling authors like S. A. Cosby and James Ellroy — both of whom showed up in the acknowledgements. There was also a lot of Thomas Harris’s influence to be found in this story. Jordan Harper had been on my to-read list for a long time and I’m glad I finally dove in with A Violent Masterpiece. I’ll certainly be reading more of him.

Manson: The Life and Times of Charles Manson by Jeff Guinn

Note: This slightly edited review was originally published in 2022.

Jeff Guinn is one of my favorite non-fiction writers. Within the first dozen pages of any of his books, you can tell he’s a master storyteller. In Manson, he shares the story and cultural context of how Charles Manson became a household name in 1969.

Guinn covers Manson’s life in its entirety: his rocky childhood and shockingly early entry into a life of crime, his multiple lengthy stays in correctional facilities, his foolhardy dreams of becoming a famous musician, and, of course, his descent into murderous cult leader.

And, as the subtitle promises, Guinn covers the “Times” too: What was it about the America of the 1960s that allowed all the players in this story — from the murderers and victims alike — to end up where they did on August 9th and 10th, 1969?

All of Guinn’s books have been 5-star reads for me and this one was no different. It’s a must-read if you’re at all interested in true crime or the cultural history of the ‘60s.

Unlike the characters in this week’s books, please be good to each other.

-Jeremy

It’s time, once again, to chat about our favorite reads of the previous month.

JEREMY: Brian Jay Jones’ biography of George Lucas is sticking with me; beyond the Star Wars origin story, there’s a lot about Hollywood history, creativity, and the business + art of making movies. (Read my review here.) Jane and I both really enjoyed Heartwood on the fiction side. It’s fast-paced, but not at the expense of well-developed characters. Great stuff. (Read my review here.)

JANE: Given that she’s a physical therapist at a sports-focused clinic here in Duluth, I was not surprised that Jane enjoyed Casey Johnston’s A Physical Education. This memoir / manifesto pushes against diet culture, embraces strength training, and offers a balanced approach to modern health and fitness.

GRAHAM (10.5 years old): I read The Tale of Despereaux aloud to the older kids and we all really enjoyed it. Kate DiCamillo combines clever writing, a unique story, and unforgettable characters. A modern classic for a reason.

WILLA (8 years old): The middle kiddo is blasting through the Junie B. Jones series by Barbara Park. Her favorite this month was First Grader (at last!). The stories have held up well in the last decade or two.

BO (5 years old): As we do every handful of months, we’ve cycled back into some Pete the Cat books. His Four Groovy Buttons is among the least offensive in the series, thankfully.

Your turn! What was your favorite March read?

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I’ve been a fan of Star Wars ever since I first saw the Tantive IV fly across the movie theater screen in the ‘90s, when I was about 10 years old and the original trilogy was back in theaters before the prequels came out. As a kid, I had all the movies on DVD and regularly re-watched them over holiday and summer breaks.

As an adult, I haven’t kept up as well with the Star Wars universe, but I’ve made up for lost time in the last few months. I’ve not only caught up on most of the new TV shows, but I’ve also become fully immersed in the wide world of Star Wars books. So far this year I’ve read nearly a dozen of ‘em.

(I have to think that Disney isn’t doing a great job marketing them, because I never really even knew they existed before my pal Jonny urged me to read a few.)

Books that are set in the Star Wars universe started appearing almost simultaneously with the release of the original movies and continue to this day with a handful of new books publishing each year (along with dozens of comics). There are hundreds of Star Wars books to read, if one so desires.

What makes Star Wars books so unique and interesting is that they tell totally new stories from a wide range of authors. The vast majority of fictional worlds (understandably) rely on a single author, which naturally limits how much of those worlds readers can ultimately explore. With Star Wars, creator George Lucas gave authors a pretty free reign to take his universe and run with it. This gives the books a surprising diversity of styles, characters, and settings — some are character studies while others fall into the classic space opera realm; some are set on a single planet while others span the galaxy.

Here’s where to start if you’ve never read a Star Wars book. It can seem intimidating, but I promise it’s not; you can really just grab a book — pretty much any book! — and start reading.

Legends vs. Canon

The first thing to know is the distinction between the Legends and Canon books. When Disney purchased the Star Wars brand and intellectual property in 2014, it basically said that all previous books would be considered Legends, while all books moving forward would have the clear continuity of being considered Canon. While the Legends books do have some continuity, you will find some wild and unrecognizable plot points if you’re only familiar with the movies and shows. Canon titles, meanwhile, offer a largely recognizable universe of even casual fans, making it the more approachable place to start, in my opinion.

Here’s a list of Legends titles.

Here’s a list of Canon titles.

(There are a lot of kids books listed in both, just FYI.)

Where to Start

Bloodline by Claudia Gray

Set in the years after Return of the Jedi movie, Bloodline is all about power and governance after you’ve won the war. This one centers on familiar faces from the films, but tells a story that feels surprisingly fresh and grounded. It explores the political landscape of the New Republic in a way that feels very Star Wars, while adding depth to characters you already know. If you want something that bridges the gap between the original trilogy and the sequel era, this is a great place to start. Gray is easily one of the best writers in the Star Wars universe.

Lost Stars by Claudia Gray

Technically a YA novel, but don’t let that scare you off — Lost Stars was one of the best reading experiences I’ve had all year. It follows two original characters who both begin their careers in the Empire before their paths gradually diverge. You get a unique, ground-level view of the major events from the original trilogy, all through the lens of a deeply personal and moving story. It’s accessible, fast-moving, and surprisingly emotional. I’m already excited to read this one again in the near future.

Alphabet Squadron trilogy by Alexander Freed

This trilogy leans more literary than you might expect from Star Wars. At its core is a former Imperial TIE fighter pilot who defects to the Rebellion, and the series really digs into the moral complexity of that shift. It’s less about big set pieces and more about character — identity, guilt, loyalty, and what it actually means to switch sides. The tone is earnest and often introspective, making it feel more like a character study than a traditional space opera.

—————

There are so many options when it comes to Star Wars books. I think the ones featured here are a great place to start, but you can jump in just about anywhere and get hooked. Head to your local bookstore and library, see what’s available on the shelves, and start reading.

Thanks for reading and be good to each other,

-Jeremy

Happy Friday, readers!

Spring officially arrives today! Even though we still have about a foot of snow on the ground here in Northern Minnesota, the air has a hint of warmth, the ice is disappearing from the lakes, and most importantly, the birds are coming back.

Though I was able to spy on a few pileated woodpeckers and bald eagles this winter, along with uncountable numbers of crows and ravens, I look forward to getting our region’s huge variety of spring and summer birds back. In that vein, today’s newsletter features two excellent books that are all about feathers.

P.S. Don’t miss my recent Art of Manliness article on birding.

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The Feather Detective: Mystery, Mayhem, and the Magnificent Life of Roxie Laybourne by Chris Sweeney

One of the coolest things I’ve learned this year: the Smithsonian Institution employs a small team dedicated entirely to feather forensics. Most of their work tackles aircraft bird strikes (small feathers get analyzed to determine species/size), but the team also handles smuggling, poaching, and even murder cases.

That team can trace its history back to one pioneering woman who made a lasting mark on the field of ornithology: Roxie Laybourne.

Roxie was a go-getter from the second she arrived in this world. Along with most women growing up in the early 20th century, she wasn’t exactly encouraged to have a mind or career of her own. But Roxie had a deep passion for birds and for aviation that she couldn’t shake.

Author Chris Sweeney tells Roxie’s story from start to finish, while also giving great background and context on the science of avian forensics — particularly in the realm aircraft bird strikes. Birds have causes thousands of deaths since the invention of airplanes and to this day still cost airlines (and their insurers) millions of dollars annually.

This may be one of those subjects you don’t think you’re at all interested in, but I’d encourage you to give it a shot. Between all the bird stuff, there are some great insights on passion, craft, and doing something well over the long haul. I loved The Feather Detective.

The Feather Thief: Beauty, Obsession, and the Natural History Heist of the Century by Kirk Wallace Johnson

This review was originally published in February 2023.

Fly tying, for the uninitiated, is the craft of making “flies” — or lures — for fly fishing. What’s interesting about this community is that the elite fly tyers don’t even necessarily fish. They’re in it to make the most beautiful flies with the rarest materials — which often means the feathers of endangered or even extinct birds.

This is the world that Kirk Wallace Johnson dives into for the sake of solving the 2009 mystery of hundreds of dead birds stolen from a famed natural history museum on the outskirts of London.

I loved Johnson’s storytelling from the first page. He explores the odd history of rare ornithological specimens, how the fly tying community became such an obsessive lot, and why a young man decided he needed to steal suitcases worth of birds from a poorly secured English institution.

Books about obsession are like catnip for me. What’s fun about this one is that the author gets as infatuated with his investigation as the fly tyers are about their feathers.

The Feather Thief is a quick, engrossing read about something you never thought you could possibly care about. I love it when that happens.

Thanks for reading and be good to each other,

-Jeremy

Happy Friday, readers!

Next week I’ll finally review a couple of the Star Wars novels I’ve been inhaling this year (the number is already in double digits), but for this week I’m reviewing a Star Wars-adjacent biography I really enjoyed as well as an outdoorsy mystery.

Let’s get right to it.

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George Lucas: A Life by Brian Jay Jones

In the midst of my Star Wars year, there’s no way I could leave out this biography of George Lucas. Though it was close to 500 pages, I never lost interest and was always excited to pick it up — Jones writes an engaging and easy-reading narrative that perfectly balances detail with big-picture context.

There was so much here I loved that I needed to drill it down into bullet points, or I’d go on for too long. A few of the most interesting themes:

• Lucas’s artsy origins and tendencies — and how that somehow turned into both the Star Wars and Indiana Jones franchises.

• His fiery independent streak, and how he came to self-finance almost all of his projects. He bet on himself a lot.

• How Lucas nearly single-handedly revolutionized the film industry in regards to special effects, especially with digital technology starting in the 90s; I had no idea Pixar started as a division of Lucasfilm.

• The playfulness of Star Wars — while fans have always made it overly serious, Lucas always maintained a playful and even irreverent tone.

• The merchandising! Lucas was (and is) a wildly savvy businessman who turned millions into billions through toys, licensing rights, and physical media (VHS, DVDs, etc.).

Above all that, though, it was just a treat to hear about the origins, evolution, and lore behind the Star Wars universe, which understandably takes up the bulk of the book.

Even if you’re not a fan of Star Wars, you may be interested in Lucas’s creative process and business drive — that narrative arc of poor ‘70s film student to billionaire household name is fascinating regardless of your interest in his work. This may end up in my year-end favorites list.

Heartwood by Amity Gaige

I’m always a sucker for an outdoorsy mystery or thriller. The God of the Woods. The River. In the Lake of the Woods. (I just now realized those titles look kinda funny being right next to each other.) Give me a crime set among lakes, mountains, and/or forests, and I can almost guarantee I’ll be hooked.

Amity Gaige’s Heartwood gives us a lost hiker on the Appalachian Trail. We get multiple POVs — the hiker, the search and rescue lead, and even an old lady Redditor — that all work in concert and only fully come together near the end. The writing is lyrical but not florid, the story clips along at a good pace, the characters were well-developed, and nature itself took a starring role at times (which I always love).

There were enough twists and turns to keep me guessing, but it wasn’t overdone, and I genuinely didn’t know what was going to happen at the end. (That’s part of the beauty of a one-off story versus an ongoing series where certain characters pretty much have to live on.)

It wasn’t my very favorite novel of the year, but Heartwood was quite enjoyable overall and I have no real complaints. I’d certainly recommend it for a wide variety of readers and it sits somewhere between 4 and 4.5 stars for me.

That’s it for me this week. Be good to each other and thanks for reading.

-Jeremy

Hi there, readers!

This week we experienced a totally new-to-us weather phenomenon: freezing fog. Chilly, moist air blew off of Lake Superior, coating the town in a thin, clear layer of ice. ‘Twas a bit of an ice rink around here while the rest of the state was basking in sunny 50s. We’ve heard spring is the worst time to be a Duluthian and it seems we’re getting an early taste of that. Thank goodness for the sauna in our basement!

Anyways, I’ve read some great stuff lately. Here’s just a small taste.

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Crux by Gabriel Tallent

“Will we make it? . . . There was no answer to that question, except in the terrifying, day-in, day-out work of the attempt. The doubt and suffering and pain—all that was the point. Without the doubt and suffering and pain, the tops were nothing.”

Dan and Tamma are two high school rock climbers of the dirtbag variety — they don’t have gear and they’re not on a team. They’re just poor kids going out in the wilds to see what they can “send.”

As real life quickly approaches, they have to decide between college, family obligations, or that dirtbag dream of living the van life in Utah’s canyon lands. It’s a coming-of-age story about making big choices while being too young to do so.

The style is unique and, I imagine, even off-putting to some readers. There’s a lot of technical climbing language — which I certainly didn’t understand but found myself immersed in anyways. There’s also just a lot of teenage dialogue, including sarcasm, raunchy jokes, and “like” galore. I’d normally be bothered by it, but since the characters are teenagers, it perfectly fit the narrative, and the rest of the prose was not in that same vein.

Overall, I loved the unique writing and the memorable, easy-to-root-for characters, who were earnest in their dreams (despite all the sarcasm). I finished Crux a few weeks ago and can’t stop thinking about it. Passages like this are going to stick with me for a long time:

“I’m going to go out into the dangerous, beautiful, empty places of the world and make of that wasteland a church and a home. And maybe, possibly, have a shot at being that hard-sending chick on the poster in the bedroom of every little girl in the world. But only that: a shot. I will consider it my very great privilege to make the attempt.”

It’s certainly not always a happy book, but I enjoyed it from start to finish.

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Comics Corner: Rough Riders by Adam Glass

We all know that Theodore Roosevelt was our most badass president. He rode a moose; he got shot in the chest during a speech and finished the speech; he swam in the Potomac in the buff. The guy was a certified legend.

In Rough Riders, Adam Glass (writer) and Patrick Olliffe (artist) imagine what would happen if a steampunk version of TR teamed up with other badasses of his era — Thomas Edison, Annie Oakley, Houdini, and boxer Jack Johnson — to fight aliens. The premise is just so frickin fun.

In this first volume, Glass rewrites our textbooks so that the Spanish-American War was actually started by non-humans and the famed Rough Riders actually had a rather different and top secret mission than what you’ve read about in history books.

Rough Riders is basically the comic version of Aliens vs. Cowboys (the 2011 movie). If that’s not an endorsement, nothing is. There are three paperback volumes of this comic run; I’ve only read the first but enjoyed it enough to definitely read the others.

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Be good to each other,

-Jeremy

Once again, it’s time to chat about our favorite reads of the previous month. My reading in February once again leaned heavily towards the Star Wars universe, which I’ll write about soon. For now, I’ll share a couple others, as well as the family’s favorites for the month.

JEREMY: I enjoyed Gabriel Tallent’s Crux way more than I thought I would. The style was memorable (not everyone will love it) and the story was fantastic; it’s all about dreams vs. reality and what brings true fulfillment. I also quite enjoyed Evan Hughes’ Pain Hustlers, which I reviewed earlier in the week.

JANE: The long library wait for Virginia Evans’ The Correspondent was well worth it for Jane. She doesn’t always enjoy the epistolary format, but Evans did it in a very unique and compelling way, including letters to famous authors about their famous books.

GRAHAM (10.5 years old): Our oldest has started venturing into YA territory rather than middle grade, which makes sense given his reading abilities. The kid did love Hunger Games and Scythe, after all. Anyways, this month is enjoyed Off Menu by Oliver Gerlach, which is described as a cozy story about a group of friends working at a restaurant.

WILLA (8 years old): Willa’s 2nd grade teacher is still reading Roald Dahl books aloud to the class and The BFG was a big hit. It’s a great book and entertaining for adults too!

BO (5 years old): The littlest discovered B.J. Novak’s bestseller through school as well. The Book With No Pictures is wildly creative and really fun for kiddos and their adult readers alike.

Your turn! What was your favorite February read?

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Hi there, readers!

This is just my third book review newsletter of the year and I’m very happy to say that I’ll be coming to you more regularly from now on. All the major edits for my book manuscript were turned in last week and while there’s still plenty of work to be done, it’s a little more spread out from this point on. (It won’t hit store bookshelves for another 18 months, so don’t worry if you don’t hear about it much just yet!)

Today I’m covering a novel, a true crime book, and a comic I rather enjoyed — I’ll write more about it at some point, but for now I’ll just say that I’ve had a blast getting into comics and graphic novels here in 2026.

As always, I’d love to know what you’re reading and enjoying lately!

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I See You’ve Called in Dead by John Kenney

The premise of this book hooked me from the get-go: Bud Stanley, an obit writer, gets canned for accidentally publishing his own falsified obituary after a few too many drinks. During his time off, Bud ends up going to strangers’ funerals with a couple of friends in a quest to figure out the point of it all — “it” being life.

Kenney, an author I wasn’t previously familiar with, writes with an incredibly readable and believable style. There was a lot of wry humor, which is hard to pull off without being annoying, and the dialogue always felt genuine. What I perhaps most appreciated was Kenney’s beautiful depiction of male friendship; Bud and wheelchair-using Tim are the heart and soul of this novel. Their relationship is full of sarcasm and ribbing, but also deep love and earnest appreciation for each other.

There are times where the writing veers into being moralizing or overly sentimental, but I’m not a reader who minds that. I think humans are inherently forgetful creatures and sometimes we need these kinds of smack-you-in-the-face reminders of what’s really important in life. (Plus, the lessons don’t quite manifest in the way you’d expect them to.)

I loved this story from start to finish and actually wished it had been longer so that I could spend more time with these characters. I See You’ve Called in Dead is a lovely and life-affirming novel that I can heartily recommend to nearly every type of reader — which is a rare thing indeed. Nice work, Mr. Kenney!

Pain Hustlers by Evan Hughes

I first encountered this story in movie form — Pain Hustlers, starring Emily Blunt and Chris Evans, was an enjoyable and well-done crime drama. I only recently discovered that it started as a book, and boy am I glad I found it. Opioids, shady investment money, sexy pharma salespeople, and oodles of prescription fraud make for an irresistible true crime tale.

A pharmaceutical startup called Insys, founded by Indian-American entrepreneur John Kapoor, created and manufactured a fentanyl spray called Subsys. It had a much narrower use than the more well-known OxyContin — theoretically, it was only to be used for intense pain caused by cancer. Executives and reps soon began hawking it for all kinds of pain relief, though, which soon enough led to a number of big problems.

There are plenty of books about the Big Pharma side of the opioid crisis, but this one is unique for its more obvious criminal element, its startup vibes, and the company’s relatively quick downfall. Turns out when you have just a handful of docs responsible for the large majority of prescriptions, it quickly became obvious that patient care was not the primary motivation for doling out Subsys.

Pain Hustlers was a great read overall and Hughes did a bang-up job putting this story into the larger context of America’s opioid tragedy.

COMICS CORNER: Absolute Martian Manhunter, written by Deniz Camp and drawn by Javier Rodriguez

I didn’t know diddly squat about DC Comics’ “Absolute” line or the Martian Manhunter character before diving into this comic book on my buddy Jonny’s highest recommendation.

I was so blown away by the wildly creative art, the unique story, and the moving writing that I read it twice in the span of a week.

The gist is that FBI detective John Jones receives a form of superhuman empathy after being injured in an explosion at a coffee shop — deemed to be a random act of violence. Jones is dazed and haunted by the stories around him as he tries to solve a strange series of violent crimes and keep his own family together at the same time.

The central questions that run through the story are incredible powerful: Why do we do the things we do? How can we come to understand people’s actions and is it even worth doing so? What keeps us from opening up to those we love? Why do I do the things I do?

Martian Manhunter is a little out there at times (in a neon ‘80s-inpsired way), but I really enjoyed its creativity and moving story. It felt like something AI could never possibly come up with — part of why I’m enjoying comics lately, actually. If you’re a fan of comics, it’s a must-read; if you’re not into that format, it’s probably not your best entry point, but ya never know. What’s great about comics is that they don’t take much time investment compared to books.

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Be good to each other,

-Jeremy

I didn’t expect 2026 to be the year that I got into graphic novels and comics. But here we are. My buddy Jonny has gotten me to read a few over the years, including Mister Miracle, The Sheriff of Babylon, and V for Vendetta. I enjoyed them all but never really had a yearning for more. I don’t quite know what happened, but after recently reading a couple of Star Wars comics from the library, I went to the local bookstore and, for the first time ever, purchased a couple comics for my own library (Adam Glass’s Rough Riders and Frank Miller’s famed Batman: The Dark Knight Returns).

Sure, comics are damn entertaining and offer a nice escape from an unending and heavy news cycle — but they’re not just lightweight reading material. If the world needs anything right now, it’s a bunch of heroes with a real sense of right and wrong.

I’d love to explore this genre even more, which means I need your best recommendations for comics and graphic novels of any kind. Let’s hear it.

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