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You Can Do Better Than a Beach Read
- Culture, Featured, Literature
- June 2, 2026
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Shannon Safford wanted to serve her country as a member of the United States Army, but in order to do so, she was required to receive the COVID-19 vaccine that would ultimately end her active service. She received the shot on deployment to Kuwait and began developing strange symptoms: She had menstrual issues, digestive problems,
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When I taught literature, I had to frequently remind my students not to skip the “boring parts” of the books—things like long paragraphs describing scenery in Dickens’ Oliver Twist or the long list of ships that appears near the beginning of The Iliad. I understand the temptation. When I was their age, I frequently skimmed
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In the face of certain death, does being civilized matter? All the narrators of Beryl Bainbridge’s 1991 historical novel The Birthday Boys die. And still, knowing their deaths loom, they carry on with birthdays, religious practices, and virtues like loyalty and courage. Heavily based on real life diaries and letters, this novel is a hybrid
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A fascinating study recently published in Science found that human lives may depend on the fate of bats. Not directly, of course. Rather, it’s the bat’s unique role in the ecosystems they inhabit that’s important for us. As a result, the decline of bat populations endangers human populations in an unexpected manner. The link between
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