The Impatient Patient

Scott McLemee Inside Higher Ed
Medicine has grown so powerful and so profitable procedures go unquestioned. Many tests detect something worthy of follow-up -- procedures sometimes dubious, all to the point of extending life without regard to its quality. Stealing a march on every medical vulnerability as you age can boomerang.

The Still-Evolving History of Tacos de Canasta

Michael Snyder Saveur Magazine
Tacos de canasta are wrapped in distinctive sky-blue plastic
Tacos de Canasta are sold everywhere in Mexico, created primarily by the drift of population between town and country that defined Mexico City in the 20th century. They are not merely a way of celebrating Mexico’s singular culinary heritage, but also a way of staking a claim to part of that heritage

The Many Layers of Atlanta’s ‘Teddy Perkins’

Matt Zoller Seitz New York Magazine
Packing in as much raw emotion and as many twists and turns as a feature-length thriller, “Teddy Perkins” is a gothic funhouse of an Atlanta episode, filled with warped mirrors reflecting different aspects of American and African-American experience.

Finding Work After War

H.C. Palmer Verse Daily
The Kansas poet H. C. Palmer, a battalion surgeon in the American War in Vietnam, addresses the effects of trauma on our war veterans.

When the Factory Leaves Town

Jane La Tour The Indypendent
A deft telling of a Wisconsin town and its people who lost their largest employer, a General Motors auto plant, typifying the collapse of much American manufacturing over the past quarter-century. Janesville is also--ironically or not-- the home of Paul Ryan, the U.S. House GOP speaker.

Other People’s Children, Part 2: Stories in the Aftermath, or “The Hate U Give”

Jonathan Alexander Los Angeles Review of Books
The March 18 killing of 22-year old Stephon Clark by Sacramento Police once again calls our attention to the racist aspect of the problem of civilians murdered by law enforcement. Angie Thomas's award-winning Young Adult novel is among the most recent literary responses to this crisis.