Opera is a rebuke to the dogma of realism; after all, no one sings the dialogue of his life, and key moments aren’t emphasized with the roll of kettledrums or a resounding swell of orchestration. Carolyn Abbate and Roger Parker

When graduate student Sarah Weston lands a summer job in Prague, she knows she’ll have an adventure, but she is in no way prepared for the fantastical experience that unfolds. Magnus Flyte’s novel, City of Dark Magic, follows

 The protagonist (Jordan Gelber) is a doughy, middle-aged man-child living with his parents and his action figures in this darkly perceptive suburban comedy from the director of Welcome to the Dollhouse. Todd Solondz is masterful

 In the preface to his Army of Evil: A History of the SS

 Well before it became a political football, China made headlines with tales of economic growth in the face of a global downturn and reports of poor conditions in its factories. Eric Jay Dolin’s well-crafted account of chapter one in

 Remember the days when neighborhood movie houses were an integral part of many residential areas of the city? These mostly small theaters boasted a single screen and double features and attracted big crowds almost every

 Scattered across Milwaukee are school buildings that shine like gems, once you look past the chalk dust and grime for ornamental friezes, murals and solid architectural bones in shapes from Romanesque Revival and Queen Anne

Walter Schroeder had already opened many fine hotels around Wisconsin and the Midwest by 1927, but none were as prestigious as the Schroeder Hotel, a 25-story building at the corner of Fifth Street and Wisconsin Avenue that immediately... 

  A native New Yorker, Robert Sullivan was inspired to write My American Revolution while gazing from the observation deck of the Empire State Building. In between Bunker Hill and Yorktown, he decided, was the...

 America is holding its breath until the Nov. 6 presidential election. Meanwhile, we can all have a little fun with the election by playing “Swing States 2012.” Introduced this summer by Victory Point, a California gaming company, “Swing States” is a solitary board game allowing a player...