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Author, playwright

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Author: stevenowad

Micro-Review #75: The Painted Bird

A viscerally shocking novel about a young boy’s odyssey through eastern Europe during World War II. In wandering from village to village, the dark-skinned boy encounters hatred and persecution from mainly white Christian rural folk. The violence and sexual abuse are appalling but easily committed, …

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Leave a Comment on Micro-Review #75: The Painted BirdOctober 21, 2022November 13, 2022 By stevenowad

Micro-Review #74: Who’s Afraid of Virginia Woolf?

It’s a gross understatement to call this a story about a troubled marriage. George and Martha live in a New England university town in the 1960s. Their marriage doesn’t crumble so much as it bursts and shatters and then bursts and shatters again. Language is …

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Leave a Comment on Micro-Review #74: Who’s Afraid of Virginia Woolf?October 21, 2022November 13, 2022 By stevenowad

Micro-Review #73: The Razor’s Edge

A classic tale about a young man’s search for meaning after the insanity of World War I. Larry Darrell gives up wealth and the woman he loves in order to seek meaning through religion. What follows is a journey of discovery to Paris and India, …

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Leave a Comment on Micro-Review #73: The Razor’s EdgeOctober 21, 2022November 13, 2022 By stevenowad

Micro-Review #72: The Last Spy

This thriller is set in the early 1990s during the demise of the Soviet Union. Three Soviet spies in Washington find themselves adrift once communism ends. Who’s in charge back home? Do the old rules of spycraft apply? Most important, are old friends and colleagues …

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Leave a Comment on Micro-Review #72: The Last SpyOctober 21, 2022November 13, 2022 By stevenowad

Micro-Review #71: Hegemony or Survival

Sometimes when the American drive toward autocracy is getting you down, you just have to give yourself over to Uncle Noam. This book lets you know you’re not alone in your sense of horror. It focuses on America’s role in the world in the early …

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Leave a Comment on Micro-Review #71: Hegemony or SurvivalOctober 21, 2022November 13, 2022 By stevenowad

Micro-Review #70: Bengal Tiger at the Baghdad Zoo

A brilliant play about the human cost of the Iraq war. Shortly after Saddam Hussein disappears into hiding, we meet a tiger in the zoo who’s probably about to be eaten by locals. There’s also the ghost of Saddam’s recently killed son Uday, who sadistically …

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Leave a Comment on Micro-Review #70: Bengal Tiger at the Baghdad ZooOctober 21, 2022November 13, 2022 By stevenowad

Micro-Review #69: King of Spies

Donald Nichols is America’s man in Korea after World War II. As an “advisor” to America’s handpicked South Korean president, he builds his own army and operates virtually independent of oversight from either Seoul or Washington. What follows is not quite a Shakespearean tragedy, but …

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Leave a Comment on Micro-Review #69: King of SpiesOctober 21, 2022November 13, 2022 By stevenowad

Micro-Review #68: Escape from Camp 14

Born and raised in a North Korean prison camp, Shin Dong-hyuk knows only what decades of indoctrination and back-breaking labor have taught him. His mother is more of a rival than a family member. Other prisoners exist in order to be snitched on. The outside …

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Leave a Comment on Micro-Review #68: Escape from Camp 14October 21, 2022November 13, 2022 By stevenowad

Micro-Review #67: Going After Cacciato

A 1987 novel about the Vietnam war. A moonfaced grunt named Cacciato has sized up Vietnam and decided that, all in all, he would rather be in Paris—so he’s going to walk there, all 10,000 klicks. His former squad follows him from the hills of …

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Leave a Comment on Micro-Review #67: Going After CacciatoOctober 21, 2022November 13, 2022 By stevenowad

Micro-Review #66: Alive

The true story of a Uruguayan rugby team that crash-lands in the Andes and resorts to cannibalism to survive. The movie (starring Ethan Hawke) is great entertainment, but it lacks the depth and grit of this epic book. Sixteen people—most of them teenagers—survive the crash. …

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Leave a Comment on Micro-Review #66: AliveOctober 21, 2022November 13, 2022 By stevenowad

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Recent Posts

  • Micro-Review #155: The Every
  • Micro-Review #154: Emilia Perez
  • Micro-Review #153: A Complete Unknown
  • Micro-Review #152: Hell of a Book
  • Micro-Review #151: The Bomber Mafia

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  2. Jillian on Micro-Review #16: Educated

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