Winter storm warnings in northern Minnesota

MPR News helps you turn down the noise and build shared understanding. Turn up your support for this public resource and keep trusted journalism accessible to all. 

Turn Up Your Support

Five things you should read, watch, listen to or experience this week.

1) ‘An Unexplained Death’ by Mikita Brottman

” is a non-fiction investigation into the death of a Baltimore man named Ray Rivera. Everyone — Rivera's family, the police, his colleagues — can agree one thing: he fell to his death in 2006 at a historic building, the Belvedere. 

The question is: Did he jump or was he pushed? 

This isn't true crime: it's a history of suicides, a meditation on lonely life in the city, and a close examination of a shady investment business. It's a constant surprise, page after page. 

The audiobook is read by the author, Mikita Brottman, and her voice adds a layer of intimacy to the tale.   

2) ‘Malfunctioning Sex Robot,’ by Patricia Lockwood

I felt like you had to choose between John Updike and Philip Roth when I was a library-lurking teen. I was firmly in the 

 camp, so I was delighted to read Patricia Lockwood's 

critique of Updike, the bard of midcentury upperclass WASPs. 

It begins, "I was hired as an assassin. You don’t bring in a 37-year-old woman to review John Updike in the year of our Lord 2019 unless you’re hoping to see blood on the ceiling." 

This is not a woman of our time looking back at a writer from another generation and judging him by contemporary PC-ness. It's about what makes a writer acclaimed in their time and what makes a writer acclaimed by future generations. 

3) Develop a green thumb with a hearty houseplant

Get a houseplant and buy a big one. Don't try to grow one from a three-inch pot. It’ll take you years. Get one 3-feet tall and robust and care for it. It will make your life better every day. Yes, you can buy them at Amazon and they will be delivered to you in good shape. But even better is a garden center where someone can help you choose a plant that will survive in your home. 

 are really hard to kill and look fantastic.)

4) Gary Gulman’s ‘The Great Depresh’

"The Great Depresh" is an HBO special by comedian Gary Gulman about life with crippling depression. It's very funny.

The premise of the new musical “Six” is that the wives of Henry VIII form a pop girl group and tell the stories of their lives. It will be 

 from November 29th to December 22nd and then goes to Broadway. Here's Anne Boleyn's big number, "Don't Lose Your Head."

"Don't lose your head" performance on YouTube

Shows

Big Books & Bold Ideas with Kerri Miller

Arts and Culture

The Five

Stephanie Curtis

Author

Five things you should read, watch, listen to or experience this week.


The Five: Plants, a mysterious death, and a brutal reevaluation

Go Deeper.

Like this?

News you can use in your inbox