“It Sounds Crazy, But You Think You Can Beat It”

They stood murmuring, cell phones out, standing in clusters along the dusty road and watching through the smoke-choked evening air as dark orange flames waved in the wind, the glow of fire surrounding them on either side. About 12 hours after officials said it was a “miracle” that the small, artsy, pastoral town of Ojai […]

“I Get Chills Talking About It”

When Margaret Atwood’s novel The Handmaid’s Tale was released in 1985, it was a work of speculative fiction: In the near future, a puritanical, militarized sect has taken over most of the United States, now known as Gilead. All of Congress has been killed; the Constitution has been suspended. Because of deteriorating fertility and plummeting […]