The Cheapskate Intellectual

A journey through matters of spirit, sustainability, and self-reliance

Five stars from The Historical Fiction Company!

Delighted and grateful to share the news that CREATURE: A Novel of Mary Shelley and Frankenstein has received five stars and the “Highly Recommended Award of Excellence” from The Historical Fiction Company. This designation has come my way with a lovely review from The Historical Fiction Company, included below: Creature: A Novel of Mary Shelley […]

Read more

Today is CREATURE’s birthday!

Today is the official publication day of my novel Creature: A Novel of Mary Shelley and Frankenstein, now out from Sea Crow Press. See the events page on this site for more about upcoming readings, and thanks to all who have supported me and my books along the way!

Read more

CREATURE Readings Coming Up!

I’m hoping to see y’all at two readings coming up for CREATURE: one at the Luther College Book Shop on Thursday, April 3 at 9:40 am, one at Pulpit Rock Brewery / Event Space (sponsored by Dragonfly Books) on April 10 at 7 pm. Thanks to my friends at the Book Shop and Dragonfly for […]

Read more

The native heart: medicine, literature, life.

Every time I teach Medicine in Literature, it’s a little different – and each time, it’s a gift. “Gift” was the throughline of our activities last week, including a discussion of organ and kidney donation, as described in Scottish physician Gavin Francis’s brilliant book ADVENTURES IN HUMAN BEING (2015). Francis, who describes himself in a […]

Read more

Sympathies for Sale: FRANKENSTEIN, AI, and Us

(This is the text of a talk delivered last night at Luther College, with responses from student attendees pasted at the end!) Intro music: Bob Dylan, “Gotta Serve Somebody.” Books for the chalk tray: Taplin, Snyder, Lanier, Orwell, Haidt, Pomerantsev, Arendt, me, YOUNG ROMANTICS, and more. Welcome, and thank you all for being here. Thanks […]

Read more

Mr. Sunak and Mrs. Dalloway.

One week ago, likely-not-for-much-longer British PM (and probably-soon-to-be-gratefully-reverted-hedgie/tech-bro) Rishi Sunak left the 80th anniversary D-Day celebrations at Normandy early to return to London and prerecord a TV campaign interview. Footage of that moment shows the host murmuring thank you for being here. Just back from Normandy, Sunak says. “It ran over.” Offense piled on offense, […]

Read more