Stories by Daniel Hautzinger

As Halloween approaches, indulge your taste for the spooky and mysterious by exploring ancient ruins, discovering the secrets of the dead, watching a biopic about the master of the macabre, and sitting on the edge of your seat as Jane Austen characters try to solve a murder.

Louisa and Larry are away in England, where Larry feels at home amongst a group of bohemians and Louisa finds herself in several odd predicaments. Back on Corfu, Gerry begins a crusade on behalf of donkeys while Margo attempts to reconcile Turks and Greeks. 

The author of Roots and The Autobiography of Malcolm X explains the origins of Roots and his difficulty in capturing the experience of being on a slave-ship in a 1976 interview. "The absence of pride changes to a presence of pride" when you know your history, he says.

Leslie is now only dating one girl, but one of his former girlfriends soon complicates the situation. The Durrells deal with a sad event that sends Louisa and Larry back to England, while Margo's old flame tries to win her back and Gerry examines insects.

Bughouse Square with Eve Ewing takes interviews between the legendary Studs Terkel and people such as James Baldwin and Lorraine Hansberry and pairs them with contemporary conversations and musings on the same themes from Studs's kindred spirit Eve Ewing. 

Lederman, who won a Nobel Prize in 1988 for demonstrating that there are at least two kinds of particles called neutrinos, coined the Higgs boson's nickname "the God particle," and worked at Fermilab outside Chicago as well as the University of Chicago, has died at age 96.

Trump's Showdown provides an in-depth examination of the events of the last two years that have led to a standoff between Donald Trump and the Justice Department over the Russia investigation. Producer Michael Kirk explains his take on Trump's strategy. 

The Durrells are back, and with Louisa, Larry, and Margo all taking a break from romance, you'd think there would be less tumult in their lives. But Leslie, of all people, is dating – three women at once. The rest of the family try to force him to choose one.

Koko Taylor would have turned 90 today. The daughter of poor Tennessee sharecroppers, she eventually came to Chicago and cleaned North Shore homes before signing with Chess Records and becoming the Queen of the Blues in a male-dominated genre.

What was once the world’s largest building will soon be the site of the world’s largest permanent digital art projection, when the Merchandise Mart's 2.5-acre facade becomes the screen for an enormous piece of public art called Art on theMART.

The American Library Assocation's Office for Intellectual Freedom is currently hosting Banned Books Week. What kinds of books were most frequently challenged in 2017, and what books from The Great America Read's list of America's favorite novels have been banned?

Johannes is put on trial while Marin's secret creates its own difficulties. Nella tries to save the brother and sister from doom by taking over the household while also searching for the mysterious miniaturist, hoping that she might hold some answers.

During Open House Chicago, which is October 13 and 14, you can see things you've never seen before as more than 250 sites across Chicagoland open to the public for free. So many choices are overwhelming, so we've chosen a few highlights.

As Nella reckons with her husband's secret, she begins to discover more hidden affairs within her household and continues to investigate the seemingly all-known miniaturist. Things go badly awry for Otto, then Johannes, and then Marin. 

One in six adults, or 35 million people, read below a fourth-grade level in the United States. The Chicago Literacy Alliance is working to change that, by bringing together organizations with similar goals and fostering collaboration amongst them.