'Her last days were comfortable, contented and surrounded by love'

'Accountability for the American people'

'He was driving on the wrong side of the road'

We have one, maybe two generations to correct the trend

'Distributing bear-repellent spray along school routes to ensure children's safety'

In northern Sri Lanka, an area largely avoided by the 2 million tourists who visit the island every year, an organization has safely removed its 300,000th landmine leftover from the island’s civil war. Those mines and unexploded bombs were cleared across an area 33% larger than the island of Manhattan, and their removal allowed for […] The post Nonprofit Removes 300,000 Landmines in Sri Lanka, Allows 280K People to Return to Their Homes appeared first on Good News Network.

Books book reviews This Vicious Hunger by Francesca May Seeks to Sate with Style For readers looking to get lost in a conjuration of confusion, sapphic lust, and toxicity, this atmospheric tale will be an excellent fit. By Maura Krause | Published on October 28, 2025 Comment 0 Share New Share “Some stories teach you to be brave, some teach you to be strong, and some make you laugh. Does laughter come cheaper than bravery or strength? Do you need all of these stories at once?” With these questions in the mouth of a character, author Francesca May offers a glimpse into how we might read This Vicious Hunger. This particular character, Olea, has been isolated for her entire life in a single place; life lessons and wider messages might actually be less valuable to her than laughter. Moreover, Olea’s home is decorated with brightly colored tapestries capturing the single most dramatic moment in the mythic stories she’s read. For her, the focal points of story are tone and image. So, perhaps it is not a coincidence that these elements are the great strengths of May’s new novel. The plot is elegant and simple: Upon the death of her not-so-dear husband, undertaker’s daughter Thora gets the chance she’s always wanted to study at St. Elianto’s university. These halls of academia are populated entirely by men—except that Thora has been offered a place by a brilliant botanist who turns out to be a woman. Dr. Florencia Petaccia is ready to consider Thora her partner in research, and the young lady begins to attend lectures and read about science late into the night. She even finds a friend in a kind and patient fellow scholar, Leonardo. Yet beneath Thora’s window, there lies a magnificent and mysterious garden. When Thora meets the garden’s strange caretaker, Olea, she ends up snared in an addiction that changes her priorities as well as her place at the university. Whether that addiction is to the beautiful and seemingly-naive Olea, or to the poisonous plants just beyond the garden gate, Thora cannot tell. From here the story becomes a spiral, contracting ever closer to the tower in the center of the garden. The novel’s progression reflects Thora’s entrapment in the same cycle: visit the garden and ask Olea for answers; rebuff (with increasing cruelty) Leonardo’s attempts to check on her; fight through her growing physical weakness and ravenousness to complete work for Petaccia… and ultimately return to the garden. Though bits of intriguing information surface with every sequence (for example, Olea is revealed as Dr. Petaccia’s ward), a reader looking for action or momentum will find this structure repetitive.  Buy the Book This Vicious Hunger Francesca May Buy Book This Vicious Hunger Francesca May Buy this book from: AmazonBarnes and NobleiBooksIndieBoundTarget The characters’ motivations also seem to lurch in circles. Some of these tangles feel real and recognizable: Thora vacillates between resolving never to think again about her attraction to women and seeking out lesbian erotic fiction, and her reasons for visiting the garden every night flip between lust for Olea and her desire for the valuable botanical knowledge the plants might contain. At other times, Thora jumps from attacking Leonardo to being grateful for him, from valuing her life at the university to feeling trapped, from spitting awful words at Olea to begging for forgiveness. This does feel like an accurate representation of addiction in its loss of reality and profound mood swings, but it feels sluggish to read. Contributing to this sense of heaviness is the reality that Thora has had no agency throughout this book: Her father controls her, then her husband, then her mother-in-law, who sends her to work under the exacting Dr. Petaccia. At the moment where Thora might gain ownership over her own life, she falls under the sway of Olea and her garden. Late in the novel, Thora makes one impetuous, confusing, and possibly damning choice at last, but at that point such an action feels out of character. Yet as Olea points out, not every story needs bravery or strength or Strong Character Arcs. There is so much heart in May’s depiction of Thora’s descent into obsession that the disorienting quality of the narrative becomes an entire experience of its own. May writes in the afterword that she worked on this novel while managing Long COVID, which clearly went into the visceral way she evokes Thora’s disintegrating health. Reading this tale, one might actually feel like Thora: dizzy, wrapped in brain fog, feverishly lustful, and compulsively returning to the mysteries at the core of this Gothic world.  Moreover, May’s gorgeous writing makes it very easy for her readers to imagine said world. From architecture to food to plants, lush yet crisp imagery populates the novel’s tonal cloud of near-madness. The difference between the hot, dry campus and the cool, fragrantly damp garden is almost tangible. When Thora struggles with the heat and moisture maintained in Petaccia’s lab, the same oppressiveness bleeds through the text. As Thora develops a hunger she cannot sate, food is depicted with the glowing deliciousness of a glossy magazine spread. And all the plants, from those that exist in our world to the utterly fictional, feel alive, immediate, and a little bit threatening. By the sequel-implying end, the profoundly toxic Machineel tree and its many poisonous siblings are characters as much as Olea and Thora are. For someone looking to get lost in a conjuration of confusion, sapphic lust, and toxicity, This Vicious Hunger will be an excellent fit. As we enter spooky season, atmospheric tales call to many a reader—and Francesca May has added to that haunted collection just in time.[end-mark] This Vicious Hunger is published by Redhook. The post <i>This Vicious Hunger</i> by Francesca May Seeks to Sate with Style appeared first on Reactor.

Excerpts Young Adult Read an Excerpt From The House Saphir by Marissa Meyer A retelling of the story of Bluebeard as a romantasy/murder mystery. By Marissa Meyer | Published on October 28, 2025 Comment 0 Share New Share We’re thrilled to share an excerpt from The House Saphir by Marissa Meyer, a young adult retelling of the story of Bluebeard publishing with Feiwel & Friends on November 4th. Mallory Fontaine is a fraud. Though she comes from a long line of witches, the only magic she possesses is the ability to see ghosts, which is rarely as useful as one would think. She and her sister have maintained the family business, eking out a paltry living by selling bogus spells to gullible buyers and conducting tours of the infamous mansion where the first of the Saphir murders took place.Mallory is a self-proclaimed expert on Count Bastien Saphir—otherwise known as Monsieur Le Bleu—who brutally killed three of his wives more than a century ago. But she never expected to meet Bastien’s great-great grandson and heir to the Saphir estate. Armand is handsome, wealthy, and convinced that the Fontaine Sisters are as talented as they claim. The perfect mark. When he offers Mallory a large sum of money to rid his ancestral home of Le Bleu’s ghost, she can’t resist. A paid vacation at Armand’s country manor? It’s practically a dream come true, never mind the ghosts of murdered wives and the monsters that are as common as household pests.But when murder again comes to the House Saphir, Mallory finds herself at the center of the investigation—and she is almost certain the killer is mortal. If she has any hope of cashing in on the payment she was promised, she’ll have to solve the murder and banish the ghost, all while upholding the illusion of witchcraft.But that all sounds relatively easy compared to her biggest challenge: learning to trust her heart. Especially when the person her heart wants the most might be a murderer himself. She ducked into an unused guest room, the furnishings cov­ ered in ghostly white cloths, to compose herself. Mallory sank against the door and buried her face in her hands, still scented with the shaving soap. The pleasure that had shivered at the end of her nerves now felt cold and traitorous. She spent an entire minute trying to convince herself that she’d been mistaken. It wasn’t Julie’s ring. It was only something similar. Surely other girls had sapphire wedding rings. Surely Armand couldn’t have murdered her. Surely… Nothing she told herself made any difference. All the signs were there. The way Julie had talked about her beau, like a knight coming to rescue her, like he was too good to be true. The pressed flower in her prayer book. The ring hidden beneath Armand’s vanity. She had to go to the police. Tell them everything. Have Armand imprisoned before he could harm anyone else.” She shuddered. For the first time, she felt like she could truly begin to under­stand what had compelled Bastien’s wives to choose him, despite all the signs that he was a man to be avoided. What had Julie said? The heart wants what the heart wants… Right now, her heart wanted away from this place. Away from Armand, and his manipulations, his lies, the way his uncertain smiles seemed crafted entirely for her… Crouching over her knees, she stuffed the hem of her skirt into her mouth and screamed. The fabric muffled her frustration and anger and betrayal, but didn’t lessen it. Gods alive, she liked him. She liked him so much. His curiosity. The way he flustered so easily. His bravery in the face of mon­sters. His willingness to believe her, no matter how many times she lied to him. The way he’d kissed her, as though she was both fragile and dangerous at the same time. Breathless, Mallory let the fabric fall from her mouth. She stared balefully at the floor as her pulse gradually slowed. She had to be sure. She had to be absolutely, without-a-doubt, cannot-possibly-be­ wrong-about-this sure. She stood, forcing strength into her legs. Smoothing her hair away from her face, she dared to step back into the hall. She found Anaïs in their room, embroidering a border of for­tune’s wheels onto a handkerchief, a full cup of tea on the table beside her. She startled when Mallory came in, pricking herselfwith the needle. “I was beginning to worry about you. Have you learned anything?” She must have seen something in Mallory’s face, because she sat straighter as she popped her jabbed finger into her mouth. “I need your help.” Anaïs watched her a long moment. Swallowing, she set the embroidery aside and picked up the teacup instead. The china clattered in her shaking hands. She turned back to the window and took a sip. “Please, Anaïs” Mallory dropped onto her knees beside the settee, pleading with her. “You know I wouldn’t ask if I didn’t have to.” Inhaling sharply, Anaïs glanced at the sky. Dark clouds were rolling over the vineyards. “I knew you would,” she whispered. “From the moment I saw her body.” “Anaïs—” “‘Just as I knew that you shouldn’t have to. Maybe I should have offered to do it from the beginning. But… I’m scared, Mally. It’s unnatural, and dangerous. And… what if it happens again?” “It won’t.” “You don’t know that.” “We can hardly summon him twice.” Crossing her arms, Anaïs settled deeper into the cushions, studying Mallory. “Who do you think it was, if not Le Bleu?” She didn’t want to say it. Saying it out loud would make it too real, too… plausible. The words came out brittle. “I’m afraid it was Armand who killed her.” Mallory had hoped for a gasp. Some shock. A whispered, no, surely not Armand. To her disappointment, Anaïs nodded. “I fear that as well.” Excerpted from The House Saphir, copyright © 2025 by Marissa Meyer. Buy the Book The House Saphir Marissa Meyer Buy Book The House Saphir Marissa Meyer Buy this book from: AmazonBarnes and NobleiBooksIndieBoundTarget The post Read an Excerpt From <i>The House Saphir</i> by Marissa Meyer appeared first on Reactor.

Pennsylvania voters will head to the polls next Tuesday to decide whether three Democrat-appointed state Supreme Court justices will be retained to serve another term on the state’s highest judicial body.  Pennsylvania’s highest court has become a lightning rod in recent years over its decisions regarding the counting of late ballots in the 2020 presidential election and the state’s congressional district map in 2018. The court currently has a 5 to 2 partisan split in favor of the Democrats. It will likely remain an important player if there are legal questions regarding the 2026 midterms and the 2028 presidential election in the swing state.  The three current Democrat Pennsylvania Supreme Court justices up for retention are Kevin Dougherty, Christine Donohue, and David Wecht. All three were first elected in 2015. State Supreme Court terms in Pennsylvania are 10 years, although there is a mandatory retirement age of 75, which Donohue would reach in 2027. If all three Democrat justices were to lose their retention votes, then the court would have an even 2 to 2 party split to the 2027 elections. The vacancies could be temporarily filled by Pennsylvania Gov. Josh Shapiro and the Republican-controlled Pennsylvania state Senate, but it appears doubtful that they would come to an agreement. Two other justices, the Democrat state Chief Justice Debra Todd and Republican Justice Sallie Updyke Mundy will be up for retention at that time. Justices openly affiliate with political parties, but the “merit retention provision of Pennsylvania’s Constitution allows all but magisterial district judges to be retained with a simple “yes” or “no” vote without ballot reference to political affiliation,” according to Pennsylvania courts. State and national Democrats appear cognizant of the importance of the elected judicial offices with Democratic National Committee Ken Martin explaining in a press call that “the Pennsylvania Supreme Court retention races are among the most important elections in the nation this year. What happens on Nov. 4 can make all the difference in the 2028 presidential election, just how it was five years ago.”  that “the Pennsylvania Supreme Court retention races are among the most important elections in the nation this year. What happens on Nov. 4 can make all the difference in the 2028 presidential election, just how it was five years ago.”  In 2020, the Pennsylvania Supreme Court, which like now had a majority of Democrat justices, ruled that ballots received as late as the Friday after election day, so long as they were postmarked by Nov. 3, would be counted in the presidential race. If no postmark was visible, then the state Supreme Court held that the ballots must be counted “unless a preponderance of the evidence” indicated they were mailed after Election Day.  Four Republican-appointed justices on the U.S. Supreme Court expressed a willingness to enact an emergency stay on the state Supreme Court’s ruling, but they were stopped by Chief Justice John Roberts and the liberal wing of the top federal court.  The 2020 decision was not the first time the Pennsylvania Supreme Court had jumped headfirst into electoral politics. In 2018, the court also ruled that a 2011 congressional district map for Pennsylvania violated the state constitution. Opponents of the map had argued that it was skewed in favor of Republicans. GOP efforts to throw out a 2018 remedial map failed in court. The chances that the state justices lose their retention votes are narrow if history is any indication. There has been only one statewide judge who has lost a retention vote since 1968 in the Keystone State. That was Pennsylvania Supreme Court Chief Justice Russell Nigro, who lost retention in 2005. The post The Most Important Elections You Likely Haven’t Heard About appeared first on The Daily Signal.

Transgender Rabbis Come Out for Mamdani