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FEATURES
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Heaven and Hell in Cameron County Jail - Gail Hanson’s soft, musical voice served her well for eight years as a volunteer chaplain at the Cameron County Jail in Brownsville. But as she witnessed and heard about the mistreatment of the mostly young and impoverished women she counseled—from unhealthy food to freezing-cold cells to lengthy detentions without convictions—Hanson’s voice …
READ MORE » - Dr. Strangevox
- In the back room of a studio in North Austin lit only by the glow of computer screens, a producer and singer who calls himself Madd Creole lets out a string of gospel-inflected vocal improvisations. As his voice wavers and slides from note to note, it’s shadowed by a ghostly shimmer …
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Coal Star State - One February night in 2007, a boisterous crowd from all around Texas—old-school ranchers and farmers, fresh-faced Baylor students, environmentalists new and old, big-city Democrats, and rural Republicans—packed a Waco auditorium to discuss the next round of an epic fight. The gathering would turn out to be the high-water mark of a …
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Boots On the Ground - Sierra Blanca—“Y’all got here just in time. We’re going to look for a body. Are you up for it? It’s gonna get rough out there, but I can have you back by lunch.”
It’s 7 a.m. I’ve already driven two hours from El Paso with my husband, whom I’ve …
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The Pecos Insurrection - Last Dec. 12, on the outskirts of Pecos, Texas, the immigrants doing time in the world’s largest privately run prison decided to turn the tables on their captors. It was the Day of the Virgin of Guadalupe, an important religious holiday in Latin America. But the inmates were in no mood …
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Texas Prodigy Goes Pop - Charles Yang got his first tattoo at a parlor in his hometown of Austin on his 18th birthday. When his parents found out, they didn’t speak to him for a week. The tattoo was the latest rebellion from a man whose parents wanted him to be a classical violinist. He’d joined …
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“I Was Just A Junkie” - She warned him not to go alone. It was a Wednesday morning in late August, and Alejandra Quintanilla was driving to the courthouse in downtown Houston. Sitting next to her, in the passenger seat, was her older brother, Alfredo Guardiola. He had been subpoenaed to appear before a grand jury to …
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Texas PIckers Strum Germans to Set Record - On an August afternoon hotter than Jerry Jeff Walker’s temper, two extraordinary things transpired: I played two songs with 1,867 other guitar pickers to set a Guinness world record. And I rekindled a subliminal inner joy buried for years.
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Killing Kid Care - On a recent Saturday afternoon, a group of parishioners from Berean Adventist Church on Houston’s near East Side gathered to fill grocery bags with donated food. It was part of a weekly post-church ritual organized by the Porters—Carol and Hurt Jr. The Porters round up donations from grocery stores and bring …
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If the Revolution is Over, Does That Mean We Won? - People of a certain age are always talking, sadly and nostalgically, about the bright, unfulfilled dreams of their youth.
I’m of a certain age myself—59, to be precise. But I usually draw a blank when the stories about lost youth, failed dreams and tarnished idealism come to the table …
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860-423-9242Observer Authors
Um...: Slips, Stumbles, and Verbal Blunders, and What They Mean
By Michael Erard
Pantheon
304 pages, $24.95
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Dr. Strangevox
In the back room of a studio in North Austin lit only by the glow of computer screens, a producer and singer who calls himself Madd Creole lets out a string of gospel-inflected vocal improvisations. As his voice wavers and slides from note to note, it’s shadowed by a ghostly shimmer …
READ MORE »
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- Investigative reporting is supported in part by a grant from the Open Society Institute.
- Books & the Culture is funded in part by the City of Austin through the Cultural Arts Division and by a grant from the Texas Commission of the Arts.
