Sadness

Percival Everett by Virgil Russell A Novel By Percival Everett Graywolf Press, 227 pp., $15 paper When I read Percival Everett's new book, "Percival Everett by Virgil Russell" - or Percival Everett read me his new book, even though he wasn't there, of course, you don't get a physical human with a book, most times; still, in a sense he read me his book - I found that I liked not only the book but also Percival Everett. He wasn't there at all, that interesting professor and novelist, that attractive, often humorous, middle-aged black literary stylist who lives and writes in Southern California, experimenting with the structure and conventions of fiction.

See Now Then A Novel Jamaica Kincaid Farrar, Straus and Giroux: 192 pp., $24 There are two ways to read Jamaica Kincaid's mesmerizing new novel, "See Now Then. " The first is the way any work of art should be read: by simply absorbing what's on the page. This is how I read the first two-thirds of "See Now Then. " "See Now Then" is Kincaid's first novel in a decade, and it's the story of a marriage whose toxicity is killing the two people in it. But more than that, the book reads like an allegory or fable about a doomed family, an effect heightened by its protagonists, Mr. and Mrs. Sweet, having two children with names taken from Greek mythology - Heracles and Persephone.

Here is the letter Archbishop Jose H. Gomez sent to the church community Thursday afternoon: My brothers and sisters in Christ, This week we are releasing the files of priests who sexually abused children while they were serving in the Archdiocese of Los Angeles. These files document abuses that happened decades ago. But that does not make them less serious. I find these files to be brutal and painful reading. The behavior described in these files is terribly sad and evil.

Bums me out that San Francisco stands poised to be a world champion in yet another sport. I was up there recently and it seemed to be mostly falling down. There are no right angles in that decaying city, and termites eat better than the tourists. Meanwhile, the teetering populace treats each night like Caligula's birthday. If California has the equivalent to Anchorage, it is San Francisco. Notice how they put all the taverns at the top of the hills, so at the end of the night everyone just rolls home.

One thing is certain: R.J. Colleary was in a playful mood while penning “Happy Face Sad Face,” now in its world premiere at the Elephant Lillian Theatre. The play tells a story from a “serious” point of view, then recapitulates essentially the same events in a “comedic” second act. It all sounds very intriguing, but Colleary and director Kathleen Rubin, who has helmed two of Colleary's previous plays, have this time collaborated on a well-meaning experiment gone awry.

No living players will be inducted into the Hall of Fame this year, a decision that baseball great Pete Rose said is "kind of sad. " In an interview with Fox News, Rose lamented the first shutout since 1996. "There's a lot of great players that were on the ballot. And Craig Biggio, the first player on the first ballot since 1945 with 3,000 hits not to make the Hall of Fame. Of course, I believe that Mike Piazza is probably the greatest offensive catcher in the history of baseball, only got over 50%. Johnny Bench is the best catcher in the history of baseball, but Piazza has all the record for catchers as far as offensively.

BEIJING - The men who barged through Shen Jianzhong's door probably thought it was a routine assignment: Break in and beat Shen's family into submission. Forced evictions to make way for real estate development are an everyday occurrence in China, and the family may have seemed no different from any in that situation. It was only after they forced open the door, threw Shen's wife to the ground and began to beat her that they learned the 38-year-old Shen and his 18-year-old son are kung fu masters.

Some former temporary workers from Amazon's warehouses in Pennsylvania are having a hard time, the Lehigh Valley's newspaper the Morning Call reports . Those who have filed for unemployment benefits -- sums of $100 to $200 per week -- often find their claims challenged. If approved, they are often challenged again. These workers, with few resources, face delays in receiving unemployment compensation. Those who aren't capable of navigating the official steps required to fight the challenges may never receive unemployment.

NEWTOWN, Conn. - It was meant to be a day of mourning, but parishioners inside a Catholic Church here had their fears renewed Sunday when a bomb threat forced a mid-morning evacuation and a SWAT team converged and surrounded a rectory. The threat, which came during morning services, was “a menacing call that threatened to disrupt the Mass in a violent way,” said Brian Wallace, a spokesman for the local diocese. As parishioners filed out of St. Rose of Lima Church, there was a swell of raw emotion -- disappointment, distress, anger and sadness, Wallace said.

When her friends were feeling sad, Emilie Parker reached for the markers and colored pencils that she almost always carried. “She never missed an opportunity to draw a picture or make a card for those around her,” father Robbie Parker said. “I can't count the number times Emilie … rushed to grab a piece of paper to draw them a picture or write them a note.” Parker's comments at a news conference Saturday were the first to be widely broadcast since a gunman forced his way into Sandy Hook Elementary School in Newtown, Conn., on Friday morning and opened fire.