Neshaminy: The Bucks County Historical and Literary Journal. Spring/Summer 2023. Vol. 4, No. 2

by Don Swaim, Daniel Dorian, Pat Achilles (Illustrator)

Neshaminy ’s seventh issue includes a comprehensive history and analysis of the recent wave of book banning and censorship in America, with a focus on Bucks County, where the Central Bucks School Board is now controlled by a conservative majority. The article by Daniel Dorian shows how the Board’s actions have led to the removal of so-called “harmful” books and content from school libraries, despite the protests of teachers, students, and parents. Also in this issue an original ghost story penned in the 1920s by the local historian, archeologist, and philanthropist Henry Chapman Mercer. Accompanying the story is scholar Tom Sparrow’s article on Mercer’s place in the history of supernatural fiction. In a memoir, Jennifer Lin writes about her early acquaintance with the celebrated Bucks County illustrator Ben Solowey. Interviews with artists Harry Boardman and Tim Gibson and horror author Chuck Wendig. Poetry by Jill Lupine, Lois Perch Villemaire, and Joseph Brunetti. Don Swaim’s short fiction about a deadly bear chase in eighteenth-century Pennsylvania. Original art by Pat Achilles plus stories by Daniel Sean Kaye and Carl Reader.

139 pages, Paperback

Published April 4, 2023

About the author

Don Swaim is a writer, novelist, journalist, and winner of the 2011 Pearl S. Buck short story prize. His novel, The H.L. Mencken Murder Case (St. Martin's Press), was republished as a trade paperback under the Authors Guild's Back in Print program. Born in Kansas and educated in Ohio, his daily feature "Book Beat" was broadcast on major radio stations through the CBS Radio Stations News Service, and can be heard on the Internet at Wired for Books and at Book Beat:The Podcast. After a career at CBS in New York and Baltimore, Swaim founded the Bucks County Writers Workshop in Pennsylvania. He edits the web's definitive Ambrose Bierce Site. His fiction and articles have been published in small magazines and on the web.