Cover Story
The Daughters
Adrienne Celt is Pima County Library’s writer in residence, part of a new statewide project dispatching writers to libraries throughout the state. Her debut novel, The Daughters, was released in paperback last month.
Get Yourself a Scary Job (The Good Kind)
Who wants to be employed in October? Well, I hope you were planning to spend the weekend beefing up your resume and working on your menacing growl, because you’ve got a job opportunity to get ready for. Nightfall, Old Tucson’s annual scary fall attraction, is holding a hiring fair next Friday, Aug. 26 from 4-7…
IBT’s Big Gay Weekend
IBT’s Big Gay Weekend is upon us! Join your local favorites Tempest DuJour and Aija Simone for a fun filled weekend featuring entertainment, giveaways, food and drinks. T.G.I.F The weekend kicks off Friday night with a drag show hosted by Tempest at 9 p.m. with special guests, Shannel from RuPaul’s Drag Race All Stars, IBT’s Drag Race…
The Weekly List: 32 Things To Do in Tucson in the Next Seven Days
Community Return of the Mermaids: Celebrate the monsoon with this annual festival and parade. Dress up and join the mermaids as they make their way through 4th Avenue and Downtown Tucson. Families are welcome at this multi-venue event, but mermaids are known to get “a little racier” as the evening goes on, so parental discretion…
New Exhibition on the Block
The Desert Artisans’ Gallery launched two new shows this week entitled Canvas Dreams and Summer Stillness. Located at 6536 E. Tanque Verde Rd., the Desert Artisans’ Galley is owned and operated by local Southern Arizona artists and features contemporary works in everything from photograph and jewelry to watercolor and and glass. The exhibition “Canvas Dreams”…
BASIS Schools: On Beyond Charters
If you haven’t been paying attention lately, you may not know that BASIS, which began with a single charter school in Tucson, now has charter schools in three states as well as two U.S. private schools—three more are scheduled to open—and a private school in Shenzhen, China. My, how BASIS has grown. This post is…
Gabby Giffords: “We Must Draw a Bright Red Line Between Political Speech and Suggestions of Violence”
You’ve undoubtedly heard that Republican presidential nominee Donald Trump yesterday alluded to the power of “Second Amendment people” to put a stop to Hillary Clinton and her Supreme Court appointees, should they try to confiscate all of the guns. Y’know, if Obama doesn’t manage to get that long-planned job done by the end of the…
Cinema Clips: The Little Prince
After sitting on the shelf for quite some time, Mark Osborne’s unorthodox, animated adaptation of Antoine de Saint-Exupery’s classic story finally gets a release, albeit a release streaming on Netflix. It’s a good enough movie, but its by no means a straight retelling of The Little Prince. There’s a modern story about a young girl…
“Have You No Sense of Decency?” Part 2: Decency Edition
A few days ago, I wrote about the famous takedown of Senator Joe McCarthy in 1954 by the attorney Joseph Welch, which began McCarthy’s downward political slide. Welch said, “Until this moment, Senator, I think I never really gauged your cruelty or your recklessness. . . . Let us not assassinate this lad further, senator.…
Is it the Weekend Yet? Let’s All Plan to See the Princess Bride at the Loft
It’s still early in the week, but let’s start talking about what the plan is to de-stress this weekend. My suggestion: Join the good folks at the Loft Cinema (3233 E. Speedway Blvd.) for an evening of battling Rodents of Unusual Size, humiliations galore and, of course, popcorn. That’s right, they’re showing the Princess Bride on…
Cinema Clips: Our Little Sister
Three sisters, Sachi, Yoshino and Chika (Haruka Ayase, Masami Nagasawa and Kaho), welcome their newfound and much younger half-sister Suzu (Suzu Asano) into their home after their father passes away. Suzu is closed off and quiet at first but, as she gets to know her new family, she starts opening up, as does the movie.…
Pick Up Some Clever Condoms, Save the World
Time for a sex ed lesson! Thanks to environmental stressors such as overpopulation the Earth is hurting and endangering wildlife. What can we do about it? The Center for Biological Diversity says it’s petty simple: Stop hogging the planet. The rapid growth of our human population is pushing other species off the planet in what most scientists…
Three Minute Film Festival
Whether you’re an experienced filmmaker or looking to try something new, this might be for you: Tucson Fringe and Strada Company are teaming up to produce the first-annual Three Minute Film Festival. Why three minutes? Because new and emerging filmmakers often don’t have the resources for longer pieces. The Fringe, as you might guess, is putting…
Election Integrity Resurfaces as a National Issue, Thanks to Vladimir Putin
The very first blogging I did was in 2007 when I covered the trial involving a public records request for voting records of Pima County elections. Sitting in the courtroom beside Mike Bryan, then the proprietor and sole writer on Blog For Arizona, I furiously scribbled down a play-by-play of the proceedings while Bryan, a…
Sawyer Needs a Home
Hi, I’m Sawyer! I’m a four year old boy and I’m looking for a new home! I was transferred to the Humane Society of Southern Arizona from a different shelter so they don’t know a lot about my history. What they do know is that I love to play and I get along well with…
Cinema Clips: Indignation
In a summer that is supposed to be blowing our minds with big budget special effects and things that go boom, this relatively quiet Philip Roth adaptation winds up being one of the season’s best bets. Logan Lerman gives one of the year’s best performances thus far as Marcus, a Jewish student attending college in…
Tucson and Its Not-So-Accessible Public Spaces
You know, one of my favorite memories of growing up here in Tucson is strolling up and down 4th Avenue on the weekends, and following the underpass into downtown. There were so many places I could explore. Bentley’s, Cafe Quebec, the back room of the Chicago Store—they were amazing times. Everything was accessible to me,…
Ducey ‘Next Step’ Watch: Day 78. Primaries Edition
It’s been two months and a few weeks since Prop 123 passed. As promised, some money has been distributed to districts around the state which they wouldn’t have seen otherwise. That’s the first step Governor Ducey was talking about in the lead-up to the election. With vote-by-mail ballots making their way to people’s homes marking the…
Kurt Vile Talks Inspiration, Family and the Quests of Songwriting
Kurt Vile is riding a bit of a high. After a rigorous year of touring behind 2015’s b’lieve i’m goin down…, the Philadelphia-based musician and his band, The Violators, had been feeling a bit of the tour blues—that zombie-esque state where “you hit a wall and things just sound the same,” as he puts it.…
Power Up Against Cancer
Unbreakable Gear has partnered with HopeKids Arizona to hold a fundraiser show to raise money for brave kids dealing with cancer and other life threatening illnesses. Power Up Against Cancer is meant to be a show of strength for all the kids who are battling an illness and fighting for their life. Hosted at the…
NAACP Calls For a Moratorium on Charter Schools
A resolution from the NAACP at the organization’s National Convention in Cincinnati in July calls for a moratorium on charter schools. It isn’t official policy until it is voted on at the National Board meeting in the Fall. The resolution includes a number of concerns about charters. It states that charters increase segregation; some low-quality charters in low-income…
Media Watch
Lee Enterprises, not-yet-erstwhile owners of the Arizona Daily Star, recently trimmed the workforce at the Tucson daily by about 20 employees. As major balloon payments on the company’s bankruptcy debt loom, Lee has already relieved itself of some of its holdings, including real estate sales put into place to bring in cash for locations that…
Benefit Show
Help a kid just be a kid by watching the Riverside play at Borderlands Brewery.
Danehy
What is so freakin’ hard about saying “Oops, sorry, I messed up?”
Dream Skies
What’s the best way to capture a cloud?
Humble Homebrewer
Michael Cook has far surpassed the college phase of “as long as the drink is wet it’s good” and has for years been dissecting the flavors that make a beer a nice brew.
Stop the Bourne-ness
Jason Bourne, a tedious, desperate and sad extension of the Bourne storyline.
Milagros
Experience a group exhibition of Tucson artists’ personal and current Ex Votos.
The Thrill Has Come
Rather than close the doors on five long careers playing electric blues, the members of the Golden State-Lone Star Blues Revue sought to kick up a notch.
Next + Direct
Celebrate rhythm and sonic power while you enjoy music from some of the Cosmos’ craftiest soundsmiths.
Spice is Not So Nice
As any republican with truly conservative beliefs will tell you, government intervention leads to negative consequences. In the case of prohibition, it leads to black markets that, without the option of regulation, create more harmful scenarios than their potentially legal analogues.
Family Fundays
Grab the family and head over the Heirloom Farmers Market.
T Q&A
Have you ever heard of a group called the Residents?
Open Mic Night
Any and all performers are welcome to participate in Tucson Cabaret Open Mic night
Editor’s Note
We spend half the year working on Best of Tucson. Your part is done, now it’s on us. Thanks for the votes.
Dust Devil
With a subtle breeze/Heat embraces
Steele Resolve
Democrat Victoria Steele has worked as a mental-health counselor, journalist and former state lawmaker. She is now seeking to challenge U.S. Rep. Martha McSally (R-CD2) in November.
Celebrate Love Unironically
Ben’s Bells and the Fourth Avenue Merchants Association unveiled the ninth and newest Locks of Love sculpture on Fourth Avenue last week.
Police Dispatch
A man used a Walmart restroom as his own personal tomato-and-clam-flavored beer bar.
Police Dispatch
A woman randomly took her personal problems out on an unfortunate female convenience-store clerk—screaming, throwing things and even pulling out the clerk’s hair.
Letter to the Editor
A reader writes in to say although the shopping center development itself is welcome, the special sign approval is just one more example of the dual standard that the southside has faced for decades.
Two-Wheeled Hope
Children’s Clinics is ensuring that kids they serve (and children in the community with complex health needs) get the opportunity to just be a kid.
