Utne Reader librarian Danielle Maestretti shares the highlights (and occasional lowlights) of what’s landing in our library each week in ‘From the Stacks.’ 

Utne’s library is abuzz with a steady flow of 1,300 magazines, newsletters, journals, weeklies, zines, and other lively dispatches from the cultural front that are rarely found at big-box bookstores, or newsstands.

Featured in this week's video:

- Brazil's "Lambe Lambe" tradition, profiled in Creative Review 

- A Virginia Quarterly Review report on depression and suicide rates in Cuba 

- The Punk Rock Fun Time Activity Book from ECW Press 

- Make a Zine by Microcosm Publishing 

- The Terrapin turtles of Chesapeake Quarterly 

When I saw the title, Jesus Christ Super Zine, it was impossible for me not to crack open Ariel Birks’ personal zine. Distributed by S.S.O. Press out of Olympia, Washington, the first installment is full of illuminating stories from Birks’ stint as a hardcore evangelical Christian. Part handwritten and part typewritten, the charmingly sarcastic stories revisit her teenage years of proselytizing, abstaining from sex, and praying cross-legged on the grass with attractive secularists.

The essays reflect the author’s personal experiences, but there is a distinct familiarity of religious zeal for anyone with a history of zealotry. Here are some of my favorite quotes from Jesus Christ Super Zine, which encapsulate the sincerity and devotion of her then-Christian life:

On Christian camp: I got to hang out with the most awesome people ever. We had few inhibitions about ‘fitting in’ as we were all liberated by Jesus to do whatever the hell we wanted (except sin.) 

On Birks’ friend Jamy finding Jesus: I’m sure it was some worship service or camp. You know. With really emotional music that made me feel vulnerable.

On witnessing: He was 19, his name was Chris and well, he was extremely attractive to me. So, so very attractive. Actually he looked exactly like Chris Cornell. And thus, a wee little bit like Jesus, no? But that’s not what I was after, of course. I was there for some mind sex. 

Reading Jesus Christ Super Zine is better than remembering my own stories as an ex-Religious Freak. I can rest assured that others have been through the same experience: first hopelessly devoted, then utterly apathetic, and finally truly embarrassed. This trip down the memory lane of impressionable youth turns that embarrassment into entertainment, portraying a light-hearted coming-of-age tale.

Philadelphia’s new double-covered two.one.five magazine is a hodgepodge of local events and issues that stretch much further than the borders of Pennsylvania. Paging through one side of volume 1.3 (not yet available online) you’ll find a daring swimsuit spread and tips on executing the perfect road trip. Flip it around and you’ll get lost in a captivating nine-part section of immigration narratives. Echoing with national relevance, the essays meander through the diverse experiences of new Americans' dreams and realities.

These are people who have waited years, sometimes decades, to call the United States their home. One now-permanent resident offers up a humorous account detailing the process of obtaining a work permit through the green card lottery. Though armed with a bachelor’s degree and a job offer from a magazine in New York, it still took “11 years, three lawyers, four instances of being fingerprinted, 23 interviews with immigration officers at 14 different U.S. ports of entry, one near deportation, almost $13,000 in legal fees and 38 two-by-two-inch recent, forward facing photographs in which I am not wearing sunglasses or headgear of any kind” for the Canadian-passport toting American-hopeful to obtain the right to live in the United States.

From an entirely different vantage point, Tara Nurin shares the view from her seat at a stadium packed with immigrant soccer players gathered for the weekly marathon of games. She writes:

This is their reward. This one communal gathering of the Imperial Azteca soccer league that counts 600 dedicated players—some of whom drive up to two hours each way in order to play—is almost as sacred as church. Inside the arena, these mostly Latino immigrants, hailing largely from Mexico, can leave behind their concerns over money and their low-paying, labor-intensive jobs to partake in their home country’s most glorious international athletic obsession, and to share a slap on the back, a handmade taco and a sense of community with their fellow countrymen. This comforting simulation of Mexico protects them from what can be a discomforting reality outside.

From feeling homesick to battling language barriers, these stories revolve around much more than what was left behind: They paint an extraordinary portrait of life after immigrating, in a country whose media largely represent immigrants in a negative light. Beautifully and candidly written by various new American residents, from Burmese to Russian to Iraqi, these diverse narratives share the experience of our growing country and highlight just what it means to be an American.

David Suzuki truly has a passion. His lifelong dedication to the environment spans across his many endeavors; most notably, he is a broadcaster, a scientist, an activist, and an author of 43 books. A Passion for This Earth (David Suzuki Foundation and Greystone Books, 2008), however, is not Suzuki’s book at all, but the product of his remarkable ability to inspire people to think critically, personally, and practically about our environment. A collection of essays from writers, scientists, and activists, the book presents an extensive selection of voices about a common passion: the earth and our role in its capacity to flourish.

Edited by Michelle Benjamin, A Passion for This Earth boasts a foreword by Bill McKibben, environmentalist and acclaimed author of several books including The End of Nature and Deep Economy. The essays range from the urgent call for action of Doug Moss’ “Save the Environment—Take Back the Media” to the anecdotal nature of David Helvarg’s “Saved by the Sea”:

As a young kid, I’d looked up at the stars and gotten pissed off, thinking I’d been born a generation too soon to explore other worlds. But that week in Key West I got hold of a mask and snorkel and got into the water and saw live rocks, and vibrant colors, sea cucumbers and a queen conch, a sea turtle and a small hammerhead gliding through a coral canyon amid shoaling fish and realized there was this whole other alien world right beyond the seawall. Sadly, in the blink of an eye that’s been my life, the Keys reef has gone from 90 percent live coral cover to less than 10 percent, devastated by pollution, physical impacts from boats, anchors and people and global warming.

A Passion for This Earth is a satisfying fusion of appreciation for nature and political activism that stems from the natural diversity of our earth, of the problems that face it and the people who choose to tackle the issues.

A synthesis of all things linguistic, Language Magazine is page after page of worldwide news, technologies for improving language acquisition, and resources for anyone who values communication. The latest issue features news about Portugal’s decision to change its national language to the Brazilian Portuguese, anecdotes from Spain, France, and Belgum, and a back page by Richard Lederer, author of several books celebrating the complexities and humor in language.

An article in the July issue, “Xpert sez txt is gr8 4 language,” considers Professor David Crystal’s research on text messaging as a new language style. Concluding that text messaging enhances and enriches language skills, Crystal “called it an ‘urban myth’ that school work was riddled with text speech, and said in fact students knew when to use it in the right context.”

Formerly known as the American Language Review, Language Magazine could be mistaken for a strictly academic publication. Though some articles are geared toward language teachers, many more are endlessly useful for those considering learning or improving proficiency of another language, which—to put it simply—most people could stand to do. Whether that language is French or Spanish, or a rare dialect known to only a few hundred folks, there is a laundry list of resources to be found between these pages, including recommendations for study abroad locations, program specifications, and news about language-learning software to help ease your journey toward language enlightenment.

For mothers (and fathers) who want more out of a parenting magazine than five ways to feed your child vegetables, the Mother explores natural parenting from pre-birth into adult life. Seeking to create a holistic lifestyle for your children, yourself as a parent, and your larger community, the UK-based magazine is anything but conventional.

The July-August 2008 issue includes “The Activist Parent,” by Dr. Richard House, which emphasizes the importance of finding “ ‘personal power’ to stand up for one’s truth” and details the defining features a parent who embraces that ideal. An “activist parent” is informed and honest and often participates in some form of “principled non-compliance,” such as refusing to subject his or her children to standardized testing, among other avant-garde attributes.

In the same issue, an article by Anton Saxon shows how to turn your city into a Transition Town. A movement founded by environmentalist Rob Hopkins, the Transition Town concept examines how a community can self-organize to decrease the effects of global warming and meet the challenges of peak oil.

If, however, you would like to know how to get your child to eat his or her greens, the Mother is not without its share of practical parenting information. In it, you can find delicious vegan recipes and suggestions for protecting your children from sun damage the nontoxic way.

The RNC Welcoming Committee, a group organizing radical activity during September’s Republican National Convention in St. Paul, Minnesota, has created a pre-convention primer, The Struggle Is Our Inheritance: A History of Radical Minnesota. 

The anti-authoritarian zine has the expected flaws—unattributed authorship that will make the Wikipedia-wary reader skeptical, and a broken link to download the zine on the RNC Welcoming Committee website, now defunct. (I eventually found a copy of the zine at Arise! Resource Center and Bookstore in Minneapolis.)

Nitpicking aside, the zine is an intriguing introduction to Minnesota radicalism over the last 150 years—union strikes, weapons manufacturing protests, the birth of the American Indian Movement, anti-racist Skinheads. The zine’s closing essay reminds readers that mass demonstrations like the ones planned for the RNC have only “a small place in something much bigger,” i.e. the radical tradition laid out in the zine. The “real work” ought to be long-term community building, writes the author, even though demonstrations do have their appeal:

...though it’s important not to let an affinity for symbolism and theater drive our strategy, it’s equally important to recognize that orchestrating massive coordinated resistance for a few days in 2008 could have a profound impact on our collective morale, fueling a broad escalation in the radical, community-based work we should all be engaged in.

UPDATE: Commenter Tony tells us the RNC Welcoming Committee's website is temporarily down, but should be up and running again soon. Thanks for the info, Tony.

From the John Jay College of Criminal Justice comes the new J Journal: a strange and delightful hybrid of literary, creative writing on crime, criminal justice, law, and law enforcement published by the college’s English department. The inaugural issue contains a fair amount of poetry in addition to the expected prose—which, alas, is not classified, making it difficult at times to distinguish between short stories and creative nonfiction.*

One of the standouts in the issue is Jason Trask’s “New Plantation,” a frank recollection of teaching writing to high school students on Rikers Island. In his first week, Trask tries to earn cred by doing a lesson on the origins of profanity, an attention-grabbing routine that opens with writing FUCK, then INTERCOURSE on the board:

I picked up the chalk again and wrote “INTERCOURSE.” I waited. “You guys know this word?”

“Intercourse,” a couple of them said.

“Right. Now is that a bad word?” I asked.

“It mean ‘fuck.’ ”

“Well then, why isn’t it a bad word too if it means the same things as ‘fuck.’ ”

. . . They sat there waiting for me to tell them. I looked around at them. “You’ve got two words that mean the same thing. How does it happen that one of them is a bad word and one of them is a good word?

I waited, but no one said anything. I returned to the board and wrote, “SHIT.”

But this is no Dangerous Minds Part II. Trask pulls off no mind-boggling feats of academic resurrection; for every success he recounts a perfectly human blundering or insecurity. It’s a good story, and perhaps a nonfiction one, if Trask’s contributor bio, which cites an early 90s stint teaching at Rikers, can be considered as evidence.

* I often grumble about this decision to not classify prose, which is shared by many publications in the Utne Reader library, but truth be told, I’m torn. There’s a rigid part of me that just wants a piece of writing plopped down in the appropriate category. But then I have to admit: It’s the hybrids of the writing world that most excite me. What’s more interesting: What actually happened—or how someone remembers it? Is that any less of a true story? Or consider David Carr’s new “memoir,” Night of the Gun, a fully-reported account of his life. Perhaps this band of magazines and journals that refuse to identify their prose are doing all of us a favor, kicking us out of literary ruts.

Image by  dideo, licensed under Creative Commons .

Herewith, the latest highlights from our alt-press library, as regularly featured in From the Stacks:

A beautifully written reverie for a lost city, from the New Orleans duet-zine Keep Loving, Keep Fighting / I Hate This Part of Texas. Feminisms in motion at make/shift, a new magazine that’s fresh, feisty, and stunningly diverse. A vivid, nostalgia-inducing tribute to “America’s greatest art form”—jazz—from Stop Smiling. The nude male form, in all its hairy variety, strutting on through the Amsterdam-based Butt. A special issue on translation from Poetry, featuring poems translated into English from 18 different languages. And it’s been a tough year for music magazines, so here’s a happy-tenth-anniversary shout-out to Paste!

A few weekends back I spurned my habitually uninspiring Sunday Times fare and sunk into the couch with Keep Loving, Keep Fighting / I Hate This Part of Texas (#7), a beautifully written combination of two zines out of New Orleans. Hours later, I peeled myself off the cushions, lost in a reverie for a lost city, but comforted by stabs of gratitude for the folks there still fighting the good fight. The zine’s writers, Hope and John, present a series of sporadically ordered flashes of Katrina aftermath, from plugging away at a youth-oriented bike clinic to spreading the news of a beloved friend’s murder: 

It felt like evacuation all over again, people calling one another with jagged voices, hushed hoarse whispers not wanting to utter the unthinkable. Asking to check in about this person or that, ending every conversation with I love you.

In our May-June 2007 issue, we reprinted Times-Picayune columnist Chris Rose’s wrenchingly honest chronicle of his descent into depression covering Katrina’s destruction (article not available online). Hope and John’s diary-like recollections moved me in a similar way, for their candor in grappling with the ugliness, kindness, resentment, beauty, fear, and pain that so many must navigate in their efforts to survive and resurrect life in New Orleans. At the end, a list of organizations doing good work in the city comes as a welcome coda of opportunities for action.

It’s ironic that we at Utne Reader have decided to give indie champ Paste magazine a shout-out this week. Because Paste Editor-in-Chief Josh Jackson had the same idea in the magazine’s May issue, offering his hip music mag a well-deserved pat on the back in recognition of 10 years spent bringing great music to its readers. Who cares that the hand doing the patting is Jackson’s own? The issue is exemplary of what Paste does best, offering a good balance of album reviews of new artists and old favorites, a roundup of musicians’ tributes to (and diatribes against) their mothers in honor of Mothers Day, and a hilarious two-page spread celebrating the 100th birthday of “Take Me Out to the Ballgame.” There’s even the much-loved accordion appreciation article.

The feature articles are excellent as well. The best is an essay by Death Cab for Cutie frontman Ben Gibbard. Paste sent Gibbard to a cabin in Big Sur—the same cabin to which he’d retreated to write the songs on the band’s latest album, Narrow Stairs, and also where Jack Kerouac wrote Big Sur—to “meditate on life, art and solitude.” Sometimes first-person thought experiments work, and sometimes they flop. In this case, Gibbard offers a very personal, not-quite-sentimental vision of Big Sur, Kerouac, and his own life in a truly enjoyable essay.

Paste brings together the best elements of the mainstream and indie music press, offering sharply written reviews (not exactly a mainstay in the underground music scene) of bands that go unwritten about in most big music glossies.

—Morgan Winters 

The latest issue of the bimonthly arts magazine Stop Smiling, dedicated entirely to jazz, is a veritable odyssey through space and time, bringing the reader from New York City’s 52nd Street to Storyville, New Orleans; cruising through the Roaring ’20s to the New Millennium; each leg of the journey accompanied by Nina Simone’s volatile tenor and the wailing trumpet of Miles Davis.

The magazine exhorts us to “start appreciating America’s greatest art form.” And it’s hard not to when grazing through the sections dedicated to classic jazz cover art, a famous 60-year-old vibraphonist with a death-defying passion for speedboats, and the top five jazz discs worth pilfering from author John Corbett’s album collection. The issue can be nostalgia-inducing, even to the casual fan. There are interviews with jazz luminaries from bygone eras—Ornette Coleman, Miles Davis—and a section dedicated to Eric Dolphy where musicians and historians pay homage to the extraordinary reedman. But more than anything, the issue is a testament to jazz’s place not only as an influential historical artifact, but as a still-thriving form of music in its own right.     

 —Morgan Winters 

Open up a copy of Bookforum and press your dirty little hands up against a window that peers into a covetable world of literary glory. Within its pages is a place where the walls are lined with well-stocked bookshelves, people chat about the latest authors like revered sports heroes, and everybody (presumably) drinks classy wine. In short, Bookforum is a slice of booklover’s heaven.

The Dec.-Jan. 2008 issue serves up a heady dish of high criticism, starting with two articles on Henry James: Peter Brooks takes on the first two volumes of James’ letters, while Colm Tóibín writes about The Mature Master, a new biography of James by Sheldon M. Novick. There's also John Banville's discourse on pulp fiction, and a depressingly intelligent essay by Billy Collins on the new book How To Talk About Books You Haven’t Read—detailing, naturally, why the reviewer resisted the temptation not to read the book he was reviewing.

—Brendan Mackie

This holiday season, our crack team of magazine readers has teamed up to help you avoid the consumer-frenzied mall and give the gift that keeps on giving: information. With the care of a gourmet sommelier pairing a rare delicacy to its rightful wine, we’ve matched some of our favorite alternative magazines to their ideal recipients—those exasperating names on the gift list for whom a sweater just won’t do. The hermit socialist uncle? Got him. The eerie niece? No problem.

If you’ve still got a magazine-gift dilemma after reading our guide, drop us a line in the comments below. We’ll sort through our stacks and get back to you.

For your faraway friend with whom you can’t share a beer:
Get him or her Imbibe, a magazine of “liquid culture.” Imbibe answers perennial questions about coffee, beer, and cocktails, such as that nagging head-scratcher: What was George Washington’s drink of choice? (Answer: Applejack, a traditional American liquor). Then, next time you see your distant friend, crack open a couple of Hefeweizen, the unfiltered wheat beer featured in the Sept.-Oct. 2007 issue, and enjoy the cultured conversation that’s sure to flow. “Did you know that Hefeweizen is brewed with at least 50 percent wheat malts, unlike most beers, which are brewed with barley?” your friend will ask. “And that while in the United States Hefe (as aficionados call it) is served with a slice of lemon, in Germany that’s unheard of.” You may never eat solid food again. —Brendan Mackie

For the unapologetically carnivorous:
Meatpaper , a nominee for best new publication in this year’s Utne Independent Press Awards, is about more than eating meat. It’s about meat history, meat ethics, meat as a metaphor, and, perhaps most bizarrely, meat as art. This San Francisco-based magazine honors what editors Sasha Wizansky and Amy Standen call fleischgeist—the spirit of meat. In Meatpaper’s Fall 2007 issue, this spirit is manifest in a wide array of articles, including a Q&A with butchers who advocate using less popular but deliciously traditional cuts of meat, and a look back at Jana Sterbak’s 1987 Vanitas: Flesh Dress for an Albino Anorectic, in which a waifish model wore a costume made entirely of raw steaks. The text throughout is framed by a clean layout and luscious images, which makes Meatpaper an intellectual and aesthetic treat. —Morgan Winters

For the Yankee pal who won’t stop with the mint juleps:
A slew of magazines without a lick of the South in them have been, of late, trumpeting this recently discovered region below Cincinnati that has a ton of great stuff going on. It’s called “The South,” and did you know that bands come from there? And writers? And artists? And that it’s impossible to write about this place without employing clichés such as “bourbon-soaked” or “country-fried?” Well, not so for the Arkansas-based Oxford American. This class act has covered its beat for the past 15 years, showcasing all things Southern and great (or sometimes not so great). The latest edition (#58) includes a CD compilation of the 26 Southern recording artists profiled for the annual music issue, which showcases a diverse group from Thelonious Monk to Daniel Johnston. The issue also features a cool series of essays titled “Writers Who Rocked,” penned by the members of an assortment of noteworthy musical acts, including the Red Crayola and the Del Fuegos. Smart, edgy, hip, funny—Oxford American proves that Southern culture isn’t an oxymoron. —Jason Ericson

For your bearded uncle who stopped coming home for the holidays because he’s too busy working on his manifesto:
So you’ve got a problem. Last year you got your uncle the Nation, and though he really enjoyed the Deadline Poet, the coverage was just too far right for him. Well, don’t fret. Z Magazine might be the solution to your gift quandary. Z regularly draws contributions from top-shelf revolutionary thinkers, such as Noam Chomsky and Howard Zinn, as well as radical educators, leaders, and in-the-trenches activists you’re likely to have never seen or heard elsewhere. Don’t expect to find much love for Democrats here, standard bearers of hegemony that they are. For a real vanguard trifecta, throw in subscriptions to Socialist Review and In These Times. Taken together, they’re guaranteed to have you and your uncle renouncing your citizenship and burning the contents of your wallet. —Jason Ericson

For the young and slightly twisted:
I had never heard of a literary journal for children until I picked up Crow Toes Quarterly. This newish Canadian publication has come out swinging as “the new face of children’s lit,” with strange, spooky stories sure to sate Roald Dahl fans. The Summer 2007 issue (Fall hasn’t landed in our library yet) is packed with imaginative stories featuring cheesecake-munching babies, an arachnophobic dandelion, and a wandering two-headed boy named Tongue. The issue also includes poetry, a call for entries for a creative writing contest, and an interview with illustrator Scott Griffin. A great gift for children ages 8 to 13, or any adults still cultivating their imaginations. —Sarah Pumroy

For the Catholic-raised intellectual who is moved by Christmas mass but feels shut out by several Church teachings:
Commonweal, a biweekly magazine published independently by lay Catholics, is comprised mostly of opinion pieces, with topics and views that, though they range widely, are rooted in a deep, critical investment in Catholic identity. Commonweal’s politics are center-left but not predictably so; its lively cultural and arts coverage is even harder to pin down. The main thread is an enthusiasm for robust, open, forward-looking debate. Highlights of the Dec. 7, 2007 include a piece by a Catholic prison chaplain on the rise of conservative evangelicalism in prisons and a smart analysis of Vatican statements on end-of-life ethics. —Steve Thorngate

For your cube mate, who still wears his “I want to believe” T-shirt at least once a week, sometimes for several days in a row:
Psst. Come over here. Did you know that cancer-causing monkey viruses have infected our vaccine pool, the Great Depression II is imminent, the government is using its pop culture outlets to slowly warm the public to the existence of extra-terrestrials, and officials have met with clergy to discuss an official merger between church and state? Well, you would have if you’d read the Winter 2008 issue of Paranoia, “the conspiracy and paranormal reader.” A Paranoia subscription would also keep you definitively up-to-date on the latest news on the investigation into the assassination of JFK. You don’t have to be a conspiracy junkie to love this magazine, but it does help. Now here’s a tinfoil hat. Go and spread the word. —Jason Ericson

For your thoughtful, but obstinate political sparring partner:
Reason , a 2007 Utne Independent Press Award nominee for political coverage, offers some of the most interesting, in-depth reporting and contrarian perspectives you’re likely to read anywhere. This monthly’s columnists are incisive and acidly funny: Look out especially for Greg Beato’s sarcastic commentary. And reminiscent of Harper’s “Index,” the “Citings” section at the beginning of each issue collects information that you might not find anywhere else, documenting everything from excessive earmarks in a Congress that promised—and continues to promise—their demise, to the pointlessness of a tax-funded anti-pornography program. Unlike Harper’s, though, Reason provides context to anchor their more surprising reports. There are some party lines in this libertarian magazine. (Consider the magazine’s December issue, which featured a sidebar chiding contemporary Republicans for not taking author Ayn Rand seriously enough.) Nevertheless, Reason cultivates a useful contrarian voice—an ideal gift for those who agree with you one moment and bare their teeth the next. —Michael Rowe

For the fashion-conscious yet tasteful young woman:
To describe Eliza as a “modest” fashion magazine doesn’t do it justice. The simple adjective brings to mind images of prudish or pious women hiding their bodies in long skirts and plain tops. But Eliza is so much more. The Fall 2007 issue features smart, compelling, and useful stories, including a piece on how to change a tire, an exploration of Seattle, tips on how to be comfortable in your own skin, and, of course, plenty of fashion articles and photo shoots. I wouldn’t have even known that Eliza was a “modest” fashion magazine if I hadn’t read the editor’s note. But once Summer Bellessa clued me in to the magazine’s mission—“We will not uncover the sexual secrets to make him want you, promote people who are glitz with no substance, or glorify lifestyles that we know do not bring happiness”—I began to notice the pleasant absence of revealing clothing and sexually explicit images. A more accurate word to describe the styles in Eliza might be “tasteful” rather than “modest.” Either way, it’s definitely a good pick for any smart young woman interested in fashion without the sleaze. —Sarah Pumroy

For your college friend who once showed up at an ’80s night party dressed as an 1880s shopkeeper:
Polite , another nominee for best new publication in this year’s Utne Independent Press Awards, publishes articles on straightforward topics, but from a perspective neither entirely serious nor exactly kidding (e.g., a travel piece that ends, “There’s no city in America with less personality than Myrtle Beach, S.C.”). It also runs more conventional pieces on odder subjects, along with fabricated profiles, features, and, in the Autumn 2007 issue’s “Best of History” section, historical narratives. (One is credited to an Oregon Trail pioneer who knows how to shoot his rifle in exactly eight directions.) The package is an entertaining assortment—sorry, a “miscellany”—of the esoteric, the deadpan, and the desperately clever. A great choice for anyone who’s interested in everything but takes none of it all that seriously. —Steve Thorngate

It's time once again for Heeb's Chosen Issue (Fall 2007), when the sassy Jewish mag's editors ordain their favorite players in arts and entertainment. It's also, as editorial director Rebecca Wiener writes, "a great excuse to unleash our OCD tendencies" with a particularly careful selection process. If that doesn't scare you away, check out the issue's goods, among them an engaging profile of Joan Rivers, who is returning to her roots in the Manhattan comedy clubs, and a short piece about Dmitry, a 33-year-old Ukrainian-born Jew who finally goes ahead with his bris nearly 20 years after emigrating to the United States. The issue also features coverboy Jonah Hill (Superbad) and the Heeb Hundred, a roster of 100 up-and-coming members of the tribe. The print edition includes just 20 of the notably hip crowd, but you can assess the rest of the lineup at Heeb100.com. —Eric Kelsey