Laurentian Reviews
Spring 2008

By Our Alumni

Can a college fraternity choose an ambitious path – starting with no hazing – and stick to it year after year? Can a fraternity have fun and be manly without ending up in the headlines or courts? And why would a faculty member say yes to a bid to join? These and other questions fill the pages of I Take Just Pride: How a Fraternity Reinvented Itself, Why a Professor Joined (Box Grove Communications, distributed Atlas Books, 2007), by Scott Conroe ’77.  

Conroe’s narrative follows Cornell University’s chapter of Phi Kappa Tau from its folding in 1995 through 2006, after the chapter was named most outstanding in the Phi Tau national. He was teaching writing at Cornell in 2000, and researching fraternities, when he first encountered the recolonized Phi Tau and became its faculty advisor, with little idea of his role. His eventual initiation into membership, the night before his 46th birthday, set him on a path of self-discovery.  Conroe’s humorous account of his failure to receive a bid at St. Lawrence, and his perspectives on the SLU Greek system in the 1970s and 1990s, serve as a backdrop. Conroe will be on campus during Reunion Weekend, May 29-June 1, to sign copies of his book.--MD

Katie Homes '03 is the illustrator of a children's interactive yoga book. Sasha and Mishoo, Little Yoga Warriors (self-published using sustainable methods, www.littleyoga warriors.com, 2007) was created by Homes and Jeff Mix to connect children across the globe and show them how to strengthen their bodies and quiet their minds through the world of yoga. It is the first in a planned series of children's books that foster awareness and appreciation of the many diverse cultures around the world. --NSB

Stuart Mesinger ’81 is the author of No Place I'd Rather Be: Wit and Wisdom from Adirondack Lean-to Journals (Adirondack Mountain Club, 2006).  A winner of the Adirondack Center for Writing’s nonfiction award for Best Edited Collection of 2006, the volume provides insight into the minds and motivations of those who venture into the woods and offers glimpses of life on the trail, with selections from the notebooks that occupy Adirondack lean-tos for all comers to add to with inspiration, hilarity, pathos and melancholy. --NSB

Nathan Larkin ’78 has written Samson and the Pirate Monks—Calling Men to an Authentic Brotherhood (Thomas Nelson Inc., 2007). His creation, the Samson Society, is a model of community and Friendship, according to a notice in the Watertown Daily Times, which adds, “Mr. Larkin’s story is one of addiction and loss and introduces men whose honest admission of weakness has been the doorway to healing.--NSB

By Our Faculty

The Sky Is Not A Ceiling (Orbis Books, 2007), by Priest Associate Professor of Physics Aileen O'Donoghue, is the story of her personal spiritual journey, as she struggles to answer the question, "what's out there?" What was it about the stars that drove O'Donoghue back to morning Mass? And how did the universe enrich her faith? Her discoveries are scientific and mystical, certain and mysterious. This critically acclaimed book is a rich mix of science and spirituality that goes beyond religion, and beyond the new physics, to a universe without limits.--MD

In the 50 years since its creation, the focus of the North American Aerospace Defense Command (NORAD) has shifted from the threat of Soviet bombers to ballistic missiles to terrorist-highjacked aircraft. In Canada in NORAD 1957-2007: A History (McGill-Queen's University Press, 2007), Professor of Canadian Studies Joseph T. Jockel ’74 looks at Canada's role in the bi-national command.--MD

The Good Society: An Introduction to Comparative Politics (Longman Press, 2007), by Professor of Government Alan L. Draper and Emeritus Professor of Government J. Ansil Ramsay, is a new textbook that the publisher claims is "a bold departure" because the authors “outline the qualities of a good society, then compare and evaluate postindustrial democracies in the West, less-developed countries, and communist and post-communist countries against this standard.--MD