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Obsessed with the wrongs of Abu Ghraib, local author Nick Flynn traveled across the globe to meet its victims
In his powerful new memoir, The Ticking Is the Bomb (W.W. Norton), Scituate native Nick Flynn recounts a conversation he had with a man in Turkey.

WHAT MAKES NICK TICK? Flynn’s memoir, unflinchingly honest, takes a hard look at the dark and dangerous world.

In his powerful new memoir, The Ticking Is the Bomb (W.W. Norton), Scituate native Nick Flynn recounts a conversation he had with a man in Turkey.

My first child will be born in January, I told Amir. A girl. He narrowed his eyes and smiled, as if I had just come into focus.

You don’t realize it, but you know who “Amir” (not his real name) is. Or at least, almost certainly, you’ve seen a photograph of him. He’s the man — naked, cowering, his face a twisted mask of pain — being dragged on a leash across the concrete floor of Abu Ghraib prison by US Army Private Lynndie England. In the moments just before and after that photo was taken, his face was rubbed into a puddle of urine and he was sodomized with a broom.

Flynn met Amir in Istanbul, in 2007, interviewing him in a hotel room, alongside lawyers and human-rights workers. He was drawn there, despite the considerable travel expense — and the fact that his partner was pregnant with their first child — by a powerful, almost primal urge to meet and speak with the men abused at that infamous Iraqi jail.

The journey to Turkey, Flynn — who reads at Berklee’s Café 939 on Wednesday — tells the Phoenix, was “about my own wrestling . . . breaking down my own unacknowledged stereotypes.” And, he says of his interview, he was “surprised that I was surprised” to find that “sitting across from this man and hearing him talk in this way that was measured and reasonable, and even humorous at times” provided “much more of a human interaction than I’d anticipated.”

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Obsessed with the wrongs of Abu Ghraib, local author Nick Flynn traveled across the globe to meet its victims
In his powerful new memoir, The Ticking Is the Bomb (W.W. Norton), Scituate native Nick Flynn recounts a conversation he had with a man in Turkey.

WHAT MAKES NICK TICK? Flynn’s memoir, unflinchingly honest, takes a hard look at the dark and dangerous world.

In his powerful new memoir, The Ticking Is the Bomb (W.W. Norton), Scituate native Nick Flynn recounts a conversation he had with a man in Turkey.

My first child will be born in January, I told Amir. A girl. He narrowed his eyes and smiled, as if I had just come into focus.

You don't realize it, but you know who "Amir" (not his real name) is. Or at least, almost certainly, you've seen a photograph of him. He's the man — naked, cowering, his face a twisted mask of pain — being dragged on a leash across the concrete floor of Abu Ghraib prison by US Army Private Lynndie England. In the moments just before and after that photo was taken, his face was rubbed into a puddle of urine and he was sodomized with a broom.

Flynn met Amir in Istanbul, in 2007, interviewing him in a hotel room, alongside lawyers and human-rights workers. He was drawn there, despite the considerable travel expense — and the fact that his partner was pregnant with their first child — by a powerful, almost primal urge to meet and speak with the men abused at that infamous Iraqi jail.

The journey to Turkey, Flynn — who reads at Berklee's Café 939 on Wednesday — tells the Phoenix, was "about my own wrestling . . . breaking down my own unacknowledged stereotypes." And, he says of his interview, he was "surprised that I was surprised" to find that "sitting across from this man and hearing him talk in this way that was measured and reasonable, and even humorous at times" provided "much more of a human interaction than I'd anticipated."

Read more

The meteoric rise and startling fall of Starbucks is emblematic of the contemporary American dream — just ask the history professor who’s been to 425 branches
In 50 states and 49 countries, the experience is the same: a placid sense of place, air suffused with the rich aromatics of fresh-brewed espresso. Customers dollop cream and sprinkle brown sugar into their drinks. Behind the counter, green-clad baristas grind beans and steam milk, smiling as they take orders in a made-up language.

In 50 states and 49 countries, the experience is the same: a placid sense of place, air suffused with the rich aromatics of fresh-brewed espresso. Customers dollop cream and sprinkle brown sugar into their drinks on their way out the door, or they stay — paging through books or talking softly while they sip, serenaded by piped-in Paul McCartney and Norah Jones. Behind the counter, green-clad baristas grind beans and steam milk, smiling as they take orders in a made-up language.

What other corporate entity but Starbucks offers such a defined experience? It’s one Temple University professor Bryant Simon immersed himself in countless times over the past few years — he spent 12 to 14 hours each week observing the human traffic in more than 425 Starbucks locations in nine countries. His curiosity having been piqued by the company’s breathtaking popularity, he sensed that the way we buy coffee said something deeper about ourselves.

I first interviewed Simon for another story in 2007. At the time, he’d already been at work on his book about the coffee colossus for a couple years. Now that book, Everything But the Coffee: Learning About America from Starbucks (University of California Press), has finally been published.

It’s taken quite a few twists and turns on the way to the shelves of your local Barnes & Noble (which, as it happens, may itself have a Starbucks inside). After all, an awful lot has changed in the past few years. In early 2007, the Dow Jones Industrial Average was above 12,000 and unemployment was at 4.5 percent. Starbucks was commensurately flush, with some 11,000 stores in several dozen countries and revenue of $6.4 billion and counting — it would rake in $10.4 billion in ‘08.

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The meteoric rise and startling fall of Starbucks is emblematic of the contemporary American dream — just ask the history professor who’s been to 425 branches
In 50 states and 49 countries, the experience is the same: a placid sense of place, air suffused with the rich aromatics of fresh-brewed espresso. Customers dollop cream and sprinkle brown sugar into their drinks. Behind the counter, green-clad baristas grind beans and steam milk, smiling as they take orders in a made-up language.

In 50 states and 49 countries, the experience is the same: a placid sense of place, air suffused with the rich aromatics of fresh-brewed espresso. Customers dollop cream and sprinkle brown sugar into their drinks on their way out the door, or they stay — paging through books or talking softly while they sip, serenaded by piped-in Paul McCartney and Norah Jones. Behind the counter, green-clad baristas grind beans and steam milk, smiling as they take orders in a made-up language.

What other corporate entity but Starbucks offers such a defined experience? It’s one Temple University professor Bryant Simon immersed himself in countless times over the past few years — he spent 12 to 14 hours each week observing the human traffic in more than 425 Starbucks locations in nine countries. His curiosity having been piqued by the company’s breathtaking popularity, he sensed that the way we buy coffee said something deeper about ourselves.

I first interviewed Simon for another story in 2007. At the time, he’d already been at work on his book about the coffee colossus for a couple years. Now that book, Everything But the Coffee: Learning About America from Starbucks (University of California Press), has finally been published.

It’s taken quite a few twists and turns on the way to the shelves of your local Barnes & Noble (which, as it happens, may itself have a Starbucks inside). After all, an awful lot has changed in the past few years. In early 2007, the Dow Jones Industrial Average was above 12,000 and unemployment was at 4.5 percent. Starbucks was commensurately flush, with some 11,000 stores in several dozen countries and revenue of $6.4 billion and counting — it would rake in $10.4 billion in ‘08.

Read more