Book tip

A Private Cathedral

James Lee Burke

There have always been strong elements of magical realism and even the supernatural in James Lee Burke's beautifully written but very dark noir books featuring Louisiana sheriff Dave Robicheaux and his best pal, PI Clete Purcel. In this 23rd novel featuring the duo, Dave and Clete come between two warring crime families whose children are used as pawns in a much bigger game with national political consequences (and, yes, there are similarities to our current national situation). Also in play is a time-traveling specter from the 16th century who seeks redemption for his violent past — a theme that mirrors Purcel and Robicheaux's own individual and collective guilt over Vietnam and various of their law enforcement experiences. Burke has always written convincingly about the notion that there is no "past" or "future" — that it all occurs simultaneously in multiple dimensions — and "A Private Cathedral" is his most direct contemplation of this. As a meditation on mortality and morality, the story is gorgeous and wistful; as a story about good but flawed men trying to do the right thing at a calculated and often violent cost, it's brutal and indelibly wrought.

— Rick Koster

Food tip

Cinnamon Buns

Zest Fresh Pastries

Velvet Mill, Stonington

First of all, the Stonington Board of Selectmen needs to step in. Y'see, the marvelous bakers at Zest only craft their cinnamon buns on Saturdays and Sundays, leaving me to skulk around in the parking lot the rest of the week, sitting next to the dumpster like a wino hoping someone will throw out a bottle of Aqua Velva aftershave with a few drops left in it. Selectmen: Order Zest to make these buns every day! They're that good. There's no creamy icing, for one thing, because that creamy icing is nothing more than a distraction from more important ingredients like cinnamon, butter and sugar. These buns are loaded with flavor, yet sufficiently light to tap dance across your tongue. What's particularly great are those surface divots or crevices where the cinnamon-sauce lava has pooled in the oven and then cools into a tar of rich sublimity.

— Rick Koster

Movie tip

Fatal Affair

Netflix

This drama hovers somewhere between "Fatal Attraction" and a Lifetime movie. The tale: a married woman has a brief but enthusiastic make-out session with a former college acquaintance (it doesn't reach the level of an affair, despite the title), and the guy, a computer expert, becomes a dedicated stalker. The movie's big advantage is star Nia Long, who is extremely likeable and makes her character easy to empathize with (even if I wondered: why doesn't she just tell her husband?). She and Omar Epps, in the Glenn Close role, have good acting chemistry. The problem is that the script hits all the expected moments with a dull monotony, and the direction is flat. Hey, if you're going to make a melodrama, you might as well go really over the top. The fact that this movie plays it so straight is its "Fatal" mistake.

— Kristina Dorsey