Much less has been written about Franklin’s younger and favorite sister, Jane, born with all the same disadvantages, and further hampered by contemporary beliefs that women should neither be educated nor have the means of earning their own living. Like a stereotypical good woman of her time, she was modest and humble and would probably be extremely puzzled that the great Jill Lepore should bother to tell her story in Book of Ages: The Life and Opinions of Jane Franklin....

From the moment he launched his campaign for Cook County Board president a year ago, Green Party candidate Tom Tresser knew what he needed to win: he needed Todd Stroger for an opponent. Unfortunately for Tresser, Stroger got hammered in February’s Democratic primary, finishing last in a field of four. The Democratic nominee, and overwhelming favorite in the November 2 election, is Fourth Ward alderman Toni Preckwinkle, who carries little of Stroger’s baggage....

Best of Chicago voting is live now. Vote for your favorites » Started in Australia in 2009, No Lights No Lycra is a weekly lights-out dance party that has hit such cities as Berlin, Glasgow, Vancouver, and Brooklyn. The event provides a “friendly, nonthreatening, drug- and alcohol-free environment” for people to “experience liberated physical movement.” Chicago’s party is tonight at Defibrillator. Douglas Pearce has an obsession with Nazi objects, something that incited protests and show cancellations when he came to Chicago ten years ago, but after three decades of Death in June, the Reader‘s Monica Kendrick says, this shouldn’t come as a surprise....

The two Democratic candidates for Cook County Recorder of Deeds are eager to tout their plans for improving the office. But first they have to explain to voters what the hell it is. Best of Chicago voting is live now. Vote for your favorites » The recorder’s office is primarily responsible for managing and maintaining millions of property and tax lien records and collecting the fees paid every time a new document is entered into the system....

New Too On first bite Big Jones was confusing. The barbecued shrimp bore no sign of smoker or grill, and the three “crispy grit cakes” holding up dollops of tangy pulled pork and slaw were soft as tapioca. But I admit to no special expertise in the “southern coastal cuisine” that is Big Jones’s calling card. And as they were both damn tasty, we gave it a bye: who cares if it’s misdescribed when it tastes so good?...

QI’m a 38-year-old straight male in a long-term relationship. We have two children, still quite young. I am not sure what killed the intimacy of our relationship, but my spouse and I have been physically disconnected for years. This led to some rather sleazy adulterous behavior on my part. We recently discussed the topic at length (at which time I informed her of my indiscretions); we have decided to remain together for our children because we work well together as parents and we are pretty good friends....

Best of Chicago voting is live now. Vote for your favorites » If you’ve been in Pilsen recently and noticed an uptick in the number of turquoise-haired people walking around, that’s because seapunk pioneers Zombelle and Ultrademon have moved down that way—and they’re currently hatching schemes to bring their Tumblrfied aesthetic into their new environs. The latest is a party called Mainframe Ver 2.0, which makes its debut tomorrow night at Kioku Lounge in Chinatown....

Q I’m a man who recently started seeing a wonderful woman. Like me, she’s divorced. While my ex-wife left me for another man, my girlfriend’s ex-husband was controlling and abusive. Our relationship is the opposite—emotionally, psychologically, and sexually. Best of Chicago voting is live now. Vote for your favorites » A If your girlfriend’s ex-husband had manipulated or bullied her into vaginal intercourse—if he had repeatedly and brutally raped her vaginally during their terrible, awful, no good, very bad marriage—would you feel guilty about an interest in consensual, vanilla, missionary, penis-in-vagina intercourse?...

Best of Chicago voting is live now. Vote for your favorites » Not long ago I was in the difficult position of batching cocktails for 200 people. Apart from the usual mathematical challenges I face, I struggled with an appropriate balance of brown and boozy vs. easily drinkable and refreshing. I settled on Old-Fashioneds and La Palomas—the latter outstrips the margarita in popularity in Mexico. While so much can go wrong with a margarita, La Palomas are easy, featuring just tequila, lime juice, and grapefruit soda....

Whenever Mark Mavrantonis comes across an oyster that refuses to open, he caresses the bottom of its shell and speaks to it softly. “They’re not stupid,” he says. “They know something’s up. Imagine your eyes are shut, you don’t know what’s going on, you’re moving around a lot, and this guy tries to shove a knife in the side of your head.” But if he reminds the oyster of its position at the bottom of the food chain, he says, it will relax and accept its fate....

Best of Chicago voting is live now. Vote for your favorites » It’s troubled teen week at the European Union Festival Film Festival, whose offerings include Putin’s Kiss, a Danish documentary about the rabid pro-Kremlin youth group Nashi; Innocence, a Czech suspense flick about a 14-year-old who accuses her doctor of rape; Ave, the story of a 17-year-old runaway in Bulgaria; and Belle Epine, about a 16-year-old girl freaking out after her mother’s death....

Best of Chicago voting is live now. Vote for your favorites » I think it took maybe 20 seconds between my friend Kara putting the Finders Keepers reissue of Selda‘s 1976 self-titled album on the stereo the other night and everyone in the room scrambling for the liner notes to figure out what the hell we were listening to. Selda’s described as an Anatolian folk singer, and I guess I can hear some of that in there — although most of my exposure to Turkish music has been while watching schlocky Turkish action movies, so I’m not exactly an expert — but this record is far from traditional....

In the summer of 1965, Drew (not his real name) was nine years old. His family lived in a sixth-floor walk-up in Harlem, and his best friend lived in the apartment below. Drew was on the street one warm day, tossing a ball up to his friend, who was grounded, when the boy stepped away, saying he’d come right back. But he never did, and not long after, Drew watched in horror as the windows blew out and flames engulfed both apartments....

As usual there’s no shortage of jazz happening around the city after the Chicago Jazz Festival winds down each night. Trumpeter and reedist Ira Sullivan returns to host the celebrated Jazz Showcase jam sessions, which reliably attract artists in town for the fest—club manager Wayne Segal says this year’s likely participants include Donald Harrison, Larry Gray, Rudresh Mahanthappa, Jack DeJohnette, Muhal Richard Abrams, Paul Wertico, and Robert Glasper. The Jazz Showcase sessions tend to be pretty mainstream, but those looking for something more avant-garde can check out David Boykin’s seventh annual Hereafter Fest at Heaven Gallery....

At the height of his fame as America’s “happy hippy cartoonist,” Robert Crumb turned down an offer to do an album cover for the Rolling Stones. Though his artwork graced the sleeve of Big Brother & the Holding Company’s Cheap Thrills, Crumb had no interest in the Summer of Love, and especially not in its music. Janis Joplin was a personal friend and a comics fan, and anyway he needed the $600....

Playing themselves, Seth Rogen and Jay Baruchel attend a party for all their hip, ironic actor friends at the Hollywood home of James Franco, but the festivities are interrupted by a strictly biblical apocalypse that leaves the aforementioned barricaded inside with Craig Robinson, Danny McBride, and Jonah Hill. This is the third feature written by Rogen and Evan Goldberg, and easily their best since Superbad (2007); their big joke is to literalize the Book of Revelation, but snaking around this is a biting contempt for the entertainment business, their own bad movies, and the social privilege these confer, which turns out to be not much help when the earth is opening up....

Marijuana went mainstream long ago—it’s widely used across racial and economic lines, and pollsters say Americans who favor legalization now outnumber those who don’t. Yet most politicians remain so freaked out about being called soft on crime that they don’t want so much as a whiff of the issue. Around here the roster of elected officials willing to defend the status quo includes everyone from south-side homeowner Barack Obama to most state lawmakers—who won’t even sign off on a pilot program to allow medical marijuana for the terminally and chronically ill....

Chicago’s progressive-jazz scene has a lot to celebrate, including an embarrassment of great soloists, a promiscuous attitude toward collaboration, supportive audiences, and production-­savvy presenters with can-do attitudes. But one feature of the scene that’s largely escaped notice is the proliferation of musicians whose names start with the tenth letter of the alphabet. Drummer Frank Rosaly may have his squirreled away—his birth name is Francisco Javier Rosaly Amoros Rosello—but the rest of his sextet Cicada Music flies the “J” flag openly....

Hands-down my favorite thing to happen in pop culture over the past few years is the rise in popularity of an awesomely crazy conspiracy theory maintaining that the most successful stars in hip-hop are all part of a secret society of illuminati that’s using pop radio as a propaganda tool in its campaign to establish an anti-Christian new world order. A surprising number of people actually believe this, and point to “clues” in lyrics and videos that “prove” that, say, Jay-Z advocates satanic human sacrifice....

Best of Chicago voting is live now. Vote for your favorites » It’s a good weekend for shows, even if you aren’t into emo. Tonight there’s Lisa Alma at Constellation, Hanni El Khatib and Bass Drum of Death at Lincoln Hall, Avenged Sevenfold and Deftones at Allstate Arena, KT Tunstall at Park West, Coliseum at Bottom Lounge, EPMD at Reggie’s Rock Club, and Jonathan Toubin at Empty Bottle. Tomorrow night you can check out New Gary Burton Quartet at Space, Jason Boland & the Stragglers at Joe’s Bar, Guitar Wolf at Subterranean, Le1f and Antwon at Empty Bottle, Sarah Lee Guthrie & Johnny Irion at Schubas, Waka Flocka Flame at UIC Pavilion, Mason Jennings at Old Town School of Folk Music, Cokegoat at Cobra Lounge, or Suicide Machines at Reggie’s Rock Club....