Do you ever wonder if you’d survive the end of the world; a sweeping pandemic that destroys cities in a week’s time? What if that pandemic was sent by God? What if the survivors were picked to survive? Stephen King’s 1978 novel, “The Stand”, is, perhaps, the greatest piece of apocalyptic fiction to have ever been written.

Apocalyptic fiction is an immensely popular genre, and has been since the Book of Revelation. Arguably, the reason why is that everyone wants to believe that they would be the last man standing; a hero in bloody armor.

King’s characters must do more than survive, however; they must choose between the path of good and the path of evil.

After the “super flu,” a weaponized form of influenza, is unleashed unto the population, a small number of survivors, who were immune to the disease, ban together in a series of small groups and try to rebuild society.

Eventually, two settlements are established, one in Boulder, Colo., ran by the saintly Mother Abigail, a prophet of God, and the other in Las Vegas, which is led by Randall Flagg, also known as the devil. Randall Flagg, the Dark Man, is also a character in several of King’s other novels. He is recognizable by his initials always being ‘R.F.’

The survivors are drawn to one of the settlements, either by Flagg or Mother Abigail, in cross country pilgrimages.

Surprisingly, the devil has some nasty plans for the Boulder settlement and the two groups are forced to collide in a true battle of good versus evil.

In interviews with King, he says that the novel was inspired by “The Lord of the Rings” trilogy.

King states, “I had wanted to write a fantasy epic like “The Lord of the Rings,” only with an American setting… Only instead of a hobbit, my hero was a Texan named Stu Redman, and instead of a Dark Lord, my villain was a ruthless drifter and supernatural madman named Randall Flagg.”

Like many of King’s stories, “The Stand” was adapted into a miniseries in the early ‘90s. The adaptation stays remarkably true to the original story as the teleplay was written by King himself. It contains a stellar cast of late-twentieth century must-have actors, like Molly Ringwald and Gary Sinise.

“The Stand” miniseries is available on Netflix Instant and everyone should watch it (but everyone should also read the book.)

“The Stand” consists of three parts in 823 pages, so, in between beach parties and brunch with your mom, or whatever people do during the summer, “The Stand” will keep undoubtedly keep you entertained.

Paige Jurgensen

Staff writer

Paige Jurgensen can be reached at
linfieldreviewculture@gmail.com.

Suzanne Real tries to break into the rocker music scene with the band’s debut album, “Kiss Me Like a Man,” after its Oct. 13, 2012 release.

Hailing from New York, The Suzanne Real Band was brought together from a simple conversation between a father and daughter about pursuing and fulfilling their passion in music.

Backed by The Suzanne Real Band, lead vocalist Suzanne Reale catches listeners’ attention with her power hungry vocalsno nonsense and provocative lyrics. Themes of being in love, craving independence and bouncing back from heartbreak dominate the grungy tone of the album.

The Suzanne Real Band’s website says the band draws from The Shirts, a popular ‘80s band that played at local New York hot spot CBGB.

Suzanne Reale herself is described as an uninhibited singer, whose forwardness, edginess and bursting attitude match the vocal chops that she powers through in songs such as the self-titled album single, “Kiss Me Like a Man,” “Blood On My Hands” and “Can’t Catch a Break With You.”

Though most of the album’s tracks need no explanation, Suzanne Reale takes listeners on an ‘80s journey of love, heartbreak, power and independence.

The Suzanne Real Band’s rhythm section features John Amato and Bob Racioppo, who are responsible for the long, but impressive guitar solos that will have listeners of both the old and new generation rocking out to the band’s tunes.

The Suzanne Real Band aims to be a pure rock band with a blues influence and it makes reference to this in “Runaway.” The jazzy and throwback ambiance of the ‘40s era are also felt in “Bad Habits.”

“Bleeker Street” and “Daddy-O” will have some listeners feeling nostalgic for ‘80s and ‘90s grunge music all over again.

Suzanne Reale draws comparison to Robyn, Pink and Cyndi Lauper with her vocals, sound and image. Her soulful range of voices is brought to fruition by producer Ed Stasium.

Vanessa So

For the Review

Vanessa So can be reached at kslcmusic@gmail.com.

Senior Reveca Primachenko performs during a senior recital May 18 in the Delkin Recital Hall in the Vivian A. Bull Music Center.

“I feel very blessed with hands to engage in playing beautiful music,” senior Reveca Primachenko said. True to her word, the talented pianist bade Linfield farewell with a senior recital at 6 p.m. May 18 in the Delkin Recital Hall in the Vivian A. Bull Music Center.

Primachenko will graduate this spring with a music degree with a focus in piano performance. During her recital, she played music from an array of composers. The music was by composers such as Bach, Beethoven, Chopin, Gershwin and Rachmaninoff.

“This recital represents my final project as a professional solo pianist in my study of music at Linfield,” Primachenko said.

Primachenko said she was happy to perform the recital because she loves sharing her music.

Primachenko is passionately devoted to music and playing the piano. She spends a great deal of time practicing each day.

“The piano is a masterpiece and it is truly a great instrument for me.

“Sometimes, when I close my eyes, I understand that this is the most beautiful music to play and hear. It always touches my soul and feelings,” Primachenko said.

Primachenko said that her pianist career has taught her countless valuable lessons.

“I know that if I can memorize and perform this much music, I can do anything I set my mind to.

“Because learning the piano requires memorization, daily practice and preparation, a great deal of personal discipline and motivation,” Primachenko said.

Primachenko enjoys the atmosphere of Linfield’s music department. She said the faculty and students offer relentless support and empathy.

“During the last two years, the music department and the people in it have become like my second home.

“It has truly been a great experience for me. I have a lot of friends in the music department and I will miss them,” Primachenko said.

She explained that her most memorable moments as a music student were walking into the department’s building.

“You can hear the music around you,” Primachenko said. “I even have the favorite place to practice, it is practice room 114 and Delkin Recital Hall.”

She said that some of her favorite Linfield experiences were performing in piano duets and ensembles. She also appreciated teaching piano through various internships.

“Another favorite experience has been when I was taking music composition lessons.

“While doing this, I got an opportunity to compose my own piece for the concert band and then conduct it with the group,” Primachenko said.

Primachenko is thankful for her family, Linfield faculty, fellow music students and many more who have allowed her to learn and enjoy her time in college.

“I know that I want to share my music with others and show them that it is a great thing to learn. I believe that music can shape and change your life, and I hope I can do this for others.”

Carrie Skuzeski

For the Review

Carrie Skuzeski can be reached at linfieldreviewculture@gmail.com.

Joel Ray/Senior photographer
Sophomore Katelyn Henson plays the saxophone during Linfield’s Jazz Band concert.

The Linfield College Music Department hosted its spring 2013 Jazz Night concert May 17 in Ice Auditorium. This concert was the final performance for Linfield’s Jazz Band, with the current senior band members. Each senior received an opportunity to perform a solo throughout the performance.

Senior Evan O’Kelly played guitar solos. Various forms of talent in the band were highlighted during the concert because players from every section of instrumentation were featured, O’Kelly said.

“This was a great way to wrap up my performing career at Linfield,” O’Kelly said, who began performing with the band as a sophomore. “I thought all of the seniors played well and ended on a high note.”

O’Kelly plays the guitar in the band. “I just love being able to hear something and then translate that to my instrument,” O’Kelly said.

At 12 years old, O’Kelly learned to play the guitar by listening to the music he liked. O’Kelly has also performed at Cat Cabs with fellow Jazz Band member, sophomore Christian Santangelo, and other musicians from Linfield.

Senior Lynette Cole, one of the trombone instrumentalists, considered Jazz Night a fantastic close to her last four years performing with the Linfield Jazz Band. Cole has been playing the trombone since she was in sixth grade. She has always had a strong love for the jazz genre.

“I always knew I’d play the trombone, as my older brother and dad played,” Cole said.

The Jazz Band performed a mixture of popular songs and music that students in the Linfield Music Department had written.

“Sao Paulo,” a well-known jazz tune from Brazil, was the second song played during the concert. The band also ended the performance with a Ray Charles hit song called “Hit the Road Jack.”  While the audience was leaving the auditorium, the band busted out in the tune of “Thrift Shop” by Macklemore.

“The concert went great, but my opinion is kind of biased,” said the wife of trumpet player Bryan Shirley. Shirley is a local McMinnville resident along with a few other community members who fill-in for missing instrumentalists during concerts.

This may have been the Linfield Jazz Band’s last performance with the seniors, but it was not all the seniors’ last concert. Some of the seniors had their Senior Recital on May 16 in Ice Auditorium.

Mariah Gonzales

Culture editor

Mariah Gonzales can be reached at linfieldreviewculture@gmail.com.

Audience members were whisked overseas during Pecha Kucha on May 13 in Ice Auditorium.

The presentation means “chit-chat” in Japanese. It  highlighted four students who participated in study-abroad programs. Senior Dana Hellie showed a slide show titled “A renewed love” to review her yearlong stay in Korea.

Sophomore JB Lange presented “In the land of AUS,” to reminisce on his Jan Term adventure. Junior Stephanie Raso discussed her visit in Austria with “Appreciating the world: my experience abroad.”

Junior Mariah Torres exhibited “From aloha to pura vida,” which recounted her semester in Costa Rica.

Appropriately named, the presentation featured a round of slide shows and allocated time discussion afterward. Yet, comments and questions were encouraged throughout. Each slide played for only 20 seconds and switched to the next slide.

“I thought that Pecha Kucha was a great way to show different study abroad experiences because it gave people just a little taste of what each destination was like, without it turning into a really long boring presentation,” sophomore Megan Beach said in an email. “So it was nice that each presentation was only six minutes.”

Pecha Kucha was designed to encourage students to consider studying abroad themselves.

“There’s no easy way of explaining how my experience abroad changed me, but Pecha Kucha allows us to do this,” Torres said in an email. “It allowed me to share my story from start to finish on how my decision to go abroad was one of the best decisions I’ve ever made.”

It was the first time the International Programs Office hosted Pecha Kucha. The idea sprouted from Michele Tomseth, the assistant director of the International Programs Office. She rounded up past study-abroad students to divulge their fulfilling encounters overseas. Although there was another lecture by Dave Hansen, professor of economics, at the same time of Pecha Kucha, there were “a few members of faculty [who] attend[ed] and a good handful of students in each class,” Torres said in an email. “I’ve also already gotten feedback that this was inspiration for a friend of mine to study abroad as well.”

All of the students agreed studying abroad was a decision with no regrets. It granted each one positive opportunities and knowledge.

“It’s the best learning experience you’ll ever have,” Torres said in an email. “Never again in your life will someone pay for your airfare to study in a foreign country, nor take you to historical landmarks and paint a picture of history that is so rich and so specific.”

Carrie Skuzeski

For the Review

Carrie Skuzeski can be reached at linfieldreviewculture@gmail.com.

“This book is narrated by a 13-year-old girl, and I’m am clearly not a 13-year-old girl, nor have I been one,” MacReads author Pete Rock said May 16 in Nicholson Library.

Diving into the real-life events of a father and daughter that were discovered living in Forest Park in Portland, Ore., Rock developed the realistic fiction of his book, “My Abandonment,” told through the voice of 13-year-old Caroline.

“I followed her voice a lot of the way,” Rock said.

Rock spoke about his inspiration after following the news of Frank and Ruth, a father and daughter that lived in Forest Park for four years, who had been discovered in 2004.

In writing through Caroline’s voice, Rock embodied her in order to understand her as a character.

“I spent a lot of time in Forest Park,” Rock said. “I went to the areas I thought Caroline would have gone, and I sat in trees to see what she would have seen.”

Rock discusses writing “My Abandonment” in the voice of the opposite gender

“I’m not a very autobiographical writer, I never have been,” Rock said. “I don’t want to write about a character who’s similar to me or has had similar experiences to me. I’m a creative writing author. I write to convince something is real, I don’t have to convince myself that those things are real.”

“My Abandonment” has now sparked the interest of film-makers, and Rock will tour Forest Park with potential producers late this summer.

Rock also shared his newly released novel, “The Shelter Cycle.”

Also based off a true story, “The Shelter Cycle“ was inspired by Rock’s time working on a cattle and sheep ranch in Montana that was near a settlement of members from the Church Universal and Triumphant.

Describing the Church Universal and Triumphant, Rock’s book is a dramatization of the experiences of the church members’ children.

“A lot of the people I talked to had been children of the church describe their childhood a happy, wonderful thing,” Rock said.

The book focuses on the experiences of one pregnant  women, who is reflecting on her childhood in the church, 15 to 20 years after leaving the church.

Rock is a professor of creative writing at Reed College, and lives in Portland, Ore., with his wife and two daughters. He attended Deep Springs College, received a bachelor of arts in English from Yale University, and held a Wallace Stegner Fellowship at Stanford University.

To learn more about Rock, visit his website, http://www.peterrockproject.com

Kaylyn Peterson

Managing editor

Kaylyn Peterson can be reached at linfieldreviewmanaging@gmail.com.

Once you listen to Daughter’s, “If You Leave,” you’ll find it hard to believe that it’s only the band’s first, full-length album.

Though released earlier this year on March 18, the album was made available for purchase on iTunes on April 30.

Daughter is a London-based band consisting of lead vocalist Elena Tonra, guitarist Igor Haefel and percussionist Remi Aguilella. Tonra and Haefel first met as classmates while studying music in college. They set out to self-release two EPs with His Young Heart in 2011, and The Wild Youth with Aguilella later in the year.

Soon after, Daughter gained a loyal following that continues to welcome new fans from the public and media spectrum.

“If You Leave” is produced by Haefel, with assistance from Rodhaidh McDonald, who has also produced for Adele and another London-based band The xx.

Daughter’s “If You Leave” is a stunning debut from a band that has already found its identity. Daughter’s themes and lyricism are wise, daunting and haunting, as Tonra reflects upon personal demons and emotions.

“Winter” sets the dark and pensive tone of the album as Tonra confesses that “winter crushes all the things that I once had.”

Universal themes of love, heartbreak, doubt, isolation and anger will resonate with listeners as Tonra’s stripped and consoling vocals echoes these intense emotions.

Tonra elevates her emotions to the next level as she sings with honesty and bravery in “Youth.” She divulges that “we are setting our insides on fire for fun,” critiquing today’s youth and young love that inevitability crumbles.

Along with “Youth,” my favorites also include “Still,” which contemplates a failed relationship, and “Lifeforms,” a song which ponders the existence of life and its meaning that individuals leave behind.

Haefel and Aguilella’s instrumentation, along with their beautiful production, supports Tonra’s amazing and strong vocal abilities as she delivers her innermost thoughts. The strumming guitar and building drums balance the band’s lyrics regarding the darkness and beauty of reality.

Though some of the songs are repetitive in melody and rhythm, “If You Leave” is a gorgeous, and impressive, collection of songs that wonderfully weaves from one another to the next.

“If you leave when I go, you’ll find me in the shallows,” Tonra declares in “Shallows.” Enchanting, moody and melancholic, Daughter’s “Shallows” sets a dramatic tone for the band and album with this epic seven-minute song that demonstrates the band’s capabilities as artists.

Daughter will please fans of Florence and the Machine, Imogen Heap, The xx, Adele and Lana Del Rey. Particularly, Tonra’s voice sounds eerily similar to Florence Welch, whose vocals captivates listeners, as well as creates a sound that will enlighten and hurt the heart.

Daughter’s “If You Leave” is now available for download on iTunes. You can also check out “If You Leave” on KSLC 90.3 FM and listen online at www.linfield.edu/kslcfm or stream the station on iTunes.

Vanessa So

Assistant Music Director Vanessa So can be reached at KSLCmusic@gmail.com.

Dear Bailey

“I’m conflicted; I don’t know what to consider cheating. Is it not until having sex, or could it still be cheating if it is only kissing?”

Whether something is cheating is up to you and your partner. For example, sending suggestive texts or emails is considered cheating when you are in a monogamous relationship, unless you gave permission for your partner to do so.

Kissing is considered cheating unless otherwise discussed. There is nothing wrong with feeling that kissing is cheating so don’t let your partner pressure you into thinking differently.

Some people feel that even thinking about having intercourse with another person is cheating, which is a little extreme since fantasizing is a natural thought process.

There are couples who don’t consider it to be cheating when one has sex with another person. While they aren’t mainstream, these types of relationships are becoming more common.

This is called an “open relationship,” which means that they are committed to each other but still have sexual relationships with other people. Usually in these situations, the two in the committed relationship ask permission from their significant other about who they can sleep with and keep each other informed about who else they are sleeping with.

In long-term relationships like this, there is a great deal of trust and open communication between the two people and commonly with whomever else is involved with them.

Another term used is “swingers,” which is when two or more couples, usually married, have recreational intercourse. In both situations safe sex and regular testing is still incredibly important because multiple people are involved.

Not everyone has the same perspectives on sex. Like so many other situations, communication is important so tell your partner what you think cheating is.

It might help if you define your relationship. Are you monogamous, casual or something else? Because monogamy is the primary idea for our society, it is extremely important to inform your partner if monogamy is an option currently or in the future.

Together you can set boundaries. If you disagree about where each of you are, don’t force the relationship. Yes, relationships take work, but if the two of you have different desires and ideas about the type of relationship you want, it will be unsatisfying for both of you. If you require monogamy and your partner feels that is too restrictive, maybe the relationship is not a good idea.

Kourtney Bailey can be reached at
linfieldreviewbailey@gmail.com.

Vladimir Nabokov’s 1955 novel is a campy story about pedophilia.

“Lolita” is narrated by the main protagonist, Humbert, a middle aged literature professor and pedophile. Humbert travels to the United States and takes lodging with a middle-aged woman, whom Humbert finds repulsive, and her 12-year-old daughter named Dolores, whom Humbert privately nicknames: ‘Lolita.’

Humbert immediately finds himself drawn to Lolita and while she is away at summer camp, he eventually marries her mother in an attempt to get closer to her. When Lolita’s mother finds out about her husband’s obsession with her daughter, she panics and runs out into the street and is run down by a car. Humbert goes to Lolita’s summer camp and takes her on a trip across the country after telling her, that if they are caught, she will be a ward of the state and lose everything she holds dear. While on the road with Humbert, he bribes her in order to receive sexual favors.

Throughout his recollection of his time with Lolita, Humbert tries to draw sympathy from the reader because of his illness, regardless of the fact that he never seems to try to cure himself or go against his sick instincts, but rather just leans into it.

Lolita is the perfect victim for Humbert, as she is an overly sexualized young girl who makes a series of awful decisions regarding her relationship with Humbert. Lolita is, more or less, an idiot, like most 12-year-olds are, and she initiates a sexual relationship with Humbert after losing her virginity to a boy at camp. Regardless, she is still a victim of statutory rape.

Because the novel is written from Humbert’s point of view, Lolita’s feelings are not shown, perhaps because Humbert is incapable of diagnosing them. Her entire character is that of a voiceless sexual object.

“Lolita” is infamous for its scandalous subject matter and was originally categorized as an erotic novel, although now it is considered a tragicomedy.

However, some critics view the novel as a romance, which is a bit disturbing. Vanity Fair said that “Lolita” was, “The only convincing love story of our century.”

“Lolita” may be responsible for the trend of finding an abusive male figure dominating his senseless consort the most romantic thing possible. This disturbing trend has been popping up in literature more and more recently, specifically “50 Shades of Grey” and “Twilight.” The popularity of these kinds of novels is particularly concerning because these “love” stories are teaching their female readers that if a man tells you that he loves you, it’s perfectly acceptable for him to be abusive.

Paige Jurgensen

Staff writer

Paige Jurgensen can be reached at linfieldreviewculture@gmail.com.