From Edgar Allan Poe to Dean Koontz to Flannery O'Connor, America's editors and contributors are not (always) afraid of some horror.

This week on “The Gloria Purvis Podcast,” Gloria speaks with Professor Jessica Hooten Wilson about the Catholic imagination—exploring writers like Toni Morrison and the medieval mystic Julian of Norwich.

Toni Morrison's fiction conveyed much of the pain, sacrifice and trauma that exemplifies so much of the African-American experience—which is why it makes some white readers uncomfortable.

Jane Austen’s literary genius lies in the fact that she crafts stories that impart the most pressing of human concerns in what seem at first the most mundane of experiences. It makes her a valuable guide to life.

The absolute refusal to accept handed-down truths—whether in politics, science, religion or art—was a constant in Kurt Vonnegut’s life and work.

Barbara F. Walter offers a handy guide for predicting where political instability is most likely to occur—and it is usually when that country is moving away from democracy.