Books

Journalist Judith D. Schwartz calls her book Cows Save The Planet "a call to action on behalf of soil."

Books

'Cows Save The Planet': Soil's Secrets For Saving The Earth

10:57am June 18, 2013

by NPR Staff

Journalist Judith Schwartz believes that the key to addressing carbon issues and climate change lies beneath our feet. In her book Cows Save The Planet, she argues that proper management of soil could solve a long list of environmental problems.

Queue Listen Now

Colum McCann's new book imagines the intersections of three historic flights across the Atlantic Ocean.

Books
Arts

In 'TransAtlantic,' The Flight Is Almost Too Smooth

5:11pm June 17, 2013

by Maureen Corrigan

Colum McCann won the National Book Award for his 2009 novel, Let the Great World Spin, about a high-wire artist. Critic Maureen Corrigan says McCann's new novel, TransAtlantic, also has its head in the clouds.

Queue Listen Now

The Deserters is Charles Glass' second book relating to World War II. His last book, Americans in Paris, told the story of the U.S. citizens who remained in the French capital after the 1940 German invasion.

WWII 'Deserters': Stories Of Men Who Left The Front Lines

5:11pm June 17, 2013

In his new book, journalist Charles Glass explores the little-known history of thousands of American and British soldiers who deserted during World War II. Glass describes how the strain of war can push a soldier to the breaking point — and how the line between courage and cowardice is never simple.

Queue Listen Now

The Victoria Square shopping center's observation deck offers a panoramic of Belfast's skyline.

Books
Arts

In Neville's Thrillers, Belfast's Violent Past Still Burns

1:13pm June 17, 2013

by Noah Adams

The capital of Northern Ireland is no longer the city of snipers that it was before the Good Friday Agreement, but novelist Stuart Neville still draws inspiration from the decades of violence. In The Ghosts of Belfast, he examines the shattered life of an IRA killer in the aftermath of The Troubles.

Queue Listen Now

Books
Arts

Dr. Brazelton On Guiding Parents And Learning To Listen

6:17pm June 16, 2013

by NPR Staff

Dr. T. Berry Brazelton has been studying babies for the better part of the last century. Now 95 years old, the renowned pediatrician is the author of more than 30 books on child development. He talks about his latest book, and how babies themselves can teach us how to be better parents.

Queue Listen Now

Firearms designer John Browning submitted this design for the M1911 pistol to the U.S. Patent Office in September 1910.

Books
Arts

A Posthumous Tribute To Guns From A Sniper Shot To Death

6:17pm June 16, 2013

by NPR Staff

Considered by many to be the most deadly sniper in American military history, Chris Kyle was killed on a Texas gun range in February. He was an outspoken advocate for both veterans and gun rights, and his book, American Gun, has just been published.

Queue Listen Now

Books
Arts

Telling Stories About Ourselves In 'The Faraway Nearby'

6:19pm June 15, 2013

by NPR Staff

"Stories are compasses and architecture," says author Rebecca Solnit. "We navigate by them, we build our sanctuaries and prisons out of them, and to be without a story is to be lost in the vastness of the world."

Queue Listen Now

Stephen King delves into the seedy underworld of carnies for his latest novel, Joyland.

Books
Arts

Stephen King On Growing Up, Believing In God And Getting Scared

2:29pm June 14, 2013

"The more carny it got, the better I liked it," King says of his new thriller, Joyland. The book, set in a North Carolina amusement park in 1973, is part horror novel and part supernatural thriller. King talks with Fresh Air's Terry Gross about his career writing horror, and about what scares him now.

Queue Listen Now

Hilary Mantel's Wolf Hall won both the Man Booker Prize and the National Book Critics Circle Award. The sequel, Bring Up the Bodies, won this year's Man Booker Prize.

Books
Arts

Mantel Takes Up Betrayal, Beheadings In 'Bodies'

1:26pm June 14, 2013

Hilary Mantel is the first woman to win the Man Booker Prize twice, first for her 2009 novel, Wolf Hall, and then for that book's 2012 sequel, Bring Up the Bodies. The novels are part of a historical fiction trilogy about Tudor England and the events surrounding the reign of King Henry VIII.

Queue Listen Now

Books
Arts

Meet 'Ivan': The Gorilla Who Lived In A Shopping Mall

7:00pm June 13, 2013

by NPR Staff

Katherine Applegate's The One and Only Ivan was inspired by a real-life gorilla who lived in a mall in Tacoma, Wash. The author says humans have "a real obligation" to care responsibly for animals in captivity.

Queue Listen Now