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Stepping Into 'Talking As Fast As I Can' Again Is Like Sense Memory For Actor Lauren Graham

8:53am December 04, 2016

Lauren Graham is the fast-talking Lorelei Gilmore, on Gilmore Girls, a role she recently reprised on Netflix. She tells NPR's Ailsa Chang about her memoir, Talking As Fast As I Can.

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Women Astronomers Shine In 'The Glass Universe'

5:47am December 04, 2016

by Heller McAlpin

Dava Sobel's new book is a history of the unheralded women — called computers, rather than astronomers — who worked at the Harvard College Observatory, studying, cataloging and classifying stars.

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Arts

Daughter Of African-American Filmmaker Asks, What Happened To Kathleen Collins?

9:14am December 03, 2016

NPR's Scott Simon talks to Nina Collins about a new book of short stories written by her late mother, Kathleen Collins, one of the first African-American filmmakers. The book is called "Whatever Happened to Interracial Love?"

'Out Of The Wreck I Rise' Supports Addiction Recovery With Literary Hero Companions

9:14am December 03, 2016

NPR's Scott Simon speaks with Sara Bader and Neil Steinberg about their book, "Out Of The Wreck I Rise: A Literary Companion to Recovery," a new anthology about addiction and sobriety.

This handmade angel was given to Bonnie Mackay by a former colleague in the Bloomingdale's Home Furnishings and Fashion office. It is one of the nearly 3,000 ornaments in her collection, which she has categorized into 67 different classifications.

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On This 'Tree Of Treasures' There's No Such Thing As An Ordinary Ornament

5:44pm December 02, 2016

by NPR Staff

Bonnie Mackay has written an unusual sort of memoir: Tree of Treasures is the story of her life, told through Christmas tree ornaments. She has nearly 3,000 of them, divided into 67 classifications.

Seafood Mousse: Cheer up, love, it might never happen.

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Arts

Hot-Dog Tiaras And Other '70s Dinner Party' Delicacies

10:52am December 02, 2016

by Jessica Leigh Hester

A food blogger's fascination with retro entertaining pays off in a colorful volume of curious eats.

Massumeh Farhad points to one of the Qurans in the exhibition. As curator, she flipped through all of the books on display. "Every page is absolutely breathtaking," she says.

Quran Exhibition Shines A Light On The Holy Books' Dedicated Artists

10:16am December 02, 2016

by Steve Inskeep

The Smithsonian show isn't about the words of the Quran so much as the people who laboriously copied it, letter by letter. When they made a mistake, they fixed it with flourish — and sometimes gold.

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Ginger Rogers is a plucky hotel switchboard operator who helps foil a spy ring in Ginger Rogers And The Riddle Of The Scarlet Cloak.

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Ginger Rogers And The Case Of The Authorized Editions

11:12am December 01, 2016

by Genevieve Valentine

Before modern fan fiction, there were the Whitman Authorized Editions — a series of mystery novels from the 1940s and 50s that "starred" real movie stars, like Ginger Rogers and Gene Tierney.

Peter and Ezra, / you made a great team. / Together you brought a snowstorm / of your dreams.

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Arts

'A Poem For Peter' Recalls One Unforgettable 'Snowy Day'

5:09am December 01, 2016

by Lynn Neary

In 1962, Peter — an African-American boy exploring his neighborhood after a snowstorm — broke the color barrier in mainstream children's publishing. A new book pays tribute to author Ezra Jack Keats.

Gianfranco Rosi's documentary, Fire at Sea, is set on the tiny Sicilian island of Lampedusa, where tens of thousands of migrants come ashore each year.

2 New Works Confront The Refugee Crisis With Empathy And Humanity

2:24pm November 30, 2016

by John Powers

Critic John Powers discusses the Italian documentary, Fire at Sea, and the novel, These Are the Names. The works take very different — but nonetheless poignant — approaches to the refugee situation.