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NPR Bestsellers: Hardcover Fiction, Week Of June 18, 2015

4:03pm June 19, 2015

After her senator father cuts her off, Layla Beck takes a job with the New Deal's Federal Writer's Project in West Virginia. Annie Barrows' The Truth According to Us debuts at No. 12.

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NPR Bestsellers: Hardcover Nonfiction, Week Of June 18, 2015

4:03pm June 19, 2015

Neurologist Oliver Sacks recounts his life and career in On the Move, which appears at No. 11.

Books

NPR Bestsellers: Paperback Fiction, Week Of June 18, 2015

4:03pm June 19, 2015

Harper Lee's To Kill a Mockingbird, about a Southern lawyer who defends a black man unjustly accused of rape, appears at No. 14.

Books

NPR Bestsellers: Paperback Nonfiction, Week Of June 18, 2015

4:03pm June 19, 2015

In The Sixth Extinction, Elizabeth Kolbert describes five devastating mass extinctions and predicts the coming of a sixth. It appears at No. 14.

Pages bookstore partner and manager Samer al-Kadri (center) talks with customers. The Syrian founded a publishing company in Damascus, but fled when the war made it impossible to run. He wound up in Istanbul, where he noticed a lack of books in Arabic, an

Istanbul Bookstore Caters To Syrian Refugees In Need Of A Good Read

2:14pm June 19, 2015

by Peter Kenyon

The mere mention of Syrian refugees can conjure up images of families living in tents in the desert. But a bookstore in Istanbul serves as a cultural oasis and informal community center for Syrians.

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Jacqueline Woodson On Growing Up, Coming Out And Saying Hi To Strangers

1:26pm June 19, 2015

Woodson, the author of the young adult novel Brown Girl Dreaming, says that growing up in South Carolina, she knew that the safest place was with her family. Originally broadcast Dec. 10, 2014.

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Book News: Isabel Allende To Be Awarded Presidential Medal Of Freedom

7:40am June 19, 2015

by Colin Dwyer

The Chilean-American novelist is among 19 people slated to receive the highest civilian honor in the U.S. Also: The fairy tales of the Brothers Grimm get a gruesome new translation.

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Book News: Even Good Writers Have Bad Sex Sometimes

7:39am June 19, 2015

by Colin Dwyer

The Bad Sex in Fiction Award honors awful sex scenes in literature, and this year's shortlist boasts plenty of names you might not expect, including a Booker winner and a perennial Nobel favorite.

Alain Mabanckou, a French novelist born in the Republic of Congo, wrote a letter to support Cameroonian poet Dieudonne Enoh Meyomesse.

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Book News: In Support Of Persecuted Colleagues, Writers Turn To Letters

7:39am June 19, 2015

by Colin Dwyer

In the run-up to the Day of the Imprisoned Writer, authors have written open letters to several imperiled authors around the world. Also: A recap of the truce between Amazon and Hachette.

Mo'ne Davis stares down a batter during a Little League World Series game in August.

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Book News: Mo'ne Davis Steps From The Pitcher's Mound Into Memoir

7:38am June 19, 2015

by Colin Dwyer

The teen pitcher, who made history at the Little League World Series, will tell her story in a book to be released in March. Also: R.A. Montgomery, an innovator in interactive reading, dies at age 78.