Books

Books

NPR Bestsellers: Paperback Nonfiction, Week Of April 2, 2015

4:03pm April 03, 2015

Michael Lewis explains how Wall Street continues to be controlled by large banks, and introduces the small group of Wall Street men that's trying to change that, in Flash Boys. It appears at No. 6.

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Mantel Takes Up Betrayal, Beheadings In 'Bodies'

3:22pm April 03, 2015

Hilary Mantel is the first woman to win the Man Booker Prize twice, first for her 2009 novel, Wolf Hall, and also for its 2012 sequel, Bring Up the Bodies. She discusses the books with Terry Gross.

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'The Brothers' Examines Motivation Behind Boston Marathon Bombing

3:21pm April 03, 2015

David Greene talks to author Masha Gessen about her new book, The Brothers: The Road to an American Tragedy, a look into the experiences that led the Tsarnaev brothers to carry out the Boston Bombing.

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Questions For David Levithan, Author Of 'Hold Me Closer'

2:21pm April 03, 2015

by Petra Mayer

Tiny Cooper, the breakout star of the 2010 novel Will Grayson, Will Grayson, steps center stage in its companion novel — a fully realized version of an epic musical Tiny's written about his own life.

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If Drugs Could Talk: In 'Delicious Foods' They Do

1:11pm April 03, 2015

by NPR Staff

In James Hannaham's novel Delicious Foods, addiction itself is a character — it even narrates some of the chapters. The book imagines what slavery would look like in modern America.

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'New Yorker' Cartoonist And TV Producer Writes 'Honest Portrait' Of His Parents

2:35pm April 02, 2015

Bruce Eric Kaplan's illustrated memoir I Was A Child describes his life in Maplewood, N.J., in the '60s and '70s. He says it's a way of keeping his parents alive, "not just for me, but for the world."

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Voyage Through An Adventurous Alternate Universe With 'Basilisk'

10:03am April 02, 2015

by Genevieve Valentine

Voyage of the Basilisk is the latest book in Marie Brennan's Memoirs of Lady Trent series; critic Genevieve Valentine says if you love dragons like Lady Trent does, now's the time to get acquainted.

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American Archetypes On A Bloody Funny Path In 'The Harder They Come'

7:03am April 02, 2015

by Jason Sheehan

In his latest novel, T.C. Boyle is at play in his usual fields: California, baby boomer angst, fathers and sons. But critic Jason Sheehan says it's a gory, absurdist, expertly paced frolic.

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'Crescent Moon' Counts Down To Political Mayhem

6:02am April 02, 2015

by Alan Cheuse

Fatima Bhutto (niece of assassinated Pakistani Prime Minister Benazir Bhutto) has written several volumes of nonfiction and poetry; her first novel is a delicate but tense political thriller.

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Margaret Howe Freydburg — seen here at 104 — was still writing and publishing well past her 100th birthday.

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Centenarian Poet Was A Fearless Guide To 'The Country Of Old Age'

8:00pm April 01, 2015

by NPR Staff

Poet and author Margaret Howe Freydburg died last week at 107; she wrote and published well past her 100th birthday. Her friend Nancy Slonim Aronie has an appreciation of a remarkable woman.

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