Arts & Life

Arts

New HBO Now Streaming Service Shows Consumer's Will Is King

7:40pm March 10, 2015

by Eric Deggans

HBO on Monday announced a new service presenting its shows online without a cable subscription. NPR TV Critic Eric Deggans says it also shows the power of consumers to bring change in a digital world.

Karen Van Lengen and James Welty created a multimedia installation to encourage visitors to experience buildings like Grand Central Terminal not only through their eyes, but also their ears.

Arts

Museum Asks Visitors To Listen To New York's Buildings

7:16pm March 10, 2015

by Hansi Lo Wang

Iconic architecture, long a subject for academics and designers, is being explored with sound in a new exhibit at the Museum of the City of New York.

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Books
Arts

Shockwaves Of A Kidnapping Echo In 'Barefoot Dogs'

5:07pm March 10, 2015

Alan Cheuse reviews Antonio Ruiz-Camacho's first book, a collection of interwoven short stories called, Barefoot Dogs. He's a Mexican-born writer who spent much of his career as a reporter.

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Books
Arts

From The Gathering Of Juggalos To Farthest Australia In 'Timid Son'

12:41pm March 10, 2015

by Michael Schaub

Kent Russell (brother of Swamplandia! author Karen) makes a striking debut with a collection of essays that double as memoir. Critic Michael Schaub calls the book tough, tender and deeply original.

Books
Arts

Straight To Audiobook: Authors Write Original Works Meant To Be Heard

12:37pm March 10, 2015

by Lynn Neary

Writer Philip Pullman says it's all part of the oral tradition: "Long before writing, people were telling each other stories," he says. Audiobook technology has come a long way since the early days.

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Italian architect Renzo Piano talks to journalists in Paris in 2014.

Architect Renzo Piano: The Future Of Europe's Cities Is In The Suburbs

12:16pm March 10, 2015

by Sylvia Poggioli

In the 1960s and '70s, Piano was involved in the battle to revive decaying historic centers of cities. Now the Pritzker Prize-winning architect is fighting to save their often desolate outskirts.

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Not necessarily the watch being interviewed, as it chose to remain anonymous.

Arts

An Interview With A Regular Watch

12:15pm March 10, 2015

by Linda Holmes

Our occasional series of in-depth interviews with inanimate objects continues as we talk to a regular watch about the threat of smart Watches.

Books
Arts

A Tale Of Two Captains On A Tragic Journey In 'Dead Wake'

11:11am March 10, 2015

by Jean Zimmerman

Erik Larson's new book about the sinking of the liner Lusitania by a German U-boat in 1915 brings the past stingingly alive. Reviewer Jean Zimmerman calls Dead Wake "thrilling, dramatic and powerful."

Books
Arts

Forget Big Sky And Cowboys: 'Crow Fair' Is Set In An Unidealized Montana

8:07pm March 09, 2015

by NPR Staff

"I think there's only one interesting story ... and that's struggle," says writer Thomas McGuane. Loners, outcasts and malcontents fill the pages of his new short story collection Crow Fair.

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Jonathan Banks' character Mike Ehrmantraut (left), a hit man and fixer, was a natural to bring back to Breaking Bad's prequel Better Call Saul. Co-creator Peter Gould says he was the right contrast with Saul Goodman, played by Bob Odenkirk (right).

Arts

'Better Call Saul' Breathes New Life Into 'Breaking Bad' Characters

7:58pm March 09, 2015

The new show's co-creator says it became a writers' room joke on Breaking Bad that if something didn't fit it would go on the Saul Goodman show, or what is now AMC's Better Call Saul.

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