Book News: North Carolina County Bans 'Invisible Man'
Also: Valerie Plame has reportedly written a spy novel called Blowback; Russian literature as sex education; a poem by Dorothy Wordsworth.
Arts & Life
Making Food From Flies (It's Not That Icky)
One of the really big challenges facing our world is how to grow more food without using up the globe's land and water. One company in Ohio says we've been ignoring one solution: insects. It's using larvae of the black soldier fly to convert waste into feed for fish or pigs.
A Predictably Pynchonian Take On The Internet And Sept. 11
Elusive and iconic, author Thomas Pynchon may intimidate some readers, but he has a devoted following. Bleeding Edge, his new new novel, is about a spunky, Upper West Side mother and fraud investigator in the era between the dot-com boom and Sept. 11.
Years After Historic Ruling, Execution Still A 'Random' Justice
Evan Mandery's A Wild Justice is an account of the legal battles that led to the U.S. Supreme Court striking down capital punishment, then reversing course four years later. He says that today, prisoners who are sentenced to death have a 10 percent chance of actually being executed.
Just What The Doctor Ordered: Med Students Team With Chefs
Tulane medical students are trading in their scrubs for chefs whites. They've teamed up with culinary students at Johnson & Wales University as part of an innovative new program designed to teach both groups how good nutrition can help stave off lifestyle diseases.
Daniel Craig Heads Back To Broadway With 'Betrayal'
The actor joins NPR's Robert Siegel to talk about an upcoming revival of the 1978 Harold Pinter play. In the show, directed by Mike Nichols, Craig is acting with his real-life wife, Rachel Weisz — but he says the two don't talk about it outside the office.
Bio Credits Manson's Terrible Rise To Right Place And Time
California parolee Charles Manson arrived in San Francisco in 1967, when the city was full of young waifs looking for a guru. In Manson, Jeff Guinn argues that if the cult leader had instead been paroled in a place like Nebraska, he likely would not have been so successful.
National Book Awards Look To Raise Profile ... And It's Not The First Time
When most people think "NBA," they think of the National Basketball Association. This year, in an attempt to maximize coverage, the National Book Foundation is releasing "long lists" of NBA nominees in different genre categories, one day at a time for a week.
Kitchen Time Machine: A Culinary Romp Through Soviet History
Author Anya Von Bremzen's new memoir, Mastering The Art of Soviet Cooking, is a tragic-comic history of a family and a nation as seen through the kitchen window. Everything we ate in the Soviet Union was grown ... by the party state," she says. "So, with the food, inevitably, you ingested the ideology."
Barnard President: Today's 'Wonder Women' Must Reframe Feminism
Many think of the feminist movement as a thing of the past, but Debora Spar says the battle isn't won yet. She tells Fresh Air's Terry Gross about the misinterpretation that got us where we are, and the need to improve support and pay for working women.