Author Interviews

Books

Kwame Alexander's memoir began as a book of love poems but morphed into so much more

7:18am May 17, 2023

NPR's Michel Martin speaks with author Kwame Alexander about his new book: Why Fathers Cry at Night: A Memoir in Love Poems, Recipes, Letters, and Remembrances.

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Books
Arts

Author R.F. Kuang on unlikable narrators and cultural appropriation in 'Yellowface'

5:24pm May 16, 2023

R.F. Kuang talks about her new novel Yellowface and why she wanted to write a book about cultural appropriation in the publishing world.

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R.F. Kuang says fiction should be about imagining outside our own perspective.

Books
Arts

She wants fiction writers to step outside their experiences. Even if it's messy

5:09pm May 16, 2023

by Manuela López Restrepo

R.F. Kuang's novel Yellowface offers a literary exploration of cultural appropriation taken to a new degree.

Samantha Irby's new memoir is Quietly Hostile. Her previous books include Meaty; New Year, Same Trash; We Are Never Meeting in Real Life; and Wow, No Thank You.

Books
Arts

'Quietly Hostile' is Samantha Irby's survival guide (of sorts)

12:43pm May 16, 2023

by Tonya Mosley

Irby shares almost everything in her new book of essays, Quietly Hostile but, she says, "If I can't have a conversation with a stranger about the thing that I wrote, I won't put it in a book."

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Books

Jonathan Eig's new biography examines the life of Martin Luther King Jr.

5:10am May 16, 2023

NPR's Steve Inskeep talks to biographer Jonathan Eig about King a Life. "One of the interesting things about King is that he's a protest leader who really does not like conflict," Eig says.

Books

'New China Playbook' has a different view than many Western policymakers do on China

5:10am May 15, 2023

NPR's Steve Inskeep speaks with economist Keyu Jin about her book: The New China Playbook. She teaches now at the London School of Economics.

Books

Cassandra Jackson on her memoir 'The Wreck'

8:02am May 14, 2023

by Ayesha Rascoe

As Cassandra Jackson struggled with infertility, she learned more about loss that devastated her father before her birth. She talks with NPR's Ayesha Rascoe about her memoir, "The Wreck."

Books

Anne Berest's novel traces her family history and leads back to the Holocaust

8:12am May 13, 2023

by Scott Simon

NPR's Scott Simon talks with Anne Berest about her new novel "The Postcard." It's based on the author's own family history and unwinds a mystery leading back to the Holocaust.

Truman Committee became the model for scrutinizing giant public expenditures

5:12am May 11, 2023

Morning Edition host Steve Inskeep talks to NPR's Steve Drummond about his book, The Watchdog: How the Truman Committee Battled Corruption and Helped Win World War Two.

This anthology wants us to redefine fitness for ourselves

5:13pm May 10, 2023

NPR's Juana Summers talks with Justice Roe Williams, who coedited Deconstructing the Fitness Industrial Complex: How to Resist, Disrupt, and Reclaim What it Means to Be Fit in American Culture.