Author Interviews

Books

Belinda Huijuan Tang's debut novel explores family, forgiveness in times of change

5:11pm August 12, 2022

Belinda Huijuan Tang's debut novel A Map for the Missing is a story about family, forgiveness and the challenge of grappling with the past while charting a path for the future.

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Mary Rodgers and Jesse Green, co-authors of Shy: The Alarmingly Outspoken Memoirs of Mary Rodgers

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Arts

Published 8 years after her death, Mary Rodgers' memoir is a true tell-all book

4:26pm August 11, 2022

by Jeff Lunden

Rodgers, the daughter of theatrical legend Richard Rogers, was a songwriter, children's book author and philanthropist. Her memoir, Shy: The Alarmingly Outspoken Memoirs of Mary Rodgers, is out now.

A photo of Joseph James DeAngelo Jr. is displayed during a news conference April 24, 2018, in Sacramento, Calif., announcing the arrest of the man suspected to be the so-called Golden State Killer.

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Arts

After a career of cracking cold cases, investigator Paul Holes opens up

3:09pm August 10, 2022

by Dave Davies

Holes spent more than 20 years investigating crimes in California and played a critical role in identifying Joseph James DeAngelo Jr. as the so-called Golden State Killer. His new book is Unmasked.

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Author of 'Taliban' reflects on how the group has changed since it was last in power

4:55pm August 09, 2022

In 2001, author and journalist Ahmed Rashid wrote the definitive account of the Taliban and its origins. NPR's Mary Louise Kelly now speaks with Rashid, a year after the Taliban re-took Afghanistan.

Covers of The Deconstructionists and Partisans

Two books dig into the 1990s for the roots of the Trump-era Republican Party

3:30pm August 09, 2022

by Ron Elving

Two veteran observers of American politics, a journalist and a historian, argue that former president Trump is not responsible for the GOP of our day but, instead, exploited it as he found it.

Books

After her mother's stroke, Lara Porzak helped finish new novel 'Properties of Thirst'

12:53pm August 06, 2022

NPR's Scott Simon speaks with novelist Marianne Wiggins about her latest book, "Properties of Thirst," along with her daughter, Lara Porzak, who helped her mother finish writing it after a stroke.

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Books

Ackerman's 'Fifth Act' focuses on the final week of U.S. involvement in Afghanistan

10:34am August 05, 2022

NPR's Rachel Martin talks to Elliot Ackerman about his new book, The Fifth Act: America's End in Afghanistan. Waves of Afghans were trying to evacuate the country.

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Arts

Matt de la Peña and Hanif Abdurraqib on how basketball feeds their writing

10:31am August 05, 2022

Children's book writer Matt de la Pena and poet and essayist Hanif Abdurraqib talk about how basketball feeds their writing.

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College is increasingly out of reach for many students. What went wrong?

1:32pm August 03, 2022

by Terry Gross

Journalist Will Bunch says instead of opening the door to a better life, college leaves many students deep in debt and unable to find well-paying jobs. His new book is After the Ivory Tower Falls.

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Books
Arts

Julia Whelan on narrating her romance novel about a narrator who hates romance novels

4:58pm August 02, 2022

NPR's Mary Louise Kelly speaks with writer and audiobook narrator Julia Whelan about what it was like bringing her own profession to the pages of her new novel Thank You For Listening.