Books

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Arts

With Humor And Sorrow, 'Life After Life' Explores The Moment Of Death

7:17pm March 28, 2013

by NPR Staff

From an old man feigning dementia to a judge's widow who keeps a scrapbook of murder, the story of Pine Haven's retired residents isn't all seriousness and tragedy. In her new novel, Jill McCorkle draws from the sometimes sad, sometimes comical experience of watching her own parents age.

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A woman uses a new iPad and iPhone 4 in the office. Nizhnevartovsk, Russia, Sept. 16, 2012.

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In A World That's Always On, We Are Trapped In The 'Present'

5:59pm March 27, 2013

by NPR Staff

In Present Shock: When Everything Happens Now, Douglas Rushkoff cautions against living in the perennial, virtual now. "It's very hard for us to orient ourselves," he says, "to look forward to things, to join movements with goals, to invest in the future."

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A Slap in the Face: Why Insults Hurt — And Why They Shouldn't by William B. Irvine

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You're So Dumb, You Probably Think This Book Is About Getting Slapped

5:58pm March 27, 2013

by NPR Staff

"Your mother was a hamster, and your father smelt of elderberries!" Philosophy professor William Irvine's new book, A Slap in the Face, is a compendium of insults — and a scholarly look at why we're constantly compelled to one-up each other.

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The only known photograph of the 1935 Bismarck town team.

Integrated Baseball, A Decade Before Jackie Robinson

5:05pm March 27, 2013

by NPR Staff

Over ten years before Jackie Robinson broke the color barrier in the major leagues, a little-known baseball team went to bat with players both black and white. Journalist Tom Dunkel writes about the team from Bismarck, N.D., in his new book Color Blind.

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In Jonathan Dee's new novel a woman finds her knack for getting powerful men to apologize.

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The Apathy In 'A Thousand Pardons' Is Hard To Forgive

4:32pm March 27, 2013

by Maureen Corrigan

The rich and good-looking get a taste of life among the 99 percent in Jonathan Dee's novels. In A Thousand Pardons, his protagonist, Helen Armstead, finds a secret talent for getting powerful men to apologize after her marriage falls apart and she is forced to enter the working world.

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Lynne Olson, a former journalist for The Baltimore Sun, is also the author of Citizens of London.

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'Angry Days' Shows An America Torn Over Entering World War II

3:30pm March 26, 2013

World War II is often thought of as a good and just war — a war the U.S. had to fight. But it wasn't that simple. Public debate was heated between interventionism, which President Roosevelt supported, and isolationism, which aviator Charles Lindbergh became an unofficial spokesman for.

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How And Why The Hollywood Star Machine Made 'Gods Like Us'

2:25pm March 25, 2013

In a new book about movie stardom and fame, Boston Globe film critic Ty Burr looks at the evolving history of the relationship between movie stars and the people who love them, and at how changing technology influences the kinds of stars the public wants.

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Dan Fagin is an associate professor of journalism and the director of the science, health, and environmental reporting program at New York University's Arthur L. Carter Journalism Institute.

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For Toms River, An Imperfect Salvation

2:03pm March 25, 2013

by NPR Staff

Toms River: A Story of Science and Salvation traces the story of a New Jersey town plagued by two generations of toxic waste dumping. Its author, Dan Fagin, talks about the origins of dumping in Toms River and its legacy today.

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Remembering Chinua Achebe And The Importance Of Struggle

12:39pm March 25, 2013

To remember Chinua Achebe who died last Thursday, Fresh Air listens back to an interview with the great African writer that originally aired on May 10, 1988. In it, Achebe talks about the literary trope of the white explorer or missionary living amongst the savages, and the importance of struggle.

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Richard Breitman (left) and Allan Lichtman are distinguished professors of history at American University in Washington, D.C.

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'FDR And The Jews' Puts A President's Compromises In Context

9:17am March 24, 2013

by NPR Staff

President Franklin D. Roosevelt said little and did less on behalf of Jews trying to get out of Nazi Germany; but he also won Jewish votes by landslide margins and led the Allies to victory in World War II. A new history by Richard Breitman and Allan Lichtman revises FDR's performance upward.

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