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'Beautiful Country' looks back on a young Chinese girl's undocumented childhood Nov 17, 2021

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Living as an undocumented immigrant means living in the shadows, says Qian Julie Wang. Her memoir Beautiful Country tells the story of her family's life in New York after fleeing China in 1994. Her mother worked menial jobs in terrible conditions. Her father struggled with his status as a man in a country that equated being Asian with weakness. They couldn't even seek out regular medical care for fear of being deported. Wang joins NPR's Scott Simon in today's episode to talk about how those experiences shaped and shamed her, even as she became a Yale Law graduate and successful attorney.
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SJ Sindu makes and unmakes a god in her new novel 'Blue Skinned Gods' Nov 16, 2021

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Questioning religion can be a pretty common identity crisis. But what if your faith is based on... yourself? When Kalki is born with blue skin and black blood, he is believed to be the reincarnation of Vishnu. But when he fails to heal a girl brought to him in distress, he questions his divinity, which means questioning everything. In today's episode, SJ Sindu talks to NPR's Scott Simon about how her novel Blue Skinned Gods was an attempt to better understand her own family's urge to believe.
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'Hail Mary' sets the record straight on the history of the women's football league Nov 15, 2021

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You're probably at least a little familiar with the WNBA, and even if you never actually seen A League of Their Own, everyone knows there's no crying in baseball. But did you know there was a whole professional women's football league in the 1960's? NPR's A Martinez spoke with Britni de la Cretaz about their book Hail Mary: The Rise and Fall of the National Women's Football League, which they co-authored with fellow sports writer Lyndsey D'Arcangelo. And, disappointingly, but perhaps unsurprisingly, de la Cretaz says it was homophobia and sexism that undermined the league's success.
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'Dear Memory' and 'Cokie' both look toward the future while remembering the dead Nov 12, 2021

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In today's double episode, both books center people who have died. And they aren't just tributes to those who've passed, but to the people who remember them. First, Steven Roberts remembers his late wife, journalist Cokie Roberts, with NPR's Steve Inskeep. His book Cokie is full of interviews with her friends, family, and colleagues. Then, poet Victoria Chang talks about past and future generations of her family and what she wants to pass on to her own daughters in her book Dear Memory: Letters on Writing, Silence, and Grief with NPR's Rachel Martin.
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Amitav Ghosh turned to legends to write a story large enough for climate change Nov 11, 2021

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Trying to decrease your carbon footprint can be complicated. You use metal straws, recycle your paper, and bring your own grocery bags to the store, but everything you buy is part of a supply chain that's simply way out of your control. That lack of control is central to Amitav Ghosh's retelling of an ancient Bengali myth of a nature goddess setting calamity after calamity on a merchant who's only concerned with money. In today's interview, Ghosh tells NPR's Ari Shapiro that writing his 2019 novel Gun Island based on old legends allowed for a full response to the scope of climate change.
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Grady Hendrix reimagines the horror movie sequel in 'Final Girl Support Group' Nov 10, 2021

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Grady Hendrix LOVES horror movies, especially those old 80's slashers. And his new book is a tribute to that "final girl" at the end of so many of them. The one who doesn't necessarily survive by being smarter or stronger, but simply makes it to the end alive by not giving up. NPR's Audie Cornish interviewed him about his novel Final Girl Support Group, which is about exactly what it sounds like, a support group for women who survived psycho murderers — except it seems like someone's starting to hunt them down... again. As Hendrix says, what's the scariest thing for a "Final Girl?" A sequel.
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Dr. Sanjay Gupta looks to a future living with COVID in 'World War C' Nov 09, 2021

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We've all heard talk about "the new normal," whatever that even is. CNN's chief medical correspondent Dr. Sanjay Gupta has his own ideas, and despite the harsh realities of nearly two years living through a pandemic — quarantines, hospital staffing shortages, massive loss of life — he remains optimistic. In his new book World War C, he says, COVID is something we'll likely live with... forever. But that doesn't mean it has to control our lives. He sat down with NPR's Rachel Martin to talk about it in today's episode.
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Lucy Barton and her ex, William, are at the heart of Elizabeth Strout's new book Nov 08, 2021

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In Elizabeth Strout's new book, a familiar character - Lucy Barton - returns when ex-husband William asks for her help unraveling a recently discovered secret, one that forces him to reevaluate what he knew about his family. Even though it's been decades since they split, the two embark on a trip to uncover the truth. Because, whether you like it or not, sometimes your ex is the only person who really knows you. In today's episode, Strout joins Here and Now's Robin Young to talk about the complexities of the ties that bind us.
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Tiphanie Yanique and Dawnie Walton on music, monsters, and family baggage Nov 05, 2021

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There was a time when the kind of music you listened to could fully define the kind of lifestyle you led, says Dawnie Walton, author of The Final Revival of Opal and Nev. It's less restricting now, but your taste in music can still say quite a bit about who you are. In her book and in Tiphanie Yanique's novel Monster in the Middle, music plays at the center of its characters' stories, as they wrestle with figuring out who they are in their relationships, with significant others and their families. NPR's Scott Simon talks with each author about it in today's episode.
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Nick Offerman ponders nature's patterns and chaos in Central Park Nov 04, 2021

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Parks and Rec actor Nick Offerman is famous for playing an outdoorsman on TV, but it turns out he actually is one in real life, too — albeit considerably less gruff than his character Ron Swanson. NPR's Scott Simon met up with him in the wilds of Central Park to discuss Offerman's new book Where the Deer and the Antelope Play. A testament to the pastoral takes a philosophical look at the vast wilderness of America and how open lands affect our approach to recreation, conservation, farming, and more.
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