In his new book, Gods of the Upper Air, Charles King tells the story of Franz Boas, Margaret Mead and the other 20th century anthropologists who challenged outdated notions of race, class and gender.
"The big picture of survival is sometimes so hard to see, but we always know what we can do to make the next best step toward survival," says cave diver, photographer and memoirist Jill Heinerth.
Eighteen-year-old Muslim Somali refugee Saida Dahir is an activist and hopes to inspire as a spoken word artist. Her debut poetry album is The Walking Stereotype. She talks with Lulu Garcia-Navarro.
The professional cat advocate and caretaker has penned a new guide, Tiny but Mighty, on how to adopt neonatal kittens, who are often too vulnerable to be housed in standard animal shelters.
Writer Ibram X. Kendi's new book tackles one of today's most important topics. How to Be an Antiracist lays out his definition of what makes a racist — and what people can do to combat racism.
In a new book, Christopher Leonard chronicles how Koch Industries acquired huge businesses, limited its liability and created a political influence network to remake the GOP.
The Catholic nun became an outspoken opponent of the death penalty following the events in her book Dead Man Walking. Her new memoir, River of Fire, details her spiritual journey up to that point.
The Nobel laureate died Monday at 88. Terry Gross talked with Morrison in 1987 after she wrote Beloved, in 1992 after she authored Jazz and in 2015 when she published God Help the Child.
Americans have a torturous relationship with fast food. We vilify it but also view it through a nostalgic lens. A new book explores this complicated yet seemingly unshakable bond.
In her new book of essays, culture writer Jia Tolentino explores how social media shapes identity, public discourse and political engagement — particularly for millennials such as herself.
Whether you're extremely online, or still confused by how a simple period can be interpreted as passive-aggressive, linguist Gretchen McCulloch has a guide to how our on-screen speech is morphing.
Lippman's latest novel, Lady in the Lake, was inspired by two real-life Baltimore disappearances in the 1960s. She says Trump's recent tweets show a "basic disrespect" for the residents of her city.
Sarah Parcak has found that studying the rise and fall of civilizations has given her hope, or at least some hope. Her new book is called Archaeology from Space: How The Future Shapes Our Past.
The decline of Earth's insect population may have serious consequences for humans, says scientist Anne Sverdrup-Thygeson. Insects are the world's janitors, as well as pollinators and a food source.
NPR's Sarah McCammon speaks with science journalist Harriet A. Washington about her new book, A Terrible Thing to Waste: Environmental Racism and Its Assault on the American Mind.
J. Ryan Stradal wasn't seeing the strong, Midwestern women who raised him reflected well in contemporary fiction. So he decided to write those characters himself in The Lager Queen of Minnesota.
Neurologist Guy Leschziner, author of The Nocturnal Brain, says the brain can be in different sleep stages at once — which explains why people sometimes walk, eat and even have sex when sleeping.
Daniel Nieh used to be a model and a translator. He says both of those professions went into his debut novel, a page-turner about a college basketball player unraveling his Chinese father's murder.
Dr. Haider Warraich talks about advancements in treating and preventing heart failure, and explains how the understanding of healthy blood pressure and good cholesterol continues to evolve.
NPR's Ari Shapiro talks with former U.S. counterterrorism coordinator Richard Clarke about his new book, The Fifth Domain, co-written with Robert Knake.
Whitehead's new novel is based on a notorious Florida reform school where boys were beaten and sexually abused. "If there's one place like this, there are many," he says.
