The Osage tribe in Oklahoma became spectacularly wealthy in the early 1900s — and then members started turning up dead. David Grann's Killers of the Flower Moon describes the dark plot against them.
Poet and author Kevin Coval talks about his new book of poems, A People's History of Chicago. The book tells the stories of the city's marginalized communities.
In his new memoir, the one-time member of The Monkees recalls befriending John Lennon and Jimi Hendrix, who opened for the band on a 1967 tour. (That didn't last long.)
Stephanie Powell Watts' No One Is Coming to Save Us isn't quite a retelling of The Great Gatsby; instead, it uses similar themes to tell a story about black characters in a declining furniture town.
New Yorker staff writer David Owen says that convoluted legal agreements and a patchwork of infrastructure determine how water from the Colorado is allocated. His new book is Where The Water Goes.
Unlike food — which gives us sensory cues like crunchy and hot, as well as tasting, say, salty — with wine, it's all about tiny differences in taste and smell. The danger is in getting too poetic.
Prince on defining his music: "The only thing I could think of, because I really don't like categories, but the only thing I could think of is inspirational."
U.S. taxpayers pay $30 billion a year to fund biomedical research aimed at finding better treatments. But competition for scarce funding and tenure may be prompting some scientists to cut corners.
Savoring the flavor of wine activates more gray matter than solving a complex math problem, according to neuroscientist Gordon Shepherd. His new book, Neurenology, explores your brain on wine.
Historian Dennis McBride writes in his new book about Nevada’s reputation as “tolerant of activities the rest of the nation shunned.” However, over the decades - in the area of gay and lesbian righ
Mark Harris says the military worked with Hollywood directors to create movies about the war. His book, Five Came Back, is the basis for a new Netflix docu-series.Originally broadcast March 3, 2014.
Journalist Sharon Weinberger discusses the Defense Advance Research Projects Agency, which develops innovative scientific technologies for the military. Her new book is The Imagineers of War.
Tressie McMillan Cottom worked in enrollment at two for-profit colleges, but quit because she felt uncomfortable selling students an education they couldn't afford. Her new book is Lower Ed.
The image of the "sad clown" can seem like a cliche. But for Kevin Breel, it's very real. He describes how he struggled with depression while performing as a stand-up comedian.
"There is no greater ... feeling of helplessness than to watch two beloved sons deteriorate before [your] eyes," says Ron Powers. His new book is No One Cares About Crazy People.
Anyone who has read or seen Victor Hugo's masterpiece knows the plot turns on the theft of a simple loaf of bread. There was no sharper barometer of economic status in 19th-century France than bread.
This week, we bring you two segments with comedian Guy Branum from our fall tour, and our friend Petra Mayer chats with author Neil Gaiman about Norse mythology.
Technology is designed to be addictive, offering gratification that's similar to that of drug abuse or gambling. Author Adam Alter says a new frontier could soon provide another escape from reality.
Tom Nealon's new book searches through patchy historical records to trace subjects like how chocolate helped lead to war in the Caribbean, or the role a grain fungus played in the Crusades.
Author Norman Ohler says that Adolf Hitler's drug abuse increased "significantly" from the fall of 1941 until winter of 1944: "Hitler needed those highs to substitute [for] his natural charisma."
Maj. Mary Jennings Hegar is part of a lawsuit that argues excluding women from combat is unconstitutional. She says the lawsuit isn't about women's rights – it's about military effectiveness.
Economist and author Tyler Cowen worries that Americans' desire to keep changing has gone away. "The forward march of progress," he says, "is not the main story today."
Kay Redfield Jamison's new book describes how Lowell's manic-depressive illness influenced his life and work. "His manias tended to lead him into writing a fresh kind of poetry," she says.
