Books

Books

NPR staffers pick their favorite food books from the 2023 Books We Love list

8:26am January 06, 2024

From NPR's Books We Love list, our staff recommends the cookbooks "Ed Mitchell's Barbeque," "Invitation to a Banquet," "The Secret of Cooking," "The Migrant Chef," and "Asada."

Books

Alvaro Enrigue's novel imagines the clash of two great empires in the 16th century

8:26am January 06, 2024

by Scott Simon

The Spanish and the Aztecs don't know what to make of each other in Alvaro Enrigue's new novel, "You Dreamed of Empires." He talks with NPR's Scott Simon about getting into a 16th-century mindframe.

Renowned author and former state poet laureate Fred Chappell dies at 87

5:27pm January 05, 2024

by Paul Garber

Chappell grew up in the mill town of Canton in the Appalachian Mountains of North Carolina. In a documentary about his life, “Fred Chappell: I Am One of You Forever,” he said he carried the mountains with him whenever he went. He spent most of his career in Greensboro, writing and teaching in the graduate-level creative writing program he helped build.

Books
Arts

Restaurateur Rose Previte shares recipes she learned from women around the world

1:38pm January 03, 2024

by Tonya Mosley

Previte's restaurants serve food inspired by her extensive travels and the home-cooked Lebanese dishes of her childhood. Her new cookbook is Maydān: Recipes from Lebanon and Beyond.

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Books

New mafia book stands out because of the background of its author, an ex-mobster

5:06am January 02, 2024

NPR's A Martinez talks to Louis Ferrante about the first volume of his Borgata trilogy on the history of the American Mafia. Ferrante is a former high-ranking member of the Gambino crime family.

Barbra Streisand shares her secret for keeping performances honest

12:00pm January 01, 2024

by Terry Gross

When she was starring in Funny Girl on Broadway, Streisand says she'd alter the music slightly each night. Her new memoir is My Name is Barbra. Originally broadcast Nov. 8, 2023.

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Books
Arts

'Prophet Song' is a beautifully-written, slow descent into fascism

12:00pm January 01, 2024

by Maureen Corrigan

Most of the characters in Paul Lynch's Booker Prize-winning novel don't want to believe that tyranny is taking shape before their eyes, even as power is cut off and democratic freedoms evaporate.

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Books

Thousands of U.S. copyrighted works from 1928 are entering the public domain

5:12am January 01, 2024

D.H. Lawrence's Lady Chatterley's Lover, Virginia Woolf's Orlando and W.E.B. Du Bois' Dark Princess are among the works entering the public domain on Jan. 1, 2024.

Books

NPR staffers share their favorite memoirs from the 2023 Books We Love list

8:13am December 31, 2023

We have five biography and memoir suggestions from NPR's Books We Love: "Spare," "Congratulations! The Best is Over," "Sunshine," "Thicker Than Water," and "Sure, I'll Join Your Cult."

Books

In 'The Storm We Made', the horrors of war are the main character

7:53am December 31, 2023

by Rob Schmitz

NPR's Rob Schmitz speaks to author Vanessa Chan about her new novel "The Storm We Made," about a Malayan mother who becomes a spy for Japanese invaders.