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'All The Rage' Has All The Despair, And All The Confusion, Too

5:00pm April 15, 2015

by Tasha Robinson

Courtney Summers' new YA novel centers on a girl who was raped at a party, and the community that mostly doesn't believe her. Critic Tasha Robinson says the book's portrait of trauma packs a punch.

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'Cold Silver' Drags Epic Fantasy Through The Mud, Wonderfully

3:54pm April 15, 2015

by Jason Heller

Alex Marshall (a pseudonym for an established author taking an epic new path) creates a memorable heroine in Cobalt Zosia, a retired general who's drawn back into blood and struggle against her will.

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Lewis And Clark Battle Giant Spiders In 'Dead Lands'

2:43pm April 15, 2015

by Jason Sheehan

Benjamin Percy's new thriller re-tells the story of Lewis and Clark's expedition, against a postapocalyptic future backdrop where the Mississippi has dried up and monsters roam the West.

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'The Fishermen' Ventures Into Dark Waters

12:19pm April 15, 2015

by Michael Schaub

Chigozie Obioma's novel follows a group of young boys who disobey their elders to spend afternoons fishing on the banks of an unlucky river, and the terrible consequences that flow from that choice.

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'The Children's Crusade': A Heavily Plotted Family Saga To Dive Into And Savor

5:13pm April 14, 2015

by Maureen Corrigan

Ann Packer's latest is about a young Navy doctor who, after the Korean War, builds a house south of San Francisco. Fifty years later, his four adult children argue over the property.

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'Gutshot' Is Gloriously Grand Guignol

12:22pm April 14, 2015

by Colin Dwyer

Amelia Gray's new story collection is brimming with gore, guts, madness and deviance. Reviewer Colin Dwyer says Gray is reclaiming a place in literature for our bloody, clumsy, inconvenient bodies.

Books

Revisiting The Night Abraham Lincoln Was Shot 150 Years Ago

8:01am April 14, 2015

On this day in 1865, John Wilkes Booth shot President Lincoln. Renee Montagne talks to author James Swanson at Ford's Theatre. (This piece initially aired on Feb. 12, 2009 on Morning Edition).

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German writer Günter Grass arrives at Günter Grass-Haus, a museum in Luebeck, Germany, for his 80th birthday celebration on Oct. 27, 2007.

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Günter Grass, Who Confronted Germany's Past As Well As His Own, Dies At 87

7:53pm April 13, 2015

by Tom Vitale

In 2006, the Nobel prize-winning author of The Tin Drum admitted that as a teen during World War II, he had served with the Waffen-SS — the combat unit of the Nazi Party's elite military police force.

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German writer GÃ¼nter Grass, seen here in 2006, died at a clinic in LÃ¼beck, Germany. He was 87.

Günter Grass, Nobel-Winning Author Of 'The Tin Drum,' Dies At 87

4:02pm April 13, 2015

by Krishnadev Calamur

Grass was one of Germany's leading intellectuals after World War II, but admitted in 2006 that he had served in the Waffen SS. News of his death was announced by his publisher.

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Arts

Practicing 'Extreme Medicine,' From Deep Sea To Outer Space

3:00pm April 13, 2015

Dr. Kevin Fong explores how humans survive extremes of heat, cold, outer space and deep sea. He compares the exploration of medicine with the "explorers of the 20th century and every age before them."

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