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December 6, 2012 Judd Apatow draws on his own experiences as a husband and father in a new comedy that explores the ups and downs of family life. The film stays close to home, literally and figuratively. It stars his wife, Leslie Mann, as well as their two daughters, and was filmed a few doors down from his house.

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December 6, 2012 To bring the past to life and make it matter, historical fiction must do more than conjure up an exotic backdrop for a conventional story. These six books challenge our preconceptions and help show how the past shaped the world we live in today.

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December 6, 2012 The duke and duchess of Cambridge, aka William and Kate, are expecting a baby. Aislin is also expecting ... a media meltdown, while Mike Graston thinks that even round-the-clock coverage will leave some royals watchers feeling shortchanged.

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December 5, 2012 Can scientists create universes in the lab? Although that may not be possible, physicists can recreate the young universe in high energy particle collisions. Recent results indicate that the young universe may be stranger than anticipated.

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December 5, 2012 When it was released 32 years ago, Michael Cimino's revisionist Western was considered one of the most colossal flops in Hollywood history. Critic John Powers takes a second look at the film and concludes that it's clearly "the work of one man and ... he wanted you to remember it forever."

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December 5, 2012 The new album It's Okay To Do Stuff pays tribute — sort of — to the 40-year-old Free To Be ... You And Me.

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December 5, 2012 It's a tombstone like no other. A rough, clumpy hunk of granite, carried across Europe on a sea of ice, dumped in a valley, shipped across the Atlantic, lugged to Massachusetts — all to honor a restless man.

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December 5, 2012 Jimmy Fallon, The Roots, and Mariah Carey perform a stripped-down holiday standard.

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December 5, 2012 Lois Duncan's 1979 novel, Daughters of Eve, takes revenge to a whole new level. Author Mary Stewart Atwell explains why this classic novel is still relevant. Do you have a favorite story of revenge that goes too far? Tell us in the comments.

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December 5, 2012 Now that House Republicans have responded with a counteroffer to President Obama's proposal for avoiding the "fiscal cliff," the two sides seem even further apart. Signe Wilkinson argues that the GOP offer doesn't go far enough, while Lisa Benson thinks the president wants way too much.

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December 4, 2012 There are two paths forward and only one of them embraces the reality of science, its methods and its ethics.

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December 4, 2012 "The President" is a 3,200-year-old giant sequoia that clocks in at 247 feet tall and counting. And contrary to most living things we can think of, giant sequoias grow faster later in life than earlier in life.

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December 4, 2012 After the U.N. voted to give Palestinians "observer state status," Israel announced plans to expand settlements in the West Bank and East Jerusalem. Patrick Chappatte doesn't see the U.N. recognition as helpful to the peace process, while Emad Hajjaj has the same opinion of Israel's building plans.

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December 3, 2012 Commentator Tania Lombrozo takes on fiction and the question of whether it can change the world with some whimsical reflections on Barbara Kingsolver's Flight Behavior, a novel about climate change.

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