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October 27, 2012 With the help of reporter Dexter Filkins, an Iraq vet seeks atonement for an early war tragedy. Critic Ed Ward reviews a new collection of hard-hitting singles from the man behind "Shake, Rattle and Roll." And Tom Wolfe takes Miami's pulse in his novel Back to Blood.

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October 26, 2012 David Mitchell's exquisite novel Cloud Atlas has been adapted for the screen by the Wachowskis and Tom Tykwer. The film is never dull, but critic David Edelstein found that unlike the book, the film fails in its attempt to tie six distinct stories together.

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October 26, 2012 In the 1970s and '80s, Cables was the pianist of choice for saxophonists Dexter Gordon and Art Pepper; Pepper called him his favorite pianist. Critic Kevin Whitehead says Cables' new trio album, My Muse, is so unassumingly good, you could miss just how good it is.

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October 26, 2012 Moogfest, the festival of electronic and visionary music, takes place on Saturday and Sunday in Asheville, N.C., the city music pioneer Bob Moog called home. Moog was the inventor of the Moog synthesizer. He died in August 2005. Fresh Air listens to an interview from February 2000.

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October 25, 2012 Michelle Shephard has traveled to Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, more than two dozen times and has been following the stories of men who've been released from the U.S. detention center. She's the author of Guantanamo's Child and Decade of Fear: Reporting From Terrorism's Grey Zone.

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October 25, 2012 True Grit author Charles Portis is the cult writer for people who hate cult writers. He hasn't published a book since 1991, and reviewer John Powers says the short pieces collected in Escape Velocity have been treasured for decades, passed around like samizdat by Portis fans.

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October 24, 2012 Colbert loves music and loves to sing, so Fresh Air's Terry Gross asked him to bring a few songs that mean a lot to him and tell her why.

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October 24, 2012 Wolfe tells Fresh Air's Dave Davies that what makes Miami exceptional is the story of how an immigrant community rose to dominate its political landscape in just over a generation. His new novel deals with racial and ethnic conflict among the city's diverse inhabitants.

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October 23, 2012 In the early days of the Iraq War, during a firefight in Baghdad, Lu Lobello's Marine unit mistakenly opened fire on a family of civilians, killing three. Years later, and after enlisting the help of reporter Dexter Filkins, Lobello reached out to that family for forgiveness.

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October 22, 2012 In January, DuVernay became the first African-American woman to win Sundance's best directing award for her second feature-length film, Middle of Nowhere. It's about a young woman who puts her life and dreams of going to medical school on hold while her husband is in prison.

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October 22, 2012 Six feet tall, weighing in at 400 pounds and in his 40s when stardom hit him, Big Joe Turner is behind a load of rock 'n' roll hits. His hardest-hitting singles have been collected on a new compilation, titled Big Joe Turner Rocks.

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October 20, 2012 Michael Feinstein chronicles his experience working as an archivist and cataloger for legendary songwriter Ira Gershwin. Critic Ed Ward reviews Roxy Music's boxed set, The Complete Studio Recordings 1972-1982. And Tyler Perry talks about his new action thriller, Alex Cross.

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October 19, 2012 On Blak and Blu, you can hear the roar in Clark's blues guitar. But critic Ken Tucker says Clark remains a work in progress.

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October 19, 2012 From the comedian and digital director of The Onion, a satirical self-help book for anyone who has a black friend, wants to be the next black president or speak for the black community.

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