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Review

Some books are made for summer. NPR staffers share their all-time favorites

July 17, 2023 • A few weeks ago we asked NPR staffers to share their favorite summer reads. Old, new, fiction, nonfiction — as long as it was great for hot and hazy hammock reading, it was fair game.

Islenia Mil for NPR

Here are 19 books our critics are excited for this summer

May 26, 2023 • We asked some of our regular book critics what soon-to-be-published titles they are most looking forward to reading this summer. Here's what they said.

Oxford University Press

'Sparks' author Ian Johnson on Chinese 'challenging the party's monopoly on history'

September 29, 2023 • Xi Jinping and China's ruling Communist Party have displayed a dogged obsession with controlling the historical narrative. But there's a group of underground historians fighting back.

As China censors homegrown feminism, a feminist scholar from Japan is a bestseller

Books by Japanese scholar Chizuko Ueno at a bookstore in Beijing, Sunday, Aug. 20, 2023. "Misogyny" and "Starting from the Limit" are at the center. Ng Han Guan/AP hide caption

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Ng Han Guan/AP

As China censors homegrown feminism, a feminist scholar from Japan is a bestseller

September 29, 2023 • A 75-year-old Japanese feminist scholar who's not married and does not have children is an unlikely celebrity on China's tightly censored internet.

Oh Bother! Winnie, poo and deforestation

Winnie-the-Pooh: The Deforested Edition is a word-for-word republishing of the A.A. Milne classic, with one arresting change: all of the trees have been cut down. Who Gives A Crap hide caption

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Who Gives A Crap

Culture

Oh Bother! Winnie, poo and deforestation

September 28, 2023 • Now that Winnie-the-Pooh is in the public domain, it's a free-for-all. In Winnie-the-Pooh: The Deforested Edition, the trees have are all gone. The book is by toilet paper company Who Gives A Crap.

Author Interviews

In conversation with Kerry Washington on her new memoir – Part II

September 27, 2023 • Part II of NPR's Juana Summers' conversation with actress Kerry Washington about her new memoir, Thicker Than Water.

In conversation with Kerry Washington on her new memoir – Part II

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In conversation with Kerry Washington on her new memoir – Part I

September 27, 2023 • Part I of NPR's Juana Summers' conversation with actress Kerry Washington about her new memoir, Thicker Than Water.

In conversation with Kerry Washington on her new memoir – Part I

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Almost 4 million people are on probation or parole. Here's why that matters.

Author Vincent Schiraldi next to the cover of his new book, Mass Supervision. Headshot (left) by Paulette Louissaint hide caption

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Headshot (left) by Paulette Louissaint

Code Switch

Almost 4 million people are on probation or parole. Here's why that matters.

September 27, 2023 • In the past decade, the problem of mass incarceration has gotten increased attention and thought. But in his new book, Mass Supervision, Vincent Schiraldi argues that in those conversations, people often neglect to think about probation and parole — two of the biggest feeders to the U.S.'s prison population. These systems surveil close to four million Americans, which Schiraldi says is both a huge waste of resources and a massive human rights violation. On this episode, we're talking to Schiraldi about how probation and parole came to be, why they're no longer working as they were once supposed to, and why he thinks they might need to be done away with entirely.

Almost 4 million people are on probation or parole. Here's why that matters.

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New California law bars schoolbook bans based on racial and LGBTQ topics

California Gov. Gavin Newsom speaks during an interview in Sacramento, Calif., on Tuesday, Sept. 12, 2023. Newsom signed a bill on Monday, Sept. 25, 2023, to ban school boards from rejecting textbooks based on their teachings about the contributions of people from different racial backgrounds, sexual orientations and gender identities, calling the measure "long overdue." Rich Pedroncelli/AP hide caption

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Rich Pedroncelli/AP

Politics

New California law bars schoolbook bans based on racial and LGBTQ topics

September 26, 2023 • Gov. Gavin Newsom called the new measure "long overdue," saying that the banning binge of diversity materials has to come to an end.

'People Collide' is a 'Freaky Friday'-type exploration of the self and persona

Harper Via

Review

Book Reviews

'People Collide' is a 'Freaky Friday'-type exploration of the self and persona

September 26, 2023 • Isle McElroy's novel covers a deep exploration of marriage, love, and the ways we know one another — while also touching on how so much of how we navigate the world depends on how it sees us.

Cars are a major predator for wildlife. How is nature adapting to our roads?

Environmental journalist Ben Goldfarb says in nature, the weaker animals are usually the ones killed by predators. That changes when cars are involved: "Roadkill is not only eliminating animals, it's in many cases eliminating those healthy animals that populations need to remain strong," Devon OpdenDries/Getty Images hide caption

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Devon OpdenDries/Getty Images

Animals

Cars are a major predator for wildlife. How is nature adapting to our roads?

Fresh Air

September 26, 2023 • Environmental journalist Ben Goldfarb says cars are killing animals, while highways cut off them off from their food sources and migration paths. His new book is Crossings.

Cars are a major predator for wildlife. How is nature adapting to our roads?

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The dystopian suspense 'Land of Milk and Honey' satisfies all manner of appetites

Penguin Random House

Review

Book Reviews

The dystopian suspense 'Land of Milk and Honey' satisfies all manner of appetites

Fresh Air

September 26, 2023 • Set in the near future, C Pam Zhang's atmospheric novel centers on a chef who takes a job at a tech entrepreneur's isolated compound after smog kills most of Earth's plant and animal species.

The dystopian suspense 'Land of Milk and Honey' satisfies all manner of appetites

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A Nobel prize-winning immigrant's view on American inequality

US-British economist Angus Deaton speaks at a press conference after winning the Nobel Prize for Economics at Princeton University in Princeton, New Jersey, on October 12, 2015. JEWEL SAMAD/AFP via Getty Images hide caption

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JEWEL SAMAD/AFP via Getty Images

Planet Money

A Nobel prize-winning immigrant's view on American inequality

September 26, 2023 • In a new book, Nobel Prize-winning economist Angus Deaton offers a scathing critique of American politics and economic policy.

How a DNA test inspired actress-activist Kerry Washington's journey of self-discovery

Little, Brown Spark

Author Interviews

How a DNA test inspired actress-activist Kerry Washington's journey of self-discovery

Fresh Air

September 25, 2023 • Washington was an adult when she learned that she had been conceived via artificial insemination and the man she considered her father was not her biological dad. Her new memoir is Thicker than Water.

How a DNA test inspired actress-activist Kerry Washington's journey of self-discovery

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Author Interviews

Picture This

September 23, 2023 • A series of conversations between the authors who write children's books and the artists who illustrate them.

A concert audience of houseplants? A new kids' book tells the surprisingly true tale

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Picture This

A concert audience of houseplants? A new kids' book tells the surprisingly true tale

September 23, 2023 • The latest children's book from Julie Andrews, Emma Walton Hamilton and illustrator Elly McKay is about the power of nature and music. They discussed their creative process in an interview with NPR.

A concert audience of houseplants? A new kids' book tells the surprisingly true tale

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Michael Harriot's 'Black AF History' could hardly come at a better time

Dey Street Books

Review

Book Reviews

Michael Harriot's 'Black AF History' could hardly come at a better time

September 22, 2023 • This engaging, well-researched, and frequently laugh-out-loud funny history places the Black experience at center stage with stories that should have already been part of our collective memory.

Two debut books make the prestigious Booker Prize shortlist

Meghan Collins Sullivan/NPR

Book News & Features

Two debut books make the prestigious Booker Prize shortlist

September 21, 2023 • Jonathan Escoffery's If I Survive You and Chetna Maroo's Western Lane are among the contenders for this year's prize, which honors the best English-language fiction published in the U.K. and Ireland.

How comic Leslie Jones went from funniest person on campus to 'SNL' star

Leslie Jones says she was 19 when Jamie Foxx told her she needed to live life — get hired, get fired, fall in love — in order to be truly funny. Jen Rosenstein/HGBUSA hide caption

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Jen Rosenstein/HGBUSA

Television

How comic Leslie Jones went from funniest person on campus to 'SNL' star

Fresh Air

September 21, 2023 • Jones says performing stand-up for the first time as a freshman in college felt like putting on a shirt that fit perfectly: "It was just so natural." Her memoir is Leslie F*cking Jones.

How comic Leslie Jones went from funniest person on campus to 'SNL' star

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Lauren Groff's survivalist novel 'The Vaster Wilds' will test your endurance, too

Riverhead Books

Review

Book Reviews

Lauren Groff's survivalist novel 'The Vaster Wilds' will test your endurance, too

Fresh Air

September 21, 2023 • An impoverished servant girl escapes the fledgling Jamestown colony during the winter of 1609–1610 in a historical saga that takes its inspiration from Robinson Crusoe.

Lauren Groff's survivalist novel 'The Vaster Wilds' will test your endurance, too

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School book bans show no signs of slowing, new PEN America report finds

A PEN America report found that the number of books permanently removed from U.S. school libraries and classrooms has quadrupled — to 1,263 books in the last school year from 333 the year before. Harkim Wright Sr./AP hide caption

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Harkim Wright Sr./AP