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'Transitions' explores the process of a mother's acceptance of her child's gender

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Top Shelf Productions

'Transitions' explores the process of a mother's acceptance of her child's gender

December 8, 2023 • First published in French in 2021 as Journal d'Anne Marbot, Élodie Durand's book is a welcome addition to the growing number of graphic novels exploring transgender and genderqueer identities.

NPR

They're not cute and fuzzy — but this book makes the case for Florida's alligators

December 7, 2023 • Rebecca Renner's Gator Country is an impeccably researched love letter to Florida's flora and fauna. She argues that alligators deserve the same respect and protection as any other animal in danger.

NPR

In a year of book bans, Maureen Corrigan's top 10 affirm the joy of reading widely

Fresh Air

December 6, 2023 • Fresh Air's book critic says 2023 was an outstanding year for reading. Corrigan shares 10 of her favorite titles – a wide-ranging list of fiction and nonfiction.

In a year of book bans, Maureen Corrigan's top 10 affirm the joy of reading widely

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Hachette Books

'All the Little Bird-Hearts' explores a mother-daughter relationship

December 6, 2023 • Through the eyes of an autistic woman named Sunday, Viktoria Lloyd-Barlow explores family relationships and friendships in her debut novel, longlisted for the Booker Prize.

NPR

12 books that NPR critics and staff were excited to share with you in 2023

December 5, 2023 • Every year we ask NPR staff and book critics to share their favorite titles in our annual Books We Love guide. Behind the scenes, it's fun to spot trends and see what gets nominated again and again.

Penguin Random House

A theater critic and a hotel maid are on the case in 2 captivating mystery novels

Fresh Air

November 30, 2023 • A critic becomes an amateur detective in order to avoid becoming a murder suspect in Alexis Soloski's Here in the Dark. In The Mystery Guest, by Nita Prose, a hotel's maid has to clean up a real mess.

A theater critic and a hotel maid are on the case in 2 captivating mystery novels

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Algonquin Books

Generations of mothers are at the center of 'A Grandmother Begins The Story'

November 29, 2023 • Métis writer Michelle Porter has created beauty from the ugliness of colonization, loss, addiction, abandonment, and grief in her debut novel that finds motherhood at its heart.

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Pop Culture Happy Hour

2023 Books We Love: Staff Picks

November 29, 2023 • NPR's Books We Love is a roundup of favorite books of the year, sorted and tagged to help you find exactly what you're looking for. Recommendations come in from critics and contributors and today, we're highlighting picks from NPR staff.

2023 Books We Love: Staff Picks

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NPR

Books

Here are the Books We Love: 380+ great 2023 reads recommended by NPR

November 20, 2023 • Books We Love returns with 380+ new titles handpicked by NPR staff and trusted critics. Find 11 years of recommendations all in one place – that's more than 3,600 great reads.

Random House

'Day' is a sad story of middle-aged disillusionment

November 18, 2023 • Michael Cunningham's Day joins a new wave of pandemic novels, including Ann Patchett's Tom Lake, Chris Bachelder and Jennifer Habel's Dayswork, and Sigrid Nunez's The Vulnerables.

Penguin Books

'Eyeliner' examines the cosmetic's history as a symbol of strength and protest

November 15, 2023 • Journalist Zahra Hankir draws a line connecting the cosmetic across civilizations, continents, and eras straight into today — as not only a beauty product but as a means of self expression and more.

Grove Atlantic

Claire Keegan's 'stories of women and men' explore what goes wrong between them

Fresh Air

November 13, 2023 • Book critic Maureen Corrigan says her only frustration with Keegan's work is that she wants more of it. So she was happy to read her nuanced, three-story collection, So Late in the Day.

Claire Keegan's 'stories of women and men' explore what goes wrong between them

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Barbra Streisand's memoir shows she wasn't born a leading lady — she made herself one

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Barbra Streisand's memoir shows she wasn't born a leading lady — she made herself one

November 7, 2023 • At nearly 1,000 pages long, My Name Is Barbra is the ultimate exercise in directorial control, and a celebration of women's authorship.

Meghan Collins Sullivan/NPR

3 new poetry collections taking the pulse of the times

November 6, 2023 • Here are three of the first poetry collections to register the still-unfolding social and physical fallout of the pandemic and Trump-era politics.

Meghan Collins Sullivan/NPR

3 books in translation for fall that are big — in different ways

November 3, 2023 • Vengeance Is Mine, Undiscovered, Pedro and Marques Take Stock come from one of France's most significant living writers, a major voice in Peru, and a new talent from Brazil, respectively.

Gallery/Saga Press

'The Reformatory' tells a story of ghosts, abuse, racism — and sibling love

November 2, 2023 • Tananarive Due's haunting, unflinching novel delves deep into the realities of the Jim Crow South and the very real horrors that took place at Florida reformatory schools in the 1950s.

Riverhead Books

In 'White Holes,' Carlo Rovelli takes readers beyond the black hole horizon

October 31, 2023 • Physicist Carlo Rovelli is unique among modern scientists who write for popular audiences in his ability to capture the purest essence of his science with both precision and lyricism.

It's Been a Minute: Britney Spears tells her story

Britney Spears holds her awards for the 1999 MTV Europe Awards; The Woman in Me (2023) by Britney Spears JOEL SAGET/AFP/Getty Images, Simon & Schuster, Inc. hide caption

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Pop Culture Happy Hour

It's Been a Minute: Britney Spears tells her story

October 31, 2023 • Britney Spears just released one of the most hotly anticipated celebrity memoirs of the year. The Woman In Me details her meteoric rise to fame, her family history, and her 13-year-long conservatorship. Today we're bringing you a special episode of It's Been a Minute, where host Brittany Luse and her guests discuss all the juicy, strange, and sad highlights from the new book.

It's Been a Minute: Britney Spears tells her story

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MacMillan

Alice McDermott's 'Absolution' transports her signature characters to Vietnam

Fresh Air

October 30, 2023 • McDermott's latest novel, which centers on two American women who meet in Saigon in 1963, explores themes of religion, humility and insistent charitable intervention.

Alice McDermott's 'Absolution' transports her signature characters to Vietnam

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Meghan Collins Sullivan/NPR

Looking for ghost stories? Here are 5 new YA books that will haunt you

October 28, 2023 • Heading into Halloween, we have a few suggested new reads. Some are genuinely terrifying, some more benevolent — but all are guaranteed to provide an atmospheric glimpse through the veil.

Madonna and Britney Spears: It's them against the world

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Culture

Madonna and Britney Spears: It's them against the world

October 28, 2023 • Two new books chronicle the lives of two pop idols, Madonna and Britney Spears. The way each came to stardom — and what happened to them after — illuminates why their paths have been so different.

Britney Spears can finally tell her own story in 'The Woman in Me'

Britney Spears holds her awards for the 1999 MTV Europe Awards; The Woman in Me (2023) by Britney Spears JOEL SAGET/AFP via Getty Images, Simon & Schuster, Inc. hide caption

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It's Been a Minute

Britney Spears can finally tell her own story in 'The Woman in Me'

October 27, 2023 • Britney Spears just released one of the most hotly anticipated celebrity memoirs of the year, The Woman In Me. The book details her meteoric rise to fame, her family history, and her 13 year-long conservatorship. This week, host Britney Luse talks to the two best people to break it all down: Claire Parker and Ashley Hamilton, comedians and co-hosts of the Celebrity Memoir Book Club podcast. Together they look at what the princess of pop is trying to tell us, how she contextualizes her own story and how she doesn't seem to implicate the audience in her abuse.

Britney Spears can finally tell her own story in 'The Woman in Me'

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Ten Speed Graphic

'Diaries of War' traces two personal accounts — one from Ukraine, one from Russia

October 26, 2023 • Through images and words, author Nora Krug illustrates the day-to-day lives of two individuals and their families living within warring nations.

Spiegel & Grau

'The Comfort of Crows' is fuel to restore spirits in dealing with ecological grief

October 25, 2023 • Here the New York Times columnist and author of Late Migrations and Graceland Margaret Renkl brings alive in 52 chapters her love for the animals and plants in her yard and nearby parks in Tennessee.