You Must Read This "You Must Read This" presents conversations with writers about the books they love to read and recommend.

Special Series

You Must Read This

Writers recommend their all-time favorite books

Wednesday April 27, 2011

In Memory Of A Mentor: 'So Long,' William Maxwell

Novelist and editor William Maxwell died in 2000. He was 91 years old. Wyatt Counts/AP hide caption

toggle caption

Wyatt Counts/AP

Review

In Memory Of A Mentor: 'So Long,' William Maxwell

April 27, 2011 • As an aspiring writer, William Lychack was lucky enough to be mentored by his literary hero, longtime New Yorker editor, William Maxwell. Maxwell's novel, So Long, See You Tomorrow, is a meditation on loss and forgiveness; Lychack says every page is touched by care, like rooms of a beautiful house.

Monday April 25, 2011

Review

Move Over, Tiger Mom: This Mother's 'On Fire'

April 25, 2011 • If Amy Chua's tale of overachievement, Battle Hymn of the Tiger Mother, left you looking for a different image of an Asian-American family, writer Ben Ryder Howe recommends Mother on Fire. Sandra Tsing Loh tells the story of her refreshingly "average" Asian-American family.

Move Over, Tiger Mom: This Mother's 'On Fire'

Listen · 3:05 3:05

Transcript

Download
Embed <iframe src="https://www.npr.org/player/embed/134059609/135997541" width="100%" height="290" frameborder="0" scrolling="no" title="NPR embedded audio player">
Transcript

Wednesday April 20, 2011

Review

Lit Novelist Confesses Nerd Love For Sci Fi Classic

April 20, 2011 • Karel Capek's The Absolute at Large demonstrates how weighty social satire can be slipped into genre fiction. Writer Cara Hoffman says the surrealist speculation in this 1920s sci-fi novel is so prescient, it feels like it could have been written today.

Lit Novelist Confesses Nerd Love For Sci Fi Classic

Listen · 4:00 4:00

Transcript

Download
Embed <iframe src="https://www.npr.org/player/embed/135241076/135610674" width="100%" height="290" frameborder="0" scrolling="no" title="NPR embedded audio player">
Transcript

Monday April 11, 2011

Review

Return To The Prairie To Revisit 'My Antonia'

April 11, 2011 • Willa Cather's pioneer tale is often considered a young adult novel — but don't be fooled by the deceptively simple prose. Writer Bradford Morrow says older readers who return to the subtly sophisticated narrative will find new perspectives on their own journeys.

Return To The Prairie To Revisit 'My Antonia'

Listen · 3:59 3:59

Transcript

Download
Embed <iframe src="https://www.npr.org/player/embed/133811309/135930219" width="100%" height="290" frameborder="0" scrolling="no" title="NPR embedded audio player">
Transcript

Monday April 4, 2011

Review

Poetry With An Edge: The Acerbic Wit Of Alan Dugan

April 4, 2011 • In honor of National Poetry Month, former poet laureate Robert Pinsky shares the work of one of his favorite writers, Alan Dugan, who died in 2003. Pinksy says Dugan was an amusing, soulful and engagingly nasty poet who sang the truth — often with a splash of high-grade vinegar.

Poetry With An Edge: The Acerbic Wit Of Alan Dugan

Listen · 2:52 2:52

Transcript

Download
Embed <iframe src="https://www.npr.org/player/embed/134745994/135186304" width="100%" height="290" frameborder="0" scrolling="no" title="NPR embedded audio player">
Transcript

Monday March 28, 2011

Review

Head Over Heels For 'Boys Over Flowers'

March 28, 2011 • Japan has been devastated by an earthquake and a tsunami — but author Marie Mutsuki Mockett has faith in the resilience of the Japanese people. She recommends Yoko Kamio's manga series, Boys Over Flowers, about a young heroine, who embodies Japanese perseverance.

Head Over Heels For 'Boys Over Flowers'

Listen

Transcript

Download
Embed <iframe src="https://www.npr.org/player/embed/134563204/135449921" width="100%" height="290" frameborder="0" scrolling="no" title="NPR embedded audio player">
Transcript

Monday March 21, 2011

Review

In Magical 'Trilogy,' A Labyrinth Of Past And Present

March 21, 2011 • In The Deptford Trilogy, the erudite Robertson Davies weaves together the lives of three adversarial men, all connected by a troubling childhood incident. Author Amy Bloom says that Davies' complicated characters electrify this winding story with wackiness, compassion and unexpected sincerity.

Tuesday March 15, 2011

Review

Well-Written 'Letters': Saul Bellow Shows Us How

March 15, 2011 • The famed writer doled out hundreds of letters to friends, enemies, multiple wives, ex-wives and lovers. Writer Rebecca Newberger Goldstein recommends a hefty collection of Bellow's works of correspondence — brimming with savory morsels of masterful prose.

Well-Written 'Letters': Saul Bellow Shows Us How

Listen · 2:49 2:49

Transcript

Download
Embed <iframe src="https://www.npr.org/player/embed/134432921/134574499" width="100%" height="290" frameborder="0" scrolling="no" title="NPR embedded audio player">
Transcript

Monday March 7, 2011

Review

'Oreo': A Satire Of Racial Identity, Inside And Out

March 7, 2011 • Fran Ross' Oreo is an uproarious look at American identity, through the eyes of a biracial girl. The funny, poignant novel was largely ignored when it was published in 1974 — but writer Mat Johnson says the time for the quirky novel is now.

'Oreo': A Satire Of Racial Identity, Inside And Out

Listen · 3:59 3:59

Transcript

Download
Embed <iframe src="https://www.npr.org/player/embed/134204725/134399700" width="100%" height="290" frameborder="0" scrolling="no" title="NPR embedded audio player">
Transcript

Review

A Kaleidoscopic Book That'll Make Your 'World Spin'

March 7, 2011 • It can feel like a chore to read an overly hyped book, but Colum McCann's celebrated novel Let the Great World Spin is an engrossing exception. Playwright Wendy MacLeod says that the prismatic tale about a day in the intersecting lives of New Yorkers has earned its rave reviews — and then some.

Thursday February 24, 2011

Review

A Haunting Tale To Judge 'The Quick And The Dead'

February 24, 2011 • In The Quick and the Dead, Joy Williams fixes a gaze of cold but evocative detachment on the lives of an eclectic cast of characters living in the arid Southwest. Writer Sarah Braunstein says the surreal novel uses wit, candor and virtuosic prose to delve into "our subterranean selves."

A Haunting Tale To Judge 'The Quick And The Dead'

Listen · 4:00 4:00

Transcript

Download
Embed <iframe src="https://www.npr.org/player/embed/133960311/134210037" width="100%" height="290" frameborder="0" scrolling="no" title="NPR embedded audio player">
Transcript

Wednesday February 16, 2011

Review

A Harsh Tale Of War, But An Unforgettable Read

February 16, 2011 • How can we understand the experiences of those who have lived through war? What do they have to teach us? Author Hilary Thayer Hamann's favorite book attempts to answer these questions, and reinforces just how beautifully implausible life during conflict can be. It's The War by Marguerite Duras.

A Harsh Tale Of War, But An Unforgettable Read

Listen · 3:58 3:58

Transcript

Download
Embed <iframe src="https://www.npr.org/player/embed/133811002/137509352" width="100%" height="290" frameborder="0" scrolling="no" title="NPR embedded audio player">
Transcript

Review

In 'Harlem,' New Faces Occupy An Old Neighborhood

February 16, 2011 • In Harlem Is Nowhere, Sharifa Rhodes-Pitts brings a dynamic new lens to the much-written-about New York neighborhood. Commentator Ralph Eubanks says the book's particular charm is in the urge it gives the reader to revisit the old Harlem classics.

Monday February 7, 2011

Review

Spare And Sublime: A Monastery's Spell Of 'Silence'

February 7, 2011 • Patrick Leigh Fermor's A Time To Keep Silence replicates in style and rhythm the very experience that it seeks to describe. The 95-page book recounts Fermor's visits to several French monasteries in the 1950s, and writer Adam Haslett found the book draws readers into deep contemplation.

Spare And Sublime: A Monastery's Spell Of 'Silence'

Listen · 3:56 3:56

Transcript

Download
Embed <iframe src="https://www.npr.org/player/embed/132708398/133664052" width="100%" height="290" frameborder="0" scrolling="no" title="NPR embedded audio player">
Transcript

Thursday January 27, 2011

In 'Mountain Lion,' Sibling Love Becomes Loathing

The Mountain Lion Promo The Mountain Lion Promo hide caption

toggle caption

The Mountain Lion Promo

Review

In 'Mountain Lion,' Sibling Love Becomes Loathing

January 27, 2011 • Jean Stafford's powerful, 1947 novel chronicles the gradual dissolution of a brother-sister bond. Writer Sigrid Nunez describes the tale as a coming-of-age story, not just for the siblings but also for their relationship.