In the 1840s, a Scottish minister named John Ferguson accepts the task of traveling to a remote island to evict Ivar, the only man who lives there. When Reverend Ferguson falls off a cliff, Ivar brings him back to life ? and the two find a common understanding even as they realize they don't speak the same language. That's the basis of Carys Davies' new novel, Clear. In today's episode, NPR's Scott Simon asks the author about how she discovered a real-life extinct language called Norn, and how the historic Highland Clearances of Scotland inspired the events of the book.

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Susan Casey has traveled about 17,000 feet deep into the ocean ? and in her book The Underworld: Journeys to the Depths of the Ocean, the diver and author speaks with oceanographers, marine biologists and geologists to explain some the of the wonders that exist way beyond what we can see in the water. For our Earth Day episode, Casey speaks with NPR's A Martinez about the millions of shipwrecks that are still preserved underwater, the creatures that call the deep ocean home and the humility it takes to learn about the sea.

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Spooky season is year-round, and so are our episodes about scary stories. First up, NPR's Ayesha Rascoe speaks with Jeanette Winterson about The Night Side of the River, a collection of ghost stories that weaves in the liminal spaces ? Metaverses, one might say ? created through technology to coexist with the dead. Then, NPR's Juana Summers asks Desiree Evans and Saraciea Fennell about The Black Girl Survives in This One, an anthology of horror stories by Black writers that contend with the genre's relationship to race.


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While screens have become a totally normalized part of kids' development today, social psychologist Jonathan Haidt argues that the negative effects might outweigh the benefits. His new book, The Anxious Generation, details the correlation between an increasingly online social life and rising mental health concerns amongst young people. In today's episode, NPR's Steve Inskeep asks Haidt about how boys and girls experience socialization on the Internet, and how some of these behaviors might be curbed to get kids playing offline.

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Patric Gagne says she realized at a young age that she wasn't like other kids. Shame, guilt, empathy ? feelings running rampant on the playground ? evaded her. Her new book, Sociopath, is about how she came to be diagnosed with sociopathy in college and how her own studies into clinical psychology shaped her understanding of the disorder. In today's episode, Gagne speaks with NPR's Michel Martin about her lived experiences as a sociopath, and how they actually led her to working as a therapist.

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Memory Piece, the new novel from National Book Award finalist Lisa Ko, kicks off in the 1980s with three teenage girls who find a deep connection to one another. Into the1990s and eventually the 2040s, the book delves into their growth as individuals and friends. In today's episode, Here & Now's Deepa Fernandes speaks with Ko about how art, gentrification and activism plays a role in each woman's life, and how memory and interdependence helps them find hope for their futures.

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Pulitzer Prize finalist Lydia Millet is known for writing novels that are sometimes dark, yet funny peeks into communities and relationships. Her new book, We Loved It All, still follows some of those satirical undertones, but it's a nonfiction work that blends the author's real life experiences with anecdotes about the natural world. In today's episode, NPR's Leila Fadel asks Millet how what started as an encyclopedia of animals morphed into a bigger project about the nature of life, and how it changed her writing process.

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Today's episode features two books for younger readers. First, NPR's Scott Simon speaks with John Schu about Louder Than Hunger, his new semi-fictional memoir that follows a middle school boy's journey with an eating disorder. Then, NPR's Scott Detrow asks author Omar Abed and illustrator Hatem Aly ? both older siblings ? about The Book That Almost Rhymed, their story about a big brother finding the silver lining in his little sister's constant interruptions.

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Garrard Conley's memoir Boy Erased chronicled his upbringing as a Baptist preacher's son and his experience being sent to conversion therapy. His new novel, All The World Beside, explores similar themes of faith, love and queer identity ? but through the lens of a relationship between two men in Puritan New England. In today's episode, Conley speaks with NPR's Ari Shapiro about how fiction allowed him to actually provide even more autobiographical details than a memoir, and how writing this book grounded him in his relationship to Christianity.

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Rae Wynn-Grant grew up in the Bay Area of California. But even if she was in the city, she was still fascinated by nature, eventually becoming one of those on-screen nature adventurers she spent her youth watching on TV. She speaks with NPR's Ayesha Roscoe about her new memoir Wild Life, and what she learned from other Black experts in the outdoors.

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In Amor Towles' story collection Table for Two, the writer revisits a character from his very first book ? Rules of Civility. Towles talks to NPR's Mary Louise Kelly about checking into the Beverly Hills Hotel for research purposes, and why he avoids technology in his stories.

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Hanif Abdurraqib's new book, There's Always This Year, is difficult even for the author to summarize ? it's part memoir, part basketball analysis, part poetry and essay collections. In today's episode, the MacArthur Fellow and writer speaks with NPR's Scott Detrow about how growing up in Columbus, Ohio, watching LeBron James' spectacular ascent, and understanding the passage of time all led to a meditation on mortality and success.

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Today's episode features two books that use bright, colorful illustrations to convey larger messages about acceptance and community. First, Here & Now's Deepa Fernandes speaks with author-illustrator Steve Asbell about Flap Your Hands, which celebrates how stimming is an act of self-care for autistic children. Then, NPR's Samantha Balaban gathers actress Julie Andrews, her daughter Emma Walton Hamilton and illustrator Elly MacKay to describe how shadows operate in their new fairytale, The Enchanted Symphony, about how music revives the plants ? and people ? in a village.


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Editor's note: This episode contains a discussion of suicide.

Early in today's episode, writer Sloane Crosley tells NPR's Ayesha Rascoe something that troubled her when paging through the self-help books she was gifted after a big loss. There was no chapter for how to grieve a close friend ? partners, siblings, parents, sure. But while not everyone has those relationships, she says, friendships are universal. Her new memoir, Grief Is for People, chronicles how she's coped with losing one of the most important people in her life.


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It's been four years since the world went into lockdown mode as COVID-19 rapidly spread across the globe. But a new book by political scientist Dali Yang dives into the information about, and mitigation of, the disease in its earliest days in China. In today's episode, Yang speaks with Here & Now's Scott Tong about the research that went into Wuhan, the way local governments and medical officials abstained from disclosing crucial intelligence in the early days, and the strict lockdown that followed.


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Jay, the 17-year-old at the heart of Daniel Kraus' novel Whalefall, has an hour of oxygen left on his tank. He's been diving in the ocean off the coast of Monterey, California trying to recover a skeleton ? but his mission is complicated when he's swallowed whole by a sperm whale. In today's episode, Kraus speaks with NPR's Ayesha Rascoe about how a book that's so enmeshed in death also reveals quite a lot about life, and how he conceptualized the pacing of his chapters to emphasize Jay's race against time.

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Early in today's episode, Here & Now's Scott Tong poses what a lot of activists and listeners might think ? that the two words titling Akshat Rathi's new book, Climate Capitalism, are at odds with one another. But Rathi says governments can play a role in shifting economic policy to prioritize both profit and environmental protections. In his book and in this interview, he explains how business leaders, students and politicians are already implementing ideas that connect the dots between the climate crisis and global markets.

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Today's episode features interviews with two poets whose new works look back in time, either in their own lives or those of their subjects. First, Don Paterson speaks with NPR's Scott Simon about his new memoir, Toy Fights, which recounts his childhood in Scotland. The two get to talking about Paterson's self-described "descent into madness" and the reason his poems go unmentioned in the book. Then, Simon speaks with Michael Ondaatje about A Year of Last Things, and how the Booker Prize-winning writer thinks about going back and forth between fiction and poetry.

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The story of Saba, the protagonist of Leo Vardiashvili's novel Hard by a Great Forest, is much like the author's own. A young boy flees the Soviet Republic of Georgia with his father and brother as the country is ravaged by a war. Decades later, when his father goes back to their homeland and promptly disappears, Saba must face his family's past ? and immense loss ? in an effort to find him. In today's episode, Vardiashvili tells NPR's Scott Simon about being separated from his own family, and the feeling of time-travel he felt when he finally made his way back to Georgia.

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A new memoir by historian Charles Spencer, 9th Earl Spencer and brother of Princess Diana, details a difficult childhood marked by alleged physical and sexual abuse at Britain's Maidwell Hall in the 1970s. In today's episode, Spencer tells NPR's Scott Simon how childhood naivete ? thinking his parents were all-knowing authorities who must've known about the school's cruelty when they sent him there ? prevented him and others from speaking up about what was happening, and why writing A Very Private School felt like an important reclamation of his boyhood.


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NPR's Sarah McCammon grew up in the white evangelical church ? and though she left the tradition as an adult, she's continued to cover its ties to Trump's politics closely as a journalist. Her new book, The Exvangelicals, chronicles why so many people like herself have removed themselves from evangelicalism. In today's episode, she speaks with NPR's Ayesha Rascoe about the different breaking points she heard from other defectors ? from COVID to racial justice ? and why a decline in people who identify as evangelical might actually explain the group's rising political profile.

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Percival Everett is a prolific author ? his 2001 book Erasure was recently adapted into the Oscar-winning film American Fiction. But his latest book, James, expands on a story readers around the world already know: Mark Twain's Huckleberry Finn. In today's episode, Everett speaks with NPR's Andrew Limbong about why he wanted to reframe the classic novel from the perspective of the enslaved titular character, why he doesn't think of his new work as a direct response to Twain, and why he doesn't buy into the controversy surrounding the original.


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Tessa Hulls' grandmother, Sun Yi, was a dissident journalist in Shanghai who faced intense political persecution during the Chinese Communist Revolution; she suffered severe mental distress after fleeing to Hong Kong. In today's episode, Hulls tells Here & Now's Scott Tong that her grandmother's trauma often cast a shadow over their family ? one she had been running away from for years, and one she decided to finally face in her new graphic memoir, Feeding Ghosts. It's a reexamining of Hulls' matriarchal lineage, of Chinese history and of generational love and healing.

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Eight young women are competing at the 12th Annual Women's 18 and Under Daughters of America Cup, a boxing competition at the heart of Headshot. Each girl has her reasons for fighting her way to this ring in Reno, Las Vegas ? and Rita Bullwinkel's debut novel is a searing look inside the mental and physical state of her protagonists. In today's episode, the author speaks with NPR's Scott Simon about how her own childhood as a polo player informed her writing, and why she chose to follow her characters way beyond their time in the ring.

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Christine Blasey Ford says the time leading up to her 2018 testimony in front of the Senate Judiciary Committee ? and its aftermath ? is a lot like surfing, venturing out into unknown waters. Her new memoir, One Way Back, recounts her experience coming forward with an accusation that Supreme Court Justice Brett Kavanaugh had sexually assaulted her in the 1980s. In today's episode, Blasey Ford speaks with NPR's Michel Martin about why she originally wanted to avoid being in the public spotlight, but why she felt it was her civic duty to inform the country about what she'd gone through.


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2034, the first novel by Elliot Ackerman and Admiral James Stavridis, chronicled a nuclear conflict between China and the U.S. Now, their sequel 2054 takes a look at the country two decades later. The President is suddenly assassinated giving a speech, which sparks a flood of conspiracy theories, digitally-altered images and horrifying technological discoveries. In today's episode, the authors speak with NPR's Mary Louise Kelly about the relationship between technology and American institutions, and how destruction is sometimes an inevitable part of progress.

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Today's episode features two retired journalists who've written memoirs reflecting on some of the highs and lows of a career in the industry. First, former Washington Post editor Marty Baron speaks with NPR's Mary Louise Kelly about Collision of Power, covering the 2016 and 2020 presidential elections and the state of media in today's electoral cycle. Then, former NPR producer Peter Breslow joins NPR's Ayesha Rascoe to discuss Outtakes, taking a three-month work trip camping across China and up Mount Everest and finding hope in a music school in Afghanistan.

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Eight translators from eight countries travel to a Polish forest to begin adapting famed author Irena Rey's newest book into their respective languages. But when Irena Rey disappears, a competitive, ego-fueled search unravels in the surrounding woods and within each person. In today's episode, author Jennifer Croft speaks with NPR's Scott Simon about her new novel, The Extinction of Irena Rey, and how her own experience as an International Booker Prize-winning translator sparked an interest in the drive and desires of the people tasked with "shapeshifting" a text into their own tongue.

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Before World War I, approximately 2 million Jewish people fled Russia and Eastern Europe for the United States. The Last Ships from Hamburg, a new book by Steven Ujifusa, recounts this time in history with a special focus on three businessmen who facilitated mass emigration: Jacob Schiff, Albert Ballin and J.P. Morgan. In today's episode, Ujifusa speaks with Here & Now's Scott Tong about how anti-immigrant rhetoric in the U.S. looks very similar today to how it did then, and why beyond historical record, this is a deeply personal story for him to write.

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Maurice Vellekoop's new graphic memoir, I'm So Glad We Had This Time Together, is named after the song Carol Burnett would close out her show with in the '60s and '70s. But it's also a reflection of some of the author-illustrator's most cherished childhood memories, going shopping in downtown Toronto with his mom. In today's episode, Vellekoop tells NPR's Ayesha Rascoe how that relationship changed as he came to terms with his sexuality ? something his religious mother did not accept ? and how his father ended up surprising him later in life.


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Raquel Toro, the protagonist of Xochitl Gonzalez's new novel, is working on her thesis about a minimalist sculptor when she discovers his all-but-forgotten wife, artist Anita de Monte, died after falling 33 stories from their apartment more than a decade prior. Based on the story of Cuban artist Ana Mendieta, Anita de Monte Laughs Last is an odyssey into ego, power and marriage in the art world. In today's episode, Gonzalez tells NPR's Scott Simon how fiction allowed her to expand on Mendieta's legacy, and why she didn't want to discredit the husband's own career along the way.

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Tommy Orange's debut novel, There, There, centers several Native American characters grappling with identity in the bustling city of Oakland, California. In today's episode, we revisit a profile of Orange reported by NPR's Lynn Neary in 2018. Then, Orange joins NPR's Scott Simon to discuss his new book Wandering Stars, a sequel to There, There that stretches across time to follow a survivor of the Sand Creek Massacre in 1864. Orange explains how an image he saw in a museum in Sweden introduced him to this historical narrative, and why he decided to focus on his protagonist Orvil's ancestors.

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Journalist Kara Swisher, who's been covering the internet and the tech industry for decades, says she's not surprised when people like Steve Jobs or Elon Musk lie to her ? but what she says they sometimes don't realize is how much they lie to themselves. Her new memoir, Burn Book, recounts what she's learned in conversation with some of the brightest minds in Silicon Valley. In today's episode, Swisher tells NPR's Steve Inskeep that as disillusioned as she is with how much harm the industry has caused, she's still optimistic about the future of tech and AI.


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Yasheng Huang, a professor of global economics at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, names four major contributors to China's economy in his new book, The Rise and Fall of the EAST: exams, autocracy, stability and technology. Huang writes that those have been the driving factors of Chinese development dating back to the Sui dynasty, and particularly during the economic boom of the past half-century. But he tells Here & Now's Scott Tong that a declining property sector, a lack of investment in people and today's political leadership is ringing alarms for the country's future.

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Lucy Sante says it was a smartphone app that ultimately pushed her to come out to herself ? and the world ? as trans in her mid 60s. In her new memoir, I Heard Her Call My Name, the writer and professor chronicles how using the gender swap function on FaceApp ultimately opened a brand new life to her. And she tells NPR's Don Gonyea that though there are a lot of complexities to having that kind of realization later in life, there are also a lot of positive outcomes.

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Early in today's episode, NPR's Mary Louise Kelly asks Pulitzer Prize-winning writer Steve Coll why he felt the need to write The Achilles Trap about the Iraq War amidst so many ongoing world conflicts. Coll explains that he hoped enough time had passed to try to answer a lingering question: Why did Saddam Hussein allow the world to believe he harbored weapons of mass destruction when he didn't? Coll's reporting ? which includes Hussein's own audio recordings ? unravels decades of tension and miscommunication between the U.S. and Iraq, which ultimately cost hundreds of thousands of lives.

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Today's episode features two books that capture how cooking, taking care of loved ones, and running a home has sustained women for generations. First, NPR's Scott Simon speaks with Helen Rebanks (who is joined by actor and comedian Nick Offerman) about The Farmer's Wife, which chronicles her life as a homemaker and farmer in England. Then, Here & Now's Celeste Headlee speaks with former Kentucky poet laureate Crystal Wilkinson about Praisesong for the Kitchen Ghosts, which stretches back into Wilkinson's family history to understand how Black women were the unsung heroes of Appalachia.

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With permission from the Orwell estate, Sandra Newman's latest novel takes place in the same world and with many of the same characters as 1984, but retold through the eyes of Winston Smith's love interest, Julia. It's a deep exploration of women's experiences under totalitarianism, and as Newman tells NPR's Scott Simon, an appreciation of the original that doubles down on some of Orwell's humor and ability to capture the psyche of fear ? and unexpected comfort ? under political tyranny.

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Journalist and former CNN anchor Hala Gorani tells NPR's Leila Fadel that she has a whole paragraph queued up to answer a seemingly simple question: Where are you from? Gorani's memoir, But You Don't Look Arab, unpacks her many roots across Istanbul, Syria, France and the U.S. ? and grapples with how her identity and its impact on her work have been scrutinized for decades. In today's episode, she opens up about why she had to change her name and add a photo of herself to her passport to land a job in journalism, and why constant movement can offer an odd sort of comfort for her.

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Phillip B. Williams' debut novel, Ours, is a sweeping story that takes place in the 19th century. It takes off with a conjuror named Saint who destroys plantations and enslavers, and creates a community of freed people, Ours, that grapples with mysticism, spirituality and liberation over the course of several decades. In today's episode, Williams speaks with NPR's Ari Shapiro about the different interpretations and experiences of freedom in the novel, and the importance of community in the story.

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There's a moment in Carrie Sun's memoir, Private Equity, when she remembers trying to answer a text for her high-pressure hedge fund job while running on the treadmill. It ended poorly ? and Sun says, looking back, it was a good metaphor for the toll her career was taking on her life. In today's episode, Sun speaks with Here & Now's Scott Tong about the moral, mental and physical sacrifices we normalize for work, and why maybe that's not such a good thing.


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Today's episode focuses on two books about legendary journalists, the business of reporting and the state of the industry today. First, NPR's Mary Louise Kelly speaks with Jennet Conant about Fierce Ambition, a biography of war correspondent Maggie Higgins ? the first woman to win a Pulitzer for foreign correspondence, who also resented being defined by her gender. Then, NPR's Scott Simon asks The New Yorker's Calvin Trillin about The Lede, an introspection into the realities of being a reporter, the careers of Edna Buchanan and R.W. "Johnny" Apple, and so much more.

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Photojournalist Kate Medley took a road trip across 11 states in the South, documenting the culture of convenience stores and gas stations that serve hot, delicious food. Her new book, Thank You Please Come Again, captures how these establishments serve as important community meeting points across class, ethnic and racial divides. In today's episode, Medley speaks to NPR's Debbie Elliott about how communities of color are playing an important role in this Southern tradition, and how it's manifesting in dishes like cajun banh mis and jollof rice.

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Lunar New Year Love Story, the new graphic novel written by Gene Luen Yang and illustrated by Leuyen Pham, follows a teenage girl who believes she's been stuck with a generational curse for heartbreak. But during the festivity's traditional lion dance, a chance encounter gives her hope she can rewrite her fate ? if she's willing to take a chance. In today's episode, Yang and Pham speak with Here & Now's Robin Young about writing romance for young readers, and what they say are the three essential elements to a good kiss.

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Julie Schwartz Gottman and John Gottman know their fair share about relationship troubles ? they're clinical psychologists who specialize in couples' therapy, and they've been married for more than 30 years. Their new book, Fight Right, breaks down how to navigate conflict by understanding communication styles, assessing wants and needs, and looking for positivity in any approach. In today's episode, the authors offer NPR's Andee Tagle some step-by-step advice on finding connection through any argument.

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Yangsze Choo says she doesn't thoroughly plan out her novels ? her newest, The Fox Wife, blossomed from that core idea behind the title, of a woman who also happens to be a fox. But beyond that, it's a story about a mother avenging her child, about a murder investigation in early 20th century China, and about family curses. As the author tells NPR's Scott Simon, foxes hold a wide range of intrigue and mystery in Chinese, Korean and Japanese legends ? and it's these traits that broke open a whole world of secrets for her characters.

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Today's episode features two thrillers that unravel in the darkened halls of historic houses. First, NPR's Scott Simon speaks with C.L. Miller about The Antique Hunter's Guide to Murder, a whodunnit amongst antique collectors trapped in an English manor under very bizarre circumstances. Then, NPR's Mary Louise Kelly asks Tracy Sierra about her debut novel, Nightwatching, and how the author's own New England home inspired this terrifying tale about a mother hiding from an intruder during a blizzard.

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Pop culture can be a powerful tool for social and political activism ? but what happens when it's used to incite discrimination, or even violence? That's the question at the heart of journalist Kunal Purohit's book, H-Pop: The Secretive World of Hindutva Pop Stars. In today's episode, Purohit speaks with NPR's Diaa Hadid about how influencers, pop songs and poems are promoting Hindu nationalist values in India, and how political propaganda on social media can legitimize hate towards minority groups.

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Years ago, author GennaRose Nethercott promised herself she would sit at a cafe every morning and come up with three new creatures ? beasts inspired by medieval bestiaries that combined scientific record with moral folk tales. The result, Fifty Beasts to Break Your Heart, is a collection of short stories that show the magical yet spooky nature of human affection. In today's episode, Nethercott speaks with NPR's Elissa Nadworny about some of the monsters she came up with, and why she cherishes writing about darkness.


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