Aspirations Come Up Against Economic Hardship In 'Sounds Like Titanic'
"J.D. Vance's Hillbilly Elegy and Sarah Smarsh's Heartland present two views of America's rural-urban divide. Sounds Like Titanic captivates us with a third: a girl who grows up in an educated family in Appalachia, whose aspirations thrust her into a battle to support herself, but really enlist her in a war against a deeply unfair economic system. Hindman doesn't shrink from the big, systemic picture, but her fascinating personal story, with its unexpected twists, puts the memorable into this memoir....
'Tonic And Balm' Builds A World In A Bottle
"The year is 1919. Doc Bell's Miracle and Mirth Medicine Show — part circus, part sideshow, all charlatanism — travels rural America, trying to gin up enough audience to support the enterprise. The characters in Tonic and Balm, Stephanie Allen's debut novel, are the performers, roustabouts, fixers, and seamstresses who inhabit Doc Bell's self-contained world....
'Joy Enough' Recalls A Daughter's All-Encompassing Love For Her Mother
"I loved my mother and she died. Is that a story?" Yes, it is the story that Sarah McColl tells in her memoir, Joy Enough. Embedded in the question, which is the first line of the book, is McColl herself — how she grew up in the family that her mother Allison created, how she entered adulthood and married, how her marriage fell apart as Allison was dying. "Extinctions takes a hard look at the politics of adoption, cultural appropriation, loss, deracination, and professional frustration, without Wilson letting up her fictional grip....
'Extinctions' Digs Up Buried Memories and Unacknowledged History|NPR Books
"Extinctions takes a hard look at the politics of adoption, cultural appropriation, loss, deracination, and professional frustration, without Wilson letting up her fictional grip....
'We Begin In Gladness' Brings A Message Of Poetry's Importance In Today's World|NPR Books
"Life in today's world can be frenetic and anxious; we are often too distracted to appreciate each other and our universe. Poetry demands that we pause and listen. 'A poem is something that can't otherwise be said addressed to someone who can't otherwise hear it....
'Heavy' Brilliantly Renders The Struggle to Become Fully Realized|NPR Books
"...Dear white people, please read this memoir. Dear America, please read this book. Kiese Laymon is a star in the American literary firmament, with a voice that is courageous, honest, loving, and singularly beautiful. Heavy is at once a paean to the Deep South, a condemnation of our fat-averse culture, and a brilliantly rendered memoir of growing up black, and bookish, and entangled in a family that is as challenging as it is grounding."
In The Powerful 'Deviation,' Luce D'Eramo Rejects Her Past And Faces An Uncertain Future|NPR Books
"... D'Eramo bears witness to her teenage years, which stand in sharp relief even against the great conflagration. Her version of youth is unimaginably extreme, and the telling of it carves out new territory. It is not simply D'Eramo's personal story, but also her ruthless quest for self-knowledge, that render Deviation a literary tour de force.
'The Most Dangerous Branch' Asks Whether The Supreme Court Has Become Too Powerful|NPR Books
"Kaplan begins with the drama surrounding Justice Scalia's death on a west Texas ranch. He goes on to describe the behind the scenes dealings that led to the appointments of the sitting Supreme Court, and the even more 'inside baseball' of how these nine people vote. If you aren't a regular on the Washington cocktail circuit or a subscriber to SCOTUSblog, this material is presented at a level of granularity with which you may not be familiar. It makes for engaging, if not reassuring, reading....
'American Hate' Profiles Survivors, But Also Brings Hope|NPR Books
"...Read American Hate for the faces Sethi puts on our national hate epidemic, and for his sobering account of the fallout — humiliation, terror, injury, and death. But read American Hate, as well, for what the last chapter terms "Hope in a Time of Despair." Hate may be rampant in America, but so are its antidotes: We must understand and own our history. We must speak out, for in community is power and love."
'How to Write,' Yes--But...|NPR Books
"Two-thirds of the way through Alexander Chee's How to Write an Autobiographical Novel, I abandoned my sharpened reviewer's pencil in favor of luxuriating in the words. Chee's writing has a mesmerizing quality; his sentences are rife with profound truths without lapsing into the didactic....
'Decarcerating America' Is A Powerful Call For Reform|NPR Books
"Criminalization is frequently America's answer to social issues. This country criminalizes people experiencing drug addiction and homelessness, women seeking abortions, people who are LGBTQ, students who skip school, immigrants and refugees, and more....
Addiction is a Family Affair in 'Mayhem'|NPR Books
"Rausing's core message is this: Addiction is a family affair. Her book embraces those surrounding the addict by courageously exposing her own self-doubt and heartache. She wants us to know her — her seemingly idyllic Swedish childhood, two caring parents raising three children...
'Ghost Of The Innocent Man' Chronicles Justice Too Long Delayed|NPR Books
"Innocence cases spotlight the many corruptions of our justice system: Mistakes beget mistakes — some intentional, some not. An epic bureaucracy protects a deeply flawed system. Thousands are wrongfully convicted. The National Registry of Exonerations calculates that over 18,000 years have been lost by innocent people serving time....
Three Family Secrets We Can't Keep | NPR
"My sister and I moved my grandmother to a nursing home when she was 107. Clearing out her apartment, we stumbled on a box of old papers. A crumbling leather portfolio emerged, overflowing with love poems written in her assertive hand. Love poems? ...
Listen below, or at NPR's website, where you can also read Martha's essay.
Listen below, or at NPR's website, where you can also read Martha's essay.