WYPL Book Talk

Stephen Usery interviews novelist Norris Church Mailer about her memoir A Ticket to the Circus, which follows her childhood in small-town Arkansas, life as a high school art teacher, and her more than thirty-year relationship with her husband, the late Norman Mailer.

Stephen Usery interviews Huffington Post blogger and international security expert Keith Thomson about his espionage thriller Once a Spy.

Stephen Usery interviews nationally-syndicated columnist and author Rheta Grimsley Johnson about her new memoir Enchanted Evening Barbie and the Second Coming. Also, she will be appearing at the Benjamin L. Hooks Central Library on Mother's Day, May 9th, 2010 at 2:00 p.m. For more information call LINC at 415-2700.

Stephen Usery interviews Brad Watson about his new short story collection Aliens in the Prime of Their Lives. Mississippi-native Watson has won the Sue Kaufmann Prize and was a finalist for the National Book Award. Download the podcast today.

Stephen Usery interviews Linda Fairstein about her latest Alexandra Cooper novel Hell Gate. Manhattan prosecutor Cooper and her homicide detective partner Mike Chapman investigate the deaths surrounding a human trafficking shipment of Ukrainians and a political scandal that has turned deadly which echoes a crime committed in America's earliest days.

 

Stephen Usery interviews Molly Caldwell Crosby about her book Asleep: The Forgotten Epidemic That Remains One of Medicine's Greatest Mysteries.

 

Stephen Usery interviews the editor of Military Heritage magazine, Roy Morris, Jr. about his last look at nineteenth century America with Lighting Out for the Territory: How Samuel Clemens Headed West and Became Mark Twain.

Stephen Usery interviews PEN/Malamud-winner Richard Bausch about his latest collection of short stories, Something Is Out There.

Stephen Usery interviews best-selling author Elizabeth Kostova about her new novel, The Swan Thieves. It follows psychiatrist Andrew Marlow as he tries to discover why painter Robert Oliver tried to attack a painting in the National Gallery of Art in Washington, DC.

Stephen Usery interviews Amy Greene about her New York Times best-selling debut novel Bloodroot, which follows four generations of women in the Smoky Mountains of east Tennessee.

Stephen Usery interviews Rhodes College professor Jeffrey Jackson about his latest look into French history with Paris Underwater: How the City of Light Survived the Great Flood of 1910. It's an intriguing look on how many with very real political and economic differences came together and endured one of the River Seine's worst floods ever.

Stephen speaks to best selling author Kimberla Lawson Roby about the second book to follow Alicia Black, the daughter of Reverend Curtis Black, in Be Careful What You Pray For.

Stephen Usery interviews Kami Garcia and Margaret Stohl about their supernatural young adult novel Beautiful Creatures, which Amazon named the fifth best book of 2009.

 

Stephen Usery interviews Rebecca Skloot about her book, The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks. It's a fascinating look into HeLa cells which were the most important advance in medical research for the twentieth century, but more than that we meet Henrietta Lacks the woman who provided the cells and the grief her loss caused her family, and it looks at the socio-economic impact the HeLa cells have had on our country and world. This is an intriguing 72 minute audio interview with Rebecca.

With vampires ubiquitous in the popular culture, Dracula has returned to claim his throne. Stephen Usery interviews Dacre Stoker, the great-grand nephew of Dracula creator Bram Stoker, about the first family-approved sequel to the original, with Dracula the Un-Dead. Set a couple of decades after dispatching the Count, the intervening years haven't been kind to our band of heroes as a new threat invades London. Download the podcast today!

2010 marks the 75th anniversary of Elvis Presley's birth, so Stephen Usery interviews Alanna Nash about her new look at the king of rock'n'roll, Baby Let's Play House: Elvis Presley and the Women Who Loved Him. More than just a look at Elvis's love life, it investigates all his relationships with women, romantic, familial, platonic, artistic and business. Over one hour of talking about The King, download it today!

Stephen Usery interviews Pulitzer Prize winner Stephen Hunter. Though retired from the world of film criticism, Hunter has kept going with his successful line of Bob Lee Swagger novels. His just released I, Sniper follows Bob the Nailer as he tries to figure out who is assassinating anti-Viet Nam war activists more than thirty years after the end of the war. Load up the podcast today.

Stephen Usery talks to Todd Wilbur about his latest interpretation of brand name foods in Top Secret Recipes Unlocked.

Stephen Usery interviews Tennessee native Madison Smartt Bell about his first novel in five years, Devil's Dream. Devil's Dream is fevered telling of twenty years in the life of Confederate General Nathan Bedford Forrest. We also talk about the appropriateness of Confederate memorials and his return to writing fiction.