Monthly Archives: March 2016

Podcast

Ellen Meeropol: On Hurricane Island & Cecelia Tichi: Jack London

Ellen Meeropol talks about her new novel, On Hurricane Island. It’s about what happens when an innocent American citizen is abducted to a domestic black site and tortured. Meeropol also discusses how being married to one of the sons of Julius and Ethel Rosenberg has influenced her writing.

Then, a look back at one of the greatest writers and critics of America’s first Gilded Age and his relevance for today, Jack London: Cecelia Tichi talks about her biography of the great writer and democratic socialist, Jack London: A Writer’s Fight For a Better America.
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Podcast

Katy Simpson Smith, Mary Costello & Poet Amy Dryansky

Katy Simpson Smith talks about her new novel, Free Men. Then in the second half of the show, we replay our 2014 interview with Smith about her acclaimed first novel, Story of Land And Sea. Also, we review Academy Street by Mary Costello and hear two poems by Amy Dryansky. Continue reading

Podcast

Cicero’s End, Dust Up over Sanders’ Plan, & Remembering Quentin Young

We talk with novelist Robert Harris about the last book in his trilogy about the Roman statesman Cicero, Dictator. Then, economist James Galbraith tells us why he disagrees with the attacks on Gerald Friedman’s analysis of Senator Bernie Sanders’ economic plan. And finally, we pay tribute to Dr.Quentin Young, who passed away this week, with a clip from an interview Francesca did with him in 2009. Continue reading

Podcast

Lauret Savoy, TRACE: Memory, History, Race, and the American Landscape

We talk with environmental earth scientist and writer Lauret Savoy about her stunning new book, Trace: Memory History, Race & The American Landscape. In it, Savoy examines how the country’s still unfolding history, and ideas of “race,” have marked her and the land — and what that history says about our relationships to each other and the places we inhabit. Continue reading