According to self-described "space dork" Andy Weir, he was just sitting around at home one day imagining a manned Mars mission — not with any goal in mind, but just as a thought experiment. Soon, he realized this would be a pretty good premise for a story. And boy was he right. His novel "The Martian" started as a series of blog posts and has become a blockbuster motion picture. In this interview, he reads excerpts from the novel and discusses the balance between pure fantasty and scientific accuracy in science fiction.
Intelligent. Optimistic. Curious.
Audio
There may be as many opinions about selfies as there are Twitter handles. Are they self-empowerment, or narcissism? Are they just personal branding? Or can they be art? Writer and critic Sarah Nicole Prickett came in to give us a primer.
Steven Biel talks about Grant Woods' iconic American painting: who the models were; how the painting's been received and why it's so often parodied.
William Gibson talks about his first collection of nonfiction, "Distrust That Particular Flavor."
TTBOOK producer Charles Monroe-Kane is a great storyteller who's led an adventurous life. Here's a wild story from his memoir "Lithium Jesus" about smuggling mob money when he lived in Prague in the '90s.
Sjon is the Icelandic trickster, drawing on Icelandic sagas and surrealism to write his mythic stories. He tells Steve Paulson why we need to re-enchant the world.
Novelist Russell Banks tells Judith Strasser that the great American story is that of the African diaspora and the struggle of many races and cultures to live harmoniously together.
It's not just the movies that offer sequels. Susan Heyboer O'Keefe's new novel is called "Frankenstein's Monster"...
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