How's this for a novel premise? Owen Lerner is a pediatric psychiatrist. One day, he's struck by lightning. He survives but he has a new obsession -- with barbecue. That's the premise behind Mary Kay Zuravleff's novel, "Man Alive!" She talks about its inspiration and the book's themes.
Intelligent. Optimistic. Curious.
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About a year ago, independent producer Karen Michel moved from Brooklyn to Pleasant Valley, New York, near the Hudson River. She prepared this piece as a way of getting to know her new neighbors
Architect Lisa Mahar is the author of “American Signs: Form and Meaning on Route 66.” She says that the signs started out plain, but became grandiose neon monuments by the 1950s.
Mark Barrowcliffe wasted his youth playing Dungeons and Dragons. Now he's turned his obsession into a book.
Alex Abramovich recommends "Blues People: Negro Music in White America" by Leroi Jones, who later changed his name to Amiri Baraka.
Mukoma Wa Ngugi is a poet and English professor who writes crime novels set in his native Kenya. He says the crime genre lets him write truthfully about race, class and violence in cities like Nairobi.
Luke Rhinehart published a novel in the 70s that became a cult classic. “The Dice Man” involves a psychiatrist who opens his life to new possibilities by basing his actions on a throw of the diced
Historian Michael Oren talks with Steve Paulson about how the Barbary Pirates brought the Marines to the shores of Tripoli and why they went into the Middle East six times during the 19th century.
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