The Thread® - Books and Literary News

The Thread® is your source for book recommendations and other literary news.

Ask a Bookseller

Ask a Bookseller is a weekly series where The Thread checks in with booksellers around the country about their favorite books of the moment. Listen to Ask a Bookseller to find your next favorite book.

Big Books and Bold Ideas

Big Books and Bold Ideas is a weekly series hosted by Kerri Miller every Friday at 11 a.m., featuring conversations about books and other literary ideas. Listen to Big Books and Bold Ideas here.

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Sign up for The Thread newsletter to get reading recommendations from Kerri Miller and other bookworms around the MPR newsroom. Find reviews for new releases, as well as hidden gems you may have missed.

Talking Volumes

Talking Volumes is back for its 25th season. Join us at the Fitzgerald Theater for four special events with renowned authors, celebrating our anniversary with a special $25 ticket price for MPR members and Star Tribune subscribers. Buy tickets here.

May 11, 2005 11:20 AM

Re-Imagining the Bosnian War

NPR's Scott Simon recreates the chaos of the Bosnian War in his new novel Pretty Birds, which tells the story of a young Muslim girl who becomes a sniper.

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May 10, 2005 11:20 AM

A spy's fiction

A former CIA covert operative talks about translating the real world of spying into thrillers.

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May 7, 2005 1:00 AM

Writer Anne Lamott reflects on our relationships with our mothers

When writer Anne Lamott became a mother, she captured the joys and messes of motherhood in her best-selling book called "Operating Instructions: A Journal of My Son's First Year." Now Anne Lamott's son is fifteen, and motherhood is still on her mind in a new book of essays called "Plan B: Further Thoughts on Faith." On Mother's Day weekend she talked with Minnesota Public Radio's John Birge.

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May 4, 2005 4:45 PM

Crossing California -- in Chicago

One day, novelist Adam Langer wrote one page of what he thought was going to be a short story. When he returned to that page a week later, he thought it had potential. He decided to write 1,000 words a day until it was finished. Fifteen hundred pages later he had the first draft of his best-selling novel, "Crossing California."

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April 28, 2005 4:00 PM

Of medicine and poetry

April is National Poetry Month, for a little while longer, at least. One of this country's most prominent poets, William Carlos Williams, was also a physician, and his poetry was often influenced by medicine. Poetry and medicine intersect more often than you might think, according to Dr. Jon Hallberg of the University of Minnesota Medical School.

by Tom Crann

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April 18, 2005 4:10 PM

Gary Snyder, eco-poet

Pulitzer Prize-winning poet Gary Snyder's new collection, "Danger on Peaks," is the current selection of the Talking Volumes book club. Snyder talked with MPR's Kerri Miller about his work and his love of nature.

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April 18, 2005 11:20 AM

War from the civilians' perspective

A journalist who has reported from war zones in the Middle East and Europe writes about the experiences of ordinary Iraqis in the months before Saddam Hussein was overthrown.

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April 11, 2005 5:09 PM

Poet Laureate Ted Kooser writes from the heartland

Poet Ted Kooser has had quite a year. Kooser, a retired insurance executive from Nebraska, was named the U.S. Poet Laureate in fall 2004. And just last week, he won the Pulitzer Prize in poetry for his newest collection, "Delights and Shadows." Kooser is in the Twin Cities for a reading at Plymouth Congregational Church in Minneapolis Monday night.

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April 9, 2005 8:08 AM

Bob Dylan at the crossroads

The idea of writing an entire book around a single song would be considered a daunting task by most authors. Greil Marcus just thought it was a bad idea. However, after first refusing the project, Griel began to realize the cultural impact of "Like a Rolling Stone: Bob Dylan at the Crossroads."

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April 5, 2005 1:20 PM

Author says Iranian youth want reform

The Iranian presidential election in June is expected to bring a conservative successor to reformist President Mohammad Khatami, but Iranian-American journalist Azadeh Moaveni says that her generation of young Iranians is hungry for democratic reform. Moaveni is the author of the bestselling "Lipstick Jihad: A Memoir of Growing up Iranian in America and American in Iran."

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