Podcasts

Your Favorite Authors

Download or listen to over 900 podcasts, recorded at various author events and lectures that take place at the Central Library.

Viewing 1 - 10 of 1071   Prev  |  Next    

• 

  Joseph Ellis | Revolutionary Summer: The Birth of American Independence

  Recorded: 6/17/2013

  Award-winning author Joseph J. Ellis’s shrewd analysis and lyric prose have made him one of the premier historians of early American history. Winner of the Pulitzer Prize for Founding Brothers and the National Book Award for American Sphinx, Ellis provides fresh insight into familiar subjects, from the life of Thomas Jefferson to the signing of the Declaration of Independence. Ellis received the Daughters of the American Revolution Award for The Passionate Sage, a biography of John Adams in which he brought to life the personality and achievements of America’s second president.  His other critically acclaimed books include His Excellency George Washington, American Creation, and First Family. In Revolutionary Summer, Ellis focuses on the political and military events of the dramatic summer of 1776. 

• 

  Jill McCorkle | Life After Life with Jami Attenberg | The Middlesteins

  Recorded: 6/13/2013

  Jill McCorkle’s eight books include the New York Times Notable Books The Cheer Leader, July 7th, Tending to Virginia, Ferris Beach, and Carolina Moon, as well as four short story collections. Her work has appeared in numerous publications, including The Atlantic, Ploughshares, New Stories from the South, and Best American Short Stories 2002, 2004, and 2009. A member of the Fellowship of Southern Writers, she teaches writing at North Carolina State University and is the recipient of the New England Book Award, the Dos Passos Prize for Excellence in Literature, and the North Carolina Award for Literature. Her new novel Life After Life charts the daily triumphs and challenges of the residents and staff of a North Carolina retirement facility.  “With a wit that never mocks and a tenderness that never gushes” (Washington Post), Jami Attenberg’s novel The Middlesteins, a Los Angeles Times Book Prize finalist, follows a quirky Midwestern family as it unravels under the weight of a mother’s lifelong food obsession. Attenberg’s other novels include The Kept Man, a story with an “admirable sense of fun” (San Francisco Chronicle) about a passive woman freed from inertia, and the “singular and disquieting” (Chicago Tribune)The Melting Season, as well as her debut story collection Instant Love: Fiction. She has written about topics such as sex, technology, design, books, television, and urban life for a number of publications, including Salon, Details, the New York Times, The Awl, and The Rumpus. A blogger since 1998, she was also a web producer for the HBO television shows The Sopranos and Six Feet Under.

• 

  Gene Robinson | God Believes in Love: Straight Talk About Gay Marriage

  Recorded: 6/12/2013

  The first openly gay bishop in the Episcopal Church, Gene Robinson served as the ninth Bishop of the Diocese of New Hampshire and is the world’s leading religious spokesperson for gay marriage. He is a senior fellow at the Center for American Progress in Washington, D.C., where he works to develop policy about faith and LGBT issues, and a longtime advocate for antiracism training in the diocese and wider church. He is the co-author of three AIDS education curricula for youth and adults, as well as the book In the Eye of the Storm: Swept to the Center by God. Knitting theology with secular arguments, his new book makes a clear case for the necessity of same-sex marriage.

• 

  Rick Atkinson | The Guns at Last Light: The War in Western Europe, 1944-1945

  Recorded: 6/11/2013

  Pulitzer Prize-winning writer and military historian Rick Atkinson is the bestselling author of An Army at Dawn, The Day of Battle, The Long Gray Line, In the Company of Soldiers, and Crusade. He served as a reporter, foreign correspondent, and senior editor for 25 years at the Washington Post. His many awards include the George Polk award, the Gerald R. Ford Award for Distinguished Reporting on National Defense, and the Pritzker Military Library Literature Award for Lifetime Achievement in Military Writing. The Guns at Last Light: The War in Europe, 1944-1945 is the final volume in Atkinson’s Liberation Trilogy, a sweeping narrative history of the U.S. military’s role in the liberation of Europe in World War II. 

• 

  Gordon Campbell | The Hermit in the Garden: From Imperial Rome to Ornamental Gnome

  Recorded: 6/6/2013

  Distinguished historian Gordon Campbell is the author of numerous books on literature, art, history, and biography, including the bestseller Bible: The Story of the King James Bible. Professor of Renaissance Studies at the University of Leicester, he is a fellow of the British Academy and a former chair of the Society for Renaissance Studies. In 2012 he was awarded the Longman-History Today Trustees Award for a lifetime contribution to History. In The Hermit in the Garden, his interests in cultural history, architectural history, and designed landscapes converge in a study of the 18th-century craze for ornamental hermits in the grand gardens of Georgian England. Campbell traces the story of garden hermits from their distant ancestors in imperial Rome to their humble descendant, the garden gnome.

• 

  Jessica Wapner | The Philadelphia Chromosome: A Mutant Gene and the Quest to Cure Cancer at the Genetic Level

  Recorded: 6/4/2013

  In The Philadelphia Chromosome, science journalist Jessica Wapner reconstructs the crucial breakthroughs in discovering the links between cancers and their genetic causes. The story unfolds over 50 years, from the first glimpse of a genetic mutation—dubbed the Philadelphia chromosome—in 1959 to determining its role in causing chronic myeloid leukemia and the development of a revolutionary drug that made this once-fatal cancer treatable with a single daily pill. Wapner’s articles about healthcare and medicine appear in the New York Times, Scientific American, Slate, Science, and Psychology Today. Her writing on cancer research and treatment also appears in Oncology Business Review, Cure, and CR, and her blog, Work in Progress, focuses on the ethics and economics of drug development. 

• 

  Walter Mosley | Little Green: An Easy Rawlins Mystery

  Recorded: 6/3/2013

  (This podcast contains explicit content.) Walter Mosley is the bestselling author of more than 41 books, including Little Scarlet, Fear Itself, and Bad Boy Brawly Brown. His many honors include an O. Henry Award, the Anisfield-Wolf Book Award, a Grammy award, and the PEN American Center’s Lifetime Achievement Award. Mosley burst on the literary scene in 1990 with Devil in a Blue Dress, the first Easy Rawlins mystery featuring a hard-boiled detective and World War II veteran living in the Watts neighborhood of Los Angeles. The book was later adapted for a film starring Denzel Washington. In Little Green, Mosley’s immortal private eye reappears on the 1960s Sunset Strip in search of a young man who has gone missing.  

• 

  Jonathan Goldstein | I’ll Seize the Day Tomorrow

  Recorded: 5/30/2013

  As host of CBC’s radio show WireTap, Jonathan Goldstein “brings self-deprecation to a whole other level” (The Montreal Gazette). Part monologue and part telephone conversation, the show reveals “the warp of Goldstein’s imagination” (Toronto Star). Celebrated author David Sedaris calls him “one of the funniest and most original writers I can think of.” Goldstein’s writing has appeared in The Walrus, the New York Times, and GQ. He is a frequent contributor to This American Life and the author of the novels Ladies and Gentlemen, The Bible! and Lenny Bruce Is Dead. His new book, I’ll Seize the Day Tomorrow begins the week of Goldstein’s 39th birthday. As he approaches the big 4-0, he humorously contemplates what it means to be an adult in an infantilized world. 

• 

  Alice Walker | The Cushion in the Road: Meditation and Wandering as the Whole World Awakens to Being in Harm's Way

  Recorded: 5/29/2013

  Alice Walker’s esteemed literary career spans over four decades and includes seven novels, four collections of short stories, four children’s books, and volumes of essays and poetry. Her 1983 novel The Color Purple received the Pulitzer Prize and the National Book Award, and was adapted for Steven Spielberg’s 1985 film and the Broadway stage. Her many honors include a Guggenheim Fellowship, the Lennon/Ono Peace Grant, and a residency at Yaddo. In 2006, she was an inaugural inductee into the California Hall of Fame, and in 2007 her archives were opened at Emory University. Her new book The Cushion in the Road is a collection of meditations on topics ranging from racism to Africa to healthcare and the work of Aung San Suu Kyi. Ms. Walker will also read from her new book of poems The World Will Follow Joy: Turning Madness into Flowers.

• 

  Mark Tercek | Nature's Fortune: How Business and Society Thrive by Investing in Nature

  Recorded: 5/22/2013

  Mark Tercek is president and CEO of The Nature Conservancy, the global conservation organization. A former managing director for Goldman Sachs, where he spent 25 years, he champions natural capital. Tercek was appointed by New York Governor Andrew Cuomo to serve on the 2100 Commission, created in the wake of Hurricane Sandy to improve the state’s infrastructure for future storms. He serves on the boards of Resources for the Future, the Nicholas Institute for Environmental Policy Solutions, and the Commission on Climate and Tropical Forests, and is a member of the Council on Foreign Relations. In Nature's Fortune: How Business and Society Thrive by Investing in Nature, he explores why nature is the foundation of human well-being and of utmost importance for economic progress. 

Viewing 1 - 10 of 1071   Prev  |  Next