Welcome! Here’s where you’ll find fascinating discussions with biographers from around the country and the world.
If you are a member of BIO and would like to talk about your recently released biography, please contact Sonja Williams here.
Podcast #234 – Todd S. Purdum
Desi Arnaz: The Man Who Invented Television, published by Simon and Schuster in June 2025, is the latest book by this veteran journalist and author. Purdum also authored Something Wonderful: Rodgers and Hammerstein’s Broadway Revolution and An Idea Whose Time Has Come: Two Presidents, Two Parties, and the Battle for the Civil Rights Act of 1964. In a career spanning more than forty years, Purdum has written extensively about politics and culture, beginning at … Read More »
Podcast #233 – Dana A. Williams
Toni at Random: The Iconic Writer’s Legendary Editorship, the latest book by author Dana A. Williams about Toni Morrison’s significant tenure as an editor at Random House, was published by Amistad in June 2025. Williams is Professor of African American literature and Dean of the Graduate School at Howard University. She also authored In the Light of Likeness—Transformed: The Literary Art of Leon Forrest. Williams has edited several books, and her writing has been published… Read More »
Share this Podcast
Podcast #232 – James M. Bradley
Martin Van Buren: America’s First Politician is James M. Bradley’s current book. It was published in December 2024 by Oxford University Press. Bradley co-edits the Martin Van Buren Papers, based at Cumberland University in Lebanon, Tennessee, and he serves as an adjunct instructor in the public history program at the State University of New York at Albany. Bradley also served as the senior project editor of the Encyclopedia of New York City, published by Yale… Read More »
Share this Podcast
Podcast #231 – Lindsay M. Chervinsky
This historian and author’s latest book, Making the Presidency: John Adams and the Precedents That Forged the Republic, was published by Oxford University Press in September 2024. Her other books include the award-winning The Cabinet: George Washington and the Creation of an American Institution, and the co-edited Mourning the Presidents: Loss and Legacy in American Culture. Chervinsky currently serves as Executive Director of the George Washington Presidential Library, and she was a historian at… Read More »
Share this Podcast
Podcast #230 – Marcus J. Moore
High and Rising: A Book About De La Soul, published by Dey Street Books in November 2024, is the latest offering by this critically acclaimed author and university professor. Moore’s work explores the intersections of music, race, and culture, and he is the author of The Butterfly Effect: How Kendrick Lamar Ignited the Soul of Black America. Moore has written for The New York Times, The Atlantic, NPR, and Rolling Stone, and has… Read More »
Share this Podcast
Podcast #229 – Dan Nadel
This author’s latest book, Crumb: A Cartoonist’s Life, examines the life of Robert Crumb, one of the most celebrated artists of the 20th century. Scribner published Crumb in April 2025, and its author is the Steven and Ann Ames Curator of Drawings and Prints at The Whitney Museum of American Art. Nadel’s previous books include It’s Life as I See It: Black Cartoonists in Chicago, 1940–1980; Peter Saul: Professional Artist Correspondence, 1945–1976,… Read More »
Share this Podcast
Podcast #228 – Alison Owings
Mayor of the Tenderloin: Del Seymour’s Journey from Living on the Streets to Fighting Homelessness, is this former broadcast journalist and author’s latest book. It was published by Beacon Press in September 2025, and her previous books include Frauen: German Women Recall the Third Reich – a New York Times “Notable Book of the Year” and a New York Times Book Review Editors’ Choice; Hey, Waitress! The USA from the Other Side of the Tray, … Read More »
Share this Podcast
Podcast #227 – Alec Nevala-Lee
This author’s latest book, Collisions: A Physicist’s Journey From Hiroshima to the Death of the Dinosaurs, was published by W. W. Norton & Company in June 2025. It explores the life and times of Nobel Prize-winning physicist, Luis W. Alvarez. Nevala-Lee also authored Inventor of the Future: The Visionary Life of Buckminster Fuller, listed by Esquire as one of the fifty best biographies of all time, and the Hugo Award finalist, Astounding: John … Read More »
Share this Podcast
Podcast #226 – Mimi Pond
Do Admit: The Mitford Sisters and Me is the award-winning cartoonist, illustrator, and author Mimi Pond’s latest book. Published by Drawn & Quarterly this month, Do Admit is Ponds’ graphic biography of the six famous Mitford sisters of England. Pond’s earlier graphic novel, Over Easy, a fictionalized account of her 1970s waitressing career, was on the New York Times bestseller list and won a PEN Center Award for Graphic Literature, Outstanding Body of Work.… Read More »
Share this Podcast
Podcast #225 – Nicholas Boggs
Baldwin: A Love Story, published by Farrar, Straus and Giroux in August 2025, is author Boggs’s examination of writer James Baldwin — the first major biography of this influential, controversial, and compelling author in three decades. Boggs also rediscovered and co-edited the out-of-print children’s book, Little Man, Little Man: A Story of Childhood, Baldwin’s collaboration with French artist Yoran Cazac. Boggs is the recipient of several writing grants, residencies (Yaddo and MacDowell), and fellowships, including… Read More »
Share this Podcast
Share this Podcast