This week we interview veteran independent writer, historian, and journalist, Fergus M. Bordewich. His latest book, Klan War: Ulysses S. Grant and the Battle to Save Reconstruction, was published in October 2023 by Knopf. Bordewich has written eight previous nonfiction books, including the award-winning The First Congress: How James Madison, George Washington, and a Group of Extraordinary Men Invented the Government, and America’s Great Debate: Henry Clay, Stephen A. Douglas, and the Compromise that … Read More »

This week we interview Katie Gee Salisbury, author of Not Your China Doll: The Wild and Shimmering Life of Anna May Wong, a new biography of the first Asian American movie star. This biography was published by Dutton in March 2024. Gee Salisbury’s work has appeared in the New York Times, Vanity Fair, The Believer, the Asian American Writers’ Workshop, and elsewhere. She was a finalist for the Jerome Hill Artist Fellowship… Read More »

This week we interview award-winning journalist and author Kenneth Miller about his first biography, Mapping the Darkness: The Visionary Scientists Who Unlocked the Mysteries of Sleep. It was published in October 2023 by Hachette Books. Miller is a contributing editor for Discover, and his work has appeared in Time, Life, Esquire, Rolling Stone, Mother Jones, Aeon, and many other publications. Miller’s honors include the John Bartlow Martin Award for Public Interest Magazine… Read More »

This week we interview Jessica (Max) Stein, author of Funny Boy: The Richard Hunt Biography. This first-time biography of a highly regarded Muppet/Sesame Street performer was published in March 2024 by Rutgers University Press. Stein is New York-based writer who teaches writing and literature at the City University of New York. Biographers International Organization honored Stein’s Funny Boy book proposal as one of three finalists for its 2016 Hazel Rowley Prize. Stein’s writing has… Read More »

This week film historian Matthew Kennedy talks about his latest book, On Elizabeth Taylor: An Opinionated Guide, published by Oxford University Press in May 2024. Kennedy also authored Roadshow! The Fall of Film Musicals in the 1960s, and he has written biographies of actresses Marie Dressler and Joan Blondell, and of director/screenwriter Edmund Goulding. Kennedy has introduced film series at the Museum of Modern Art, UCLA Film & Television Archive, and Pacific Film Archive,… Read More »

This week we interview City University of New York (CUNY) professor and author Rachel Kousser. Her latest book, Alexander at the End of the World: The Forgotten Final Years of Alexander the Great, was published in July 2024 by Mariner Books. Kousser heads the Classics Department in CUNY’s Graduate Center and serves as a professor of ancient art and archaeology at Brooklyn College. One of her previous books, The Afterlives of Greek Sculpture: Interaction, Transformation, … Read More »

This time we interview author Will Hermes, whose latest book, Lou Reed: The King of New York, was published by Farrar, Straus and Giroux in October 2023. Hermes is a contributing editor at Rolling Stone and a longtime contributor to NPR’s All Things Considered and The New York Times. He also is the author of Love Goes to Buildings on Fire, he writes for Pitchfork and other publications, and he co-edited SPIN: 20 … Read More »

This week we interview Amrita Chakrabarti Myers, an award-winning author and the Ruth N. Halls Associate Professor of history and gender studies at Indiana University in Bloomington. Her latest book, The Vice President’s Black Wife: The Untold Life of Julia Chinn, was published by the University of North Carolina Press in October 2023. Myers also is the author of Forging Freedom: Black Women and the Pursuit of Liberty in Antebellum Charleston. Amrita Chakrabarti… Read More »

This week we interview poet, novelist, and biographer Brad Gooch. His latest book, Radiant: The Life and Line of Keith Haring, was published by Harper/HarperCollins in March 2024. Gooch’s previous ten books include Flannery: A Life of Flannery O’Connor—a National Book Critics Circle Award finalist, a New York Times Notable Book of the Year, and a New York Times bestseller—and City Poet: The Life and Times of Frank O’Hara. Brad Gooch is the recipient… Read More »

This week we interview Marsha Gordon, author, professor, and director of Film Studies at North Carolina State University. Gordon’s latest book, Becoming the Ex-Wife: The Unconventional Life & Forgotten Writings of Ursula Parrott, was published by the University of California Press in April 2023. Gordon is a former National Humanities Center Fellow and an NEH Public Scholar. Her other books include Film is Like a Battleground: Sam Fuller’s War Movies, and Hollywood Ambitions: … Read More »