Every year the Georgia Center for the Book and the DeKalb County Public Library in Georgia bring many top authors to the library to speak about and read from their work. This podcast brings you recordings from many of these author talks.
Karin Slaughter
Posted: March 2012Atlanta’s own Karin Slaughter The New York Times’ and #1 international bestselling author of ten thrillers, talked about her latest spellbinding book, Broken. It’s not just the page-turning plotting and unexpected twists that make Karin’s books so popular, but also the vivid portraits of real lives in stress, people shadowed by loss and heartbreak that keep readers by the tens of thousands coming back for more. In Broken, a Grant County novel, Special Agent Will Trent arrives to look into a prisoner’s death and encounters a police department beset with murder. Karin’s bestselling books, which have sold millions of copies here and abroad, include Blindsighted, A Faint Cold Fear and Beyond Reach, which was on an earlier list of “25 Books All Georgians Should Read.”
An audio podcast in MP3 format.Deborah Blum
Posted: February 2012Deborah Blum is the Pulitzer Prize-winning science writer of a new book, The Poisoner’s Handbook: Murder and the Birth of Forensic Medicine in Jazz Age New York. Blum’s true story, which reads like a first-rate novelist’s tale, features a memorable cast of movie stars, gangsters, aristocrats, relentless medical examiners and even homicidal grandmothers. Her chronicle of Jazz Age chemical crimes will leave you breathless and transform the way you think about the power of science. Blum is the author of the bestselling book Ghost Hunters. She is also professor of science journalism at the University of Wisconsin.
An audio podcast in MP3 format.Kevin Young and Natasha Trethewey
Posted: October 2011Kevin Young is one of America’s most acclaimed young poets, and he talked with us about the new volume of poetry that he edited called The Art of Losing: Poems of Grief and Healing. Young is the author of several notable books of poetry including For the Confederate Dead, Jelly Roll, Most Way Home and Black Maria. He was also joined by the poet Natasha Trethewey, who also contributed to the new volume. Trethewey is the author of Domestic Work, Bellocq’s Ophelia, and Native Guard, for which she was awarded the 2007 Pulitzer Prize in Poetry.
An audio podcast in MP3 format.Jayne Anne Phillips
Posted: September 2011Set in West Virginia, Jayne Anne Phillips’ National Book Award-nominated Lark & Termite is her first book in nine years. Set during the 1950s in West Virginia and Korea, it is a story of the power of loss and love, the echoing ramifications of war, family secrets, dreams and ghosts, and the unseen, almost magical bonds that unite and sustain us. Phillips is the award-winning author of Motherkind and Shelter.
An audio podcast in MP3 format.Philip Lee Williams talks with Terry Kay
Posted: June 2011Philip Lee Williams is one of Georgia’s finest authors and winner of the Michael Shaara Award for his Civil War novel A Distant Flame. He returns with an exciting, new Civil War story, The Campfire Boys. Williams is a novelist, poet and essayist whose books include The Heart of a Distant Forest and Crossing Wildcat Ridge, and he also is represented on the Georgia Center for the Book’s list of “25 Books All Georgians Should Read.” This appearance by Mr. Williams was even more special because it was held as an onstage conversation with his friend and fellow author Terry Kay. We’re pleased to present to you the wonderful conversation between Phillip Lee Williams and Terry Kay, recorded on November 2, 2009.
An audio podcast in MP3 format.Wil Haygood Discusses Sugar Ray Robinson
Posted: April 2011Wil Haygood is the author of a riveting new biography, Sweet Thunder: The Life and Times of Sugar Ray Robinson, one of the greatest boxers in history. Haygood’s book is “a biography worthy of a great athlete and an important social force,” vividly detailing the often controversial life in and out of the ring of the legendary Sugar Ray, who was born in rural Georgia. His story weaves in some of the major figures in 20th century American history, including Langston Hughes, Miles Davis and Lena Horne. Haygood previously has written acclaimed biographies of Adam Clayton Powell and Sammy Davis, Jr.
An audio podcast in MP3 format.Wendell Potter
Posted: January 2011In 2009, Wendell Potter made headlines all over the country when he testified before Congress that many in the health insurance business are corrupt and are dedicated to denying benefits to consumers while spending billions on lobbying to protect their interests. Now Potter, former executive with CIGNA, has written a powerful book about his experience, Deadly Spin: An Insurance Company Insider Speaks Out on How Corporate PR is Killing Health Care and Deceiving Americans. It’s a “must” program that explains how health insurers have consistently put profits ahead of patient care. Senator Jay Rockefeller of West Virginia says Potter’s book and the story of his conversion from a health care executive to outspoken advocate of reform “is essential reading for anyone trying to understand how the system really works.” We urge you to join us for this program and discussion.
An audio podcast in MP3 format.R. A. Salvatore
Posted: December 2010The author of more than 40 books, a dozen of them New York Times’ bestsellers, Salvatore has a terrific, exciting new book: The Ghost King: Transitions, Book III, the gripping conclusion to the Transitions trilogy. When the Spellplague ravages Faerun, Drizzt and his companions are caught in the chaos. Seeking help from the priest Cadderly, the hero of the recently reissued series, The Cleric Quintet, Drizzt finds himself facing his most powerful and elusive foe: the twisted Crenshinibon, the demonic crystal shard believed destroyed many years before. Mr. Salvatore visited us on October 19, 2009.
An audio podcast in MP3 format.Robert Olen Butler
Posted: November 2010Robert Olen Butler, the Pulitzer Prize-winning author, visits us to discuss his stunning new novel, Hell. It’s a hilarious romp, all about good, evil and free will and one of the year’s best novels. You’ll meet a television news anchorman now residing in hell and living with Anne Boleyn, surrounded by a remarkable cast of characters including Shakespeare, Humphrey Bogart and most of the popes and former U.S. presidents. It promises to be a fun evening! Butler won the Pulitzer for his book, A Good Scent from a Strange Mountain.
An audio podcast in MP3 format.Carmen Deedy and Thomas Gonzalez
Posted: November 2010Carmen Deedy joins us to showcase her exciting, colorful new book, 14 Cows for America. Wonderfully illustrated by Thomas Gonzalez—who like Deedy is a native Cuban now living near Atlanta—it is an inspiring, delightful story produced in collaboration with Wilson Kimeli Naiyomah. It begins in 2002 in a far-flung village in western Kenya where hundreds of the Masai people have gathered to make a most unusual, heartfelt gift to the American people in the tragic wake of the September 11 attacks.
An audio podcast in MP3 format.Jan Karon
Posted: November 2010One of America’s most popular authors, Jan Karon, joined us to talk about her latest, eagerly anticipated novel, In the Company of Others: A Father Tim Novel. Karon’s novels, marvels of gentle, arresting storytelling, have sold tens of millions of copies, and there are over 30 million in print, making her one of the country’s top bestselling authors. In the latest novel, Father Timothy Kavanagh and Cynthia arrive on the west coast of Ireland to research his ancestry and encounter some very unexpected, surprising activities. Karon’s Mitford novels, set in a small North Carolina town in the foothills of the Blue Ridge mountains, include A Light in the Window, At Home in Mitford, and Out to Canaan. This was one of only seven stops in the author’s fall tour around the country. A new edition of her Mitford Cookbook and Kitchen Reader is being released at the same time.
An audio podcast in MP3 format.Hoda Kotb
Posted: October 2010The popular anchor for NBC’s Today Show, Hoda Kotb, shares her life story in a revealing, fascinating, behind-the-scenes new book, Hoda: How I Survived War Zones, Bad Hair, Cancer, and Kathie Lee. With humor and grace, she shows how we all have the capacity to turn a crisis into a blessing, and the lessons she has learned, from growing up with immigrant Egyptian parents to reporting from dangerous war zones all over the world, from surviving breast cancer to getting along with her Today Show colleagues. Hoda Kotb has been co-anchor of the fourth hour of Today since 2007. She has been a Dateline NBC correspondent since 1998 and hosts the weekly series Your Total Health. She is a winner of the prestigious Peabody Award and a four-time Emmy nominee and also received the 2002 Edward R. Murrow Award for her reporting.
An audio podcast in MP3 format.
Links
Review the full list of podcast channels in our category for English and literature, including contemporary and traditional poems as well as learning the English language.
Whilst all the podcasts listed in this directory are selected in line with our criteria, we do strongly recommend educators that the contents of all podcasts, podcast feeds and channels are regularly auditioned to ensure that they are suitable and appropriate for the age range of the children and young people.
Thursday, 17th May 2012
