Thursday, December 30, 2010
Great House/Nicole Krauss
Thematically interlinked stories and characters tell the tale of legacy, memory and loss in a well-reviewed novel.
Interviewer: Richard Wolinsky
Thursday, December 23, 2010
The Children's Book/A.S. Byatt
A sprawling and diverting novel encompassing thirty years and several major characters in Edwardian England, focusing on the middle class world of an entire generation that refused to grow up.
Interviewer: Richard Wolinsky
Monday, December 20, 2010
Parrot & Olivier in America/Peter Carey. Rebroadcast
By Nightfall/Michael Cunningham
A pitch-perfect gorgeously written short novel about a married art dealer who begins to question his life and his sexuality. Highly recommended.
Interviewer: Richard Wolinsky
Monday, December 13, 2010
Country Driving/Peter Hessler
Interviewer: Richard Wolinsky
Rebroadcast
Friday, December 10, 2010
Open Book: Robert Kelley, artistic director of Theatreworks Silicon Valley; director, A Christmas Memory
Interviewer: Richard Wolinsky
Thursday, December 9, 2010
I Remember Nothing/Nora Ephron
A short collection of essays that are perfect in length, often profound and more often very very funny, by the director of Sleepless In Seattle and Julie & Julia.
Interviewer: Richard Wolinsky
Monday, December 6, 2010
A Visit from the Goon Squad /Jennifer Egan
Listed by the New York Times as one of the ten notable books published in 2010.
Interviewer: Richard Wolinsky
Rebroadcast.
December 2, 2010
Finishing The Hat/Stephen Sondheim
I Remember Nothing/Nora Ephron
Interviewer: Richard Wolinsky.
Monday, November 29, 2010
Lit/Mary Karr
Interviewer: Richard Wolinsky.
Rebroadcast.
November 25, 2010
The Hilliker Curse/James Ellroy
A memoir about the crime novelist's private life, told in a hard-boiled style. An interesting exercise but not in the same league with his L.A. Quartet or the non-fiction My Dark Places.
Interviewer: Richard Wolinsky
Monday, November 22, 2010
Cutting for Stone/Abraham Verghese.
Interviewer: Richard Wolinsky
Rebroadcast
November 18, 2010
My Hollywood/Mona Simpson
A young couple comes to Hollywood and employs a Filipina nanny, told from the points of view of the wife and the nanny.
Interviewer: Richard Wolinsky
Friday, November 12, 2010
Open Book: Interview with Mark Rucker, Associate Artistic Director of American Conservatory Theatre, San Francisco (A.C.T.) and director of Marcus, or the Secret of Sweet.
Interviewer: Richard Wolinsky
November 11, 2010
Finishing The Hat/Stephen Sondheim
A collection of the great composer/lyricist's song lyrics, 1954-1981, but so much more: annotations, footnotes, prefaces, essays on the great lyricists of the past; even some cranky rants. A master class on the musical for some; a visit with the greatest composer/lyricist of his time for others. Stunning.
Special thanks to James Allen Brewer; technical assistance courtesy William Toner. Recorded at the Four Seasons, San Francisco.
Interviewer: Richard Wolinsky
November 4, 2010
Eating Animals/Jonathan Safran Foer
A compelling polemic on factory farming and in its own way a game changer. You'll never be able to buy cheap meat again.
Interviewer: Richard Wolinsky (rebroadcast Nov. 8, 2010)
Monday, November 1, 2010
"C"/Tom McCarthy
Experimental author McCarthy writes a Joycean historical novel about the birth of radio that functions both as straightforward fiction and as a multi-leveled experience. What seems to be missing is heart, what McCarthy would call "sentimentalism." Still, a very superior read.
Interviewer: Richard Wolinsky
October 28, 2010
When Everything Changed/Gail Collins
Part Two.
Monday, October 25, 2010
Interview with Indhu Rubasingham, co-director of "The Great Game: Afghanistan" playing at Berkeley Rep.
Interviewer: Richard Wolinsky
October 21, 2010
When Everything Changed/Gail Collins
A remarkable and very readable overview of the American women's movement and the changing role of women from 1960 to the present, by the noted twice-weekly New York Times Op-Ed columnist. Now out in trade paperback. First of two parts.
Interviewer: Richard Wolinsky
October 14, 2010
zero history/William Gibson
The third volume in Gibson's latest triptych of related novels in which he comments on life and technology today using the tropes of science fiction.
Interviewer: Richard Wolinsky
October 7, 2010
Best of Bookwaves Vols. 1 & 2.. Fund-raising one-hour special featuring excerpts from interviews with Gore Vidal, E.L. Doctorow, Janis Ian and Amy Goodman.
Host: Richard Wolinsky
September 30, 2010
Best of Bookwaves Volume 2. Fund-raising one-hour special featuring excerpts from interviews with Janis Ian, Don DeLillo, Amy Goodman, Paul Krugman and Annie Liebovitz
Host: Richard Wolinsky
September 23, 2010
Best of Bookwaves. Fund-raising one-hour special featuring excerpts from interviews with Zadie Smith, Gore Vidal, Umberto Eco and Susan Sontag.
Host: Richard Wolinsky
September 16, 2010
Packing for Mars/Mary Roach
Spook/Mary Roach
A popular science writer, Mary Roach takes a subject that interests her and turns it inside out in a way that's always entertaining and informative at the same time. Packing for Mars is about weightlessness, life in a space suit, and how people would live on a mojnths-long journey in space. Spook looks at life after death from a scientific viewpoint, and how science has been trying to discover if indeed there is a soul. There's a tendency for sexual and potty humor in her work, so be prepared.
Interviewer: Richard Wolinsky.
September 9, 2010
Super Sad True Love Story/Gary Shteyngart
A love story set against the backdrop of a future America projected outward from today's trends, and an uneasy mix of satire and pathos from one of America's top authors under forty.
Interviewer: Richard Wolinsky
September 2, 2010
Pre-empted
August 26, 2010
The Thousand Autumns of Jacob de Zoet/David Mitchell
The author of Cloud Atlas returns with this historical novel about Dutch traders in Japan at the cusp of the 19th Century. Complex and fascinating. Short-listed for the Booker Prize.
Interviewer: Richard Wolinsky
August 20, 2010
Open Book: Noir and Film Noir
Eddie Muller, noted programmer of film noir festivals, and author of books on noir including The Art of Noir, examines the nature of noir. The extended edit includes a discussion about his career as a writer and novelist.
Interviewer: Richard Wolinsky
August 19, 2010
The Lunatic, The Lover and the Poet/Myrlin A. Hermes
Horatio falls in love with Hamlet in this mash-up of Shakespeare's plays and sonnets.
Interviewer: Richard Wolinsky
August 12, 2010
The Passage/Justin Cronin
Reminiscent of Stephen King's The Stand, this new novel brings together zombies, vampires, political commentary and post-apocalyptic angst in a fast-paced tale of a future world ruined by a military experiment gone awry. The must-read book of Summer, 2010 and first of a projected trilogy.
Interviewer: Richard Wolinsky
August 5, 2010
Inside Out/Barry Eisler
Fault Line/Barry Eisler
Spy novelist and progressive activist Barry Eisler discusses his latest thrillers, Inside Out and Fault Line, two fast-paced novels based on the true story of missing CIA torture tapes. Eisler's fast-paced page turners serve as a welcome antidote to the work of people like Brad Thor and Tom Clancy.
Host: Richard Wolinsky
Tuesday, August 3, 2010
More Best of Bookwaves. Fund-raising one-hour special featuring excerpts from interviews with Susan Sontag, John Updike, David Grann and Gore Vidal.
Host: Richard Wolinsky
July 29, 2010
Best of Bookwaves. Fund-raising one-hour special featuring excerpts from interviews with Zadie Smith, E.L. Doctorow, Margaret Atwood and Gore Vidal.
Host: Richard Wolinsky
July 22, 2010
A Visit from the Goon Squad/Jennifer Egan
Using different point of views and different genres of writing, Egan creates a fascinating mosaic about life in the present, the recent past and the near future, exploring ideas about the nature of aging, music, and tranformation, set against the backdrop of the punk rock era and the music business.
Interviewer: Richard Wolinsky
July 15, 2010
The Spies of Warsaw/Alan Furst
Spies of the Balkans/Alan Furst
Two outstanding literary thrillers set before and during the early days of World War II, the first in Poland and the second in Greece, with sidetrips to Paris and Germany. Atmospheric and character-driven, these novels deserve to be savored rather than gobbled down.
Interviewer: Richard Wolinsky
July 8, 2010
Private Life/Jane Smiley
13 Ways of Looking at the Novel/Jane Smiley
Pulitzer Prize winner Jane Smiley's latest novel spans over fifty years, from the 1880s to World War II in the story of a woman limited by her circumstances and the belief systems of her society, who eventually comes into her own. Smiley's earlier book details her ideas about the nature of the novel, both from the perspective of the writer and the reader.
Interviewer: Richard Wolinsky
July 1, 2010
Imperial Bedrooms/Bret Easton Ellis
Ellis returns to his roots with a novel featuring characters from Less Than Zero as they live in Hollywood today. Spare and terse, Ellis's homage to Chandler.
Interviewer: Richard Wolinsky
June 25, 2010
Open Book: Sam Harris, actor/performer
Interviewer: Richard Wolinsky
June 24, 2010
The Eastern Stars/Mark Kurlansky
The story of San Pedro de Macoris in the Dominican Republic, and how so many professional baseball players came from that one town. A fascinating subject. The appendix is filled with errors.
Interviewer: Richard Wolinsky
June 17, 2010
I'll Mature When I'm Dead/Dave Barry
Dave Barry is a very funny writer, and this is a very funny collection of essays.
Interviewer: Richard Wolinsky
June 10, 2010
Parrot & Olivier in America/Peter Carey
A wonderfully funny historical novel based on the life of Alexis de Tocqueville, the French aristocrat who came to the United States in the 1920s and wrote Democracy in America.
Interviewer: Richard Wolinsky.
June 3, 2010
Every Last One/Anna Quindlen
Former New York Times and Newsweek columnist Quindlen has written a novel that hinges on a game-changing event exactly half-way through. The set-up to the game-change can be a struggle, but in the end, it's worth it.
Interviewer: Richard Wolinsky
May 27, 2010
Pre-empted
May 20, 2010
Panel Discussion on the Independent Bookstore & Publishing
Guests: Clark Kepler, Bill Petrocelli, Andy Ross, Leslie Berkler
Host: Richard Wolinsky
Monday, May 16, 2010
A Ticket to the Circus/Norris Church Mailer
The last of Norman Mailer's six wives tells her story in this fascinating memoir. Ms. Mailer is an excellent writer in her own right.
Interviewer: Richard Wolinsky
May 13, 2010
David Grann, Part Two
May 6, 2010
The Devil and Sherlock Holmes/David Grann
A wonderful collection of essays originally published in The New Yorker and Atlantic Monthly dealing with the notion of obsession.
Interviewer: Richard Wolinsky
April 29, 2010
Imperfect Birds/Anne Lamott
Anne Lamott brings back characters from earlier novels to tell the story of teenagers and parents in Marin County dealing with drug issues.
Interviewer: Richard Wolinsky
April 23, 2010
Open Book: Carey Perloff, Artistic Director of American Conservatory Theatre in San Francisco.
Interviewer: Richard Wolinsky
April 22, 2010
On Chesil Beach/Ian McEwan
Solar/Ian McEwan
On Chesil Beach is a short gem about love and missed opportunities. Solar is McEwan's funniest book featuring a larger-than-life protagonist exploiting climate change as a way of furthering his own self-delusions.
Interviewer: Richard Wolinsky
April 15, 2010
Pre-empted for special programming
April 8, 2010
Shanghai Girls/Lisa See
Rebroadcast
Interviewer: Richard Wolinsky
April 1, 2010
So Much For That/Lionel Shriver
A family undergoes the horrors of cancer, as the story of our health system unfolds in a novel alternately tragic and funny, which hits very close to home.
Interviewer: Richard Wolinsky
March 26, 2010
Union Atlantic/Adam Haslett
An acclaimed short story writer, Haslett's first novel tells the story of four people against the backdrop of the modern financial industry. A superb debut
Interviewer: Richard Wolinsky
March 19, 2010
Country Driving/Peter Hessler
Peter Hessler, former China correspondent for The New Yorker, tells the story of his decade in that country in three segments: a road trip along the Great Wall in 2001-2002; life in a small village from 2001-2007; and life in a factory town in the south in the latter part of the period. Hessler is a fine writer and his view of China eye-opening.
Interviewer: Richard Wolinsky
March 12, 2010
Open Book: An interview with Les Waters, Associate Director of Berkeley Rep Theatre Company
Interviewer: Richard Wolinsky
March 11, 2010
The Poisoner's Handbook/Deborah Blum
The birth of modern forensic detection, set against the backdrop of the Roaring Twenties and the Volstead Act. A story that reads like a novel but is based on information unearthed in the New York City archives, and an important cautionary tale of politics and prohibition.
Interviewer: Richard Wolinsky
March 4, 2010
Bomb Power/Garry Wills
A history of the growth of the National Security State and the rise of the Unitary Presidency, as seen against the backdrop of the Manhattan Project and the secrecy surrounding the atom bomb. Wills' theses may be debatable, but his history is not. A fascinating and important read.
Interviewer: Richard Wolinsky
(originally aired in two edited segments during the KPFA fund drive).
February 25, 2010
Book Reviews with Richard Wolinsky and Richard A. Lupoff.
February 18, 2010
Her Fearful Symmetry/Audrey Niffenegger
The Time Traveler's Wife/Audrey Niffenegger
Audrey Niffenegger follows up her best-selling Time Traveler's Wife with a ghost story set in London that's hard to put down.
Interviewer: Richard Wolinsky
February 11, 2010
Aired: Julie Powell, author of Cleaving (see January 21, 2010)
Scheduled:Shanghai Girls/Lisa See
Rebroadcast from 2009
February 4, 2010
Cutting for Stone/Abraham Verghese
Rebroadcast from 2009
January 28, 2010
The Piano Teacher/Janice Y.K. Lee
An evocative novel about love and loss set in Hong Kong during and after the Second World War.
Interviewer: Richard Wolinsky
January 21, 2010
Julie & Julia/Julie Powell
Cleaving/Julie Powell
The author of the best selling blog-turned-memoir, Julie & Julia, turned into an award-winning movie starring Meryl Streep and Amy Adams, returns with a second memoir about the confluence of her decision to learn how to be a butcher and an extra-marital affair with an old boyfriend. The butchering parts make up for the moments when you want to shake the author and say, "Get over yourself."
Interviewer: Richard Wolinsky
January 14, 2010
Lit/Mary Karr
Mary Karr is a poet and memoirist. This latest memoir was listed as one of the New York Times Ten Best Books of 2010. It tells the story of her recovery from alcoholism and her turn towards Catholicism, with both humor and a very objective look at her own thoughts and behavior.
Interviewer: Richard Wolinsky
January 8, 2010
Open Book
An interview with Sharon Gless, performing through Feb. 7 in A Round-Heeled Woman at Z Space at Theatre Artaud in San Francisco.
Interviewer: Richard Wolinsky
January 7, 2010
In the Company of the Courtesan/Sarah Dunant
Sacred Hearts/Sarah Dunant
The Birth of Venus/Sarah Dunant
A fictional trilogy about the role of women in Renaissance Italy, using heavily researched sources. Dunant has the singular capability of setting you in the place and time she writes about, which gives her work a special authenticity. Recommended.
Interviewer: Richard Wolinsky
