Maria Semple's new comic novel is about a stressed-out wife and mother who starts every day with a mantra. She tells Fresh Air's Sam Briger that the book was inspired by her own experiences as a mom.
Critic Maureen Corrigan has watched the TV drama since its debut, though she admits she never thought it was any good. But now that the 1980s are over, she thinks Dallas's outlandish, greed-obsessed storylines no longer resonate with viewers.
Lambert's new release features 24 songs on 2 CDs. Critic Ken Tucker calls The Weight of These Wings a collection that "keeps on giving the deeper you get into it."
Nicole Maines, who is transgender, is a young woman who filed and won a discrimination lawsuit against her school district, after she was forbidden to use the girls' bathroom.
Classical Music critic Lloyd Schwartz reviews a new compact disc of the string quartets of Charles Ives, performed by the Lydian String Quartet. Schwartz says it's one of the best quartet performances on record.
Fist and his wife are the only foreign journalists still living in Beirut. He has been covering Lebanon for the past fourteen years, and has a new book about his reporting, called Pity the Nation: Lebanon at War.
Halvorson, a prolific jazz guitarist, plays with harmonies and melodies as she leads an eight-piece band on her new album. Critic Kevin Whitehead calls Away With You "richer than ever."
Trump tweeted yesterday that he would be taking himself out of his business operations, but there are still concerns that the Trump Organization's business interests in the U.S. and in at least 20 countries around the world could lead to unprecedented conflicts of interest for the president-elect.
The new Italian documentary "Fire At Sea" won top prize at this year's Berlin Film Festival for its look at today's refugee crisis. The newly translated novel These Are The Names won the Dutch equivalent of the Booker Prize for its look at the refugee crisis. Our critic-at-large John Powers says each offers an original way of looking at something it's easy to think you know all about.
Actress Carrie Fisher talks about staring in Star Wars, her affair - back then - with co-star Harrison Ford, her mother Debbi Reynolds, and her own struggles with being bi-polar.
Before he died earlier this month, Cohen released a new album with songs that wrestled with mortality, transcendence and the question of God — themes he touched on in this 2006 Fresh Air interview.
Chabon's new novel is a collection of stories in which a dying grandfather tells the secrets of his life to his grandson. Critic Maureen Corrigan calls Moonglow "violent and very funny."
Trevor Noah talks about growing up in Apartheid-era South Africa. His mother was black; his father white, and at the time Noah was born it was illegal for such couples to have intimate relations. His memoir is titled Born a Crime.
