Free Library Podcast

In conversation with Tamala Edwards, anchor, 6abc Action News morning edition

Ibram X. Kendi is the Andrew W. Mellon Professor in the Humanities at Boston University and the founding director of the BU Center for Antiracist Research. He is a contributing writer at The Atlantic and a CBS News correspondent. He is the author of many books including Stamped from the Beginning: The Definitive History of Racist Ideas in America, which won the National Book Award for Nonfiction, and five #1 New York Times bestsellers including How to Be an Antiracist; Stamped: Racism, Antiracism, and You, co-authored with Jason Reynolds; and Antiracist Baby, illustrated by Ashley Lukashevsky. His latest books are How to Raise an Antiracist and Goodnight Racism, illustrated by Cbabi Bayoc. In 2020, Time magazine named him one of the 100 most influential people in the world. He was awarded a 2021 MacArthur Fellowship, popularly known as the ''Genius Grant.'' 

Nic Stone is an Atlanta native and a Spelman College graduate. Her debut novel for young adults, Dear Martin, and her debut middle-grade novel, Clean Getaway, were both New York Times bestsellers. She is also the author of Odd One Out, which was an NPR Best Book of the Year and a Rainbow Book List Top Ten selection, Jackpot, and Shuri: A Black Panther Novel. Dear Justyce, the sequel to Dear Martin, recently published. She is one of the authors in the New York Times bestselling book Black Out, recently optioned for as a new anthology program for Netflix by Barack and Michelle Obama's production company, Higher Ground. Find her online at nicstone.info or @nicstone 

Based on Kendi's internationally acclaimed book and co-authored by bestselling author Stone, How to Be a (Young) Antiracist is a dynamic reframing of the concepts shared in How to Be an Antiracist, with young adulthood front and center. (recorded 1/31/2023)

In conversation with Robert Kolker

John Hendrickson is the author of a 2019 Atlantic article titled ''What Joe Biden Can't Bring Himself to Say.'' An account of the President's-and his own-lifelong experience with stuttering, it was read by more than two million people, including multitudes of stutterers who responded with stories of their own journeys. Life on Delay is a memoir born from that article and the deeper questions it raised for Hendrickson, as well as an exploration of the wider personal, societal, and professional issues that can affect stutterers and their families. A senior editor at The Atlantic, he wrote and edited for Rolling Stone, Esquire, and The Denver Post, and has spoken about stuttering, politics, and journalism on a variety of media platforms and at universities across the United States. 

Robert Kolker's Hidden Valley Road, the nonfiction account of a family's experience with schizophrenia, was an instant No. 1 New York Times bestseller, an Oprah's Book Club selection, and was named a best book of the year by scores of media outlets. He is also the author of Lost Girls, one of Slate's best nonfiction books of the quarter century. A National Magazine Award finalist, his articles have appeared in Wired, The New York Times Magazine, and Bloomberg Businessweek, among many other periodicals. (recorded 1/24/2023)

In conversation with Imani Perry

Ilyon Woo is the author of The Great Divorce, the ''lively, well-written, and engrossing tale'' (The New York Times Book Review) of a young mother's five-year fight against her husband, the Shakers religious sect, and the norms of 19th century United States for her and her children's freedom. The recipient of a Whiting Creative Nonfiction Writing Grant and of fellowships from the American Antiquarian Society and the National Endowment for the Humanities, Woo has contributed writing to The Wall Street Journal and The Boston Globe. Her latest book recounts the remarkable true story of an enslaved husband and wife who posed as master and slave while trekking more than a 1,000 miles to freedom in mid-19th century United States.

Imani Perry won the 2022 National Book Award for nonfiction for South to America: A Journey Below the Mason-Dixon to Understand the Soul of a Nation. Her other books include, Vexy Thing: On Gender and Liberation, Breathe: A Letter to My Sons, and Looking for Lorraine: The Radiant and Radical Life of Lorraine Hansberry. Perry is the Hughes-Rogers Professor of African American Studies and faculty associate in the Program in Law and Public Affairs and Gender and Sexuality Studies at Princeton University. (recorded 1/19/2023)

In conversation with Mike Sielski

The star of ESPN's No. 1 morning talk show First Take, Stephen A. Smith is one of the U.S. sporting press's most popular and outspoken personalities. He is also the host of NBA in Stephen A's World on ESPN2 and ESPN+, the host and producer of the podcast K[no]w Mercy with Stephen A. Smith, and an NBA analyst on ABC's NBA Countdown and ESPN's Sportscenter. From his upbringing as the youngest son in an immigrant family in Queens, NY to the successes and challenges in his professional career, Smith is characteristically candid in Straight Shooter and offers hot takes on sports, politics, and his personal life. 

A sports columnist at The Philadelphia Inquirer since 2013, Mike Sielski is the author of The Rise, an account of Kobe Bryant's life and impact as a sports and cultural figure. He is also the author of Fading Echoes: A True Story of Rivalry and Brotherhood from the Football Field to the Fields of Honor and is the co-author of How to Be Like Jackie Robinson: Life Lessons from Baseball's Greatest Hero. In 2015 he was voted the best sports columnist in the U.S. by the Associated Press Sports Editors.  (recorded 1/19/2023)

He started as Jerry Blavat, a half-Jewish, half-Italian kid from South Philadelphia. These days, he's better known as The Geator with the Heater, The Boss with the Hot Sauce.  After 50 years in the music business, the man former Governor Ed Rendell declared ''as Philadelphia as the cheesesteak'' is still going strong.  His life in show business began at the age of 13 as a dancer on Bandstand.  He brought rock n' roll to Philadelphia in the 1960s and keeps it here to this day.  His new biography details his life rubbing elbows with stars and mobsters and bringing The Music to the people.  

Interviewed by Tom Moon, former music critic for The Inquirer and author of 1,000 Recordings to Hear Before You Die. (recorded 8/1/2011)

In conversation with Nate Chinen

The author of Dirty Blvd.: The Life and Music of Lou Reed and editor of Patti Smith on Patti Smith: Interviews and Encounters, Aiden Levy played the baritone saxophone in the Stan Rubin Orchestra for 10 years. His writing has been published in The New York Times, The Village Voice, and JazzTimes, among other publications. Formerly a fellow at the Leon Levy Center for Biography, he is a doctoral candidate at Columbia University in the Department of English and Comparative Literature, works with the Center for Jazz Studies, and was a co-convener of the African American Studies Colloquium. In Saxophone Colossus, Levy offers the first full-length biography of Sonny Rollins, one of jazz's most celebrated but enigmatic musicians and composers. 

WRTI jazz radio's editorial director, a regular contributor to NPR Music, and a consulting producer with Jazz Night in America, Nate Chinen formerly worked as a critic for The New York Times and wrote a long-running column for JazzTimes. He is the author of Playing Changes: Jazz for the New Century, named one of the best books of 2018 by NPR, GQ, and Billboard. A 13-time winner of the Helen Dance-Robert Palmer Award for Excellence in Writing, Chinen has also had his work widely anthologized. (recorded 1/17/2023)

Julie Dannenbaum Memorial Culinary Arts Lecture

In conversation with Dena Heilik, head of Philbrick Hall, the Fiction and Movie department at Parkway Central. She also cohosts a monthly library Cookbook Club that has been running continuously for six years.

Receiving praise from outlets like The New York Times and NPR, and counting Martha Stewart and Rachael Ray among her many fans, self-taught home chef Deb Perelman is the creator of smittenkitchen.com, a candid, can-do, go-to blog for those who want to make and eat good food without using complicated methods or expensive ingredients. Adapted from the website, her bestselling The Smitten Kitchen Cookbook won the IACP Julia Child Award and was a Cooking Light Top 100 Cookbook of the Last 25 Years recipient. Perelman followed up this success with Smitten Kitchen Every Day, a 100-recipe guide for delicious and easy-to-make food. In her long-awaited, follow-up cookbook to these two bestsellers, Perelman serves up recipes for cakes, quiches, pastas, and dozens of other dishes intended to become a part of the readers' every day cooking. (recorded 12/6/2022)

The national baseball writer for The New York Times since 2010, Tyler Kepner began his career as a teenager, interviewing players for a homemade magazine that garnered him national attention. His national bestseller K: A History of Baseball in Ten Pitches earned praise from fans, fellow sportswriters, and Hall of Fame pitchers alike. Also the author of The Phillies Experience: A Year-by-Year Chronicle of the Philadelphia Phillies, Kepner formerly covered the Angels for the Riverside Press-Enterprise, the Mariners for the Seattle Post-Intelligencer, and the Mets for the Times. In The Grandest Stage, Kepner uses analysis, lore, humor, and behind-the-scoreboards anecdotes to offer a vivid 117-year history of the World Series.

(recorded 12/1/2022)

In conversation with Tamala Edwards, anchor, 6abc Action News morning edition

The first African American principal dancer in the history of the elite American Ballet Theatre, Misty Copeland is one of the world's most accomplished and recognizable artists. She is the author of the New York Times bestsellers Life in Motion, Ballerina Body, Black Ballerinas, and the children's books Bunheads and Firebird. A recipient of the Spingarn Medal from the NAACP, an inductee in the Boys and Girls Club Alumni Hall of Fame, one of TIME magazine's 100 most influential people, and one of Glamour's Women of the Year, Copeland also made her critically acclaimed Broadway debut in 2015 in On the Town. In The Wind at My Back, Copeland offers a memoir about her formative and enduring relationship with friend, mentor, and trailblazing ballet dancer Raven Wilkinson. (recorded 11/29/2022)

Pine Tree Foundation Endowed Lecture

In conversation with Richard Vague

David Rubenstein is the co-founder and co-chairman of The Carlyle Group, one of the world's most successful private equity firms. The host of The David Rubinstein Show and Bloomberg Wealth with David Rubenstein on Bloomberg TV, he is the author of the New York Times bestsellers The American Story, How to Lead, and The American Experiment. He is chairman of the boards of the John F. Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts, the Council on Foreign Relations, and the National Gallery of Art, and as a leader in patriotic philanthropy, he has provided long-term loans of his rare copies of the Magna Carta, the Declaration of Independence, the Emancipation Proclamation, and other historical documents to the U.S. Government. Utilizing his own three decades' experience and conversations with some of the biggest names in finance, his new book is a master class in investing.

Venture capitalist and longtime Philadelphia-area philanthropist Richard Vague serves on the Penn Medicine board, is Chairman of the University of Pennsylvania Press, and is the president of the Philadelphia Live Arts and Fringe Festival. He is the author of The Next Economic Disaster: Why It's Coming and How to Avoid It and A Brief History of Doom: Two Hundred Years of Financial Crises. (recorded 11/28/2022)