Free Library Podcast

Pulitzer Prize–winning journalist James B. Stewart is the author of the number-one New York Times bestseller Den of Thieves, the story of the most notorious insider-trading ring in financial history; DisneyWar, the boardroom imbroglio about the bitter struggle for control of the secretive corporation; and Blind Eye, the account of a coldblooded doctor who moonlighted as a serial killer. A New York Times columnist and journalism professor at Columbia University, he is a frequent contributor to the New Yorker and is a former editor at the Wall Street Journal. In Deep State, Stewart offers a definitive account of the war between the current President and America's largest law enforcement agencies, which ventures into new and disturbing territory the Mueller probe could not approach.

(recorded 10/23/2019)

The co-anchor of the flagship hour of the venerable Today show, Hoda Kotb has also been a Dateline correspondent for the past 21 years. Her New York Times–bestselling books include Ten Years Later and Hoda, and the children's books I've Loved You Since Forever and You Are My Happy. The winner of four Emmys, a Peabody Award, and the Edward R. Murrow Award, she has several times been honored with the Gracie Award by the Alliance for Women in Media. In I Really Needed This Today, Kotb offers a curated collection of quotes-by turns inspiring, wise, and funny-drawn from her wildly popular Instagram posts.

(recorded 10/18/2019)

In conversation with award-winning broadcaster, Tracey Matisak

The first openly gay U.S. male athlete to win a winter Olympics medal, Adam Rippon earned bronze as part of the figure skating team event at the 2018 games. He was also the winner of the 2016 U.S. National Championships and the 2010 Four Continents Championships. Last year he was named one of Time's 100 most influential people and to Out magazine's Power 50: The Most Influential Voices in LGBTQ America. From the athlete's impoverished homeschooled childhood in Scranton to Olympic glory and winning Dancing with the Stars, Rippon's new memoir is a showcase for his inspiring story and humorous outlook.

(recorded 10/17/2019)

In conversation with Andy Kahan, director, author events

''As good as any piece of literature can get'' (Chicago Sun Times), Tim O'Brien's The Things They Carried was a finalist for the Pulitzer Prize and the National Book Critics Circle Award, and stands as perhaps the most acclaimed book about the Vietnam War. His other books include If I Die in a Combat Zone, Box Me Up and Ship Me Home, In the Lake of the Woods, and Going After Cacciato, winner of the 1979 National Book Award. Penned one scrap of paper at a time, Dad's Maybe Book is a collection of O'Brien's advice for the two young sons who might never get to know him in adulthood.

Horace W. Goldsmith Foundation Endowed Lecture

(recorded 10/15/2019)

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

U.S. ambassador to the United Nations from 2009 to 2013 and President Obama's national security advisor from 2013 to 2017, Susan Rice has been at the forefront of some of the 21st century's most consequential international challenges. Currently the Distinguished Visiting Research Fellow at the School of International Service at American University, she also sits on the board of the John F. Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts. From Rice's early family struggles to her becoming a champion of American interests on the world stage, Tough Love is not only a personal story, but a larger entreaty to bridge the domestic divides that threaten our global moral credibility.

(recorded 10/10/2019)

In conversation with Joe Torsella, State Treasurer for the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania

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, an examination of the role of public debt in financial crises. In his latest book, Vague employs insights gained through years spent in the banking industry and analysis of historical economic disasters spanning the last two centuries in order to illustrate how our current system can break the cycle of calamity.

Meelya Gordon Memorial Lecture

(recorded 10/7/2019)

In conversation with Tracey Matisak, award-winning broadcaster and journalist

Dr. Imani Perry is the author of Looking for Lorraine, a work of ''masterly syntheses of research and analysis'' (New York Times Book Review) of the life of Lorraine Hansberry, the author of A Raisin in the Sun. A professor of African-American studies, public affairs, and gender and sexuality studies at Princeton University, Perry is also the author of More Beautiful and More Terrible: The Embrace and Transcendence of Racial Inequality in the United States and May We Forever Stand: A History of the Black National Anthem.  A meditation on black resilience and resistance, Breathe challenges America to see black children as deserving of humanity in an increasingly unjust society.

(recorded 10/2/2019)

In conversation with Laurie Halse Anderson, bestselling author of Speak, Shout, Fever 1793, and the Seeds of America trilogy

Introduced by the Poet Laureate of Philadelphia, Raquel Salas Rivera

The first Latina to write for Marvel comics, Gabby Rivera created the popular AMERICA series, featuring the eponymous multiverse-hopping superpowered queer Latina dynamo Miss America, aka America Chavez. Honored as one of the SyFy network's top comic creators and one of NBC's #Pride30 Innovators, she has also contributed short stories to several anthologies, including The Secret Loves of Geeks, Sound Bites, and A People's Future of the United States. In Juliet Takes a Breath, Rivera offers up an audacious queer coming-of-age tale about a newly out young Puerto Rican from the Bronx who embarks upon an eye-opening internship with her idol.

 

(recorded 9/27/2019)

SPOILER ALERT. A number of critical plot points are exposed during the discussion.

In conversation with Pulitzer Prize-winning biographer David Blight, author of Frederick Douglass: Prophet of Freedom

Ta-Nehisi Coates won the 2015 National Book Award for Between the World and Me, a ''searing meditation on what it means to be black in America today'' (New York Times). A national correspondent for the Atlantic, he won the 2014 George Polk Award for his cover story ''The Case for Reparations.'' Coates is the recipient of a MacArthur Fellowship and the author of We Were Eight Years in Power, a collection of new and previously published essays. His debut novel tells the story of an escaped enslaved person's journey from the barbaric Deep South to the misguided utopic movements of the North.

 

(recorded 9/25/2019)

With ''an uncanny ability to simplify without being simplistic'' (Seattle Times), Malcolm Gladwell synthesizes academic research and critical analysis with engaging prose and relatable anecdotes to fashion surprisingly counterintuitive conclusions about our everyday lives. His mega-bestselling books include The Tipping Point, Outliers, Blink, and David and Goliath. A former business and science writer for the Washington Post, Gladwell has been a staff columnist at the New Yorker since 1996 and is the host of the popular Revisionist History podcast. From Fidel Castro to Bernie Madoff to the death of Sandra Bland, Gladwell's latest book examines our interactions with strangers and why they often go awry.  

(recorded 9/26/2019)