Overheard with Evan Smith

Lucinda Williams is a Grammy Award-winning singer/songwriter, whose highly acclaimed self-titled album, Lucinda Williams, was released 25 years ago this month. That album featured the song Passionate Kisses, later performed by Mary Chapin Carpenter and which earned Williams a Grammy for Best Country Song in 1994.

Amy Tan is the author of three best-selling novels including her 1989 novel The Joy Luck Club. Her newest novel, The Valley of Amazement, was published in November and is already on The New York Times best-seller list. The editors of The New York Times Book Review also named it a 2013 Notable Book. Tan co-produced and co-wrote the screenplay of The Joy Luck Club movie, released in 1993. Millions of copies of her books are in print and they have been translated into thirty languages.

John Sayles is an Academy Award-nominated writer and director whose credits include Lone Star, Passion Fish, The Brother From Another Planet and The Return of the Secaucus Seven. His 18th film, Go For Sisters, was recently released.

Dr. Neil deGrasse Tyson is the coolest astrophysicist in the universe and a nerd rockstar. He is the director of the Hayden Planetarium at the American Museum of National History and the host of the new documentary series Cosmos: A Space-Time Odyssey.

Doris Kearns Goodwin is a best-selling, Pulitzer Prize-winning historian. Her latest book, The Bully Pulpit: Theodore Roosevelt, William Howard Taft and the Golden Age of Journalism is a riveting history of the first decade of the Progressive Era.

Reza Aslan is a religious scholar and author of the New York Times best-seller Zealot: The Life and Times of Jesus of Nazareth. His first book No god but God: The Origins, Evolution, and Future of Islam was named one of the most important books of our decade and was translated into thirteen languages.

Mark Halperin and John Heilemann are veteran political reporters, famous for scoop-filled presidential campaign narratives. Their best-selling book Game Change spawned an Emmy Award-winning film. Double Down is their best-selling follow-up on the 2012 race.

Mark Leibovich is The New York Times Magazine Chief National Correspondent and a National Magazine Award winner.

Mark Kelly is a retired American astronaut and U.S. Navy Captain. He is also the husband of former U.S. Congresswoman Gabrielle Giffords, who was shot at a constituent event in Tucson in 2011. Kelly flew his first NASA mission in 2001 and retired in 2011. He is the recipient of numerous naval awards including two Defensive Superior service medals and four Air Medals.

Jonathan Lethem is an award-winning, best-selling novelist, essayist and short story writer. Lethem’s most recent novel, released in September, is Dissident Gardens.