From 2006--  Franz Wisner, author of "Honeymoon with my Brother: a Memoir."  When Wisner's fiancee breaks off their engagement,  Franz decides to go on his scheduled honeymoon anyway ... but with his brother.  

From 2008- Michael Joseph Gross talks about his book "Starstruck:  When a Fan gets Close to Fame."  Please note that the book was published and the interview conducted a year before singer Michael Jackson's unexpected death at the age of 50.  

From 2017 comes this conversation with Meta Wagner, author of "What's Your Creative Type: Harnessing the Power of Your Artistic Personality."  

From the archives comes this 2009 conversation with Dr. Mardy Grothe, author of "I Never Metaphor I Didn't Like: a Comprehensive Compilation of History's Greatest Analogies, Metaphors and Similes."  

From the archives comes this 2005 conversation with Dan Koeppel, author of "To See Every Bird on Earth: a Father, a Son, and a Lifelong Obsession."  This book examines birdwatching at its most elite level, when people will travel the globe in order to see literally thousands of different species of birds in the wild.  

We spend most of the program looking back at the terrifying Polio Epidemic of the late 1940s and early 1950s.  We begin by previewing the American Experience documentary "The Polio Crusade," which is being rebroadcast Tuesday night on PBS.   After that, you'll hear an interview with David Oshinsky, author of "Polio: An American Story,"  which served as valuable source material for the film.  The hour finishes out with a brief 2003 interview with former U.S. Secretary of State Madeleine Albright, talking about her memoir "Madame Secretary." 

We begin with a newly-recorded interview with Dr. Beth Rush, a neuropsychologist with the Mayo Clinic, who offers some advice to people on how to maintain their mental and emotional health during the COVID-19 crisis.   After that is a 2008 interview with food writer Frederick Kaufman, author of "A Short History of the American Stomach."  

From the archives comes this 2008 interview with Beth Lisick, who takes an amusing look at the self-help movement in her book "Helping Me Help Myself:  One Skeptic, Ten Self-Help Gurus, and a Year on the Brink of the Comfort Zone."  

From the archives comes this 2008 interview with Mark Kreidler, author of "6 Good Innings: How one small town became a Little League Giant."  Kreidler explored a spectacular Little League program in a small community in New Jersey in order to determine what was behind their exceptional success. 

This interview was recorded one week ago with Hope Jahren, a writer and teacher who is one of the most compelling voices on the topic of Climate Change.  Her new book is "The Story of More:  How We Got to Climate Change and Where to Go from Here."  The book spells out the most significant ways in which our planet has changed drastically over the last 50 years- and how those changes are inter-related.  We open the interview by talking briefly about what life is like in Norway (where Jahren lives) during this COVID-19 Crisis.