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The Thread® - Books and Literary News

The Thread® is your source for book recommendations and other literary news.

Sign Up for The Thread® Newsletter

Sign up for The Thread newsletter to get reading recommendations from Kerri Miller and other bookworms around the MPR newsroom. Sam Stroozas rounds up local events and Minnesota book news you may have missed.

Ask a Bookseller

Ask a Bookseller is a weekly series where host Emily Bright checks in with booksellers around the country about their favorite books of the moment. Listen to Ask a Bookseller to find your next favorite book.

Big Books and Bold Ideas

Big Books and Bold Ideas is a weekly series hosted by Kerri Miller and produced by Kelly Gordon every Friday at 11 a.m., featuring conversations about books and other literary ideas. Listen to Big Books and Bold Ideas here.

Talking Volumes

Talking Volumes is an annual event series featuring notable authors in conversation about their new books. Presented by MPR News and The Minnesota Star Tribune.

'Aftershocks' is a powerful memoir of a life upended — then pieced back together

'Aftershocks' is a powerful memoir of a life upended — then pieced back together

When Nadia Owusu was 4 years old, her Armenian American mother disappeared from her life. When she was 13, her Ghanaian father died. Owusu reflects the losses and her biracial identity in her memoir.
by Maureen Corrigan

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There's pain and tragedy in 'Yellow Wife' — but also great joy

There's pain and tragedy in 'Yellow Wife' — but also great joy

Sadeqa Johnson's novel — inspired by a real historical figure — pulls no punches in its tale of an enslaved woman trying to survive and make a life for herself and her family.
by Denny S. Bryce

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Ask a bookseller: 'The Magical Language of Others' gives a compassionate look at mother-daughter relationships

Ask a bookseller: 'The Magical Language of Others' gives a compassionate look at mother-daughter relationships

Amanda Toronto of Word Bookstore in Brooklyn, N.Y., says she can’t stop thinking about a memoir she read recently: “The Magical Language of Others” by poet and translator E.J. Koh. 
by Emily Bright

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Trying to survive on the margins in 'At the Edge of the Haight'

Trying to survive on the margins in 'At the Edge of the Haight'

Katherine Seligman's new novel makes alive and visible the lives of people we often walk past. It's the story of a young woman surviving on the streets of San Francisco with a few friends and her dog.
by Scott Simon

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'Aftershocks' tells of a reckoning with the self — and with memory

'Aftershocks' tells of a reckoning with the self — and with memory

Writer Nadia Owusu has lived many lives. Her nonlinear memoir, centered on the idea of physical and metaphorical earthquakes, is about all of the parts of what is her single, complex life.
by Ilana Masad

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There's not a single off note in 'That Old Country Music'

There's not a single off note in 'That Old Country Music'

In his new story collection, Kevin Barry proves to be a master at evoking the landscapes of both western Ireland and the human heart; he seems to have an innate sense of why people do what they do.
by Michael Schaub

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To adapt 'After the Rain,' artists cross all kinds of boundaries

To adapt 'After the Rain,' artists cross all kinds of boundaries

A new graphic novel adaptation of Nnedi Okorafor's story "After the Rain" sets straightforward art against scattered, skewed panels to produce a sense of primal struggle between order and chaos.
by Etelka Lehoczky

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'Ambitious Girl' reminds kids: Your dreams are not a drawback

'Ambitious Girl' reminds kids: Your dreams are not a drawback

Activist and author Meena Harris, the niece of Vice President-elect Kamala Harris, has written a children's book called “Ambitious Girl” in the hope that no young woman in the next generation will have her dreams characterized as a liability.
by Michel Martin

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Ask a Bookseller: A master class on writing, reading — and life

Ask a Bookseller: A master class on writing, reading — and life

Cat Bock of Parnassus Books in Nashville, Tenn., recommended a brand-new work of literary criticism by George Saunders with a tempting subtitle indeed: “A Swim in a Pond in the Rain: In which Four Russians Give a Master Class on Writing, Reading, and Life."
by Emily Bright

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