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The Thread® - Books and Literary News

The Thread from MPR News

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

Ask a Bookseller

Ask a Bookseller is a weekly series where The Thread 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 every Friday at 11 a.m., featuring conversations about books and other literary ideas. Listen to Big Books and Bold Ideas here.

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. Find reviews for new releases, as well as hidden gems you may have missed.

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. 

Tickets are now available for our 26th season. Join award-winning journalist and MPR News host Kerri Miller (and special guest host Catharine Richart) as they talk with authors including Stacey Abrams, Patricia Lockwood, Misty Copeland, John Grisham, and Kate Baer. 

In 'Imaginary Friend,' Stephen Chbosky squeezes horror from everyday life

In 'Imaginary Friend,' Stephen Chbosky squeezes horror from everyday life

Stephen Chbosky — who wrote the YA classic The Perks of Being a Wallflower -- says his new book takes the familiar scares of childhood, like monsters in the closet, and twists them a little.
by Scott Simon

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A dangerous search for a dozen eggs

A dangerous search for a dozen eggs

Bookseller Holly Brooks recommends a novel that follows two men desperately searching for cake ingredients in the middle of the siege of Leningrad.
by Tracy Mumford

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In 'The Water Dancer,' Ta-Nehisi Coates creates magical alternate history

In 'The Water Dancer,' Ta-Nehisi Coates creates magical alternate history

Ta-Nehisi Coates' new novel, set during the era of slavery, follows a young black man who discovers that his memories trigger a mysterious power of teleportation that can help escaped slaves flee.
by Annalisa Quinn

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In 'This Tender Land,' writer crafts a Minnesota odyssey on the Mississippi

In 'This Tender Land,' writer crafts a Minnesota odyssey on the Mississippi

St. Paul writer William Kent Krueger tells MPR News host Tom Crann about “This Tender Land,” his new Depression-era novel of four orphans canoeing the Mississippi River to escape the cruelty of their Native American boarding school.
by Nick Scheffler

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'The Shadow King' is a gorgeous meditation on memory, war and violence

'The Shadow King' is a gorgeous meditation on memory, war and violence

Maaza Mengiste's new novel is set just before the second Italo-Ethiopian War, and follows a woman who becomes a guard to a "shadow king," a man impersonating exiled Ethiopian ruler Haile Selassie.
by Michael Schaub

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Patti Smith weaves between worlds real and imagined in 'Year of the Monkey'

Patti Smith weaves between worlds real and imagined in 'Year of the Monkey'

Smith's musical career sometimes threatens to overshadow her accomplishments in other creative fields, but every page in this book reminds us that she is an accomplished novelist, essayist and poet.
by Gabino Iglesias

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Tegan and Sara find pain — and unexpected joy — in 'High School'

Tegan and Sara find pain — and unexpected joy — in 'High School'

Music duo Tegan and Sara revisit their teen years and their early music in a new memoir and companion album. Listening back to the songs they wrote, Sara says: "I was struck by the joy in our voices."
by Terry Gross

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