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.

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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. 

Yes, some comics are for kids -- and they're big business
What's the best way to get people reading comics? Hook 'em young. And comics for early readers are booming -- even big publishers like DC, famed for grim and gritty, are getting in on the action.
Inside the 'Shakespearean irony' of Trump and Bannon's relationship
Author Joshua Green says that although Steve Bannon was instrumental to Donald Trump's election, it now appears that the president lacks the ability to implement Bannon's nationalist vision.
The poet Bao Phi, on creating a 'guidebook' for young Asian-Americans
When Bao Phi was a child, there was little literature about Vietnamese refugees in the U.S. Phi hopes to change that with his new poetry book 'Thousand Star Hotel' and a forthcoming children's book.
London literally stank in the summer of 1858 -- just ask Dickens and Darwin
In 'One Hot Summer,' historian Rosemary Ashton follows Charles Dickens, Charles Darwin and Benjamin Disraeli through an unpleasant couple of months -- as the River Thames flowed with hot, smelly sewage.