The Thread® - Books and Literary News

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

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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.

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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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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.

January 1, 2015 6:28 PM

Cats, dogs write poems (sort of)

by Jasmine Garsd

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December 31, 2014 6:24 AM

Vocab-intensive tech encourages 'anytime, anywhere learning'

Sesame Workshop's games are designed to help kids learn words and have fun. One educator says it's never too soon to teach tykes that technology can be more than just entertainment.

by Lynn Neary

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December 30, 2014 1:00 AM

What 2014 taught us about reading

The year's developments in how and why we read, from speed reading to e-readers to the redemptive power of books.

by Tracy Mumford

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December 30, 2014 12:00 AM

The enduring life of lit mags: We'll always have (The) Paris (Review)

It's the story we've heard time and again over the past decade or so: the story of a good literary magazine dying. But the mags still have an enduring fascination -- and the news isn't all bad.

by Juan Vidal

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December 30, 2014 12:00 AM

Nonprofit fights illiteracy by getting books to kids who need them

There are neighborhoods in this country with plenty of books; and then there are neighborhoods where books are harder to find. First Book is a nonprofit that distributes books to kids who live in the latter.

by Lynn Neary

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December 30, 2014 12:00 AM

Talk, sing, read, write, play: How libraries reach kids before they can read

Literacy begins at home -- but parents can't do it all alone, and that's where community services, especially libraries, come in.

by Lynn Neary

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December 29, 2014 1:57 PM

Before the Internet, librarians would 'answer everything' -- and still do

The New York Public Library recently found a box of questions posed to the library from the 1940s to the '80s -- an era when humans consulted other humans for answers to their everyday questions.