Terry Gross

Carol Muske-Dukes' new novel Life After Death (Random House) is the story of a woman who, one day, says to her husband in anger "Why don't you just die?" The next day, he drops dead. The book follows her journey into grief, self-reproach and self- discovery. Muske-Dukes directs the doctoral program in creative writing and literature at the University of Southern California; she's published six collections of poetry, the most recent titled An Octave Above Thunder. She's also a regular critic for the New York Times Book Review.

A concert and interview with singer and pianist Marcia Ball. She has a new CD titled Presumed Innocent (Alligator Records). She been compared with Fats Domino, Professor Longhair, Dr John, Leon Russell and Jerry Lee Lewis. She's been called the bayou queen of the piano. The concert was recorded in September 1998 in Austin, Texas as a benefit for the public radio station KUT.

Rhythm and Blues singer Tracey Nelson is best known for her work leading the Mother Earth band from the 1960s and 70s. Her hits included Down So Low and Mother Earth. A collection of her hits The Best of Tracy Nelson/Mother Earth (Reprise) came out in 1996. Her new CD is Ebony & Irony.

Writer Alice Randall is the author of the controversial new parody of Gone with the Wind. Her book The Wind Done Gone (Houghton Mifflin). Randall retells the story of the antebellum South from the viewpoint of Cynara, a beautiful illegitimate mulatto woman, the daughter of a plantation-owning father, and a slave mother.

Film director Julien Temple. His new film Pandaemonium is set in the 1880s and is about the relationship between two poets: William Woodsworth and Samuel Taylor Coleridge. Temple is one of the early pioneers of music videos, directing the Kinks, Rolling Stones, David Bowie, and Janet Jackson. He also directed documentaries. His other films include the 1995 Bullet and the 1999 Vigo.

Editor and writer Walter Kirn's new novel Up in the Air (Doubleday) is about 35 year-old Ryan Bingham, a well-traveled business man who has a goal of accumulating one million miles in his frequent flyer account. Kirn is the literary editor for GQ and a contributing editor to Time and Vanity Fair. His fiction and non-fiction work has appeared in The New Yorker and the New York Times Magazine. He also the author of two other novels, and a selection of short stories.

Casting director and actress Joanna Merlin has written a new guide for actors, Auditioning: An Actor-Friendly Guide (Vintage Books). Merlin was casting director for Harold Prince and his productions of Follies, A Little Night Music, Sweeney Todd, Evita, and more. She casted films, as well as acted in films and on television.

He recreated the journey Jules Verne described in Around the World in 80 Days. Michael Palin turned his journey into a very successful eight-part TV BBC series. He is of course also known for his tenure as a member of Monthy Python's Flying Circus and his appearances in The Missionary and A Fish Called Wanda.

Monty Python and the Holy Grail is being re-released in theatres this summer in anticipation of a new DVD release this Fall. Idle has also written a number of books. His latest is a comic science-fiction thriller, The Road to Mars: A Post-Modem Novel.

Comic Graham Chapman was the straight man in the Monty Python troupe who would come in and break up the skits. A physician by training, he was a writer and activist for gay rights. He died in 1989.