Terry Gross

Soul singer Barry White, the sweet-talking, deep-voiced performer who rhapsodized about love, died on July 4. He was 58. The cause was kidney failure. His hits included "My First, My Last, My Everything," "Never Never Gonna Give Up," and "I'm Gonna Love You Just a Little More." Before he became a hit as a solo performer, White put together the female vocal trio Love Unlimited and founded the Love Unlimited Orchestra, a 40-piece ensemble, to accompany himself and the trio.

Journalist James Bennet of The New York Times. He's been in the Middle East covering how the crisis there is affecting both Israelis and Palestinians.

He has written the new biography Benjamin Franklin: An American Life. Reviewer Arthur Schlesinger, Jr., writes of the book, "both an absorbing narrative biography and an acute assessment of the man and his impact on his time and on posterity." Isaacson is also the author of a biography of Kissinger, is president of the Aspen Institute, and was managing editor of Time magazine.