Books & Literature

Book critic John Leonard reviews "Wall to Wall," Mary Morris' memoir of her travels through China and the Soviet Union.

Maureen Corrigan reviews film maker John Sayle's new novel, "Los Gusanos."

Journalist Ron Powers. Powers new book, "Far From Home, " examines the decline of the small town in America. To illustrate the point, Powers profiled the decline of Cairo, Illinois and Kent Connecticut.

Rock critic Jimmy Guterman and editor Owen O'Donnell have a new book called "The Worst Rock 'n' Roll Records of All Time." Many of their selections are recordings made by some of the most popular artists, including the Doors, Bob Dylan, Billy Joel, and the Moody Blues.

Miller was the first executive director of the Major League Baseball Players Association when it was formed in 1966. He helped form a labor union to represent the athletes, which caused the dramatic increase in player's salaries, and ended the system that bound an athlete to one team forever. To some, he's the man who depreciated the value of teams. His memoir is called "A Whole Different Ball Game."

Jacobson is the executive director of the Center for Science in The Public Interest. He's one of the authors of the new book, "Safe Food." It's a guide to the dangers in what we eat. The book discusses pesticides, bacteria and other toxic substances found in food.

Boyd's new book, "The Revolution of Little Girls," follows a child coming-of-age in the South in the 60s. (It's published by Knopf). Boyd's the author of two earlier novels, and a collection of essays, called "The Rebel Way of Knowledge."

Book critic John Leonard reviews "Jernigan," the first novel from writer David Gates. It's about an erudite alcoholic's frustration with suburban life.

The Soviet Union just withdrew from Czechoslovakia. We talk to two people about what affect this will have on the literary culture in that country. Czech writer Ivan Klima was one of Czechoslovakia's leading dissident writers, and was recently elected the president of the Czech chapter of PEN. Michael March organized an international book and writers' festival in Prague last month.

Dubus' short stories earned him this year's Bernard Malamud Award from the writers group, PEN. Dubus has just released his first work of non-fiction, a collection of essays, called "Broken Vessels." It deals with, among other things, a tragic car accident that killed one person and left him severely injured.

Book critic John Leonard reviews the author's latest book, which he says doesn't live up to DeLillo's excellent novels from last decade.

Tan's debut novel, "The Joy Luck Club," was a huge critical and commercial success, earning Tan a nomination for the National Book Award. She has a new novel, called "The Kitchen God's Wife," which draws explicitly from her mother's experiences as a Chinese immigrant and survivor of an abusive relationship.

Williams' new book, "The Alchemy of Race and Rights," is her personal reflection on racism in American life and society.

Book critic John Leonard reviews "Bully for Brontosaurus," the new collection of popular science essays from biologist Stephen Jay Gould.

Book critic John Leonard reviews "Open Letters," the new collection of writings by the playwright and former President of Czechoslovakia.

Rock and roll historian Ed Ward plays some of the many 1960s artists who tried to cash in on the Bob Dylan sound.

Perl's new book, "Gallery Going," is a collection of essays about the art world of the late 80s and 90s. He says that museums are succumbing to new pressures to generate income, which is affecting the kind of art curators choose to feature.

Alvarez was born into a prosperous family in the Dominican Republic. When she was ten, her family moved to New York City. Alvarez's new novel, "How the Garcia Girls Lost Their Accents," is a semi-autobiographical work about the clash of cultures in her early life.

For more than a decade, Sciolino has been reporting on the Middle East. She was one of the few American journalists who recognized the danger of Saddam Hussein before the invasion of Kuwait. She currently is a diplomatic correspondent covering U.S. foreign policy and national security issues for the New York Times. Her new book is "The Outlaw State: Saddam Hussein's Quest for Power and the Gulf Crisis."

Sayles' films include Return of the Secaucus Seven, Brother From Another Planet, Matewan, and Eight Men Out. He has just written a novel, called Los Gusanos, about Cuban Americans living in Miami. He joins Fresh Air to talk about the difference between moviemaking and creative writing.