Health & Medicine

The drama is set in a New York hospital in 1900, when surgeons were developing new techniques. Series creators Jack Amiel and Michael Begler and medical historian Stanley Burns talk about the show.

Allison Janney has been nominated for Emmys for her roles on Masters of Sex and Mom. She says her relationships with her mother and her brother, who was an addict, helped inform her characters.

Robert Timberg, who was disfigured by a land mine as a Marine in Vietnam, went on to become a successful journalist. His new memoir Blue Eyed Boy charts his struggle to recover from his wounds.

Arthur Allen's new book, The Fantastic Laboratory of Dr. Weigl, describes how as WWII scientist in Poland smuggled the typhus vaccine to Jews -- while his team made a weakened version for the Nazis.

The Supreme Court term ended Monday. The New York Times correspondent and lawyer Adam Liptak talks with Fresh Air's Terry Gross about what the decisions reveal about the nine justices.

Emily Gould's first novel stars 30-something single women in New York City who are figuring out what's important in life. It's worth picking up for its sharp social observations and inspired wordplay.

Fresh Air tech contributor Alexis Madrigal explains how a tiny computer attaches to a pill you ingest to record how your body responds. It sounds crazy, he says, but it was approved by the FDA.

On Sunday night, HBO presents a new TV version of Larry Kramer's 1985 play. Kramer himself wrote the adaptation, which stars Mark Ruffalo and Julia Roberts.

In a new book, bioethicist and internist Barron Lerner recalls how he came to question some of his father's medical practices — practices that were common among many doctors of that generation.

In Missing Microbes, Dr. Martin Blaser argues that the overuse of antibiotics, as well as now-common practices like C-sections, may be messing with gut microbes.

Falco plays ER nurse Jackie Peyton, who is competent at her high-stress job but struggles with addiction. The sixth season of Nurse Jackie begins Sunday on Showtime.

In Dancing Fish And Ammonites, the British writer reflects on growing older. She tells Fresh Air's Terry Gross about adjusting to her husband's death and losing the desire for new things.

Fresh Air's classical music critic Lloyd Schwartz recently published a poem about friendship and loss on Poets.org.

Nuland's book won a National Book Award and impacted the national debate about end-of-life care. He died on Monday at 83. Nuland spoke to Fresh Air in 1994.

Kayla Williams and Brian McGough met in Iraq in 2003. Williams' new memoir, Plenty of Time When We Get Home, describes their homecoming after McGough suffered physical and cognitive injuries in an IED explosion.

Ann Patchett got married and divorced young. When she met the man who would eventually become her second husband she said: "I'll be true, I'll be faithful, I'll see you every day ... but I don't want to get married and I don't want to live together." Her new book is This Is The Story of a Happy Marriage.

Despite being the daughter of a child psychologist and self-help author, Jessica Lamb-Shapiro has spent most of her life recoiling from the self-help industry. But eventually, her curiosity got the best of her. She tells Fresh Air about self-help's high- and low-brow iterations and the ways the industry helped her address her fears.

In The Man He Became, historian James Tobin says, despite misimpressions to the contrary, Americans of Franklin Roosevelt's day were well-aware of his disability — it was an important part of the personal narrative that helped him win the presidency.

Critic David Edelstein calls the film, in which an elderly man sets out to claim a million-dollar sweepstakes prize, a "superb balancing act" from director Alexander Payne.

Dern's new film follows a man named Woody who is starting to show signs of dementia. When Woody falls for one of those junk-mail sweepstakes come-ons, he becomes convinced that he's won $1 million and sets out on foot to collect the cash. Dern tells Fresh Air's Terry Gross, "[Nebraska] is the most personal movie I've ever done in my career."