Literary Figures

In So We Read On, Maureen Corrigan looks at the story behind The Great Gatsby, from F. Scott Fitzgerald's life to the era in which it's set. Originally broadcast Sept. 8, 2014.

Phil Klay served in Iraq from January 2007 to February 2008. He recently won a National Book Critics Circle award for his collection of short stories. Originally broadcast Nov. 25, 2014.

In Daniel Torday's The Last Flight of Poxl West, a Jewish refugee tells his heroic World War II story in a best-selling — and partly fabricated — memoir.

In 2011, George Hodgman visited his mother Betty for her 91st birthday in Paris, Missouri. When he saw she needed care, he left Manhattan to live with her. But she still hasn't accepted that he's gay.

Offutt's late father went from running a small insurance agency to writing more than 400 books, mostly pornography. The writer tells Fresh Air his dad believed he would be "extremely famous" for it.

Colson Whitehead's book, now out in paperback, was born of an assignment to write about the World Series of Poker. It's a sharp observational tale of poker: those who play it and how it changed him.

In his new memoir, Philip Connors writes about "living in the shadow of suicide." Wracked by guilt and haunted by what-ifs, Connors investigated his brother's death and learned a terrible secret.

Native American writer David Treuer bases the World War II camp for German prisoners on a real-life one that existed near the village of Bena, Minn., on the Leech Lake Reservation where he grew up.

In his new collection of short stories and a novella, Pelecanos explores crime, adoption and writing from an African-American point of view. He says he's "aware of the responsibility" to get it right.

In Can't We Talk About Something More Pleasant?, Roz Chast combines text, cartoons, sketches and photos to describe her interactions with her parents during the last years of their lives.

Originally broadcast May 8.