Racially mixed people

Novelist Mat Johnson believes that America has its own unique "flavor" of apocalypse. "It's hard not seeing the possible end of things in a variety of different ways," he says. Johnson's new satirical novel, Invisible Things, serves up one of those apocalyptic flavors.

"Really, the heart of the story is about misplaced loyalty and what we can do with memory and how fluid and malleable memory can be when we ... use it to fit the narrative that we've created in our mind," says novelist John Vercher.

In Bruised, which is now available on Netflix, Berry plays a disgraced mixed martial arts fighter named Jackie Justice, who takes on MMA's newest star. She does this to win back her name while figuring out how to be a mother to her estranged child. It's a role that Berry identifies with fundamentally.

Akash Kapur was raised in an intentional community in India, then moved to the U.S. at age 16. He writes about the reality of utopian communities in Better to Have Gone.

The son of a Jewish father and a Guatemalan mother, Goldman grew up mostly in working class suburbs of Boston. His new novel draws on his own experiences, including being physically abused by his dad

Julie Lythcott-Haims's new book, Your Turn: How to Be an Adult, is a handbook on adulthood. Her 2017 memoir, Real American, is the story of her coming to terms with her biracial identity.

Ellen and Ben Harper both grew up in the Folk Music Center in Claremont Calif., which Ellen's parents founded in 1958. They join Fresh Air to discuss Ellen's new memoir, Always a Song.

Natasha Trethewey has written before about the murder of her mother decades ago by her step father. She got a new window on her mother's life after getting access to the police files about her mother's case. Her new memoir is 'Memorial Drive.'

The host of the Emmy-nominated Daily Show revisits his childhood in apartheid-era South Africa in the memoir, Born a Crime. Originally broadcast Nov. 22, 2016.