Texas

In their new book, Forget the Alamo, Bryan Burrough and co-writers Chris Tomlinson and Jason Stanford challenge common misconceptions surrounding the conflict — including the notion that Davy Crockett was a martyr who fought to the death rather than surrender.

Locke says her new novel "was about place before it was about a character." The story follows a black ranger who patrols East Texas searching for the missing son of an Aryan Brotherhood leader.

Torn, who died Tuesday, won an Emmy Award for playing the gruff producer Artie on The Larry Sanders Show. In 1994, he told Fresh Air that he based his character on Johnny Carson's long time producer.

Pulitzer Prize-winning journalist Lawrence Wright predicts that the largest "red" state in the union will eventually move into the "blue" column — and change the nation's politics in the process.

Chris Tomlinson covered conflict, including apartheid in Africa, for 11 years. Then the great-great-grandson of Texas slaveholders realized he needed to write a book about his family's history.

Boyhood is about a boy in Texas whose parents have separated. Filmed over 12 years, audiences watch him grow up — and his worldview evolve. The cumulative power of the movie is tremendous.

Journalist Carolyn Jones wrote about her experience with the law for The Texas Observer after having an abortion last year. The state requires that a woman seeking an abortion receive a sonogram at least 24 hours before the procedure.

Journalist Robert Draper's article for The Atlantic traces how the redistricting process has been manipulated for electoral gain. It has created increasingly solid Republican or Democratic congressional districts, which has led to more representatives who are unwilling to compromise, Draper tells Fresh Air.

The alternative country singer from West Texas pays tribute to his late father on an album of honky-tonk country classics, Come on Back. He describes his introduction to country music -- and seeing Johnny Cash perform for the first time -- in a 2005 interview with Terry Gross.

This interview was originally broadcast on Nov. 23, 2005.

Quanah Parker, considered the greatest Comanche chief, was the son of Cynthia Ann Parker, a white pioneer woman kidnapped by a raiding party when she was a little girl. Their story — and the saga of the powerful American Indian tribe — is told by S.C. Gwynne in his new book, Empire of the Summer Moon.