NPR's Book of the Day Folgen

Yasheng Huang, a professor of global economics at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, names four major contributors to China's economy in his new book, The Rise and Fall of the EAST: exams, autocracy, stability and technology. Huang writes that those have been the driving factors of Chinese development dating back to the Sui dynasty, and particularly during the economic boom of the past half-century. But he tells Here & Now's Scott Tong that a declining property sector, a lack of investment in people and today's political leadership is ringing alarms for the country's future. To listen to Book of the Day sponsor-free and support NPR's book coverage, sign up for Book of the Day+ at plus.npr.org/bookoftheday Learn more about sponsor message choices: podcastchoices.com/adchoicesNPR Privacy Policy

Lucy Sante says it was a smartphone app that ultimately pushed her to come out to herself — and the world — as trans in her mid 60s. In her new memoir, I Heard Her Call My Name, the writer and professor chronicles how using the gender swap function on FaceApp ultimately opened a brand new life to her. And she tells NPR's Don Gonyea that though there are a lot of complexities to having that kind of realization later in life, there are also a lot of positive outcomes. To listen to Book of the Day sponsor-free and support NPR's book coverage, sign up for Book of the Day+ at plus.npr.org/bookofthedayLearn more about sponsor message choices: podcastchoices.com/adchoicesNPR Privacy Policy

Early in today's episode, NPR's Mary Louise Kelly asks Pulitzer Prize-winning writer Steve Coll why he felt the need to write The Achilles Trap about the Iraq War amidst so many ongoing world conflicts. Coll explains that he hoped enough time had passed to try to answer a lingering question: Why did Saddam Hussein allow the world to believe he harbored weapons of mass destruction when he didn't? Coll's reporting – which includes Hussein's own audio recordings – unravels decades of tension and miscommunication between the U.S. and Iraq, which ultimately cost hundreds of thousands of lives. To listen to Book of the Day sponsor-free and support NPR's book coverage, sign up for Book of the Day+ at plus.npr.org/bookoftheday Learn more about sponsor message choices: podcastchoices.com/adchoicesNPR Privacy Policy