NPR's Book of the Day Folgen

Viet Thanh Nguyen's novel The Committed follows the same unnamed character we met in his Pulitzer-winning thriller, The Sympathizer. The character is now in Paris; having become disillusioned with the revolution he was a part of when we last saw him, he hasn't given up on the idea entirely. Nguyen told NPR's Scott Simon the book is also about colonization: He "wanted it to be set in a Paris that was not the tourist Paris or the romantic Paris. [It's] a novel about French ideas and French Revolution and French colonialism, but it's also a crime thriller set in these immigrant neighborhoods."Learn more about sponsor message choices: podcastchoices.com/adchoicesNPR Privacy Policy

In 1970, a cyclone tore through Pakistan and the political lines that existed, leading to genocide and very nearly a nuclear war in the country. Author Scott Carney was curious about this catastrophe but also how these extreme weather events, which are only becoming more common, have political consequences. Carney told NPR's Steve Inskeep that we will almost certainly face similar problems in the future, so we should be wary of today's unstable political systems.Learn more about sponsor message choices: podcastchoices.com/adchoicesNPR Privacy Policy

Author Karen Joy Fowler thinks John Wilkes Booth craved attention – and that gotten his fair share of it. So her new novel, Booth, instead focuses on his family. Their history might surprise you, given how John turned out. His grandfather was a part of the Underground Railroad. Fowler told NPR's Scott Simon that because of all we know about Booth's family, the path that John took is one of life's great mysteries. And, no, she hasn't solved it.Learn more about sponsor message choices: podcastchoices.com/adchoicesNPR Privacy Policy