Podcast - Ashton Lee

Linda Lloyd interviews Ashton Lee about his latest installment in the Cherry Cola Book Club series, A Cherry Cola Christmas, in which business opportunities to help save the town, as well as a country superstar are considering coming to Cherico, Mississippi to help the struggling town.

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Podcast - Lori Wilde

Linda Lloyd interviews superstar romance author Lori Wilde about the latest and festive entry into her Twilight Texas series, I'll Be Home for Christmas.

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Podcast - Claire Vaye Watkins

Claire Vaye Watkins's story collection, Battleborn, won many prizes including the Story Prize and the Dylan Thomas Prize. In this episode, we discuss her debut novel, Gold Fame Citrus, in which the southwest United States has been devastated by a long term drought and those who stayed behind are struggling to survive.

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Podcast - Leonard Pitts, Jr.

I'm honored to welcome Pulitzer Prize-winning newspaper columnist Leonard Pitts, Jr. to the program. In addition to his award-winning syndicated columns, which originate with the Miami Herald, he also writes acclaimed novels like Freeman and Before I Forget. In this episode we discuss his latest novel, Grant Park, in which a newspaper columnist and his editor are already having a horrible day when they become entangled with two white-supremacist, wannabe terrorists.

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Podcast - Stephan Pastis

Stephan Pastis is best known for his award-winning daily comic strip, Pearls Before Swine, which has a new treasury available, entitled, Pearls Gets Sacrificed. But today, we'll begin the conversation talking about Timmy Failure: Sanitized for Your Protection, the fourth entry in his series about the less-than-great, grade-school detective.

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Podcast - Nicola Yoon

Nicola Yoon talks about her debut Novel, Everything Everything, which debuted at number one on the New York Times Young Adult bestseller list. It's the story of an 18 year old girl who has been stuck at home her entire life because of her severely compromised immune system and what she will do for the sake of love.

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Podcast - Sloane Crosley

Sloane Crosley has enjoyed a great deal of success for her humorous essays, including being a finalist for The Thurber Prize. Her collections, I Was Told There Would Be Cake and How Did You Get This Number were both NY Times bestsellers. Today, we'll be talking about her debut novel, The Clasp, which was inspired by the Guy de Maupassant short story, "The Necklace."

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Podcast - Lauren Groff

Lauren Groff has been on Book Talk twice before to talk about her previous novels, The Monsters of Templeton and Arcadia. Today we'll be discussing her latest novel Fates and Furies, which has already been named a finalist for the National Book Award.

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Podcast - Matthew Guinn

When last in our studio, Matthew Guinn and I talked about his debut novel, The Resurrectionist, which went on to be a finalist for the Edgar Award for best first novel. W.W. Norton has recently published his second novel, The Scribe, where a madman terrorizes the African-American citizens of Atlanta in the early 1880s.

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Podcast - Garth Stein

Playwright and best-selling novelist Garth Stein recently stopped by the Book Talk studios. Garth is probably best known for his smash best-seller, The Art of Racing in the Rain. We start the conversation with his most recent novel, A Sudden Light, which was recently released in paperback by Simon and Schuster.

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Podcast - Dennis Bryon

Dennis Bryon first tasted pop chart success as the drummer for the Welsh blue-eyed soul band The Amen Corner. A few years later, he joined another band and got to travel the world and enjoy incredible success, which he writes about in his memoir You Should Be Dancing: My Life with the Bee Gees.

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Podcast - Andrew Malan Milward

Andrew Malan Milward, who is the editor-in-chief of Mississippi Review and professor of creative writing at the University of Southern Mississippi. His first collection of short stories, The Agriculture Hall of Fame won the Juniper Prize, and his second collection, I Was a Revolutionary, was recently published by Harper.

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Podcast - Tiffany Quay Tyson

Linda Lloyd talks to Mississippi native Tiffany Quay Tyson about her debut novel Three Rivers. Melody Mahaffey is unsatisfied as a keyboard player in a Christian pop band. She returns home to Mississippi as her mother abandons Melody's dying father and handicapped brother. A local man Obi tries to outrun a terrible mistake, and as the rivers rise, the stories converge.

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Podcast - John Scalzi

John Scalzi is a journalist, blogger and writer of non-fiction, and he has enjoyed a great deal of success as a science fiction novelist. He's written several stand-alone novels, like the Hugo Award-winning Redshirts, but today we talk about the sixth entry into his Old Man's War series, The End of All Things.

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Podcast - Adam Johnson

Credit: Tamara Beckwith

Adam Johnson back to the program today. Adam was last on Book Talk for his novel, The Orphan Master's Son which would go on to win the 2013 Pulitzer Prize for Fiction, and well as the Dayton Peace Prize. He's also previously published the novel Parasites Like Us, and the short story collection, Emporium. Today we discuss his success as well as his new collection of short stories, Fortune Smiles, which is published by Random House.

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Podcast - Barry Wolverton

Barry Wolverton enjoyed a good deal of success for his debut novel for younger readers, Neversink. On this episode, we talk about the first book in his new series Chronicles of the Black Tulip. Book one is The Vanishing Island, and it's published by Walden Pond Press.

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Podcast - Amy Stewart

Amy Stewart might be best known as a writer of lively non-fiction about the natural world, with several books including Flower Confidential, Wicked Plants, and The Drunken Botanist, but today we talk about her fiction debut, Girl Waits with Gun, which is published by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt.

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Podcast - Katy Simpson Smith

Katy Simpson Smith earned a Ph.D in history from the University of North Carolina-Chapel Hill and an MFA from Bennington. She's published one non-fiction work, We Have Raised All of You: Motherhood in the South, 1750-1835, and last year her debut novel, The Story of Land and Sea was released, and is now available in paperback from Harper Perennial.

Download here.

Book Talk Schedule for the Week of August 24, 2015

M-F at 12:30 p.m.

Mon, August 13 - Jacqueline Winspear "Elegy for Eddie"
Tue, August 14 - Donald McCaig "Rhett Butler's People"
Wed, August 15 - Carrie Bebris "The Sedition at Sanditon"
Thu, August 26 - Karen Essex "Stealing Athena"
Fri, August 27 - R.J. Ellory "A Quiet Belief in Angels"

Saturday, August 29

6:00 p.m. - Katy Simpson Smith "The Story of Land and Sea"
6:30 p.m. - Barry Wolverton "The Vanishing Island"

Podcast - Carrie Bebris

Carrie Bebris is the author of the seven book series of mystery novels starring Elizabeth and Mister Darcy from Jane Austen's Pride and Prejudice, the newest of which is The Suspicion at Sanditon, set in the world of Sanditon, the unfinished novel Austen had had worked on just prior to her death.

Download here.

Book Talk Schedule for the Week of August 17, 2015

M-F at 12:30 p.m.

Mon, August 17 - Debbie Macomber "Twenty Wishes"
Tue, August 18 - Joshilyn Jackson "Someone Else's Love Story"
Wed, August 19 - Susan Elizabeth Phillips "Heroes Are My Weakness"
Thu, August 20 - Haywood Smith "Ladies of the Lake"
Fri, August 21 - Lisa Patton "Whistling Dixie in a Nor'easter"

Saturday, August 22

6:00 p.m. - Carrie Bebris "The Sedition at Sanditon"
6:30 p.m. - Donald McCaig "Rhett Butler's People"

Podcast - Susan Elizabeth Phillips

Susan Elizabeth Phillips is the only writer to the Romance Writers of America favorite book award five times. She's also been elected to their hall of fame and has received their lifetime achievement award. She's written the popular Wynette, Texas and Chicago Stars series, but she stopped by the Book Talk studios to talk to Linda Lloyd about her latest stand-alone novel, Heroes Are My Weakness, which is new in paperback.

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Book Talk Schedule for the Week of August 10, 2015

M-F at 12:30 p.m.

Mon, August 10 - Hillary Jordan "Mudbound"
Tue, August 11 - Michael Morris "Man in the Blue Moon"
Wed, August 12 - Susan Crandall "The Flying Circus"
Thu, August 13 -Lee Martin "River of Heaven"
Fri, August 14 - Cornelia Nixon "Jarretsville"

Saturday, August 15

6:00 p.m. - Susan Elizabeth Phillips "Heroes Are My Weakness"
6:30 p.m. - Joshilyn Jackson "Someone Else's Love Story"

Podcast - Susan Crandall

Susan Crandall was last on to talk about her breakthrough best-selling novel, Whistling Past the Graveyard. This time, we'll be discussing her new historical novel, The Flying Circus, which is published by Gallery Books.

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Book Talk Schedule for the Week of August 3, 2015

M-F at 12:30 p.m.

Mon, August 3 - Philip Stephens "Miss Me When I'm Gone"
Tue, August 4 - Matthew Guinn "The Resurrectionist"
Wed, August 5 - Martin Clark "The Jezebel Remedy"
Thu, August 6 -N. M. Kelby "Murder at the Bad Girl's Bar and Grill"
Fri, August 7 - Jeffrey Buckner Ford "Tennessee Ernie Ford and the Woman He Loved"

Saturday, August 8

6:00 p.m. - Susan Crandall "The Flying Circus"
6:30 p.m. - Michael Morris "Man in the Blue Moon"

Podcast - Martin Clark

The Honorable Martin Clark is a circuit court judge from the Commonwealth of Virginia, but we'll only be talking about the law as it is in the confines of his fourth novel, The Jezebel Remedy, which is published by Knopf.

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Schedule for the Week of July 27, 2015

M-F, 12:30 p.m.

Mon, July 27 -  Sophie Littlefield "A Bad Day for Mercy"

Tue, July 28 - Stuart Dill "Murder on Music Row"

Wed, July 29 -  Ace Atkins "The Redeemers"
Thu, July 30 - Rick Gavin "Ranchero"
Fri, July 31  - Daniel Friedman "Don't Ever Get Old"

Saturday, August 1

6:00 p.m. - Martin Clark "The Jezebel Remedy"
6:30 p.m. -  Matthew Guinn "The Resurrectionist"

Podcast - Ace Atkins

Ace Atkins is a former newspaper journalist and current writer of crime fiction. He started off with a series about the New Orleans private eye Nick Travers. Then he moved on to a quartet of critically acclaimed novels based on historic true crimes. Currently, he is continuing the Spenser series for the Robert B Parker estate, as well as writing his own series based in the northern Mississippi county of Tibbeha, the newest of which is 
The Redeemers.

Download here.

Book Talk Schedule for the Week of July 20, 2015

M-F, 12:30 p.m.

Mon, July 20 -  Karin Slaughter "Fractured"
Tue, July 21 - Michael Connelly "The Brass Verdict"
Wed, July 22 -  Jefferson Bass "The Breaking Point"
Thu, July 23 - Tess Gerritsen "Ice Cold"
Fri, July 24  - Joseph Kanon "Istanbul Passage"


Saturday, July 26

6:00 p.m. -  Ace Atkins "The Redeemers"
6:30 p.m. -  Stuart Dill "Murder on Music Row"

Podcast - Jefferson Bass

Our guest for this edition is Jon Jefferson, one half of the Jefferson Bass writing team. Together with Dr. Bill Bass, who founded the famous Body Farm forensic research facility at the University of Tennessee, Jon has published two works of nonfiction, and nine novels featuring forensic genius Dr. Bill Brockton. The newest of which is The Breaking Point.

Download here.

Podcast - Harrison Scott Key

Harrison Scott Key is a humorist whose writings have appeared in The New York Times, Reader's Digest, and The Oxford American. Harper has recently published his memoir, The World's Largest Man.

Download here.

Book Talk Schedule for the Week of July 13, 2015

M-F, 12:30 p.m.

Mon, July 13 -  Bruce Campbell "Make Love the Bruce Campbell Way"
Tue, July 14 - Jill Conner Brown "American Thighs: The Sweet Potato Queen's Guide to Preserving Your Assets"
Wed, July 15 -  Harrison Scott Key "The World's Largest Man"
Thu, July 16 - Chuck Klosterman "Killing Yourself to Live"
Fri, July 17  - Donna Johnson "Holy Ghost Girl"


Saturday, July 18

6:00 p.m. -  Jefferson Bass "The Breaking Point"
6:30 p.m. -  Michael Connelly "The Brass Verdict"

Book Talk Schedule for the Week of July 6, 2015

M-F, 12:30 p.m.

Mon, July 6 -  Lauretta Hannon "The Cracker Queen"
Tue, July 7 -  Alexis Coe "Alice and Freda Forever"
Wed, July 8 -  Sonja Livingston "Queen of the Fall"
Thu, July 9 - Jeanette Walls "Half-Broke Horses"
Fri, July 10  - Rheta Grimsley Johnson "Enchanted Evening Barbie and the Second Coming"


Saturday, July 11

6:00 p.m. -  Harrison Scott Key "The World's Largest Man"
6:30 p.m. -  Jill Conner Brown "American Thighs: The Sweet Potato Queen's Guide to Preserving Your Assets"

Podcast - Sonja Livingston

Sonja Livingston was last on Book Talk to talk about her memoir, Ghostbread, which won the AWP award for non-fiction. Today we'll be discussing her new collection of essays entitled, Queen of the Fall.

Download here.