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On the show
From 22 epsHosts
Recent guests
Recent episodes
Philip Norman, "Mr. Moonlight: Brian Epstein and the Making of the Beatles" (Da Capo Press, 2026)
Jun 26, 2026
39m 58s
Xiaobing Li, "China’s Mahan: Admiral Liu Huaqing and the Rise of the Modern Chinese Navy (Naval Institute Press, 2026)
Jun 25, 2026
33m 44s
Where Harlem Rests at the Woodlawn Cemetery
Jun 23, 2026
Unknown duration
Samantha Ellis, "Always Carry Salt: A Memoir of Preserving Language and Culture" (Pegasus Books, 2026)
Jun 17, 2026
49m 38s
Emily Doucet, "Inventing Nadar: A History of Photographic Firsts" (Duke UP, 2026)
Jun 16, 2026
1h 08m 10s
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| Date | Episode | Topics | Guests | Brands | Places | Keywords | Sponsor | Length | |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 6/26/26 | ![]() Philip Norman, "Mr. Moonlight: Brian Epstein and the Making of the Beatles" (Da Capo Press, 2026) | Philip Norman's latest biography, Mr. Moonlight (DaCapo Press, 2026) is the definitive, comprehensive biography of Brian Epstein--the man who built the Beatles. There will never be another pop manager like Brian Epstein, the young record-retailer from Liverpool behind the 20th century's greatest romance. Having achieved his much-derided aim of making the Beatles "bigger than Elvis," Brian went on to make them bigger than any earthly instrument could measure. Only a handful of years older, he nonetheless referred them as "the Boys," protecting and pampering them like the children he could never hope to have. Due to his homosexuality--and possibly his Jewishness--Brian received no public honor (or even thanks) for this incalculable contribution to Britain's exports, let alone the national morale. He may not have been the best dealmaker for the Beatles, but in his hands, their guiding principles were always good taste, niceness to their fans, and value for money. Yet his only tangible memorials are a blue plaque marking his former office in London's theatreland and a modest bronze statue near the site of his family's electrical goods store in Liverpool. Mr. Moonlight draws on a cache of never-before-heard audio interviews to tell the story of this hugely complex, self-contradictory, and ultimately tragic character. From his Pre-Beatles years--the eight different expensive private schools at which he failed to shine, his problematic career as an army National Serviceman, his vague ambitions to be a couturier--through his management of the Beatles, where he turned a quartet of unruly young musicians in cracked black leather into a worldwide religion, up to his supposedly "incautious" overdoses in 1967 at aged 32, and the calamity that followed. As John Lennon said upon hearing the news, "Then we're fucked!"--and they were. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices Support our show by becoming a premium member! https://newbooksnetwork.supportingcast.fm/biography | 39m 58s | ||||||
| 6/25/26 | ![]() Xiaobing Li, "China’s Mahan: Admiral Liu Huaqing and the Rise of the Modern Chinese Navy (Naval Institute Press, 2026) | In 2012, China debuted its first aircraft carrier, the Liaoning, a refurbished Soviet-era ship from Ukraine. The debut of the Liaoning was largely thanks to a longtime pressure campaign by Liu Huaqing, the onetime leader of the People’s Liberation Army Navy and the man responsible for transforming China’s naval strategy. (China now has three carriers, and is building a fourth). When Liu began his career, China saw its military victories as coming primarily via land warfare; Liu, over decades, forced China to take naval combat seriously. Xiaobing Li writes about Liu’s life in his book China’s Mahan: Admiral Liu Huaqing and the Rise of the Modern Chinese Navy (Naval Institute Press, 2026), from his early career in the aftermath of the Chinese Civil War and finishing with his long push to start China’s aircraft carrier program. Xiaobing Li, professor of history and Don Betz Endowed Chair in International Studies at the University of Central Oklahoma, is the author of The Dragon in the Jungle, Attack at Chosin, Building Ho’s Army, History of Taiwan, and The Cold War in East Asia. He is the executive editor of the Chinese Historical Review. Li served in the PLA in China. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices Support our show by becoming a premium member! https://newbooksnetwork.supportingcast.fm/biography | 33m 44s | ||||||
| 6/23/26 | ![]() Where Harlem Rests at the Woodlawn Cemetery | A cemetery as open-air museum? Historian and award-winning author of Boss of the Grips: The Life of James H. Williams and the Red Caps of Grand Central Terminal, Eric K. Washington thinks so. In this compelling discussion, Washington talks about his newly-completed project revealing the hidden stories of Harlem Renaissance figures buried at the historic Woodlawn Cemetery in the Bronx, New York. Funded by a $50,000 grant from the National Trust for Historic Preservation, the initiative was led by Washington, alongside A’Lelia Bundles, journalist, historian, and great-granddaughter of entrepreneur and icon Madam C.J. Walker. While the Harlem Renaissance is often told through a handful of well-known names, Where Harlem Rests (available here) allows for a look beyond the spotlight, uncovering the many voices that helped shape the movement, and the community itself, expanding the historical narrative, and honoring a broader, more inclusive legacy of creativity, resilience, and cultural impact that has long deserved recognition. The Woodlawn Conservancy is the 501c3 not-for-profit support organization for the Woodlawn Cemetery. Woodlawn Cemetery was established in 1863 and spans 400 acres in the Bronx, New York. It is one of the nation’s most distinguished historic cemeteries and a certified Level II Arboretum. In 2011, Woodlawn was designated a National Historic Landmark for its singular importance in the history of the nation and New York City. It is also an active cemetery with ongoing burials and funeral services, and more than 310,000 individuals are memorialized on its grounds. Woodlawn is one of the nation's finest examples of a 19th-century garden cemetery. Its monuments represent some of the best memorial art and architecture in the nation, including nearly 1,300 private mausoleums designed by some of the most prominent architects of the 20th century. The Woodlawn Cemetery is open to the public free of charge 365 days a year from 8:30am - 4:30 pm. You can find Erik at his website, and on at personal Instagram page, as well as @taggingthepast. His recommended reading list is available on the Additions to the Archive Substack. Subscribe, like, follow, and rate Additions to the Archive with Sullivan Summer on Instagram, Substack, and wherever you get your podcasts. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices Support our show by becoming a premium member! https://newbooksnetwork.supportingcast.fm/biography | — | ||||||
| 6/17/26 | ![]() Samantha Ellis, "Always Carry Salt: A Memoir of Preserving Language and Culture" (Pegasus Books, 2026) | I had the privilege of speaking with writer Samantha Ellis about her deeply moving new book, Always Carry Salt: A Memoir of Preserving Language and Culture (Pegasus Books, 2026). Our discussion explored not only the story of a disappearing language, but also the broader questions of memory, identity, and what it means to inherit a fragile cultural legacy. At the heart of Ellis’s book is Judeo-Iraqi Arabic—also known as Baghdadi Jewish Arabic or Hakimalna—a language once spoken by the Jews of Iraq. Rich with layers of Hebrew and Judeo-Babylonian Aramaic, it reflects over two millennia of Jewish life in the region. Today, however, it stands on the brink of extinction. As Ellis shared, a language is considered endangered when it is no longer passed on to children, and Judeo-Iraqi Arabic may have only about a thousand speakers remaining worldwide. Within a generation, it could fall silent. Ellis described a powerful turning point in her own awareness: a casual question from another parent about why she was not sending her son to a nursery that spoke “her language.” Her spontaneous response—“my language is dead”—became the catalyst for the journey that led to this book. That moment captures the quiet grief of linguistic loss, but also the urgency of preservation. Our conversation traced the long arc of Iraqi Jewish history, beginning with the Babylonian exile in 597 BCE. Iraqi Jews lived in the region long before the arrival of Arabic, shifting over centuries from Hebrew to Aramaic and later to Arabic, while preserving distinctive linguistic features from earlier eras. This layered history lives on in the language itself. Yet the mass departures of Iraqi Jews in the mid-20th century—particularly the 1950–51 airlift—fractured this continuity. Today, only a handful of Jews remain in Iraq. And yet, as Ellis emphasized, culture does not disappear all at once. Language may fade, but other forms of transmission endure. Food, in particular, becomes a powerful vessel of memory. Ellis initially resisted including recipes in her book, but came to understand that cooking is itself a kind of language—a sensory bridge to the past. The image of her mother carrying three rolling pins from Iraq is emblematic of this continuity: tangible objects that hold intangible heritage. Even the book’s title gesture—“always carry salt”—evokes protective practices familiar across Mizrahi communities, small rituals that encode belief, memory, and identity. We also discussed the remarkable story of the Iraqi Jewish Archive, discovered in 2003 in the flooded basement of Saddam Hussein’s secret police headquarters. The archive contains hundreds of thousands of documents—school records, letters, communal registers—offering an intimate portrait of everyday Jewish life in Iraq. Today, innovative projects are using AI to transcribe and translate these materials across multiple scripts, making them accessible to descendants and scholars alike. Yet the archive’s ultimate fate remains uncertain, raising complex questions about ownership, memory, and cultural restitution. A particularly resonant theme in our conversation was Ellis’s struggle with authenticity. As a second-generation Iraqi Jew raised in the UK, she grappled with whether she had the “right” to tell this story, especially without having visited Iraq herself. Her resolution—to be “authentic to me”—offers an important model for thinking about diasporic identity. Preservation, she suggests, does not require perfect replication. It allows for adaptation, creativity, even reinvention. One can honor tradition while also “messing with it,” whether by adjusting a recipe or reimagining inherited practices. Ellis introduces a beautiful concept she calls “milk language”—the language absorbed in early childhood, through intimacy and care, even if it is not the dominant language of one’s environment. This idea invites us to reconsider how language lives within us, not only as a tool of communication but as a carrier of emotional and cultural memory. As an educator, I was especially struck by Ellis’s closing insight and her implicit call to action: to speak with our elders while we still can. There is a profound difference between hearing fragments of family stories in childhood and sitting down, as an adult, to listen fully and intentionally. These conversations do more than preserve history; they create connection, continuity, and a deeper sense of self. Always Carry Salt is not only a memoir. It is an invitation—to remember, to document, and to carry forward what might otherwise be lost. In a time when so many cultural threads are at risk of unraveling, Ellis’s work reminds us that preservation begins with attention, with curiosity, and with the willingness to listen. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices Support our show by becoming a premium member! https://newbooksnetwork.supportingcast.fm/biography | 49m 38s | ||||||
| 6/16/26 | ![]() Emily Doucet, "Inventing Nadar: A History of Photographic Firsts" (Duke UP, 2026) | Félix Nadar took the first aerial photograph in 1858, so the story goes. The evidence, Emily Doucet notes, is mixed. In Inventing Nadar: A History of Photographic Firsts (Duke UP, 2026), Doucet analyzes the historical and material production of the nineteenth-century Parisian photographer’s famous and numerous photographic firsts. Focusing on these oft-labeled groundbreaking elements of his career, she deconstructs Nadar’s legacy as a prime protagonist in the history of photography by interrogating the media techniques used to construct his invention narratives. Doucet highlights this highly mediated process as one that canonized novel applications of photography as discrete techniques with single authors and inventors. Looking to this process of mediation through the institutions and individuals that shaped Nadar’s archives, Doucet unpacks assumptions of Nadar as a master of early photography and shows how the medium is enmeshed in larger histories of media, science, and technology. The result is both a new account of Nadar’s place in photographic history and a critical study of how stories of innovation take shape. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices Support our show by becoming a premium member! https://newbooksnetwork.supportingcast.fm/biography | 1h 08m 10s | ||||||
| 6/15/26 | ![]() Colin Flahive, "The Galaxy's Last Ride: Shifting Gears in Rural China" (Earnshaw Books, 2026) | Colin Flahive is an American entrepreneur and writer who has spent more than two decades living and running social enterprises in southwestern China. He is best known as one of the founders of Salvador's Coffee House, which is a hub of international exchange in Kunming, the capital of Yunnan province. In this New Books Network episode, we talk with Colin about his latest book, The Galaxy's Last Ride: Shifting Gears in Rural China (Earnshaw Books, 2026). The Galaxy's Last Ride is a rich combination of memoir, travelogue, and oral history that explores China's sweeping development through a deeply personal lens. The book weaves together several strands—a 2,500-kilometer solo motorcycle journey that Colin took across rural China during the height of the COVID-19 pandemic, the personal stories of Salvador’s employees, and recollections from Colin’s past travels—to paint a part-insider-part-outsider portrait of China’s evolutions over the last two decades. Anthony Kao is a writer who intersects international affairs and cultural criticism. He founded/edits Cinema Escapist—a publication exploring the sociopolitical context behind global film and television—and also writes for outlets like The Guardian, Al Jazeera, The Diplomat, and Eater. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices Support our show by becoming a premium member! https://newbooksnetwork.supportingcast.fm/biography | 46m 39s | ||||||
| 6/14/26 | ![]() Ida Kinalska-Pietruska and Isabella Skrypczak, "A Polish Girl in Siberia: Surviving and Transcending Exile" (Disruption Books, 2026) | A memoir of a child’s forced relocation to Siberia under Stalin’s Gulag system reveals the potential for true human kindness in the face of extraordinary hardship. In April of 1940, six-year-old Ida woke to the sound of pounding on her door. Soviet soldiers forcibly packed her and her mother onto a train with thousands of their neighbors and deported them to remote Siberia, leaving them stranded to survive the brutal winter in subhuman conditions. Looking back, Ida shares their struggles: foraging for food, trying to reunite with her imprisoned father, spending weeks in a desolate hospital with typhoid fever, and adapting to shifts in the political climate to make the long journey home to Poland. Ida published this acclaimed memoir in her native Polish in 2011. Here, Ida’s granddaughter, Isabella Skrypczak, translates her babcia’s words and provides additional context—including describing the remarkable life Ida has gone on to live as a pioneering doctor. In the vein of Anne Frank’s The Diary of a Young Girl, A Polish Girl in Siberia: Surviving and Transcending Exile (Disruption Books, 2026) chronicles Ida’s experiences on a lesser-known front of the Second World War. Together, Ida and Isabella reflect on how every small act of kindness contributed to Ida’s liberation from exile and ability to build a life and a family. Her story celebrates the capacity of the human spirit to not only survive trauma but thrive beyond it.Ida Kinalska-Pietruska survived childhood exile to Siberia during the Soviet Union’s World War II assault on Poland. When she returned to Poland as a teen, she began studying medicine. A pioneering endocrinologist, she founded the School of Endocrinology and Diabetology in Białystok and led the region’s first endocrinology clinic for twenty years. Ida has authored more than four hundred publications, mentored countless other doctors, and collaborated across the international medical community, including using her research to make widely known the Chernobyl disaster’s effects on people’s endocrinological health. She has been honored with the Order Odrodzenia Polski, Poland’s second-highest civilian state award, and two Doctor Honoris Causa titles, reflecting her resilience, brilliance, and global impact on science and humanity.Isabella Skrypczak is an author, intuitive healer, and former HR professional in Big Tech whose work bridges the seen and unseen. Born to Polish immigrants and raised in Houston, Texas, she spent every summer with her grandmother in Poland. When her grandmother’s memoir gained national attention in Polish media, Iza felt called to translate it into English—an act of love, remembrance, and advocacy. As war returned to Eastern Europe, she recognized the urgency in sharing this history with the Western world. She lives in Austin, Texas, with her daughter, Kamila.Stephen Satkiewicz is an independent scholar with research areas spanning Civilizational Sciences, Social Complexity, Big History, Historical Sociology, Military History, War Studies, International Relations, Geopolitics, and Russian and East European history. He is currently the Book Review Editor for Comparative Civilizations Review. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices Support our show by becoming a premium member! https://newbooksnetwork.supportingcast.fm/biography | 1h 05m 50s | ||||||
| 6/13/26 | ![]() The Legacy of Chaim Grade✨ | Yiddish literatureHolocaust+4 | Ruth WisseOfer Dynes+1 | YIVONational Library of Israel+3 | VilnaPoland+2 | Chaim GradeYiddish literature+5 | — | — | |
| 6/11/26 | ![]() “America’s Founding Son”: Author & Musician Bob Crawford on the Life of John Quincy Adams✨ | John Quincy AdamsAmerican history+3 | Bob Crawford | Library of AmericaThe Avett Brothers+4 | — | John Quincy AdamsBob Crawford+3 | — | — | |
| 6/10/26 | ![]() Natalia Rogach Alexander, "Growing People: The Enduring Legacy of John Dewey" (Columbia UP, 2025)✨ | educationdemocracy+3 | Natalia Rogach Alexander | Columbia University PressGrowing People: The Enduring Legacy of John Dewey | — | John Deweyeducation+5 | — | 51m 37s | |
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| 6/9/26 | ![]() Understanding Themistocles: A Discussion with Author Michael Scott✨ | ancient historybiography+3 | Michael Scott | Yale UPThemistocles: The Rise and Fall of Athen’s Naval Mastermind | AthensUniversity of Warwick | Themistoclesancient Athens+3 | — | 35m 54s | |
| 6/8/26 | ![]() Andrea Gunraj, "Go-Between Girl: My Indentured Roots as Reclaimed Present" (McClelland & Stewart, 2026)✨ | indentured servitudefamily history+4 | Andrea Gunraj | McClelland & StewartGo-Between Girl: My Indentured Roots as Reclaimed Present+2 | Toronto | indentured labourdiaspora+5 | — | 25m 27s | |
| 6/4/26 | ![]() Mollie Barnes, "Paper Heroines: Women Writers in Conversation and Community Across the Sea Islands, 1838-1902" (U South Carolina Press, 2026)✨ | women writersbiography+5 | Dr. Mollie Barnes | U South Carolina PressPaper Heroines: Women Writers in Conversation and Community Across the Sea Islands, 1838-1902 | South Carolina LowcountryPort Royal+3 | close readingarchival silences+6 | — | 49m 38s | |
| 6/3/26 | ![]() A Divine Comedy: On Hollywood, Creativity, and Religion with Rob Long✨ | HollywoodCreativity+5 | Rob Long | National ReviewCommentary+16 | — | HollywoodRob Long+8 | — | 1h 03m 45s | |
| 6/2/26 | ![]() Steven Nadler, "Spinoza, Atheist" (Princeton UP, 2026)✨ | philosophyatheism+4 | Steven Nadler | Princeton University PressSpinoza, Atheist+1 | AmsterdamPortugal | Spinozaatheism+6 | — | 40m 55s | |
| 6/2/26 | ![]() Elizabeth Stordeur Pryor, "Something We Said: Richard Pryor, a Notorious Word and Me" (37 Ink, 2026)✨ | N-wordracism+4 | Elizabeth Stordeur Pryor | 37 InkSomething We Said: Richard Pryor, a Notorious Word and Me+1 | — | N-wordRichard Pryor+6 | — | — | |
| 5/31/26 | ![]() Craig Fehrman, "This Vast Enterprise: A New History of Lewis & Clark" (Simon & Schuster, 2026)✨ | Lewis and Clark ExpeditionAmerican History+3 | Craig Fehrman | Corps of DiscoverySimon & Schuster+1 | — | Lewis and ClarkCraig Fehrman+3 | — | 59m 00s | |
| 5/30/26 | ![]() Annette Gordon-Reed ed., "Jefferson on Race: A Reader" (Princeton UP, 2026) | From The New York Times–bestselling and Pulitzer Prize–winning author of The Hemingses of Monticello, a groundbreaking collection of Thomas Jefferson’s writings on race that every American should read Among America’s Founding Fathers, none was more deeply, personally, or controversially entangled with race and slavery than Thomas Jefferson. The man whose Declaration of Independence proclaimed that “all men are created equal” enslaved more than 600 people of African descent even as he acknowledged the injustice of slavery, saw himself as its opponent, and condemned it in his writings. How is this possible? In Jefferson on Race: A Reader (Princeton University Press, 2026), Pulitzer Prize–winning historian Annette Gordon-Reed gathers Jefferson’s most revealing writings about African Americans, slavery, and Native Americans, enabling readers as never before to directly explore his complex and contradictory thoughts, feelings, and decisions on these subjects—the most hotly debated aspect of his legacy. These selections come from Jefferson’s public and private writings, letters, and plantation records, as well as accounts by contemporaries, including his son Madison Hemings and three other people formerly enslaved at Monticello. The book documents Jefferson’s ideas about—and self-image in relation to—African Americans, slavery, and Native Americans, as well as his conduct, including interactions with individual Black and Native people. The writings show how Jefferson responded to living in a multiracial slave society while professing progressive ideals, and how his views on race and slavery were shaped by his experiences with enslaved Black people. Jefferson on Race is essential reading for anyone seeking to understand Jefferson’s conflicted attitudes—and the impact of race and slavery on American history. Annette Gordon-Reed is a New York Times-bestselling historian and the Carl M. Loeb University Professor at Harvard University. Her books include The Hemingses of Monticello: An American Family, which won the Pulitzer Prize and National Book Award, Caleb Zakarin is CEO and Publisher of the New Books Network. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices Support our show by becoming a premium member! https://newbooksnetwork.supportingcast.fm/biography | — | ||||||
| 5/29/26 | ![]() Lauren W. Westerfield, "Woman House: Essays and Assemblages" (U Massachusetts Press, 2026) | A compelling and inventive memoir exploring how pain and pleasure are passed down through generations of women For years, Lauren W. Westerfield looked back at her childhood as an imaginative playscape lovingly crafted by her artist mother. But in truth, theirs was always a fraught relationship, close yet turbulent. It wouldn’t be until her mid-twenties that Westerfield would learn that her mother was assaulted while living as a single woman in 1970s Los Angeles, or until her mid-thirties when caretaking for her now chronically ill mother during pandemic lockdown would reveal how that earlier incident and its ripple effects had shaped both their lives. The essays and assemblages in this book plumb the depths of two women’s experiences, exploring the pain and pleasure they find in their bodies, in culture, and in their own art. Violence, beauty, and love reverberate and dissipate and shape the forms and psyches of these two profoundly connected family members. At once raw and refined, narrative and lyrical, nostalgic and blunt, the stories and images presented here explore Westerfield’s life—from childhood to adulthood—passing through innocence, self-discovery and familial tethers. In unpacking her mother’s history and the complexities of their relationship, Westerfield finds herself confronted with her own story: one grounded in a yearning for agency and individuation, of a body and mind groomed to be at odds with one another, of a feminist politics examining deeply rooted patriarchal understandings of beauty, control, and power. Part memoir, part critical sense-making, part reckoning with family, identity, illness, addiction, art, and inheritance, Woman House (U Massachusetts Press, 2026) draws on diverse inspirations in an attempt to recontextualize the female body—in danger, in pleasure, in portraiture, in proximity, in resistance—and challenge the structures that silence and restrict female expression. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices Support our show by becoming a premium member! https://newbooksnetwork.supportingcast.fm/biography | 37m 43s | ||||||
| 5/22/26 | ![]() Tony Lee Moral, "A Century of Hitchcock: The Man, the Myths, the Legacy" (UP of Kentucky, 2026) | For over a century, Alfred Hitchcock has remained one of cinema's most influential directors. Known as the Master of Suspense, this visionary filmmaker directed more than fifty films over six decades. His thriller The Lodger (1927) marked the start of his signature style, which was later exemplified in classic films like Vertigo (1958), North by Northwest (1959), Psycho (1960), and The Birds (1963). Hitchcock's work received tremendous success and critical acclaim. While he never won the competitive Academy Award for Best Director, he received five Oscar nominations, two Golden Globes, the Irving G. Thalberg Memorial Award, a BAFTA Fellowship, multiple lifetime achievement awards, and two stars on the Hollywood Walk of Fame. Nine of his films are preserved in the United States National Film Registry. His mastery of tension, innovative camera techniques, and psychological depth continue to inspire and influence modern filmmakers such as Christopher Nolan, Jordan Peele, and Bong Joon Ho. Drawing on new archival research, previously unpublished interviews, and a rigorous examination of key biographies, A Century of Hitchcock: The Man, the Myths, the Legacy (University Press of Kentucky, 2026) challenges the long-standing narratives that have shaped Hitchcock's legacy. Author Tony Lee Moral revisits controversial claims regarding Hitchcock's alleged abuses, scrutinizing biographer Donald Spoto's interpretations—particularly Spoto's portrayal of the director's relationship with actress Tippi Hedren. With his analysis of Spoto's 1980 interview of Hedren, Moral reveals for the first time how one key document contradicts decades of exaggeration. In this comprehensive reappraisal of Hitchcock's career, Moral encourages readers to explore the complexities of creative collaboration and the risks of relying on a single biographical narrative. Marking one hundred years since Hitchcock's first film, The Pleasure Garden, and fifty years since his last film, Family Plot, Moral reexamines the director's cinematic brilliance, storytelling mastery, creative partnerships, and controversies, offering a fresh perspective on Hitchcock's legacy in the post-#MeToo era. Tony Lee Moral is a British filmmaker and author who specializes in film history, especially the work of Alfred Hitchcock. He is the author of Hitchcock and the Making of Marnie, The Making of Hitchcock's The Birds, The Young Alfred Hitchcock's Moviemaking Master Class, and Alfred Hitchcock Storyboards. Morteza Hajizadeh is a Ph.D. graduate in English from the University of Auckland in New Zealand. His research interests are Cultural Studies; Critical Theory; Environmental History; Medieval (Intellectual) History; Gothic Studies; 18th- and 19th-century British Literature. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices Support our show by becoming a premium member! https://newbooksnetwork.supportingcast.fm/biography | 35m 33s | ||||||
| 5/19/26 | ![]() Tom Meschery, "The Mad Manchurian: From the Internment Camps of Tokyo to the Hardwood Courts of the NBA" (Coffeetown Press, 2025) | I was born in Harbin, Manchuria, (later China), in 1938. At the outbreak of the Second World War my mother, sister and I, along with other non-combatants of the Allied countries, were taken by the Japanese to an internment camp in Tokyo where we would remain four year--to the end of the war. My mother's recollection is that I was a sickly child. By the time I arrived in Japan, according to her, I had survived diphtheria, whooping cough, yellow fever, smallpox and tuberculosis. Such afflictions, to my mother's astonishment, did not keep me from growing to my adult height of 6'6" and muscular weight of 220 pounds. Nor did they keep me from being strong enough and skillful enough to become a professional basketball player and play 10 years for the National Basketball Association, as the first ethnic Russian and immigrant to do so, and the first to be named to an All-Star team. Listen to this interview about The Mad Manchurian: From the Internment Camps of Tokyo to the Hardwood Courts of the NBA (Coffeetown Press, 2025). Paul Knepper covered the New York Knicks for Bleacher Report. His first book was The Knicks of the Nineties: Ewing, Oakley, Starks and the Brawlers That Almost Won It All. His next book, Moses Malone: The Life of a Basketball Prophet, is now available. You can reach Paul at paulknepper@gmail.com and follow him on Twitter @paulieknep. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices Support our show by becoming a premium member! https://newbooksnetwork.supportingcast.fm/biography | 1h 01m 57s | ||||||
| 5/10/26 | ![]() Shannon McKenna Schmidt, "You Can't Catch Us: Lady Bird Johnson’s Trailblazing 1964 Campaign Train and the Women Who Rode With Her" (Sourcebooks, 2026) | From the author of The First Lady of WWII comes You Can't Catch Us: Lady Bird Johnson’s Trailblazing 1964 Campaign Train and the Women Who Rode With Her (Sourcebooks, 2026), the story of Lady Bird Johnson's groundbreaking trip during the 1964 election, and the women who rode with her. "It takes women to have guts." Deemed “the most important campaign effort ever undertaken by the wife of an American president,” the Lady Bird Special was a whistle-stop tour of the South undertaken by Lady Bird Johnson, in a bid for her husband’s reelection in 1964. Never before had a president’s spouse taken to the campaign trail so ambitiously. The 1,682-mile trek through the southern United States, from Washington DC to New Orleans, was a deliberate choice by Lady Bird—many in the southern states resented her husband’s championing of civil rights. But the first lady, proud of her southern heritage, wanted to appeal to her fellow southerners and bridge the divide. Despite the potential danger, she pressed forward, making speeches, shaking hands, and showing herself to be confident, capable, and impressive. You Can't Catch Us is a story of an election campaign, but it is also a story of a women-led operation and an appeal for understanding and civility. Lady Bird Johnson's exciting journey was monumental in expanding the role of women in politics and progressing the fight for women’s rights—a fight we still continue to this day. Hosted by Jane Scimeca, Professor of History at Brookdale Community College: website here @janescimeca.bsky.social Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices Support our show by becoming a premium member! https://newbooksnetwork.supportingcast.fm/biography | 36m 39s | ||||||
| 5/7/26 | ![]() Lucy Stewart, "The Japanese Garden: Ella Christie and Cowden" (Birlinn, 2026)✨ | Japanese gardenElla Christie+4 | Lucy Stewart | Birlinn | Cowden CastleDollar+2 | Japanese gardenElla Christie+6 | — | 53m 00s | |
| 5/7/26 | ![]() Mary Lucia, " What Doesn't Kill Me Makes Me Weirder and Harder to Relate To" (U Minnesota Press, 2025)✨ | stalkingmemoir+4 | Mary Lucia | U Minnesota Press | Twin Cities | stalkingrock DJ+6 | — | 46m 38s | |
| 5/5/26 | ![]() Lerone Martin, "Young King: The Making of Martin Luther King Jr." (Amistad, 2026)✨ | biographycivil rights+4 | Lerone A. Martin | Martin Luther King InstituteAmistad | ConnecticutJim Crow South+1 | Martin Luther King Jr.biography+6 | — | — | |
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Pitch Fit is a Pro feature
See how bookable this show is for guests, which brands already advertise, the per-episode ad value, and the best-fit guest and sponsor profile. The numbers are blurred on the free plan.
How readily this show books outside guests like you.
How proven this show is for host-read sponsorships.
For Guests
ProFor Advertisers
ProUpgrade to Pro to unlock guest cadence, sponsor categories, fit scores, and per-episode ad value for this show.
