Booktalk with Diana Korte

Host Diana Korte speaks with naval aviator Dan Pedersen , author of   “TOPGUN. An American Story,” who was the boss of the group that formed the elite Navy Fighter Weapons School. Also known as the TOPGUN program, it began in Miramar, California 57 years ago.  CLASSIC. I’m re-airing this 2019 conversation with Dan in 4th of July week because his advice at the end of it, in particular, is a good re...

Host Diana Korte speaks with writer Lisa See who has published 13 books. Her newest title, DAUGHTERS OF THE SUN AND MOON , is the story of three Chinese women immigrants. As the book begins, it’s 1870 when these Chinese women arrive in the small, dusty, and violent part of Los Angeles. Each woman has her own desires. Dove wants to love and be loved, Petal desires freedom, and Moon seeks justice. T...

Host Diana Korte speaks with writer and Iraq War veteran Kevin Powers .  Author of 5 books, his first title, “The Yellow Birds,” is considered a landmark work of American fiction and was a finalist for the National Book Award. His newest title, CHILDREN OF THE WILD , is a love story of three people written against the background of rural Virginia, WW1 battle scenes and the 1918 pandemic. As the bo...

Host Diana Korte speaks with Pulitzer Prize - winning novelist Jane Smiley, author of 34 books. Her newest title, “LIDIE. The Further Travels and Adventures of Lidie Newton,” follows two young women fleeing a divided America in 1857.   When Lidie’s niece Annie becomes an actress at the local theater in Quincy IL, and is offered an opportunity to perform in England, she decides to run away. But tra...

Host Diana Korte speaks with historian and University of Georgia professor Daniel Rood, author of 2 books. His newest title is “IN THE SHADOW OF THE GREAT HOUSE. A History of the Plantation in America.”  In a narrative that sweeps across 400 years of American history, Rood reveals that the plantation did not die after the Civil War. It metastasized.   From the advent of sharecropping in the late 1...

Host Diana Korte speaks with science writer Helen Pearson , author of 2 books and editor for England’s prestigious  Nature Journal. Her newest title is, “BEYOND BELIEF: How Evidence Shows What Really Works.”   In an age of alternative facts, today more people around the globe are using scientific evidence to figure out what works in health and medicine, government, business, as well as conservatio...

Host Diana Korte speaks with historian Craig Fehrman whose newest title, THIS VAST ENTERPRISE, is a major revisionist history of the Lewis and Clark years-long expedition that began in 1804.   Commissioned by President Thomas Jefferson who fought bitter Congressional unrest to get the funding for it, this group of 45 or so traveled up the Missouri River from St. Louis to the Pacific Ocean in Orego...

Host Diana Korte speaks with Marie Benedict , known for her suspenseful historical fiction, about her 10th book, DAUGHTER OF EGYPT, a story of two ambitious women who lived centuries apart.  In the 1920s, British archeologist Howard Carter and Lord Carnarvon of Highclere Castle  (the real life Downton Abbey) made headlines around the world with the discovery of the treasure-filled tomb of the boy...

Host Diana Korte speaks with Harry Reis whose newest title is "HOW TO FEEL LOVED. The Five Mindsets That Get You More of What Matters Most." We can be loved and still not feel loved. Many people believe that if they behave the right way, say the right things, or make themselves more lovable, they will feel more loved. Turns out it doesn’t work that way. In this exceptional book the autho...

Host Diana Korte speaks with  New York Times  bestselling author Caroline Paul , author of 8 books. Her newest title is “WHY FLY. Seeking Awe, Healing, and Our True Selves in the Sky.”  She’s been drawn to flying since she was twenty and learned to fly a single-engine plane for the first time. In her thirties, she moved to a paraglider, in her forties, a motorized hang glider. Now in her fifties,...

Host Diana Korte speaks with author Alia Hanna Habib this week whose debut book is “TAKE IT FROM ME, An Agent's Guide to Building a Nonfiction Writing Career from Scratch.” She’s the agent behind some of today’s most successful authors and has written a narrative guide geared specifically to the needs of aspiring and working nonfiction writers. She demystifies the world of publishing and offer...

Host Diana Korte spoke with Ex-Evangelical Josiah Hesse this week about his fourth book,  “ON FIRE FOR GOD. Fear, Shame, Poverty, and the Making of the Christian Right—A Personal History.” When asked why he wrote this book, Colorado-based Hesse said “I was tired of hearing my colleagues in journalism express their bafflement as to why working-class evangelicals would support a man like Donald Trum...

Host Diana Korte speaks with  Meg Donohue , author of 6 books, whose newest title is “The Memory Gardener”  about Lucy Barnes, a gardener with a magical ability to grow flowers whose scents awaken lost memories.   Her work among the lush gardens of Oceanview Home, a retirement community, soon helps residents unearth memories that will forever change all who cross Lucy’s path there.  In today’s uns...

Wild West Historian Mark Lee Gardner's newest title--his 12th--is "BROTHERS OF THE GUN: Wyatt Earp, Doc Holliday, and a Reckoning in Tombstone."  He focuses on the friendship between the two men and uses new research to provide a detailed account of their lives, their involvement in the politics of the Old West, and the famous O.K. Corral gunfight in Tombstone, AZ.  As an authority o...

Host Diana Korte speaks with military historian  Phillips Payson O’Brien, author of 5 books, whose newest title is “WAR AND POWER. Who Wins Wars And Why.”            He is an American professor of strategic studies at the University of St Andrews in Scotland and known for his work on 20th and 21st-century conflict, war, and politics.            His groundbreaking book reveals that military might a...

This is Diana Korte with Booktalk. My guest today is true-crime reporter Skip Hollandsworth ⁠⁠, author of 2 books. His newest is SHE KILLS : The Murderous Socialite, the Cross-Dressing Bank Robber, and Other True Crime Tales.” This book focuses on female perpetrators—from the high schooler who was so desperate to move back in with Mom that she had no choice but to poison her father’s refried beans...

Host Diana Korte speaks with  Priyanka Kumar , author of 3 books, whose newest title is “ The Light Between Apple Trees: Rediscovering the Wild Through a Beloved American Fruit.”  As a child in the foothills of the Himalayas, Priyanka Kumar was entranced by forest-like orchards of diverse and luscious fruit—especially apples. These biodiverse orchards seemed worlds away from the cardboard apples t...

Host Diana Korte speaks with  Jade Chang , author of 2 books, whose newest title is WHAT A TIME TO BE ALIVE  about an accidental self-help guru. This book blends humor with an exploration of what it means to be living in our current moment, and for many of us, constantly consuming and being consumed by stories on social media.  Eventually, Lola Treasure Gold, the book's heroine, also takes a hard...

In her 8th book, ⁠ ⁠"REPLACEABLE YOU. Adventures in Human Anatomy"⁠ , science writer Mary Roach dives in with her characteristic verve and infectious wit. Her travels take her to the OR at a legendary burn unit in Boston, a “superclean” xeno-pigsty in China, and a stem cell “hair nursery” in a San Diego tech hub.  The body is the most complex machine in the world, and the only one for wh...

Host Diana Korte speaks with Artis Henderson whose newest title, “NO ORDINARY BIRD. Drug Smuggling, a Plane Crash, and a Daughter's Quest for the Truth,” is a page-turning true crime book based on personal history, interviews with long-lost family members (and co-conspirators), along with government records.      They all illuminate the life of her experienced pilot dad, Lamar Chester, who die...

Host Diana Korte speaks with  Bill McKibben , environmental activist and author of some 20 books. His newest title is “HERE COMES THE SUN. A Last Chance for the Climate and a Fresh Chance for Civilization.” Largely unnoticed by many of us is the rapid rise of power from the sun around the world. The cost of alternative energy—sun & wind—has fallen below the price of fossil fuels. Globally, eve...

Georgia Hunter 's first historical novel, “We Were the Lucky Ones” was born of her quest to uncover her family's staggering history. The book’s chapters are written in the voices of her ancestors, most of whom were in Poland at the beginning of World War II when 3 generations still gathered at the dining room table. By the end of the war, they had scattered to five continents. This book ha...

Host Diana Korte speaks with author and historian Scott Ellsworth about his fifth title, MIDNIGHT ON THE POTOMAC , my favorite civil war book.  Its pages are full of compelling details and new research that brings us a story many of us might have felt like we already knew. But turns out there are so many more facts he discovered in obscure places. It’s about the last year of the war, the Lincoln a...

Host Diana Korte speaks with Julie McFadden, author of  2 books--her  New York Times  bestselling “Nothing to Fear,” published in 2024, and her newest, “The Nothing to Fear Journal: Questions and Reflections for Demystifying and Preparing for the End of Life.” In both she interweaves emotional insight and practical advice.   Julie is a hospice/palliative care nurse with more than 15 years of exper...

Host Diana Korte speaks with award-winning journalist  Becky Aikman about her new book,  “SPITFIRES. The American Women Who Flew in the Face of Danger During World War II.”   This is a fast paced true story of the 25 US women who flew the world’s most dangerous aircraft through the treacherous skies of Britain during World War II eighty years ago. Another fifty years would pass before the first Am...