The Avid Reader Show

Challenging leading scientific theories that claim that our senses report back objective reality, cognitive scientist Donald Hoffman argues that while we should take our perceptions seriously, we should not take them literally. How can it be possible that the world we see is not objective reality? And how can our senses be useful if they are not communicating the truth? Hoffman grapples with these...

Good afternoon everyone and welcome to another edition of The Avid Reader. Today our guest is Megan Angelo, author of Followers, her first novel. Megan is another fellow Pennsylvanian. It seems like all authors are now. From Madeline Miller, to Kiley Reid, Liz Moore, Vikram Pall-el-kar, and a bunch more. Then Ann Patchett who writes about my home town of Elkins Park. It’s wonderful. Megan’s writin...

Good afternoon everyone and welcome to another edition of The Avid Reader. Today our guest is Megan Angelo, author of Followers, her first novel. Megan is another fellow Pennsylvanian. It seems like all authors are now. From Madeline Miller, to Kiley Reid, Liz Moore, Vikram Pall-el-kar, and a bunch more. Then Ann Patchett who writes about my home town of Elkins Park. It’s wonderful. Megan’s writin...

Good Afternoon everyone and welcome to another edition of The Avid Reader. Today our guest is Vikram Paralkar author of Night Theater, his second novel the first was Afflictions. Night Theater was published in January by Catapault. Vikram is a physician-scientist at the University of Pennsylvania. He treats patients with leukemia and researches the disease and the nature and manner in which normal...

Good Afternoon everyone and welcome to another edition of The Avid Reader. Today our guest is Vikram Paralkar author of Night Theater, his second novel the first was Afflictions. Night Theater was published in January by Catapault. Vikram is a physician-scientist at the University of Pennsylvania. He treats patients with leukemia and researches the disease and the nature and manner in which normal...

Good Afternoon everyone and welcome to another edition of The Avid Reader. Today our guest is Emily Beyda, author of this, her first novel The Body Double, published last month by Doubleday. Emily has been the author of the popular advise column “Dear Glutton” for the past few years in The Austin Chronicle. Her articles are online at the paper. They are fun to read. Austin natives have a great res...

Good Afternoon everyone and welcome to another edition of The Avid Reader. Today our guest is Emily Beyda, author of this, her first novel The Body Double, published last month by Doubleday. Emily has been the author of the popular advise column “Dear Glutton” for the past few years in The Austin Chronicle. Her articles are online at the paper. They are fun to read. Austin natives have a great res...

Good afternoon everyone and welcome to another edition of The Avid Reader. Today our guest is Lily King (which is a lovely name) author of Writers & Lovers which will be published tomorrow by Grove Press. Lily’s first novel was The Pleasing Hour, a NYT notable book and winner of the Barnes and Noble Discover award. Her second was The English Teacher, her third was Father Of The Rain, a NYT edi...

Good afternoon everyone and welcome to another edition of The Avid Reader. Today our guest is Lily King (which is a lovely name) author of Writers & Lovers which will be published tomorrow by Grove Press. Lily’s first novel was The Pleasing Hour, a NYT notable book and winner of the Barnes and Noble Discover award. Her second was The English Teacher, her third was Father Of The Rain, a NYT edi...

Good afternoon everyone and welcome to another edition of The Avid Reader. Today our guest is Kate Winkler Dawson author of American Sherlock: Murder, Forensics, And The Birth Of American CSI published this month by Putnam. Kate has been in television news for almost a quarter of a century. She’s worked at WCBS, ABC News Radio and Fox. Her first documentary film was “La Candelaria” followed by “Br...

Good afternoon everyone and welcome to another edition of The Avid Reader. Today our guest is Kate Winkler Dawson author of American Sherlock: Murder, Forensics, And The Birth Of American CSI published this month by Putnam. Kate has been in television news for almost a quarter of a century. She’s worked at WCBS, ABC News Radio and Fox. Her first documentary film was “La Candelaria” followed by “Br...

Good afternoon everyone and welcome to another edition of The Avid Reader. Today our guest is Margaret Wilkerson Sexton author of this, her second novel The Revisioners, published in November by Counterpoint. Margaret was born and raised in New Orleans which is also the setting of this book. Her debut novel A Kind Of Freedom, was long listed for the National Book Award. She has written for The NYT...

Good afternoon everyone and welcome to another edition of The Avid Reader. Today our guest is Margaret Wilkerson Sexton author of this, her second novel The Revisioners, published in November by Counterpoint. Margaret was born and raised in New Orleans which is also the setting of this book. Her debut novel A Kind Of Freedom, was long listed for the National Book Award. She has written for The NYT...

Good afternoon everyone and welcome to another edition of The Avid Reader. Today our guest is Paul Soon author of Run Me To Earth, published this month by Simon & Schuster. Paul’s first book was Once The Shore, a NYT Notable Book. His novel Snow Hunters won the 2014 Young Lions Fiction Award and his most recent book, before Run Me To Earth was The Mountain an NPR Best Book of The Year. His sto...

Good afternoon everyone and welcome to another edition of The Avid Reader. Today our guest is Paul Soon author of Run Me To Earth, published this month by Simon & Schuster. Paul’s first book was Once The Shore, a NYT Notable Book. His novel Snow Hunters won the 2014 Young Lions Fiction Award and his most recent book, before Run Me To Earth was The Mountain an NPR Best Book of The Year. His sto...

Good afternoon everyone and welcome to another edition of The Avid Reader. Today our guest is Karine Jean-Pierre, author of this her first book, a memoir entitled Moving Forward: A Story of Hope, Hard Work, and The Promise OF America, published in November by Hanover Square Press. Karine was born in Martinique raised by working class Haitian immigrant parents in New York. She obtained her master’s...

Good afternoon everyone and welcome to another edition of The Avid Reader. Today our guest is Karine Jean-Pierre, author of this her first book, a memoir entitled Moving Forward: A Story of Hope, Hard Work, and The Promise OF America, published in November by Hanover Square Press. Karine was born in Martinique raised by working class Haitian immigrant parents in New York. She obtained her master’s...

Good afternoon and welcome to another edition of The Avid Reader. Today our guest is Keena Roberts. Her new memoir is Wild Life: Dispatches from a Childhood of Baboons and Button-Downs, published in November by Grand Central Publishing. Keena is a graduate of Harvard and holds two Masters Degrees from Johns Hopkins in international development as well as global diseases epidemiology (EP I Deem E A...

Good Afternoon everyone and welcome to another edition of The Avid Reader. Today our guest is Dexter Palmer, author of Mary Toft or The Rabbit Queen. Published in November by Pantheon. Dexter is also the author of Version Control and The Dream Of Perpetual Motion, two really cool books. Science fiction, fantasy and magical realism. He wrote his dissertation on James Joyce, William Gaddis and Thoma...

Good Afternoon everyone and welcome to another edition of The Avid Reader. Today our guest is Dexter Palmer, author of Mary Toft or The Rabbit Queen. Published in November by Pantheon. Dexter is also the author of Version Control and The Dream Of Perpetual Motion, two really cool books. Science fiction, fantasy and magical realism. He wrote his dissertation on James Joyce, William Gaddis and Thoma...

Good afternoon everyone and welcome to another edition of The Avid Reader. Today our guest is Kiley Reid, author of her debut novel Such A Fun Age, just published by Putnam. Kiley graduated from the Iowa Writers Workshop as have so many wonderful writers and where she had wonderful teachers like Paul Harding and Jess Walters. And I have been really happy to have interviewed both of them. (Tinkers,...

Good afternoon everyone and welcome to another edition of The Avid Reader. Today our guest is Kiley Reid, author of her debut novel Such A Fun Age, just published by Putnam. Kiley graduated from the Iowa Writers Workshop as have so many wonderful writers and where she had wonderful teachers like Paul Harding and Jess Walters. And I have been really happy to have interviewed both of them. (Tinkers,...

Good afternoon everyone and welcome to another edition of The Avid Reader. Today our guest is our old friend Liz Moore whose fourth novel Long Bright River published by Riverhead is just arriving on our shelves and I should tell you that Liz will be appearing at The Hilton Garden Inn on January 9th at 7PM. The Hilton is right here in Exton, 720 Eagleview Blvd East (although I don’t know why they c...

Good afternoon everyone and welcome to another edition of The Avid Reader. Today our guest is our old friend Liz Moore whose fourth novel Long Bright River published by Riverhead is just arriving on our shelves and I should tell you that Liz will be appearing at The Hilton Garden Inn on January 9th at 7PM. The Hilton is right here in Exton, 720 Eagleview Blvd East (although I don’t know why they c...

Good afternoon everyone and welcome to another edition of The Avid Reader. Today our guest is Michael Graziano, author of Rethinking Consciousness: A Scientific Theory Of Subjective Experience, Published in September by Norton. Michael is professor of psychology and neuroscience at Princeton. He has written four other neuroscience books and his work has appeared in The Atlantic, NYT, Huffington Po...