Big Books & Bold Ideas with Kerri Miller Minnesota Public Radio

Claire Messud has long wanted to write a novel inspired by her family’s history in Algeria, thanks to a handwritten memoir, more than 1,500 pages long, penned by her paternal grandfather. It was rich with stories and history and photos about her ancestors, who were born in French Algeria but then expelled from their homes in 1962 when Algeria won its independence.

Her new novel, “This Strange Eventful History,” was inspired by that personal past. It sprawls across generations, geography and time, moving from 1940 to 2010, and across multiple points of view.

In fact, MPR News host Kerri Miller says the way Messud plays with time is one of the vital threads of the book — and Messud admits time is almost a character in the novel. “The past informs the present,” she says. “People’s dreams and hopes for the future inform the present, and in a funny way, the ghosts of the past — the people who are no longer there but whose voices swirl around in our head — make sure the past is always with us.”

Join Miller and Messud on this week’s Big Books and Bold Ideas to take a journey into memory, time and the longing for home.

Guest:


Claire Messud’s novels includes “The Emperor’s Children” and “The Woman Upstairs.” Her new novel is “This Strange Eventful History.”




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New York Times bestselling author Nicola Yoon’s new novel, “One of our Kind,” is one of the most talked about books of the summer. On this week’s Big Books and Bold Ideas, Yoon joins MPR News host Kerri Miller to talk about what led her to write a book about finding the sinister in a Shangri-La. When does our natural bent to protect and enjoy become destructive? What is the true meaning of community?

Lily Chen is not endowed with good fortune — despite the fact that her scientist mother managed to grow a backyard of four-leaf clovers. She doesn’t win raffles or lotteries. She scrapes out a meager living as an unpaid intern with the hopes that it might give her a shot at an entry-level gig.

In short: Not lucky.

But then a chance encounter upends her life and changes her idea of what fortune really is.

Rachel Khong’s new book, “Real Americans,” is already a New York Times bestseller and one of the hottest novels of the summer. She joins MPR News host Kerri Miller on this week’s Big Books and Bold Ideas to talk about teasing out the truth between luck and choice, soul mates and chance.

The Civil War is remembered for its sweeping battles: Gettysburg, Atlanta, Antietam. Less known are the small troops of men, enlisted by both sides, to fight far from the battlefields.

These ruthless soldiers relied on stealth to sneak behind enemy lines — often wearing their opponent’s uniform — and destroyed supply lines, assassinated military officials and gathered critical information.

Today, we know this kind of warfare as shadow ops — which is a specialty of military historian Patrick K. O’Donnell. A roadside marker he happened to see in rural Virginia ignited years of research into the Civil War era special forces who were tasked by President Lincoln to undertake spy operations and secrete missions against Confederate units.

This week, he joined MPR News host Kerri Miller on Big Books and Bold ideas to talk about his new book, “The Unvanquished,” which masterfully tells the story of this forgotten chapter of history.

Taiyon Coleman has been writing since she was a child. At age 8, she announced to her family that a novel was in the works.

Today, she’s a published author and a professor of literature at St. Catherine University. But the road from there to here wasn’t as straight-forward as you might think.

Coleman joins host Kerri Miller on Big Books and Bold Ideas this week to talk about what happened in the in-between. Some of it is detailed in her new collection of personal essays, “Traveling without Moving: Essays from a Black Woman Trying to Survive in America.”

But the deeper story is held in Coleman’s body, in her voice, in her strength. Don’t miss this vulnerable and moving conversation about mothers and ancestors, writing and truth-telling and the power of being a teacher.

Guest:


Taiyon J. Coleman is a poet, a author and a literature professor at St. Paul’s St. Catherine University. Her new book is “Traveling without Moving.”




Subscribe to Big Books and Bold Ideas with Kerri Miller on Apple Podcasts, Google Podcasts, RSS or anywhere you get your podcasts.

Subscribe to the Thread newsletter for the latest book and author news and must-read recommendations.

America is steeped in the notion of rugged individualism. It’s comforting to think success is based on our own hard work and self determination.

But social scientist Robert Mark Rank says random chance governs far more of our lives that most of us want to admit.

This week on Big Books and Bold Ideas, Rank joins MPR News host Kerri Miller to talk about his new book, “The Random Factor.” He shares how luck and chance play a crucial role in shaping history, the natural world and our everyday lives.