Today's Guest: Marc Spitz, author, Bowie: A Biography. (EDITOR'S NOTE -- Late tonight, February 4, 2017, we learned that Marc Spitz, biographer of David Bowie, and contributing writer over the years to Rolling Stone, Spin, and The New York Times, died suddenly. It's shocking that Bowie and Spitz passed within the same year, each taking their... Continue Reading →
Hank Rosenfeld’s Wicked Wit of the West is Groucho-filled! PODCAST INTERVIEW
Today's Guest: Hank Rosenfeld, author The Wicked Wit of the West Hank Rosenfeld found the kind of book writing job that guys like me salivate over. He met Irving Brecher, a brilliant and funny writer from the Golden Age of Hollywood comedy, and spent hours recording stories from Irv about everyone from Groucho Marx... Continue Reading →
Susan Wels charts Amelia Earhart’s Thrill Of It! PODCAST INTERVIEW
I lived in a pretty male-centric world most of my life, idolizing certain baseball players, rock stars and even a writer or two. But when my daughter was born back in ’96, I made a marked effort to learn more about women who she might one day find influential for their achievements. High-flier Amelia... Continue Reading →
Mark Ribowsky tells The Supremes story! PODCAST INTERVIEW
It’s not pleasant when a man’s good fortune comes at the hands of another man’s loss. What would you call it when you’re the author of a new book about a Motown act, Diana Ross and The Supremes, that fizzled out more than 35 years ago—but another Motown star of that era, Michael Jackson, ... Continue Reading →
Peter Carlson wasn’t there but wrote K Blows Top anyway! PODCAST INTERVIEW
Peter Carlson could have taken all the research he did on Soviet Premier Nikita Khruschev’s two-week barnstorming tour of the United States in 1959 and converted it into a Cold War-era fable such as Dr. Strangelove or The Mouse That Roared. He could have done that, but truth is stranger than fiction and the... Continue Reading →
Did the Roof Cave In on CNBC’s David Faber? PODCAST INTERVIEW
CNBC anchor and reporter David Faber is my guest today. He’s the author of a new book, And Then the Roof Caved In: How Wall Street's Greed and Stupidity Brought Capitalism to Its Knees. I’m very excited for David and his new book, but first we have some old business to cover. He won’t... Continue Reading →
Anna Jane Grossman offers an Obsolete encyclopedia! PODCAST INERVIEW
As I’m saying this, I can’t help wondering if, by the time you hear this, I won’t be obsolete. Think I’m kidding? I’m not. In her new book, Obsolete: An Encyclopedia of Once-Common Things Passing Us By, Anna Jane Grossman reels off a stunning list of devices, equipment and habits that were once everywhere... Continue Reading →
Bob Dylan, a complete unknown? Not after Charles Gatewood! PODCAST INTERVIEW
Great photographs—whether shot by Ansel Adams or your Aunt Anna—capture a moment in time that people familiar with the moment, the subject or the place can relate to for years to come. And even if you don’t have any familiarity with what’s in the picture, the good ones always relate an emotion, a texture... Continue Reading →
Fantagraphics guys defend the art of criticism! PODCAST INTERVIEW
Today's Guests: Gary Groth, Kim Thompson, editors, The Comics Journal, Fantagraphics They are probably the best-known good cop/bad cop team in comics today. “They” are Gary Groth, the founder of The Comics Journal, and his partner in Fantagraphics—and fellow editor—Kim Thompson. Fantagraphics is a preeminent publisher of comics –related books and magazines, including the... Continue Reading →
Novelist Kamran Pasha tells of the Mother of the Believers! PODCAST INTERVIEW
Today's Guest: Kamran Pasha, novelist, Mother of the Believers. Kamran Pasha is a brave man. He knows that Sherry Jones’ book, The Jewel of Medina—about the birth of Islam—lost its initial publisher in 2008 because of the ruckus it stirred up. He knows that filmmaker Moustapha Akkad—who created the 1977 movie The Messenger, about... Continue Reading →