Longer Listen

Steve Inskeep has written a new book: Jacksonland: President Andrew Jackson, Cherokee Chief John Ross, and a Great American Land Grab. We talk with Inskeep about his new book, and the lessons within for today. 

According to researchers the African elephant is actually two different species of elephant - a development with big implications for conservation. We talk with Alfred Roca, a researcher at the University of Illinois who specializes in genetics and wildlife conservation, about the differences in the elephant and what that means for its survival. 

Saul Bellow would have been 100 on Wednesday. The novelist who set much of his work in Chicago, immigrated to Chicago from Montreal in July of 1924 and his family settled in Humboldt Park. He stayed in Chicago for most of the rest of his life, attending Northwestern University and teaching at the University of Chicago. We talk with Beena Kamlani who began editing Saul Bellow’s works at Viking in 1988 about her time working with the author considered one of the United States’ greats.

Star Wars fans are waiting anxiously to see what Disney does with Star Wars when Episode VII: The Force Awakens opens on December 18th. Adam Bray is excited. He’s one of the authors of a forthcoming Star Wars guide: Ultimate Star Wars that sets the stage for Episode VII.

John W. Dean talks about his book on Watergate, "The Nixon Defense: What He Knew and When He Knew It" which bills itself as the complete story of the Watergate break-in and cover-up, and discloses Nixon’s part in it.