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The "NBN Book of the Day" features the most timely and interesting author interviews from the New Books Network delivered to you every weekday. Support our show by becoming a premium member! https://newbooksnetwork.supportingcast.fm/book-of-the-day
Based on 6 episodes we listened to · September 2026
Author interviews connect scholarly arguments to lived experience, making difficult books and the evidence behind them easier to examine.
NBN Book of the Day turns author interviews into patient examinations of the ideas inside a book. Its range stretches from the economics of college credentials to competing ideas of China, while other conversations take up Japan's space programs, diaper insecurity, and the…
A Coptic Christian Sesame character could rearrange your next bookstore detour.
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Short reviews from the PlayNext desk, based on the episodes we processed.
Keith Cooper tests Tatooine, Dune, and ocean worlds against unsettled questions in planetary science.
This episode uses science fiction as a practical way into planetary science, with Keith Cooper testing familiar imagined worlds against what researchers actually know.
A thoughtful conversation on Bowie, Prince, grief, and the ethics of writing after loss.
David Bowie and Prince are approached through grief, with the conversation asking how music writing can honor artists after death while still leaving room for what their music gives the living. Rebecca Buchanan speaks with editor Daphne A.
A focused account of how post-Revolutionary Mexican print culture pictured belonging.
Pablo Zavala's account of post-Revolutionary Mexican print culture centers on a clear historical question: how images and publications helped define who counted as part of the nation.
A precise look at how Rapa Nui's archaeological evidence was gathered, disputed, and left underexamined.
Mike Pitts frames Easter Island through the making, loss, and delayed use of knowledge as much as through the island's famous statues. The episode tracks Catherine's research, the researchers' return to Britain after roughly half a year, and the scientific community's refusal to…
A thoughtful return to truth, identity, and the political worlds language can make.
A long-running argument about truth and political action gets a fresh hearing in this discussion of a 1995 book. The episode returns to the theory wars around the Kantian left and post-structuralist theory, where critics worried that describing racism and sexism as constructed…
A careful look at how Sesame Street travels across countries while keeping a few core social limits in place.
Tamara Kay frames Sesame Street as a format that can travel across countries without losing its core social rules. Local teams can change the title, branding, and characters, but the message stays fixed: no violence, a focus on tolerance, and a social-emotional center.
A direct look at how diaper insecurity becomes a daily burden.
The episode treats the diaper as more than a basic supply. Jennifer Randles shows how diaper insecurity adds cost, planning, and a fair amount of improvisation to parenting, from stretching what is on hand to making do with temporary substitutes and keeping close track of how…
A family-rooted look at who belongs in China's story.
The piece keeps circling a plain but stubborn question: what counts as China, and who gets counted as Chinese? Its strongest ground is the family history, especially the gap between Xu's own education and the lives of siblings who had little or no schooling and moved through the…
Campus radio from the wrong side of reality.
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How research culture changes in practice.
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Historian Xu Guoqi discusses his book 'The Idea of China: A Contested History,' exploring the fluid and debated concepts of Chinese identity and nationhood.
This episode introduces a discussion about Ainehi Edoro's book 'Forest Imaginaries: How African Novels Think', exploring African literary culture and analysis.
This segment promotes the New Books Network's 2026 audience survey and introduces an upcoming interview with Dr.
This segment discusses how plastics influenced postwar bodies, focusing on military uses like atomic bombshells and bullets, based on Isabelle Held's upcoming book.
This segment introduces Carl Death's research on African climate futures, following a promotional announcement for the NewBooks Network audience survey.
This episode introduces Helen Redmond's book 'Liquid Handcuffs,' which examines policing in methadone clinics and the future of opioid addiction treatment.
The host promotes a 2026 audience survey for the New Books Network, encouraging listeners to participate for a chance to win a gift card and help improve the network.
This segment features an interview with historian Sugata Bose about his book 'Asia after Europe', focusing on concepts like colorful cosmopolitanism and Asian universalisms.
This segment promotes the Disorder podcast featuring an Epstein survivor interview and encourages listeners to participate in the NewBooks Network audience survey.
This episode segment introduces a discussion with Dr.
This segment is a promotional announcement for the 2026 NewBooks Network audience survey, encouraging listeners to participate for a chance to win a gift card and help improve the network.
This segment promotes the NewBooks Network's 2026 audience survey and introduces an upcoming interview with historian Anna-Luna Post.
This episode features a discussion with Dr.
This segment introduces an interview with Zalman Newfield about his book on leaving Hasidism, preceded by promotional content for the podcast and a listener survey.
The segment begins with a survey announcement for the NewBooks Network audience and transitions into an interview with author Ashley Elker about her book on death and emergency medicine.
This segment introduces an interview with Dr.
This segment introduces Thomas Zeitzoff's book on radical environmental movements, discussing their extreme tactics and role in addressing climate change.
This episode introduces Emily Dufton's book 'Addiction, Inc.', which explores medication-assisted treatment in the U.S.
This episode introduces Dr.
This segment promotes the NewBooks Network's 2026 audience survey, encouraging listeners to participate for feedback and a chance to win a gift card.
This episode segment introduces Dr.
Steven Pinker discusses his new book exploring how common knowledge influences politics, cryptocurrency, social movements, and everyday life.
This segment promotes the Disorder podcast featuring an Epstein survivor interview and encourages listeners to participate in the NewBooks Network audience survey.
This episode segment introduces anthropologist Amelia Frank-Vitale discussing her research on migration and violence in bordered worlds, starting with her background from Reading, Pennsylvania, and her fieldwork in Mexico and Honduras.
This segment introduces an upcoming interview with author Gabrielle Oliveira about her book on family migration, children's education, and aspirations for a better life.
The New Books Network promotes its 2026 audience survey to gather listener feedback for improving partnerships and resources.
This segment introduces a discussion on Daniel McClellan's book about common misunderstandings and debates regarding what the Bible says on controversial topics.
This segment introduces an interview with astrophysicist Emma Chapman about her book on radio astronomy and its role in exploring the invisible cosmos.
The podcast segment includes a survey announcement and introduces an interview with authors discussing the rural-urban divide and its impact on democracy.
This episode introduces Dr.
This episode discusses Professor Leigh-Anne Wong's book examining how U.S.
This episode segment introduces a conversation with Dr.
This segment introduces an upcoming interview with Mark Hlavacik about his book on the education culture wars, following promotional content for other podcasts and a listener survey.
The segment introduces a survey for listeners and transitions to a discussion about Shelley Puhak's book 'The Blood Countess', focusing on myth-busting and the story of the countess.
This segment introduces Christopher Munn's book on capital trials in colonial Hong Kong, exploring the irony of colonists viewing themselves as victims in the colonial relationship.
This segment promotes an interview with an Epstein survivor on the Disorder podcast and encourages listeners to participate in the NewBooks Network audience survey.
This episode introduces an interview with author Susannah B.
The host introduces a survey for listeners and then welcomes author Amy Landry to discuss her new book on yoga.
This segment is a promotional announcement for the NewBooks Network's 2026 audience survey, encouraging listeners to participate for feedback and a chance to win a gift card.
This transcript is a promotional announcement for a listener survey and does not contain the substantive discussion about Iran under attack with Vali Nasr.
This segment discusses the nearly century-long delay in publishing Langston Hughes's translations of Mexican and Cuban stories, edited by Ricardo Wilson, highlighting Hughes's lesser-known Latin American connections.
Author John B.
["Mike Pitts says `Island at the Edge of the World` challenges the ecocide thesis by arguing that Europeans, not Rapa Nui islanders, drove the destruction of the island's society.", "He points to a 1960s collapse from about 5,000 people to 110, caused by slave raids, emigration, disease, and colonial rule.", "The book follows Catherine and Scoresby Routledge, who spent about 16 or 17 months on Easter Island after a 1994 visit and recorded legends, photographs, and field notes.", "Pitts also traces an uprising against Chile's sheep-ranch regime, the loss of the Routledge archive, and Thor Heyerdahl's later South American-origin story."]
Morteza Hajizadeh interviews Wendy Brown about why a 1995 critique of identity politics still matters in debates over DEI, hate-speech law, and the right.
Dr.
Economist Bryan Caplan discusses his controversial book 'The Case Against Education', arguing that the primary economic value of education is not skill-building but signaling intelligence, conscientiousness, and conformity to employers.
Historian Subodhana Wijeyeratne discusses his book on Japan's space programs, tracing their origins from 1920s comics through WWII rocketry, postwar development under Itokawa Hideo, the creation of competing agencies ISAS and NASDA, and eventual consolidation into JAXA in 2003.
Sociologist Jennifer Randles discusses her book on 'diaper insecurity,' revealing how half of U.S.
Sociologist Tamara Kay discusses her book about how Sesame Workshop collaborates with local partners worldwide to create culturally specific versions of Sesame Street.
This episode discusses Derek Krueger's research on how medieval Byzantine monks navigated homoeroticism, homophobia, and divine love within monastic communities, examining historical concepts of sexuality that differ from modern Freudian frameworks.
Keith Cooper, a science journalist focused on astronomy and physics, explains how exoplanet discoveries since the mid-1990s have changed science fiction's imagined worlds.
Daphne A.