10182 results were found.

Fiction Writing Workshop with Courtney Maum

Rut Busters: New ways to bring focus (and fun!) back to your writing. Join acclaimed novelist Courtney Maum for this 1.5-hour intensive workshop and learn strategies for reinvigorating your work, finishing tough projects, and “finding the fun” in writing again. Bogged down by research? Afraid of starting over, or even…

Romance Roundup: October 2019

Fall is in the air — finally — and I’m working my way through my late-summer TBR pile. This month, I’m reviewing three recent romance novels I have loved, including a small-town romantic comedy, a dazzling paranormal fantasy, and a travel romance that has me yearning to book a trip…

Meet Tara Laskowski

Join us to celebrate Tara Laskowski's debut thriller, One Night Gone, “A timely and timeless mystery that will keep you obsessively reading well past your bedtime” (Paul Tremblay, author of The Cabin at the End of the World). And if that recommendation isn't enough to get you here, Tara and…

Older and Wiser?

There are various thresholds in growing older, each more alarming than the previous. First comes that invitation from AARP. This is not so bad because the former American Association of Retired Persons invites people at age 50. Then comes the threshold of qualifying for senior tickets at the cinema. This…

Authors on Audio: A Conversation with Richard Zoglin

A longtime journalist and contributing editor at TIME Magazine, Richard Zoglin is also the author of three nonfiction books, including Hope: Entertainer of the Century and Comedy at the Edge: How Stand-up in the 1970s Changed America. Here, he discusses his latest release, Elvis in Vegas: How the King Reinvented…

7 Best-Reviewed Books in September 2019

Tell Me Who We Were: Stories by Kate McQuade (William Morrow). Reviewed by Janet A. Martin. “This book prompts me to define it by what it is not. It is not a story to rush. It’s not chick lit. It’s not a beach read. Not a whodunit. Not necessarily a…

Meet E.A. Aymar, John Copenhaver, and Angie Kim

Join us for an evening of readings and engaging discussion with three of today's finest mystery writers John Copenhaver (Dodging and Burning), E.A. Aymar (The Unrepentant), and Angie Kim (Miracle Creek). The discussion will be moderated by Sisters in Crime president, author Sherry Harris. The event will be followed by…

5 Most Popular Posts: September 2019

Joel Looper’s review of To Change the Church: Pope Francis and the Future of Catholicism by Ross Douthat. “The crux of the problem, according to Douthat, is Pope Francis himself. Little by little, through Vatican appointments and sudden sackings, pregnant silences in response to theological questions, and, above all, his…

Puppy Love

We got a dog. A puppy, to be precise. Now, you’re probably thinking, “Wait a minute, Delancey. You’re supposed to be writing about romance. What does this have to do with that?” So here we go. The definition of romance describes a sense of excitement and mystery — either relating…

Meet Travis Rieder

Join us at Baltimore County Public Library’s Parkville Branch to hear Travis Rieder discuss his new book In Pain: A Bioethicist's Personal Struggle with Opioids. In Pain is a bioethicist’s eloquent and riveting memoir of opioid dependence and withdrawal — a harrowing personal reckoning and clarion call for change not…

Lara Prescott and Jennifer Croft in Conversation with Lisa Page

Prescott won the 2016 Crazyhorse Fiction Prize for the first chapter of her gripping debut novel, which uses historical details to tell the story of Sally and Irina, two well-educated women who are sprung from the CIA’s typing pool to smuggle the manuscript of Dr. Zhivago out of the Soviet…

Learning as You Go

However far in advance I plan a trip, however much I want to read up on the history of the places we’re going to visit — or even to cheat and just watch the movies that feature those places — it never actually happens. I’m forever approaching locations that are…

Authors on Audio: A Conversation with Philip Mudd

After a combined 25 years serving in the CIA and FBI — including a stint as a deputy director of the CIA’s Counter Terrorism Center — Philip Mudd knows a thing or two about national security and the complex threats facing our nation. Here, Mudd discusses his latest book, Black…

Meet Annalee Newitz

From the founding editor of io9 comes a story of time travel, murder, and the lengths we'll go to in order to protect the ones we love. 1992: After a confrontation at a riot grrl concert, 17-year-old Beth finds herself in a car with her friend's abusive boyfriend dead in…

Making Room for Healers

In the children’s book Martin the Warrior by Brian Jacques, woodland creatures are fighting, killing, and dying to free themselves of the evil stoat, Badrang. A young mouse, Brome, blanches at seeing his squirrel friend Felldoh slay some of Badrang’s horde. “I’m not a warrior,” Brome says. “I know that…

Meet Kit Chapman

Join us for a fascinating evening as award-winning science journalist and broadcaster Kit Chapman shares from his new book, Superheavy: Making and Breaking the Periodic Table, an in-depth look at how elements are discovered, why they matter, and where they will take us. The science of element discovery is a…

Patriotic Picks: Sept. 2019

Whether it’s via their tone, topic, or tenor, certain works just say “America.” Here are three such titles, suggested by David Bruce Smith, founder of the Grateful American™ Foundation: 1984 by George Orwell. Though written and set in Great Britain, this chilling, dystopian tale of Big Brother feels eerily relevant…

It’s Partnership Friday!

Why should you head to Politics and Prose, one of DC’s finest indie bookstores, this Friday, Sept. 20th? Because the Independent will be there, and we’ll get part of the proceeds from your purchase! When you’re checking out, just tell the cashier you support us, and P&P will make sure…

Burn It Down!

“For girls like me, anger was not always wild and red and raging. For girls like me, it was internal decay. It was cool blue, icy islands of flat nothing floating on a cerulean sea.” – Nina St. Pierre There are many causes of anger, and many ways to express…

Authors on Audio: A Conversation with Dayton Duncan and Julie Dunfey

Dayton Duncan has long collaborated with Ken Burns, writing the companion books to many of the acclaimed filmmaker’s productions. Duncan’s latest work, Country Music: An Illustrated History, pairs beautifully with Burns’ “Country Music,” an eight-part documentary that debuted on PBS this past Sunday. In this week’s podcast, Duncan and Emmy…

Bedtime Stories: Sept. 2019

Andrew Shaffer: I just finished Jaron Lanier's Ten Arguments for Deleting Your Social Media Accounts Right Now. It's a book every American should read — Lanier is a Silicon Valley veteran and has been raising alarm bells for years about the dark side of tech companies. For the record, I…

Meet Us at Politics and Prose this Friday!

Why should you head to Politics and Prose, one of DC’s finest indie bookstores, this Friday, Sept. 20th? Because the Independent will be there, and we’ll get part of the proceeds from your purchase! After you’re done shopping — don’t pretend you aren’t going to buy anything — just tell…

Meet & Greet: Betty K. Bynum and Joshua Drummond

We are super to excited to welcome authors Betty K. Bynum and Joshua Drummond to MahoganyBooks for a Meet & Greet book signing for their respective books, I'm A Pretty Little Black Girl and I'm A Brilliant Little Black Boy. On September 18, 2019, from 6:30PM to 7:30PM, Betty and…

How Do You Find the Time?

On the last Sunday in August, my wife, Tara, and I had two afternoon/evening readings on our calendar — overlapping events: the Reston Readings Series at the Used Book Shop in Reston’s Lake Anne Village Center and a Noir at the Bar at Busboys & Poets in Shirlington. But the…

Children’s Book Roundup: September 2019

Not much is sweeter than the relationship between child and grandparent. But, sometimes, it seems the only stories for children that include elder relatives focus on declining abilities and fading memories, where grandparents are relegated to a flat character or simple plot device in order to interpret the grieving process.…

Carrie Callaghan in Conversation with Jenny Yacovissi

Friends of the Library, Rockville Memorial Chapter will be hosting historical fiction writer Carrie Callaghan to talk about her novel A Light of Her Own. Jennifer Bort Yacovissi, also a local author and friend, will interview Callaghan about this remarkable story of Judith Leyster, a 17th-century Dutch painter whose work…

Join Us Again in 2020!

Dear Writer, Maybe you don’t sharpen pencils anymore, but that’s what I imagine at this time of year to inspire me to write. Riddled with edits, my draft of chapter 19 fits snugly in a plastic-zip folder. I promise myself I’ll finish those last two or three chapters by next…

Hitting the Perfect Note

September 15th is the release date for the new Ken Burns’ documentary, “Country Music,” on PBS, containing eight episodes spanning 16 hours. A bonus accompanying each Burns epic is the companion coffee-table book that provides a narrative of the film’s subject along with its most memorable photographs. Dayton Duncan authored…

Rejected!

There is always the danger of a columnist going back to the well once too often. That’s particularly true of writers of a certain age, who can be forgetful. Fortunately, that doesn’t apply to me. Fortunately, that doesn’t apply…ONLY KIDDING! Anyway, I checked my old columns (thank the Lord the…

September 2019 Exemplars: Poetry Reviews by Grace Cavalieri

An American Sunrise by Joy Harjo. W.W. Norton & Company. 144 pages. The Grace of Distance by Matthew Thorburn. LSU Press. 84 pages. I Will Destroy You by Nick Flynn. Graywolf Press. 80 pages. The River Twice by Kathleen Graber. Princeton University Press. 112 pages. Before Our Eyes: New and…

Authors on Audio: A Conversation with Stephen Hunter

Once a film critic for the Washington Post, Pulitzer Prize-winning writer Stephen Hunter is also the bestselling author of 20-plus novels. His latest — and the 11th installment in his popular Bob Lee Swagger series — is Game of Snipers, which a recent review in the Independent called “suspenseful…potent…wry.” In…

An Interview with Matt Richtel

What is the key to health and wellness, life and death? The immune system is part of the story and may be central to the answer. Matt Richtel, a Pulitzer Prize-winning journalist with the New York Times, explores the human connections to immunology in his new book, An Elegant Defense:…

Publish Now

Find your readers! The Writer’s Center presents a one-day seminar dedicated to helping you take the next steps toward publication. Join more than 20 industry professionals as they share the ins and outs of publishing articles, essays, stories, books, and more. Panels will cover publishing with traditional and independent presses,…

Designing Your Happy Life

Summer is a good time for a reset. I usually like to do an annual mind map: organizing my dreams and the plans that help ground me on one sheet of paper. It’s usually not cluttered. Categories include works-in-progress, long-term plans, and things that make me happy. The book I…

Why Attend the 2020 Washington Writers Conference?

Not sure you should attend the 2020 Washington Writers Conference? Listen to some of the folks who attended last year’s SOLD-OUT event: “It was awesome and a great experience for every writer.” “It's a fantastic opportunity to meet with agents and get publishing advice and feedback.” “Great chance to pitch,…

Rachel Monroe in Conversation with Marin Cogan

In this illuminating exploration of women, violence, and obsession, Rachel Monroe interrogates the appeal of true crime through four narratives of fixation. Each woman, Monroe argues, represents and identifies with a particular archetype that provides an entryway into true crime. Through these four cases, she traces the history of American…

Romance Roundup: September 2019

It’s September, which is always a bittersweet month for me. My kids went back to school this week and, while I loved having them home all summer, it was tough carving out time to read. I try to model good reading behavior, so my sons are quite used to finding…

8 Autumn Novels to Watch For

We enjoy an embarrassment of writing riches in the DC/MD/VA triangle. As a crime fiction writer, enthusiastic reader, and host of the DC Noir at the Bar series, I see this firsthand. I can easily pull from a list of over 50 writers to take the stage at Noir at…

Marie Arana in Conversation with Carlos Lozada

Latin America encompasses myriad geographies, peoples, and cultures, but as Arana’s new book illustrates, over the last several hundred years the region as a whole has been shaped by three constants: exploitation, violence, and religion. With the historical mastery and psychological insight she showed in her biography, Bolívar, Arana, also…

Authors on Audio: A Conversation with Margaret Renkl

New York Times op-ed writer Margaret Renkl recently released her debut collection of essays, Late Migrations: A Natural History of Love and Loss. Said a recent review in the Independent, the book is “about grief, yet within that grief lies beauty, wonder, and love…Each chapter, written as a short vignette…

7 Best-Reviewed Books in August 2019

Late Migrations: A Natural History of Love and Loss by Margaret Renkl (Milkweed Editions). Reviewed by Gretchen Lida. “Each chapter, written as a short vignette rich in imagery and the language of place, creates an immersive experience for the reader. The chapters span 1940 to 2018 and tell the stories…

To Blurb or Not to Blurb

Who knew that being an author was such an ethical minefield? Once, I dreamed of the acclaim and riches that would come with publication. What I got instead were sticky situations as I tried to be true to my principles while promoting my book. Blurbs When my publisher said they…

5 Most Popular Posts: August 2019

Joseph A. Esposito’s review of A Hard Rain: America in the 1960s, Our Decade of Hope, Possibility, and Innocence Lost by Frye Gaillard (NewSouth Books). “The chronicling of the ups and downs of the decade is comprehensive. The big developments are covered, but so are the backstories of some lesser-known…

Meet Ray Locker

When General Alexander M. Haig Jr. returned to the White House on May 3, 1973, he found the Nixon administration in worse shape than he had imagined. President Richard Nixon, reelected in an overwhelming landslide just six months earlier, had accepted the resignations of his top aides — the chief…

We Need Diverse Bookstores!

We’re on the cusp of something great with independent bookstores. We’re not dying out; we’re growing. We’re connecting to our immediate communities and the larger world of books in new ways. Opening Loyalty Bookstore as a pop-up last year in Silver Spring, MD, was a joy that grew into a…

Blind Accordion Players, Blissful Cuckolds, and a Fascist

“She lives alone in Madrid and doesn’t want to hear tell of the village…” – Camilo José Cela, 1989 Nobel Laureate Galicia, Spain. I am winding through Galician villages from the town of O Grove, a centuries-old smuggler’s haven, to the region’s capital — Santiago de Compostela, one of the…

2019 National Book Festival

Come for the big-name authors — from Ruth Bader Ginsburg and Barbara Kingsolver to Henry Louis Gates Jr. and Rebecca Makkai — and stay for the kids' activities, book-signings, poetry slam, panel discussions, and too much more great stuff to list. Click here for a complete rundown of the day's…

Authors on Audio: A Conversation with Mary Kay Andrews

In her latest page-turner, Sunset Beach, bestselling author Mary Kay Andrews tells the story of Drue Campbell, a woman at loose ends who finds herself going to work for her estranged father and her frenemy-turned-stepmother at their law firm. In today’s podcast, Andrews discusses the novel — about which Publishers…

A Justice for All?

Barely 48 hours after his historically narrow confirmation to the Supreme Court, Justice Brett Kavanaugh sought to put what he called the “contentious” confirmation process behind him. “My focus now is to be the best justice I can be,” Kavanaugh said at the duplicative White House swearing-in ceremony. “I take…

With Father, Time

One of life’s toughest journeys is accompanying a loved one into old age or disability, for it is a trip that will inevitably lead to the grave, and that final farewell can bring crushing grief and an awful aloneness. In Patrimony: A True Story, published in 1991, Philip Roth made…

The Emperor of All Trajectories

By a strange twist of fate (have I said this already?), my family and I have been able to follow the Portuguese trade routes — Nagasaki to Macau, China, to Salvador, Brazil, to Portugal itself — in our travels. But I also believe that reading, even if the book isn’t…

Rion Amilcar Scott in Conversation with Amber Sparks

Faulkner gave us Yoknapatawpha County, García Marquez the magical Macondo. Scott, in his PEN/Robert W. Bingham Prize-winning collection, Insurrections, introduced Cross Creek, a fictional Maryland town founded by leaders of America’s only successful slave revolt. His second collection of stories returns to Cross Creek, exploring its past, its rich culture,…

How to Write a Nerdy Poem

According to the poet Richard Hugo, “Words love the ridiculous areas of our minds, but silly or solid, assumptions are necessary elements in a successful base of writing operations.” If you have ever wanted to write an unabashedly nerdy poem, here are a few things you might assume. Think of…

Noir at the Bar

Busboys and Poets Presents: NOIR AT THE BAR… Host Josh Pachter, co-editor and translator of Amsterdam Noir, leads you on an odyssey into the mysterious world of dark fiction known as NOIR. Each quarter, featured local authors will read passages from their Noir works, and the first 50 guests are…

Authors on Audio: A Conversation with Mary Miller

An instructor at the University of Mississippi, Mary Miller is also the author of five works of fiction, including the short-story collections Always Happy Hour and Big World. Here, she discusses her new novel, Biloxi — which Publishers Weekly called “a witty, insightful exploration of masculinity and self-worth” — with…

An Interview with Kenneth P. Anderson

Kenneth P. Anderson’s book, Saving the Heart of American Healthcare: How Patients and Their Doctors Can Mend a Broken System, digs deep into the historical context of how physicians are trained in the U.S. today and looks forward to how our healthcare system could be better suited to what people…

It’s Not Just *Writing* the Book

When I first decided I wanted to be a writer, I had visions of myself at a big desk, typing away on my Mac and making magic. I’d tell my stories and send them out into the world and then get started on the next one. Write, publish, repeat. I…

Jia Tolentino in Conversation with Kat Chow

Tolentino, a staff writer at the New Yorker since 2016, has quickly become one of the most exciting and authoritative critical voices of the millennial generation. Praised for her fierce intelligence, formidable mix of skepticism and optimism, and her lyrical, lucid prose, Tolentino has written on a wide range of…

Patriotic Picks: Aug. 2019

Whether it’s via their tone, topic, or tenor, certain works just say “America.” Here are three such titles, suggested by David Bruce Smith, founder of the Grateful American™ Foundation: My Antonia by Willa Cather. This final installment in the author’s prairie trilogy chronicles the lives of hardy 19th-century immigrants attempting…

The Unbearable Serendipity of Being

Serendipity took on new meaning for me when I wandered a couple of weeks ago into Black Swan Books and Music in Staunton, Virginia. It is an extremely well-organized used-book store, free of the usual mustiness and belying the notion that such a store is obsolete. And there, on a…

August 2019 Exemplars: Poetry Reviews by Grace Cavalieri

Be Recorder by Carmen Giménez Smith. Graywolf Press. 88 pages. Innumerable Moons by Clarinda Harriss; art by Peter Bruun. Beignet Books. 48 pages. Nightshade by Andrea Cohen. Four Way Books. 104 pages. The Milk Hours by John James. Milkweed Editions. 88 pages. Erou by Maya Phillips. Four Way Books. 124…

National Bookstore Romance Day

Join us in the first ever national observance of Bookstore Romance Day! Indies all across the country will be celebrating romance novels and the authors who write them. We'll be hosting “A Carnival of Love” all day, complete with cotton candy, sno cones, and prizes! We start with a morning…

Authors on Audio: A Conversation with Chanelle Benz

Chanelle Benz, an instructor at Rhodes College in Memphis and author of the award-winning story collection The Man Who Shot My Eye Out Is Dead — named a Best Book of 2017 by the San Francisco Chronicle and one of Electric Literature’s 15 Best Short Story Collections of 2017 —…

An Interview with Tom Harbin

Tom Harbin is an ophthalmologist in Atlanta who woke up one morning and decided that he wanted to write a book. He had a striking story to tell and a reason to tell it. But it was a complicated tale, and it felt like it might require specialized knowledge to…

The School Bus Cometh

A few years ago, I kept a blog. There was one post that I look back on every year at right about this time. I think about raising boys, about sending my kids out into a world full of people and things I can’t control. Lately, I think about who…

Meet Richard Armstrong

THE DON CON is a pure-entertainment crime comedy caper novel with all the intrigue of Ocean's 11 and The Bank Job—as well as a smart, witty pop-culture, and satire humour that riffs on The Sopranos, The Godfather, Star Trek, and The Sting. Joey Volpe's life sucks. As an actor, he…

Sherry and Christie Book Club

The Reading Room's resident Sherry Expert Chantal Tseng joins Loyalty Bookstore owner Hannah Oliver Depp in a monthly book club that will read through Agatha Christie's works in order of publication within each of her detectives and celebrate them in style with a tea service and some sherry to boot.…

Summer Memories

Summer. That impossibly infinite span of days between the end of one school year and the start of the next. Anything, everything was possible, even probable. Excruciating, those last few days of the year, sitting at your desk with papers and books while the whole vast expanse of summer was…

Authors on Audio: A Conversation with Deb Spera

A TV producer whose credits include “Criminal Minds,” “Army Wives,” and “Reaper,” Deb Spera is also a much-lauded writer. Here, she discusses her debut historical novel, Call Your Daughter Home, with FM89.3 WYPL’s Stephen Usery. This podcast comes courtesy of WYPL Book Talk in Memphis, TN. Listen to it here.…

The Grand Strategist

For those aspiring to excel in commercial, legal, or governmental affairs, an essential skill necessary to carry in the toolkit is being a shrewd negotiator. Deals get made only when the stars align and cause two or more parties to decide they’re more likely to prosper under the terms of…

An Interview with Alex Segura

There’s a reason that seemingly everyone in the crime fiction community knows Alex Segura. You won’t find a writer involved in more projects. Not only is he the co-president of Archie Comics, but he also wrote a podcast in 2019 that the New York Times called “one of the best…

Meet Natalie Wexler

A leading education journalist, Wexler has been in the vanguard of Washington’s school reform movement for many years. Her book draws on her experience as both a reporter and a tutor in D.C.’s public schools, where she discovered that the fundamental flaw in the country’s education system is not lazy…

7 Best-Reviewed Books in July 2019

Mark Twain’s Literary Resources: A Reconstruction of His Library and Reading by Alan Gribben (NewSouth Books). Reviewed by Philip K. Jason. “It is great fun to join Gribben as he puts us into this significant part of Twain’s life. While much of Gribben’s work is the bedrock business of fact-collecting,…

Realizing a Book-Filled Dream

This May, over 23,000 (thousand!) people converged on the park grounds of Olde Towne Gaithersburg, MD, to revel in books, authors, and more books. In 10 years, Gaithersburg has managed to build a world-class festival. But this isn’t “Field of Dreams,” and the people didn’t just magically appear. The Gaithersburg…

“We Found Waldo” Celebration

Were you lucky enough to spot at least 10 Waldos during Find Waldo in Downtown Frederick? If so, you’re invited to attend the free We Found Waldo Celebration at the Delaplaine Arts Center. Kids ages 3-12 will enjoy a Waldo look-alike contest and other fun games and activities, in addition…

5 Most Popular Posts: July 2019

“Poetry Exemplars” by Grace Cavalieri. “What a natural phenomenon. It’s a delight to read a fulsome description of a place or occurrence and then see it synthesized into nuance and essence. It’s even fun to track the mind to its crystallization. The form Mandel masters is fundamental to our senses.…

Romance Roundup: August 2019

We’re in the dog days of summer — which I recently learned has nothing to do with the heat but was used by the ancient Greeks and Romans to refer to the position of Sirius (the dog star) in the sky — and I’ve been reading, reading, reading. And also…

More than 40 Whacks

“I thumb through the weathered copy of my Bible, reinforcing the tenets of my faith — and how I am failing it. But as a child repeatedly reminded of her inadequacy, her dirtiness and worthlessness, I’ll never shed these feelings of guilt and shame, not even if I confessed every…

The MahoganyBooks & Very Smart Brothas Book Club

The MahoganyBooks & Very Smart Brothas book club is excited to announce that our July book is Go Ahead in the Rain: Notes to a Tribe Called Quest by Hanif Abdurraqib. Named A Most Anticipated Book of 2019, Abdurraqib traces Tribe's creative career, from their early days as part of…

Meet the (Small) Press: Thick Press

In 2017, Erin Segal and Julie Cho met in the California desert for a weekend getaway. Segal, a DC-based social worker, had just completed a storytelling group with senior citizens raised in El Salvador. She thought Cho, an L.A.-based graphic designer, might be able to help her figure out a…

Authors on Audio: A Conversation with Bud Selig

In For the Good of the Game: The Inside Story of the Surprising and Dramatic Transformation of Major League Baseball, former MLB commissioner Bud Selig chronicles — and reflects on — the sometimes tumultuous issues facing our national pastime during the 1990s-2000s. Selig spoke recently about the book with author/attorney…

An Interview with Jamie Mason

A teenage girl, walking into her house late at night, successfully fends off an attack from a would-be assailant. Her heroics are captured on film and quickly become a viral sensation on social media. But there’s a catch. The filming took place inside the house. And the girl (and her…

Up and Coming

My debut novel, One Night Gone, is being published this October. It’s been an interesting journey so far, filled with extreme highs (“I’m the best author in the world!”) and extreme lows (“I’m going to fail miserably, and everyone will hate me”). Having a debut book is a wonderful —…

Meet Dean A. Strang

Before World War I, the government reaction to labor dissent had been local, ad hoc, and quasi-military. Sheriffs, mayors, or governors would deputize strikebreakers or call out the state militia, usually at the bidding of employers. When the United States entered the conflict in 1917, government and industry feared that…

Nicole Dennis-Benn in Conversation with Lupita Aquino

Join us for a special edition of LIT on H St Book Club featuring Nicole Dennis-Benn! She'll be discussing her novel Patsy with book club leader Lupita Reads (Lupita Aquino) and contributor Tarts and Letters (keondra bills freemyn). The book is 10% off in our store in July! A beautifully…

The Prolific Philosopher

Although author Eva Brann is a world-class philosopher, she’ll say she’s not a scholar, academic, or professional intellectual. “I’m a teacher” is the only attribution she’ll agree to. A tutor at St. John’s College in Annapolis, Maryland, and having taught for 62 years (once dean for seven years), we can…

Authors on Audio: A Conversation with Michael Knight

A creative-writing instructor at the University of Tennessee, Michael Knight already has several works of fiction under his belt, including The Typist, Eveningland: Stories, and The Holiday Season. Here, he discusses his latest novel, At Briarwood School for Girls, with FM89.3 WYPL’s Stephen Usery. This podcast comes courtesy of WYPL…

An Interview with Brian Switek

Science journalist Brian Switek studies big, ferocious creatures like the brontosaurus. Since many of the animals he writes about are extinct, he has spent a significant amount of time piecing their lives together through their bones. In his new book, Skeleton Keys: The Secret Life of Bone, he seeks to…

Violence, Apology, and the Politics of Art

“I am done waiting.” So begins Eve Ensler’s The Apology, a letter from the grave written in Ensler’s father’s voice 30 years after his death. He violated her from the age of 5, going on to rape her and then beat her for years while demonizing her as a liar…

Laura Lippman in Conversation with Neely Tucker

In her latest standalone mystery, Lippman, author of the iconic Tess Monaghan series and one of crime fiction’s most decorated writers, returns to her Baltimore beat for a book that’s as much a compelling character study as it is a riveting thriller. Set in 1966, the story follows Maddie Schwartz…

Patriotic Picks: July 2019

Whether it’s via their tone, topic, or tenor, certain works just say “America.” Here are three such titles, suggested by David Bruce Smith, founder of the Grateful American™ Foundation: Adventures of Huckleberry Finn by Mark Twain. This story of the ragamuffin Huck’s journey down the Mississippi River offers an often…

Meet Melanie Rigney

Join us as we welcome back author Melanie Rigney to share from her latest book, Woman of Worth: Prayers and Reflections for Women Inspired by the Book of Proverbs. Melanie is also the author of Blessed Are You: Inspiration from Our Sisters in Faith, which shows how women saints can…

Virginia Is for (Book) Lovers

I’d never been to Winchester, Virginia, so I didn’t know what to expect when I drove down there earlier this year. Sean Murphy, the director of 1455 Literary Arts (formerly the Virginia Center for Literary Arts), had invited me and buzzed-about debut author Angie Kim to participate in his monthly…

July 2019 Exemplars: Poetry Reviews by Grace Cavalieri

The Last Visit by Chad Abushanab. Autumn House Press. 64 pages. Bully Love by Patricia Colleen Murphy. Press 53. 84 pages. Luxury, Blue Lace by S. Brook Corfman. Autumn House Press. 80 pages. Fearless: Women’s Journeys to Self-Empowerment, edited by Cat Pleska. Mountain State Press. 228 pages. Alive & In…

Authors on Audio: A Conversation with David Maraniss

A Pulitzer Prize-winning journalist for the Washington Post, David Maraniss has authored multiple books, including Barack Obama: The Story, Clemente: The Passion and Grace of Baseball's Last Hero, and Once in a Great City: A Detroit Story. Here, he discusses his latest work, A Good American Family: The Red Scare…

An Interview with Lauren E. Oakes

As the title of her new book implies, Lauren E. Oakes is In Search of the Canary Tree. She is a conservation scientist and climate-adaptation specialist at the Wildlife Conservation Society, and an adjunct professor of earth system science at Stanford. Her unique approach to studying trees in remote Alaska…

Silent Book Club: Events for (Noisy!) Book Lovers

Ask a random person in the DC area whether they’ve heard of Silent Book Club, and they’re likely to say no. I’d love to change that, because Silent Book Club is an exciting new trend that offers many benefits over traditional book clubs. Don’t get me wrong — traditional clubs…

The Garden and the Telescope

I’ll never forget the first philosophical sensation I ever had. It came in the mid-80s, while I was watching Disney’s animated “Alice in Wonderland.” “Whoooo are yoooou?” puffed Caterpillar. I was 5 years old and intimidated by Caterpillar’s attitude toward Alice. His clipped responses (“I do NOT see” and “Explain…

Isha Sesay in Conversation with Frederica Wilson

Boko Haram’s kidnapping of 276 Nigerian girls in April 2014 made headlines worldwide. Sesay, the long-time CNN Africa reporter, covered the story from the beginning and was the only journalist to accompany 21 of the girls back home. Building on the work that earned her a Peabody and a Gracie…

Girl Writes Memoir

“[This is] an attempt to tell a complicated story as simply as possible.” – Lara Lillibridge I am packing for a trip in a day or two to the tomb of Fernando Pessoa in Lisbon before heading to my paternal grandfather’s birthplace outside the port city of Vigo in Galicia,…

Meet Susan Swain

We hope you will join us for an interview and Q&A with Susan Swain, co-author of The Presidents. Swain is C-SPAN's co-CEO and, in addition to her senior management role at the network, has been an on-camera host for C-SPAN for more than thirty years, interviewing public officials, historians, and…

Authors on Audio: A Conversation with Eric Barnes

Tennessee newspaper publisher and author Eric Barnes already has several novels under his belt, including The City Where We Once Lived, Something Pretty, Something Beautiful, and Shimmer. Here, he chats with FM89.3 WYPL’s Stephen Usery about his latest release, Above the Ether. This podcast comes courtesy of WYPL Book Talk…

2019 Washington Writers Conference Wrap-Up

The conference ended. Adrenaline had pumped through me the entire day. I didn’t even know I needed to sit down until the goodbyes started. Thank you for coming and strengthening our community of writers. I hope your book projects are now that much closer to your goals. Before I became…

Meet Andrew Shaffer

In the sequel to the New York Times bestselling novel Hope Never Dies, Obama and Biden reprise their roles as BFFs-turned-detectives as they chase Obama’s stolen cell phone through the streets of Chicago — and right into a vast conspiracy. Andrew Shaffer is the New York Times bestselling author of…

An Interview with Nancy Naomi Carlson

Last fall, the post office mistakenly delivered a stack of literary magazines addressed to six other people all to me. Most of them went back the way they came, but one, which my husband had opened, we delivered in person. I dropped it off at the recipient’s house with a…

Seeing Ourselves?

I read Alice Walker’s Meridian around the same time as J.D. Salinger’s The Catcher in the Rye. I was at home during the last Christmas vacation I would ever take there (you can’t go home again). The Color Purple had been a big, fat hit for a couple of years,…

Andrew Blum in Conversation with Jason Samenow

A journalist with a knack for making complex systems accessible, Blum follows Tubes, his primer on the physical structure of the internet, with an engaging look at the international collaborative effort that gives us the daily weather report. Charting how forecasting has evolved from scattered stations to the U.N.'s World…

Romance Roundup: July 2019

It’s July, and at my house that means lazy days by the pool, barbecues with friends, and new books. (Actually, every month means new books at my house.) This month, I read a trio of contemporary romances that wowed me with their multi-dimensional main characters, realistic portrayals of female friendships,…

4 Reasons to Watch Pro Wrestling

To quote a good friend, Anthony Moll, author of Out of Step, “WWE is like the Shakespearean Theater of our time.” Here’s why: 1. It has broad spectacle for the masses. There are stock characters and archetypal characters (the heel, the face) played by athlete-actors. It blends elements of both…

Authors on Audio: A Conversation with Casey Cep

A former Rhodes Scholar, Casey Cep has written for the New Republic, the New Yorker, the New York Times, and many other publications. Here, she discusses her first book, Furious Hours: Murder, Fraud, and the Last Trial of Harper Lee, with FM89.3 WYPL’s Stephen Usery. This podcast comes courtesy of…

7 Best-Reviewed Books in June 2019

All That You Leave Behind: A Memoir by Erin Lee Carr (Ballantine Books). Reviewed by Kitty Kelley. “Erin Lee Carr’s writing is filled with tiger-stalking courage. In fact, she writes so well that when she falls off the wagon, you can almost taste the tingling pleasure of her first forbidden…

5 Most Popular Posts: June 2019

Kenneth Jost’s review of The Chief: The Life and Turbulent Times of Chief Justice John Roberts by Joan Biskupic (Basic Books). “The veteran Supreme Court reporter Joan Biskupic opens The Chief, her long-awaited biography of Chief Justice John Roberts, by describing him as ‘hard-wired from birth for success.’ By fortunate…

An Interview with John Paul Stevens

The book is wonderful, and it contains not only great biographical detail, but a lot of new insights for those of us who teach some of the cases you discuss in the book. Well, anybody who is able to wade through the entire book is entitled to high praise. No,…

Meet Tiffany Jackson

MahoganyBooks is extremely excited to announce that award-winning author and Howard University alumnae Tiffany Jackson will be in-store for a Meet & Greet book signing on July 5th from 5:00 PM to 6:00 PM for her new book, Let Me Hear A Rhyme. Jackson's new book tells the story of…

Growing Pains

For the past several years, social issues, social disparities, and demands for change within the sci-fi/fantasy, mystery, and romance communities have been played out at the institutional level. Those organizations have had — in some cases — to scramble to respond. This is not a bad thing. But growth can…

Lit on H Street with Angie Kim

Join us for a special edition of Lit on H St Book Club featuring Angie Kim! She'll be discussing her novel Miracle Creek with book club leaders Spines & Vines (Jamise Harper) and Lupita Reads (Lupita Aquino). The book is 10% off in our store in June. A thrilling debut…

Bedtime Stories: June 2019

Paullina Simons: When I’m working on a novel, I tend to stay away from fiction so as not to become too reactive in my own, and I focus mainly on history, biography, and essays. But while writing my End of Forever books, set in London and L.A., I did manage…

Editorial. Writers.

Journalists are often thought to be failed novelists. After all, if you can write, why not be Stephen King and make millions churning out bestsellers? Obviously, not everyone can duplicate King’s publishing success, but the suspicion is still there that most journalists tried at some point to break into books…

Authors on Audio: A Conversation with Basil Hero

Using skills honed during his years as an investigative reporter, Basil Hero interviewed several surviving Apollo astronauts while writing The Mission of a Lifetime: Lessons from the Men Who Went to the Moon. Hero spoke with FM89.3 WYPL’s Stephen Usery about the book, which came out in April. This podcast…

An Interview with Tom Jackson

Tom Jackson uses writing to make science accessible and entertaining. He has written more than 80 books on the physical and life sciences and is adept at deconstructing complex topics with logic and humor. One of his most recent books for the general public is Chilled: How Refrigeration Changed the…

Brad Thor in Conversation with Larry O’Connor

#1 New York Times, #1 Wall Street Journal, and #1 Publishers Weekly bestselling author Brad Thor is back with his most gripping thriller yet! In ancient texts, there are stories about men who struck from the shadows, seemingly beyond the reach of death itself. These men were considered part angel,…

Rethinking the Beach Read

In the summer, I often overhear people asking for recommendations for “beach reads” or “vacation books.” Most of the time, I think this means they’re looking for lighter fare, the side salad of novels to go with their time at the pool or the beach, or to read while lounging…

Meet Andrew Nagorski

Word War II went on until 1945, but as Nagorski shows in this deeply researched study, Germany essentially sealed its fate in 1941. Building on his study of 1940, The Greatest Battle, where he argued that the Nazis lost their first major fight due to Hitler’s flouting of his generals’…

Patriotic Picks: June 2019

Whether it’s via their tone, topic, or tenor, certain works just say “America.” Here are three such titles, suggested by David Bruce Smith, founder of the Grateful American™ Foundation: Obscure Destinies by Willa Cather. The Great Plains serve as the harshly beautiful backdrop for this trio of novellas about sacrifice,…

Comforting Absurdities

In my garden, June signals the start of daylily season. There are roughly 55,000 varieties of daylilies, and I would guess I have something like 50 — a tiny percentage, certainly, but still too many for me to keep track of which is which. This year, as I admire what’s…

Authors on Audio: A Conversation with Clay Risen

The author of The Bill of the Century: The Epic Battle for the Civil Rights Act and A Nation on Fire: America in the Wake of the King Assassination, among other books, New York Times deputy op-ed editor Clay Risen turns his pen toward American history in his new work,…

An Interview with Alice Stephens

When a book browser cracks the spine to begin Alice Stephens’ debut novel, Famous Adopted People, s/he lands in the opening scene at a Dunkin’ Donuts in downtown Seoul, where two Korean adoptees raised in America argue about finding their birth mothers. Lisa Pearl, an American teaching English in Tokyo,…

Don’t Handle with Care

“See?” read the snarky note that fell out of a novel my daughter had just returned to me. “Anything can be a bookmark if you want it to be!” Apparently, my dog-ear method of marking my place bothers her. (And millions like her; there are countless memes devoted to this…

9 Steps to Being a Great Moderator

It’s a ubiquitous feature of the lecture hall or public presentation: the person who, during the Q&A period, stands up and says, “Well, it’s more of a comment…” And then proceeds to monopolize the airtime for five minutes. The audience groans. The speakers at the dais shift uncomfortably. Audience members…

An Evening with D. Watkins and Chris Wilson

Join us for this powerful conversation with authors and activists D. Watkins (We Speak for Ourselves: A Word from Forgotten Black America) and Chris Wilson (The Master Plan: My Journey from Life in Prison to a Life of Purpose). Free and open to the public; no registration required. Books will…

Storytime with John Taesoo Kim

Illustrator John Taesoo Kim reads from and shows the art development for his newest book, Nova the Star Eater. Hear about this stellar tale of explosive proportions with sun-filled facts and giggle-inducing fun. Nova has a big appetite for stars, so when she decides to gobble up Earth’s Sun, panic…

Compassionate, Gritty, and Transgender

I love diversity in books. And you will find no heroine more diverse than Bobbi Logan, the transgender-woman protagonist in Renee James’ newest thriller, Seven Suspects. Bobbi is not your average hairdresser: “All the things that make me a less-than-perfect woman make me a somewhat intimidating opponent,” she says. “I’m…

June 2019 Exemplars: Poetry Reviews by Grace Cavalieri

Little Glass Planet by Dobby Gibson. Graywolf Press. 88 pages. Hybrida by Tina Chang. W.W. Norton & Company. 144 pages. Night Angler by Geffrey Davis. BOA Editions. 112 pages. Is, Is Not by Tess Gallagher. Graywolf Press. 160 pages. Notes from the Dry Country by Ellen Aronofsky Cole. Mayapple Press.…

3 Play-Worthy Podcasts You May Have Missed

We get it: The interweb overflows with podcasts, and nobody has time for them all. But if you’re a true book nerd — and you know you are — here are three you’ll want to check out: David McCullough. The Pulitzer winner discusses his latest work, The Pioneers: The Heroic…

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