Big Books & Bold Ideas with Kerri Miller

Many of their names are unknown, but early American feminists fought hard for the freedoms that are cornerstones to democracy. This week on Big Books and Bold Ideas, historian Elizabeth Cobbs and our new series, “Big Books, Bold Americans.”

In her new novel, “Village Weavers,” author Myriam J. A. Chancy draws on her Haitian roots to share a story about friendship, family and what can stitch us back together after we are ripped apart.

Hmong author Kao Kalia Yang concludes her family trilogy by sharing her mother’s remarkable story in the new memoir, “Where Rivers Part.”

Journalist Susan Casey descended to some of the deepest parts of the ocean in tiny submersibles while researching her new book, “The Underworld.” What she saw is astounding.

Why is music so evocative? Why do some memories stick and others fade? How important is slow-wave sleep to the way memory works? One of the country’s leading neuroscientists joins MPR News host Kerri Miller on Big Books and Bold Ideas this week to talk about why memory isn’t so much who we were as who we are.

Best-selling author Tommy Orange brings unrecognized history into contemporary stories with his new eagerly awaited novel, “Wandering Stars.”