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Emma Straub's novel, Laura Lamont's Life in Pictures, centers on small-town girl Elsa Emerson's transition into movie star Laura Lamont. Straub says her main character came to her while she was reading an obituary of real-life actress Jennifer Jones. "I was just struck by her life," Straub says.

Boxer Ray "Boom Boom" Mancini won the championship his fighter father never could — but his life was marred by tragedy when he defended his title against a South Korean boxer who died after the match. A new biography of Mancini describes how his life changed after that fateful fight.

A big dog has a big birthday this year: Norman Bridwell's beloved Clifford was born in 1962. Bridwell says he was "shocked" when it was accepted for publication.

In her book This Republic of Suffering: Death and the American Civil War, historian Drew Gilpin Faust writes that Civil War deaths — both their number and their manner — transformed America. She is featured in PBS's American Experience called Death and the Civil War, which premiered Sept. 18.

At his new venture, The Blaze, Beck has far fewer audience members soaking in his commentary than he did at Fox News. But the numbers don't tell the whole story. Fox helped amplify Beck's voice, whereas now, Beck projects his message on his own terms.

If you need help in ultramodern Berlin, the low-tech tradition of posting a note on a lamppost may yield the best results. Just ask Maira Becke, who has turned to the city's many avid lamppost readers for help recovering a beloved stiletto shoe.

The residential real estate listing website Trulia is riding the recovery in the housing market. Trulia's initial public stock offering is the first real test of the market's appetite for technology start-ups since Facebook's rocky debut.

In his new book, The Fine Print: How Big Companies Use "Plain English" to Rob You Blind, author David Cay Johnston examines the fees that companies have added over the years that have made bills incrementally larger. He tells Fresh Air that companies are misusing language to "confuse people."

In his new book, Doug Saunders says there are those who believe immigration and high birth rates will make Muslims a majority in Europe in coming decades — and their hostility to Western values makes them a threat. Saunders tells Fresh Air that such fears are based on inaccurate assertions of fact.

Susanna Moore tells the saga of an ambitious girl, a family's artistic fortune and a world at war. Young heroine Beatrice Palmer is whisked off to Berlin where she is put to work packing up priceless artwork in a wealthy family's mansion.