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Remarkable Creatures, the new novel by Tracy Chevalier, focuses on the life and work of 19th century fossil hunter Mary Anning, and how her discoveries helped change scientific understanding of the world. Chevalier is the author of Girl with a Pearl Earring.

In 2003, rare-book dealer and bibliodetective Ken Sanders tracked and caught a con artist with designs on first editions of some of the most cherished books in the world. Author Allison Bartlett tells the story in a new book called The Man Who Loved Books Too Much.

The novelist Margaret Atwood wrote the anti-religious parable The Handmaid's Tale. Religious scholar Karen Armstrong's latest book is The Case for God. While they may seem at odds, Rick Kleffel investigates the areas in which their views overlap.

The Interrogative Mood: A Novel? is a book like no other. It is composed entirely of questions. Some of them are laugh-out-loud funny, others provoke memories of long gone times, while some leave you pondering the meaning of life.

Too Much Happiness, the newest collection of short stories from the master of the form, features a cast of lovers and losers, husbands and widows, scientists and woodworkers. "Is there anyone writing short fiction today in English who has more authority?" asks reviewer Alan Cheuse.

During his lifetime, South African poet Dennis Brutus made incredible contributions to the fight against apartheid. Brutus died on December 26, 2009, after successfully battling segregation in athletics with global recognition. Fresh Air remembers the life and achievements of Brutus in this interview from 1986.

The British are crazy for actor and comedian Russell Brand, but he's not content to stop with his compatriots. With a comic triumph as a bad-boy rocker in Forgetting Sarah Marshall and a startlingly frank memoir called My Booky Wook, Brand is shooting for Stateside stardom.

Wil Haygood talks to Steve Inskeep about the life and career of Sugar Ray Robinson, including his many fights against rival boxer Jake LaMotta. Haygood is the author of a new biography of Robinson called Sweet Thunder.

Robin D.G. Kelley spent 14 years on a new book, which some are calling the definitive work on a jazz legend. In Thelonious Monk: The Life and Times of an American Original, he portrays the great pianist as a trained musician, a psychiatric case and a father.

Author Aravind Adiga was not interested in stuffy classics or long, drawn-out historical accounts. But Edmund Wilson's history of socialism, To the Finland Station, proved to be anything but dull — it's electrifying.