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The title novella in Tillie Olsen's Tell Me a Riddle, says Scott Turow, "achieves the shocking brevity and power of the best poems." Turow, the author of Presumed Innocent and other novels, talks about why Olsen's story about an aged couple has become one of his favorite texts.

One hundred years ago, German psychiatrist Alois Alzheimer first described the puzzling symptoms now known as Alzheimer's disease. Billions of dollars have since gone to research for a cure, but some scientists think that money is better spent on prevention and care.

Isabel Allende's novel, Ines of My Soul, is a fictionalized account of the life of Ines Suarez, a seamstress who helped found Chile. The story led Allende to empathize with both sides of a centuries-old conflict.

Comedian Harry Shearer has a new book called Not Enough Indians, a novel about Native Americans and gambling. He also has a role in the new film For Your Consideration, directed by Christopher Guest. Shearer is a voice actor on The Simpsons, playing the roles of Mr. Burns, Waylon Smithers, Ned Flanders, Principal Skinner and many more characters. Shearer is also the host of the weekly public radio series Le Show.

A book about a dog has been at or near the top of nonfiction best-seller lists for about a year now. Librarian Nancy Pearl suggests some other notable books featuring, but not necessarily written by, canines.

Richard Ford's novels are deeply rooted in the suburbs, and his latest, The Lay of the Land is no exception. Ford says he writes about the 'burbs because of what they tell readers about themselves and the America in which they live.

As history marches on, space for memorials on the National Mall in Washington, D.C., is shrinking. The Martin Luther King Jr. Memorial, which officially begins construction Nov. 13, may perhaps be the last monument to be built on the parcel.

A reporter's job is to present the facts, but that's hard to do from a body bag or gurney, says journalist Michael Weisskopf. In 2003, a grenade shattered Weisskopf's right hand while he was an embedded reporter with the U.S. Army in Iraq.

The story of Valentino Achak Deng, one of the tens of thousands of children refugees from the Sudanese civil war, is the basis for Dave Eggers' new novel, What Is the What. Eggers and Deng talk about their collaboration and the traumas the "Lost Boys" endured.

One of football's greatest players was quarterback Johnny Unitas. But he was more than a great player. Unitas was a unique man who towered above his contemporaries, and the stars who have played after him.