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David Lipsky says that his favorite comic, Runaways, is both a brilliant reading experience — and an embarrassment festival. The tiny digests by Brian K. Vaughan have been a fount of guilt, awkwardness and grave personal doubts, but he still pulls them out on the subway, because they are just that good.

The Border Patrol's indicators of success for Operation Streamline don't always add up and neither do the numbers: No one knows just how much the program costs. The Border Patrol makes arrests, but the Justice Department and federal courts provide the logistics of convicting those who cross illegally.

Dr. Donald Berwick, federal chief of Medicare and Medicaid, asked insurers for their help in making health overhaul a success and to achieve common goals. Cheaper, better health care is in everyone's interest, he said.

If the tax cut for wealthiest Americans is allowed to expire, those households making over $250,000 would see their income tax rate rise from 33 percent to 36 percent and those making upwards of $375,000 would go from a 35 percent rate to 39.6 percent. But does it make sense for the tax rate for someone making six figures to be the same as for multimillionaires?

More than 6 million African-Americans moved from the South to cities in the Northeast and Midwest between 1915 and 1970. Pulitzer Prize-winning journalist Isabel Wilkerson documents the resulting demographic and social changes in her history of the Great Migration, The Warmth of Other Suns.

Nine years in the making, the author's new book explores the story of a country through the story of a Minnesota couple and their best friend. Franzen tells NPR's Guy Raz that getting it to the page was a dark -- and at times stormy -- journey.

Home ownership holds a special place in American culture: It is the nest egg, the lifelong investment and what many see as the key to the American dream. Everyone told Dawn Crowell, a single mother of four in St. Paul, Minn., she would be stupid to keep throwing money away on rent. So she took the plunge -- and regrets it to this day.

In autumn, the publishing industry kicks into high gear, rolling out "big books" — the titles that publishers hope readers will buy through the all-important holiday season. NPR's Lynn Neary follows the path of Emma Donoghue's novel, Room, a book that has generated some serious buzz.

The Purple Heart is the most powerful symbol that a soldier has sacrificed for his or her country. For generations, the military has awarded Purple Hearts to soldiers wounded in action. But an investigation by NPR and ProPublica has found that Army commanders routinely deny Purple Hearts to soldiers who've suffered concussions from explosions -- even though Army regulations say they merit the award. Four soldiers have struggled to get Purple Hearts -- and medical help.

NPR News/ProPublica Investigation: Army commanders have routinely denied Purple Hearts to soldiers who have sustained mild traumatic brain injuries in Iraq, despite regulations that make such wounds eligible for the medal.