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The longest-serving senator in U.S. history has died. West Virginia Sen. Robert Byrd died Monday in a Washington-area hospital at age 92. Ross Baker, a political science professor at Rutgers University, talks with Mary Louise Kelly about Byrd's legacy in the Senate and across his home state.

Sebastian Mallaby's book is an expert primer on hedge funds — the "Ferraris of finance" — and a detailed portrait of Wall Street's daredevils. Reviewer Susan Jane Gilman says More Money Than God is illuminating ... and infuriating.

From sporting events to prostate exam results — if there's one thing you'll learn from Beth Raymer's new gambling memoir, Lay the Favorite, it's that some people will bet on just about anything.

In 1795, a young man named William-Henry Ireland signed a tattered piece of paper "Wm Shakespeare." It was the first of hundreds of documents that he forged and passed off as William Shakespeare originals. Doug Stewart tells his story in The Boy Who Would Be Shakespeare.

Years ago, writer Adam Ross' father told him a disturbing story involving a morbidly obese second cousin and a deadly peanut. Now, Ross has transformed that tale into a dark, debut novel, Mr. Peanut, which dramatizes the case of a man who may or may not have killed his wife via legume.

President Obama may not have cleaned up the oil spill yet -- but on Wednesday he succeeded in extracting a big financial commitment from BP. After a four hour meeting with BP executives at the White House, the oil giant agreed to put $20 billion in an escrow fund to pay the claims of Gulf residents hurt by the spill.

Garden writer Bonnie Blodgett didn't know what her sense of smell meant to her — until she lost it. Her new book, Remembering Smell, describes what it's like to live in the world without being able to smell it — from the sweet aromas of springtime to the stench of sour milk.

From endless book signings to heated arguments with booksellers, author M.J. Rose knows the value of self-promotion. NPR's Lynn Neary joins Rose on the road for a taste of what it means to be a writer in today's new world of publishing.

The Daily Beast editor-in-chief joins NPR's Steve Inskeep for another chat about the best reading she's been doing lately — books and articles about an iconic Depression-era photo, campaign promises and a country that has a way of flying too close to the sun.

When Michael Koryta was 8 years old, his father took him to visit the ruins of an American hotel that was once referred to as the Eighth Wonder of the World. Eighteen years later, he's written So Cold the River, a supernatural thriller about the historic hotel and the mysterious waters that run beneath it.