Weekend Edition Sunday host Rachel Martin speaks with David Rohde about his new book, Beyond War: Reimagining American Influence in a New Middle East.

Last week, the The Orphan Master's Son was awarded the Pulitzer prize for fiction. Weekend Edition Sunday host Rachel Martin spoke with author Adam Johnson last year about his book. In that interview, Johnson explained that as part of his research he actually managed to finagle a visit to North Korea. He said his government minders maintained tight control over his itinerary, but they couldn't hide everything.

Kay Bailey Hutchison was the first woman to represent Texas in the U.S. Senate. Her new book, Unflinching Courage, profiles some of the brave female pioneers who shaped her home state.

Michael Pollan helped start -- or at least spur -- the slow food movement by taking readers through the food chain and examining why and how we eat. Now, Pollan is taking to the kitchen in an effort to reclaim cooking as an enjoyable and important part of daily life.

Books that fall into the category of "graphic novel" encompass nearly all literary genres and artistic mediums. We explore the increasingly popular field and talk with artist-cum-authors who are finding new ways to tell stories.

Writer Barbara Kingsolver is one of a handful of novelists with a science background, and she puts it to use in her new novel Flight Behavior. Kingsolver discusses the book and why she chose to look at the the issue of climate change in a fictional work set in rural Tennessee.

In his latest book Hallucinations, neurologist Oliver Sacks collects stories of individuals who can see, hear and smell things that aren't really there--such as strange voices, or collages of unrecognizable faces--and explores the disorders and drugs that can produce such illusions.

In his new book, The Dispensable Nation, former State Department adviser Vali Nasr explores the state of U.S. foreign policy in Afghanistan and beyond. Nasr says the U.S. "is happy ... to play a less important role, to no longer be the stabilizer."