Kentucky Author Forum Sponsors
Kentucky Author Forum Partners
Great Conversations and Great Podversations created in Louisville and heard Nationwide.
Amor Towles, author of Table for Two: Fictions (Penguin Random House)
Interviewer – Alexandra Jacobs, New York Times Book Critic
September 30, 2024
***
Singing legend Renée Fleming, author of Music and Mind: Harnessing the Arts for Health and Wellness (Viking)
Interviewer – Richard Powers, author
May 10, 2024
***
Ann Patchett, author of Tom Lake (HarperCollins)
Interviewer – Kevin Wilson, author and professor
February 12, 2024
***
Stephen B. Bright, author of The Fear of Too Much Justice: Race, Poverty, and the Persistence of Inequality in the Criminal Courts (The New Press)
Interviewer – James Forman Jr., Pulitzer Prize-Winner / Yale Professor
November 13, 2023
***
Jill Lepore, author of The Deadline: Essays (Liveright)
Interviewer – Congressman Jamie Raskin
September 11, 2023
Geraldine Brooks, author of Horse: A Novel (Viking Books)
Interviewer – Jacki Lyden, former NPR Host
March 27, 2023
***
Maggie Haberman, New York Times journalist and author of Confidence Man: The Making of Donald Trump and the Breaking of America (Penguin Press)
Interviewer – Laura Coates, CNN Legal Analyst and Sirius XM Radio Host
January 9, 2023
***
Josh Chin, author of Surveillance State: Inside China’s Quest to Launch a New Era of Social Control (MacMillan)
and Evan Osnos, author of Age of Ambition: Chasing Fortune, Truth, and Faith in the New China (Farrar, Straus and Giroux), and Journalist at The New Yorker and CNN Contributor
September 29, 2022
***
Jamie Raskin, author of Unthinkable: Trauma, Truth and the Trials of American Democracy (Harper Books)
and Fiona Hill, author of There Is Nothing for You Here: Finding Opportunity in the Twenty-First Century (Mariner Books)
January 24, 2022
James Stavridis, author of Sailing True North: Ten Admirals and the Voyage of Character (Penguin Press)
Interviewer – Melissa Block, NPR special correspondent
December 16, 2019
***
Dani Shapiro, author of Inheritance: A Memoir of Genealogy, Paternity, and Love (Knopf)
Interviewer – Robert Siegel, former host of NPR’s All Things Considered
September 25, 2019
David McCraw, author of Truth in Our Times (All Points Books, Macmillan)
Interviewer – Chuck Rosenberg, MSNBC legal analyst, Former Senior DEA official, podcaster of ‘The Oath’
May 14, 2019
***
Doris Kearns Goodwin, author of Leadership in Turbulent Times (Simon & Schuster)
Interviewer – A. Scott Berg, Pulitzer-prize winning author and five time NY Times best seller of biographies
December 6, 2018
***
Charles Graeber, author of The Breakthrough: Immunotherapy and the Race to Cure Cancer (Twelve, Hachette)
Interviewer – Dr. Thomas Gajewski, University of Chicago, Award-winning top Cancer and Immunotherapy Researcher and Scientist
November 15, 2018
***
Casey Gerald, author of There Will Be No Miracles Here (Riverhead, PRH)
Interviewer- Van Jones, CNN Host and Analyst
October 25, 2018
***
John Feinstein, author of The First Major: The Inside Story of the 2016 Ryder Cup (Anchor Books, Knopf)
Interviewer – Mike Tirico, NBC Sports Anchor
September 20, 2018
Malcolm Nance, author of The Plot to Hack America: How Putin’s Cyberspies and WikiLeaks Tried to Steal the 2016 Election (Skyhorse Publishing)
Interviewer – Ned Price, director of policy and communications for National Security Action
April 5, 2018
***
David Frum, author of Trumpocracy: The Corruption of the American Republic (HarperCollins)
Interviewer- David Jolly, former U. S. Representative (R-FL)
January 31, 2018
***
Masha Gessen, author of The Future is History: How Totalitarianism Reclaimed Russia (Riverhead)
Interviewer – Clarissa Ward, senior international correspondent, CNN
December 19, 2017
***
Robert Wright, author of Why Buddhism is True: The Science and Philosophy of Meditation and Enlightenment (Simon and Schuster)
Interviewer – Jon Kabat-Zinn, Founding Executive Director of the Center for Mindfulness in Medicine, Health Care and Society at University of Massachusetts Medical School
November 27, 2017
Thomas Friedman, author of Thank You for Being Late: An Optimist’s Guide to Thriving in the Age of Accelerations (Farrar, Straus & Giroux)
Interviewer- U. S. Congressman John Yarmuth (D-KY)
May 8, 2017
***
Joseph Stiglitz, author of The Euro and The Price of Inequality (W. W. Norton)
Interviewer – Rana Foroohar, global business columnist for the Financial Times, author of Makers and Takers (Crown)
April 13, 2017
***
P.J. O’Rourke, author of How the Hell Did This Happen? The Election of 2016 (Grove Atlantic)
Interviewer – Robert Siegel, host of NPR’s All Things Considered
March, 20, 2017
***
Colson Whitehead, author of The Underground Railroad (Doubleday)
Interviewer – Isaac Fitzgerald, Book Editor at Buzzfeed
December 5, 2016
***
Sebastian Junger, author of Tribe: On Homecoming and Belonging (Twelve)
Interviewer – Joe Klein, political columnist for TIME, author of Charlie Mike: A True Story of Heroes Who Brought Their Mission Home
September 21, 2016
Joe Nocera, author of Indentured: The Inside Story of the Rebellion Against the NCAA (Portfolio/Penguin)
Interviewer – Buzz Bissinger, journalist and author of Friday Night Lights
April 18, 2016
***
Diane Rehm, author of On My Own (Knopf)
Interviewer- Ann Patchett, author of Bel Canto and This Is the Story of a Happy Marriage
March 23, 2016
***
E.J. Dionne, author of Why the Right Went Wrong: Conservatism – from Goldwater to the Tea Party and Beyond (Simon and Schuster)
Interviewer – James Fallows, national correspondent for The Atlantic
February 24, 2016
***
John Irving, author of Avenue of Mysteries (Simon and Schuster)
Interviewer- Sam Tanenhaus, former editor in chief of The New York Times “Sunday Book Review” and “Week in Review”
November 10, 2015
David Boies, author of Redeeming the Dream: The Case for Marriage Equality (Viking)
Interviewer- Jeffrey Toobin, prominent legal journalist and senior analyst for CNN
March 24, 2015
***
Jessye Norman, author of Stand Up Straight and Sing! (Houghton Mifflin Harcourt)
Interviewer- Gloria Steinem, writer, editor, activist and co-founder of Ms. magazine
November 17, 2014
***
Timothy Geithner, author of Stress Test: Reflections on Financial Crises (Crown)
Interviewer – James Surowiecki, staff writer of “The Financial Page” at The New Yorker
November 3, 2014
***
Philippe de Montebello, author of Rendez-vous with Art (Thames and Hudson)
Interviewer- Michael Kimmelman, architecture critic and longtime chief art critic for The New York Times
October 15, 2014
Alain de Botton, author of The Art of Travel, How Proust Can Change Your Life, and The News: A User’s Manual (Pantheon)
Interviewer – Brian Stelter, senior media correspondent for CNN Worldwide
March 4, 2014
***
Chris Matthews, author of Tip and the Gipper: When Politics Worked (Simon & Schuster)
Interviewer- E. J. Dionne, Jr., Senior Fellow at the Brookings Institution and syndicated columnist for The Washington Post
December 3, 2013
***
Pat Conroy, author of The Prince of Tides, The Great Santini, South of Broad, and The Death of Santini (Doubleday)
Interviewer- Maureen Corrigan, Book Critic for “Fresh Air” on National Public Radio
October 30, 2013
***
Congressman John Lewis, key Civil Rights figure and author of March (Top Shelf)
Interviewer- Rachel Maddow, Host of MSNBC’s primetime news and information program, The Rachel Maddow Show
October 15, 2013
***
Coach Rick Pitino, author of The One-Day Contract: How to Add Value to Every Minute of Your Life (St. Martin’s Press)
Interviewer- Joe Nocera, Opinion and Business Columnist for The New York Times
October 9, 2013
Elaine Pagels, author of Revelations: Visions, Prophecy & Politics in the Book of Revelation (Penguin)
Interviewer – Gustav Niebuhr, Associate Professor in Religion & the Media, Syracuse University, former New York Times Religion Correspondent
March 19, 2013
***
Jared Diamond, author of The World Until Yesterday: What Can We Learn From Traditional Societies? (Viking)
Interviewer- Sarah Hardy, Professor Emerita, University of California-Davis, associate in the Peabody Museum of Archeology & Ethnology at Harvard
January 9, 2013
***
Ray Kurzweil, author of How to Create a Mind: The Secret of Human Thought Revealed (Viking)
Interviewer- Jim Fleming, host of “To the Best of Our Knowledge” on Wisconsin Public Radio/Public Radio International
November 26, 2012
***
Steven Pinker, author of The Better Angels of Our Nature: Why Violence Has Declined (Penguin)
Interviewer- Neal Conan, host of “Talk of the Nation” on National Public Radio
October 2, 2012
Ahmed Rashid, author of Pakistan on the Brink: The Future of America, Pakistan and Afghanistan (Viking)
Interviewer– Clarissa Ward, CBS News Foreign Correspondent
May 15, 2012
***
Erik Larson, author of In the Garden of Beasts: Love, Terror, and an American Family in Hitler’s Berlin (Crown)
Interviewer- Robert Siegel, Senior Host of All Things Considered on National Public Radio
April 16. 2012
***
Michio Kaku, author of Physics of the Future: How Science Will Shape Human Destiny and Our Daily Lives by the Year 2100 (Anchor)
Interviewer- James Canton, global futurist, author, CEO and Chairman of the Institute for Global Futures
February 22, 2012
***
Siddhartha Mukherjee, author of The Emperor of All Maladies: A Biography of Cancer (Scribner)
Interviewer – Dr. David Scadden, Professor of Medicine, Harvard University; co-chair of Harvard Stem Cell Institute
October 13, 2011
***
Rosanne Cash, author of Composed: A Memoir (Penguin)
Interviewer- Nick Spitzer, producer and host of public radio’s American Routes
September 26, 2011
Billy Collins, author of Horoscopes for the Dead: Poems (Random House)
Interviewer – Garrison Keillor
April 21, 2011
***
Dr. Eric Kandel, author of In Search of Memory (W. W. Norton)
Interviewer- Jonah Lehrer, author of Proust Was a Neuroscientist and How We Decide
February 15, 2011
***
Andrew Ross Sorkin, author of Too Big to Fail: The Inside Story of How Wall Street and Washington Fought to Save the Financial System- and Themselves (Penguin)
Interviewer- Bethany McLean, author of The Smartest Guys in the Room and All the Devils are Here: The Hidden History of the Financial Crisis
November 9, 2010
***
Arianna Huffington, author of Third World America (Crown)
Interviewer – Howard Fineman, Senior Political Editor, The Huffington Post
October 11, 2010
***
David Plouffe, author of The Audacity to Win (Penguin)
Interviewer- Richard Wolffe, author of Renegade: The Making of a President
September 21, 2010
Daniel Okrent, author of Last Call: The Rise and Fall of Prohibition (Scribner)
Interviewer- John Huey, Editor-in-Chief of TIME Inc.
May 10, 2010
***
Richard Ellis, author of On Thin Ice: The Changing World of the Polar Bear (Knopf)
Interviewer- Jeff Corwin, biologist and host on Animal Planet and The Travel Channel
April 13, 2010
***
Michael Sandel, author of Justice: What’s The Right Thing To Do? (Farrar, Straus & Giroux)
Interviewer – John S. Carroll, Pulitzer Prize-winning journalist
December 1, 2009
***
Dr. Harold Varmus, author of The Art and Politics of Science (W. W. Norton)
Interviewer- Governor Howard Dean, author of Howard Dean’s Prescription for Real Healthcare Reform
November 12, 2009
Michael Kinsley, editor of Creative Capitalism: A Conversation with Bill Gates, Warren Buffett, and Other Economic Leaders (Simon & Schuster)
Interviewer – James Surowiecki, author of The Wisdom of Crowds
March 24, 2009
***
Elizabeth Gilbert, author of Eat, Pray, Love and Stern Men (Penguin)
Interviewer – ZZ Packer, author of Drinking Coffee Elsewhere
February 26, 2009
***
Malcolm Gladwell, author of Blink, The Tipping Point, and Outliers: The Story of Success (Little, Brown)
Interviewer – Daniel Pink, author of A Whole New Mind and The Adventures of Johnny Bunko: The Last Career Guide You’ll Ever Need
January 22, 2009
***
Senator David Boren, author of A Letter to America (University of Oklahoma Press)
Interviewer – Neal Conan, host of Talk of the Nation on National Public Radio
October 6, 2008
United States Supreme Court Justice Stephen Breyer, author of Active Liberty: Interpreting Our Democratic Constitution (Knopf/Doubleday)
Interviewer – Pete Williams, NBC News Justice Correspondent
May 6, 2008
***
Greg Mortenson, author of Three Cups of Tea: One Man’s Mission to Promote Peace…One School at a Time (Penguin)
Interviewer – Jacki Lyden, Correspondent & Host on National Public Radio
April 1, 2008
***
Michael Pollan, author of The Omnivore’s Dilemma and In Defense of Food (Penguin)
Interviewer – Michael Shnayerson, Contributing Editor, Vanity Fair
January 11, 2008
***
Tom Brokaw, author of The Greatest Generation and Boom! Voices of the Sixties: Personal Reflections on the ‘60s and Today (Random House)
Interviewer – Rick Atkinson, author of An Army at Dawn
November 27, 2007
James A. Baker, III, author of Work Hard, Study…and Keep Out of Politics! (Putnam)
Interviewer – John King, CNN chief national correspondent
April 24, 2007
***
Bill McKibben, author Deep Economy: The Wealth of Communities and the Durable Future (Times Books/Henry Holt)
Interviewer – Wendell Berry, writer, cultural and economic critic
February 28, 2007
***
Lawrence Wright, author of The Looming Tower: Al Qaeda and the Road to 9/11 (Knopf)
Interviewer – Peter Bergen, author of The Osama bin Laden I Know
October 18, 2006
***
George Soros, author The Age of Fallibility: Consequences of the War on Terror (Public Affairs)
Interviewer – John Podesta, President & CEO, Center for American Progress
September 12, 2006
Sue Monk Kidd, author of The Secret Life of Bees and The Mermaid Chair (Viking)
Interviewer – Jean Shinoda Bolen, M.D., author of The Goddesses in Everywoman
April 6, 2006
***
Gene Sperling, author of The Pro-Growth Progressive (Simon & Schuster)
Interviewer – John Ydstie, Correspondent & Host on National Public Radio
March 7, 2006
***
Senator John McCain, author of Character is Destiny (Random House)
Interviewer – Robert Siegel, Senior Host of All Things Considered, National Public Radio
December 19, 2005
***
R.W. “Johnny” Apple Jr., author of Apple’s America (North Point Press)
Interviewer – Tom Brokaw, Special Correspondent, NBC News
November 1, 2005
Azar Nafisi, author of Reading Lolita in Tehran: A Memoir in Books (Random House)
Interviewer – Karl Fleming, civil rights reporter
April 19, 2005
***
Ari Fleischer, author of Taking Heat: The President, The Press, and My Years in the White House (HarperCollins)
Interviewer – Bill Plante, CBS News White House Correspondent
March 29, 2005
***
Dennis Ross, author of The Missing Peace (Farrar, Straus & Giroux)
Interviewer – Jacki Lyden, foreign correspondent for National Public Radio
November 17, 2004
***
Karen Armstrong, author of Buddha (Penguin)
Interviewer – Robert Siegel, Senior Host of All Things Considered, National Public Radio
October 20, 2004
Margaret Atwood, author of Oryx and Crake (Doubleday)
Interviewer – Ira Flatow, Host, Talk of the Nation: Science Friday on National Public Radio
April 12, 2004
***
Robert Kagan, author of Of Paradise and Power: America and Europe in the New World Order (Vintage)
Interviewer – Neal Conan, Host of Talk of the Nation on National Public Radio
February 12, 2004
***
Henry Louis Gates, Jr., author of America Behind the Color Line: Dialogues with African Americans (Warner Books)
Interviewer – Karen Grigsby Bates, Correspondent, National Public Radio
January 20, 2004
***
Madeleine Albright, author of Madam Secretary (Random House)
Interviewer – Richard Roth, CNN, United Nations Correspondent
December 17, 2003
United States Supreme Court Justice Sandra Day O’Connor, author of The Majesty of the Law: Reflections of a Supreme Court Justice (Random House)
Interviewer – Pete Williams, NBC News Justice Correspondent
May 14, 2003
***
Arthur Levitt, author of Take on the Street (Pantheon)
Interviewer – Jane Bryant Quinn, Financial Columnist, NEWSWEEK
November 21, 2002
***
Garrison Keillor, author of Good Poems and Lake Wobegon Summer 1956 (Viking)
November 13, 2002
***
Strobe Talbott, author of The Russia Hand (Random House)
Interviewer – David Halberstam, author of The Best and the Brightest
September 25, 2002
Wynton Marsalis, author of jazz in the bittersweet blues of life (Da Capo Press)
Interviewer – Robert Siegel, Senior Host of All Things Considered on NPR
May 6, 2002
***
Vernon E. Jordan, Jr., author of Vernon Can Read! (Public Affairs)
Interviewer – Ronald Brownstein, Senior Washington Correspondent, Los Angeles Times
March 26, 2002
***
David Hockney, author of Secret Knowledge: Rediscovering the Lost Techniques of the Old Masters (Penguin)
Interviewer – Michael Kimmelman, Chief Art Critic, The New York Times
December 4, 2001
***
General Wesley K. Clark, author of Waging Modern War: Bosnia, Kosovo, and the Future of Combat (Public Affairs)
Interviewer – Joe Klein, author of Primary Colors
November 6, 2001
James McBride, author of The Color of Water: A Black Man’s Tribute to His White Mother (Penguin)
Interviewer – Christopher Lydon, former host of The Connection, WBUR, Boston
April 25, 2001
***
Dr. David Kessler, author of A Question of Intent (Public Affairs)
Interviewer – Roger Cossack, Co-host of CNN’s Burden of Proof
April 2, 2001
***
L. Doctorow, author of City of God (Random House)
Interviewer – Christopher Lydon, former host of The Connection, WBUR, Boston
February 28, 2001
***
Ted Koppel, author of Off Camera: Private Thoughts Made Public (Knopf)
Interviewer – Robert Siegel, Senior Host of All Things Considered, on NPR
October 23, 2000
Elie Wiesel, author of Night and And the Sea is Never Full, Memoirs 1969 – (Knopf)
Interviewer – Gustav Niebuhr, Religion Correspondent, The New York Times
April 10, 2000
***
John Glenn, author of John Glenn: A Memoir (Bantam)
Interviewer – Lou Dobbs, CEO of space.com
December 13, 1999
***
Dr. Jane Goodall, author of Reason For Hope: A Spiritual Journey (Warner Books)
Interviewer – Dr. Richard Wrangham, Chair, Dept. of Anthropology, Harvard University
October 28, 1999
***
Frances Mayes, author of Under the Tuscan Sun and Bella Tuscany (Crown)
Interviewer – Rebecca Bain, Host, WPLN- Nashville’s NPR Station
October 7, 1999
Ruth Reichl, author of Tender at the Bone: Growing Up at the Table (Random House)
Interviewer – Susan Stamberg, Special Correspondent, National Public Radio
March 9, 1999
***
Pat Schroeder, author of 24 Years of House Work…and the Place is Still a Mess (Andrews McMeel)
Interviewer – Eleanor Clift, Contributing Editor, NEWSWEEK
January 12, 1999
***
A Scott Berg, author of Lindbergh (Putnam)
Interviewer – Jonathan Yardley, Book Critic, The Washington Post
December 2, 1998
David Halberstam, author of The Children: A Novel About the Civil Rights Movement (Random House)
Interviewer – Roger Wilkins, Professor, George Mason University
April 20, 1998
***
Carl Lewis, author of One More Victory Lap (Aum Publications)
Interviewer – Frank Deford, Sports Commentator, National Public Radio
February 11, 1998
***
Jane Bryant Quinn, author of Making the Most of Your Money (Simon & Schuster)
Interviewer – Marshall Loeb, former Managing Editor, Fortune
December 2, 1997
***
Dr. Susan Love, author of Dr. Susan Love’s Breast Book (Addison-Wesley) and Dr. Susan Love’s Hormone Book (Random House)
Interviewer – Anne Taylor Fleming, Commentator, PBS
October 6, 1997
Hillary Rodham Clinton, author of It Takes a Village: And Other Lessons Children Teach Us (Simon & Schuster)
Interviewer – Carl Sferrazza Anthony
April 24, 1997
***
Katharine Graham, author of Personal History (Knopf)
Interviewer – Andrea Mitchell, Chief Foreign Affairs Correspondent, NBC News
March 25, 1997
***
John Updike, author of Golf Dreams (Knopf)
Interviewer – Robert Siegel, Senior Host of All Things Considered, on NPR
February 25, 1997
***
Neil Simon, author of Rewrites (Simon & Schuster)
Interviewer – Jon Jory, Producing Director of Actors Theatre of Louisville
November 25, 1996
***
Sister Helen Prejean, author of Dead Man Walking (Knopf)
Interviewer – Stephen Bright, Director, Southern Center for Human Rights
October 12, 1996
***
Senator Bill Bradley, author of Time Present, Time Past: A Memoir (Knopf)
Interviewer – Eleanor Clift, Contributing Editor, NEWSWEEK
May 13, 1996