Kentucky Author Forum Sponsors
Kentucky Author Forum Partners
Great Conversations and Great Podversations created in Louisville and heard Nationwide.
2023-2024
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
2022-2023
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
2019-2020
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
2018-2019
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
2017-2018
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
2016-2017
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
2015-2016
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
2014-2015
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
2013-2014
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
2012-2013
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
2011-2012
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
2010- 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
2009-2010
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
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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
2008-2009
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
2007-2008
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
2006-2007
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
2005-2006
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
2004-2005
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
2003-2004
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
2002-2003
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
2001-2002
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
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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
2000-2001
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
1999-2000
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
1998-1999
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
1997-1998
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
1996 – 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
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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