Mpr News With Kerri Miller

The roots of ecologist Suzanne Simard’s love of forests are multiple generations deep. Her family relied on forestry for their livelihood, and she was one of the early groups of women to carve out space within the logging industry. But her experience didn’t mirror her family’s. As the scale of the industry’s business grew, Simard’s concern about the implications for the ecosystem around it eventually evolved into a new career path.  Simard is now a professor of forest ecology at the University of British Columbia and is working to reframe conversations about conservation. In her book “Finding the Mother Tree: Discovering the Wisdom of the Forest” she writes, “This is not a book about how we can save the trees. This is a book about how the trees might save us.” In June 2021, Simard talked with MPR News host Kerri Miller about what humans can learn from the way trees cooperate and communicate with other plants. Let this conversation whet your appetite for more science-based conversation coming this Friday. Gues

If you stand in the Sistine Chapel and look up at Michelangelo’s depiction of God, you’ll see the archetype. God is white, old, and male. Always male. Theologian and activist Christena Cleveland believes that image is limiting and even harmful. Her new book, “God is a Black Woman,” seeks to recover the sacred, Black feminine, thanks to a pilgrimage she undertook in 2018 to visit some of the 450 Black Madonnas scattered throughout Europe. Christena Cleveland Three photos of Black Madonnas taken by Christena during her pilgrimage. Ancient and revered, the Black Madonnas are sources of strength and miracles. Joan of Arc prayed before the Black Madonna of Moulin. At the Black Madonna of Vichy, thousands of sick came to pray and be comforted. Cleveland. herself, found strength and healing during her pilgrimage. She writes in her book, “Imagination is theology. We can only believe what we can imagine. And our cultural landscape hasn’t given us many tools to imagine a non-white, no

For centuries, the white American church enabled and even embraced racism. Many Christians say that's in the past. Jemar Tisby doesn't agree. MPR News host Kerri Miller talked to the theologian and author in 2019 about his book, "The Color of Compromise," and again in 2021, in the aftermath of George Floyd’s murder. This week, as we look ahead to a conversation with Christena Cleveland, about how her Christian faith changed when she viewed it through the lens of being a Black woman, we are listening to Miller’s 2021 program with Tisby. Here, they discuss his book “How to Fight Racism” and talk about how the white evangelical church in America could do more to heal the wounds it caused. Guest: Jemar Tisby is a historian of race and religion. He recently released a young reader’s edition of “How to Fight Racism.” To listen to the full conversation you can use the audio player above.  Subscribe to the MPR News with Kerri Miller podcast on Apple Podcasts, Google Podcasts or RSS. Subscrib

In classic literature, a hero goes forth to find great adventure and calamitous tragedy. But at the end of their journey, they often turn toward home. Don Winslow uses Greek and Roman literature as his muse as he launches his new trilogy with the book, “City of Fire.” Set in Rhode Island in the late 1980s, it chronicles the clashes of two crime families, one Italian and one Irish, who control the state and have led a relatively peaceful coexistence — until a woman, reminiscent of Helen of Troy, fractures the truce and kicks off a brutal war. His protagonist is Danny Ryan, an Aeneas-like character whose loyalty is both his greatest strength and his tragic flaw. Ryan is forced to grow from a street soldier into a ruthless leader in order to protect the people and the home he loves. Winslow himself went home to write this novel. As he tells MPR News host Kerri Miller, he was eager to leave Rhode Island as a young man, and he’s happily exiled himself in San Diego for years. But to write “City of Fire,” he retu

Novelist Don Winslow has written hundreds of pages about America's war on drugs. He's taken readers into the labyrinth of Mexican cartels, revealed the cynical calculations made in the highest echelons of governments and laid bare the violence and the damage that flow from America's greed for drugs. This Friday, MPR Hews host Kerri Miller will talk to Winslow about his new book, “City on Fire,” which is the first in what promises to be an epic saga about the Irish and Italian crime syndicates in America. To whet your appetite, here’s Miller’s last conversation with Winslow from 2019, when they discussed “The Border,” the final chapter in his trilogy about the war on drugs. Guest: Don Winslow is a best-selling author of 21 books and countless articles and short stories. His new novel, coming April 2022, is “City on Fire.” To listen to the full conversation you can use the audio player above.  Subscribe to the MPR News with Kerri Miller podcast on Apple Podcasts, Google Podcasts or RSS. Subscri

In 2014, after years of writing in relative obscurity, Emily St. John Mandel published a breakaway novel. “Station Eleven” was a huge hit, selling more than 1.5 million copies and receiving critical acclaim. It was even made into a television series by HBO Max. Eerily enough, “Station Eleven” was set in a world confronting a global pandemic. Her new novel, “Sea of Tranquility,” is also set in the future — and the past — thanks to a time-traveling narrative the weaves together five centuries across space and time. This Friday, as part of the Big Books and Bold Ideas conversation, MPR News host Kerri Miller stepped into the void with Mandel. They talk about the folly of time travel, how hinge moments are often recognized only in hindsight, and the constant contingency of living. Who would we be if we weren’t ourselves? Guest: Emily St. John Mandel is the best-selling author of five novels, including “Station Eleven” and “The Glass Hotel.” Her new book is “Sea of Tranquility.” To listen to the full conve

More than 60 million years ago, an object the size of a small city barreled into planet Earth, traveling at more than 22,000 miles per hour. That meteoroid, many scientists believe, triggered a set of cataclysmic climate changes and natural disasters that led to the extinction of the dinosaurs. But what triggered the meteoroid? Lisa Randall, a particle physicist and bestselling author, tackles this question in her book, "Dark Matter and the Dinosaurs: The Astounding Interconnectedness of the Universe." Randall theorizes that the meteoroid was a comet that was dislodged from its orbit when the solar system passed through a disc of dark matter. If you're now wondering, "what's dark matter?", you're not alone. Dark matter is one of the great mysteries of modern science. Dark matter acts like matter, Randall said, "but what distinguishes it is that light just goes right through it. ... I wouldn't call it dark — I would call it transparent." "Billions of dark mat

When someone we deeply love dies, the grief can be overwhelming. But it also reveals a dichotomy in our brains. Neuroscience has learned that we are wired to keep two streams of information running simultaneously about those we love. One stream deals with the day-to-day reality, the memories. The other stream encodes the relationship into the brain with an abiding belief that our loved one will always be there for us. Until they are not. Then our brain struggles to reconcile the two conflicting maps. It’s why someone walking through grief might say, “Technically, I know they died last year. But part of me keeps waiting for them to walk in the door.” Mary-Frances O’Connor studies what happens in the brain while we are grieving, as she directs the Grief, Loss and Social Stress Lab at the University of Arizona. Her new book, “The Grieving Brain,” details what brain imaging tells us about the process of saying a forever goodbye to those we love. This week, she joined MPR News host Kerri Miller to talk about he

Max Porter's debut novel, "Grief is the Thing with Feathers," packs an emotional landslide into its slim 100 pages. The book features a grief-stricken father and his two young sons, unmoored by a great loss. Then Crow comes to the door. Not just a crow, but Crow. Sarcastic, wise and ripped from the pages of folklore, Crow tells the father that he will be there as long as he is needed. The imaginary bird watches over the ravaged family, negotiating a path through their trauma. Grief, Porter said, "is completely unique, and it's as unique as the human brain. There is not a template for thinking about it or dealing with it." His observation echoes the scientific discoveries detailed in Mary-Frances O’Connor’s new book, “The Grieving Brain.” This Friday at 11 a.m., MPR News host Kerri Miller will talk with her about what grief does to the human brain. As a preview, enjoy Miller’s 2016 conversation with Porter, as they discuss his novel, the ubiquitous of grief and the origins of C

It feels like the COVID-19 pandemic launched a thousand conspiracies. From microchips in the vaccines, to using bleach to treat the virus, to a shadowy cabal controlling it all, vast swaths of America fell prey to false thinking. But it has also enflamed a conspiracy theory that has nothing to do with viruses and vaccines. Journalist Kelly Weill has covered flat-Earthers for years. In her new book, “Off the Edge: Flat Earthers, Conspiracy Culture, and Why People Will Believe Anything,” she says the flat Earth movement is a microcosm of how and why conspiracy theories thrive and spread. On this week’s Big Books and Bold Ideas, Weill and MPR News host Kerri Miller had a fascinating discussion about the culture of conspiracy, why flat-Earthers believe what they do, and why presenting the facts to true believers doesn’t usually change their minds. Guest: Kelly Weill is a journalist at the “Daily Beast,” where she covers extremism, disinformation, and the internet. Her new book is “Off the Edge: Flat Earther