Blogs & Podcasts

Find early literacy tips and children's books on the Children's Blog. Discover your next great read on the Books Movies Music Blog. Dig into Nashville history with the Community History Blog. Listen to stories, history, and culture on NPL Podcasts. Please see this Note for Readers.

Remembering Philip Roth

May 23, 2018

Laurie Handshu

Philip Roth, America’s best-known writer of Jewish angst and second-best-known native son of New Jersey, died Tuesday evening at age 85.

Podcast

Family Folktales: To Your Good Health

May 23, 2018

Who will get what he wants: the stubborn shepherd, or the demanding king?

Book cover for Crescent Moons and Pointed Minarets showing an illustration of four people looking up at a moon.

Book Review: Crescent Moons and Pointed Minarets

May 22, 2018

Klem-Mari Cajigas

Published just in time for Ramadan, the follow-up to Hena Khan's marvelous book of colors delves into the shapes that make up the Muslim world.

Best Cookbooks for Millennials

May 21, 2018

Emily Krieble

Album cover for They Say I'm Different by Betty Davis.

NPL Mixtapes: Betty Davis Sampler

May 20, 2018

Megan Adovasio-Jones

An NPL curated playlist of songs from funk queen Betty Davis.

Podcast

Back in the Day Podcast: US Weather Service Nashville Station Journals, Celestial Events, and the Buffalo Balloon

May 19, 2018

Sarah Arntz, an Archivist with the Metro Archives, speaks about her recent processing of the US Weather Service, Nashville Station journals. Some of the more interesting entries relate sightings of the Northern Lights and the first Airmail balloon—The Buffalo—making trips across Nashville.

Punk's Not Read

May 17, 2018

Sabrina Hamilton

Punk rock is the voice of the silenced. It rises in troubling times, disquiets in times of peace.

Colorful book cover for "Jimi: Sounds Like a Rainbow," featuring a stylized illustration of a young Jimi Hendrix playing an acoustic guitar.

Summer Challenge Edition: Picture Book Biographies of Musical Greats

May 15, 2018

Klem-Mari Cajigas

There are a bevy of picture book biographies about musicians, artists, and singers from all genres! Add some rock, jazz, folk, swing, blues, and hip hop to your reading this summer for Summer Challenge!

The Infinity Gauntlet

May 14, 2018

Jeremy Estes

WARNING: This post contains spoilers for the film Avengers: Infinity War, because the internet is a cruel place.

Podcast

Back in the Day Podcast: Over There, Over Here: Tennesseans in World War One

May 12, 2018

During this episode, Myers Brown, Tennessee State Library and Archives, Archives Development Program, discusses their project to collect and preserve the records of Tennesseans during the war.