Karen Grigsby Bates
Karen Grigsby Bates is the Senior Correspondent for Code Switch, a podcast that reports on race and ethnicity. A veteran NPR reporter, Bates covered race for the network for several years before becoming a founding member of the Code Switch team. She is especially interested in stories about the hidden history of race in America—and in the intersection of race and culture. She oversees much of Code Switch's coverage of books by and about people of color, as well as issues of race in the publishing industry. Bates is the co-author of a best-selling etiquette book (Basic Black: Home Training for Modern Times) and two mystery novels; she is also a contributor to several anthologies of essays. She lives in Los Angeles and reports from NPR West.
-
Audiobooks as we know them have been around for about 25 years. But the form really took off when MP3 players like the iPod came out.
-
From the time of slavery, some light-skinned African-Americans escaped racism by passing as white. The new book, A Chosen Exile: A History of Racial Passing in American Life, explores what they lost. -
Twenty years ago, Diana Gabaldon's time-travel epic Outlander shot to the top of the best-seller lists — and stayed there. NPR's Karen Grigsby Bates digs into the enduring potency of Gabaldon's magic. -
In her new book, Rachel Howzell Hall introduces Elouise "Lou" Norton, a fiercely ambitious homicide detective who patrols the same Los Angeles streets that she — and Hall — grew up on. -
Speculation about her grandmother's life in China in the early 1900s provided Tan inspiration for her latest novel, out Tuesday. Valley is an opus that covers half of a tumultuous century, ranges across two continents and involves love, deceit, forgiveness and, ultimately, redemption. -
Two new books published Tuesday tell the story of Harlem. The first features the white women involved in the Harlem Renaissance. And the second profiles three black female artists during World War II.
-
After an editor asked him to tone down his racial politics, the first-time author walked away from his book deal, moved to a smaller press and eventually published two books to critical acclaim. He hopes his story helps make the case for why publishers should welcome different voices to the table. -
Six years ago, the mystery writer sent Easy Rawlins off a cliff, seemingly killing him. Now, Easy's back on the streets his creator once called home. Mosley says other than Los Angeles, he and his detective hero don't have much in common, but NPR's Karen Grigsby Bates begs to differ. -
In 1965, sociologist Daniel Patrick Moynihan, who would later become a U.S. senator from New York, authored a controversial report. It concluded the decline of the black nuclear family was a major component to black poverty. Nearly 50 years later, the Urban Institute has released a follow-up to Moynihan's study that looks at the current barriers poor black families continue to face, and compares those findings to the country's other ethnic groups.
-
When Detroit milliner Luke Song made Aretha Franklin's now-iconic 2009 inaugural hat — you know, the one with the big bow? — he had no idea he'd be making thousands more.
