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The author spent more than five years writing and researching her book, Inside Scientology: The Story of America's Most Secretive Religion. It gives a detailed account of the lives of founder L. Ron Hubbard and the man who succeeded him, David Miscavige.

Electric vehicles and solar power are growing quickly and offering hope the world could still meet climate change goals.

Before Agatha Christie wrote Death on the Nile or Murder on the Orient Express, she took her own, less perilous, journey around the world in 1922. Her grandson Mathew Prichard has now published a volume of her letters and photographs from the trip.

Nigerian writer Wole Soyinka was the first black African to win the Nobel Prize in literature, in 1986. He tells NPR's Michel Martin that the best part about it was the money. His latest work, Of Africa, is a study of the continent that has dominated his career.

Ahmadou Kourouma's Allah Is Not Obliged recounts the story of a child soldier in Liberia. Author A. Igoni Barrett says in this book, horror and humor become bedfellows, making for a heartbreaking yet laughter-filled read.

Author Leah Hager Cohen says it's time to stop faking your way through conversations. "Once you finally own up to what you don't know, then you can begin to have honest interactions with the people around you," she explains.

The cult favorite 1965 novel Dune was a classic of sci-fi literature. But author Leigh Bardugo says that when she was 12, Dune wasn't just an escape — it changed her world. Has a book ever opened your eyes to an alternate reality? Tell us in the comments.

The sound of the sea, the smell of rain — what makes Ireland such a magical place? Maybe its writers like Claire Keegan who tease the nuance and grace out of everyday interactions. Author Keith Donohue says each of Keegan's stories is a morsel worth savoring.

Just as the passengers aboard the MV Akademik Shokalskiy thought they had escaped the Antarctic ice, word came that the Chinese ship that rescued them might be stuck as well. Poet Jynne Martin recommends a book to put the situation in perspective, one that tells the story of an expedition that was doomed from the start.

Susan Minot's new novel is a departure from her usual minimalist explorations of upper-crust love. Based on her own journalism, it's a gripping fictionalized account of the 1996 abduction of 139 Ugandan schoolgirls by militant guerrillas. Reviewer Jane Ciabattari says Thirty Girls is "panoramic" and "poetic" in its descriptions.