TV Talk: Recent books go behind the scenes of ‘West Wing,’ ‘Sopranos,’ ‘Gilmore Girls,’ ‘thirtysomething,’ ‘Golden Girls’
Trib Total Media TV writer Rob Owen offers reading tips
for recent books about TV. One of the best aspects of writing about TV is the opportunity to occasionally visit the sets of shows to gather insider intel. A raft of recent books about the industry take readers behind the...
Westmoreland native’s new guidebook explores the ‘weird, wonderful and obscure’ in New York City
Having grown up in Western Pennsylvania, Rossilynne Skena Culgan had a leg up when she started her first guidebook, “101 Things to Do in Pittsburgh Before You Die.” A few years ago, the Murrysville native moved to New York City, where she quickly began cataloguing five boroughs’ worth of oddities...
Nobel Prize in literature is awarded to South Korean author Han Kang for her ‘intense poetic prose’
STOCKHOLM — The Nobel Prize in literature was awarded Thursday to South Korean author Han Kang for what the Nobel committee called “her intense poetic prose that confronts historical traumas and exposes the fragility of human life.” Nobel committee chairman Anders Olsson praised Han’s “physical empathy for the vulnerable, often...
Riley Keough felt a duty to finish Lisa Marie Presley’s book on Elvis, grief, addiction and love
Riley Keough was quick to agree to help complete her mother’s memoir. She thought they’d write it together, reflecting on her extraordinary upbringing and life, but it became a much greater responsibility after Lisa Marie Presley’s sudden death in 2023. Finishing the task her mother — the only child of...
Bob Woodward book reveals Trump’s calls with Putin and Biden’s private remarks on Obama, Netanyahu
WASHINGTON — Donald Trump has had as many as seven private phone calls with Vladimir Putin since leaving office and secretly sent the Russian president covid-19 test machines during the height of the pandemic, Bob Woodward reported in his new book, “War.” The revelations were made in the famed Watergate...
Salman Rushdie, Percival Everett and Miranda July are National Book Award finalists
NEW YORK — Salman Rushdie’s memoir a bout his near-fatal stabbing, “Knife,” and Percival Everett’s revisionist historical novel, “James,” are among the finalists for the 75th annual National Book Awards. Others nominated include author-filmmaker Miranda July for her explicit novel on middle age, “All Fours,” and the celebrated Canadian poet...
Ina Garten, the Barefoot Contessa, looks back in memoir ‘Be Ready When the Luck Happens’
NEW YORK — Long before Ina Garten’s Barefoot Contessa mini-empire of bestselling cookbooks and TV shows ever took off, she found herself at an airport, wanting to learn to fly. It was the late 1960s and she was a newlywed in Fayetteville, North Carolina. She and her soldier-husband, Jeffrey, would...
JoJo was a teen sensation. At 33, she’s found her voice again
Joanna Levesque shot to stardom at 13. Two decades later, “JoJo” — as she’s better known — has written a memoir and says the song responsible for her meteoric rise, “Leave (Get Out),” was foreign to her. In fact, she cried when her label told her they wanted to make...
Pennsylvania state senator sues critics of his book about WWI hero Sgt. York
HARRISBURG — A Pennsylvania state senator and former GOP gubernatorial candidate whose support for Donald Trump drew him to the U.S. Capitol on Jan. 6 has sued a Canadian university and nearly two dozen academics over criticism of him and his research into World War I hero Sgt. Alvin York....
Murrysville woman writes a book about grandmothers with Alzheimer’s
In her professional career, Doreen Coulson Putnam noticed when grandchildren were separated from their grandparents who had Alzheimer’s and dementia. A certified dementia practitioner, Putnam sought to create an educational resource for families to help them understand memory loss and how to include children. The Murrysville resident wrote “Sometimes Grandmamma...
Justice Ketanji Brown Jackson is hitting the road to promote her new memoir, ‘Lovely One’
WASHINGTON — Supreme Court Justice Ketanji Brown Jackson is embarking on a high-profile, nationwide tour to promote her new memoir, “Lovely One.” Jackson, 53, is using the book, publisher Random House says, to trace her family’s rise from segregation to her confirmation as the first Black woman on the nation’s...
Book review: ‘Steel City’ novel a vivid journey through Pittsburgh’s industrial heyday
In the late 19th century, Pittsburgh was in many ways the center of the universe. From steel to electricity to food, the innovators and barons of America’s biggest industries called the Steel City home. In his debut novel, “Steel City: A Story of Pittsburgh,” William J. Miller Jr. transports the...
5 things to do in Pittsburgh this weekend: Aug. 9-11
After a long, rainy week, it’s time to relax and enjoy some downtime. From performances to parties, from celebrity appearances to festivals, Pittsburgh is jumping this weekend. Join in the fun with these events. Idina Menzel at the Benedum Center Broadway legend — and real-life Disney princess — Idina Menzel...
West Leechburg native pens trilogy of books about his international aerospace career
Most jobs don’t result in your car being destroyed by debris from an exploding rocket. But for Daniel Kovalchik, formerly of Allegheny Township, Leechburg and West Leechburg, a workday in 1997 turned tragic at Cape Canaveral, Fla., when the launch of an unmanned Delta II rocket experienced a failure, sending...
Ligonier Valley Writers invite public to picnic at Unity farm
The Ligonier Valley Writers are setting a new scene for the organization’s annual picnic this year. On Aug. 11, attendees will gather under a pavilion at the Jamison Farm in Unity for a feast of potluck dishes and local literature. After holding the picnic for many years at St. Michael’s...
Melania Trump to tell her story in memoir, ‘Melania,’ scheduled for this fall
NEW YORK — Former first lady Melania Trump has a memoir coming out this fall, “Melania,” billed by her office as “a powerful and inspiring story of a woman who has carved her own path, overcome adversity and defined personal excellence.” It’s the first memoir by Trump, who has been...
‘Hillbilly Elegy’ generates high interest at Westmoreland, Allegheny libraries
Since former President Donald Trump announced Ohio Sen. J.D. Vance as his running mate, Vance’s memoir has generated attention at local libraries. The 2016 book, “Hillbilly Elegy: A Memoir of a Family and Culture in Crisis,” tells the story of Vance’s family roots in Kentucky, his upbringing in Middletown, Ohio,...
Ernest Hemingway fans celebrate the author’s 125th birthday in his beloved Key West
KEY WEST, Fla. — Ernest Hemingway spent the 1930s in Key West, Florida, and more than six decades after his death, fans, scholars and relatives continue to congregate on the island city to celebrate the author’s award-winning novels and adventure-filled life. Hemingway Days started in 1981 with a short-story competition...
Here are 5 things to do in Pittsburgh this weekend: July 12-14
From bombastic battle demonstrations to silent parties, a variety of events will be taking place around Pittsburgh this weekend. It’s always a good time to try something new. Find an activity to fit into your busy summer schedule here! Quiet Reading Party Haven’t managed to finish that beach read just...
Monroeville author goes ‘noir’ with 1st mystery novel
Don Ammon of Monroeville grew up writing short plays performed by other children in his neighborhood. By the time he graduated from Penn-Trafford High School, he’d read all 86 of Agatha Christie’s mystery novels and was ready to move to Devonshire, England, to do exactly what Christie was doing. That...
Michigan Gov. Gretchen Whitmer shuts down 2024 presidential talk but doesn’t hide ambitions in timely book launch
LANSING, Mich. — Michigan Gov. Gretchen Whitmer is releasing a new memoir at a particularly fraught moment, both for herself and for the Democratic Party. Set for release Tuesday amid the frenzy over President Joe Biden’s recent debate performance, “True Gretch” won’t do much to dispel questions about her national...
What was the 1st ‘American novel’? On this Independence Day, a look at what it started
NEW YORK — In the winter of 1789, around the time George Washington was elected the country’s first president, a Boston-based printer quietly launched another American institution. William Hill Brown’s “The Power of Sympathy,” published anonymously by Isaiah Thomas & Company, is widely cited as something momentous: the first American...
Millvale author’s book dives into Pittsburgh’s storied boxing history
Douglas Cavanaugh of Millvale has been a big boxing fan since he was a kid back in the 1970s. By the early 1990s, he was deep into the sport’s history and writing about its present, getting his first story published in 1993. “I wrote about mob-controlled lightweight champion Ike Williams,...
A new ‘Hunger Games’ book — and movie — is coming
NEW YORK — Inspired by an 18th century Scottish philosopher and the modern scourge of misinformation, Suzanne Collins is returning to the ravaged, post-apocalyptic land of Panem for a new “The Hunger Games” novel. Scholastic announced Thursday that “Sunrise on the Reaping,” the fifth volume of Collins’ blockbuster dystopian series,...
Mystery Lovers Bookshop in Oakmont to host Washington County crime novelist
As a fourth-generation resident of Washington County’s Smith Township, author Annette Dashofy has spent her whole life in Southwestern Pennsylvania. It should come as no surprise, then, that the region’s rolling hills and bucolic countryside have served as the setting for many of her books. The latest, “What Comes Around,”...
