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Thursday, November 6, 2014 | 11:00 am
During National Novel Writing Month participants write an average of 1,667 words a day to complete a novel by the end of the month. (Oliver Hammond / Flickr)

One month to write an entire novel. We look at the craze of National Novel Writing Month.

Comments [22]
 
Thursday, November 6, 2014 | 10:00 am
Final preparations are made prior to the opening of the 40th session of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) in Copenhagen, Monday, Oct. 27, 2014. (AP)

“All we need is the will to change,” says the new UN climate report. Looking past the fear, looking to the solutions.

Comments [432]
 
Wednesday, November 5, 2014 | 11:11 am
Author Jen Lin-Liu shares some of the manta dumplings she shared with guest host Jane Clayson in the WBUR studios. Lin-Liu is the author of the new book, "“On The Noodle Road: From Beijing to Rome, With Love and Pasta." (Jesse Costa / WBUR)

Noodle-mania. We track the birth story of a staple from China to Italy. Its savory history.

Comments [14]
 
Wednesday, November 5, 2014 | 10:00 am
Republican Senate candidate State Sen. Joni Ernst casts her ballot in the general election, Tuesday, Nov. 4, 2014, in Red Oak, Iowa. Ernst is running against Democrat U.S. Rep. Bruce Braley for the U.S. Senate seat of Tom Harkin, who is not seeking reelection.  (AP)

On the ground in key states, we’ll look at Tuesday’s midterm results: What they say and where we’re headed.

Comments [960]
 
Tuesday, November 4, 2014 | 11:00 am
The Virgin Galactic SpaceShipTwo rocket explodes in the air during a test flight on Friday, Oct. 31, 2014. The explosion killed a pilot aboard and seriously injured another while scattering wreckage in Southern California's Mojave Desert, witnesses and officials said. (AP)

A rocket explodes, a Virgin Galactic flight breaks up, a co-pilot dead. We look at the future of commercial space flight.

Comments [96]
 
Tuesday, November 4, 2014 | 10:00 am
Anti-American Chinese blogger Zhou Xiaoping, seen here in his Sina Weibo account profile pic with Chinese president Xi Jinping. (Sina Weibo)

A Chinese blogger whose harsh anti-American essays have a huge following in China just got a big embrace from China’s top leadership.

Comments [218]
 
Monday, November 3, 2014 | 11:00 am
A still from the Rob Bliss Creative street harassment video. (Rob Bliss Creative)

An internet video of a woman showered in catcalls on the street goes viral. We’ll look at women and men in public space. The catcall culture.

Comments [735]
 
Monday, November 3, 2014 | 10:00 am
Apple CEO Tim Cook introduces the new Apple iPad Air 2 during an event at Apple headquarters on Thursday, Oct. 16, 2014 in Cupertino, Calif. The CEO publicly acknowledged that he was gay for the first time in a Bloomberg Businessweek column in late October 2014. (AP)

Apple’s CEO Tim Cook is now 100 percent out and proud. Gay. We’ll look at the landmark moment for gays in the business world.

Comments [426]
 
Friday, October 31, 2014 | 2:25 pm
Doc Sportello (Joaquin Phoenix) and Sauncho Smilax (Beninico del Toro) share a drink in a scene from the upcoming Paul Thomas Anderson film, "Inherent Vice," an adaptation of the Thomas Pynchon novel of the same name. (Courtesy Warner Bros. Entertainment)

From “Interstellar” to “Into the Woods.” The biggest and best movies of the fall and holiday seasons. What to see, what to skip.

Comments [23]
 
Friday, October 31, 2014 | 10:00 am
Nurse Kaci Hickox, right, and her boyfriend, Ted Wilbur are followed by a Maine State Trooper as they ride bikes on a trail near her home in Fort Kent, Maine, Thursday, Oct. 30, 2014.  (AP)

Quarantines and Ebola. An exploding rocket. Apple’s CEO comes out. Hawaiian lava flows. Midterms in the home stretch. Our weekly news roundtable goes behind the headlines.

Comments [663]
 
Thursday, October 30, 2014 | 11:00 am
Soylent is a new meal-replacement substance meant to offer a complete nutritional alternative to traditional food. (Courtesy Soylent)

Soylent is a grey smoothie the consistency of pancake batter that claims it can replace all your food. On a crowded planet, is this the future of food? Plus: what does the Antares rocket crash mean for private space travel?

Comments [277]
 
Thursday, October 30, 2014 | 10:00 am
Realtor Helen Hertz stands in front of one of her listings in Cleveland Heights, Ohio Friday, Oct. 24, 2014. Hertz, a real estate agent for more than three decades, has seen firsthand what has happened to the market in the wake of the recession and foreclosure crisis. (AP)

Home ownership rates are at a 20-year low. Millennials and more aren’t buying. We’ll look at what American’s think now about owning a home.

Comments [410]
 
Wednesday, October 29, 2014 | 11:00 am
A visitor looks at the simple wooden cross that marks the grave of Welsh poet and playwright Dylan Thomas, in Laugharne, Wales, Sept. 17, 1963. (AP)

A century after his birth, poet and writer Dylan Thomas lives on. We look at his exuberant work and short life.

Comments [8]
 
Wednesday, October 29, 2014 | 10:00 am
In this Tuesday, Oct. 1, 2013 image provided by the Utah Division of Wildlife Resources, a young bear is rescued from drowning after eluding officials, at Lake Powell, Utah. (AP)

A big debate in the West over transferring Federal public lands to states. We’ll hear from both sides.

Comments [287]
 
Tuesday, October 28, 2014 | 11:00 am
Jimmy Velvet, Jerry Lee Lewis, Don Everly and Buddy Holly in an undated photograph. (BP Fallon / Flickr)

Southern storyteller Rick Bragg’s big, new biography of “The Killer”—Jerry Lee Lewis.

Comments [11]
 
Tuesday, October 28, 2014 | 10:00 am
Kaci Hickox (R) speaks with civil rights attorney Norman Siegel from within her mandatory quarantine tent in Newark, NJ. (Steven Hyman)

The history of quarantines, from the Spanish Flu to polio to Ebola and the challenge of fighting an epidemic and fear of the epidemic.

Comments [367]
 
Monday, October 27, 2014 | 11:00 am
This undated product image provided by Google shows the Google Shopping Express mobile app. Same-day grocery delivery services from Google, Instacart and Postmates are expanding into more cities around the country, delivering everything from cereal to bottled water to toilet paper from nearby stores. (AP)

Will going to the grocery store be history? How the online order and delivery business is reshaping our food economy.

Comments [82]
 
Monday, October 27, 2014 | 10:00 am
A woman places a candle on photos of the missing students during a protest against the disappearance of 43 students from the Isidro Burgos rural teachers college, in Mexico City, Wednesday, Oct. 22, 2014. Tens of thousands marched in Mexico City's main avenue demanding the return of the missing students. (AP)

What really happened in that massacre of students in Mexico? Forty three missing. Mexico laid bare. We’ll investigate.

Comments [185]
 
Friday, October 24, 2014 | 11:00 am
Andrew (Miles Teller) and his often demanding conductor, Terrence (J.K. Simmons) in a scene from the new film, "Whiplash." (Courtesy Sony Pictures Classics)

The new movie “Whiplash”. The thin line between obsession and abuse on the road to greatness. In music, the arts…sports.

Comments [53]
 
Friday, October 24, 2014 | 10:00 am
Ottawa police officers, with Parliament Hill in the background, guard the area around the National War Memorial in downtown Ottawa on Thursday. (Reuters/Landov)

Gunfire in Canada’s capital. Billionaire millions hit the midterms. Huge airbag recall. Ben Bradlee is dead. Our weekly news roundtable goes behind the headlines.

Comments [861]
 
Thursday, October 23, 2014 | 11:00 am
A screenshot from the interactive game, "Depression Quest," the game at the root of the ongoing #GamerGate controversy. (Courtesy  "Depression Quest")

#GamerGate. Sexism, misogyny and rough stuff in a video game world culture clash.

Comments [1,225]
 
Thursday, October 23, 2014 | 10:00 am
Specialist Ronnie Howard, center, calls out prices as he works at his post on the floor of the New York Stock Exchange Thursday, Oct. 16, 2014. Beyond the turmoil shaking financial markets, the U.S. economy remains sturdier than many seem to fear. (AP)

The global economic wobble. Europe weakness. China fears. Wild markets. We’ll lay out the global economy now.

Comments [330]
 
Wednesday, October 22, 2014 | 11:00 am
Authors Nicholas Kristof and wife Sheryl WuDunn attend the premiere of "Meena" at the AMC Loews Theater on Thursday, June 26, 2014 in New York.

Author and New York Times columnist Nicholas Kristof says regular folks like us can change the world. He explains how. Plus: we remember the late, great Washington Post editor, Ben Bradlee.

Comments [68]
 
Wednesday, October 22, 2014 | 10:00 am
Health workers carry the body of a woman suspected of contracting the Ebola virus in Bomi county situated on the outskirts of Monrovia, Liberia, Monday, Oct. 20, 2014. (AP)

We’ll go to Liberia, and hear from a pastor and a physician at the epicenter of the Ebola crisis.

Comments [284]
 
Tuesday, October 21, 2014 | 11:00 am
This undated image provided by Google, shows an early version of Google's prototype self-driving car. For the first time, California's Department of Motor Vehicles knows how many self-driving cars are traveling on the state's public roads. The agency is issuing permits, Tuesday, Sept. 16, 2014 that let three companies test 29 vehicles on highways and in neighborhoods. (AP)

The future of the car: from the fuels they’ll run on, to the materials they’ll be made of, to the computers that may drive them.

Comments [209]
 
Tuesday, October 21, 2014 | 10:00 am
David Perdue, Michelle Nunn

Two weeks to go till Midterm Election Day. We’ll look at how the biggest issues are playing out around the country.

Comments [602]
 
Monday, October 20, 2014 | 11:00 am
In this Oct. 2, 2014 photo, patrons line up for “Nightmare: New York,” a haunted house attraction in New York. (AP)

Afraid of snakes? Heights? Ebola? We’ll unpack the science of fear.

Comments [88]
 
Monday, October 20, 2014 | 10:00 am
A statue of President Franklin Delano Roosevelt on New York City's Roosevelt Island. (Flickr / Alexisrael)

Greatness and the American Presidency. Aaron David Miller says aim for good. Really good.

Comments [740]
 
Friday, October 17, 2014 | 11:00 am
Jazz violinist Regina Carter. (Courtesy of the Artist)

Regina Carter turns her jazz violin down home with her new album “Southern Comfort.”

Comments [3]
 
Friday, October 17, 2014 | 10:00 am
U.S. Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell (R) Ky., center, and Democratic opponent, Kentucky Secretary of State Alison Lundergan Grimes, rehearsed with host Bill Goodman before their appearance on "Kentucky Tonight" television broadcast live from KET studios in Lexington, Ky.,Monday, Oct. 13, 2014. (AP)

The CDC in the hot seat on Ebola. Markets reeling. Mid-term fireworks. Our weekly news roundtable goes behind the headlines.

Comments [702]
 
Thursday, October 16, 2014 | 11:00 am
Pope Francis leaves at the end of an afternoon session of a two-week synod on family issues, at the Vatican, Friday, Oct. 10, 2014. (AP)

The Catholic Church signals a new openness towards gays, the divorced, and more. We’ll ask American Catholics what they think.

Comments [209]
 
Thursday, October 16, 2014 | 10:00 am
In this Oct. 8, 2014 file photo, a sign points to the entrance to the emergency room at Texas Health Presbyterian Hospital Dallas, where U.S. Ebola patient Thomas Eric Duncan was being treated, in Dallas. (AP)

A second Dallas nurse infected with Ebola. At least 76 in her hospital, exposed. We’ll look at the American medical system racing for Ebola readiness.

Comments [809]
 
Wednesday, October 15, 2014 | 11:00 am
Comedian and actor Russell Brand, on the cover of his new book, "Revolution." (Penguin / Random House)

The wild, funny, blithely offensive comedian Russell Brand takes on the world’s woes with us. He says he’s got the answer.

Comments [279]
 
Wednesday, October 15, 2014 | 10:00 am
Students march carrying Cuban flags during a march against terrorism in Havana, Cuba, Tuesday, Sept. 30, 2014. Youths marched today through downtown Havana in protest against the United States policy towards the island nation and demanding the that U.S. free three Cuban agents imprisoned there. (AP)

The US embargo against Cuba is 54 years old next week and there are new calls –and maybe new reasons – to end it. We’ll hear the fresh debate.

Comments [247]
 
Tuesday, October 14, 2014 | 11:00 am
ThirdofMay

Goya. Francisco Goya. The Spanish painter of war and upheaval. He’s relevant right now, again. We’ll go to Goya.

Comments [9]
 
Tuesday, October 14, 2014 | 10:00 am
This Tuesday, Sept. 9, 2014 photo shows Jonah Devorak testing the dimensions on a high-pressure valve at Swagelok Co. in Strongsville, Ohio. (AP)

The new blue collar jobs. We’ll look at where they are and what it will take to get one.

Comments [365]
 
Monday, October 13, 2014 | 11:00 am
Singer-songwriter Doug Seegers. (Courtesy Doug Seegers / JohanyLitalo)

Country singer Doug Seegers was homeless for years in New York and Nashville. He’s out with a new album and will break your heart.

Comments [11]
 
Monday, October 13, 2014 | 10:00 am
Yemeni-American Ahmed al-Moflihi, who is thought to have participated in the ongoing civil war in Syria. (NPR News)

A young American, arrested at O’Hare airport, allegedly on his way to join ISIS. Who is drawn to this? And why?

Comments [323]
 
Friday, October 10, 2014 | 11:00 am
The Spanish Harlem Orchestra at a recent tour performance. (Courtesy Spanish Harlem Orchestra)

The Spanish Harlem Orchestra. Salsa, jazz and a lot of great energy. We’ll hear their sound.

Comments [3]
 
Friday, October 10, 2014 | 10:00 am
Married couple Penny Kirby, left, and Terri Henry kiss during a gay marriage rally Monday, Oct. 6, 2014, in Salt Lake City. Same-sex couples in Utah were celebrating after the U.S. Supreme Court on Monday cleared the way for gay marriages to begin in this state and 30 others. (AP)

America’s first Ebola death. Leon Panetta blasts the President. US teens and ISIS. Our weekly news roundtable goes behind the headlines.

Comments [640]
 
Thursday, October 9, 2014 | 11:00 am
U.S. Supreme Court Justice Sonia Sotomayor gestures as she speaks at Oklahoma City University in Oklahoma City, Thursday, Sept. 11, 2014.  (AP)

Joan Biskupic on the Supreme Court’s first Latina justice, Sonia Sotomayor, and the high court’s agenda now.

Comments [91]
 
Thursday, October 9, 2014 | 10:00 am
This Sept. 11, 2013 file photo shows oil pumps the desert oil fields of Sakhir, Bahrain. Dramatic changes in oil production around the globe, both higher and lower, are balancing each other out instead of wreaking havoc. (AP)

Despite the Middle East crisis and Russian tensions, world oil prices are plummeting. We’ll look at why and what it means for rising clean energy.

Comments [275]
 
Wednesday, October 8, 2014 | 11:00 am
New York City Mayor Bill De Blasio (D) and members of the US Conference of Mayors gather at New York City's Gracie Manion in August 2014. (Courtesy US Conference of Mayors)

We talk with mayors from across the country on going local to find the future. Plus: Jack Beatty on Boston’s own Mayor Menino.

Comments [30]
 
Wednesday, October 8, 2014 | 10:00 am
Dr Tom Kenyon, director of the Center for Disease Control's Center for Global Health, listens to a question at a news conference in Monrovia, Liberia, Wednesday Oct. 1, 2014.  (AP)

Are we ready for Ebola? The CDC says it will stop Ebola in its tracks in the US. We’ll hear what it’s really going to take.

Comments [695]
 
Tuesday, October 7, 2014 | 11:00 am
Author and former New York Times columnist Bob Herbert. (S Griffin / Random House)

Former New York Times columnist Bob Herbert has been in the road in the USA. He says America has lost its way. He joins us.

Comments [477]
 
Tuesday, October 7, 2014 | 10:00 am
Supporters hold up campaign signs during a debate between Republican Gov. Sam Brownback and his Democratic challenger, Paul Davis, at the Kansas State Fair Saturday, Sept. 6, 2014, in Hutchinson, Kan. (AP)

We go to the deep red state of Kansas, where Republicans from the Senator to the Governor may lose their seats in the midterm election.

Comments [476]
 
Monday, October 6, 2014 | 11:00 am
In this image provided by 20th Century-Fox Film Corporation, a scene from "Star Wars" movie released by 20th Century-Foxin 1977, where an Imperial stormtrooper, one of the fearsome soldiers of the Galactic Empire, fires at the fleeing Princess Leia. (AP Photo/20th Century-Fox Film Corporation)

A long time ago in a galaxy called George Lucas, “Star Wars” was born. We look at how “Star Wars” conquered the cultural universe.

Comments [30]
 
Monday, October 6, 2014 | 10:00 am
In this Tuesday, Sept. 23, 2014, photo, released by the U.S. Air Force, a pair of U.S. F-15E Strike Eagle flies over northern Iraq, after conducting airstrikes in Syria. U.S.-led coalition warplanes bombed oil installations and other facilities in territory controlled by Islamic State militants in eastern Syria on Friday, Sept. 26, 2014, taking aim for a second consecutive day at a key source of financing that has swelled the extremist group's coffers, activists said. (AP Photo/U.S. Air Force, Matthew Bruch)

War powers, the White House and the Islamic State. Some see Presidential overreach in the US military push right now. We’ll take it up.

Comments [198]
 
Friday, October 3, 2014 | 11:00 am
In this 2014 photo released by NPG Records, Prince performs in Birmingham, England. (AP)

Musical icon Prince is back. With two new albums. We look at the life and music of the Purple One.

Comments [17]
 
Friday, October 3, 2014 | 10:00 am
In this Sept. 30, 2014 file photo, Secret Service Director Julia Pierson testifies on Capitol Hill in Washington. Secret Service Director Julia Pierson has resigned amid recent White House security breach. (AP)

Secret Service director, out. Ebola, in America. Hong Kong protesters versus China. Our weekly news roundtable goes behind the headlines.

Comments [833]
 
Thursday, October 2, 2014 | 11:00 am
Duluth, Minnesota's Canal Park Lakewalk, shown here in 2005. (Jacob Norlund / Creative Commons)

What makes a good place to live in America today? We’ll talk with the people who size up our cities and towns.

Comments [151]
 
Thursday, October 2, 2014 | 10:00 am
Kurds in Turkey look over the border with Syria toward the embattled town of Kobani. (David Takaki / Twitter)

ISIS and the battle for control of the Syrian town of Kobani. The Kurds have it. ISIS wants it. The US is bombing. We’ll look at the lessons of the battle for Kobani.

Comments [272]
 
Wednesday, October 1, 2014 | 11:00 am
Actress Eva Longoria, center, Henry R. Munoz III, co-founder of the Latino Victory Project, left, and Rep. Joaquin Castro, D-Texas, are seated at an event launching The Latino Victory Project, a Latino political action committee, at the National Press Club in Washington, Monday, May 5, 2014. (AP)

Latino America. It is very large and growing very fast. How will it move the country?

Comments [316]
 
Wednesday, October 1, 2014 | 10:00 am
Pro-democracy protesters hold umbrellas under heavy rain in a main street near the government headquarters in Hong Kong late Tuesday, Sept. 30, 2014. The protesters demanded that Hong Kong's top leader meet with them on Tuesday and threatened wider actions if he did not, after he said China would not budge in its decision to limit voting reforms in the Asian financial hub. (AP)

China, democracy and Hong Kong. They’re in the streets in Hong Kong with their “Umbrella Revolution.” What now?

Comments [277]
 
Tuesday, September 30, 2014 | 11:00 am
In this Jan. 15, 2013, photo, Rosser Pryor, Co-owner and President of Factory Automation Systems, examines a new high-performance industrial robot at the company's Atlanta facility.  (AP)

Nicholas Carr says automation, all over, is turning us into zombies. Out of touch with the world. He’s with us.

Comments [152]
 
Tuesday, September 30, 2014 | 10:00 am
St. Louis county police officers advance on protestors trying to shut down Interstate 70 in Berkeley, Mo. on Wednesday, Sept. 10, 2014 near the St. Louis suburb of Ferguson, Mo. where Michael Brown, an unarmed, black 18-year old was shot and killed by a white police officer on Aug. 9. (AP)

Police shootings, cop culture, body cameras. And the big debate over how to protect the public and the police.

Comments [505]
 
Monday, September 29, 2014 | 11:00 am
A 1597 map of Lesbos / Mytilene, Greece by Giacomo Franco. (Flickr / Creative Commons)

How Aristotle invented science. The great ancient Greek, and life on Earth.

Comments [53]
 
Monday, September 29, 2014 | 10:00 am
In this March 8, 2012 file photo, Peter Thiel speaks in San Francisco. (AP)

Silicon Valley’s Peter Thiel; the entrepreneur, investor and the PayPal co-founder’s call for deep invention.

Comments [372]
 
Friday, September 26, 2014 | 11:00 am
On Point host Tom Ashbrook raises a toast with a glass of fresh apple cider in the On Point studios. (Jesse Costa / WBUR)

All about hard cider. It’s all over these days. And sweet, fresh apple cider, too. We’ll look at the history and comeback.

Comments [38]
 
Friday, September 26, 2014 | 10:00 am
President Barack Obama, accompanied by Attorney General Eric Holder, speaks in the State Dining Room of the White House in Washington, Thursday, Sept. 25, 2014, to announce Holder is resigning. (AP)

Syria airstrikes. Obama at the UN. Climate protests. And Derek Jeter says goodbye. Our weekly news roundtable goes behind the headlines.

Comments [811]
 
ONPOINT
TODAY
Nov 6, 2014
Final preparations are made prior to the opening of the 40th session of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) in Copenhagen, Monday, Oct. 27, 2014. (AP)

“All we need is the will to change,” says the new UN climate report. Looking past the fear, looking to the solutions.

Nov 6, 2014
During National Novel Writing Month participants write an average of 1,667 words a day to complete a novel by the end of the month. (Oliver Hammond / Flickr)

One month to write an entire novel. We look at the craze of National Novel Writing Month.

RECENT
SHOWS
Nov 5, 2014
Author Jen Lin-Liu shares some of the manta dumplings she shared with guest host Jane Clayson in the WBUR studios. Lin-Liu is the author of the new book, "“On The Noodle Road: From Beijing to Rome, With Love and Pasta." (Jesse Costa / WBUR)

Noodle-mania. We track the birth story of a staple from China to Italy. Its savory history.

 
Nov 5, 2014
Republican Senate candidate State Sen. Joni Ernst casts her ballot in the general election, Tuesday, Nov. 4, 2014, in Red Oak, Iowa. Ernst is running against Democrat U.S. Rep. Bruce Braley for the U.S. Senate seat of Tom Harkin, who is not seeking reelection.  (AP)

On the ground in key states, we’ll look at Tuesday’s midterm results: What they say and where we’re headed.

On Point Blog
On Point Blog
Callers Share Brave, True Stories Of Street Harassment And Workplace Openness
Monday, Nov 3, 2014

We sum up some of the wonderful and surprisingly moving calls from both of our broadcasts today.

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4 Comments
 
The Explicast, Episode Three: What Is The Dow Jones Industrial Average?
Friday, Oct 31, 2014

We dig in to that all-important, all-confusing daily stock notice: the Dow Jones Industrial Average.

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2 Comments
 
Our Week In The Web: October 31, 2014
Friday, Oct 31, 2014

We tumble for ya, Ruth Bader Ginsburg and Tuco the Massachusetts K-9 Unit puppy in training.

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3 Comments