RadioWest

Is a river alive? That’s the animating question in Robert Macfarlane’s latest book. And if the answer is yes, and rivers are living things, what do we owe them?

If you’ve ever wanted to share a room with two great actors talking about Shakespeare, here’s your chance — with Dame Judi Dench and Brendan O’Hea.

In 2021, protestors stormed the U.S. Capitol and tried to overturn the presidential election. In that moment, author Charles King turned to Handel’s Messiah.

If the word “Viking” conjures for you a braided warrior raiding a village in the north of Europe, you’re not exactly wrong. But there’s a lot more to the story.

Multilevel marketing is something of an American tradition. Journalist Bridget Read tells the story of the money-making schemes that continue to ensnare people today.

Jesus’s mother Mary likely lived for over 40 years, but many believers only think of her in two places, the Nativity and the Crucifixion. The scholar James Tabor wants to change that.

Author and journalist Jonathan Rauch is a Jewish atheist. And yet, he’s calling on Christians to remember their faith — and practice it the way Founding Father James Madison might have done.

What do books say about us? This week, Catherine Weller, Ken Sanders and Anne Holman join us to talk about their favorite winter reads — the titles they recommend that we can all gift to each other or curl up with while the snow (hopefully) falls and the fire crackles.

What weighs five pounds, hasn’t been seen in print for 20 years, but still shapes the way we think about language? Merriam-Webster’s Collegiate Dictionary — and author Stefan Fatsis is here to tell us why it matters.

Jerry Kane and his teenage son Joseph were men of no nation. Their lives — and their violent ends — are the subject of the new feature film “Sovereign,” directed by Christian Swegal, who joins us to talk about it.

For many people, the night sky is an afterthought, especially if you live in a big city, where all the artificial light drowns out the stars. But the nature writer Craig Childs wants to help us rediscover the dark heavens and consider what they show us about who we are and where we fit in the universe.

Of the many casualties of violent conflict, food is yet another. Michael Shaikh’s new book explains how war and genocide change what we eat.

Wallace Stegner made a name for himself writing about the place that shaped him: the Mountain West and the people there. Alex Beam’s biography tells the story.

Lots of people dream about leaving it all behind, but Maurice and Maralyn Bailey really did it. They bought a boat and set sail in June of 1972.

A lengthy chapter in the battle over Utah’s congressional boundaries came to a close yesterday when a judge chose a new congressional map for Utah. Judge Dianna M. Gibson’s ruling shakes up the state’s political landscape and likely its representation in Congress. We are joined by Sen. Scott Sandall, Salt Lake Tribune columnist Robert Gehrke and KUER reporter Martha Harris.

What happens when a progressive Hollywood filmmaker and a conservative congressman team up to document one of the most volatile chapters in American politics? We’re talking with Steve Pink — director of “Hot Tub Time Machine” — and former Illinois Rep. Adam Kinzinger about their unlikely collaboration and the film that emerged.

This week we spoke with Matthew Whitaker about his film “Truth & Treason.” He’s coming back to talk more about the movie, as well as making it with Angel Studios.

During Hitler’s rise to power, a young Mormon named Helmuth Hubener dared to defy the regime. He was 17 years old when the Third Reich executed him for telling the truth. Filmmaker Matthew Whitaker and scholar Alan Keele tell his story.

Mars isn’t just a modern-day obsession, because we earthlings were nuts for the Red Planet more than a century ago. David Baron’s new book tells the story.

When Brigham Young and the Mormons arrived in Utah in the mid-1800s, they encountered a Native American leader who already dominated the region. Wakara, a Timpanogos Ute, was a fierce warrior, prolific horse thief and merciless slave trader. In a new biography, the historian Max Perry Mueller argues Wakara should be considered one of the founding figures of the American West.