To the Best of Our Knowledge: Kicking off the Coasts

In this hour, as the Books Editor of Paste Magazine, and a Pulitizer Prize-nominated novelist himself, Charles McNair cares deeply about what we read. But McNair is concerned that Americans are only reading a handful of writers, thanks to what he calls a kind of geographic hegemony of taste-making. In other words - we're all reading the same books because a handful of respected critics on the East and West coasts tell us to. He's out to change that.

Next, Lesley Kagen was a Milwaukee girl. But she blew off Wisconsin for the bright lights of LA, and a career as an actress and voiceover artist. But despite the lures of California, something about Milwaukee kept calling her home.

Then, Stephen Thompson is the founder of the A.V. Club, the arts section of the satirical newspaper, The Onion, originally based in Madison, Wisconsin. Thompson eventually left Madison for Washington DC, to work at NPR as an editor and reviewer at NPR Music. In this interview, Thompson tells Steve Paulson about the forces that drew The Onion staff to New York, the power of regionalism, and what it means to be an artist in the Heartland.

After that, Michael Perry is proud to be a Wisconsin writer. Even with a few bestsellers under his belt, Perry chooses to live and write in his hometown, New Auburn, Wisconsin. He writes with humor and grace about his life there in the books, Population: 485, and Truck: A Love Story. So, what's life like, as a writer from the Midwest?

And finally, Marilynne Robinson is from Idaho, although she's spent years of her life on the East Coast. The Western character is something Robinson has never let go of, it still informs her life and her writing today. She told Steve Paulson about what it means to be from the West, and her book of essays, When I Was a Child I Read Books. [Broadcast Date: March 16, 2012]