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It's not unusual to get in a cab and find a paperback novel on the seat next to the driver. What makes Jack Clark's cab different is that he's both the driver and the author. Clark is a Chicago cab driver who's been driving for 30 years — and written three mystery novels.

The titular event happens just a few pages into Paul Murray's novel; the rest of the story is an extended flashback, following the doomed Skippy, his geeky roommate and their cadre of bored, irreverent friends as they tease girls, dodge bullies and attend Catholic school in a rundown Dublin neighborhood.

In her new book about bad behavior, Laura Kipnis explores why we can't look away when a public drama unfolds. But critic Susan Jane Gilman says her approach is a bit too timid for such a titillating topic.

From when not to say thank you, to an embarrassing run-in at a Shanghai Taco Bell, Deborah Fallows recounts her tumultuous journey through the Chinese language in her new book, Dreaming in Chinese: Mandarin Lessons in Life, Love, and Language.

The fictional, aphorism-spouting Chinese detective is best known today as a stereotypical relic from a less sensitive time. Yunte Huang tells the story of the real man who inspired the caricature in Charlie Chan: The Untold Story of the Honorable Detective and His Rendezvous with American History.

In Rosecrans Baldwin's wise debut novel, a young widower comes to terms with the sudden death of his wife. Critic Michael Schaub says this moving meditation on the way grief distorts memories is affecting, profound and true.

In an interview with Terry Gross, taped in front of a live audience in New York City, the Daily Show host deconstructs his upcoming "Rally to Restore Sanity" on the National Mall and explains how The Daily Show comes up with material.

For his 22nd novel, celebrated author and former intelligence officer John le Carre found inspiration in a real Russian criminal. Our Kind Of Traitor details the shady activities of a crime lord named Dima operating in Moscow's underworld of dirty money.

The Colombian politician was on her way to a remote village when she was abducted by members of the FARC in 2002. At first she thought she'd be held for only a few weeks — but then six years passed. She says she didn't want to make it easy on her captors despite being tortured, underfed and forced to march through the rain forest.

The humorist, who made his name with personal essays and other nonfiction, tells Steve Inskeep that his return to fiction kept taking him to surprising places. But the unhappy endings? Those he could have predicted.