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First Reads NPR's First Reads series gives you an exclusive sneak peek at new books before they are published.
Special Series

First Reads

NPR's First Reads series gives you an exclusive sneak peek at new books before they are published.
Hear Margaret Atwood Read From 'The Testaments,' Her Sequel To 'The Handmaid's Tale'

Margaret Atwood says reader questions about the world of The Handmaid's Tale — and the world we live in now — inspired The Testaments. Liam Sharp hide caption

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Liam Sharp

Hear Margaret Atwood Read From 'The Testaments,' Her Sequel To 'The Handmaid's Tale'

In this recording, exclusive to NPR, Atwood returns to the world of The Handmaid's Tale, reading from her long-awaited sequel. Some 15 years after the first book, it introduces a few new voices.

Hear Margaret Atwood's Exclusive Reading Of 'The Testaments'

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Exclusive First Read: Anna Lyndsey's 'Girl In The Dark'
Courtesy Doubleday

Exclusive First Read: Anna Lyndsey's 'Girl In The Dark'

Anna Lyndsey — a pseudonym — was an ordinary civil servant when she developed a rare disorder: A severe sensitivity to light. She deftly chronicles her shadowy new normal in Girl in the Dark.

Exclusive First Read: Anna Lyndsey's 'Girl In The Dark'

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Exclusive First Read: You CAN Phone Home Again In 'Landline'

Exclusive First Read: You CAN Phone Home Again In 'Landline'

Read an exclusive pre-publication excerpt of Landline, the new novel from Eleanor & Park author Rainbow Rowell. Love, heartache, sitcom success and a magic phone — did we mention the magic phone?

Exclusive First Read: You CAN Phone Home Again In 'Landline'

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Exclusive First Read (And Listen!): B.J. Novak's 'One More Thing'

B.J. Novak is a writer and actor best known for his work on NBC's Emmy Award-winning comedy series The Office. One More Thing: Stories and Other Stories is his first collection. Jennifer Rocholl hide caption

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Jennifer Rocholl

Exclusive First Read (And Listen!): B.J. Novak's 'One More Thing'

The Office writer B.J. Novak expands his scope from Dunder Mifflin to the range of human experience in a new short story collection. We've got an exclusive excerpt — with readings by Novak himself, Mindy Kaling and Emma Thompson.

'The Literalist's Love Poem,' Read By Emma Thompson

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Exclusive First Read: Chang-rae Lee's 'On Such A Full Sea'

Chang-rae Lee won the PEN/Hemingway award for best first novel for 1995's Native Speaker. His most recent book was 2010's The Surrendered. Annika Lee hide caption

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Annika Lee

Exclusive First Read: Chang-rae Lee's 'On Such A Full Sea'

Lee's upcoming novel is a dystopian tale, set in a future America where corporations have replaced a long-crumbled government, and Chinese immigrant workers have become a new laboring class, repopulating deserted cities.

Exclusive First Read: Chang-rae Lee's 'On Such A Full Sea'

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Exclusive First Read: 'Bridget Jones: Mad About The Boy'
The Kobal Collection

Exclusive First Read: 'Bridget Jones: Mad About The Boy'

Bridget Jones has grown up — a bit, anyhow — in our exclusive First Read of the new Bridget Jones: Mad About The Boy. A widow (shocking!) with two young children (even more shocking!), she's struggling to balance motherhood and her own needs — not to mention a hot, much younger boyfriend.

Exclusive First Read: 'Bridget Jones: Mad About The Boy'

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Exclusive First Read: 'From Scratch: Inside The Food Network'

Emeril Lagasse promo image Jim Cooper/AP hide caption

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Jim Cooper/AP

Exclusive First Read: 'From Scratch: Inside The Food Network'

Read an exclusive excerpt of Allen Salkin's new history of the Food Network, From Scratch. It's an affectionate but unsparing look at a scrappy little startup network that became a national broadcasting behemoth — and brought people like Emeril Lagasse and Rachael Ray into millions of homes.

Exclusive First Read: 'From Scratch: Inside The Food Network'

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Exclusive First Read: 'Five Days At Memorial,' By Sheri Fink

An airboat pulls up to the Memorial Medical Center in New Orleans on Wednesday, Aug. 31, 2005. AP hide caption

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AP

Exclusive First Read: 'Five Days At Memorial,' By Sheri Fink

Read an exclusive excerpt of Sheri Fink's searing new book, Five Days at Memorial: Life and Death in a Storm-Ravaged Hospital. It's the story of the overwhelmed nurses and doctors fighting to save patients at New Orleans' Memorial Medical Center during the worst of Hurricane Katrina.

Exclusive First Read: 'Five Days At Memorial,' By Sheri Fink

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