Petra Mayer
Petra Mayer (she/her) is an editor (and the resident nerd) at NPR Books, focusing on fiction, and particularly genre fiction. She brings to the job passion, speed-reading skills, and a truly impressive collection of Doctor Who doodads. You can also hear her on the air and on the occasional episode of Pop Culture Happy Hour.
Previously, she was an associate producer and director for All Things Considered on the weekends. She handled all of the show's books coverage, and she was also the person to ask if you wanted to know how much snow falls outside NPR's Washington headquarters on a Saturday, how to belly dance, or what pro wrestling looks like up close and personal.
Mayer originally came to NPR as an engineering assistant in 1994, while still attending Amherst College. After three years spending summers honing her soldering skills in the maintenance shop, she made the jump to Boston's WBUR as a newswriter in 1997. Mayer returned to NPR in 2000 after a roundabout journey that included a master's degree in journalism from Columbia University and a two-year stint as an audio archivist and producer at the Prague headquarters of Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty. She still knows how to solder.
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Literary pun purveyor Tom Gauld turns his pen to the foibles of science (and science fiction) in his new comic collection Department of Mind-Blowing Theories, inspired by his scientist grandfather. -
Tomie DePaola died Monday following a fall. Among his classics is the Caldecott winner Strega Nona, which was a tale of a witch, her assistant and a magic pot.
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Yang's new graphic novel Dragon Hoops chronicles the year he spent following a high school basketball team in their quest for a title; he says he admires the courage it took to step onto the court.
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N.K. Jemisin's new novel kicks off a trilogy of stories about a world in which great cities can be born into human avatars, who must battle eldritch horrors to defend themselves and their people.
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Laura Zigman's compassionate, occasionally cringey and ultimately comforting new novel follows a middle-aged woman as she comes to terms with the ways her life hasn't turned out the way she'd hoped.
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Tochi Onyebuchi's slim, devastating novella follows a young man born amidst the chaos of the 1992 Rodney King riots — and his sister, whose terrifying magical powers can't protect him from racism. -
The creators of Harry Potter and the Cursed Child designed their show so it wouldn't look like the world Potterheads knew from the movies. They've documented that process in a new book, The Journey. -
The NPR 2019 Book Concierge is here! It features more than 350 recommendations from NPR staffers and trusted critics. -
"Mudlarks" were the people who made a living picking objects out of the mud along the River Thames. Writer Lara Maiklem follows in their tracks; she chronicles her journeys in a new book, Mudlark. -
Sheila O'Connor never knew her maternal grandmother, who was imprisoned in a state reform school when she became pregnant at 15. But now, she's reconstructed her grandmother's life in fictional form.
