Best Joshua Ballantine Podcasts (2025)

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Karen Bartlett, "Escape from Kabul: The Afghan Women Judges Who Fled the Taliban and Those They Left Behind" (New Press, 2025) 1:01:03

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23h ago1:01:03

1:01:03

In this episode, New Books Network Host Nina Bo Wagner speaks with Karen Bartlett about The Escape From Kabul: A True Story of Sisterhood and Defiance (The New Press and Duckworth, 2025). The book follows Afghan women judges who fought for justice in the courtroom, then fought to escape with their lives. Across twenty years of U.S.-backed governmen…

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Margaret E. Roberts, "Censored: Distraction and Diversion Inside China’s Great Firewall" (Princeton UP, 2020) 50:55

5d ago50:55

50:55

We often think of censorship as governments removing material or harshly punishing people who spread or access information. But Margaret E. Roberts’ new book Censored: Distraction and Diversion Inside China’s Great Firewall (Princeton University Press, 2020) reveals the nuances of censorship in the age of the internet. She identifies 3 types of cen…

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Tom Arnold-Forster, "Walter Lippmann: An Intellectual Biography" (Princeton UP, 2025) 42:50

9d ago42:50

42:50

From the years before World War I until the late 1960s, the journalist and political theorist Walter Lippmann was one of the most influential writers in the United States of America. His words and ideas had a powerful impact on American liberalism and his writings on the media are still taught today. Lippmann is now the subject of Tom Arnold-Forste…

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Vanessa Diaz, "Manufacturing Celebrity: Latino Paparazzi and Women Reporters in Hollywood" (Duke UP, 2020) 50:01

11d ago50:01

50:01

While Hollywood’s images present a veneer of fantasy for some, the work to create such images is far from escapism. In Manufacturing Celebrity: Latino Paparazzi and Women Reporters in Hollywood (Duke University Press, 2020), anthropologist Vanessa Díaz examines the raced and gendered hierarchies and inequalities that are imbricated within the work …

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Bill Dedman and Paul Clark Newell, Jr., "Empty Mansions: The Mysterious Life of Huguette Clark and the Spending of a Great American Fortune" (Ballantine, 2013) 57:03

14d ago57:03

57:03

Bill Dedman, Pulitzer Prize-winning investigative reporter and New York Times #1 bestselling author of Empty Mansions, shares the extraordinary story of a reclusive copper heiress, the battle over her fortune, and the HBO series adaptation now in development. As an investigative journalist, Bill Dedman has built his career writing stories that chan…

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"Assignment Moscow" with author James Rodgers 56:41

16d ago56:41

56:41

Is it possible to do independent journalism in today’s Russia? “The short answer is no,” James Rodgers tells me in our conversation about his insightful and scrupulously researched book Assignment Moscow: Reporting on Russia from Lenin to Putin (Bloomsbury Academic, 2023). Rodgers is a former BBC correspondent in Moscow. We first talk about Western…

1
Joshua Nall, "News from Mars: Mass Media and the Forging of a New Astronomy, 1860-1910" (U Pittsburgh Press, 2019) 1:04:04

19d ago1:04:04

1:04:04

In the midst of the COVID-19 pandemic, we’re hearing an awful lot about the fraught relationship between science and media. In his book, News from Mars: Mass Media and the Forging of a New Astronomy, 1860-1910 (University of Pittsburgh Press, 2019), historian of science Joshua Nall shows us that a blurry boundary between science and journalism was …

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David de Boer, "The Early Modern Dutch Press in an Age of Religious Persecution" (Oxford UP, 2023) 34:47

21d ago34:47

34:47

David de Boer returns to the podcast to talk to Jana Byars about his first book, The Early Modern Dutch Press in the Age of Religious Persecution (Oxford UP, 2023). This book is available open source here. For victims of persecution around the world, attracting international media attention for their plight is often a matter of life and death. This…

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Matthew Facciani, "Misguided: Where Misinformation Starts, How It Spreads, and What to Do about It" (Columbia UP, 2025) 30:29

22d ago30:29

30:29

Why are people inclined to believe misinformation? Misguided: Where Misinformation Starts, How It Spreads, and What to Do about It (Columbia UP, 2025) is a wide-ranging and comprehensive book that shines a light on how false beliefs take root and spread, exploring the cognitive, emotional, and social factors that make us all susceptible to misinfor…

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Suruchi Mazumdar, "Divided Media: Politics and Mediated Movements in India" (Routledge, 2025) 1:10:48

1M ago1:10:48

1:10:48

Suruchi Mazumdar’s book addresses the complex relationship between India’s evolving, emerging media landscape, the political and economic interests of diverse media actors, and movements opposing contentious issues such as market-based economic reforms and religious nationalism. In the mid-2000s, Singur and Nandigram, nondescript semi-urban and rur…

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Aatish Taseer, "A Return to Self: Excursions in Exile" (Catapult, 2025) 46:06

1M ago46:06

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In 2019, famed journalist and writer Aatish Taseer was thrown out of India. Soon after he wrote a cover article for Time calling Prime Minister Narendra Modi the country’s “divider in chief,” New Delhi decided to revoke his residency. That sent Aatish on a journey across the world–to places like Turkey, Spain, Mexico and Sri Lanka–to explore identi…

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Arianne Edmonds, "We Now Belong to Ourselves: J. L. Edmonds, the Black Press, and Black Citizenship in America" (Oxford UP, 2025) 49:46

1M ago49:46

49:46

At the turn of the twentieth century, the Black press provided a blueprint to help Black Americans transition from slavery and find opportunities to advance and define African American citizenship. Among the vanguard of the Black press was Jefferson Lewis Edmonds, founder and editor of The Liberator newspaper. His Los Angeles-based newspaper champi…

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Nadya Bair, "The Decisive Network: Magnum Photos and the Postwar Image Market" (U California Press, 2020) 38:05

1M ago38:05

38:05

The legendary Magnum photo agency has long been associated with heroic lone wolf male photographers such as Robert Capa and Henri Cartier-Bresson, roaming the world in search of the “decisive moment” – the perfect shot that captured the essence of a major news story. Nadya Bair’s highly original book The Decisive Network: Magnum Photos and the Post…

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Susan Shapiro Barash, "Estranged: How Strained Female Friendships Are Mended Or Ended" (Meridian Editions, 2025) 28:42

2M ago28:42

28:42

When life gets hard, we turn to our female friends. Husbands, partners, and jobs come and go, but close friendships are our bedrock. Until they're not. What happens when these bonds sabotage instead of support? Who among us has the courage to walk away? And how can we protect ourselves from further heartbreak? In Estranged: How Strained Female Frie…

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Lorna Graham, "Where You Once Belonged: A Novel" (She Writes Press, 2025) 33:00

2M ago33:00

33:00

A writer at Dateline NBC tries her hand at a different kind of mystery, perfect for fans of Chandler Baker’s Whisper Network, where a cynical TV news producer sells out her principles to rise to her network’s top job, and comes face-to-face with what appears to be her idealistic teenage self. Everleigh Page is on the cusp of greatness. Executive pr…

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Matthew Hongoltz-Hetling, "The Ghost Lab: How Bigfoot Hunters, Mediums, and Alien Enthusiasts Are Wrecking Science" (PublicAffairs, 2025) 1:03:51

2M ago1:03:51

1:03:51

In this episode, New Books Network host Nina Bo Wagner talks to Matthew Hongoltz-Hetling about his recently published book The Ghost Lab: How Bigfoot Hunters, Mediums, and Alien Enthusiasts Are Wrecking Science (PublicAffairs, 2025). They talk about the process of writing the book, including delving deep into the local paranomal community in New Ha…

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Illustrating Punk 42:57

2M ago42:57

42:57

In the sixth episode of Soundscapes NYC, host Ryan Purcell talks with John Holmstrom a comic illustrator and founder of Punk magazine. In the early 1970s, Holmstrom moved from suburban Connecticut to New York City to attend the School of Visual Arts where he studied under the celebrated comic illustrator Will Eisner and Harvey Kurtzman creator of M…

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Alex Vernon, "Peace Is a Shy Thing: The Life and Art of Tim O'Brien" (St. Martin's Press, 2025) 50:16

2M ago50:16

50:16

The first literary biography of Tim O'Brien, the preeminent American writer of the war in Vietnam and one of the best writers of his generation, drawing on never-before-seen materials and original interviews. "Vietnam made me a writer." —Tim O'Brien Featuring over one hundred interviews with family, friends, peers, and others—not to mention countle…

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Felix Cowan, "The Kopeck Press: Popular Journalism in Revolutionary Russia, 1908-1918" (U Toronto Press, 2025) 49:56

2M ago49:56

49:56

In this episode, Alisa interviews Dr. Felix Cowan about his new book, The Kopeck Press Popular Journalism in Revolutionary Russia, 1908–1918 (University of Toronto Press, 2025). The Imperial Russian penny press was a vast network of newspapers sold for a single kopeck per issue. Emerging in cities and towns across the empire between the 1905 Revolu…

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A Book Imprint from The Nation Magazine and OR Books Launches with Bhaskar Sunkara and Colin Robinson 38:01

3M ago38:01

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The Nation Magazine, known for its long and storied history as a publisher of in-depth political and cultural analysis, has launched a new book imprint with OR Books. The Nation’s president, Bhaskar Sunkara, and OR Books publisher, Colin Robinson, joined editor Caleb Zakarin to discuss the project and the upcoming slate of books set for publication…

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Ulf Laessing, "Understanding Libya Since Gaddafi" (Hurst, 2020) 1:05:39

3M ago1:05:39

1:05:39

Why has Libya fallen apart since 2011? The world has largely given up trying to understand how the revolution that toppled Muammar Gaddafi has left the country a failed state and a major security headache for Europe. Gaddafi's police state has been replaced by yet another dictatorship, amidst a complex conflict of myriad armed groups, Islamists, tr…

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The Telegraph Takeover: Power, Profit & the Press 54:52

3M ago54:52

54:52

In the season finale of Ctrl Alt Deceit, Nina dos Santos and Owen Bennett-Jones dig into the tangled web of media ownership, foreign influence and the future of free press. With a new UK government potentially greenlighting a UAE-backed bid for a stake in The Daily Telegraph, the hosts ask: does it matter who owns the news anymore? From Silicon Val…

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Thomas Mutch, "The Dogs of Mariupol: Russia's Invasion and the Forging of Ukraine's Iron Generation" (Biteback, 2025) 39:03

3M ago39:03

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In early 2022, as Russian troops massed on Ukraine’s border, Tom Mutch, a freelance war reporter, took a trip to Mariupol to take the temperature of this (then) culturally vibrant port on the Sea of Azov. What stayed with him was the sound of the stray dogs and their "rhythmic and frantic barking, as if they were shouting a warning in unison". With…

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Alex Davies, "Driven: The Race to Create the Autonomous Car" (Simon & Schuster, 2022) 1:21:49

3M ago1:21:49

1:21:49

In Driven: The Race to Create the Autonomous Car (Simon & Schuster, 2022), Alex Davies tells the enlightening and significant story of the effort to create driverless cars and the intense competition among tech heavyweights such as Google, Uber, and Tesla to move this technology forward. Autonomous vehicles (AVs) have been one of the most hyped tec…

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Andrew Holter, ed., "Going Around: Selected Journalism / Murray Kempton" (Seven Stories Press, 2025) 59:49

4M ago59:49

59:49

From 1949 until his death in 1997, Murray Kempton was a distinct presence in New York City journalism. Peddling around town on a three-speed bicycle wearing a three-piece suit, he wrote about everything from politics to jazz to the Mafia. His writing was eloquent, his perspective unique, and his moral judgements driven by a profound sympathy for lo…

Joshua Ballantine Podcasts

101
New Books in Journalism

Marshall Poe

1
Karen Bartlett, "Escape from Kabul: The Afghan Women Judges Who Fled the Taliban and Those They Left Behind" (New Press, 2025) 1:01:03

1
Margaret E. Roberts, "Censored: Distraction and Diversion Inside China’s Great Firewall" (Princeton UP, 2020) 50:55

1
Tom Arnold-Forster, "Walter Lippmann: An Intellectual Biography" (Princeton UP, 2025) 42:50

1
Vanessa Diaz, "Manufacturing Celebrity: Latino Paparazzi and Women Reporters in Hollywood" (Duke UP, 2020) 50:01

1
Bill Dedman and Paul Clark Newell, Jr., "Empty Mansions: The Mysterious Life of Huguette Clark and the Spending of a Great American Fortune" (Ballantine, 2013) 57:03

1
"Assignment Moscow" with author James Rodgers 56:41

1
Joshua Nall, "News from Mars: Mass Media and the Forging of a New Astronomy, 1860-1910" (U Pittsburgh Press, 2019) 1:04:04

1
David de Boer, "The Early Modern Dutch Press in an Age of Religious Persecution" (Oxford UP, 2023) 34:47

1
Matthew Facciani, "Misguided: Where Misinformation Starts, How It Spreads, and What to Do about It" (Columbia UP, 2025) 30:29

1
Suruchi Mazumdar, "Divided Media: Politics and Mediated Movements in India" (Routledge, 2025) 1:10:48

1
Aatish Taseer, "A Return to Self: Excursions in Exile" (Catapult, 2025) 46:06

1
Arianne Edmonds, "We Now Belong to Ourselves: J. L. Edmonds, the Black Press, and Black Citizenship in America" (Oxford UP, 2025) 49:46

1
Nadya Bair, "The Decisive Network: Magnum Photos and the Postwar Image Market" (U California Press, 2020) 38:05

1
Susan Shapiro Barash, "Estranged: How Strained Female Friendships Are Mended Or Ended" (Meridian Editions, 2025) 28:42

1
Lorna Graham, "Where You Once Belonged: A Novel" (She Writes Press, 2025) 33:00

1
Matthew Hongoltz-Hetling, "The Ghost Lab: How Bigfoot Hunters, Mediums, and Alien Enthusiasts Are Wrecking Science" (PublicAffairs, 2025) 1:03:51

1
Illustrating Punk 42:57

1
Alex Vernon, "Peace Is a Shy Thing: The Life and Art of Tim O'Brien" (St. Martin's Press, 2025) 50:16

1
Felix Cowan, "The Kopeck Press: Popular Journalism in Revolutionary Russia, 1908-1918" (U Toronto Press, 2025) 49:56

1
A Book Imprint from The Nation Magazine and OR Books Launches with Bhaskar Sunkara and Colin Robinson 38:01

1
Ulf Laessing, "Understanding Libya Since Gaddafi" (Hurst, 2020) 1:05:39

1
The Telegraph Takeover: Power, Profit & the Press 54:52

1
Thomas Mutch, "The Dogs of Mariupol: Russia's Invasion and the Forging of Ukraine's Iron Generation" (Biteback, 2025) 39:03

1
Alex Davies, "Driven: The Race to Create the Autonomous Car" (Simon & Schuster, 2022) 1:21:49

1
Andrew Holter, ed., "Going Around: Selected Journalism / Murray Kempton" (Seven Stories Press, 2025) 59:49