What I'm reading right now is Herman Melville's Moby-Dick, Second Edition (Norton Critical Editions) (various e-text versions here), partly out of respect for the advice of many wonderful UNLV folk, and partly because of this episode of Studio 360. (Don't have time for the full hour episode? Please please listen to this Laurie Anderson bit on the Enterprise v. the Pequod. Please.)

Listener Supported may be dry, but as an introduction to public radio, it is fantastic. It's an institutional history told by an insider who does a pretty clear and remarkable job at explaining the manueverings that NPR, PRI, WGBH and others engaged in. Also good are the first couple of chapters that define public radio's audience--it's an actual demographic, no surprise there, and it's one with a long history. The one giant minus is the unforgivable number of typos, most notably a missing "l" in public near the end.

The one giant plus not mentioned before? The rampant dissing of Bob Edwards:

Karni accepted the limitations Edwards brought to the program--his lack of curiosity, which limited his ability to conduct an interview, and his total lack of enthusiasm for any task assigned to him. (99)

Let me quote Home Movies's Jason: Wee-ow.

Also read Chip Kidd's Chip Kidd: Book One : Work: 1986-2006 (Chip Kidd)--gorgeous covers, gorgeous meditations on graphic design (though his The Cheese Monkeys : A Novel in Two Semesters