NPR's Book of the Day Folgen

Paris Hilton is ubiquitous with early 2000s pop culture: She graced the cover of magazines, her own reality TV show and even Billboard charts. But the heiress now says she was playing a character – one she built to hide from the trauma she endured earlier in her life. In Paris: The Memoir, Hilton finally takes control of her own narrative. She spoke to NPR's Juana Summers about what made her want to start breaking down the walls between her public persona and her private life, and how paparazzi and influencer culture has changed during her time in the spotlight.Learn more about sponsor message choices: podcastchoices.com/adchoicesNPR Privacy Policy

Author Dina Nayeri was young when she found out that there's a stark difference between credibility and belief – and it's a disconnect at the center of her new book, Who Gets Believed?: When the Truth Isn't Enough. Nayeri's family came to the U.S. as refugees from Iran in 1979. As she tells NPR's Juana Summers, that asylum process showed her how subjective belief can be – and she explains why, for her, the meaning of believing continued to shift, through faith and vulnerability, even as she was writing the book.Learn more about sponsor message choices: podcastchoices.com/adchoicesNPR Privacy Policy

Nguyễn Phan Quế Mai's new novel, Dust Child, takes a closer look at the often-fraught relationships between Vietnamese women and American soldiers during the war. In today's episode, the author tells NPR's Scott Simon how she was always fascinated by the stories of the forgotten children from those relationships – often left behind, abandoned, and raised with a deep resentment for their mixed roots. The novel follows both the perspective of that generation – trying to find a better future – and that of the servicemembers being forced, decades later, to confront their past decisions.Learn more about sponsor message choices: podcastchoices.com/adchoicesNPR Privacy Policy