Access Utah

Shannon Hale is the Utah-based New York Times best-selling author of the Princess Academy series, Rapunzel’s Revenge and Austenland, which was made into a movie. Her latest, Amethyst, is on our latest UPR Booklist. We revisit our conversation.

On this episode, a conversation with David Maraniss about his new book "Path Lit By Lightning: The Life of Jim Thorpe."

Isabel Allende is one of the most widely-read authors in the world, having sold more than 75 million books. She is our guest for today's Access Utah.

Next time on Access Utah we’ll revisit our conversation from March with writer Azar Nafisi. We’ll talk about her new book “Read Dangerously: The Subversive Power of Literature in Troubled Times.”

Our guest for the hour on Tuesday’s Access Utah is Brian Steed, the new Executive Director of the Janet Quinney Lawson Institute for Land, Water and Air at Utah State University. Established in 2021, the Janet Quinney Lawson Institute for Land, Water, and Air connects researchers from Utah State University with problem solvers and decision-makers around Utah. The institute envisions a state with a high quality of life for our citizens that values and optimizes our state’s shared resources while managing continued growth. We value data-driven decision-making, shared partnerships, and a non-partisan perspective as we share the latest land, water, and air research.

About one in five adults reported experiencing food insecurity in the previous 30 days. Al Switzler joins us to discuss Tabitha’s Way, a Utah-based food pantry.

We revisit our conversation with Dr. Christine Montross about her book, "Waiting For an Echo: The Madness of American Incarceration."

Gregory Madden joins us to talk about his research, which has applications for public health including substance-use disorders, pathological gambling and obesity.

We're joined by storyteller Anastasia Zadeik and talk about her debut novel “Blurred Fates,” which addresses issues of mental health and family dysfunction, among other themes.

We're joined by author Kirk Wallace Johnson to discuss the story of white fishermen and Vietnamese shrimpers clashing on the Texas coast in the 1970s and ‘80s.

Open space will be on the ballot in northern Utah in November. In this episode, we talk about a proposed $20 million bond in Cache Valley that would buy up open space to preserve it.

Gallup says that support for a third U.S. political party is at a high point. On this episode, we talk with representatives from the United Utah Party, the Constitution Party of Utah, the Utah Libertarian Party and the Green Party of Utah.

A recent report says that the Colorado River is America’s most endangered. Today we’ll talk with reporter Alex Hager.

On this episode we talk about some of the history behind the transcontinental railroad.

Today, Nicole Chung joins us to talk about her book and about several recent topics covered in her I Have Notes newsletter from The Atlantic, including writing about trauma and grief.

For much of a year, writer Sebastian Junger and three friends—a conflict photographer and two Afghan War vets—walked the railroad lines of the East Coast.

Journalist Amanda Ripley joins us to discuss her new op-ed titled, “I stopped reading the news. Is the problem me — or the product?”

In her new book, Jessica Fanzo explores how in the context of the broad global trends of population growth, climate crisis and inequitable food availability, food systems need to be re-oriented to ensure they can produce enough food to nourish the world.

On this episode we're joined by Teow Lim Goh, author of 'Western Journeys', and we discuss immigration, history and the American West.

R.E. Burrillo is an archaeologist and conservation advocate. He is the author of Behind the Bears Ears: Exploring the Cultural and Natural Histories of a Sacred Landscape. He joins us to talk about his new book, 'The Backwoods of Everywhere: Words from a Wandering Local.'