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Ann Powers on one of the world's biggest singers, who died at age 48 Saturday afternoon.

Dismal attendance rates have put Detroit Public Schools at risk of losing vital state funding, so the city has launched an assault on truancy. Attendance agent George Eason says, "If we see that the parent is willfully ... not sending the child to school, then we will take every means necessary to enforce the law."

That is somewhat ironic, of course, since they so famously sued Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg for allegedly stealing their idea when he created the social media website while they were all students at Harvard. The case was eventually settled.

Susan Jane Gilman recommends behind-the-scenes reads about the rich and famous — by a rock star, a hotel concierge, a stuntman and a Brat Packer, all offering backstage passes to their glamorous lives. Entertaining and star-studded, they make for perfect holiday escapism — with a cocktail (or two) in hand.

There's no question that the Great Recession has meant hard times all around, but from 2007 to 2009, it sent black America into an economic tailspin. NPR's Robert Siegel travels to Atlanta to find out what those numbers mean in the lives of real people.

By Doug Fabriziohttp://stream.publicbroadcasting.net/production/mp3/kuer/local-kuer-996234.mp312/6/11: 2011 Holiday Book ShowSalt Lake City, Utah –…

By Dan Nailenhttp://stream.publicbroadcasting.net/production/mp3/kuer/local-kuer-992417.mp3Salt Lake City, UT – Rich Robinson is best known as half of the…

By Dan Bammeshttp://stream.publicbroadcasting.net/production/mp3/kuer/local-kuer-991837.mp3Paragonah, UT – The Utah Prairie Dog is listed as a threatened…

Russell Banks' latest is an uneven effort to excavate and redeem the dregs of modern society. Critic Maureen Corrigan says the novel — about porn addiction and sexual predators — is compelling in a low-grade, nightmarish sort of way.

Much of the NFL integrated in the 1940s. The Washington Redskins held out until 1962. In a new book, historian Thomas G. Smith writes about how it took an ultimatum from the Kennedy administration to allow blacks into pro football in the nation's capital.