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Novelist Lee Smith says she has based her new work of fiction, The Last Girls, on a personal experience: a 1966 boating adventure along the mighty Mississippi River. Smith says it's a story about "aging, among other things." Smith talks with NPR's Bob Edwards.

John Cephas and Phil Wiggins are two musicians from different generations who have played Piedmont blues together for 25 years. The two perform their music and talk with NPR's Scott Simon about their distinctive brand of the blues.

A South Korean envoy meets with Chinese officials to gain support in resolving North Korea's nuclear issue. Experts say they're baffled about what the North hopes to gain through its nuclear brinkmanship. NPR's Eric Weiner reports.

New research shows that plants and animals around the world are being affected by global warming. The change comes in response to a temperature increase of just one degree Fahrenheit in the past century. NPR's Richard Harris reports.

A lawyer for two Illinois National Guard pilots who accidentally bombed Canadian forces in Afghanistan last spring says his clients were on drugs. He says military officials pushed the men to take amphetamines. Hear more from NPR's Lynn Neary and Christian Science Monitor correspondent Brad Knickerbocker, a former Navy pilot.

NPR's John Nielsen reports on plants that make a stink. For example: the voodoo lily. When it blooms -- people wilt.

NPR's John McChesney reports on the one-dollar-per-head fee cattle producers must pay when they sell cattle. The money goes in large part to finance commercials that promote beef consumption. But some ranchers say forcing them to pay for the campaign violates their constitutional rights.

Commentator Andrei Codrescu brings us this glimpse of the kind of day that feeds a commentator's mind.

DuPont and other multinational corporations announce the launch of the Chicago Climate Exchange. The effort is the first major attempt at establishing a market for cutting greenhouse gas emissions. NPR's Robert Siegel talks to Andrew Aulisi, a policy analyst with Environmental Defense.

Guest host John Ydstie talks with Jeffrey Lehman, dean of the University of Michigan Law School, and Cornell's president-elect, about the affirmative action policies of the law school at Michigan.