Susan Rice

Former National Security Advisor Susan Rice talks about her memoir, “Tough Love.”

Susan Rice began her service in the public sector in 1993. In the Clinton administration, she was a foreign policy analyst on the National Security Council and assistant secretary of state for African affairs. Under President Barack Obama, she served as the U.S. ambassador to the United Nations and national security advisor. She is currently a distinguished visiting research fellow at the School of International Service at American University, a non-resident senior fellow at the Belfer Center for Science and International Affairs at Harvard’s Kennedy School of Government and a contributing opinion writer for The New York Times. 

Rice received a master’s degree and a doctorate in international relations from Oxford University where she was a Rhodes Scholar and her bachelor’s degree from Stanford University. She released a memoir, “Tough Love,” in 2019 that provides an insider’s look at the White House, foreign affairs and balancing work with motherhood. 

Scott Pelley

“60 Minutes” correspondent Scott Pelley discusses his memoir, “Truth Worth Telling.”

Scott Pelley has been a journalist for nearly five decades. He is the most awarded correspondent in the history of “60 Minutes,” and he is the former anchor of the “CBS Evening News.” His work has been recognized with three duPont-Columbia Awards, three Peabody Awards, the Walter Cronkite Award for Excellence in Journalism and 37 Emmy Awards. 

In his memoir, “Truth Worth Telling: A Reporter’s Search for Meaning in the Stories of Our Time,” Pelley recounts the best and worst of his career – stories from 9/11 as he encounters extraordinary heroism, insight to the military fighting in the Middle East and the families they left behind and the grieving mothers and fathers of Sandy Hook. He gives behind-the-scenes looks at interviews with world-famous people, from Bruce Springsteen to Donald Trump, and examines both the impulse to serve and the arrogance that can sully a leader’s ethical perspective.

 

Saeed Jones

Poet and author Saeed Jones talks about his debut memoir, “How We Fight for Our Lives.”

Saeed Jones is the author of “Prelude to Bruise,” winner of the 2015 PEN/Joyce Osterweil Award for Poetry and the 2015 Stonewall Book Award/Barbara Gittings Literature Award. The poetry collection was also a finalist for the 2015 National Book Critics Circle Award, as well as awards from Lambda Literary and the Publishing Triangle in 2015. Jones is a former co-host of BuzzFeed’s morning show, “AM to DM,” and previously served as BuzzFeed’s LGBT editor and Culture editor. In his debut memoir, “How We Fight for Our Lives,” Jones tells his story of growing up a young, black, gay man from the South and fighting to carve out a place for himself within his family, within his country, within his own hopes, desires, and fears. Jones was born in Memphis, Tennessee, and grew up in Lewisville, Texas. He earned a BA at Western Kentucky University and an MFA at Rutgers University-Newark.

 

Overheard with Evan Smith made possible with generous support from these underwriters.