Hey, it's NPR's Book of the Day. I'm Andrew Limbaugh. Today we're going to celebrate being an absolute obsessive dork over the things you love.

Being the type of person to search high and low to try and find out, okay, when Gladys Knight was recording vocals to midnight Train to Georgia, who was in the room?

Who was engineering?

Who was laying down the backing tracks?

Where was she standing?

And why does all of this matter?

The writer Danielle Smith does just that in her new book, Shine Bright, and we'll hear from her about it in a sec.

But first, the Pulitzer Prize winning writer Margot Jefferson has a new memoir out now,

titled Constructing a Nervous System.

And it's an examination of her life through the lens of the art she consumes.

And in this interview with NPR's Ari Shapiro,

they have this really fascinating discussion about Ella Fitzgerald and her sweat, how she'd always

look hot when she performed on TV, and what that says about race, class, gender, and the

labor of performance.

In the U.S., national security news can feel far away from daily life.

Distant wars, murky conflicts, diplomacy behind closed doors on our new show, Sources and Methods.

NPR reporters on the ground bring you stories of real people, helping you understand why distant events matter here at home.

Listen to sources and methods on the NPR app or wherever you get your podcasts.

Who made you the person you are? Parents, friends, sure. But what about people you've never met?

Musicians, writers, characters in TV and movies. Margot Jefferson is a Pulitzer Prize-winning

cultural critic, and she's also a celebrated memoirist.

Her new book combines the two forms.

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