Terry Gross

Novelist Mario Puzo. The author best known for his novel "The Godfather" died last week. We rebroadcast his interview, recorded in 1996 at the time of his novel "The Last Don" Besides "The Godfather," Puzo wrote "The Fortunate Pilgrim," and "The Dark Arena," both novels. He was also a two-time Academy Award winner and wrote several screenplays, including all three Godfathers and Superman I and II. (REBROADCAST from 7/25/96)

Actor J.K. Simmons. He's a regular on HBO's "OZ" the graphic and disturbing drama of life in a maximum security prison. The show is produced by Tom Fontana, who also wrote and produced "Homicide: Life on the Street." Simmons plays convict and neo-nazi Vernon Schillinger. "OZ" is about to begin a new season. Simmons film credits include "The Jackal" and "Extreme Measures." His TV credits include: "Law and Order," "Homicide" and "Spin City." (REBROADCAST from 7/30/98)

Helen Bamber is the founder and director of the London-based Medical Foundation for the Care of Victims of Torture. A biography "The Good Listener: Helen Bamber, A Life Against Cruelty" by Neil Belton has just been published. (Pantheon) When Helen Bamber was a little girl growing up in 1930s England, her father read her sections of Mein Kampf to inure her to the evil in the world. In 1945, at the age of 19, she traveled to the former concentration camp at Belsen to help with the physical and psychological recovery of Holocaust survivors.

Retired U.S. Army Colonel Stuart A. Herrington. He spent 30 years as a military intelligence officer, serving in Europe, Asia, Latin America and the Middle East. He was the Army's authority on counterintelligence and on the interrogation and debriefing of defectors and prisoners of war. He's written the new book "Traitors Among Us: Inside the Spy Catcher's World" (Presido).

Clarinetist Ken Peplowski. The 40-year old jazz musician, has been playing the instrument since the age of 7, and went on to play in Benny Goodman's last band, and in the Tommy Dorsey Orchestra (led by Buddy Morrow). Peplowski influences include Goodman, saxophonist Sonny Stitt, the Beatles, and Ornette Coleman He launched a successful solo career in the early 1980s and now has 16 albums to his credit. His latest is "Ken Peplowski: Last Swing of the Century-Big Band Music of Benny Goodman" (Concord Jazz).

Scott Anderson is author of the new book "The Man Who Tried to Save the World : The Dangerous Life and Mysterious Disappearance of Fred Cuny ." (Doubleday) He talks about the life of disaster relief specialist Fred Cuny who went to war-torn regions of the world to help the people rebuild their communities. CUNY disappeared in April, 1995 while working in Chechnya. Anderson is also author of the novel "Triage" set in the Kurdish occupied region of Iraq.

Singer and pianist Ray Charles. His name is synonymous with soul music and rhytmn n blues. But some of his most popular recordings are of country songs. Terry Gross talked to him last year after the release of the four CD box-set "Ray Charles: The Complete Country and Western Recordings 1959-1986. (Rhino) Blind since the age of six (from glaucoma), Charles studied composition and learned many instruments at the St. Augustine School for the Deaf and the Blind.

William Langewiesche ("long-ah-VEE-sha") is a writer and a pilot. He grew up around planes and learned to fly when he was a child. His father, a test pilot, wrote a text that is considered to be the bible of aerial navigation ("Stick and Rudder"). Langewiesche's book "Inside the Sky: A Meditation on Flight" has just come out in paperback. (Vintage) His other books include: "Cutting for Sign," "Stick and Rudder," and "Sahara unveiled: a Journey across the Desert." Originally aired 6/18/98.

Kevin Bales is a leading expert on the modern-day practice of slavery. He is author of the new book "Disposable People: New Slavery in the Global Economy." (University of California Press) Bales is a principal lecturer at the Roehampton Institute, University of Surrey, England.

Dr. Lori Arviso Alvord is the first Navajo woman surgeon. She is the author of the new book "The Scalpel and the Silver Bear." (Bantam) In her practice, she combines modern surgery with ancient Navajo healing practices. Born and raised on a reservation near Gallup, New Mexico she now serves as an assistant professor of surgery at Dartmouth Medical School in Hanover, New Hampshire.