I know that “Beowulf” is technically an epic poem rather than a novel, but I’m going to say it counts. Are there any classic novels that you only recently read for the first time? The gift: I get to talk to an author I admire about his brilliant work of literature! The curse: I have no time to go back and read any of Verghese’s previous books, much as I’d like to. This points to the gift and the curse of my job. What’s the last great book you read?Ībraham Verghese’s next novel, “The Covenant of Water,' is more than 700 pages, and even though it doesn’t come out until May, I devoured it more quickly than many books that were ahead of it in my queue. I have already read them, but I hope that by sleeping near them every night I will finally make some headway on the Harry Hay project that I’ve been dreaming about creating for a few years now. All three are about the queer trailblazer Harry Hay: “The Trouble With Harry Hay,' by Stuart Timmons “Radically Gay,” a collection of Hay’s writings edited by Will Roscoe and a play called “The Temperamentals,” by Jon Marans. I also have a few books on my bedside table that have sat there longer than I’d like to admit.

I usually keep more of a balance between fiction and nonfiction, but it varies. “Four Battlegrounds,” by Paul Scharre, about artificial intelligence and the future of war “A Sun to Be Sewn,” a slim and brutal work of fiction by the Haitian poet Jean D’Amérique and “The Great Displacement,” by Jake Bittle, about Americans forced to relocate by climate change. The vast majority of my reading is for author interviews on “All Things Considered.” So as I write this in January, I’m chipping away at a pile of titles with February and March publication dates: “The Exceptions,” by Kate Zernike, about a group of women scientists who fought for equality at M.I.T.

Speedy Reads by Chris-Jean Clarke