"A meticulous examination of the personalities and processes that have revived radio's artistry, once lost beneath the gloss of television. . . Fine radio can be as rewarding as literature." -- The New York Times
". . .a well-written, highly sympathetic backstage account of NPR." -- Marvin Kalb, Washington Post
" . . . firm opinions . . . on the role noncommercial radio should play in a society driven by television . . . Every reader of The Sound and the Story stands to learn something." -- The Christian Science Monitor
" . . . a love letter of sorts to this curiously intimate medium. . . . It is an inestimable good to have Thomas Looker's record of the daily toil at NPR. An insightful member of Congress ought to have The Sound and the Story put into the Congressional Record . . ." -- BookPage
"Looker deserves our thanks for a valuable examination of a fascinating part of the great American media." -- Tampa Tribune
"Public radio, Looker writes, is the 'sightless courier of the air,' and it 'may carry some of the antidote for the plague of our time - the atrophying of our private imaginations.' Nestled among the many soft voices at NPR, the lone voice has a chance. This book is a rich and intimate portrait of those people who give the voice wings." -- The Atlanta Constitution
"Looker spins the sometimes arcane debates over radio sound into an intriguing, quirky meditation about the role of pubic radio and media in general. . . [He] has successfully captured the internal workings of public radio, as well as its struggles." -- James Ledbetter, Newsday
"Reading The Sound and the Story is a bit like watching a Robert Altman film. Characters move in and out, sometimes wandering leisurely, sometimes bursting frantically on their way somewhere else. . . Looker's background as a member of the NPR family helps him balance his clinical fascination with the most minute facts against an affectionate, often humorous insight into the human beings behind the voices. It's his genuine, enthusiastic regard for Susan Stamberg, Linda Wertheimer, Nina Totenberg, Bob Edwards, Scott Simon and company that saves the book from being just a name on the syllabus for broadcasting students and turns it into a true work of storytelling." -- Mary Elizabeth Williams, San Francisco Bay Guardian
"Looker seeks to understand and explain how NPR works, and in particular he tries to illuminate the tensions between the 'hard news' advocates, who mostly came to NPR from newspapers, and the 'good sounds' types who love and cherish the technical uniqueness of their medium. . . While a great deal of the book deals with such timely philosophical issues, there's also considerable attention paid to the actual production of the network's most popular shows, including Morning Edition and All Things Considered. Read these chapters and you'll never again listen to these programs with the same casualness, for as Looker explains, these programs come to us only after the expenditure of great amounts of anxiety and uncertainty. . ." -- Tampa Tribune
". . .immensely readable, reasonably accurate, and at
time out-and-out funny. . . What emerges from these four hundred
pages or so is, in fact, a remarkably faithful picture not only
of the people but the process...the 'art' of radio in Looker's
subtitle. The book goes into great detail concerning the 'art' of
organizing and mounting a daily news program. Want to know
exactly how All Things Considered or Morning Edition
come together? Looker puts you there. There is also much musing
on what it all means...print journalists versus radio people; the
commercialization of non-commercial radio; NPR and issues of
diversity; NPR 'growing up.' Looker believes that NPR at its best
has the power to inspire its listeners. Perhaps, he says,
listeners in turn will continue to inspire NPR to provide 'an
antidote for the plague of our time - the atrophying of our
private imaginations.'" -- Lars Hoel, AIRSPACE
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