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Whether it’s rediscovering an old favorite or engaging with a new title, ideastream encourages YOU to read some, many, or all of the 100 best-loved American novels (as chosen in a national survey) as PBS celebrates the joy of reading and the books we love!

• Take a quiz to find out how many of the 100 books you have already read
• Share the GREAT AMERICAN READ book list with fellow bibliophiles, book worms, book clubs, or students.  Why not pick a few titles to read and discuss during June, July, August, and September?
• Plan viewing parties with your book club or reading friends and family to enjoy the reading frenzy!
• Use #GreatReadPBS to post pictures of you with your favorite book—on vacation, in your favorite reading spot—the choice is yours!

Series Schedule

Tuesday, September 11 | 8 p.m. “Fall Kick Off”—Join host Meredith Vieira in the search for America’s best-loved novel. The voting is underway, and the competition is heating up!

Tuesday, September 18 | 8 p.m. “Who Am I?”—Explore the ways that America’s best-loved novels answer the age-old question.  From life lessons to spiritual journeys, these books help us understand our own identities and find our place in the world.

Tuesday, September 25 | 8 p.m.  “Heroes”—Follow the trials and tribulations of some of literature’s favorite heroes. Examine how the everyday hero and the anti-hero find their inner strength, overcome challenges and rise to the occasion.

Tuesday, October 2 | 8 p.m.  “Villains and Monsters”—Learn why literature’s most notorious villains began behaving badly. Many weren’t born evil, but became that way when faced with some of the same choices we make every day. See what these villains can teach us about our own dark impulses.

Tuesday, October 9 | 8 p.m. “What We Do For Love”—Fall in love with some of literature’s most beautiful romances and explore the many forms of love, from family to passion to the unrequited type.

Tuesday, October 16 | 8 p.m.  “Other Worlds”—Take a magical journey to another world through some of America’s best-loved novels. From Middle Earth to Lilliput, the trials and tribulations of these alternate universes help us to better understand our own world.

Tuesday, October 23 | 8 p.m. “Grand Finale”—American’s best loved novel is revealed!

Young readers can join in the fun, too! PBS KIDS has created a list of books to share with children. Download a copy of the list.

PBS KIDS know there are many more great books for children, and they would love to share more book recommendations during the summer. You can let them know about your favorites through social media @pbskids #PBSKIDSRead

Vote For Your Favorites!

Vote now for your favorite books by clicking on the covers of the books shown below!

The Glenville Shootout, which played out from 23 through the 28 July, 1968, happened after decades of changes in Cleveland, changes that triggered racial tensions. Until 1940, Glenville was a predominantly Jewish neighborhood, but by the late 1960s, it was 96 percent African-American. This timeline shows the key dates in the history leading up to the shootout and tries to plot key moments during the violence. The timeline is taken from multiple sources including James Robenalt's "Ballots and Bullets: Black Power Politics and Urban Guerrilla Warfare in 1968 Cleveland"², the Masotti report³, the Cleveland Memory Project at Cleveland State University, ClevelandHistorical.org, and a transcript of the police radio calls¹ during the shootout.

In some instances to clarify the sources of specific language or quotes, we refer to the specific sources, marked above by the superscript numbers.

Violins of Hope: Strings of the Holocaust [watch on-demand now], narrated by Academy Award-winner Adrien Brody, is a documentary featuring Israeli violinmaker Amnon Weinstein and his efforts to restore violins recovered from the Holocaust. Some were played by Jewish prisoners in concentration camps; others belonged to the Klezmer musical culture, which was all but destroyed by the Nazis. From their amazing stories and Weinstein’s mission to collect and restore the instruments comes the inspiration for this one-hour documentary, which will be offered to PBS member stations nationwide. Generous support for this WVIZ/PBS ideastream production was provided by contributors to the ideastream Campaign for Community and the donors for Violins of Hope Cleveland.

About the Violins of Hope Collaboration

Played before and during the Holocaust, the Violins of Hope instruments have been painstakingly restored by Amnon Weinstein, a second-generation violin-maker, and serve as testaments to the resilience of the human spirit and the power of music to lift hearts in even the most horrific of circumstances.

ideastream: A proud partner
The organizations partnering on this project—which includes performances, educational programs and a major exhibition—are The Cleveland Orchestra, Case Western Reserve University, the Cleveland Institute of Music, Facing History and Ourselves, ideastream, the Jewish Federation of Cleveland and the Maltz Museum of Jewish Heritage. ideastream will document, report on and deliver programs relating to the many dimensions and activities surrounding this inspiring community collaboration.

Enjoy the following video postcards from WVIZ’s early days.

Join Ideastream Public Media Thursday, November 3rd at 9 p.m. for the 87th Annual Anisfield-Wolf Book Awards hosted by Henry Louis Gates, Jr. We highlight the winners and their important work, in a one-hour television special. Watch on WVIZ, the Ideastream Public Media app or on the PBS App.

In Ideastream Public Media's "Sound of Us" project, we team up with individuals and communities to record and present stories of life in Northeast Ohio. We also teach people to record and produce their own radio.

In this week-long "Sound of Us" series, the students at Richmond Heights Secondary School raise questions. Big questions, including “What’s the point of school choice with no transportation?” and “What happened to school spirit?” The answers in this self-reported series surprised them – and enlighten us.

We want to hear from you!