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Forget the picturesque tree and perfectly arranged presents. Christmas means blending old customs with new traditions, even if the result is messier than a bag full of carrot jam.

Since the Manhattan Project, the U.S. president has wielded more military power than ever before. And in the opinion of historian Garry Wills, more than the commander-in-chief is allowed by the Constitution. Guy Raz talks with Wills about his new book, Bomb Power: The Modern Presidency and the National Security State.

NPR's Linda Wertheimer walks the halls of power — and the local cafes — with crime novelist Mike Lawson, whose Joe DeMarco books serve up murder and mayhem in the nation's capital.

A lot of tragic stories have been in the news this week. To name a few, there was the Boston Marathon bombing, letters believed to be laced with ricin were sent to President Obama and other officials and the explosion at fertilizer plant in Texas. David Greene talks to NPR's Shankar Vedantam about the psychology of "crazy weeks."

The Seattle Gum Wall, the Montana Testicle Festival, and the entire state of Nevada are just a few of the non-destinations Catherine Price lists in her anti-travel guide, 101 Places Not To See Before You Die. Price takes it upon herself to go to terrible tourist destinations ... so you don't have to.

While writer Stephen King was recovering from a near-fatal car accident, he finished a nonfiction book about the craft of writing. In a 2000 interview with Terry Gross, King talked about the demons that haunted him after the accident — and how writing helped his recovery process.

Matthew Alexander, a pseudonym for the author, was a military interrogator in Iraq who rejected previously used harsh techniques. He writes about how his team hunted down two key al-Qaida operatives in Kill or Capture.

Rex Ryan, the head coach of the New York Jets, has been called a lot of things: boastful, brash, profane and even fat. But one thing you can't call him is ineffective. In his new book, Play Like You Mean It, Ryan writes about his journey to the top.

They were married when they first met, but he kept her from leaving a party when he asked, "Must you go?" That simple question launched a 33-year relationship and serves as the title of biographer Lady Antonia Fraser's new memoir about her years with playwright Harold Pinter.

During the 1898-1904 pox epidemic, public health officials and policemen forced thousands of Americans to be vaccinated against their will. Historian Michael Willrich examines that epidemic's far-reaching implications for individual civil liberties in Pox: An American History.