It took over five years for Nathaniel Rich to finish his first novel — maybe because he was writing The Mayor's Tongue secretly, first as a college student, and then while writing film criticism during the day.

» E-Mail This     » Add to Del.icio.us

Abortion-rights backers want quick action from the president-elect, although they may not press for sweeping changes. Obama has said he is looking to find common ground on reproductive health issues.

» E-Mail This     » Add to Del.icio.us

WASHINGTON (AP) -- A crucial first Senate vote on President Barack Obama's health care overhaul in a rare Saturday night session looms as a test of Democratic unity and the president's prestige....

ROME (AP) -- Italy's ANSA news agency reports that police in the northern city of Brescia have arrested two Pakistanis accused of logistical support for last year's terror attacks in Mumbai....

GENEVA (AP) -- Scientists switched on the world's largest atom smasher for the first time since the $10 billion machine suffered a spectacular failure more than a year ago, circulating beams of protons in a significant leap forward for the Large Hadron Collider....

NEW YORK (AP) -- Jim Boeheim has always made a point of telling the media not to get too caught up in runs because basketball, especially on the college level, is a game of runs....

ROME (AP) -- A Vatican researcher has rekindled the age-old debate over the Shroud of Turin, saying that faint writing on the linen proves it was the burial cloth of Jesus. Experts say the historian may be reading too much into the markings, and they stand by carbon-dating that points to the shroud being a medieval forgery....

RALEIGH, N.C. (AP) -- The U.S. Army said Friday it would open Sarah Palin's appearance on Fort Bragg to media, a reversal from earlier in the week when the military wanted the event closed out of fears it would prompt political grandstanding against President Barack Obama....

FAYETTEVILLE, N.C. (AP) -- A 5-year-old North Carolina girl was raped and killed the same day she was taken from her home, according to an arrest warrant released Friday. Shaniya Davis was sexually assaulted and asphyxiated Nov. 10, the day her mother reported her missing from the trailer park where she was staying, according to the warrant. Authorities embarked on a nearly weeklong search that ended when the girl's body was found dumped off a rural road....

WASHINGTON (AP) -- Republicans are seizing on this week's recommendations for fewer Pap smears and mammograms to fuel concern about government-rationed medical care - and to try to chip away support by women for President Barack Obama's proposed health care overhaul....

WASHINGTON (AP) -- The Justice Department intends to drop manslaughter and weapons charges against one of the Blackwater Worldwide security guards involved in a deadly 2007 Baghdad shooting, prosecutors said in court documents Friday....

WASHINGTON (AP) -- There may be additional e-mails that could have tipped off law enforcement or military officials to the Fort Hood shooter before he went on his deadly rampage, the chairman of the Senate Armed Services Committee said Friday....

LOS ANGELES (AP) -- California is investigating several companies suspected of bilking churches nationwide of hundreds of thousands of dollars through fraudulent computer leasing schemes, authorities said Friday....

LOS ANGELES (AP) -- Federal officials say they arrested a man who strapped 15 live lizards to his chest to get through customs at Los Angeles International Airport....

Sen. Carl Levin, the chairman of the Senate Armed Forces Committee, said there may be additional e-mails that could have tipped off law enforcement or military officials to the alleged Fort Hood shooter before the deadly rampage.

» E-Mail This     » Add to Del.icio.us

CHICAGO (AP) -- For more than two decades, Oprah Winfrey has been the inspirational, change-your-life champion who reigned over daytime television much like Johnny Carson once ruled late night....

ROME (AP) -- Two fingers and a tooth removed from Galileo Galilei's corpse in a Florentine basilica in the 18th century and given up for lost have been found again and will soon be put on display, an Italian museum director said Friday....

The NFL Players Association opposes commissioner Roger Goodell's call for players to tell their teams' medical staffs if they think a teammate shows symptoms of a concussion, saying that is not an adequate solution....

The Justice Department intends to drop manslaughter and weapons charges against one of the Blackwater Worldwide security guards involved in a deadly 2007 Baghdad shooting, prosecutors said in court documents Friday.

» E-Mail This     » Add to Del.icio.us