Colt, Smith & Wesson, Winchester, Remington — all are names that helped shape and define the American experience. American companies, building an American product.

Then in 1982 everything changed. An obscure Austrian curtain-rod manufacturer named Gaston Glock, starting completely from scratch, designed and built a pistol that revolutionized weaponry.

His ingenious design, coupled with some equally ingenious marketing and a little bit of urban legend, allowed the Glock to overtake its long-established competitors and become America’s gun.

Its story is now told in journalist Paul Barrett‘s book “Glock: The Rise of America’s Gun.”

Listen to Paul Barrett

Download audio file (paulbarrett.mp3)

Don’t see a player here? Click on this link to listen, or right click and “Save As” to download.

After a young journalist is killed in a horrible traffic accident in Canada, it comes to light that her death was not an accident. Francesca Page was murdered because she had uncovered a Chinese-Iranian conspiracy that could choke off oil to the U.S.

Unfortunately for the bad guys in Allan Topol‘s thriller “The China Gambit,” Francesca’s father is Craig Page, a former CIA agent who now freelances his terrorism-fighting work in Europe, and who is not about to let his daughter’s death go unpunished, nor the plot she uncovered go unchecked.

Using as a backdrop real events that lend a very uneasy realism to the story, Topol follows Page’s efforts to avenge his daughter and preserve the American way of life.

Listen to Allan Topol

Download audio file (allantopol.mp3)

Don’t see a player here? Click on this link to listen, or right click and “Save As” to download.

Deborah Scroggins‘s book “Wanted Women” illuminates an entire generation of Muslims through the lives of activist Ayaan Hirsi Ali and religious extremist Aafia Siddiqui.

One is a martyr, the other a she-devil — but who’s who depends entirely on whom you’re asking.

Siddiqui was branded “Lady al-Qaeda” for her involvement with extremist factions. Hirsi Ali has defiantly renounced the Muslim fundamentalism in which she was raised, to become a darling of the anti-Islam extremists.

Scroggins says she came to this story through a coincidence of sorts….

Listen to Deborah Scroggins

Download audio file (deborahscroggins.mp3)

Don’t see a player here? Click on this link to listen, or right click and “Save As” to download.

A few years back, in a different life, Leonid McGill framed Zella Grisham and helped send her to prison for a crime she didn’t do.

Now, as the story begins in Walter Mosley‘s fourth McGill novel “All I Did Was Shoot My Man,” McGill is hired to help Zella get her life back after prison.

Trouble is, there are those who are, shall we say, very uncomfortable that Zella is free.

And Leonid’s plate is full of personal problems, as well, all of which challenge him on every page to stay the new course he has so earnestly set for himself.

Listen to Walter Mosley

Download audio file (waltermosley.mp3)

Don’t see a player here? Click on this link to listen, or right click and “Save As” to download.

For some 27 years I’ve been interviewing authors on tour, and have always been curious about what it is really like to travel from one city to the next, one bookstore or library or book club to the next, one hotel to the next – and trying to sound really smart and clever all along the way.

Victoria Christopher Murray and ReShonda Tate Billingsley, authors of “Sinners and Saints,” have now posted a short video. Granted, it’s way too short to really show what the tour is like. But it’s a nice little taste.

Kiriakou told Eye on Books in 2010 that he is “just an ordinary guy.” But federal prosecutors say he violated the Intelligence Identities Protection Act and the Espionage Act. They say he illegally disclosed the name of another covert CIA officer to a reporter, and separately that he lied to the CIA’s Publications Review Board to persuade them to let him publish “The Reluctant Spy.”

Kiriakou has been freed on $250,000 bond after appearing in federal court in Alexandria, Virginia on Monday.

Click here to go to our 2010 interview with John Kiriakou

Somewhere in America, there’s about to be a terrorist attack, a blockbuster assault on a critical homeland resource that could cripple the nation — unless Pike Logan and his super-secret Taskforce can stop it, in Brad Taylor‘s new thriller “All Necessary Force.”

Taskforce’s job is to obtain the crucial information that America’s better-known and more high-profile intel operations can’t.

As Logan and partner Jennifer Cahill get deeper into their mission, however, it turns out there are two plots in the works. And they don’t have much time to stop them.

The story is informed by Taylor’s real-life experiences with Delta Force.

Listen to Brad Taylor

Download audio file (bradtaylor.mp3)

Don’t see a player here? Click on this link to listen, or right click and “Save As” to download.

Ty Hunter is a strong, handsome, charismatic star. But the task before him is a lot tougher than acting. There are some stolen nuclear warheads, which are about to be acquired by some very, very bad people. Hunter must stop them.

Tommy Caplan is a lifelong thriller reader, as is his college roommate, and the man who contributed the introduction to this novel, former President Bill Clinton. And while readers and reviewers instantly see parallels with Ian Fleming and Robert Ludlum, Caplan says there was another source of inspiration for him.

Listen to Thomas Caplan

Download audio file (thomascaplan.mp3)

Don’t see a player here? Click on this link to listen, or right click and “Save As” to download.

Strong women who will do whatever it takes to help their husbands win a coveted position of power and leadership clash, in a new novel by two strong and bestselling writers. Victoria Christopher Murray is renowned for her novels such as The Ex Files and Lady Jasmine, featuring the beloved — and be-hated — Jasmine Cox Larson Bush.ReShonda Tate Billingsley is author of the Amen series featuring the equally memorable Rachel Jackson Adams.

Now, in “Sinners and Saints,” it’s Team Jasmine versus Team Rachel, as both their husbands are up for the presidency of the American Baptist Coalition, and each wife sees herself as the future First Lady of the Coalition. Their dirty tricks and schemes may be outdone only by a third party who comes along.

Listen to Victoria Christopher Murray & ReShonda Tate Billingsley

Download audio file (victoriamurray.mp3)

Don’t see a player here? Click on this link to listen, or right click and “Save As” to download.

The votes are all in, this year drawing on 47 sources in all, and we’re ready to declare our exclusive, consensus Best of the Best Books of 2011 lists. Fiction dominates the overall top 10 this year, with novels claiming the first four spots, and Téa Obreht‘s THE TIGER’S WIFE as the clear “book of the year.”

As we noted last April when EYE ON BOOKS interviewed this modest and totally unassuming young woman, her acclaimed first novel may be all the more remarkable, given that Téa is only in her mid 20s, the youngest of the New Yorker’s 20-under-40.

Click here to go to our interview with Téa Obreht