In today’s episode, we meet author Elaine Neil Orr, whose recent book “Swimming Between Worlds” is set in Winston-Salem, North Carolina during the early stages of the Civil Rights movement of the 1960s.

The Richmond Times-Dispatch observes that “Swimming Between Worlds” is “a novel of great humanity, . . . Conceived with compassion and rendered with grace, it scores a triumph for its author and a blessing for her readers.”

The plot focuses on Tacker and Kate and the world around them, and whether they can find a life together given Tacker’s desire for social change and Kate’s desire to go slow on race relations. It is a love story at the epicenter of change in a small southern town in the late 50s and early 60s.

We start the show with Elaine reading about the protagonist’s initial impressions upon his return home. His town of Winston-Salem had changed, but after spending two years in Nigeria, Tacker Hart had changed even more.