Latest / In Focus with Carolyn Hutcheson / Mary Louise Kelly - TPR's In Focus - Oct. 20, 2026

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Mary Louise Kelly - TPR's In Focus - Oct. 20, 2026 · In Focus with Carolyn Hutcheson

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  Support comes from Troy University's Trojan Cafe, offering handcrafted
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  Starbucks beverages and a wide assortment of meal and snack options,
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  located on Troy University's Montgomery campus across from the Rosa Parks
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  Library and Museum.
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  From Troy Public Radio, this is
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  In Focus, and I'm Carolyn Hutcheson.
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  After 25 years with NPR, Mary Louise
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  Kelly will step down in November as host
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  of All Things Considered and her podcast, Sources and
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  Methods. Today we're bringing you an interview with her from
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  the spring of 2025 about her book,
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  It Goes So Fast. Mary Louise has won several
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  awards and was a finalist for the 2021 Pulitzer
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  Prize for her reporting on Iran.
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  Mary Louise, I am excited that your book, It Goes So Fast:
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  The Year of No Do-Overs, is coming out in paperback. Backed.
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  Congratulations. Thank you. Thank you. I'm excited too.
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  Tell me about your time in Georgia. You were for a time
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  at the Atlanta Journal-Constitution. Indeed.
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  That was my very first real job
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  right out of college. They hired me as a summer intern.
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  And I did the thing you're always told as a
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  rookie journalist to do, just be there in case news breaks. Be the
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  person who's there at all hours. And I got a couple of front page scoops
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  over that summer. And then they took me on to cover,
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  I think it was first the night cop shift
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  in Cobb County, which is every bit as glamorous as it sounds.
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  And then I got a big promotion to cover the county commission in DeKalb County
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  and found my way from there. Made a bunch of rookie mistakes,
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  learned from them, had tremendous editors whose voices I
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  still hear in my head to this day. You went into broadcasting,
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  and we're glad that you did, as host of NPR's
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  All Things Considered. And I want to talk about your book.
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  It felt like you and I were sitting down having a conversation over
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  a cup of coffee. And I think that's what your readers are going to feel
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  when they read your book. It goes so fast.
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  But I want to start out talking about this chicken,
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  Mary Louise Clucky. I mean, you did a huge news
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  story and you got back some what?
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  Indeed. Well, first of all, thank you for saying it felt like we were just
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  sitting and having a cup of coffee. I think that was my goal in writing
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  it was I'm just going to lay it out here. People can make of it
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  what they to make of it, but this is my story,
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  so here we go. Um, Mary Louise Kluckey. So I have
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  only sons. There was no one to give the name Mary Louise to. I've kept
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  my maiden name, so my maiden name isn't being passed to anyone. And I hadn't
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  really realized that that bugged me, that my name will presumably die
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  with me someday, hopefully a few years in the far future.
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  Yes, I had done a story. It was an interview about a refugee crisis
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  in Eastern Europe on the Belarusian border. It was
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  a dramatic and desperate story of children in peril,
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  families fleeing for their lives, trying to cross this border.
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  And I tweeted it out. And you expect when you tweet something like
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  that, that you'll hear from, I don't know, government officials, other journalists, human rights
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  groups, that type thing. And instead, the very first reply I got
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  was something to the effect of, thank you for your reporting. And by the way,
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  I named a chicken for you. And I thought, wait, what?
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  And I think I emailed something back like, wait, what? And yes,
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  it emerges that a very kind family
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  had named one of their chickens Mary Louise Clucky
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  in my honor. There are a few other NPR journalists who I
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  think have namesakes out in this particular henyard,
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  but I had them send me a picture and it was a little surprising how
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  very touched I was. And you think, gosh, you just don't know who you're reaching
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  on any given day or what their reaction's going to be. But here we are.
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  Mary Louise, you say in the book, after looking at her picture,
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  you could tell she was sassy, the kind of hen that would brook no
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  nonsense. She looked like that. She was russet. She was big.
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  She was like, you wouldn't mess with this chicken.
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  I was proud to have her bear my name. In the same chicken coop was
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  Ruth Bader Ginsburg. Uh-huh.
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  And another Supreme Court justice was honored in the same
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  hen coop, Sonia Sotomayor over easy.
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  Speaking of animals, some of your stories touch animal
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  lovers. And you were, I believe it was in Ukraine,
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  and you were talking with another mother.
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  Motherhood is a big connection throughout your book.
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  And the conversation began to be about her
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  daughter. Her daughter wanted a pet. It's such an
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  interesting thing how the stories that feel important to
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  me to report and bring to our audience have changed.
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  Since I have become a mother. This was an interview, yes, in Ukraine,
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  just a few weeks before the full-on invasion of Russia.
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  So early 2022. And I was interviewing
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  a woman who has had a phenomenal political career as a big newsmaker
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  in Ukraine. And we were talking about all the big important things,
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  the front lines and the preparations and the economics of this and NATO
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  and all the rest. And then yeah, she started talking about her daughter.
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  And how the thing that was really weighing on her, this is a woman named
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  Hannah Hopko, on that particular day was that her daughter was begging
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  for a pet guinea pig. And she started weeping as she
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  told me this. The thing that was really doing her in that day was the
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  thought of, I'm trying to figure out how to defend my country, what my
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  responsibility as a prominent political figure in this country
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  is, and also evacuation plans for my family
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  and how the heck a rodent would fit into that. Guinea pigs have
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  the big cage and the pellets and the food and the water bottle and all
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  the rest. Thinking, how on earth do I take that on? But on the other
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  hand, how do I let Vladimir Putin take that
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  away from my daughter? She earned it. She got the grades she promised she would
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  get, and I owe her a guinea pig. So I connected with that, and I
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  thought about how younger Mary Louise Kelly would've sat there
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  and thought, yeah, yeah, whatever. Who cares about your kid's pet? Can we get back
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  to NATO? And instead my reaction was,
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  this is the story. This is what People sitting in
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  the United States will never know what it is like to have Russian tanks
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  and troops lined up on your border, but we can all understand,
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  I got to take care of my family. I got to protect my daughter.
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  I have to keep my word to her. I have to figure out now what
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  the heck to do with a pet that is completely inconvenient to my plans.
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  We can relate. And it was a moment of humanity. And I believe that
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  it resonated because to this day, 3 years later, I still have people writing me
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  saying, How's the guinea pig? How's Hanahoko? How's her daughter? How are
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  they doing? And I'm happy to report they're all doing okay.
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  They're hanging in there. Human interest. In your book, you talk
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  about why should things be easy when they can be difficult?
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  And certainly your heart is with your children. And yet here
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  you are halfway across the world covering a major story.
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  And then you say the older you get, the more you realize that time is
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  not a line, but a circle. What do you mean by that?
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  So here's an example I can give you from the last 24 hours. I started
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  writing this book because that tension we all feel of how to
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  be true to multiple things that are important to us, that define
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  us. In my case, I was wrestling with how do I do my job
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  and do it well and go to the war zone they're asking me to go
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  to for work and be home and be fully present for my kids who I'm
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  going to miss among the many other things like all their soccer games. And that
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  really matters to them. How do I do these 2 things? How can I possibly
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  be in 2 places at once? What kind of choices does that look like?
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  In the 2 years since I completed and published this
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  book in hardcover, my kids have both graduated from high school. They're both off
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  at college. There are days where it feels like I'm in such a different chapter
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  of life. And yet I could read you a text from my
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  son, which came in last night. Hold on, I'm pulling it up. This came
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  in last night at 7:44 PM.
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  Hi, would it be a big hassle to ship my soccer cleats to my dorm?
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  I think I'm going to play intramural soccer. And I'm
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  thinking, it never ends. So of course I replied, sure, do you need your shin
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  guards too? And on my to-do list for today, along with all the news
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  stories that we're covering here in the NPR newsroom today, is ship the
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  soccer cleats. Time is not a line, it is a circle.
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  Mary Louise, it has made my day to interview
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  you. Thank you so much. Carolyn, the honor
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  and pleasure was mine. Thank you so much. That was NPR's Mary
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  Louise Kelly talking about her book, It Goes So Fast.
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  We interviewed her in the spring of 2025 about the
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  book. She is stepping down in November as host
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  of All Things Considered and her podcast, Sources and Methods.
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  And we hope to catch up with her to talk about her 2 previous
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  novels, the thrillers Anonymous Sources and
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  The Thanks for joining us for In Focus,
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  which is a podcast wherever you get your podcasts. Feel free
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  to get in touch at infocus@troy.edu.
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  I'm Carolyn Hutcheson, and this is listener-supported Troy
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  Public Radio.