James McBride's Advice For New Writers: 'A Simple Story Is The Best Story

"In the real world, villains too often succeed and heroes, too often die," says writer James McBride — and that's one of the great things about being novelist. "In novels you can move matters around ... you get to show the best side of people. You get to show redemption, and forgiveness, and you get to show the parts of people that most of us never get to see." McBride's new novel, Deacon King Kong, opens with a shooting, then soon moves — improbably, memorably — into laughs, love, quirky and compelling characters, and the connective tissue of human experience in multiracial Brooklyn in the summer of 1969.' -- Weekend Edition Saturday