The Finest

• A special episode where a superfan takes our survey — plus your chance to win a Finest T-shirt

  We’re dropping a special minisode during our season break with one request: Help shape Season 2 of The Finest by taking our anonymous survey at KPBS.org/TheFinestSurvey. Your feedback helps guide what stories we cover next — and it enters you in a raffle to win an exclusive The Finest T-shirt. We’ll draw winners before the Season 2 premiere on Jan. 15. Plus, KPBS Racial Justice and Social Equity Reporter Katie Hyson, a self-proclaimed The Finest fan, takes the survey live on the show.

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• The nation's largest book ban: Inside the fight to read in America's prisons

  For many people who are incarcerated, a single book can be life-changing – a rare source of freedom and connection in a system built on isolation. That was true for Cherish Burtson, who discovered during her time in federal prison that reading could be a source of survival. Books became her escape, her education and a starting point to rebuild her life. But getting books behind bars isn't easy. Across the United States, correctional systems routinely ban or reject thousands of titles each year, reflecting deeper struggles over punishment, control and compassion. According to PEN America,  correctional facilities in all 50 states contribute to the nation's largest book ban, censoring more books than schools and libraries combined. This episode follows a group of San Diego volunteers working to get books past prison walls. It explores how the simple act of reading can restore a sense of humanity in even the harshest conditions — and what it says about who we are when we decide who gets to read.Guests:Cherish Burtson, substance use disorders counselor at Family Health Centers of San DiegoMoira Marquis, Freewrite project senior manager at PEN Americaterry vargas, Books Through Bars San Diego volunteerSources:United States Incarceration Profile (Prison Policy Initiative)Incarceration Trends (Vera, 2024)Women’s Pathways to Serious and Habitual Crime: A Person-Centered Analysis Incorporating Gender Responsive Factors (Tim Brennan, Markus Breitenbach, William Dieterich, Emily J. Salisbury and Patricia van Voorhis Notes, Criminal Justice and Behavior via Sage Journals, 2012)East Bay Federal Prison Plagued by Sex Abuse Scandal Will Close Permanently (KQED, 2024)Time-In-Cell: A 2021 Snapshot of Restrictive Housing based on a Nationwide Survey of U.S. Prison Systems (The Correctional Leaders Association & The Arthur Liman Center for Public Interest Law at Yale Law School, 2022)COVID-19 Timeline (California Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation)Three State Prison Oversight During the COVID-19 Pandemic (John Howard Association of Illinois, the Correctional Association of New York and the Pennsylvania Prison Society, 2021)Groundwork Books Collective (Idealist)Over the Edge: Death in Grand Canyon (Michael P. Ghiglieri and Thomas M. Myers, 2001)Books Thru Bars 2024 Impact (Books Through Bars San Diego via Instagram, 2024)Books Thru Bars Your Donation at a Glance (Books Through Bars San Diego via Instagram, 2025)Local prison book program brings connection and humanity despite censorship (Julia Dixon Evans, KPBS, 2024)Literature Locked Up How Prison Book Restriction Policies Constitute the Nation’s Largest Book Ban (James Tager, PEN America, 2019)Reading Between the Bars: An In-Depth Look at Prison Censorship (Moira Marquis and Juliana Luna, PEN America, 2023)Disapproved Publications (California Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation)Perfecting the Prison: United States, 1789-1865 (David J. Rothman, Oxford History of the Prison: The Practice of Punishment in Western Society via University of Minnesota Duluth, 1995)History of Eastern State Penitentiary (Eastern State)Deterrence and Incapacitation: A Quick Review of the Research (Laura Bennett and Felicity Rose, The Center for Just Journalism, 2025)Mass Incarceration: The Whole Pie 2025 (Wendy Sawyer and Peter Wagner, Prison Policy Initiative, 2025Custodial Sanctions and Reoffending: A Meta-Analytic Review (Damon M. Petrich, Travis C. Pratt, Cheryl Lero Jonson and Francis T. Cullen, University of Chicago Press Journals, 2021)Prison Banned Books Week: Books give incarcerated people access to the world, but tablets are often used to wall them off (Mike Wessler and Juliana Luna, Prison Policy Initiative, 2024)Books through Bars Stories from the Prison Books Movement (Dave "Mac" Marquis and Moira Marquis, University of Georgia, 2024)

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• The lost composer: Alice Barnett and the paradox of fame and memory

  Alice Barnett's music once echoed across America — her songs were performed on national radio, reviewed in major newspapers and sung in concert halls from New York to Los Angeles. But over time, her name slipped from memory. In this episode, San Diego musician and researcher Katina Mitchell brings Alice's story back into focus, tracing her journey from a gifted young composer in Illinois to an internationally recognized artist who made her home in San Diego. Through archival letters, fragile sheet music and rare recordings, Katina reconstructs a life devoted to music and performs pieces that haven't been widely heard in decades. With insight from cultural scholars, we look at how fame fades, why some artists are remembered while others vanish and what it takes to restore a legacy. The result is both a rediscovery of a remarkable composer and a reflection on the delicate ways art outlasts the people who create it.Guests:Katina Mitchell, musician, teacher and musicologistCésar A. Hidalgo, professor at Toulouse School of Economics and director of the Center for Collective Learning, Corvinus University of BudapestSwapnil Rai, associate professor in the Department of Film, Television and Media, University of Michigan, Ann ArborTina Zarpour, vice president of community engagement, education and collections, San Diego History CenterSources:Alice Barnett Stevenson Performance and Lecture (Katina Mitchell, San Diego History Center via YouTube, 2023)Amy Marcy Beach (Encyclopaedia Britannica, 2025)100 Years of Marriage and Divorce Statistics, United States 1867-1967 (National Center for Health Statistics, 1973)Pantheon Project (Center for Collective Learning)How We’ll Forget John Lennon (Kevin Berger, Nautilus, 2019)

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• The science of the supernatural: Psychics, cults and why we believe

  "Dispatch From Paradise" writer Cora Lee went searching for ghosts in Presidio Park, but her exploration of San Diego's supernatural underbelly didn't stop there. She visited San Diego's many mysterious cults in person, meeting members and observing their practices, and explored a long-running family dynasty of fortune tellers that has sometimes drawn law enforcement and media attention. In this Halloween episode, we follow Cora through the city's paranormal scene, from haunted hillsides and psychic shops to the strange and sprawling world of alternative spiritual communities. Along the way, religious studies professor Joseph Laycock helps unpack why belief in ghosts, aliens and spirits persists and what our search for "presence" reveals about being human. It's part spooky story, part San Diego history and part philosophical journey into why some mysteries endure — and why, deep down, we might not want them to end.Guests:Cora Lee, journalist and writer of "Dispatch From Paradise" SubstackJoseph Laycock, Associate Professor of Religious Studies at Texas State UniversitySources:The Junipero Serra Museum (Bill Virden, The Journal of San Diego History via San Diego History Center, 1962)Sociopolitical Aspects of the 1775 Revolt at Mission San Diego de Alcala (Richard L. Carrico, The Journal of San Diego History via San Diego History Center, 1997)Rumor Has It (Cora Lee, Dispatch From Paradise Substack, 2024)Why are people starting to believe in UFOs again? (The Conversation, Joseph Laycock, 2016)Over a third of Americans believe in ghosts and U.F.O's (Ipsos, 2021)Supernatural Belief Is Not Modulated by Intuitive Thinking Style or Cognitive Inhibition (Miguel Farias, Valerie van Mulukom, Guy Kahane, Ute Kreplin, Anna Joyce, Pedro Soares, Lluis Oviedo, Mathilde Hernu, Karolina Rokita, Julian Savulescu and Riikka Möttönen, Scientific Reports, 2017)History and Presence (Robert A. Orsi, The Belknap Press of Harvard University Press, 2016)American Piety In The 21st Century (The Baylor Religion Survey, 2006)People of the Forest Orangutans (Mission Wildlife)Visionary Spiritual Experiences and Cognitive Aspects of Spiritual Transformation (David J. Hufford, The Global Spiral via Penn Medicine, 2008)Spirituality Among Americans (Becka A. Alper, Chip Rotolo, Patricia Tevington and Justin Nortey and Asta Kallo, Pew Research Center, 2023)Law of Three Stages (Encyclopedia Britannica)Family Business (Cora Lee, Dispatch From Paradise Substack, 2023)Gypsy Clan Facing Test as Psychics: Hearing will be held in San Diego today on difficult-to-prove 'theft by false pretense' charges against Marks family. The group has been active in county since the '40s. (Tony Perry, Los Angeles Times, 1995)ABC10 News San Diego Investigation into Marks Family (Juliette Var and Michael Gonzalez, 2009)How a Hoax by Two Sisters Helped Spark the Spiritualism Craze (Becky Little, History.com, 2022)Psychical research and the origins of American psychology (Andreas Sommer, History of the Human Sciences via National Library of Medicine, 2012)Star Gate Project: An Overview (CIA, 1993)2 arrested in 'fortune telling scheme' that duped victims out of $600,000, officials say (Rebecca Cohen, NBC News, 2025)Three Spirit Mediums: A Case Study on Grief, Death, and Alternative Religious Traditions during the COVID-19 Pandemic (Natasha L. Mikles, 2023)Cult Classic (Cora Lee, Dispatch From Paradise Substack, 2025)Heaven's Gate cult members found dead (History.com, 2010)Unarius Academy of Science (Atlas Obscura)The Frenzy About the Weirdest Continent That Never Existed (Frank Jacobs, Atlas Obscura, 2024)The media's love affair with alleged sex criminal Sri Chinmoy (Edwin Lyngar, Salon, 2014)The Cults of California (Carey Mcwilliams, The Atlantic, 1946)Is it a cult, or a new religious movement? (Tina Rodia, Penn Today, 2019)Twelve Tribes 'child caning punishment' claims (BBC News, 2013)

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• Big guitars, bigger feelings: Slacker's San Diego story of growing pains and friendship

  San Diego's rising rock trio Slacker helped launch the pilot phase of the new KPBS Music Series with a live performance — loud, joyful and a little chaotic in the best way, but played with real precision and skill. Dressed in button-down shirts and ties, the band tore through their songs on the KPBS patio as the lunchtime crowd cheered. We sat down with the band right after their set to talk about where their music comes from — the friendships (and burritos) that built it and the feelings behind their biggest songs. They also share how they recorded their debut album in a legendary San Diego studio using a bass guitar once played by one of the city's most famous bands. It's a story about finding connection, growing together and turning shared experiences into music that feels personal, powerful and magical.Guests:Slacker: Jp Houle (singer/guitar), Avery Nelson (bass guitar/backup vocals) and Sam Hockaday (drums)Mentioned in this episode:Velvet worms | Ancient invertebrates with soft, velvety skin and tiny limbs that shoot slime to catch preyJimmy Page | Legendary Led Zeppelin guitarist known for his influence on generations of rock musiciansBig Fish Recording Studio | Encinitas recording studio where Blink-182 made their 1997 breakthrough album "Dude Ranch"Skyler Deci | San Diego producer and engineer who recorded and mixed Slacker's debut albumSources:Israel: White Phosphorus Used in Gaza, Lebanon (Human Rights Watch, 2023)Israel denies using white phosphorus munitions in Gaza (Patrick Wintour, The Guardian, 2023)Tiny desk, big talent: Our favorite San Diego artists from this year's contest (Julia Dixon Evans, Anthony Wallace, Ben Redlawsk, Brenden Tuccinardi and Katie Anastas, KPBS, 2025)Tiny Desk local listening party: The Neighborhood Kids and Aleah Discavage (Julia Dixon Evans and Anthony Wallace, KPBS, 2025)

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