Very few books make it to what I call “The Necessary Bookshelf” where reads are collected that are vital to understanding the times in which we live.

The first book to get there was Lawrence Wright’s The Looming Tower, the Pulitzer Prize winning history of al Qaeda.  I don’t take very seriously anyone who wants to talk about Islamist extremism who hasn’t read that book.

Now Wright, a senior reporter and writer for The New Yorker, has returned with a riveting, flabbergasting history of Scientology, titled Going Clear: Scientology, Hollywood and the Culture of Belief. He joins me on today’s program to discuss the book.