Morning Edition

House and Senate leaders have reached a deal on a roughly 7 billion dollar budget after weeks of tense negotiations that practically ground the state capitol to a halt.

Tina Brown, editor of The Daily Beast and Newsweek, checks in again with the recommended-reading feature Morning Edition likes to call Word of Mouth.

This month, Brown selects a book and pair of articles about people shaped by unique places and situations — whether they be uprisings half a world away or police investigations in America's largest city.

'Libya's Revolutionary Road'

John Denver had trouble filling a room prior to releasing his 1971 album Poems, Prayers, and Promises. As a solo act, he was virtually unknown. All that changed with the the album's single, "Take Me Home, Country Roads," which launched Denver's career and made him an international star. But the song almost never happened.

One year after 29 coal miners lost their lives in a massive explosion in West Virginia, state and federal officials vowed not to let such a disaster happen again.

"We will never forget this tragedy," said Labor Secretary Hilda Solis at a memorial service in Whitesville, W.Va., on Tuesday. "Because only by remembering will we continue our vigilance to make sure that this type of tragedy never happens again."

Solis spoke at the second of two services held on the first anniversary of the tragedy at Massey Energy's Upper Big Branch mine.

The area of northeastern Japan hit by the tsunami is called Tohoku. It is largely rural, agrarian, traditional — and, in a country that already has the oldest population in the world, Tohoku is where you find the most seniors.

Soon, the government must decide whether to rebuild some two-dozen destroyed seaside cities and towns in the northeast, or move the residents to higher ground elsewhere. Relocation, if it happens, will be hardest on the elderly.