Lauren Markham is the author of A Map of Future Ruins, available from Riverhead Books. Markham is the author of the award-winning The Far Away Brothers: Two Young Migrants and the Making of an American Life. She has been working with migrants for two decades and has written about migration and other social issues in The New York Times Magazine, The Guardian, The New York Review of Books, and other publications. She lives in Berkeley, CA. *** Otherppl with Brad Listi is a weekly literary podcast featuring in-depth interviews with today's leading writers. Available where podcasts are available: Apple Podcasts, Spotify, YouTube, etc. Subscribe to Brad Listi’s email newsletter. Support the show on Patreon Merch Twitter Instagram  TikTok Bluesky Email the show: letters [at] otherppl [dot] com The podcast is a proud affiliate partner of Bookshop, working to support local, independent bookstores. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

In today's flashback, an outtake from Episode 29, my conversation with author Ben Loory. It first aired on December 25, 2011. Loory is the author of the story collections Tales of Falling and Flying and Stories for Nighttime and Some for the Day, and a picture book for children, The Baseball Player and the Walrus. His stories have appeared in The New Yorker, Tin House, READ Magazine, and Fairy Tale Review; been heard on This American Life and Selected Shorts; performed live at WordTheatre in Los Angeles and London; and translated into many languages, including Japanese, Farsi, Arabic, and Indonesian. A graduate of Harvard and the American Film Institute, Loory lives in Los Angeles, where he is an Instructor for the UCLA Extension Writers' Program. *** Otherppl with Brad Listi is a weekly literary podcast featuring in-depth interviews with today's leading writers. Available where podcasts are available: Apple Podcasts, Spotify, YouTube, etc. Subscribe to Brad Listi’s email newsletter. Support the show on Patreon Merch @otherppl Instagram  TikTok Email the show: letters [at] otherppl [dot] com The podcast is a proud affiliate partner of Bookshop, working to support local, independent bookstores. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Vanessa Chan is the author of the bestselling debut novel The Storm We Made, available from Marysue Rucci Books. It is the official February pick of the Otherppl Book Club. The Storm We Made is a national bestseller, Good Morning America Book Club Pick and BBC Radio 2 Book Club pick. Acquired by international publishers in a flurry of auctions, the novel will be published in more than twenty languages worldwide. Her other work has been published in Vogue, Esquire, and more. Vanessa grew up in Malaysia and is now based mostly in Brooklyn. *** Otherppl with Brad Listi is a weekly literary podcast featuring in-depth interviews with today's leading writers. Available where podcasts are available: Apple Podcasts, Spotify, YouTube, etc. Subscribe to Brad Listi’s email newsletter. Support the show on Patreon Merch Twitter Instagram  TikTok Bluesky Email the show: letters [at] otherppl [dot] com The podcast is a proud affiliate partner of Bookshop, working to support local, independent bookstores. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Leslie Jamison is the author of the memoir Splinters, available from Little, Brown & Co. Jamison is the author of the New York Times bestsellers The Recovering and The Empathy Exams; the collection of essays Make It Scream, Make It Burn, a finalist for the PEN/Diamonstein-Spielvogel Award; and the novel The Gin Closet, a finalist for the LA Times Book Prize. She is a contributing writer for the New York Times Magazine, and her work has appeared in publications including The Atlantic, Harper's, the New York Times Book Review, the Oxford American, and the Virginia Quarterly Review, among many others. She teaches at Columbia University and lives in Brooklyn. *** Otherppl with Brad Listi is a weekly literary podcast featuring in-depth interviews with today's leading writers. Available where podcasts are available: Apple Podcasts, Spotify, YouTube, etc. Subscribe to Brad Listi’s email newsletter. Support the show on Patreon Merch Twitter Instagram  TikTok Bluesky Email the show: letters [at] otherppl [dot] com The podcast is a proud affiliate partner of Bookshop, working to support local, independent bookstores. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

In today's flashback, an outtake from Episode 264, my conversation with author Jacinda Townsend. It first aired on March 30, 2014. Jacinda Townsend is the author of the novels Mother Country (Graywolf Press) and Saint Monkey (W.W. Norton), which won the Janet Heidinger Kafka Prize and the James Fenimore Cooper Prize. She is a graduate of the Iowa Writers' Workshop and teaches in the MFA program at Brown University. *** Otherppl with Brad Listi is a weekly literary podcast featuring in-depth interviews with today's leading writers. Available where podcasts are available: Apple Podcasts, Spotify, YouTube, etc. Subscribe to Brad Listi’s email newsletter. Support the show on Patreon Merch @otherppl Instagram  TikTok Email the show: letters [at] otherppl [dot] com The podcast is a proud affiliate partner of Bookshop, working to support local, independent bookstores. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Sarah Tomlinson is the author of the novel The Last Days of the Midnight Ramblers, available from Flatiron Books. Tomlinson, a former music journalist, has been a ghostwriter since 2008, penning more than twenty books, including five New York Times bestsellers. In 2015, she published the father-daughter memoir, Good Girl (Gallery Books). She wrote The Last Days of the Midnight Ramblers, her first novel, in-between assignments for a who's who of celebrity clients. *** Otherppl with Brad Listi is a weekly literary podcast featuring in-depth interviews with today's leading writers. Available where podcasts are available: Apple Podcasts, Spotify, YouTube, etc. Subscribe to Brad Listi’s email newsletter. Support the show on Patreon Merch Twitter Instagram  TikTok Bluesky Email the show: letters [at] otherppl [dot] com The podcast is a proud affiliate partner of Bookshop, working to support local, independent bookstores. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Paul Theroux is the author of the novel Burma Sahib, available from Mariner Books. Theroux is the author of many highly acclaimed books. His novels include The Bad Angel Brothers, The Lower River, Jungle Lovers, and The Mosquito Coast, and his renowned travel books include Ghost Train to the Eastern Star and Dark Star Safari. He lives in Hawaii and on Cape Cod. *** Otherppl with Brad Listi is a weekly literary podcast featuring in-depth interviews with today's leading writers. Available where podcasts are available: Apple Podcasts, Spotify, YouTube, etc. Subscribe to Brad Listi’s email newsletter. Support the show on Patreon Merch Twitter Instagram  TikTok Bluesky Email the show: letters [at] otherppl [dot] com The podcast is a proud affiliate partner of Bookshop, working to support local, independent bookstores. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

In today's flashback, an outtake from Episode 531, my conversation with author Bethany C. Morrow. It first aired on July 4, 2018. Morrow is a national bestselling author writing for adult and young adult audiences. She is the author of the novels Mem, A Song Below Water, A Chorus Rises, and So Many Beginnings: A Little Women Remix. She is the editor/contributor to the young adult anthology Take the Mic, which won the 2020 ILA Social Justice Literature Award. Her work has been featured in the Los Angeles Times, Forbes, Bustle, BuzzFeed, and more. She is included on USA Today's list of "100 Black Novelists and Fiction Writers You Should Read." *** Otherppl with Brad Listi is a weekly literary podcast featuring in-depth interviews with today's leading writers. Available where podcasts are available: Apple Podcasts, Spotify, YouTube, etc. Subscribe to Brad Listi’s email newsletter. Support the show on Patreon Merch @otherppl Instagram  TikTok Email the show: letters [at] otherppl [dot] com The podcast is a proud affiliate partner of Bookshop, working to support local, independent bookstores. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Margot Livesey is the author of the novel The Road from Belhaven, available from Knopf. Livesey was born and grew up on the edge of the Scottish Highlands. She is the author of a collection of stories and nine other novels, including Eva Moves the Furniture, The Flight of Gemma Hardy, and The Boy in the Field. She has received awards from the NEA, the Guggenheim Foundation and the Radcliffe Institute. She lives in Cambridge, Massachusetts and is on the faculty of the Iowa Writers' Workshop. *** Otherppl with Brad Listi is a weekly literary podcast featuring in-depth interviews with today's leading writers. Available where podcasts are available: Apple Podcasts, Spotify, YouTube, etc. Subscribe to Brad Listi’s email newsletter. Support the show on Patreon Merch Twitter Instagram  TikTok Bluesky Email the show: letters [at] otherppl [dot] com The podcast is a proud affiliate partner of Bookshop, working to support local, independent bookstores. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Brandi Wells is the author of the debut novel The Cleaner, available from Hanover Square Press. Wells' other books include the novella This Boring Apocalypse, published by Civil Coping Mechanisms (2015) and a full length chapbook of stories, Please Don't Be Upset, published by Tiny Hardcore Press (2011). Their fiction appears in Puerto Del Sol, Mid-American Review, Tri-Quarterly and many other journals. Wells earned an MFA in creative writing from the University of Alabama, as well as a PhD in literature and creative writing from the University of Southern California. They're currently an Assistant Professor of creative writing at CSU Fullerton. *** Otherppl with Brad Listi is a weekly literary podcast featuring in-depth interviews with today's leading writers. Available where podcasts are available: Apple Podcasts, Spotify, YouTube, etc. Subscribe to Brad Listi’s email newsletter. Support the show on Patreon Merch Twitter Instagram  TikTok Bluesky Email the show: letters [at] otherppl [dot] com The podcast is a proud affiliate partner of Bookshop, working to support local, independent bookstores. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

In today's flashback, an outtake from Episode 13, my conversation with author Megan Boyle. It first aired on October 30, 2011. Boyle (b. 1985) lives in Baltimore. She is the author of the novel Live Blog (Tyrant Books) and the poetry collection selected unpublished blog posts of a mexican panda express employee (muumuu house). her work has been published by Vice,Thought Catalog, 3: AM, Pop Serial, and other venues. *** Otherppl with Brad Listi is a weekly literary podcast featuring in-depth interviews with today's leading writers. Available where podcasts are available: Apple Podcasts, Spotify, YouTube, etc. Subscribe to Brad Listi’s email newsletter. Support the show on Patreon Merch @otherppl Instagram  TikTok Email the show: letters [at] otherppl [dot] com The podcast is a proud affiliate partner of Bookshop, working to support local, independent bookstores. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Christina Cooke is the author of the debut novel Broughtupsy, available from Catapult. Cooke's writing has previously appeared in The Caribbean Writer, Prairie Schooner, PRISM international, Epiphany: A Literary Journal, and elsewhere. A MacDowell Fellow, Journey Prize winner, and Glenna Luschei Prairie Schooner Award winner, she holds a Master of Arts degree from the University of New Brunswick and a Master of Fine Arts degree from the Iowa Writers' Workshop. Born in Jamaica, Christina is now a Canadian citizen who lives and writes in New York City. *** Otherppl with Brad Listi is a weekly literary podcast featuring in-depth interviews with today's leading writers. Available where podcasts are available: Apple Podcasts, Spotify, YouTube, etc. Subscribe to Brad Listi’s email newsletter. Support the show on Patreon Merch Twitter Instagram  TikTok Bluesky Email the show: letters [at] otherppl [dot] com The podcast is a proud affiliate partner of Bookshop, working to support local, independent bookstores. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Annie Liontas is the author of the memoir-in-essays Sex with a Brain Injury, available from Scribner. Liontas is also the author of the novel Let Me Explain You, and they co-edited the anthology A Manner of Being: Writers on their Mentors. Their work has appeared in The New York Times Book Review, Gay Magazine, NPR, Electric Literature, BOMB, Lithub, The Believer, Guernica, McSweeney’s, The Rumpus, and elsewhere. A graduate of Syracuse University’s MFA program, they are a professor of writing at George Washington University. Liontas has served as a mentor for Pen City’s incarcerated writers and helped secure a Mellon Foundation grant on Disability Justice to bring storytelling to communities in the criminal justice system. They co-host the literary podcast LitFriends and live in Philadelphia with their wife, dog, and Email the rabbit. *** Otherppl with Brad Listi is a weekly literary podcast featuring in-depth interviews with today's leading writers. Available where podcasts are available: Apple Podcasts, Spotify, YouTube, etc. Subscribe to Brad Listi’s email newsletter. Support the show on Patreon Merch Twitter Instagram  TikTok Bluesky Email the show: letters [at] otherppl [dot] com The podcast is a proud affiliate partner of Bookshop, working to support local, independent bookstores. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

In today's flashback, an outtake from Episode 370, my conversation with author Lidia Yuknavitch. It first aired on July 15, 2015. Yuknavitch is the bestselling author of the novels Thrust, The Book of Joan, The Small Backs of Children, and Dora: A Headcase, the story collection Verge, and the memoir The Chronology of Water. She is the recipient of two Oregon Book Awards and has been a finalist for the Brooklyn Public Library Literary Prize and the PEN Center USA Creative Nonfiction Award. She lives in Portland, Oregon.   *** Otherppl with Brad Listi is a weekly literary podcast featuring in-depth interviews with today's leading writers. Available where podcasts are available: Apple Podcasts, Spotify, YouTube, etc. Subscribe to Brad Listi’s email newsletter. Support the show on Patreon Merch @otherppl Instagram  TikTok Email the show: letters [at] otherppl [dot] com The podcast is a proud affiliate partner of Bookshop, working to support local, independent bookstores. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Venita Blackburn is the author of the debut novel Dead in Long Beach, CA, available from MCD Books.   Blackburn's other books include the story collection Black Jesus and Other Superheroes, which won the Prairie Schooner Book Prize and was a finalist for the New York Public Library Young Lions Fiction Award and the PEN/Robert W. Bingham Prize for Debut Fiction; and another collection called How to Wrestle a Girl, which was a finalist for the Lambda Literary Award for Lesbian Fiction and the Ernest J. Gaines Award for Literary Excellence. Her stories have appeared in The New Yorker online, The Paris Review, Pleiades, Bat City Review, and American Short Fiction. She is a faculty member in the creative writing program at Fresno State University and is the founder and president of Live, Write, an organization devoted to offering free creative writing workshops for communities of color. She lives in Fresno, California. *** Otherppl with Brad Listi is a weekly literary podcast featuring in-depth interviews with today's leading writers. Available where podcasts are available: Apple Podcasts, Spotify, YouTube, etc. Subscribe to Brad Listi’s email newsletter. Support the show on Patreon Merch Twitter Instagram  TikTok Bluesky Email the show: letters [at] otherppl [dot] com The podcast is a proud affiliate partner of Bookshop, working to support local, independent bookstores. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Ishmael Reed is the author of the play The Slave Who Loved Caviar, now available in print from Archway Editions. Ishmael Reed is the author of over twenty-five books including Mumbo Jumbo, Yellow Back Radio Broke-Down, Conjugating Hindi, Why No Confederate Statues in Mexico and most recently Malcolm and Me and Why the Black Hole Sings the Blues. He is also a publisher, television producer, songwriter, radio and television commentator, lecturer, and has long been devoted to exploring an alternative black aesthetic: the trickster tradition, or Neo-Hoodooism. A regular contributor to CounterPunch and founder of the Before Columbus Foundation, he taught at the University of California, Berkeley for over thirty years, retiring in 2005. Reed is the only person to be nominated for the National Book Award in two categories in the same year. *** Otherppl with Brad Listi is a weekly literary podcast featuring in-depth interviews with today's leading writers. Available where podcasts are available: Apple Podcasts, Spotify, YouTube, etc. Subscribe to Brad Listi’s email newsletter. Support the show on Patreon Merch Twitter Instagram  TikTok Bluesky Email the show: letters [at] otherppl [dot] com The podcast is a proud affiliate partner of Bookshop, working to support local, independent bookstores. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

In today's flashback, an outtake from Episode 331, my conversation with Atticus Lish. It first aired on November 19, 2014. Lish is the author of the novel The War for Gloria, published in 2022 by Vintage, and the debut novel Preparation for the Next Life, which won the 2015 Pen/Faulkner Award for Fiction and the 2016 Grand Prix de Littérature Américaine. *** Otherppl with Brad Listi is a weekly literary podcast featuring in-depth interviews with today's leading writers. Available where podcasts are available: Apple Podcasts, Spotify, YouTube, etc. Subscribe to Brad Listi’s email newsletter. Support the show on Patreon Merch @otherppl Instagram  TikTok Email the show: letters [at] otherppl [dot] com The podcast is a proud affiliate partner of Bookshop, working to support local, independent bookstores. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Marie-Helene Bertino is the author of the novel Beautyland, available from Farrar, Straus, & Giroux. Bertino's other books include the novels Parakeet and 2 A.M. at The Cat's Pajamas, and the story collection Safe as Houses. She was the 2017 Frank O'Connor International Short Story Fellow in Cork, Ireland. She has received the O. Henry Prize, the Pushcart Prize, the Iowa Short Fiction Award, the Mississippi Review Prize, and fellowships from MacDowell, Sewanee, and New York City's Center for Fiction, and her work has twice been featured on NPR's Selected Shorts. She teaches creative writing at New York University and Yale University and lives in Brooklyn. *** Otherppl with Brad Listi is a weekly literary podcast featuring in-depth interviews with today's leading writers. Available where podcasts are available: Apple Podcasts, Spotify, YouTube, etc. Subscribe to Brad Listi’s email newsletter. Support the show on Patreon Merch Twitter Instagram  TikTok Bluesky Email the show: letters [at] otherppl [dot] com The podcast is a proud affiliate partner of Bookshop, working to support local, independent bookstores. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

De'Shawn Charles Winslow is the author of the novel Decent People, now available in trade paperback from Bloomsbury. Winslow's debut novel, In West Mills, won the Center for Fiction First Novel Prize winner, an American Book Award, and a Willie Morris Award for Southern Fiction, and was a finalist for the Los Angeles Times Book, Lambda Literary, and Publishing Triangle awards. He was born and raised in Elizabeth City, North Carolina, and graduated from the Iowa Writers' Workshop. *** Otherppl with Brad Listi is a weekly literary podcast featuring in-depth interviews with today's leading writers. Available where podcasts are available: Apple Podcasts, Spotify, YouTube, etc. Subscribe to Brad Listi’s email newsletter. Support the show on Patreon Merch Twitter Instagram  TikTok Bluesky Email the show: letters [at] otherppl [dot] com The podcast is a proud affiliate partner of Bookshop, working to support local, independent bookstores. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

In today's flashback, an outtake from Episode 659, my conversation with Jean Kyoung Frazier. This episode first aired on July 22, 2020. Jean's debut novel, Pizza Girl, is available in trade paperback from Anchor Books. She lives in Los Angeles. *** Otherppl with Brad Listi is a weekly literary podcast featuring in-depth interviews with today's leading writers. Available where podcasts are available: Apple Podcasts, Spotify, YouTube, etc. Subscribe to Brad Listi’s email newsletter. Support the show on Patreon Merch @otherppl Instagram  TikTok Email the show: letters [at] otherppl [dot] com The podcast is a proud affiliate partner of Bookshop, working to support local, independent bookstores. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

A new 'Craftwork' episode. A conversation with Kathleen Schmidt, an expert on the book business and the author of a Substack called Publishing Confidential. In this episode, Kathleen shares her publishing industry predictions for 2024. Kathleen Schmidt is a well-respected voice in book publishing with in-depth experience in all aspects of the industry, including as a publicist, literary agent, acquisitions editor, and ghostwriter. Her career encompasses 30 years of creating and directing impactful and strategic global media, marketing, and branding campaigns for politicians, A-List celebrities, athletes, and high-profile personalities. To date, she has worked on 50 New York Times bestsellers, and her clients have continuously appeared in top-tier national print, broadcast, and radio outlets such as The Today Show, Good Morning America, Vogue, Elle, Financial Times, Vanity Fair, GQ, and Sirius XM. Schmidt is the founder of Kathleen Schmidt Public Relations. She lives in New Jersey. *** Otherppl with Brad Listi is a weekly literary podcast featuring in-depth interviews with today's leading writers. Available where podcasts are available: Apple Podcasts, Spotify, YouTube, etc. Subscribe to Brad Listi’s email newsletter. Support the show on Patreon Merch Twitter Instagram  TikTok Bluesky Email the show: letters [at] otherppl [dot] com The podcast is a proud affiliate partner of Bookshop, working to support local, independent bookstores. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Julie Myerson is the author of the novel Nonfiction, available from Tin House. It is the official January pick of the Otherppl Book Club.  Myerson is the author of ten novels, including the bestselling Something Might Happen and The Stopped Heart, and three works of nonfiction, including Home: The Story of Everyone Who Ever Lived in Our House and The Lost Child. As a critic and columnist, she has written for many newspapers including The Guardian, the FT, Harper's Bazaar and the New York Times, and she was a regular guest on BBC TV's Newsnight Review. She lives in London with her family. *** Otherppl with Brad Listi is a weekly literary podcast featuring in-depth interviews with today's leading writers. Available where podcasts are available: Apple Podcasts, Spotify, YouTube, etc. Subscribe to Brad Listi’s email newsletter. Support the show on Patreon Merch Twitter Instagram  TikTok Bluesky Email the show: letters [at] otherppl [dot] com The podcast is a proud affiliate partner of Bookshop, working to support local, independent bookstores. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

In today's flashback, an outtake from Episode 507, my conversation with author Azareen Van Der Vliet Oloomi. This episode first aired on March 7, 2018. Azareen Van Der Vliet Oloomi is an American novelist and non-fiction writer. She is the author of Call Me Zebra, named a Best Book of the Year by over twenty publications and the winner of the 2019 PEN/Faulkner Award, the John Gardner Award, and long listed for the PEN/Open Book Award. Her other novels include Savage Tongues and Fra Keeler, for which she received a Whiting Writers' Award and a National Book Foundation "5 Under 35" award. She is the 2023-2024 Carl and Lily Pforzheimer Foundation Fiction Fellow at the Radcliffe Institute for Advanced Studies at Harvard University. A recipient of fellowships from Fulbright, the Aspen Institute, MacDowell, and Art Omi, her work has appeared in The Best American Short Stories (Ed. by Min Jin Lee and Heidi Pitlor), The Sewanee Review, The Yale Review, The New York Times, and The Paris Review among other places. In 2020, she founded Literatures of Annihilation, Exile & Resistance, a conversation series focused on the intersection of the arts and transformational migrations. Born in Los Angeles, she spent her childhood in Iran, the United Arab Emirates, and Spain, and speaks Farsi, Italian, and Spanish. She is the Dorothy G. Griffin College Professor of English at the University of Notre Dame. *** Otherppl with Brad Listi is a weekly literary podcast featuring in-depth interviews with today's leading writers. Available where podcasts are available: Apple Podcasts, Spotify, YouTube, etc. Subscribe to Brad Listi’s email newsletter. Support the show on Patreon Merch @otherppl Instagram  TikTok Email the show: letters [at] otherppl [dot] com The podcast is a proud affiliate partner of Bookshop, working to support local, independent bookstores. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Susannah Breslin is the author of the memoir Data Baby: My Life in a Psychological Experiment, available from Legacy Lit. Breslin is a freelance journalist and a Forbes.com senior contributor. From 2018 to 2019, she was the Lawrence Grauman Jr. Post-graduate Fellow at U.C. Berkeley's Investigative Reporting Program. Her reporting and essays have appeared in The Atlantic, Slate, Harper's Bazaar, The Daily Beast, Salon, Newsweek, The Guardian, and Variety, among other media outlets. She holds a B.A. in English from U.C. Berkeley and an M.A. from the Program for Writers at the University of Illinois at Chicago. She lives in Los Angeles, California. *** Otherppl with Brad Listi is a weekly literary podcast featuring in-depth interviews with today's leading writers. Available where podcasts are available: Apple Podcasts, Spotify, YouTube, etc. Subscribe to Brad Listi’s email newsletter. Support the show on Patreon Merch Twitter Instagram  TikTok Bluesky Email the show: letters [at] otherppl [dot] com The podcast is a proud affiliate partner of Bookshop, working to support local, independent bookstores. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

In this, the final episode of 2023, I'm sharing my ten favorite books of the year. Incredibly difficult to choose—and really, there are dozens of books that could've made the list. So please consider this, more than anything else, a celebration of all the great conversations and talented authors who shared their time and insight and talent on this program over the course of the past twelve months. I'm grateful to all of my guests. My thanks as well to everyone who listens to this show (this means you!). Wishing you all the very best in the new year, and looking forward to more big things in 2024! Stay tuned... *** Otherppl with Brad Listi is a weekly literary podcast featuring in-depth interviews with today's leading writers. Available where podcasts are available: Apple Podcasts, Spotify, YouTube, etc. Subscribe to Brad Listi’s email newsletter. Support the show on Patreon Merch Twitter Instagram  TikTok Bluesky Email the show: letters [at] otherppl [dot] com The podcast is a proud affiliate partner of Bookshop, working to support local, independent bookstores. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

The third in a series of episodes, looking back on 2023 and breaking down the most popular conversations of the year. Today, a look at the top-five most-downloaded author interviews of 2023. Also: On New Year's Eve, I'll be closing out the year by sharing my personal favorite books of the year. Stay tuned... *** Otherppl with Brad Listi is a weekly literary podcast featuring in-depth interviews with today's leading writers. Available where podcasts are available: Apple Podcasts, Spotify, YouTube, etc. Subscribe to Brad Listi’s email newsletter. Support the show on Patreon Merch Twitter Instagram  TikTok Bluesky Email the show: letters [at] otherppl [dot] com The podcast is a proud affiliate partner of Bookshop, working to support local, independent bookstores. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

The second in a series of episodes, looking back on 2023 and breaking down the most popular conversations of the year. Today, a look at five of the most-downloaded author interviews (10 through 6). And tomorrow, I'll be sharing the top-five author interviews of 2023. Also: On New Year's Eve, I'll be closing out the year by sharing my personal favorite books of the year. Stay tuned... *** Otherppl with Brad Listi is a weekly literary podcast featuring in-depth interviews with today's leading writers. Available where podcasts are available: Apple Podcasts, Spotify, YouTube, etc. Subscribe to Brad Listi’s email newsletter. Support the show on Patreon Merch Twitter Instagram  TikTok Bluesky Email the show: letters [at] otherppl [dot] com The podcast is a proud affiliate partner of Bookshop, working to support local, independent bookstores. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

The first in a series of episodes, looking back on 2023 and breaking down the most popular conversations of the year. Today, a look at the five most-downloaded 'Craftwork' episodes, as well as five of the most-downloaded author interviews (15 through 11). In the days to come, I'll be sharing additional 'Best of' episodes where I finish the countdown and share the full list of Top 15 author interviews of 2023. And on New Year's Eve, I'll be closing out the year by sharing my personal favorite books of the year. Stay tuned... *** Otherppl with Brad Listi is a weekly literary podcast featuring in-depth interviews with today's leading writers. Available where podcasts are available: Apple Podcasts, Spotify, YouTube, etc. Subscribe to Brad Listi’s email newsletter. Support the show on Patreon Merch Twitter Instagram  TikTok Bluesky Email the show: letters [at] otherppl [dot] com The podcast is a proud affiliate partner of Bookshop, working to support local, independent bookstores. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

In today's flashback, an outtake from Episode 400, my conversation with author Alexander Chee. This episode first aired on February 16, 2016. Chee is the author of the bestselling novels The Queen of the Night and Edinburgh, and the essay collection How to Write an Autobiographical Novel.  He is an associate professor of English and Creative Writing at Dartmouth College. He is a contributing editor at The New Republic, an editor at large at The Virginia Quarterly Review, and a critic at large at The Los Angeles Times. *** Otherppl with Brad Listi is a weekly literary podcast featuring in-depth interviews with today's leading writers. Available where podcasts are available: Apple Podcasts, Spotify, YouTube, etc. Subscribe to Brad Listi’s email newsletter. Support the show on Patreon Merch @otherppl Instagram  TikTok Email the show: letters [at] otherppl [dot] com The podcast is a proud affiliate partner of Bookshop, working to support local, independent bookstores. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Lauren Elkin is the author of Art Monsters: Unruly Bodies in Feminist Art, available from Farrar, Straus, & Giroux. Elkin's essays have appeared in many publications, including The New York Times, The Guardian, Frieze, and The Times Literary Supplement. Her book Flâneuse was named a notable book of 2017 by The New York Times Book Review and was a finalist for the PEN/Diamonstein-Spielvogel Award for the Art of the Essay. A native New Yorker, she lived in Paris for twenty years and now resides in London. *** Otherppl with Brad Listi is a weekly literary podcast featuring in-depth interviews with today's leading writers. Available where podcasts are available: Apple Podcasts, Spotify, YouTube, etc. Subscribe to Brad Listi’s email newsletter. Support the show on Patreon Merch Twitter Instagram  TikTok Bluesky Email the show: letters [at] otherppl [dot] com The podcast is a proud affiliate partner of Bookshop, working to support local, independent bookstores. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

A new 'Craftwork' episode, about how meditation can inform creative writing. My guest is Melissa Broder, author of the novel Death Valley (Scribner). Broder's other books include the novels Milk Fed andThe Pisces, the essay collection So Sad Today, and five poetry collections, including Superdoom and Last Sext. She has written for The New York Times, Elle, and New York magazine's The Cut. She lives in Los Angeles. *** Otherppl with Brad Listi is a weekly literary podcast featuring in-depth interviews with today's leading writers. Available where podcasts are available: Apple Podcasts, Spotify, YouTube, etc. Subscribe to Brad Listi’s email newsletter. Support the show on Patreon Merch Twitter Instagram  TikTok Bluesky Email the show: letters [at] otherppl [dot] com The podcast is a proud affiliate partner of Bookshop, working to support local, independent bookstores. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

In today's flashback, an outtake from Episode 308, my conversation with poet Michael Earl Craig. This episode first aired on August 31, 2014. Craig is originally from Dayton, Ohio. He is the author of several poetry collections, most recently Iggy Horse, which was published by Wave Books this past spring. His other collections include Woods and Clouds Interchangeable (Wave Books, 2019), Talkativeness (Wave Books, 2014), Thin Kimono (Wave Books, 2010), Yes, Master (Fence Books, 2006), Can You Relax in My House, (Fence Books, 2002), and the chapbook Jombang Jet (Factory Hollow Press, 2012). He lives in the Shields Valley, near Livingston, Montana, where he runs a full-time farrier practice. He was the 2015-2017 Poet Laureate of Montana. *** Otherppl with Brad Listi is a weekly literary podcast featuring in-depth interviews with today's leading writers. Available where podcasts are available: Apple Podcasts, Spotify, YouTube, etc. Subscribe to Brad Listi’s email newsletter. Support the show on Patreon Merch @otherppl Instagram  TikTok Email the show: letters [at] otherppl [dot] com The podcast is a proud affiliate partner of Bookshop, working to support local, independent bookstores. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

E.J. Koh is the author of the debut novel The Liberators, available from Tin House. It is the official December pick of the Otherppl Book Club. Koh's other books include the memoirThe Magical Language of Others, which won a Washington State Book Award, Pacific Northwest Book Award, and Association for Asian American Studies Book Award, and was longlisted for the PEN Open Book Award. She is also the author of the poetry collection A Lesser Love, a Pleiades Press Editors Prize for Poetry winner. Her work has appeared in AGNI, the Atlantic, Boston Review, Los Angeles Review of Books, Poetry, Slate, World Literature Today, and elsewhere. Koh earned her MFA at Columbia University and her PhD at the University of Washington, and has received National Endowment for the Arts and MacDowell fellowships. She lives in Seattle, Washington. *** Otherppl with Brad Listi is a weekly literary podcast featuring in-depth interviews with today's leading writers. Available where podcasts are available: Apple Podcasts, Spotify, YouTube, etc. Subscribe to Brad Listi’s email newsletter. Support the show on Patreon Merch Twitter Instagram  TikTok Bluesky Email the show: letters [at] otherppl [dot] com The podcast is a proud affiliate partner of Bookshop, working to support local, independent bookstores. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Rumaan Alam is the bestselling author of the novel Leave the World Behind, available in trade paperback from Ecco Books. In 2020, it was a finalist for the National Book Award, and it is now a major motion picture, directed by Sam Esmail and starring Julia Roberts, Ethan Hawke, and Mahershala Ali. Alam's other books include Rich and Pretty and That Kind of Mother. His writing has appeared in The New York Times, New York Magazine, The New Yorker, The New York Review of Books, Bookforum, and the New Republic, where he is a contributing editor. He studied writing at Oberlin College and lives in New York with his family. *** Otherppl with Brad Listi is a weekly literary podcast featuring in-depth interviews with today's leading writers. Available where podcasts are available: Apple Podcasts, Spotify, YouTube, etc. Subscribe to Brad Listi’s email newsletter. Support the show on Patreon Merch Twitter Instagram  TikTok Bluesky Email the show: letters [at] otherppl [dot] com The podcast is a proud affiliate partner of Bookshop, working to support local, independent bookstores. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

In today's flashback, an outtake from Episode 423, my conversation with bestselling author Chuck Klosterman. This episode first aired on July 20, 2016. Klosterman is the bestselling author of eight nonfiction books (including Sex, Drugs, and Cocoa Puffs; I Wear the Black Hat; But What If We’re Wrong?; and Killing Yourself to Live). he has also published two novels (Downtown Owl and The Visible Man). He has written for The New York Times, The Washington Post, GQ, Esquire, Spin, The Guardian, The Believer, Billboard, The A.V. Club, and ESPN. Klosterman served as the Ethicist for The New York Times Magazine for three years, appeared as himself in the LCD Soundsystem documentary Shut Up and Play the Hits, and was an original founder of the website Grantland with Bill Simmons. *** Otherppl with Brad Listi is a weekly literary podcast featuring in-depth interviews with today's leading writers. Available where podcasts are available: Apple Podcasts, Spotify, YouTube, etc. Subscribe to Brad Listi’s email newsletter. Support the show on Patreon Merch @otherppl Instagram  TikTok Email the show: letters [at] otherppl [dot] com The podcast is a proud affiliate partner of Bookshop, working to support local, independent bookstores. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Blake Butler is the author of the memoir Molly, available from Archway Editions. Butler is the author of five books of fiction, including There Is No Year and Scorch Atlas; a work of hybrid nonfiction, Nothing: A Portrait of Insomnia; and two collaborative works, Anatomy Courses with Sean Kilpatrick and One with Vanessa Place and Christopher Higgs. He is the founding editor of HTMLGIANT, "the Internet literature magazine blog of the future," and maintains a weekly column covering literary art and fast food for Vicemagazine. His other work has appeared widely, including in The Believer, the New York Times, Fence, Dazed and Confused, and The Best Bizarro Fiction of the Decade. He lives in Baltimore. *** Otherppl with Brad Listi is a weekly literary podcast featuring in-depth interviews with today's leading writers. Available where podcasts are available: Apple Podcasts, Spotify, YouTube, etc. Subscribe to Brad Listi’s email newsletter. Support the show on Patreon Merch Twitter Instagram  TikTok Bluesky Email the show: letters [at] otherppl [dot] com The podcast is a proud affiliate partner of Bookshop, working to support local, independent bookstores. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Wendy Chin-Tanner is the author of the debut novel King of the Armadillos, available from Flatiron Books. Chin-Tanner is the author of the poetry collections Turn and Anyone Will Tell You, editor of Embodied: An Intersectional Feminist Comics Poetry Anthology, and copublisher at A Wave Blue World, an independent publishing company for graphic novels. Born and raised in New York City, she lives in the Hudson Valley with her family. King of the Armadillos is her first novel. *** Otherppl with Brad Listi is a weekly literary podcast featuring in-depth interviews with today's leading writers. Available where podcasts are available: Apple Podcasts, Spotify, YouTube, etc. Subscribe to Brad Listi’s email newsletter. Support the show on Patreon Merch Twitter Instagram  TikTok Bluesky Email the show: letters [at] otherppl [dot] com The podcast is a proud affiliate partner of Bookshop, working to support local, independent bookstores. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

In today's flashback, an outtake from Episode 99, my conversation with author and publisher Elizabeth Ellen. This episode first aired on August 26, 2012. Elizabeth Ellen’s stories have been published in American Short Fiction, HARPER'S Magazine, Muumuu House, Joyland, and numerous other magzines and journals. She is the recipient of a Pushcart Prize for her story "Teen Culture," and is the author of several books including Fast Machine and Person/a. In 2024, Clash Books will publish her novel, American Thighs. *** Otherppl with Brad Listi is a weekly literary podcast featuring in-depth interviews with today's leading writers. Available where podcasts are available: Apple Podcasts, Spotify, YouTube, etc. Subscribe to Brad Listi’s email newsletter. Support the show on Patreon Merch @otherppl Instagram  TikTok Email the show: letters [at] otherppl [dot] com The podcast is a proud affiliate partner of Bookshop, working to support local, independent bookstores. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

A new 'Craftwork' episode, all about the art of book publicity. My guest is longtime literary publicist Lauren Cerand. Lauren has more than twenty years of experience running her own thriving global communications consultancy, driven by an intensive personal focus on each client’s needs and desires, a vast network of relationships, and a well-honed gift for making creative, strategic decisions. She is known for working with authors early on, or at pivotal moments in their careers, including Atticus Lish, Min Jin Lee, and Tayari Jones, and this year, launched and led the inaugural cohort of Get the Word Out for Poets & Writers, a new publicity incubator for debut authors. *** Otherppl with Brad Listi is a weekly literary podcast featuring in-depth interviews with today's leading writers. Available where podcasts are available: Apple Podcasts, Spotify, YouTube, etc. Subscribe to Brad Listi’s email newsletter. Support the show on Patreon Merch Twitter Instagram  TikTok Bluesky Email the show: letters [at] otherppl [dot] com The podcast is a proud affiliate partner of Bookshop, working to support local, independent bookstores. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

A new 'Craftwork' episode, all about ghostwriting. My guest is Stuart Horwitz, founder and principal of Book Architecture. Horwitz has spent over twenty years helping writers become authors. His clients have reached the New York Times best-seller list in both fiction and nonfiction, and have appeared on Oprah, The Today Show, The Tonight Show, and in the most prestigious journals in their respective fields. He has written three highly acclaimed books which together comprise the Book Architecture trilogy: first is Blueprint Your Bestseller: Organize and Revise any Manuscript with the Book Architecture Method; second is Book Architecture: How to Plot and Outline Without Using a Formula, and third: Finish Your Book in Three Drafts: How to Write a Book, Revise a Book, and Complete a Book While You Still Love It. Horwitz is also an award-winning essayist and poet, and has taught writing at Grub Street of Boston and at Brown University. He holds two masters degrees—one in Literary Aesthetics from NYU, and one in East Asian Studies from Harvard with a concentration in Medieval Japanese Buddhism. *** Otherppl with Brad Listi is a weekly literary podcast featuring in-depth interviews with today's leading writers. Available where podcasts are available: Apple Podcasts, Google Podcasts, Spotify, Stitcher, iHeart Radio, etc. Subscribe to Brad Listi’s email newsletter. Support the show on Patreon Merch @otherppl Instagram  YouTube TikTok Email the show: letters [at] otherppl [dot] com The podcast is a proud affiliate partner of Bookshop, working to support local, independent bookstores. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

In today's flashback, an outtake from Episode 647, my conversation with author Susan Choi. She won the National Book Award in 2019 for her novel Trust Exercise. This episode first aired on June 10, 2020. Susan's first novel, The Foreign Student, won the Asian-American Literary Award for fiction, and her second novel, American Woman, was a finalist for the 2004 Pulitzer Prize. Her third novel, A Person of Interest, was a finalist for the PEN/Faulkner Award. Ander fourth novel, My Education, received a 2014 Lammy Award. ” She serves as a trustee of PEN America and teaches in The Writing Seminars at Johns Hopkins University. ‘ *** Otherppl with Brad Listi is a weekly literary podcast featuring in-depth interviews with today's leading writers. Available where podcasts are available: Apple Podcasts, Spotify, YouTube, etc. Subscribe to Brad Listi’s email newsletter. Support the show on Patreon Merch @otherppl Instagram  TikTok Email the show: letters [at] otherppl [dot] com The podcast is a proud affiliate partner of Bookshop, working to support local, independent bookstores. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Lindsay Hunter is the author of the novel Hot Springs Drive, available from Roxane Gay Books.   Hunter received her MFA in Writing from the School of the Art Institute of Chicago. She is the author of two story collections and three novels. Her story collection Don't Kiss Me was named one of Amazon's 10 Best Books of the Year: Short Stories. Her novel Eat Only When You're Hungry was a Book of the Month Club selection, a finalist for the Chicago Review of Books Fiction Award, and an NPR Great Read. She lives in Chicago with her family. *** Otherppl with Brad Listi is a weekly literary podcast featuring in-depth interviews with today's leading writers. Available where podcasts are available: Apple Podcasts, Spotify, YouTube, etc. Subscribe to Brad Listi’s email newsletter. Support the show on Patreon Merch Twitter Instagram  TikTok Bluesky Email the show: letters [at] otherppl [dot] com The podcast is a proud affiliate partner of Bookshop, working to support local, independent bookstores. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Lexi Freiman is the author of the novel The Book of Ayn, available from Catapult. Freiman is an Australian writer and editor who graduated from Columbia's MFA program in 2012. Her first novel, Inappropriation, was longlisted for the Center for Fiction's First Novel Prize and the Miles Franklin Award. She also writes for television. *** Otherppl with Brad Listi is a weekly literary podcast featuring in-depth interviews with today's leading writers. Available where podcasts are available: Apple Podcasts, Spotify, YouTube, etc. Subscribe to Brad Listi’s email newsletter. Support the show on Patreon Merch Twitter Instagram  TikTok Bluesky Email the show: letters [at] otherppl [dot] com The podcast is a proud affiliate partner of Bookshop, working to support local, independent bookstores. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

In today's flashback, an outtake from Episode 520, my conversation with author Jonathan Ames. Ames is the author of several books, including I Pass Like Night; The Extra Man; What's Not to Love?; My Less Than Secret Life; Wake Up, Sir!; I Love You More Than You Know; The Alcoholic; The Double Life Is Twice as Good, and most recently, a string of noir novels, including You Were Never Really Here (which was dapted into the acclaimed film starring Joaquin Phoenix), A Man Named Doll, and The Wheel of Doll. He is also the creator of two television series, Blunt Talk and Bored to Death, and has had two amateur boxing matches, fighting as "The Herring Wonder." *** Otherppl with Brad Listi is a weekly literary podcast featuring in-depth interviews with today's leading writers. Available where podcasts are available: Apple Podcasts, Spotify, YouTube, etc. Subscribe to Brad Listi’s email newsletter. Support the show on Patreon Merch @otherppl Instagram  TikTok Email the show: letters [at] otherppl [dot] com The podcast is a proud affiliate partner of Bookshop, working to support local, independent bookstores. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Michael Cunningham is a Pulitzer Prize winner and the author of the novel Day, available from Random House.  Cunningham is a novelist, screenwriter, and educator. His novel The Hours received the PEN/Faulkner Award and the Pulitzer Prize for Fiction in 1999. He has taught at Columbia University and Brooklyn College. He is currently a professor at Yale University. *** Otherppl with Brad Listi is a weekly literary podcast featuring in-depth interviews with today's leading writers. Available where podcasts are available: Apple Podcasts, Spotify, YouTube, etc. Subscribe to Brad Listi’s email newsletter. Support the show on Patreon Merch Twitter Instagram  TikTok Bluesky Email the show: letters [at] otherppl [dot] com The podcast is a proud affiliate partner of Bookshop, working to support local, independent bookstores. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Jami Nakamura Lin is the author of the memoir The Night Parade, available from Mariner Books. It is the official November pick of the Otherppl Book Club. Lin is a Japanese Taiwanese Okinawan American writer, whose work has been featured in the New York Times, Catapult, and Electric Literature, among other publications. She has received fellowships and support from the National Endowment for the Arts/Japan-U.S. Friendship Commission, Yaddo, Sustainable Arts Foundation, Sewanee Writers' Conference, We Need Diverse Books, and the Illinois Arts Council Agency. She received her MFA in nonfiction from Pennsylvania State University and lives in the Chicago area. *** Otherppl with Brad Listi is a weekly literary podcast featuring in-depth interviews with today's leading writers. Available where podcasts are available: Apple Podcasts, Spotify, YouTube, etc. Subscribe to Brad Listi’s email newsletter. Support the show on Patreon Merch Twitter Instagram  TikTok Bluesky Email the show: letters [at] otherppl [dot] com The podcast is a proud affiliate partner of Bookshop, working to support local, independent bookstores. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

In today's flashback, an outtake from Episode 627, my conversation with author and poet Megan Fernandes. Her books include The Kingdom and After, Good Boys, and I Do Everything I'm Told. It first aired on March 1, 2020. Megan’s work has appeared in a variety of publications, including The New Yorker, The American Poetry Review, Tin House, Ploughshares, Guernica, McSweeney’s. She is an Associate Professor of English and the Writer-in-Residence at Lafayette College.  *** Otherppl with Brad Listi is a weekly literary podcast featuring in-depth interviews with today's leading writers. Available where podcasts are available: Apple Podcasts, Spotify, YouTube, etc. Subscribe to Brad Listi’s email newsletter. Support the show on Patreon Merch @otherppl Instagram  TikTok Email the show: letters [at] otherppl [dot] com The podcast is a proud affiliate partner of Bookshop, working to support local, independent bookstores. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Thurston Moore is a founding member of the band Sonic Youth and the author of a new memoir entitled Sonic Life, available from Doubleday Books. Moore helped found Sonic Youth in New York in 1981 and spent the ensuing thirty years at the vanguard of alternative rock, influencing and inspiring such acts as Nirvana, Pavement, the Yeah Yeah Yeahs, My Bloody Valentine, and Beck. The band's album Daydream Nation was chosen by the Library of Congress for historical preservation in the National Recording Registry in 2006. Moore is involved in publishing and poetry and teaches at the Summer Writing Workshop at Naropa University in Boulder, Colorado. He divides his time between the USA and England. *** Otherppl with Brad Listi is a weekly literary podcast featuring in-depth interviews with today's leading writers. Available where podcasts are available: Apple Podcasts, Spotify, YouTube, etc. Subscribe to Brad Listi’s email newsletter. Support the show on Patreon Merch Twitter Instagram  TikTok Bluesky Email the show: letters [at] otherppl [dot] com The podcast is a proud affiliate partner of Bookshop, working to support local, independent bookstores. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Justin Torres is the author of the novel Blackouts, a finalist for the 2023 National Book Award for Fiction. Available from Farrar, Straus, and Giroux. Torres is also the author of the debut novel We the Animals, which won the VCU Cabell First Novelist Award, was translated into fifteen languages, and was adapted into a feature film. He was named one of the National Book Foundation's 5 Under 35, a Wallace Stegner Fellow at Stanford University, a fellow at the Radcliffe Institute for Advanced Study at Harvard University, and a fellow at the New York Public Library's Cullman Center. His short fiction has appeared in The New Yorker, Harper's Magazine, Granta, Tin House, and The Washington Post. He lives in Los Angeles and is an associate professor of English at UCLA. *** Otherppl with Brad Listi is a weekly literary podcast featuring in-depth interviews with today's leading writers. Available where podcasts are available: Apple Podcasts, Spotify, YouTube, etc. Subscribe to Brad Listi’s email newsletter. Support the show on Patreon Merch Twitter Instagram  TikTok Bluesky Email the show: letters [at] otherppl [dot] com The podcast is a proud affiliate partner of Bookshop, working to support local, independent bookstores. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

In today's flashback, an outtake from Episode 436, my conversation with Wendy C. Ortiz. Her books include Excavation: A Memoir, Hollywood Notebook, and the "dreamoir" Bruja. Wendy was born and raised in Los Angeles. Her work has been featured in the Los Angeles Times, The Rumpus, the Los Angeles Review of Books, and the National Book Critics Circle Small Press Spotlight blog. Her writing has appeared in such venues as The New York Times, Joyland, StoryQuarterly, and a year-long series appeared at McSweeney’s Internet Tendency. Her “Urban Liminal” series of texts appear alongside signature graphic representations of the projects of Lorcan O’Herlihy Architects in the book Amplified Urbanism (2017). Wendy is a psychotherapist in private practice in Los Angeles. *** Otherppl with Brad Listi is a weekly literary podcast featuring in-depth interviews with today's leading writers. Available where podcasts are available: Apple Podcasts, Spotify, YouTube, etc. Subscribe to Brad Listi’s email newsletter. Support the show on Patreon Merch @otherppl Instagram  TikTok Email the show: letters [at] otherppl [dot] com The podcast is a proud affiliate partner of Bookshop, working to support local, independent bookstores. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

A conversation with Dan Sinykin, author of Big Fiction: How Conglomeration Changed the Publishing Industry and American Literature, available from Columbia University Press. Sinykin is an assistant professor of English at Emory University with a courtesy appointment in quantitative theory and methods. He is the author of a book called American Literature and the Long Downturn: Neoliberal Apocalypse (2020), and his writing has appeared in the New York Times, the Washington Post, the Los Angeles Review of Books, The Rumpus, Dissent, and other publications. *** Otherppl with Brad Listi is a weekly literary podcast featuring in-depth interviews with today's leading writers. Available where podcasts are available: Apple Podcasts, Spotify, YouTube, etc. Subscribe to Brad Listi’s email newsletter. Support the show on Patreon Merch @otherppl Instagram  TikTok Email the show: letters [at] otherppl [dot] com The podcast is a proud affiliate partner of Bookshop, working to support local, independent bookstores. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Athena Dixon is the author of the memoir-in-essays entitled The Loneliness Files, available from Tin House. Dixon's other books include the essay collection The Incredible Shrinking Woman (Split/Lip Press 2020) and No God In This Room (Winner of the Intersectional Midwest Chapbook Contest, Argus House Press 2018). Her work has appeared in publications such as Harper’s Bazaar, Narratively, GAYMagazine, Shenandoah, Grub Street, Lit Hub, and The Washington Square Review, among others. She has been nominated for three Pushcart Prizes for both poetry and creative nonfiction as well as a Best of the Net nomination for poetry. She lives in Philadelphia. *** Otherppl with Brad Listi is a weekly literary podcast featuring in-depth interviews with today's leading writers. Available where podcasts are available: Apple Podcasts, Spotify, YouTube, etc. Subscribe to Brad Listi’s email newsletter. Support the show on Patreon Merch @otherppl Instagram  TikTok Email the show: letters [at] otherppl [dot] com The podcast is a proud affiliate partner of Bookshop, working to support local, independent bookstores. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

In today's flashback, an outtake from Episode 564, my conversation with author and visual artist Brad Phillips. His debut story collection, Essays and Fictions, is available from Tyrant Books. This episode first aired on February 13, 2019. Phillips is a native of Canada. His visual art has been exhibited all over the world. He is noted for his photorealist style of panting and for dark imagery and dark humor, and for his engagement with subjects like mental illness, addiction, shame, sexuality, and pop culture. *** Otherppl with Brad Listi is a weekly literary podcast featuring in-depth interviews with today's leading writers. Available where podcasts are available: Apple Podcasts, Spotify, YouTube, etc. Subscribe to Brad Listi’s email newsletter. Support the show on Patreon Merch @otherppl Instagram  TikTok Email the show: letters [at] otherppl [dot] com The podcast is a proud affiliate partner of Bookshop, working to support local, independent bookstores. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

A conversation with Lee McIntyre, author of On Disinformation: How to Fight for Truth and Protect Democracy, available from MIT Press. McIntyre is Research Fellow at the Center for Philosophy and History of Science at Boston University. Formerly Executive Director of the Institute for Quantitative Social Science at Harvard University, he has taught philosophy at Colgate University, Boston University, Simmons University, Tufts Experimental College, and Harvard Extension School. *** Otherppl with Brad Listi is a weekly literary podcast featuring in-depth interviews with today's leading writers. Available where podcasts are available: Apple Podcasts, Spotify, YouTube, etc. Subscribe to Brad Listi’s email newsletter. Support the show on Patreon Merch @otherppl Instagram  TikTok Email the show: letters [at] otherppl [dot] com The podcast is a proud affiliate partner of Bookshop, working to support local, independent bookstores. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Eliza Clark is the author of the novel Penance, available from Harper Books. It is the official October pick of the Otherppl Book Club. A native of Newcastle, Clark lives in London, where she previously attended Chelsea College of Art. Her other books include the debut novel Boy Parts and the forthccoming story collection She's Always Hungry. *** Otherppl with Brad Listi is a weekly literary podcast featuring in-depth interviews with today's leading writers. Available where podcasts are available: Apple Podcasts, Spotify, YouTube, etc. Subscribe to Brad Listi’s email newsletter. Support the show on Patreon Merch @otherppl Instagram  TikTok Email the show: letters [at] otherppl [dot] com The podcast is a proud affiliate partner of Bookshop, working to support local, independent bookstores. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

In today's flashback, an outtake from Episode 244, my conversation with Pulitzer Prize winner Hilton Als. This episode first aired on January 19, 2014. Als's most recent book is a memoir called Pin-Up. He became a staff writer at The New Yorker in 1994, a theater critic in 2002, and chief theater critic in 2013. His other books include The Women and White Girls, which was nominated for a National Book Critics Circle Award in Criticism. *** Otherppl with Brad Listi is a weekly literary podcast featuring in-depth interviews with today's leading writers. Available where podcasts are available: Apple Podcasts, Spotify, YouTube, etc. Subscribe to Brad Listi’s email newsletter. Support the show on Patreon Merch @otherppl Instagram  TikTok Email the show: letters [at] otherppl [dot] com The podcast is a proud affiliate partner of Bookshop, working to support local, independent bookstores. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Elle Nash is the author of the novel Deliver Me, available from The Unnamed Press. Nash is the author of the novels Gag Reflex (Clash Books, 2022) and Animals Eat Each Other (Dzanc Books), which was featured in the 2018 June Reading Room of O - The Oprah Magazine and hailed by Publishers Weekly as a ‘complex, impressive exploration of obsession and desire.’ Nudes (SF/LD Books and 404 Ink), her debut short story collection, is out now. Her work appears in Guernica, BOMB, The Nervous Breakdown, Literary Hub, The Fanzine, Volume 1 Brooklyn, New York Tyrant and elsewhere. She is a founding editor of Witch Craft Magazine and has edited fiction at both Hobart Pulp and Expat Literary Journal.  *** Otherppl with Brad Listi is a weekly literary podcast featuring in-depth interviews with today's leading writers. Available where podcasts are available: Apple Podcasts, Spotify, YouTube, etc. Subscribe to Brad Listi’s email newsletter. Support the show on Patreon Merch @otherppl Instagram  TikTok Email the show: letters [at] otherppl [dot] com The podcast is a proud affiliate partner of Bookshop, working to support local, independent bookstores. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Claudia Dey is the author of the novel Daughter, available from Farrar, Straus, and Giroux. Dey's previous novel, Heartbreaker, was a Northern Lit and Trillium Book Award finalist. It was named a best book of the year by multiple publications and is being adapted for television. Her plays have been produced internationally and nominated for the Governor General's, Dora Mavor Moore, and Trillium Book Awards. Dey has worked as a film actress, a guest artist at the National Theatre School, and an adjunct professor at the University of Toronto. Her fiction, interviews, and essays have appeared in The Paris Review ("Mothers as Makers of Death"), McSweeney's, Literary Hub, Hazlitt, and The Believer. *** Otherppl with Brad Listi is a weekly literary podcast featuring in-depth interviews with today's leading writers. Available where podcasts are available: Apple Podcasts, Spotify, YouTube, etc. Subscribe to Brad Listi’s email newsletter. Support the show on Patreon Merch @otherppl Instagram  TikTok Email the show: letters [at] otherppl [dot] com The podcast is a proud affiliate partner of Bookshop, working to support local, independent bookstores. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

In today's flashback, an outtake from Episode 268, my conversation with Douglas Coupland. This episode first aired on April 13, 2014. Since 1991 Coupland has written thirteen novels. Including Generation X, Microserfs, Player One, and Worst. Person. Ever. He has written and performed for England’s Royal Shakespeare Company and is a columnist for The Financial Times of London. He is a frequent contributor to The New York Times, e-flux, and Vice.  *** Otherppl with Brad Listi is a weekly literary podcast featuring in-depth interviews with today's leading writers. Available where podcasts are available: Apple Podcasts, Spotify, YouTube, etc. Subscribe to Brad Listi’s email newsletter. Support the show on Patreon Merch @otherppl Instagram  TikTok Email the show: letters [at] otherppl [dot] com The podcast is a proud affiliate partner of Bookshop, working to support local, independent bookstores. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Roxane Gay is the author of the essay collection Opinions: A Decade of Arguments, Criticism, and Minding Other People's Business, available from Harper. Roxane's other books include the essay collection Bad Feminist, which was a New York Times bestseller; the novel An Untamed State, a finalist for the Dayton Peace Prize; the memoir Hunger, which was a New York Times bestseller and received a National Book Critics Circle citation; and the short story collections Difficult Women and Ayiti. A contributing opinion writer to the New York Times, she has also written for Time, McSweeney's, the Virginia Quarterly Review, the Los Angeles Times, The Nation, The Rumpus, Bookforum, and Salon. Her fiction has also been selected for The Best American Short Stories 2012, The Best American Mystery Stories 2014, and other anthologies. *** Otherppl with Brad Listi is a weekly literary podcast featuring in-depth interviews with today's leading writers. Available where podcasts are available: Apple Podcasts, Google Podcasts, Spotify, Stitcher, iHeart Radio, etc. Subscribe to Brad Listi’s email newsletter. Support the show on Patreon Merch @otherppl Instagram  YouTube TikTok Email the show: letters [at] otherppl [dot] com The podcast is a proud affiliate partner of Bookshop, working to support local, independent bookstores. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

David L. Ulin is the author of the novel Thirteen Question Method, available from Outpost 19. Ulin is the author or editor of nearly twenty books, including Sidewalking: Coming to Terms with Los Angeles, shortlisted for the PEN/Diamonstein-Spielvogel Award for the Art of the Essay, and the novel Ear to the Ground. His fiction has appeared in Black Clock, The Santa Monica Review, Scoundrel Time, and Zyzzyva, among other publications. The recipient of fellowships from the Guggenheim Foundation, the Lannan Foundation, and Ucross Foundation, he is the books editor of Alta Journal, and a Professor of English at the University of Southern California, where he edits the literary magazine Air/Light. *** Otherppl with Brad Listi is a weekly literary podcast featuring in-depth interviews with today's leading writers. Available where podcasts are available: Apple Podcasts, Google Podcasts, Spotify, Stitcher, iHeart Radio, etc. Subscribe to Brad Listi’s email newsletter. Support the show on Patreon Merch @otherppl Instagram  YouTube TikTok Email the show: letters [at] otherppl [dot] com The podcast is a proud affiliate partner of Bookshop, working to support local, independent bookstores. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

In today's flashback, an outtake from Episode 327, my conversation with Frederick Barthelme. This episode first aired on November 5, 2014. Barthelme studied fiction with John Barth at The Johns Hopkins Writing Seminars in the mid-seventies, and from 1977-2010 he taught fiction writing and directed the Center for Writers at the University of Southern Mississippi. He is the author of sixteen books of fiction and nonfiction including Moon Deluxe, Second Marriage, Tracer, Two Against One, Natural Selection, The Brothers, Painted Desert, Bob the Gambler, Elroy Nights, and Waveland. His collected stories will be published in January 2024, by Arcade Publishing. *** Otherppl with Brad Listi is a weekly literary podcast featuring in-depth interviews with today's leading writers. Available where podcasts are available: Apple Podcasts, Google Podcasts, Spotify, Stitcher, iHeart Radio, etc. Subscribe to Brad Listi’s email newsletter. Support the show on Patreon Merch @otherppl Instagram  YouTube TikTok Email the show: letters [at] otherppl [dot] com The podcast is a proud affiliate partner of Bookshop, working to support local, independent bookstores. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

James Frankie Thomas is the author of the debut novel Idlewild, available from The Overlook Press. It was the official September pick of the Otherppl Book Club. Thomas is a lifelong New Yorker. He attended the City College of New York and the Iowa Writers' Workshop. He has worked as a video store clerk, a Shakespeare tutor, and the "YA of Yore" columnist for the Paris Review; he was most recently a theater critic at Vulture. Idlewild is his first novel. *** Otherppl with Brad Listi is a weekly literary podcast featuring in-depth interviews with today's leading writers. Available where podcasts are available: Apple Podcasts, Google Podcasts, Spotify, Stitcher, iHeart Radio, etc. Subscribe to Brad Listi’s email newsletter. Support the show on Patreon Merch @otherppl Instagram  YouTube TikTok Email the show: letters [at] otherppl [dot] com The podcast is a proud affiliate partner of Bookshop, working to support local, independent bookstores. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

C Pam Zhang is the author of the novel Land of Milk and Honey, available from Riverhead Books. Zhang's other book is the debut novel How Much of These Hills Is Gold, winner of the Academy of Arts and Letters Rosenthal Award and the Asian/Pacific American Award for Literature, long-listed for the Booker Prize, a finalist for the PEN/Hemingway Award and the National Book Critics Circle John Leonard Prize, and one of Barack Obama's favorite books of the year. She is a National Book Foundation 5 Under 35 honoree and a New York Public Library Cullman Fellow. *** Otherppl with Brad Listi is a weekly literary podcast featuring in-depth interviews with today's leading writers. Available where podcasts are available: Apple Podcasts, Google Podcasts, Spotify, Stitcher, iHeart Radio, etc. Subscribe to Brad Listi’s email newsletter. Support the show on Patreon Merch @otherppl Instagram  YouTube TikTok Email the show: letters [at] otherppl [dot] com The podcast is a proud affiliate partner of Bookshop, working to support local, independent bookstores. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

In today's flashback, an outtake from Episode 117, conversation with Susan Straight, author of the novel Mecca (FSG). This episode first aired on March 5, 2014. Straight's other novels include the national bestseller Highwire Moon, a finalist for the National Book Award, and A Million Nightingales, a finalist for the Los Angeles Times Book Prize, as well as the memoir In the Country of Women, named a best book of 2019 by NPR and Real Simple. She is the recipient of the Edgar Award for Best Short Story, the O. Henry Prize, the Lannan Literary Award for Fiction, and a Guggenheim Fellowship, and her stories and essays have been published in The New Yorker, The New York Times, The Guardian, Granta, Harper's Magazine, and elsewhere. She was born and continues to live in Riverside, California, with her family, where she serves as a distinguished professor of creative writing at the University of California, Riverside. *** Otherppl with Brad Listi is a weekly literary podcast featuring in-depth interviews with today's leading writers. Available where podcasts are available: Apple Podcasts, Google Podcasts, Spotify, Stitcher, iHeart Radio, etc. Subscribe to Brad Listi’s email newsletter. Support the show on Patreon Merch @otherppl Instagram  YouTube TikTok Email the show: letters [at] otherppl [dot] com The podcast is a proud affiliate partner of Bookshop, working to support local, independent bookstores. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Vauhini Vara is the author of the story collection This is Salvaged, available from W.W. Norton & Co. Vara has been a reporter and editor for the Wall Street Journal, The New Yorker, and the New York Times Magazine, and is the prize-winning author of the novel The Immortal King Rao, which was a finalist for the Pulitzer. She lives in Fort Collins, Colorado. *** Otherppl with Brad Listi is a weekly literary podcast featuring in-depth interviews with today's leading writers. Available where podcasts are available: Apple Podcasts, Google Podcasts, Spotify, Stitcher, iHeart Radio, etc. Subscribe to Brad Listi’s email newsletter. Support the show on Patreon Merch @otherppl Instagram  YouTube TikTok Email the show: letters [at] otherppl [dot] com The podcast is a proud affiliate partner of Bookshop, working to support local, independent bookstores. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Mona Awad is the bestselling author of the novel Rouge, available from Marysue Rucci Books, an imprint of Simon & Schuster. Awad's other books include the novels All's Well, Bunny, and the story collection 13 Ways of Looking at a Fat Girl. Bunny was a finalist for a Goodreads Choice Award and the New England Book Award. It was named a Best Book of 2019 by Time, Vogue and the New York Public Library. It is currently being developed for film by Jenni Konner and New Regency Productions. All's Well was a finalist for a Goodreads Choice Award. 13 Ways won the Amazon Best First Novel Award and was shortlisted for the Giller Prize. Awad currently teaches fiction in the creative writing program at Syracuse University. She is based in Boston. *** Otherppl with Brad Listi is a weekly literary podcast featuring in-depth interviews with today's leading writers. Available where podcasts are available: Apple Podcasts, Google Podcasts, Spotify, Stitcher, iHeart Radio, etc. Subscribe to Brad Listi’s email newsletter. Support the show on Patreon Merch @otherppl Instagram  YouTube TikTok Email the show: letters [at] otherppl [dot] com The podcast is a proud affiliate partner of Bookshop, working to support local, independent bookstores. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

In today's flashback, an outtake from Episode 257, my conversation with Natalie Baszile, author of the novel Queen Sugar (Penguin Books). This episode first aired on March 5, 2014. Baszile is the author of the novel Queen Sugar, which was a San Francisco Chronicle Best Book of 2014, longlisted for the Crooks Corner Southern Book Prize, nominated for an NAACP Image Award, and adapted for television by writer/director Ava DuVernay and co-produced by Oprah Winfrey for OWN. Baszile holds a M.A. in Afro-American Studies from UCLA and is a graduate of Warren Wilson College's MFA Program for Writers. She lives in San Francisco. *** Otherppl with Brad Listi is a weekly literary podcast featuring in-depth interviews with today's leading writers. Available where podcasts are available: Apple Podcasts, Google Podcasts, Spotify, Stitcher, iHeart Radio, etc. Subscribe to Brad Listi’s email newsletter. Support the show on Patreon Merch @otherppl Instagram  YouTube TikTok Email the show: letters [at] otherppl [dot] com The podcast is a proud affiliate partner of Bookshop, working to support local, independent bookstores. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Anne Enright is the author of the novel The Wren, The Wren, available from W.W. Norton & Co. Enright is author of seven novels, most recently Actress. She has been awarded the Man Booker Prize, the Andrew Carnegie Medal for Excellence in Fiction, and a Lifetime Achievement Award from the Irish Book Awards. She lives in Dublin. *** Otherppl with Brad Listi is a weekly literary podcast featuring in-depth interviews with today's leading writers. Available where podcasts are available: Apple Podcasts, Google Podcasts, Spotify, Stitcher, iHeart Radio, etc. Subscribe to Brad Listi’s email newsletter. Support the show on Patreon Merch @otherppl Instagram  YouTube TikTok Email the show: letters [at] otherppl [dot] com The podcast is a proud affiliate partner of Bookshop, working to support local, independent bookstores. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Karl Ove Knausgaard is the author of the novel The Wolves of Eternity, available from Penguin Press. Translated by Martin Aitken. Knausgaard's My Struggle cycle of novels is one of this century’s most celebrated works of literature and it has been heralded as a masterpiece all over the world. Over the course of his career, Karl Ove has been awarded the Norwegian Critics Prize for Literature, the Brage Prize and the Jerusalem Prize. His work, which also includes the novels The Morning Star, Out of the World, A Time for Everything and the Seasons Quartet, has been published in thirty-five languages. *** Otherppl with Brad Listi is a weekly literary podcast featuring in-depth interviews with today's leading writers. Available where podcasts are available: Apple Podcasts, Google Podcasts, Spotify, Stitcher, iHeart Radio, etc. Subscribe to Brad Listi’s email newsletter. Support the show on Patreon Merch @otherppl Instagram  YouTube TikTok Email the show: letters [at] otherppl [dot] com The podcast is a proud affiliate partner of Bookshop, working to support local, independent bookstores. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

In today's flashback, an outtake from Episode 147, my conversation with Joyce Johnson, author of the biography The Voice is All: The Lonely Victory of Jack Kerouac (Viking). This episode first aired on February 10, 2013. Johnson is the author of eight books, including the award-winning memoir Minor Characters, Missing Men, and Door Wide Open: A Beat Love Affair in Letters, 1957-1958 (with Jack Kerouac). She lives in New York City. *** Otherppl with Brad Listi is a weekly literary podcast featuring in-depth interviews with today's leading writers. Available where podcasts are available: Apple Podcasts, Google Podcasts, Spotify, Stitcher, iHeart Radio, etc. Subscribe to Brad Listi’s email newsletter. Support the show on Patreon Merch @otherppl Instagram  YouTube TikTok Email the show: letters [at] otherppl [dot] com The podcast is a proud affiliate partner of Bookshop, working to support local, independent bookstores. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

A new 'Craftwork' episode, all about anti-heroes. My guest is Tod Goldberg, author of the novel Gangsters Don't Die, available from Counterpoint Press. Goldberg is the author of more than a dozen books, including Gangsterland, a finalist for the Hammett Prize; Gangster Nation; and The Low Desert: Gangster Stories, named a Southwest Book of the Year and a finalist for several literary prizes. He lives in Indio, California, where he directs the low-residency MFA in creative writing and writing for the performing arts at the University of California, Riverside. *** Otherppl with Brad Listi is a weekly literary podcast featuring in-depth interviews with today's leading writers. Available where podcasts are available: Apple Podcasts, Google Podcasts, Spotify, Stitcher, iHeart Radio, etc. Subscribe to Brad Listi’s email newsletter. Support the show on Patreon Merch @otherppl Instagram  YouTube TikTok Email the show: letters [at] otherppl [dot] com The podcast is a proud affiliate partner of Bookshop, working to support local, independent bookstores. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Lauren Groff is the bestselling author of the novel The Vaster Wilds, available from Riverhead Books. Groff is a three-time National Book Award finalist and the New York Times bestselling author of the novels The Monsters of Templeton, Arcadia, Fates and Furies, and Matrix, and the short story collections Delicate Edible Birds and Florida. She has won the Story Prize and the Joyce Carol Oates Prize, and has been a finalist for the National Book Critics Circle Award. Groff 's work regularly appears in The New Yorker, The Atlantic, and elsewhere. *** Otherppl with Brad Listi is a weekly literary podcast featuring in-depth interviews with today's leading writers. Available where podcasts are available: Apple Podcasts, Google Podcasts, Spotify, Stitcher, iHeart Radio, etc. Subscribe to Brad Listi’s email newsletter. Support the show on Patreon Merch @otherppl Instagram  YouTube TikTok Email the show: letters [at] otherppl [dot] com The podcast is a proud affiliate partner of Bookshop, working to support local, independent bookstores. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

In today's flashback, an outtake from Episode 374, my conversation with Matt Sumell, author of the novel-in-stories Making Nice (Picador). It first aired on August 5, 2015. Sumell is a graduate of UC Irvine's MFA program, and his fiction has since appeared in Esquire, the Paris Review, Electric Literature, One Story, Noon, and elsewhere. He lives in Los Angeles, California.  *** Otherppl with Brad Listi is a weekly literary podcast featuring in-depth interviews with today's leading writers. Available where podcasts are available: Apple Podcasts, Google Podcasts, Spotify, Stitcher, iHeart Radio, etc. Subscribe to Brad Listi’s email newsletter. Support the show on Patreon Merch @otherppl Instagram  YouTube TikTok Email the show: letters [at] otherppl [dot] com The podcast is a proud affiliate partner of Bookshop, working to support local, independent bookstores. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Yiyun Li is the author of the story collection Wednesday's Child, available from Farrar, Straus, and Giroux. Li is the author of several works of fiction--The Book of Goose, Must I Go, Where Reasons End, Kinder Than Solitude, A Thousand Years of Good Prayers, The Vagrants, and Gold Boy, Emerald Girl--and the memoir Dear Friend, from My Life I Write to You in Your Life. She is the recipient of many awards, including a PEN/Malamud Award, a PEN/Hemingway Award, a PEN/Jean Stein Book Award, a MacArthur Fellowship, and a Windham-Campbell Prize. Her work has also appeared in The New Yorker, A Public Space, The Best American Short Stories, and The PEN/O. Henry Prize Stories, among other publications. She teaches at Princeton University and lives in Princeton, New Jersey. *** Otherppl with Brad Listi is a weekly literary podcast featuring in-depth interviews with today's leading writers. Available where podcasts are available: Apple Podcasts, Google Podcasts, Spotify, Stitcher, iHeart Radio, etc. Subscribe to Brad Listi’s email newsletter. Support the show on Patreon Merch @otherppl Instagram  YouTube TikTok Email the show: letters [at] otherppl [dot] com The podcast is a proud affiliate partner of Bookshop, working to support local, independent bookstores. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Myriam Gurba is the author of the essay collection Creep: Accusations and Confessions, available from Avid Reader Press. Gurba is a writer and artist. She is the author of the true-crime memoir Mean, a New York Times Editors' Choice. O, the Oprah Magazine, ranked Mean as one of the best LGBTQ books of all time. Publishers Weekly describes Gurba as having a voice like no other. Her essays and criticism have appeared in The Paris Review, TIME.com, and 4Columns. She has shown art in galleries, museums, and community centers. She lives in California. *** Otherppl with Brad Listi is a weekly literary podcast featuring in-depth interviews with today's leading writers. Available where podcasts are available: Apple Podcasts, Google Podcasts, Spotify, Stitcher, iHeart Radio, etc. Subscribe to Brad Listi’s email newsletter. Support the show on Patreon Merch @otherppl Instagram  YouTube TikTok Email the show: letters [at] otherppl [dot] com The podcast is a proud affiliate partner of Bookshop, working to support local, independent bookstores. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

In today's flashback, an outtake from Episode 546, my conversation with Laura van den Berg, author of five works of fiction. It first aired on October 10, 2018. Laura van den Berg was born and raised in Florida. Her books include The Third Hotel (Farrar, Straus and Giroux, 2018), a finalist for the New York Public Library Young Lions Fiction Award, and I Hold a Wolf by the Ears (Farrar, Straus and Giroux, 2020), which was one of Time Magazine’s 10 Best Fiction Books of 2020. She is the recent recipient of a Guggenheim Fellowship, a Strauss Livings Award from the American Academy of Arts & Letters, and a literature fellowship from the National Endowment for the Arts. Her next two novels, Florida Diary and Ring of Night, are forthcoming from FSG. *** Otherppl with Brad Listi is a weekly literary podcast featuring in-depth interviews with today's leading writers. Available where podcasts are available: Apple Podcasts, Google Podcasts, Spotify, Stitcher, iHeart Radio, etc. Subscribe to Brad Listi’s email newsletter. Support the show on Patreon Merch @otherppl Instagram  YouTube TikTok Email the show: letters [at] otherppl [dot] com The podcast is a proud affiliate partner of Bookshop, working to support local, independent bookstores. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Maggie Downs is an award-winning journalist, travel writer, and the author of the memoir Braver Than You Think:Around the World on the Trip of My (Mother’s) Lifetime (Counterpoint Press). Her work has appeared in The New York Times, The Washington Post, Los Angeles Times, Palm Springs Life, and McSweeney's and has been anthologized in The Lonely Planet Travel Anthology: True Stories from the World's Best Writers and Best Women's Travel Writing. She lives in Yucca Valley, California. *** Otherppl with Brad Listi is a weekly literary podcast featuring in-depth interviews with today's leading writers. Available where podcasts are available: Apple Podcasts, Google Podcasts, Spotify, Stitcher, iHeart Radio, etc. Subscribe to Brad Listi’s email newsletter. Support the show on Patreon Merch @otherppl Instagram  YouTube TikTok Email the show: letters [at] otherppl [dot] com The podcast is a proud affiliate partner of Bookshop, working to support local, independent bookstores. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Rebekah Bergman is the author of the debut novel The Museum of Human History, available from Tin House. It is the official August pick of the Otherppl Book Club. Bergman's fiction has been published in Joyland, Tin House, The Masters Review anthology, and other journals. She lives in Rhode Island with her family. *** Otherppl with Brad Listi is a weekly literary podcast featuring in-depth interviews with today's leading writers. Available where podcasts are available: Apple Podcasts, Google Podcasts, Spotify, Stitcher, iHeart Radio, etc. Subscribe to Brad Listi’s email newsletter. Support the show on Patreon Merch @otherppl Instagram  YouTube TikTok Email the show: letters [at] otherppl [dot] com The podcast is a proud affiliate partner of Bookshop, working to support local, independent bookstores. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Today, a special episode remembering the life and work of Tom Hansen, who died this week of esophageal cancer. Hansen was born in Seattle and raised by adoptive parents in nearby Edmonds, Washington. A failed skateboarder, dishwasher, and punk rock guitarist, he turned to shooting and dealing smack. He later kicked his habit, returned to school, and eventually earned an MFA in writing from the University of British Columbia. His books include the memoir American Junkie (Soft Skull Press) and the retro noir thriller This Is What We Do. *** Otherppl with Brad Listi is a weekly literary podcast featuring in-depth interviews with today's leading writers. Available where podcasts are available: Apple Podcasts, Google Podcasts, Spotify, Stitcher, iHeart Radio, etc. Subscribe to Brad Listi’s email newsletter. Support the show on Patreon Merch @otherppl Instagram  YouTube TikTok Email the show: letters [at] otherppl [dot] com The podcast is a proud affiliate partner of Bookshop, working to support local, independent bookstores. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

In today's flashback, an outtake from Episode 24, my conversation with biographer Charles Shields, author of And So It Goes— Kurt Vonnegut: A Life, available now in trade paperback from St. Martin's Press. It first aired on December 7, 2011. Shields's other books include Mockingbird: A Portrait of Harper Lee, and I Am Scout: The Biography of Harper Lee (Henry Holt Books for Young Readers). He grew up in the Midwest and taught in a rural school in central Illinois for several years. He has been a reporter for public radio, a journalist, and the author of nonfiction books for young people. He and his wife live near Charlottesville, Virginia. *** Otherppl with Brad Listi is a weekly literary podcast featuring in-depth interviews with today's leading writers. Available where podcasts are available: Apple Podcasts, Google Podcasts, Spotify, Stitcher, iHeart Radio, etc. Subscribe to Brad Listi’s email newsletter. Support the show on Patreon Merch @otherppl Instagram  YouTube TikTok Email the show: letters [at] otherppl [dot] com The podcast is a proud affiliate partner of Bookshop, working to support local, independent bookstores. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Maya Binyam is the author of the debut novel Hangman, available from Farrar, Straus, and Giroux. Binyam is a fiction writer and critic whose work has appeared in The Paris Review, The New Yorker, The New York Times Magazine, New York, Bookforum, Columbia Journalism Review, The New York Times Book Review, and elsewhere. She is a contributing editor at The Paris Review and has previously worked as an editor at Triple Canopy and The New Inquiry. She lives in Los Angeles. *** Otherppl with Brad Listi is a weekly literary podcast featuring in-depth interviews with today's leading writers. Available where podcasts are available: Apple Podcasts, Google Podcasts, Spotify, Stitcher, iHeart Radio, etc. Subscribe to Brad Listi’s email newsletter. Support the show on Patreon Merch @otherppl Instagram  YouTube TikTok Email the show: letters [at] otherppl [dot] com The podcast is a proud affiliate partner of Bookshop, working to support local, independent bookstores. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

In today's 'Craftwork' episode, a conversation with Emily Rapp Black about "truth" in creative nonfiction. Emily is the author of five books of creative nonfiction: Poster Child, The Still Point of the Turning World, which was a New York Times bestseller, Sanctuary, Frida Kahlo and My Left Leg, and I Would Die if I Were You (forthcoming). She is Professor of Creative Writing at UC-Riverside and a co-founder, with Gina Frangello, of Circe Consulting, which offers coaching and developmental editing to writers. *** Otherppl with Brad Listi is a weekly literary podcast featuring in-depth interviews with today's leading writers. Available where podcasts are available: Apple Podcasts, Google Podcasts, Spotify, Stitcher, iHeart Radio, etc. Subscribe to Brad Listi’s email newsletter. Support the show on Patreon Merch @otherppl Instagram  YouTube TikTok Email the show: letters [at] otherppl [dot] com The podcast is a proud affiliate partner of Bookshop, working to support local, independent bookstores. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

In today's flashback, an outtake from Episode 364, my conversation with Mat Johnson, author of the novel Invisible Things and other books. Johnson is a Philip H. Knight Chair of the Humanities at the University of Oregon. His publications include the novels Loving Day and Pym, the nonfiction novella The Great Negro Plot, and the graphic novel Incognegro. Johnson is the recipient of the American Book Award, the United States Artists James Baldwin Fellowship, The Hurston/Wright Legacy Award, and the John Dos Passos Prize for Literature. His most recent novel, Invisible Things, was published in 2022 and was long-listed for the PEN/Faulkner Award. *** Otherppl with Brad Listi is a weekly literary podcast featuring in-depth interviews with today's leading writers. Available where podcasts are available: Apple Podcasts, Google Podcasts, Spotify, Stitcher, iHeart Radio, etc. Subscribe to Brad Listi’s email newsletter. Support the show on Patreon Merch @otherppl Instagram  YouTube TikTok Email the show: letters [at] otherppl [dot] com The podcast is a proud affiliate partner of Bookshop, working to support local, independent bookstores. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Brando Skyhorse is the author of the novel My Name is Iris, available from Avid Reader Press. Skyhorse's debut novel, The Madonnas of Echo Park, won the 2011 PEN/Hemingway Award and the Sue Kaufman Award for First Fiction from the American Academy of Arts and Letters. His memoir, Take This Man, was named one of Kirkus Reviews Best Nonfiction Books of 2014 and one of NBC News's 10 Best Latino Books of 2014. He also coedited the anthology, We Wear the Mask: 15 True Stories of Passing in America. A recipient of a Rockefeller Foundation Bellagio Center fellowship, Skyhorse teaches English and creative writing at Indiana University Bloomington. *** Otherppl with Brad Listi is a weekly literary podcast featuring in-depth interviews with today's leading writers. Available where podcasts are available: Apple Podcasts, Google Podcasts, Spotify, Stitcher, iHeart Radio, etc. Subscribe to Brad Listi’s email newsletter. Support the show on Patreon Merch @otherppl Instagram  YouTube TikTok Email the show: letters [at] otherppl [dot] com The podcast is a proud affiliate partner of Bookshop, working to support local, independent bookstores. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

In today's 'Craftwork' episode, a conversation with Kathleen Schmidt. She is a longtime publishing industry veteran with in-depth experience in a variety of roles, including as a publicist, literary agent, acquisitions editor, and ghostwriter. She has worked over the years on 50 New York Times bestsellers. Kathleen is the founder and CEO of Kathleen Schmidt Public Relations, and her Substack newsletter, Publishing Confidential, is an excellent resource where she shares her wealth of inside knowledge and makes efforts to demystify the book business.  *** Otherppl with Brad Listi is a weekly literary podcast featuring in-depth interviews with today's leading writers. Available where podcasts are available: Apple Podcasts, Google Podcasts, Spotify, Stitcher, iHeart Radio, etc. Subscribe to Brad Listi’s email newsletter. Support the show on Patreon Merch @otherppl Instagram  YouTube TikTok Email the show: letters [at] otherppl [dot] com The podcast is a proud affiliate partner of Bookshop, working to support local, independent bookstores. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

In today's flashback, an outtake from Episode 460, my conversation with Melissa Febos, author of Body Work, Girlhood, and other books. Girlhood was a national bestseller, a Lambda Literary Award finalist, and the winner of the National Book Critics Circle Award in Criticism. Body Work was also a national bestseller, an LA Times Bestseller, and an Indie Next Pick. Her fifth book, The Dry Season, is forthcoming from Alfred. A. Knopf. *** Otherppl with Brad Listi is a weekly literary podcast featuring in-depth interviews with today's leading writers. Available where podcasts are available: Apple Podcasts, Google Podcasts, Spotify, Stitcher, iHeart Radio, etc. Subscribe to Brad Listi’s email newsletter. Support the show on Patreon Merch @otherppl Instagram  YouTube TikTok Email the show: letters [at] otherppl [dot] com The podcast is a proud affiliate partner of Bookshop, working to support local, independent bookstores. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Lydia Kiesling is the author of the novel Mobility, available from Crooked Media Reads. Kiesling is the author of The Golden State, a 2018 National Book Foundation 5 under 35 honoree, a finalist for the VCU Cabell First Novelist Award, and longlisted for the Center for Fiction First Novel Prize. Her writing has appeared in the New York Times Magazine, The New Yorker online, and The Cut, among other outlets. She lives in Portland, Oregon. *** Otherppl with Brad Listi is a weekly literary podcast featuring in-depth interviews with today's leading writers. Available where podcasts are available: Apple Podcasts, Google Podcasts, Spotify, Stitcher, iHeart Radio, etc. Subscribe to Brad Listi’s email newsletter. Support the show on Patreon Merch @otherppl Instagram  YouTube TikTok Email the show: letters [at] otherppl [dot] com The podcast is a proud affiliate partner of Bookshop, working to support local, independent bookstores. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Khashayar J. Khabushani is the author of the debut novel I Will Greet the Sun Again, available from Hogarth Books. Khabushani was born in Van Nuys, California, in 1992. During his childhood he spent time in Iran before returning to Los Angeles. He studied philosophy at California State University, Northridge, and prior to completing his MFA at Columbia University he worked as a middle school teacher. *** Otherppl with Brad Listi is a weekly literary podcast featuring in-depth interviews with today's leading writers. Available where podcasts are available: Apple Podcasts, Google Podcasts, Spotify, Stitcher, iHeart Radio, etc. Subscribe to Brad Listi’s email newsletter. Support the show on Patreon Merch @otherppl Instagram  YouTube TikTok Email the show: letters [at] otherppl [dot] com The podcast is a proud affiliate partner of Bookshop, working to support local, independent bookstores. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

In today's flashback, an outtake from Episode 684, my conversation with Michael Schumacher, author of Dharma Lion: A Biography of Allen Ginsberg (University of Minnesota Press). Schumacher has written extensively about Allen Ginsberg and the Beat Generation. His articles, reviews, and essays have appeared in newspapers and magazines across the country. He is editor of Family Business, a collection of letters between Allen and Louis Ginsberg, and The Essential Ginsberg, a volume of the best of Ginsberg’s poems, essays, songs, letters, journal entries, interviews, and photographs. He lives in Wisconsin.  Air date: December 9, 2020. *** Otherppl with Brad Listi is a weekly literary podcast featuring in-depth interviews with today's leading writers. Available where podcasts are available: Apple Podcasts, Google Podcasts, Spotify, Stitcher, iHeart Radio, etc. Subscribe to Brad Listi’s email newsletter. Support the show on Patreon Merch @otherppl Instagram  YouTube TikTok Email the show: letters [at] otherppl [dot] com The podcast is a proud affiliate partner of Bookshop, working to support local, independent bookstores. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Jamel Brinkley is the author of the story collection Witness, available from Farrar, Straus, & Giroux. Brinkley is the author of A Lucky Man: Stories, which won the Ernest J. Gaines Award for Literary Excellence and was a finalist for the National Book Award, the PEN/Robert W. Bingham Prize for Debut Fiction, the Story Prize, the John Leonard Prize, and the Hurston/Wright Legacy Award. He has also been awarded an O. Henry Prize, the Rome Prize, a Wallace Stegner Fellowship, and a Lannan Foundation Fellowship. His work has appeared in The Paris Review, A Public Space, Ploughshares, and The Best American Short Stories. He was raised in the Bronx and in Brooklyn, New York, and currently teaches at the Iowa Writers' Workshop. *** A SPECIAL OFFER for Otherppl listeners! Use the offer code SUMMERSCHOOL and get 10% off of all summer writing workshops at https://www.chillsubs.com/writeordie/education *** Otherppl with Brad Listi is a weekly literary podcast featuring in-depth interviews with today's leading writers. Available where podcasts are available: Apple Podcasts, Google Podcasts, Spotify, Stitcher, iHeart Radio, etc. Subscribe to Brad Listi’s email newsletter. Support the show on Patreon Merch @otherppl Instagram  YouTube TikTok Email the show: letters [at] otherppl [dot] com The podcast is a proud affiliate partner of Bookshop, working to support local, independent bookstores. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Edan Lepucki is the bestselling author of the novel Time's Mouth, available from Counterpoint Press. Lepucki's other books include the novels California and Woman No. 17. She is also the editor of Mothers Before: Stories and Portraits of Our Mothers as We Never Saw Them. Her nonfiction has been published in The New York Times Magazine, the Los Angeles Times, Esquire Magazine, and The Cut, among other publications. She lives in Los Angeles with her family. *** Otherppl with Brad Listi is a weekly literary podcast featuring in-depth interviews with today's leading writers. Available where podcasts are available: Apple Podcasts, Google Podcasts, Spotify, Stitcher, iHeart Radio, etc. Subscribe to Brad Listi’s email newsletter. Support the show on Patreon Merch @otherppl Instagram  YouTube TikTok Email the show: letters [at] otherppl [dot] com The podcast is a proud affiliate partner of Bookshop, working to support local, independent bookstores. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

In today's flashback, an outtake from Episode 419, my conversation with Pulitzer Prize-winner Viet Thanh Nguyen, author of the bestselling novel The Sympathizer. His other books are Nothing Ever Dies: Vietnam and the Memory of War (a finalist for the National Book Award in nonfiction and the National Book Critics Circle Award in General Nonfiction) and Race and Resistance: Literature and Politics in Asian America. He is a University Professor, the Aerol Arnold Chair of English, and a Professor of English, American Studies and Ethnicity, and Comparative Literature at the University of Southern California. Viet’s next book is A Man of Two Faces: A Memoir, A History, A Memorial, forthcoming in October 2023 from Grove Press. Air date: June 22, 2016. *** A SPECIAL OFFER for Otherppl listeners! Use the offer code SUMMERSCHOOL and get 10% off of all summer writing workshops at https://www.chillsubs.com/writeordie/education *** Otherppl with Brad Listi is a weekly literary podcast featuring in-depth interviews with today's leading writers. Available where podcasts are available: Apple Podcasts, Google Podcasts, Spotify, Stitcher, iHeart Radio, etc. Subscribe to Brad Listi’s email newsletter. Support the show on Patreon Merch @otherppl Instagram  YouTube TikTok Email the show: letters [at] otherppl [dot] com The podcast is a proud affiliate partner of Bookshop, working to support local, independent bookstores. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Geoff Rickly is the author of the debut novel Someone Who Isn't Me, available from Rose Books. It is the official July pick of the Otherppl Book Club. Rickly is the lead singer and songwriter of Thursday and No Devotion. He lives in Brooklyn, New York, and this is his first book. *** Otherppl with Brad Listi is a weekly literary podcast featuring in-depth interviews with today's leading writers. Available where podcasts are available: Apple Podcasts, Google Podcasts, Spotify, Stitcher, iHeart Radio, etc. Subscribe to Brad Listi’s email newsletter. Support the show on Patreon Merch @otherppl Instagram  YouTube TikTok Email the show: letters [at] otherppl [dot] com The podcast is a proud affiliate partner of Bookshop, working to support local, independent bookstores. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Ruth Madievsky is the author of the debut novel All-Night Pharmacy, available from Catapult. Madievsky is the author of a bestselling poetry collection, Emergency Brake (Tavern Books, 2016). Her work appears in Harper's Bazaar, Guernica, Literary Hub, Kenyon Review, Ploughshares, and elsewhere. She is a founding member of the Cheburashka Collective, a community of women and nonbinary writers from the former Soviet Union. Originally from Moldova, she lives in Los Angeles, where she works as an HIV and primary care pharmacist. *** Otherppl with Brad Listi is a weekly literary podcast featuring in-depth interviews with today's leading writers. Available where podcasts are available: Apple Podcasts, Google Podcasts, Spotify, Stitcher, iHeart Radio, etc. Subscribe to Brad Listi’s email newsletter. Support the show on Patreon Merch @otherppl Instagram  YouTube TikTok Email the show: letters [at] otherppl [dot] com The podcast is a proud affiliate partner of Bookshop, working to support local, independent bookstores. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

In today's flashback, an outtake from Episode 491, my conversation with Carmen Maria Machado, author of the bestselling memoir In the Dream House. Machado's other books include the graphic novel The Low, Low Woods, and an award-winning short story collection called Her Body and Other Parties.  She has been a finalist for the National Book Award and the winner of the Bard Fiction Prize, the Lambda Literary Award for Lesbian Fiction, the Lambda Literary Award for LGBTQ Nonfiction, the Brooklyn Public Library Literature Prize, the Shirley Jackson Award, and the National Book Critics Circle's John Leonard Prize. Air date: November 8, 2017. *** A SPECIAL OFFER for Otherppl listeners! Use the offer code SUMMERSCHOOL and get 10% off of all summer writing workshops at https://www.chillsubs.com/writeordie/education *** Otherppl with Brad Listi is a weekly literary podcast featuring in-depth interviews with today's leading writers. Available where podcasts are available: Apple Podcasts, Google Podcasts, Spotify, Stitcher, iHeart Radio, etc. Subscribe to Brad Listi’s email newsletter. Support the show on Patreon Merch @otherppl Instagram  YouTube TikTok Email the show: letters [at] otherppl [dot] com The podcast is a proud affiliate partner of Bookshop, working to support local, independent bookstores. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Jenny Xie is the author of the debut novel Holding Pattern, available from Riverhead Books. Xie is a writer and editor living in Brooklyn. Originally from Shanghai, she graduated from the University of California, Berkeley, and earned her MFA at Johns Hopkins University. Her work has appeared in AGNI, Ninth Letter, Joyland, Narrative, and the Best of the Net Anthology. Jenny is the recipient of a Bread Loaf scholarship and fellowships from MacDowell, Yaddo, the Virginia Center for the Creative Arts, and Loghaven. She is a contributing writer for Architectural Digest, Apartment Therapy, and Dwell, where she was the executive editor. *** Otherppl with Brad Listi is a weekly literary podcast featuring in-depth interviews with today's leading writers. Available where podcasts are available: Apple Podcasts, Google Podcasts, Spotify, Stitcher, iHeart Radio, etc. Subscribe to Brad Listi’s email newsletter. Support the show on Patreon Merch @otherppl Instagram  YouTube TikTok Email the show: letters [at] otherppl [dot] com The podcast is a proud affiliate partner of Bookshop, working to support local, independent bookstores. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Andrew Lipstein is the author of the novel The Vegan, available from Farrar, Straus, and Giroux. Lipstein is also the author of Last Resort (FSG, 2022), a novel "you'll think about . . . for weeks after you read the last pages" (Los Angeles Times). He lives in Brooklyn. *** Otherppl with Brad Listi is a weekly literary podcast featuring in-depth interviews with today's leading writers. Available where podcasts are available: Apple Podcasts, Google Podcasts, Spotify, Stitcher, iHeart Radio, etc. Subscribe to Brad Listi’s email newsletter. Support the show on Patreon Merch @otherppl Instagram  YouTube TikTok Email the show: letters [at] otherppl [dot] com The podcast is a proud affiliate partner of Bookshop, working to support local, independent bookstores. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

In today's flashback, an outtake from Episode 107, my conversation with D.T. Max, New Yorker staff writer and author of Every Love Story is a Ghost Story: A Life of David Foster Wallace, which was published by Viking in 2012. Max's other books include The Family That Couldn’t Sleep: A Medical Mystery and Finale: Late Conversations with Stephen Sondheim. Air date: September 22, 2012 *** Otherppl with Brad Listi is a weekly literary podcast featuring in-depth interviews with today's leading writers. Available where podcasts are available: Apple Podcasts, Google Podcasts, Spotify, Stitcher, iHeart Radio, etc. Subscribe to Brad Listi’s email newsletter. Support the show on Patreon Merch @otherppl Instagram  YouTube TikTok Email the show: letters [at] otherppl [dot] com The podcast is a proud affiliate partner of Bookshop, working to support local, independent bookstores. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Nicole Flattery is the author of the novel Nothing Special, available from Bloomsbury. Flattery is also the author of the story collection Show Them A Good Time. She is the winner of A Post Irish Book Award, the Kate O'Brien Prize, the London Magazine Prize for Debut Fiction, and the White Review Short Story Prize. Her work has appeared in theStinging Fly, the Guardian, the White Review, and the London Review of Books. A graduate of the master's program in creative writing at Trinity College, she lives in Dublin, Ireland. *** Otherppl with Brad Listi is a weekly literary podcast featuring in-depth interviews with today's leading writers. Available where podcasts are available: Apple Podcasts, Google Podcasts, Spotify, Stitcher, iHeart Radio, etc. Subscribe to Brad Listi’s email newsletter. Support the show on Patreon Merch @otherppl Instagram  YouTube TikTok Email the show: letters [at] otherppl [dot] com The podcast is a proud affiliate partner of Bookshop, working to support local, independent bookstores. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Sarah Rose Etter is the author of the novel Ripe, available from Scribner. Etter's other books include The Book of X and Tongue Party. Her work has appeared or is forthcoming in The Cut, Electric Literature, Vice, Guernica, Philadelphia Weekly, and more. She is the recipient of writing residencies in Portugal and the Gullkistan Creative Program in Iceland. She earned her MFA degree from Rosemont College. *** Otherppl with Brad Listi is a weekly literary podcast featuring in-depth interviews with today's leading writers. Available where podcasts are available: Apple Podcasts, Google Podcasts, Spotify, Stitcher, iHeart Radio, etc. Subscribe to Brad Listi’s email newsletter. Support the show on Patreon Merch @otherppl Instagram  YouTube TikTok Email the show: letters [at] otherppl [dot] com The podcast is a proud affiliate partner of Bookshop, working to support local, independent bookstores. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

In today's flashback, an outtake from Episode 506, my conversation with Elif Batuman. Elif Batuman's first novel, The Idiot, was a finalist for a Pulitzer Prize, and was shortlisted for the Women's Prize for Fiction in the UK. She is also the author of a novel called Either/Or, published in 2022, as well as The Possessed: Adventures with Russian Books and the People Who Read Them, which was a finalist for a National Book Critics Circle Award in criticism. She has been a staff writer at The New Yorker since 2010. *** Otherppl with Brad Listi is a weekly literary podcast featuring in-depth interviews with today's leading writers. Available where podcasts are available: Apple Podcasts, Google Podcasts, Spotify, Stitcher, iHeart Radio, etc. Subscribe to Brad Listi’s email newsletter. Support the show on Patreon Merch @otherppl Instagram  YouTube TikTok Email the show: letters [at] otherppl [dot] com The podcast is a proud affiliate partner of Bookshop, working to support local, independent bookstores. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Patrick deWitt is the author of the novel The Librarianist, available from Ecco. His other books include the novels French Exit, a national bestseller; The Sisters Brothers, a New York Times bestseller short-listed for the Booker Prize; and the critically acclaimed Undermajordomo Minor and Ablutions. Born in British Columbia, he now resides in Portland, Oregon. *** Otherppl with Brad Listi is a weekly literary podcast featuring in-depth interviews with today's leading writers. Available where podcasts are available: Apple Podcasts, Google Podcasts, Spotify, Stitcher, iHeart Radio, etc. Subscribe to Brad Listi’s email newsletter. Support the show on Patreon Merch @otherppl Instagram  YouTube TikTok Email the show: letters [at] otherppl [dot] com The podcast is a proud affiliate partner of Bookshop, working to support local, independent bookstores. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Chelsea Hodson is the author of the essay collection Tonight I'm Someone Else, which came out in 2018. She is the founder of the new indie press Rose Books as well as the Morning Writing Club, and is currently booking one-on-one writing coaching sessions on her website. The first Rose Books title, Someone Who Isn't Me, the debut novel by Geoff Rickly, will be published on July 25, and it is the July selection for the Otherppl Book Club. It is available for preorder now via rosebooks.co.  *** Otherppl with Brad Listi is a weekly literary podcast featuring in-depth interviews with today's leading writers. Available where podcasts are available: Apple Podcasts, Google Podcasts, Spotify, Stitcher, iHeart Radio, etc. Subscribe to Brad Listi’s email newsletter. Support the show on Patreon Merch @otherppl Instagram  YouTube TikTok Email the show: letters [at] otherppl [dot] com The podcast is a proud affiliate partner of Bookshop, working to support local, independent bookstores. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

In today's flashback, an outtake from Episode 401, my conversation with Hanya Yanagihara from February 2016. Hanya Yanagihara is a prize-winning author and the Editor-in-Chief of T: The New York Times Style Magazine. Her novel entitled To Paradise, published in 2022, was a #1 NY Times bestseller. Her novel A Little Life, won the 2015 Kirkus Prize, was a finalist for the National Book Award and the 2016 Baileys Women’s Prize for Fiction, and was shortlisted for the Man Booker Prize. The People in the Trees was shortlisted for the PEN/Robert W. Bingham Prize in 2014. She joined the PEN America Board in 2016. I spoke with Hanya as she was on tour in support of her award-winning novel, A Little Life. Air date: February 24, 2016. *** Otherppl with Brad Listi is a weekly literary podcast featuring in-depth interviews with today's leading writers. Available where podcasts are available: Apple Podcasts, Google Podcasts, Spotify, Stitcher, iHeart Radio, etc. Subscribe to Brad Listi’s email newsletter. Support the show on Patreon Merch @otherppl Instagram  YouTube TikTok Email the show: letters [at] otherppl [dot] com The podcast is a proud affiliate partner of Bookshop, working to support local, independent bookstores. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Tess Gunty is the author of the debut novel The Rabbit Hutch, now available in trade paperback from Vintage. It received the National Book Award for Fiction in 2022. Gunty earned an MFA in creative writing from NYU, where she was a Lillian Vernon Fellow. Her work has appeared in The Iowa Review, Joyland, Los Angeles Review of Books, No Tokens, Flash, and elsewhere. She was raised in South Bend, Indiana, and lives in Los Angeles. *** Otherppl with Brad Listi is a weekly literary podcast featuring in-depth interviews with today's leading writers. Available where podcasts are available: Apple Podcasts, Google Podcasts, Spotify, Stitcher, iHeart Radio, etc. Subscribe to Brad Listi’s email newsletter. Support the show on Patreon Merch @otherppl Instagram  YouTube TikTok Email the show: letters [at] otherppl [dot] com The podcast is a proud affiliate partner of Bookshop, working to support local, independent bookstores. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Lorrie Moore is the bestselling author of the novel I Am Homeless if This Is Not My Home, available from Knopf. Moore is the Gertrude Conaway Vanderbilt Professor of English at Vanderbilt University. She is the recipient of a Lannan Foundation Fellowship, as well as the PEN/Malamud Award and the Rea Award for her achievement in the short story. She is a member of the American Academy of Arts and Letters. She lives in Nashville, Tennessee.   *** Otherppl with Brad Listi is a weekly literary podcast featuring in-depth interviews with today's leading writers. Available where podcasts are available: Apple Podcasts, Google Podcasts, Spotify, Stitcher, iHeart Radio, etc. Subscribe to Brad Listi’s email newsletter. Support the show on Patreon Merch @otherppl Instagram  YouTube TikTok Email the show: letters [at] otherppl [dot] com The podcast is a proud affiliate partner of Bookshop, working to support local, independent bookstores. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

In today's flashback, an outtake from Episode 616, my conversation with Tim O'Brien from December 2019. O'Brien received the 1979 National Book Award for Going After Cacciato. Among his other books are The Things They Carried, Pulitzer Finalist and a New York TimesBook of the Century, and In the Lake of the Woods, winner of the James Fenimore Cooper Prize. He was awarded the Pritzker Literature Award for lifetime achievement in military writing in 2013. His new novel, America Fantastica, is due out in October 2023 from Mariner Books. I spoke with Tim O'Brien as he was on tour in support of his memoir, Dad's Maybe Book. Air date: December 11, 2019. *** Otherppl with Brad Listi is a weekly literary podcast featuring in-depth interviews with today's leading writers. Available where podcasts are available: Apple Podcasts, Google Podcasts, Spotify, Stitcher, iHeart Radio, etc. Subscribe to Brad Listi’s email newsletter. Support the show on Patreon Merch @otherppl Instagram  YouTube TikTok Email the show: letters [at] otherppl [dot] com The podcast is a proud affiliate partner of Bookshop, working to support local, independent bookstores. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Leila Slimani is the author of the novel Watch Us Dance, available from Viking. Translated by Sam Taylor. Slimani is the bestselling author of The Perfect Nanny, one of The New York Times Book Review's 10 Best Books of 2018, for which she became the first Moroccan woman to win France's most prestigious literary prize, the Goncourt. Her other books include Adèle, Sex and Lies, and the #1 international bestseller In the Country of Others the first part of a trilogy of novels based on her family's roots in revolutionary Morocco. Slimani is French president Emmanuel Macron's personal representative for the promotion of the French language and culture, and is the chair of the jury for the 2023 International Booker Prize. She was ranked #2 on Vanity Fair France's annual list of the Fifty Most Influential French People in the World. Born in Rabat, Morocco, in 1981, she divides her time between France and Portugal. Sam Taylor is the award-winning translator of more than sixty books from French, including all of Leila Slimani's fiction. *** Otherppl with Brad Listi is a weekly literary podcast featuring in-depth interviews with today's leading writers. Available where podcasts are available: Apple Podcasts, Google Podcasts, Spotify, Stitcher, iHeart Radio, etc. Subscribe to Brad Listi’s email newsletter. Support the show on Patreon Merch @otherppl Instagram  YouTube TikTok Email the show: letters [at] otherppl [dot] com The podcast is a proud affiliate partner of Bookshop, working to support local, independent bookstores. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Alejandra Oliva is the author of Rivermouth: A Chronicle of Language, Faith, and Migration, available from Astra House. Oliva is an essayist, translator, immigrant justice advocate, and embroiderer. She is a recipient of the 2022 Creative Nonfiction Whiting Grant. Her writing has been included in Best American Travel Writing 2020, was nominated for a Pushcart prize, and was honored with an Aspen Summer Words Emerging Writers Fellowship. She was the Frankie Fellow at the Yale Whitney Hummanities Center in 2022. *** Otherppl with Brad Listi is a weekly literary podcast featuring in-depth interviews with today's leading writers. Available where podcasts are available: Apple Podcasts, Google Podcasts, Spotify, Stitcher, iHeart Radio, etc. Subscribe to Brad Listi’s email newsletter. Support the show on Patreon Merch @otherppl Instagram  YouTube TikTok Email the show: letters [at] otherppl [dot] com The podcast is a proud affiliate partner of Bookshop, working to support local, independent bookstores. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Today on the program, a special Pulitzer Prize episode featuring authors Hernan Diaz and Ingrid Rojas Contreras. Diaz won a 2023 Pulitzer Prize in Fiction for his bestselling novel Trust, and Contreras was a National Book Award finalist and a 2023 Pulitzer Prize finalist for her memoir The Man Who Could Move Clouds. In the episode, you'll hear outtakes from Episode 775, my conversation with Hernan (air date: June 1, 2022); and my conversation with Ingrid in Episode 785 (air date: August 10, 2022). You'll also hear my recent conversations with each of them, as we discuss the success of their respective books and the impact it has had on their lives. Hernan Diaz is the author of two novels translated into more than twenty languages. His first novel, In the Distance, was a finalist for the Pulitzer Prize and the PEN/Faulkner Award. He has also written a book of essays, and his work has appeared in The Paris Review, Granta, Playboy, The Yale Review, McSweeney's, and elsewhere. He has received a Guggenheim Fellowship, a Whiting Award, the William Saroyan International Prize for Writing, and a fellowship from the New York Public Library's Cullman Center for Scholars and Writers. Ingrid Rojas Contreras was born and raised in Bogotá, Colombia. Her debut novel Fruit of the Drunken Tree was the silver medal winner in First Fiction from the California Book Awards, and a New York Times editor's choice. Her essays and short stories have appeared in the New York Times Magazine, The Believer, and Zyzzyva, among others. She lives in California. *** Otherppl with Brad Listi is a weekly literary podcast featuring in-depth interviews with today's leading writers. Available where podcasts are available: Apple Podcasts, Google Podcasts, Spotify, Stitcher, iHeart Radio, etc. Subscribe to Brad Listi’s email newsletter. Support the show on Patreon Merch @otherppl Instagram  YouTube TikTok Email the show: letters [at] otherppl [dot] com The podcast is a proud affiliate partner of Bookshop, working to support local, independent bookstores. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Molly Lynch is the author of the debut novel The Forbidden Territory of a Terrifying Woman, available from Catapult. Lynch grew up on the west coast of Canada and lived in Ireland as a teenager. She worked in Dublin, Cork, Manchester and Malaga before moving to Montreal to study literature. She's spent time in Syria, Lebanon and Turkey and moved to Baltimore where she earned an MFA from the Johns Hopkins Writing Seminars. She now teaches creative writing at the University of Michigan. *** Otherppl with Brad Listi is a weekly literary podcast featuring in-depth interviews with today's leading writers. Available where podcasts are available: Apple Podcasts, Google Podcasts, Spotify, Stitcher, iHeart Radio, etc. Subscribe to Brad Listi’s email newsletter. Support the show on Patreon Merch @otherppl Instagram  YouTube TikTok Email the show: letters [at] otherppl [dot] com The podcast is a proud affiliate partner of Bookshop, working to support local, independent bookstores. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Tania James is the author of the novel Loot, available from Knopf. James is the author of the novels The Tusk That Did the Damage and Atlas of Unknowns and the short story collection Aerogrammes. Her fiction has appeared in Boston Review, Granta, Guernica, One Story, A Public Space, and The Kenyon Review. She lives in Washington, D.C. *** Otherppl with Brad Listi is a weekly literary podcast featuring in-depth interviews with today's leading writers. Available where podcasts are available: Apple Podcasts, Google Podcasts, Spotify, Stitcher, iHeart Radio, etc. Subscribe to Brad Listi’s email newsletter. Support the show on Patreon Merch @otherppl Instagram  YouTube TikTok Email the show: letters [at] otherppl [dot] com The podcast is a proud affiliate partner of Bookshop, working to support local, independent bookstores. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

In today's flashback, an outtake from Episode 549, my conversation with Andre Dubus III from October 2018. Dubus is the author of several books, including Dirty Love, The Garden of Last Days, House of Sand and Fog (a New York Times bestseller, Oprah's Book Club pick, and finalist for the National Book Award), and a memoir called Townie. Earlier this month, he published his latest novel, entitled Such Kindness, available now from W.W. Norton & Co. I spoke with Andre Dubus III as he was on tour for his novel Gone So Long. Air date: October 31, 2018. *** Otherppl with Brad Listi is a weekly literary podcast featuring in-depth interviews with today's leading writers. Available where podcasts are available: Apple Podcasts, Google Podcasts, Spotify, Stitcher, iHeart Radio, etc. Subscribe to Brad Listi’s email newsletter. Support the show on Patreon Merch @otherppl Instagram  YouTube TikTok Email the show: letters [at] otherppl [dot] com The podcast is a proud affiliate partner of Bookshop, working to support local, independent bookstores. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Jasmin 'Iolani Hakes is the author of the debut novel Hula, available from HarperVia. Hakes was born and raised in Hilo, Hawai'i. Her essays have appeared in the Los Angeles Times and the Sacramento Bee. She is the recipient of the Best Fiction award from the Southern California Writers Conference, a Squaw Valley LoJo Foundation Scholarship, a Writing by Writers Emerging Voices fellowship, and a Hedgebrook residency. Dance has always been central to Jasmin's life and creativity. She took her first hula class when she was four years old and danced for the esteemed Halau o Kekuhi and the Tahitian troupe Hei Tiare. She worked throughout college as a professional luau dancer. She lives in California. *** Otherppl with Brad Listi is a weekly literary podcast featuring in-depth interviews with today's leading writers. Available where podcasts are available: Apple Podcasts, Google Podcasts, Spotify, Stitcher, iHeart Radio, etc. Subscribe to Brad Listi’s email newsletter. Support the show on Patreon Merch @otherppl Instagram  YouTube TikTok Email the show: letters [at] otherppl [dot] com The podcast is a proud affiliate partner of Bookshop, working to support local, independent bookstores. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Jim Ruland is the author of the novel Make It Stop, available from Rare Bird Books. Ruland is the co-author of Do What You Want with Bad Religion, and My Damage with Keith Morris, the founding vocalist of Black Flag, Circle Jerks, and OFF! Ruland has been writing for punk zines such as Flipside and Razorcake for more than twenty-five years and his work has received awards from Reader's Digest and the National Endowment for the Arts. *** Otherppl with Brad Listi is a weekly literary podcast featuring in-depth interviews with today's leading writers. Available where podcasts are available: Apple Podcasts, Google Podcasts, Spotify, Stitcher, iHeart Radio, etc. Subscribe to Brad Listi’s email newsletter. Support the show on Patreon Merch @otherppl Instagram  YouTube TikTok Email the show: letters [at] otherppl [dot] com The podcast is a proud affiliate partner of Bookshop, working to support local, independent bookstores. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

In today's flashback, an outtake from Episode 448, my conversation with Roxane Gay from January 2017. Roxane Gay is the bestselling author of the books Bad Feminist, Hunger, An Untamed State, Difficult Women, and Ayiti. She is a contributing opinion writer for the New York Times. She wrote The World of Wakanda, the Marvel Comics Series. She has a Substack called The Audacity, which has its own very popular book club. And this month, her publishing imprint, Roxane Gay Books, which she launched in association with Grove Atlantic, is celebrating the publication of its inaugural title, a debut novel called And Then He Sang a Lullaby, by Nigerian writer Ani Kayode Somtochukwu. I spoke with Roxane Gay as Difficult Women was being published and her memoir, Hunger, was imminent. Air date: January 11, 2017. *** Otherppl with Brad Listi is a weekly literary podcast featuring in-depth interviews with today's leading writers. Available where podcasts are available: Apple Podcasts, Google Podcasts, Spotify, Stitcher, iHeart Radio, etc. Subscribe to Brad Listi’s email newsletter. Support the show on Patreon Merch @otherppl Instagram  YouTube TikTok Email the show: letters [at] otherppl [dot] com The podcast is a proud affiliate partner of Bookshop, working to support local, independent bookstores. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Bea Setton is the author of the debut novel Berlin, available from Penguin Books. Setton was born in Paris to Franco-British parents and has lived in the US, Colombia, Belgium, Germany, and the UK. Currently residing in London, Setton holds an MPhil in Philosophy and Theology from Cambridge University and gives her time mentoring for Black Girls Writers. Her critical and creative writing has started popping up in popular outlets such as The Irish Times and Female First. *** Otherppl with Brad Listi is a weekly literary podcast featuring in-depth interviews with today's leading writers. Available where podcasts are available: Apple Podcasts, Google Podcasts, Spotify, Stitcher, iHeart Radio, etc. Subscribe to Brad Listi’s email newsletter. Support the show on Patreon Merch @otherppl Instagram  YouTube TikTok Email the show: letters [at] otherppl [dot] com The podcast is a proud affiliate partner of Bookshop, working to support local, independent bookstores. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Declan Meade is the guest. He is the founding editor and publisher of The Stinging Fly, one of the world’s premiere literary magazines, based in Dublin, Ireland. You may have read about Declan and The Stinging Fly in the New York Times back in April 2023, in a feature story by Max Ufberg.  The Stinging Fly Magazine was founded in 1997 by Declan Meade and Aoife Kavanaugh. The first issue appeared in March 1998 and the magazine now publishes twice annually, working to give new and emerging writers an opportunity to be read, with a special emphasis on the short story form. Since its founding, The Stinging Fly has expanded its operations to include an independent press, writing courses, and an online platform. The magazine is celebrating 25 years of existence. Over the decades it has featured some of the best new writing from Ireland and around the world, offering readers an eclectic mix of fiction, nonfiction and poetry. *** Otherppl with Brad Listi is a weekly literary podcast featuring in-depth interviews with today's leading writers. Available where podcasts are available: Apple Podcasts, Google Podcasts, Spotify, Stitcher, iHeart Radio, etc. Subscribe to Brad Listi’s email newsletter. Support the show on Patreon Merch @otherppl Instagram  YouTube TikTok Email the show: letters [at] otherppl [dot] com The podcast is a proud affiliate partner of Bookshop, working to support local, independent bookstores. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

In today's flashback, an outtake from Episode 426, my conversation with Jonathan Franzen from August 2016. He is the author of six novels, most recently Crossroads. He has also published five works of nonfiction, including The Discomfort Zone, Farther Away, and The End of the End of the Earth. Over the course of his career, Franzen has received the National Book Award, the James Tait Black Memorial Award, the Heartland Prize, Die Welt Literature Prize, the Budapest Grand Prize, and the first Carlos Fuentes Medal awarded at the Guadalajara International Book Fair. He is a member of the American Academy of Arts and Letters, the American Academy of Arts and Sciences, the German Akademie der Künste, and the French Ordre des Arts et des Lettres. I spoke with Jonathan Franzen as the paperback edition of his bestselling novel Purity was being published. Air date: August 10, 2016. *** Otherppl with Brad Listi is a weekly literary podcast featuring in-depth interviews with today's leading writers. Available where podcasts are available: Apple Podcasts, Google Podcasts, Spotify, Stitcher, iHeart Radio, etc. Subscribe to Brad Listi’s email newsletter. Support the show on Patreon Merch @otherppl Instagram  YouTube TikTok Email the show: letters [at] otherppl [dot] com The podcast is a proud affiliate partner of Bookshop, working to support local, independent bookstores. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

In the latest "Craftwork" episode, a deep-dive conversation about the horror genre with author and story expert John Truby. His latest book, The Anatomy of Genres: How Story Forms Explain the Way the World Works, is available from Picador. Truby is the founder and director of Truby's Writers Studio. Over the past thirty years, he has taught more than fifty thousand students worldwide, including novelists, screenwriters, and TV writers. Together, these writers have generated more than fifteen billion dollars at the box office.  Truby has an ongoing program where he works with students who are actively creating shows, movies, and novel series. He regularly applies his genre techniques in story consulting work with major studios including Disney, Sony Pictures, Fox, HBO, the BBC, Canal Plus, Globo, and AMC. He lives in Los Angeles with his wife, Leslie, and their two cats, Tink and Peanut. For story software and courses, please visit Truby.com. *** Otherppl with Brad Listi is a weekly literary podcast featuring in-depth interviews with today's leading writers. Available where podcasts are available: Apple Podcasts, Google Podcasts, Spotify, Stitcher, iHeart Radio, etc. Subscribe to Brad Listi’s email newsletter. Support the show on Patreon Merch @otherppl Instagram  YouTube TikTok Email the show: letters [at] otherppl [dot] com The podcast is a proud affiliate partner of Bookshop, working to support local, independent bookstores. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Ivy Pochoda is the author of the novel Sing Her Down, available from MCD Books. Pochoda's other books include the acclaimed novels Wonder Valley, Visitation Street, and These Women. She won the 2018 Strand Critics Award for Best Novel and the Prix Page/America in France, and has been a finalist for the Los Angeles Times Book Prize, the Edgar Award, the Macavity Award, and the International Thriller Writers Award. Her writing has appeared in The New York Times, The Wall Street Journal, and the Los Angeles Times, among other publications. *** Otherppl with Brad Listi is a weekly literary podcast featuring in-depth interviews with today's leading writers. Available where podcasts are available: Apple Podcasts, Google Podcasts, Spotify, Stitcher, iHeart Radio, etc. Subscribe to Brad Listi’s email newsletter. Support the show on Patreon Merch @otherppl Instagram  YouTube TikTok Email the show: letters [at] otherppl [dot] com The podcast is a proud affiliate partner of Bookshop, working to support local, independent bookstores. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Today I'm launching a new feature on the Otherppl podcast: flashback episodes from the Otherppl archives. These flashbacks will be short-form, and they will happen on Fridays. They will feature highlights from past conversations: bits of insight and instruction and commiseration and revelation.  Today, in this inaugural flashback episode, an outtake from Episode 532, my conversation with bestselling author Ottessa Moshfegh. Eileen, her debut novel, was shortlisted for the National Book Critics Circle Award and the Man Booker Prize, and it won the PEN/Hemingway Award for debut fiction. Her other novels include My Year of Rest and Relaxation, Death in Her Hands, and Lapvona. She is also the author of the short story collection Homesick for Another World and a novella entitled McGlue.  This episode first aired on July 11, 2018.  *** Otherppl with Brad Listi is a weekly literary podcast featuring in-depth interviews with today's leading writers. Available where podcasts are available: Apple Podcasts, Google Podcasts, Spotify, Stitcher, iHeart Radio, etc. Subscribe to Brad Listi’s email newsletter. Support the show on Patreon Merch @otherppl Instagram  YouTube TikTok Email the show: letters [at] otherppl [dot] com The podcast is a proud affiliate partner of Bookshop, working to support local, independent bookstores. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Anne Elizabeth Moore is the author of the essay collection Body Horror: Capitalism, Fear, Misogyny, Jokes, available from The Feminist Press. It is the official May pick of the Otherppl Book Club. Moore was born in Winner, SD. She is the author of Unmarketable (2007), the Eisner Award-winning Sweet Little Cunt (2018), Gentrifier: A Memoir (2021), which was an NPR Best Book of the Year, and others. She is the founding editor of Houghton Mifflin's Best American Comics and the former editor of Punk Planet, The Comics Journal, and the Chicago Reader. She has received support from the National Endowment for the Arts, the New York State Council on the Arts, and the Ragdale Foundation. She is a Fulbright Senior Scholar, has taught in the Visual Critical Studies department at the School of the Art Institute of Chicago, and was the 2019 Mackey Chair of Creative Writing at Beloit College. She lives in the Catskills with her ineffective feline personal assistants, Taku and Captain America. *** Otherppl with Brad Listi is a weekly literary podcast featuring in-depth interviews with today's leading writers. Available where podcasts are available: Apple Podcasts, Google Podcasts, Spotify, Stitcher, iHeart Radio, etc. Subscribe to Brad Listi’s email newsletter. Support the show on Patreon Merch @otherppl Instagram  YouTube TikTok Email the show: letters [at] otherppl [dot] com The podcast is a proud affiliate partner of Bookshop, working to support local, independent bookstores. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Samantha Irby is the bestselling author of the essay collection Quietly Hostile, available from Vintage. Irby's other books include Meaty, Wow, No Thank You, and We Are Never Meeting in Real Life. She also writes for television, having worked on shows like Shrill, And Just Like That, and Tuca & Bertie. She blogs at Bitches Gotta Eat and lives in Kalamazoo, Michigan. *** Otherppl with Brad Listi is a weekly literary podcast featuring in-depth interviews with today's leading writers. Available where podcasts are available: Apple Podcasts, Google Podcasts, Spotify, Stitcher, iHeart Radio, etc. Subscribe to Brad Listi’s email newsletter. Support the show on Patreon Merch @otherppl Instagram  YouTube TikTok Email the show: letters [at] otherppl [dot] com The podcast is a proud affiliate partner of Bookshop, working to support local, independent bookstores. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Isabella Hammad is the author of the novel Enter Ghost, available from Grove Press. Hammad was born in London. Her writing has appeared in Conjunctions, The Paris Review, The New York Times and elsewhere. She was awarded the 2018 Plimpton Prize for Fiction and a 2019 O. Henry Prize. Her first novel The Parisian (2019) won a Palestine Book Award, the Sue Kaufman Prize from the American Academy of Arts and Letters, and a Betty Trask Award from the Society of Authors in the UK. She was a National Book Foundation 5 Under 35 Honoree, and has received literary fellowships from MacDowell and the Lannan Foundation. She is currently a fellow at the Columbia University Institute for Ideas and Imagination in Paris. *** Otherppl with Brad Listi is a weekly literary podcast featuring in-depth interviews with today's leading writers. Available where podcasts are available: Apple Podcasts, Google Podcasts, Spotify, Stitcher, iHeart Radio, etc. Subscribe to Brad Listi’s email newsletter. Support the show on Patreon Merch @otherppl Instagram  YouTube TikTok Email the show: letters [at] otherppl [dot] com The podcast is a proud affiliate partner of Bookshop, working to support local, independent bookstores. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Dave Eggers is the author of the all-ages novel The Eyes and the Impossible, available in a deluxe, limited edition, wood-bound hardcover from McSweeney's, and in a traditional hardcover from Knopf Books for Young Readers. Illustrations by Shawn Harris. Eggers is the author of many books, including bestsellers The Every, The Monk of Mokha, The Circle, A Hologram for the King, and A Heartbreaking Work of Staggering Genius. His work has been nominated for the National Book Award, the Pulitzer Prize, and the National Book Critics Circle Award. He is the founder of McSweeney's, an independent publishing company based in San Francisco, and cofounder of 826 National, a network of educational centers around the country offering free tutoring to kids of all backgrounds. He lives in Northern California with his family.  Shawn Harris is the author/illustrator of Have You Ever Seen a Flower?, which won a Caldecott Honor Award. He is the illustrator of Her Right Foot by Dave Eggers, which received seven starred reviews, was an Orbis Pictus Award Honor Book, an ALA Notable, and a PW Best Book of the Year. His other picture books include Eggers's What Can a Citizen Do (a Time Magazine Best Children's Book), Everyone's Awake by Colin Meloy, and A Polar Bear in the Snow by Mac Barnett. *** Otherppl with Brad Listi is a weekly literary podcast featuring in-depth interviews with today's leading writers. Launched in 2011. Books. Literature. Writing. Publishing. Authors. Screenwriters. Etc. Available where podcasts are available: Apple Podcasts, Google Podcasts, Spotify, Stitcher, iHeart Radio, etc. Subscribe to Brad Listi’s email newsletter. Support the show on Patreon Merch @otherppl Instagram  YouTube TikTok Email the show: letters [at] otherppl [dot] com The podcast is a proud affiliate partner of Bookshop, working to support local, independent bookstores. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

In the latest "Craftwork" episode, a deep-dive conversation about the bestseller lists with Carly Watters, herself a longtime literary agent and the co-host of the popular writing podcast The Shit No One Tells You About Writing. Carly is "very online"—follow her on Instagram and Twitter—with a keen understanding of the digital landscape and the challenges faced by contemporary authors. In this episode, we discuss how the bestseller lists actually work, who the decision-makers are, and what making a list can mean to a writer's career in practical terms. Carly Watters is a SVP and Senior Literary Agent at P.S. Literary. She began her publishing career in London as an assistant at the Darley Anderson Literary, TV and Film Agency. Carly joined Toronto-based P.S. Literary Agency in 2010 and has sold over 100 books during her career. She represents award-winning and bestselling authors in the adult fiction and non-fiction categories, and select children’s books. She is known for her long-term vision for her authors and being an excellent collaborator with a nose for commercial success. She has close ties to publishers in the major markets, is a member of the AALA, and works directly with film agents to option film and TV rights to leading networks and production companies. Her clients’ books have been translated into 40 languages, optioned for TV and film, adapted into podcasts, and have been on every bestseller list from coast to coast, including the New York Times, USA Today, the LA Times, the Washington Post, the Toronto Star, and theGlobe and Mail. Carly is also an annual judge for the Women’s Fiction Writing Association Rising Star Award. *** Otherppl with Brad Listi is a weekly literary podcast featuring in-depth interviews with today's leading writers. Launched in 2011. Books. Literature. Writing. Publishing. Authors. Screenwriters. Etc. Available where podcasts are available: Apple Podcasts, Google Podcasts, Spotify, Stitcher, iHeart Radio, etc. Subscribe to Brad Listi’s email newsletter. Support the show on Patreon Merch @otherppl Instagram  YouTube TikTok Email the show: letters [at] otherppl [dot] com The podcast is a proud affiliate partner of Bookshop, working to support local, independent bookstores. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Hannah Pittard is the author of the memoir We Are Too Many, available from Henry Holt & Co. Pittard is the author of four novels. She is a winner of the Amanda Davis Highwire Fiction Award, a MacDowell Colony fellow, and a graduate of Deerfield Academy, the University of Chicago, and the University of Virginia. She also spent some time at St. John's College in Annapolis. She is a professor of English at the University of Kentucky and lives in Lexington with her boyfriend and stepdaughter. *** Otherppl with Brad Listi is a weekly literary podcast featuring in-depth interviews with today's leading writers. Launched in 2011. Books. Literature. Writing. Publishing. Authors. Screenwriters. Etc. Available where podcasts are available: Apple Podcasts, Google Podcasts, Spotify, Stitcher, iHeart Radio, etc. Subscribe to Brad Listi’s email newsletter. Support the show on Patreon Merch @otherppl Instagram  YouTube TikTok Email the show: letters [at] otherppl [dot] com The podcast is a proud affiliate partner of Bookshop, working to support local, independent bookstores. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Emily St. John Mandel is the bestselling author of the novel Sea of Tranquility, now available in trade paperback from Vintage. Mandel's five previous novels include The Glass Hotel, which has been translated into twenty-five languages, and Station Eleven, which was a finalist for a National Book Award and the PEN/Faulkner Award for Fiction, was the basis of a limited series on HBO Max, and has been translated into thirty-seven languages. She lives in New York City and Los Angeles. *** Otherppl with Brad Listi is a weekly literary podcast featuring in-depth interviews with today's leading writers. Launched in 2011. Books. Literature. Writing. Publishing. Authors. Screenwriters. Etc. Available where podcasts are available: Apple Podcasts, Google Podcasts, Spotify, Stitcher, iHeart Radio, etc. Subscribe to Brad Listi’s email newsletter. Support the show on Patreon Merch @otherppl Instagram  YouTube TikTok Email the show: letters [at] otherppl [dot] com The podcast is a proud affiliate partner of Bookshop, working to support local, independent bookstores. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Claire Dederer is the author of Monsters: A Fan's Dilemma, available from Knopf. Dederer is the author of Love and Trouble, and the New York Times best-selling memoir Poser: My Life in Twenty-Three Yoga Poses, which has been translated into twelve languages. A book critic, essayist, and reporter, Dederer is a longtime contributor to The New York Times and has also written for The Atlantic, Vogue, Slate, The Nation, and New York magazine. She lives near Seattle with her family. *** Otherppl with Brad Listi is a weekly literary podcast featuring in-depth interviews with today's leading writers. Launched in 2011. Books. Literature. Writing. Publishing. Authors. Screenwriters. Etc. Available where podcasts are available: Apple Podcasts, Google Podcasts, Spotify, Stitcher, iHeart Radio, etc. Subscribe to Brad Listi’s email newsletter. Support the show on Patreon Merch @otherppl Instagram  YouTube TikTok Email the show: letters [at] otherppl [dot] com The podcast is a proud affiliate partner of Bookshop, working to support local, independent bookstores. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Matthew Zapruder is the author of the memoir Story of a Poem, available from Unnamed Press. Zapruder is the author of five collections of poetry, including Come On All You Ghosts, a New York Times Notable Book of the Year, and Father's Day (Copper Canyon, 2019), as well as Why Poetry, a book of prose. He lives in the San Francisco Bay Area, where he teaches in the MFA in Creative Writing at Saint Mary's College of California. Zapruder has received a Guggenheim Fellowship, a William Carlos Williams Award, a May Sarton Award from the Academy of American Arts and Sciences, and a Lannan Foundation Residency Fellowship in Marfa, TX. His poetry has been adapted and performed at Carnegie Hall by Composer Gabriel Kahane and Brooklyn Rider, and was the libretto for "Vespers for a New Dark Age", a piece by composer Missy Mazzoli commissioned by Carnegie Hall for the 2014 Ecstatic Music Festival. In 2000, he co-founded Verse Press, and is now editor at large at Wave Books, where he edits contemporary poetry, prose, and translations. He was the founding Director of the Bagley Wright Lecture Series. From 2016-17 he held the annually rotating position of Editor of the Poetry Column for the New York Times Magazine and Guest Editor of Best American Poetry 2022. *** Otherppl with Brad Listi is a weekly literary podcast featuring in-depth interviews with today's leading writers. Launched in 2011. Books. Literature. Writing. Publishing. Authors. Screenwriters. Etc. Available where podcasts are available: Apple Podcasts, Google Podcasts, Spotify, Stitcher, iHeart Radio, etc. Subscribe to Brad Listi’s email newsletter. Support the show on Patreon Merch @otherppl Instagram  YouTube TikTok Email the show: letters [at] otherppl [dot] com The podcast is a proud affiliate partner of Bookshop, working to support local, independent bookstores. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

J. Ryan Stradal is the bestselling author of the novel Saturday Night at the Lakeside Supper Club, available from Viking / Pamela Dorman Books. Stradal is the author of New York Times bestseller Kitchens of the Great Midwest and national bestseller The Lager Queen of Minnesota. His writing has appeared in The New York Times, The Wall Street Journal, The Guardian, Granta, The Rumpus, and the Los Angeles Review of Books. His debut, Kitchens of the Great Midwest, won the American Booksellers Association Indies Choice Award for Adult Debut Book of the Year. Born and raised in Minnesota, he now lives in California with his family. *** Otherppl with Brad Listi is a weekly literary podcast featuring in-depth interviews with today's leading writers. Launched in 2011. Books. Literature. Writing. Publishing. Authors. Screenwriters. Etc. Available where podcasts are available: Apple Podcasts, Google Podcasts, Spotify, Stitcher, iHeart Radio, etc. Subscribe to Brad Listi’s email newsletter. Support the show on Patreon Merch @otherppl Instagram  YouTube TikTok Email the show: letters [at] otherppl [dot] com The podcast is a proud affiliate partner of Bookshop, working to support local, independent bookstores. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Jinwoo Chong is the author of the debut novel Flux, available from Melville House. It is the official April pick of the book club. Chong received an MFA from Columbia University. His short stories have appeared in The Southern Review, Chicago Quarterly Review, and Salamander. Flux is his first novel. He lives in New York. *** Otherppl with Brad Listi is a weekly literary podcast featuring in-depth interviews with today's leading writers. Launched in 2011. Books. Literature. Writing. Publishing. Authors. Screenwriters. Etc. Available where podcasts are available: Apple Podcasts, Google Podcasts, Spotify, Stitcher, iHeart Radio, etc. Subscribe to Brad Listi’s email newsletter. Support the show on Patreon Merch @otherppl Instagram  YouTube TikTok Email the show: letters [at] otherppl [dot] com The podcast is a proud affiliate partner of Bookshop, working to support local, independent bookstores. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Tara Conklin is the author of the novel Community Board. It was the official March pick of the book club. Conklin was born on St. Croix in the US Virgin Islands and raised in Stockbridge, Massachusetts. She is the author of the New York Times bestsellers The Last Romantics and The House Girl. *** Otherppl with Brad Listi is a weekly literary podcast featuring in-depth interviews with today's leading writers. Launched in 2011. Books. Literature. Writing. Publishing. Authors. Screenwriters. Etc. Available where podcasts are available: Apple Podcasts, Google Podcasts, Spotify, Stitcher, iHeart Radio, etc. Subscribe to Brad Listi’s email newsletter. Support the show on Patreon Merch @otherppl Instagram  YouTube TikTok Email the show: letters [at] otherppl [dot] com The podcast is a proud affiliate partner of Bookshop, working to support local, independent bookstores. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Tiffany Clarke Harrison is the author of the debut novel Blue Hour, available from Soft Skull Press. Harrison graduated from Salisbury University with a BA in English, Creative Writing concentration, and holds an MFA in Creative Writing (Fiction) from Queens University of Charlotte. Writing is a whole-body experience, and her intuitive writing process has helped shape the raw honesty of her stories, and the stories of other authors she's coached. Tiffany lives with her husband and two children in North Carolina. *** Otherppl with Brad Listi is a weekly literary podcast featuring in-depth interviews with today's leading writers. Launched in 2011. Books. Literature. Writing. Publishing. Authors. Screenwriters. Etc. Available where podcasts are available: Apple Podcasts, Google Podcasts, Spotify, Stitcher, iHeart Radio, etc. Subscribe to Brad Listi’s email newsletter. Support the show on Patreon Merch @otherppl Instagram  YouTube TikTok Email the show: letters [at] otherppl [dot] com The podcast is a proud affiliate partner of Bookshop, working to support local, independent bookstores. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

In the latest "Craftwork" episode, a deep-dive conversation about literary agents with Carly Watters, herself a longtime literary agent and the co-host of the popular writing podcast The Shit No One Tells You About Writing. Carly is "very online"—follow her on Instagram and Twitter—with a keen understanding of the digital landscape and the challenges faced by contemporary authors. In this episode, we discuss what you need to know about pitching a literary agent, what agents are looking for in writers—and more. Carly Watters is a SVP and Senior Literary Agent at P.S. Literary. She began her publishing career in London as an assistant at the Darley Anderson Literary, TV and Film Agency. Carly joined Toronto-based P.S. Literary Agency in 2010 and has sold over 100 books during her career. She represents award-winning and bestselling authors in the adult fiction and non-fiction categories, and select children’s books. She is known for her long-term vision for her authors and being an excellent collaborator with a nose for commercial success. She has close ties to publishers in the major markets, is a member of the AALA, and works directly with film agents to option film and TV rights to leading networks and production companies. Her clients’ books have been translated into 40 languages, optioned for TV and film, adapted into podcasts, and have been on every bestseller list from coast to coast, including the New York Times, USA Today, the LA Times, the Washington Post, the Toronto Star, and theGlobe and Mail. Carly is also an annual judge for the Women’s Fiction Writing Association Rising Star Award. *** Otherppl with Brad Listi is a weekly literary podcast featuring in-depth interviews with today's leading writers. Launched in 2011. Books. Literature. Writing. Publishing. Authors. Screenwriters. Etc. Available where podcasts are available: Apple Podcasts, Google Podcasts, Spotify, Stitcher, iHeart Radio, etc. Subscribe to Brad Listi’s email newsletter. Support the show on Patreon Merch @otherppl Instagram  YouTube TikTok Email the show: letters [at] otherppl [dot] com The podcast is a proud affiliate partner of Bookshop, working to support local, independent bookstores. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Clancy Martin is the author of How Not to Kill Yourself: A Portrait of the Suicidal Mind, available from Pantheon. Martin is the acclaimed author of the novel How to Sell (FSG) as well as numerous books on philosophy, and has translated works by Friedrich Nietzsche, Søren Kierkegaard, and other philosophers. A Guggenheim Fellow, his writing has appeared in The New Yorker, New York, The Atlantic, Harper's, Esquire, The New Republic, Lapham's Quarterly, The Believer, and The Paris Review. He is a professor of philosophy at the University of Missouri in Kansas City and Ashoka University in New Delhi. He is the survivor of more than ten suicide attempts and a recovering alcoholic. *** Otherppl with Brad Listi is a weekly literary podcast featuring in-depth interviews with today's leading writers. Launched in 2011. Books. Literature. Writing. Publishing. Authors. Screenwriters. Etc. Available where podcasts are available: Apple Podcasts, Google Podcasts, Spotify, Stitcher, iHeart Radio, etc. Subscribe to Brad Listi’s email newsletter. Support the show on Patreon Merch @otherppl Instagram  YouTube TikTok Email the show: letters [at] otherppl [dot] com The podcast is a proud affiliate partner of Bookshop, working to support local, independent bookstores. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Alex Mar is the author of Seventy Times Seven: A True Story of Murder and Mercy, available from Penguin Press. Mar is the author of Witches of America, which was a New York Times Notable Book and Editors' Pick. Her work has appeared in New York Magazine, Wired, The New York Times Book Review, and The Guardian, among many other outlets, as well as The Best American Magazine Writing. She has been a finalist for the National Magazine Award in Feature Writing, and she is the director of the feature-length documentary American Mystic. She lives in the Hudson Valley and New York City. *** Otherppl with Brad Listi is a weekly literary podcast featuring in-depth interviews with today's leading writers. Launched in 2011. Books. Literature. Writing. Publishing. Authors. Screenwriters. Etc. Available where podcasts are available: Apple Podcasts, Google Podcasts, Spotify, Stitcher, iHeart Radio, etc. Subscribe to Brad Listi’s email newsletter. Support the show on Patreon Merch @otherppl Instagram  YouTube TikTok Email the show: letters [at] otherppl [dot] com The podcast is a proud affiliate partner of Bookshop, working to support local, independent bookstores. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Shannon McLeod is the author of the Nature Trail Stories, available from Thirty West Publishing. McLeod is the author of the novella, Whimsy (Long Day Press, 2021). Her writing has appeared in Tin House, Prairie Schooner, Hobart, and SmokeLong Quarterly, among other publications, and has been nominated for Best Small Fictions, Best of the Net, and featured in Wigleaf Top 50. Born in Detroit, she now lives in central Virginia. *** Otherppl with Brad Listi is a weekly literary podcast featuring in-depth interviews with today's leading writers. Launched in 2011. Books. Literature. Writing. Publishing. Authors. Screenwriters. Etc. Available where podcasts are available: Apple Podcasts, Google Podcasts, Spotify, Stitcher, iHeart Radio, etc. Subscribe to Brad Listi’s email newsletter. Support the show on Patreon Merch @otherppl Instagram  YouTube TikTok Email the show: letters [at] otherppl [dot] com The podcast is a proud affiliate partner of Bookshop, working to support local, independent bookstores. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Madelaine Lucas is the author of the debut novel Thirst for Salt, available from Tin House. Lucas is a senior editor of NOON. Born in 1990, she was raised in Melbourne and Sydney as the daughter of a visual artist and a rock ‘n’ roll musician. In 2015, she moved to New York to complete her MFA in fiction at Columbia University, where she now teaches in the undergraduate and graduate writing programs. Her essays and interviews have appeared in publications such as Paris Review Daily, The Believer, Literary Hub, Catapult, The Lifted Brow and Meanjin, and her fiction has been awarded the Elizabeth Jolley Prize and the Overland/Victoria University Emerging Writer’s Prize. She lives in Brooklyn with her husband and her dog, Pancho. *** Otherppl with Brad Listi is a weekly literary podcast featuring in-depth interviews with today's leading writers. Launched in 2011. Books. Literature. Writing. Publishing. Authors. Screenwriters. Etc. Available where podcasts are available: Apple Podcasts, Google Podcasts, Spotify, Stitcher, iHeart Radio, etc. Subscribe to Brad Listi’s email newsletter. Support the show on Patreon Merch @otherppl Instagram  YouTube TikTok Email the show: letters [at] otherppl [dot] com The podcast is a proud affiliate partner of Bookshop, working to support local, independent bookstores. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Gina Frangello is the guest in the latest 'Craftwork' episode. We talk about the editorial omniscient point of view—what it is, what it can do, and how to use it in your writing. Gina is the author of the acclaimed memoir Blow Your House Down: A Story of Family, Feminism, and Treason (Counterpoint, 2021). Her other books include Every Kind of Wanting, A Life in Men, Slut Lullabies, and My Sister's Continent. Her short fiction, essays, book reviews, and journalism have been published in Ploughshares, The Boston Globe, Chicago Tribune, HuffPost, Fence, Five Chapters, Prairie Schooner, Chicago Reader, and many other publications. She is also the co-founder, with Emily Rapp Black, of Circe Consulting, which provides a variety of services to writers. *** Otherppl with Brad Listi is a weekly literary podcast featuring in-depth interviews with today's leading writers. Launched in 2011. Books. Literature. Writing. Publishing. Authors. Screenwriters. Etc. Available where podcasts are available: Apple Podcasts, Google Podcasts, Spotify, Stitcher, iHeart Radio, etc. Subscribe to Brad Listi’s email newsletter. Support the show on Patreon Merch @otherppl Instagram  YouTube TikTok Email the show: letters [at] otherppl [dot] com The podcast is a proud affiliate partner of Bookshop, working to support local, independent bookstores. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Jennifer Michael Hecht is the author of The Wonder Paradox: Embracing the Weirdness of Existence and the Poetry of Our Lives, available from Farrar, Straus, & Giroux. Hecht, a historian and poet, is the award-winning and bestselling author of the histories Doubt, Stay, The Happiness Myth, and The End of the Soul. Her poetry books include Who Said, The Next Ancient World, and Funny. She earned her PhD in history from Columbia University and teaches in New York City. *** Otherppl with Brad Listi is a weekly literary podcast featuring in-depth interviews with today's leading writers. Launched in 2011. Books. Literature. Writing. Publishing. Authors. Screenwriters. Etc. Available where podcasts are available: Apple Podcasts, Google Podcasts, Spotify, Stitcher, iHeart Radio, etc. Subscribe to Brad Listi’s email newsletter. Support the show on Patreon Merch @otherppl Instagram  YouTube TikTok Email the show: letters [at] otherppl [dot] com The podcast is a proud affiliate partner of Bookshop, working to support local, independent bookstores. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Camonghne Felix is the author of the memoir Dyscalculia: A Love Story of Epic Miscalculation, available from One World Press. Felix, poet and essayist, is the author of Build Yourself a Boat, which was longlisted for the National Book Award in Poetry, shortlisted for the PEN/Open Book Award, and shortlisted for the Lambda Literary Awards. Her poetry has appeared in or is forthcoming from Academy of American Poets, Freeman's, Harvard Review, LitHub, The New Yorker, PEN America, Poetry Magazine, and elsewhere. Her essays have been featured in Vanity Fair, New York, Teen Vogue, and other places. She is a contributing writer at The Cut. *** Otherppl with Brad Listi is a weekly literary podcast featuring in-depth interviews with today's leading writers. Launched in 2011. Books. Literature. Writing. Publishing. Authors. Screenwriters. Etc. Available where podcasts are available: Apple Podcasts, Google Podcasts, Spotify, Stitcher, iHeart Radio, etc. Subscribe to Brad Listi’s email newsletter. Support the show on Patreon Merch @otherppl Instagram  YouTube TikTok Email the show: letters [at] otherppl [dot] com The podcast is a proud affiliate partner of Bookshop, working to support local, independent bookstores. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Tracey Rose Peyton is the author of the debut novel Night Wherever We Go, available from Ecco Books. Peyton received her MFA from the Michener Center for Writers at the University of Texas at Austin. Her short fiction has appeared in Guernica, American Short Fiction, Prairie Schooner, The Best American Short Stories 2021, and other outlets.  *** Otherppl with Brad Listi is a weekly literary podcast featuring in-depth interviews with today's leading writers. Launched in 2011. Books. Literature. Writing. Publishing. Authors. Screenwriters. Etc. Available where podcasts are available: Apple Podcasts, Google Podcasts, Spotify, Stitcher, iHeart Radio, etc. Subscribe to Brad Listi’s email newsletter. Support the show on Patreon Merch @otherppl Instagram  YouTube TikTok Email the show: letters [at] otherppl [dot] com The podcast is a proud affiliate partner of Bookshop, working to support local, independent bookstores. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

V. V. Ganeshananthan is the author of the novel Brotherless Night, available from Random House. Ganeshananthan is the author of Love Marriage, which was longlisted for the Women's Prize and named one of the best books of the year by The Washington Post. Her work has appeared in Granta, The New York Times, and The Best American Nonrequired Reading, among other publications. A former vice president of the South Asian Journalists Association, she has also served on the board of the Asian American Writers' Workshop, and is presently a member of the board of directors of the American Institute for Sri Lankan Studies and the Minnesota Prison Writing Workshop. She teaches in the MFA program at the University of Minnesota and co-hosts the Fiction/Non/Fiction podcast on Literary Hub, which is about the intersection of literature and the news. *** Otherppl with Brad Listi is a weekly literary podcast featuring in-depth interviews with today's leading writers. Launched in 2011. Books. Literature. Writing. Publishing. Authors. Screenwriters. Etc. Available where podcasts are available: Apple Podcasts, Google Podcasts, Spotify, Stitcher, iHeart Radio, etc. Subscribe to Brad Listi’s email newsletter. Support the show on Patreon Merch @otherppl Instagram  YouTube TikTok Email the show: letters [at] otherppl [dot] com The podcast is a proud affiliate partner of Bookshop, working to support local, independent bookstores. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Delia Cai is the author of the debut novel Central Places, available from Ballantine Books. Cai was born in Madison, Wisconsin, and grew up in central Illinois. She is a graduate of the Missouri School of Journalism and her writing has appeared in BuzzFeed, GQ, The Cut, and Catapult. Her media newsletter, Deez Links, has been highlighted in The New York Times, New York magazine, and Fortune. She is currently a senior correspondent at Vanity Fair and lives in Brooklyn.  *** Otherppl with Brad Listi is a weekly literary podcast featuring in-depth interviews with today's leading writers. Launched in 2011. Books. Literature. Writing. Publishing. Authors. Screenwriters. Etc. Available where podcasts are available: Apple Podcasts, Google Podcasts, Spotify, Stitcher, iHeart Radio, etc. Subscribe to Brad Listi’s email newsletter. Support the show on Patreon Merch @otherppl Instagram  YouTube TikTok Email the show: letters [at] otherppl [dot] com The podcast is a proud affiliate partner of Bookshop, working to support local, independent bookstores. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Rebecca Makkai is the author of the novel I Have Some Questions for You, available from Viking Books. Makkai's last novel, The Great Believers, was a finalist for both the Pulitzer Prize and the National Book Award; it was the winner of the ALA Carnegie Medal, the Stonewall Book Award, the Clark Prize, and the Los Angeles Times Book Prize; and it was chosen as one of the Ten Best Books of 2018 by The New York Times. Her other books are the novels The Borrower and The Hundred-Year House, and the collection Music for Wartime--four stories from which appeared in The Best American Short Stories. A 2022 Guggenheim Fellow, Rebecca is on the MFA faculties of the University of Nevada, Reno at Lake Tahoe and Northwestern University, and is Artistic Director of StoryStudio Chicago. *** Otherppl with Brad Listi is a weekly literary podcast featuring in-depth interviews with today's leading writers. Launched in 2011. Books. Literature. Writing. Publishing. Authors. Screenwriters. Etc. Available where podcasts are available: Apple Podcasts, Google Podcasts, Spotify, Stitcher, iHeart Radio, etc. Subscribe to Brad Listi’s email newsletter. Support the show on Patreon Merch @otherppl Instagram  YouTube TikTok Email the show: letters [at] otherppl [dot] com The podcast is a proud affiliate partner of Bookshop, working to support local, independent bookstores. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Chetna Maroo is the author of the debut novel Western Lane, available from Farrar, Straus, & Giroux. Maroo lives in London. Her stories have been published in the Paris Review, the Stinging Fly and the Dublin Review, and she was the recipient of the 2022 Plimpton Prize for Fiction. *** Otherppl with Brad Listi is a weekly literary podcast featuring in-depth interviews with today's leading writers. Launched in 2011. Books. Literature. Writing. Publishing. Authors. Screenwriters. Etc. Available where podcasts are available: Apple Podcasts, Google Podcasts, Spotify, Stitcher, iHeart Radio, etc. Subscribe to Brad Listi’s email newsletter. Support the show on Patreon Merch @otherppl Instagram  YouTube TikTok Email the show: letters [at] otherppl [dot] com The podcast is a proud affiliate partner of Bookshop, working to support local, independent bookstores. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

In today's "Craftwork" episode, a conversation with Courtney Maum about how to write a good book proposal. Courtney is the author of five books, including the groundbreaking publishing guide that Vanity Fair recently named one of the ten best books for writers, Before and After the Book Deal and the memoir The Year of the Horses, chosen by The Today Show as the best read for mental health awareness. The paperback edition publishes this week! A writing coach, executive director of the nonprofit learning collaborative “The Cabins,” and educator, Courtney's mission is to help people hold on to the joy of art-making in a culture obsessed with turning artists into brands. You can sign up for her publishing tips newsletter and online masterclasses at her website. *** Otherppl with Brad Listi is a weekly literary podcast featuring in-depth interviews with today's leading writers. Launched in 2011. Books. Literature. Writing. Publishing. Authors. Screenwriters. Etc. Available where podcasts are available: Apple Podcasts, Google Podcasts, Spotify, Stitcher, iHeart Radio, etc. Subscribe to Brad Listi’s email newsletter. Support the show on Patreon Merch @otherppl Instagram  YouTube TikTok Email the show: letters [at] otherppl [dot] com The podcast is a proud affiliate partner of Bookshop, working to support local, independent bookstores. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Ayobami Adebayo is the author of the novel A Spell of Good Things, available from Knopf. Adebayo was born in Lagos, Nigeria. Her debut novel, Stay with Me, won the 9mobile Prize for Literature, was shortlisted for the Baileys Prize for Women's Fiction, the Wellcome Book Prize, and the Kwani? Manuscript Prize. It has been translated into twenty languages and the French translation was awarded the Prix Les Afriques. Longlisted for the International Dylan Thomas Prize and the International Dublin Literary Award, Stay with Me was a New York Times, Guardian, Chicago Tribune, and NPR Best Book of the Year. *** Otherppl with Brad Listi is a weekly literary podcast featuring in-depth interviews with today's leading writers. Launched in 2011. Books. Literature. Writing. Publishing. Authors. Screenwriters. Etc. Available where podcasts are available: Apple Podcasts, Google Podcasts, Spotify, Stitcher, iHeart Radio, etc. Subscribe to Brad Listi’s email newsletter. Support the show on Patreon Merch @otherppl Instagram  YouTube TikTok Email the show: letters [at] otherppl [dot] com The podcast is a proud affiliate partner of Bookshop, working to support local, independent bookstores. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Charmaine Craig is the author of the novel My Nemesis, available from Grove Press. Craig is the author of the novels Miss Burma, longlisted for the National Book Award and the Women's Prize for Fiction, and The Good Men. Formerly an actor, she teaches in the program in fiction at UC Riverside and lives in Los Angeles. *** Otherppl with Brad Listi is a weekly literary podcast featuring in-depth interviews with today's leading writers. Launched in 2011. Books. Literature. Writing. Publishing. Authors. Screenwriters. Etc. Available where podcasts are available: Apple Podcasts, Google Podcasts, Spotify, Stitcher, iHeart Radio, etc. Subscribe to Brad Listi’s email newsletter. Support the show on Patreon Merch @otherppl Instagram  YouTube TikTok Email the show: letters [at] otherppl [dot] com The podcast is a proud affiliate partner of Bookshop, working to support local, independent bookstores. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Wendell Steavenson is the author of the novel Margot, available from W.W. Norton & Co. It is the official February pick of the TNB Book Club. Steavenson, whose writing has appeared in The New Yorker, the Financial Times, and Granta, is the author of the novel Paris Metro and three books of reporting. Born in New York and raised in London, she now lives in France. *** Otherppl with Brad Listi is a weekly literary podcast featuring in-depth interviews with today's leading writers. Launched in 2011. Books. Literature. Writing. Publishing. Authors. Screenwriters. Etc. Available where podcasts are available: Apple Podcasts, Google Podcasts, Spotify, Stitcher, iHeart Radio, etc. Subscribe to Brad Listi’s email newsletter. Support the show on Patreon Merch @otherppl Instagram  YouTube TikTok Email the show: letters [at] otherppl [dot] com The podcast is a proud affiliate partner of Bookshop, working to support local, independent bookstores. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

In this episode of "Craftwork," author Peter Turchi teaches a lesson on how to use shifting power dynamics to write more dynamic scenes in fiction. Turchi is the author of seven books and the co-editor of three anthologies. His books include (Don't) Stop Me if You've Heard This Before; A Muse and A Maze: Writing as Puzzle, Mystery, and Magic; Maps of the Imagination: The Writer as Cartographer; Suburban Journals: The Sketchbooks, Drawings, and Prints of Charles Ritchie, in collaboration with the artist; a novel, The Girls Next Door; a collection of stories, Magician; and The Pirate Prince, co-written with Cape Cod treasure hunter Barry Clifford, about Clifford’s discovery of the pirate ship Whydah. His short story “Night, Truck, Two Lights Burning” has been published, with images by Charles Ritchie, in a limited edition artist’s book. He has also co-edited, with Andrea Barrett, A Kite in the Wind: Fiction Writers on Their Craft, The Story Behind the Story: 26 Stories by Contemporary Writers and How They Work and, with Charles Baxter, Bringing the Devil to His Knees: The Craft of Fiction and the Writing Life. Turchi’s work has appeared in Tin House, Fiction Writers Review, Ploughshares, Story, The Alaska Quarterly Review, Puerto del Sol, and The Colorado Review, among other journals. His honors include fellowships from the National Endowment for the Arts and the John Simon Guggenheim Memorial Foundation, Washington College’s Sophie Kerr Prize, an Illinois Arts Council Literary Award, North Carolina’s Sir Walter Raleigh Award, and having a quotation from A Muse and a Maze serve as the answer to the New York Times Magazine Sunday acrostic. Born in Baltimore, he earned his BA at Washington College in Chestertown, Maryland, and his MFA at the University of Arizona. He has taught at Northwestern University and Appalachian State University, and has been on the faculty of the Bread Loaf Writers' Conference. For 15 years he directed The MFA Program for Writers at Warren Wilson College in Asheville, North Carolina; at Arizona State University he taught fiction and served as Director of Creative Writing and Director of the Virginia G. Piper Center for Creative Writing. He currently teaches at the University of Houston, and in Warren Wilson’s MFA Program for Writers. Laura, his wife, is a Clinical Professor in English at Arizona State University, where she is curriculum director for “RaceB4Race: Sustaining, Building, Innovating” at the Arizona Center for Medieval and Renaissance Studies; she also co-directs the Shakespeare and Social Justice Project at the Shakespeare Center of Los Angeles. Reed, their son, is a musician (www.reedturchi.com). *** Otherppl with Brad Listi is a weekly literary podcast featuring in-depth interviews with today's leading writers. Launched in 2011. Books. Literature. Writing. Publishing. Authors. Screenwriters. Etc. Available where podcasts are available: Apple Podcasts, Google Podcasts, Spotify, Stitcher, iHeart Radio, etc. Subscribe to Brad Listi’s email newsletter. Support the show on Patreon Merch @otherppl Instagram  YouTube TikTok Email the show: letters [at] otherppl [dot] com The podcast is a proud affiliate partner of Bookshop, working to support local, independent bookstores. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

David S. Wills is the author of High White Notes: The Rise and Fall of Gonzo Journalism, available from Beatdom Books. Wills is the founder and editor of Beatdom literary journal. His other books include Scientologist! William S. Burroughs and the Weird Cult, and World Citizen: Allen Ginsberg as Traveller. He lives in Kampot, Cambodia.  *** Otherppl with Brad Listi is a weekly literary podcast featuring in-depth interviews with today's leading writers. Launched in 2011. Books. Literature. Writing. Publishing. Authors. Screenwriters. Etc. Available where podcasts are available: Apple Podcasts, Google Podcasts, Spotify, Stitcher, iHeart Radio, etc. Subscribe to Brad Listi’s email newsletter. Support the show on Patreon Merch @otherppl Instagram  YouTube TikTok Email the show: letters [at] otherppl [dot] com The podcast is a proud affiliate partner of Bookshop, working to support local, independent bookstores. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Kevin Maloney is the author of the novel The Red-Headed Pilgrim, available from Two Dollar Radio. Maloney is the author of Cult of Loretta and the forthcoming story collection Horse Girl Fever. At times a TJ Maxx associate, grocery clerk, outdoor school instructor, organic farmer, electrician, high school English teacher, and teddy bear salesman, he currently works as a web developer and writer. His short stories have appeared in Hobart, Barrelhouse, Green Mountains Review, and a number of other journals and anthologies. He lives in Portland, Oregon, with his wife Aubrey. *** Otherppl with Brad Listi is a weekly literary podcast featuring in-depth interviews with today's leading writers. Launched in 2011. Books. Literature. Writing. Publishing. Authors. Screenwriters. Etc. Available where podcasts are available: Apple Podcasts, Google Podcasts, Spotify, Stitcher, iHeart Radio, etc. Subscribe to Brad Listi’s email newsletter. Support the show on Patreon Merch @otherppl Instagram  YouTube TikTok Email the show: letters [at] otherppl [dot] com The podcast is a proud affiliate partner of Bookshop, working to support local, independent bookstores. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

In the inaugural episode of Craftwork, a new series from the Otherppl podcast, author Matt Bell teaches a lesson on how to write action in fiction. Bell is the author most recently of the novel Appleseed (a New York Times Notable Book) and the craft book Refuse to Be Done, a guide to novel writing, rewriting, and revision. He is also the author of the novels Scrapper and In the House upon the Dirt Between the Lake and the Woods, as well as the short story collection A Tree or a Person or a Wall, a non-fiction book about the classic video game Baldur's Gate II, and several other titles. His writing has appeared in The New York Times, Esquire, Tin House, Fairy Tale Review, American Short Fiction, Orion, and many other publications. A native of Michigan, he teaches creative writing at Arizona State University. His novel In the House upon the Dirt between the Lake and the Woods was a finalist for the Young Lions Fiction Award and an Indies Choice Adult Book of the Year Honor Recipient, and was selected as the winner of the Paula Anderson Book Award, among other honors. Both In the House and Scrapper were selected by the Library of Michigan as Michigan Notable Books.  *** Otherppl with Brad Listi is a weekly literary podcast featuring in-depth interviews with today's leading writers. Launched in 2011. Books. Literature. Writing. Publishing. Authors. Screenwriters. Etc. Available where podcasts are available: Apple Podcasts, Google Podcasts, Spotify, Stitcher, iHeart Radio, etc. Subscribe to Brad Listi’s email newsletter. Support the show on Patreon Merch @otherppl Instagram  YouTube TikTok Email the show: letters [at] otherppl [dot] com The podcast is a proud affiliate partner of Bookshop, working to support local, independent bookstores. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Matthew Salesses is the author of the novel The Sense of Wonder (Little, Brown & Co.). Salesses' other books include the national bestseller Craft in the Real World, the 2021 finalist for the PEN/Faulkner Award for Fiction Disappear Doppelgänger Disappear, and two other novels. Adopted from Korea, he has written about adoption, race, and Asian American masculinity in The Best American Essays 2020, NPR's Code Switch, the New York Times blog Motherlode, and The Guardian, among other media outlets. BuzzFeed has named him one of 32 Essential Asian American Writers. He lives in New York City, where he is an Assistant Professor of Writing at Columbia University. *** Otherppl with Brad Listi is a weekly literary podcast featuring in-depth interviews with today's leading writers. Launched in 2011. Books. Literature. Writing. Publishing. Authors. Screenwriters. Etc. Available where podcasts are available: Apple Podcasts, Google Podcasts, Spotify, Stitcher, iHeart Radio, etc. Subscribe to Brad Listi’s email newsletter. Support the show on Patreon Merch @otherppl Instagram  YouTube TikTok Email the show: letters [at] otherppl [dot] com The podcast is a proud affiliate partner of Bookshop, working to support local, independent bookstores. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Bruce Wagner is the author of Roar: American Master, available from Arcade Publishing. Wagner has written twelve novels and bestsellers, including the famous "Cellphone Trilogy," I'm Losing You (PEN USA finalist), I'll Let You Go and Still Holding), Dead Stars, The Empty Chair, and the PEN/Faulkner-finalist Chrysanthemum Palace. He wrote the screenplay for David Cronenberg's film Maps to the Stars, for which Julianne Moore won Best Actress at the Cannes Film Festival in 2014. In 1993, Wagner wrote and created the visionary mini-series Wild Palms for producer Oliver Stone and co-wrote (with Ullman) three seasons the acclaimed Tracey Ullman'sState of the Union. He has written essays and articles for the New York Times, Artforum and the New Yorker. *** Otherppl with Brad Listi is a weekly literary podcast featuring in-depth interviews with today's leading writers. Launched in 2011. Books. Literature. Writing. Publishing. Authors. Screenwriters. Etc. Available where podcasts are available: Apple Podcasts, Google Podcasts, Spotify, Stitcher, iHeart Radio, etc. Subscribe to Brad Listi’s email newsletter. Support the show on Patreon Merch @otherppl Instagram  YouTube TikTok Email the show: letters [at] otherppl [dot] com The podcast is a proud affiliate partner of Bookshop, working to support local, independent bookstores. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Kashana Cauley is the author of the debut novel The Survivalists, available from Soft Skull Press. Cauley is a former Midtown antitrust lawyer and Brooklyn resident. She is a writer for the Fox comedy The Great North, a contributing opinion writer for the New York Times, and a GQ contributor. She's written for The Daily Show with Trevor Noah and Pod Save America on HBO as well as The Atlantic, The New Yorker, Pitchfork, and Rolling Stone, and has published fiction in Esquire, Slate, Tin House, and The Chronicles of Now. Kashana now lives in Los Angeles. *** Otherppl with Brad Listi is a weekly literary podcast featuring in-depth interviews with today's leading writers. Launched in 2011. Books. Literature. Writing. Publishing. Authors. Screenwriters. Etc. Available where podcasts are available: Apple Podcasts, Google Podcasts, Spotify, Stitcher, iHeart Radio, etc. Subscribe to Brad Listi’s email newsletter. Support the show on Patreon Merch @otherppl Instagram  YouTube Email the show: letters [at] otherppl [dot] com The podcast is a proud affiliate partner of Bookshop, working to support local, independent bookstores. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Sean Adams is the author of the novel The Thing in the Snow, available from William Morrow. It is the official January pick of the TNB Book Club. Adams is a graduate of Bennington College and the Iowa Writers' Workshop. The Heap is his first novel. *** Otherppl with Brad Listi is a weekly literary podcast featuring in-depth interviews with today's leading writers. Launched in 2011. Books. Literature. Writing. Publishing. Authors. Screenwriters. Etc. Available where podcasts are available: Apple Podcasts, Google Podcasts, Spotify, Stitcher, iHeart Radio, etc. Subscribe to Brad Listi’s email newsletter. Support the show on Patreon Merch @otherppl Instagram  YouTube Email the show: letters [at] otherppl [dot] com The podcast is a proud affiliate partner of Bookshop, working to support local, independent bookstores. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Dorthe Nors is the author of the acclaimed essay collection A Line in the World: A Year on the North Sea Coast (Graywolf Press), translated by Caroline Waight. Nors is the author of the story collections Wild Swims and Karate Chop; four novels, including Mirror, Shoulder, Signal, a finalist for the Man Booker International Prize; and two novellas, collected in So Much for That Winter. *** Otherppl with Brad Listi is a weekly literary podcast featuring in-depth interviews with today's leading writers. Launched in 2011. Books. Literature. Writing. Publishing. Authors. Screenwriters. Etc. Available where podcasts are available: Apple Podcasts, Google Podcasts, Spotify, Stitcher, iHeart Radio, etc. Subscribe to Brad Listi’s email newsletter. Support the show on Patreon Merch @otherppl Instagram  YouTube Email the show: letters [at] otherppl [dot] com The podcast is a proud affiliate partner of Bookshop, working to support local, independent bookstores. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Here we are again. Another year in the books. Another Holiday Spectacular episode of the Otherppl podcast. This year, the Spectacular was recorded at 8 a.m. rather than the traditional evening hour. The reason? I was disorganized and scrambling to assemble a team of people willing to participate in this questionable annual rite. Thankfully, my friends Joseph Grantham, Gene Morgan, and Timothy Willis Sanders bailed me out. They were kind enough to join me for a year-end gathering and some good cheer. Mira Gonzalez was supposed to be there too, but she ate too many edibles the night before and didn't wake up in time to participate. Big thanks to everyone out there who listens to this show and supports this show. It's a labor of love for me, and the show wouldn't exist with you. Here's to another great year, and more great conversations with great writers in 2023.... *** Otherppl with Brad Listi is a weekly literary podcast featuring in-depth interviews with today's leading writers. Launched in 2011. Books. Literature. Writing. Publishing. Authors. Screenwriters. Etc. Available where podcasts are available: Apple Podcasts, Google Podcasts, Spotify, Stitcher, iHeart Radio, etc. Subscribe to Brad Listi’s email newsletter. Support the show on Patreon Merch @otherppl Instagram  YouTube Email the show: letters [at] otherppl [dot] com The podcast is a proud affiliate partner of Bookshop, working to support local, independent bookstores. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Sam Lipsyte is the author of the novel No One Left to Come Looking for You (Simon & Schuster). Lipsyte is the author of the story collections Venus Drive and The Fun Parts and four novels: Hark, The Ask (a New York Times Notable Book), The Subject Steve, and Home Land, which was a New York Times Notable Book and received the Believer Book Award. His fiction has appeared in The New Yorker, The Paris Review, and Best American Short Stories, among other places. The recipient of a Guggenheim fellowship, he lives in New York City and teaches at Columbia University. *** Otherppl with Brad Listi is a weekly literary podcast featuring in-depth interviews with today's leading writers. Launched in 2011. Books. Literature. Writing. Publishing. Authors. Screenwriters. Etc. Available where podcasts are available: Apple Podcasts, Google Podcasts, Spotify, Stitcher, iHeart Radio, etc. Subscribe to Brad Listi’s email newsletter. Support the show on Patreon Merch @otherppl Instagram  YouTube Email the show: letters [at] otherppl [dot] com The podcast is a proud affiliate partner of Bookshop, working to support local, independent bookstores. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Allegra Hyde is the author of the novel Eleutheria, available from Vintage. It is the official December pick of the TNB Book Club. Hyde's debut story collection, Of This New World, won the John Simmons Short Fiction Award through the Iowa Short Fiction Award Series. Her stories and essays have appeared in The Pushcart Prize, Best of the Net, The Best Small Fictions, and The Best American Travel Writing. Originally from New Hampshire, she currently lives in Ohio and teaches at Oberlin College. *** Otherppl with Brad Listi is a weekly literary podcast featuring in-depth interviews with today's leading writers. Launched in 2011. Books. Literature. Writing. Publishing. Authors. Screenwriters. Etc. Available where podcasts are available: Apple Podcasts, Google Podcasts, Spotify, Stitcher, iHeart Radio, etc. Subscribe to Brad Listi’s email newsletter. Support the show on Patreon Merch @otherppl Instagram  YouTube Email the show: letters [at] otherppl [dot] com The podcast is a proud affiliate partner of Bookshop, working to support local, independent bookstores. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Emily Pifer is the author of the award-winning debut memoir The Running Body, available from Autumn House Press. Pifer received her MFA in creative nonfiction from the University of Wyoming and is now a PhD candidate in composition and cultural rhetoric at Syracuse University, where she holds a research fellowship and has taught courses in creative nonfiction and critical research and writing. Her work has appeared in The Fiddlehead, Brevity’s Nonfiction Blog, Women’s Health, Esquire, and elsewhere. The Running Body was chosen by Steve Almond as the winner of the 2021 Autumn House Press Nonfiction Prize. Emily is from West Virginia and Ohio, and she currently lives in Laramie, Wyoming.  *** Otherppl with Brad Listi is a weekly literary podcast featuring in-depth interviews with today's leading writers. Launched in 2011. Books. Literature. Writing. Publishing. Authors. Screenwriters. Etc. Available where podcasts are available: Apple Podcasts, Google Podcasts, Spotify, Stitcher, iHeart Radio, etc. Subscribe to Brad Listi’s email newsletter. Support the show on Patreon Merch @otherppl Instagram  YouTube Email the show: letters [at] otherppl [dot] com The podcast is a proud affiliate partner of Bookshop, working to support local, independent bookstores. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Kyle Spencer is an investigative journalist and the author of Raising Them Right: The Untold Story of America's Ultraconservative Youth Movement and Its Plot for Power (Ecco Books). Spencer is is an award-winning journalist and frequent New York Times contributor. She has written for New York magazine, Slate, the Daily Beast, the Washington Post, Politico, and many other publications. *** Otherppl with Brad Listi is a weekly literary podcast featuring in-depth interviews with today's leading writers. Launched in 2011. Books. Literature. Writing. Publishing. Authors. Screenwriters. Etc. Available where podcasts are available: Apple Podcasts, Google Podcasts, Spotify, Stitcher, iHeart Radio, etc. Subscribe to Brad Listi’s email newsletter. Support the show on Patreon Merch @otherppl Instagram  YouTube Email the show: letters [at] otherppl [dot] com The podcast is a proud affiliate partner of Bookshop, working to support local, independent bookstores. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Pete Hsu is the author of the story collection If I Were the Ocean, I'd Carry You Home, available from Red Hen Press. It is the official November pick of the Otherppl/TNB Book Club. Hsu is also the author of the experimental chapbook There Is A Man (Tolsun Books). His writing has been featured in The Los Angeles Review, The Bare Life Review, F(r)iction Magazine, Faultline Journal of Arts and Letters, The Los Angeles Review of Books, and others. He was a 2017 PEN America Emerging Voices Fellow and the 2017 PEN in the Community Writer in Residence. He was born in Taipei, Taiwan and currently resides in Southern California’s San Gabriel Valley. *** Otherppl with Brad Listi is a weekly literary podcast featuring in-depth interviews with today's leading writers. Launched in 2011. Books. Literature. Writing. Publishing. Authors. Screenwriters. Etc. Available where podcasts are available: Apple Podcasts, Google Podcasts, Spotify, Stitcher, iHeart Radio, etc. Subscribe to Brad Listi’s email newsletter. Support the show on Patreon Merch @otherppl Instagram  YouTube Email the show: letters [at] otherppl [dot] com The podcast is a proud affiliate partner of Bookshop, working to support local, independent bookstores. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Rich Ferguson, Mary Kerr, and S.A. Griffin are the guests for a roundtable discussion of Beat literature and the new anthology Beat Not Beat: An Anthology of California Poets Screwing on the Beat and Post-Beat Tradition (Moon Tide Press). Pushcart Prize-nominated poet Rich Ferguson has shared the stage with Patti Smith, Wanda Coleman, Moby, and other esteemed poets and musicians. Ferguson was selected by the National Beat Poetry Foundation, Inc. (NBPF), to serve as the State of California Beat Poet Laureate (Sept. 2020 to Sept. 2022). He is a featured performer in the film, What About Me? featuring Michael Stipe, Michael Franti, k.d. lang, and others. His poetry and award-winning spoken-word music videos have appeared in numerous anthologies and festivals, and he was a winner in Opium Magazine’s Literary Death Match, L.A. Ferguson is the editor of an anthology of CA poets entitled Beat Not Beat (Moon Tide Press).  Mary Kerr is an Independent Producer of documentaries on the California Beat Era. Her films include The Beach (1996), Venice West and the LA Scene (2011), and San Francisco's Wild History Groove (2011). S.A. Griffin, co-editor of Beat Not Beat and The Outlaw Bible of American Poetry (Firecracker Award) and Carma Bum progenitor lives, loves and works in Los Angeles. In 2010 he created The Poetry Bomb, a former Vietnam era practice bomb converted into an art object filled with over 900 poems from around the world in an effort to inspire civil disagreements culminating in The Poetry Bomb Couch Surfing Across America Tour of Words. Named Best Performance Poet by the LA Weekly, in 2011 he was the first recipient of Beyond Baroque's Distinguished Service Award. His most recent book, Pandemic Soul Music (Punk Hostage Press), will be on bookshelves December 2022. Husband, father and USAF Vietnam era veteran. *** Otherppl with Brad Listi is a weekly literary podcast featuring in-depth interviews with today's leading writers. Launched in 2011. Books. Literature. Writing. Publishing. Authors. Screenwriters. Etc. Available where podcasts are available: Apple Podcasts, Google Podcasts, Spotify, Stitcher, iHeart Radio, etc. Subscribe to Brad Listi’s email newsletter. Support the show on Patreon Merch @otherppl Instagram  YouTube Email the show: letters [at] otherppl [dot] com The podcast is a proud affiliate partner of Bookshop, working to support local, independent bookstores. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Lynn Steger Strong is the author of the novel Flight, available from Mariner Books. Strong's other books include the novels Want and Hold Still. Her nonfiction has appeared in The New York Times, Time, Harper's Bazaar, Los Angeles Times, The Paris Review, The Cut, New York Magazine, and elsewhere. She teaches writing at Catapult and Columbia University, and in 2022-23, she will be the Visiting Fiction Writer at Bates College. *** Otherppl with Brad Listi is a weekly literary podcast featuring in-depth interviews with today's leading writers. Launched in 2011. Books. Literature. Writing. Publishing. Authors. Screenwriters. Etc. Available where podcasts are available: Apple Podcasts, Google Podcasts, Spotify, Stitcher, iHeart Radio, etc. Subscribe to Brad Listi’s email newsletter. Support the show on Patreon Merch @otherppl Instagram  YouTube Email the show: letters [at] otherppl [dot] com The podcast is a proud affiliate partner of Bookshop, working to support local, independent bookstores. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Andrew Sean Greer is a Pulitzer Prize winner and the author of the novel Less is Lost (Little, Brown), a New York Times bestseller. Greer is the author of six works of fiction, including the bestsellers The Confessions of Max Tivoli and Less. Greer has taught at a number of universities, including the Iowa Writers Workshop, been a Today show pick, a New York Public Library Cullman Center Fellow, a judge for the National Book Award, and a winner of the California Book Award and the New York Public Library Young Lions Award. He is the recipient of a NEA grant, a Guggenheim Fellowship, and the 2018 Pulitzer Prize for Fiction. He lives in San Francisco. *** Otherppl with Brad Listi is a weekly literary podcast featuring in-depth interviews with today's leading writers. Launched in 2011. Books. Literature. Writing. Publishing. Authors. Screenwriters. Etc. Available where podcasts are available: Apple Podcasts, Google Podcasts, Spotify, Stitcher, iHeart Radio, etc. Subscribe to Brad Listi’s email newsletter. Support the show on Patreon Merch @otherppl Instagram  YouTube Email the show: letters [at] otherppl [dot] com The podcast is a proud affiliate partner of Bookshop, working to support local, independent bookstores. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Jonathan Escoffery is the author of the debut story collection If I Survive You, available from MCD/FSG. If I Survive You is a National Book Award Nominee, an Andrew Carnegie Medal for Excellence Nominee, a New York Times Editor’s Choice, and an Indie National Bestseller.  Escoffery is the winner of The Paris Review’s 2020 Plimpton Prize for Fiction and is the recipient of a 2020 National Endowment for the Arts (Prose) Literature Fellowship. His story “Under the Ackee Tree” was among the trio that won the Paris Review the 2020 ASME Award for Fiction from the American Society of Magazine Editors, and was subsequently included in The Best American Magazine Writing 2020. His stories have appeared in The Paris Review, Oprah Daily, Electric Literature, Zyzzyva, AGNI, Pleiades, American Short Fiction, Prairie Schooner, Passages North, and elsewhere. Jonathan has taught creative writing and seminars on the writer’s life at Stanford University, the University of Minnesota, the Center for Fiction, Tin House, Writers in Progress, and at GrubStreet in Boston, where, as former staff, he founded the Boston Writers of Color Group, which currently has more than 2,000 members. He has received support and honors from Bread Loaf Writers’ Conference, the Helene Wurlitzer Foundation of New Mexico, Aspen Words, Kimbilio Fiction, the Anderson Center, and elsewhere. He is a graduate of the University of Minnesota’s Creative Writing MFA Program (Fiction) and attends the University of Southern California’s Ph.D. in Creative Writing and Literature Program as a Provost Fellow. He is a 2021-2023 Wallace Stegner Fellow at Stanford University. *** Otherppl with Brad Listi is a weekly literary podcast featuring in-depth interviews with today's leading writers. Launched in 2011. Books. Literature. Writing. Publishing. Authors. Screenwriters. Etc. Available where podcasts are available: Apple Podcasts, Google Podcasts, Spotify, Stitcher, iHeart Radio, etc. Subscribe to Brad Listi’s email newsletter. Support the show on Patreon Merch @otherppl Instagram  YouTube Email the show: letters [at] otherppl [dot] com The podcast is a proud affiliate partner of Bookshop, working to support local, independent bookstores. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

George Saunders is the author of the story collection Liberation Day, available from Random House. Saunders is the #1 New York Times bestselling author of eleven books, including A Swim in a Pond in the Rain; Lincoln in the Bardo, which won the Booker Prize; Congratulations, by the Way; Tenth of December, a finalist for the National Book Award and winner of the inaugural Folio Award; The Braindead Megaphone; and the critically acclaimed collections CivilWarLand in Bad Decline, Pastoralia, and In Persuasion Nation. He teaches in the creative writing program at Syracuse University. *** Otherppl with Brad Listi is a weekly literary podcast featuring in-depth interviews with today's leading writers. Launched in 2011. Books. Literature. Writing. Publishing. Authors. Screenwriters. Etc. Available where podcasts are available: Apple Podcasts, Google Podcasts, Spotify, Stitcher, iHeart Radio, etc. Subscribe to Brad Listi’s email newsletter. Support the show on Patreon Merch @otherppl Instagram  YouTube Email the show: letters [at] otherppl [dot] com The podcast is a proud affiliate partner of Bookshop, working to support local, independent bookstores. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Morgan Talty is the author of the debut story collection Night of the Living Rez, available from Tin House. It is the official October pick of The Nervous Breakdown Book Club. Talty is a citizen of the Penobscot Indian Nation where he grew up. Named one of Narrative's "30 Below 30," Talty's work has appeared in The Georgia Review, Shenandoah, TriQuarterly, Narrative Magazine, LitHub, and elsewhere. He lives in Levant, Maine. *** Otherppl with Brad Listi is a weekly literary podcast featuring in-depth interviews with today's leading writers. Launched in 2011. Books. Literature. Writing. Publishing. Authors. Screenwriters. Etc. Available where podcasts are available: Apple Podcasts, Google Podcasts, Spotify, Stitcher, iHeart Radio, etc. Subscribe to Brad Listi’s email newsletter. Support the show on Patreon Merch @otherppl Instagram  YouTube Email the show: letters [at] otherppl [dot] com The podcast is a proud affiliate partner of Bookshop, working to support local, independent bookstores. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

A.M. Homes is the author of the novel The Unfolding, available from Viking. Homes is the author of thirteen books, among them the best-selling memoir The Mistress' Daughter; the novels This Book Will Save Your Life, The End of Alice, and Jack; and the short story collections Days of Awe, The Safety of Objects and Things You Should Know. She also writes for film and television and teaches in the Creative Writing Program at Princeton University. *** Otherppl with Brad Listi is a weekly literary podcast featuring in-depth interviews with today's leading writers. Launched in 2011. Books. Literature. Writing. Publishing. Authors. Screenwriters. Etc. Available where podcasts are available: Apple Podcasts, Google Podcasts, Spotify, Stitcher, iHeart Radio, etc. Subscribe to Brad Listi’s email newsletter. Support the show on Patreon Merch @otherppl Instagram  YouTube Email the show: letters [at] otherppl [dot] com The podcast is a proud affiliate partner of Bookshop, working to support local, independent bookstores. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Chelsea Martin is the author of the novel Tell Me I'm an Artist, available from Soft Skull Press. Martin is the author of the essay collection Caca Dolce and the novella Mickey, among other books. She lives in Spokane, WA with her husband and child. *** Otherppl with Brad Listi is a weekly literary podcast featuring in-depth interviews with today's leading writers. Launched in 2011. Books. Literature. Writing. Publishing. Authors. Screenwriters. Etc. Available where podcasts are available: Apple Podcasts, Google Podcasts, Spotify, Stitcher, iHeart Radio, etc. Subscribe to Brad Listi’s email newsletter. Support the show on Patreon Merch @otherppl Instagram  YouTube Email the show: letters [at] otherppl [dot] com The podcast is a proud affiliate partner of Bookshop, working to support local, independent bookstores. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Elizabeth Strout is the Pulitzer Prize-winning author of the novel Lucy by the Sea, available from Random House. Strout is the #1 New York Times bestselling author of Oh William!; Olive, Again; Anything Is Possible, winner of the Story Prize; My Name Is Lucy Barton; The Burgess Boys; Olive Kitteridge, winner of the Pulitzer Prize; Abide with Me; and Amy and Isabelle, winner of the Los Angeles Times Art Seidenbaum Award for First Fiction and the Chicago Tribune Heartland Prize. She has also been a finalist for the PEN/Faulkner Award and the Orange Prize in London. She lives in Maine. *** Otherppl with Brad Listi is a weekly literary podcast featuring in-depth interviews with today's leading writers. Launched in 2011. Books. Literature. Writing. Publishing. Authors. Screenwriters. Etc. Available where podcasts are available: Apple Podcasts, Google Podcasts, Spotify, Stitcher, iHeart Radio, etc. Subscribe to Brad Listi’s email newsletter. Support the show on Patreon Merch @otherppl Instagram  YouTube Email the show: letters [at] otherppl [dot] com The podcast is a proud affiliate partner of Bookshop, working to support local, independent bookstores. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Jerry Stahl is the author of the memoir Nein, Nein, Nein!: One Man's Tale of Depression, Psychic Torment, and a Bus Tour of the Holocaust, available from Akashic Books. Stahl has written ten books, including the best-selling memoir Permanent Midnight, made into a movie with Ben Stiller; the essay collection OG Dad; and the novels Pain Killers; I, Fatty; Perv; Plainclothes Naked; Happy Mutant Baby Pills; and Bad Sex on Speed. A Pushcart Prize–winning author, Stahl’s work has appeared in Esquire, Vice, the Believer, Tin House, Los Angeles Review of Books, and the New York Times, among other places. He has written extensively for film and television, including HBO’s Hemingway & Gellhorn, which earned a Writers Guild Award nomination; Bad Boys II; and the cult classic Dr. Caligari; series credits include Maron, CSI, and Escape at Dannemora, for which he received an Emmy nomination. Stahl’s writing has been widely translated, and he has taught with the InsideOUT Writers program for incarcerated youth, edited The Heroin Chronicles for Akashic Books, and participated in the documentary series, San Quentin Film School. He has two daughters, and lives with artist Zoe Hansen.  *** Otherppl with Brad Listi is a weekly literary podcast featuring in-depth interviews with today's leading writers. Launched in 2011. Books. Literature. Writing. Publishing. Authors. Screenwriters. Etc. Available where podcasts are available: Apple Podcasts, Google Podcasts, Spotify, Stitcher, iHeart Radio, etc. Subscribe to Brad Listi’s email newsletter. Support the show on Patreon Merch @otherppl Instagram  YouTube Email the show: letters [at] otherppl [dot] com The podcast is a proud affiliate partner of Bookshop, working to support local, independent bookstores. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Luke Dani Blue is the author of the debut story collection Pretend It's My Body, available from The Feminist Press. It is the official September pick of The Nervous Breakdown Book Club. Blue’s stories have appeared in the Colorado Review, Crab Orchard Review, and have been included on the list of the year's most distinguished stories in Best American Short Stories 2016. Originally from Michigan, Luke (they/them) is a two-time college dropout and time-traveling Victorian invalid who resides most reliably on the internet. They are also an astrologer.  *** Otherppl with Brad Listi is a weekly literary podcast featuring in-depth interviews with today's leading writers. Launched in 2011. Books. Literature. Writing. Publishing. Authors. Screenwriters. Etc. Available where podcasts are available: Apple Podcasts, Google Podcasts, Spotify, Stitcher, iHeart Radio, etc. Subscribe to Brad Listi’s email newsletter. Support the show on Patreon Merch @otherppl Instagram  YouTube Email the show: letters [at] otherppl [dot] com The podcast is a proud affiliate partner of Bookshop, working to support local, independent bookstores. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Timothy Willis Sanders is the author of the story collection Modern Massacres (Publishing Genius). Modern Massacres is Timothy Willis Sanders’s third book and second collection of short stories. In the vein of Orange Juice (his first collection with PGP, from 2010), stories like “John Lennon,” “Officer Walter,” and “Glasses” examine contemporary life in a familiar, canny way. Humorous and full of keen observations, Sanders writes with care and respect for his characters, from the innocent kids to the flawed adults, all of whom are looking for connection and approval—or at least some kindness in a world that isn’t always easy to live in. *** Otherppl with Brad Listi is a weekly literary podcast featuring in-depth interviews with today's leading writers. Launched in 2011. Books. Literature. Writing. Publishing. Authors. Screenwriters. Etc. Available where podcasts are available: Apple Podcasts, Google Podcasts, Spotify, Stitcher, iHeart Radio, etc. Subscribe to Brad Listi’s email newsletter. Support the show on Patreon Merch @otherppl Instagram  YouTube Email the show: letters [at] otherppl [dot] com The podcast is a proud affiliate partner of Bookshop, working to support local, independent bookstores. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Melissa Chadburn is the author of the debut novel A Tiny Upward Shove, available from Farrar, Straus, & Giroux. Chadburn's writing has appeared in The Los Angeles Times, The New York Times Book Review, The New York Review of Books, The Paris Review Daily, The Best American Food Writing, and many other publications. Her extensive reporting on the child welfare system appears in the Netflix docuseries The Trials of Gabriel Fernandez. Melissa is a worker lover and through her own labor and literary citizenship strives to upend economic violence. Her mother taught her how to sharpen a pencil with a knife and she's basically been doing that ever since. She is a Ph.D. candidate in Creative Writing at the University of Southern California and lives in greater Los Angeles. *** Otherppl with Brad Listi is a weekly literary podcast featuring in-depth interviews with today's leading writers. Launched in 2011. Books. Literature. Writing. Publishing. Authors. Screenwriters. Etc. Available where podcasts are available: Apple Podcasts, Google Podcasts, Spotify, Stitcher, iHeart Radio, etc. Subscribe to Brad Listi’s email newsletter. Support the show on Patreon Merch @otherppl Instagram  YouTube Email the show: letters [at] otherppl [dot] com The podcast is a proud affiliate partner of Bookshop, working to support local, independent bookstores. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Nada Alic is the author of the debut story collection Bad Thoughts, available from Vintage. It is the official August pick of The Nervous Breakdown Book Club.  Alic's story "The Intruder" was shortlisted for the CBC Short Fiction Prize 2019. "My New Life" was published in No Tokens Journal. She lives in Los Angeles. *** Otherppl with Brad Listi is a weekly literary podcast featuring in-depth interviews with today's leading writers. Launched in 2011. Books. Literature. Writing. Publishing. Authors. Screenwriters. Etc. Available where podcasts are available: Apple Podcasts, Google Podcasts, Spotify, Stitcher, iHeart Radio, etc. Subscribe to Brad Listi’s email newsletter. Support the show on Patreon Merch @otherppl Instagram  YouTube Email the show: letters [at] otherppl [dot] com The podcast is a proud affiliate partner of Bookshop, working to support local, independent bookstores. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Ingrid Rojas Contreras is the author of the memoir The Man Who Could Move Clouds, available from Doubleday. Contreras was born and raised in Bogotá, Colombia. Her debut novel Fruit of the Drunken Tree was the silver medal winner in First Fiction from the California Book Awards, and a New York Times editor's choice. Her essays and short stories have appeared in the New York Times Magazine, The Believer, and Zyzzyva, among others. She lives in California. *** Otherppl with Brad Listi is a weekly literary podcast featuring in-depth interviews with today's leading writers. Launched in 2011. Books. Literature. Writing. Publishing. Authors. Screenwriters. Etc. Available where podcasts are available: Apple Podcasts, Google Podcasts, Spotify, Stitcher, iHeart Radio, etc. Subscribe to Brad Listi’s email newsletter. Support the show on Patreon Merch @otherppl Instagram  YouTube Email the show: letters [at] otherppl [dot] com The podcast is a proud affiliate partner of Bookshop, working to support local, independent bookstores. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Lynne Tillman is the author of Mothercare: On Obligation, Love, Death, and Ambivalence, available from Soft Skull. Tillman is a novelist, short story writer, and cultural critic. Her novels are Haunted Houses; Motion Sickness; Cast in Doubt; No Lease on Life, a finalist for the National Book Critics Circle Award; American Genius, A Comedy, and Men and Apparitions. Her nonfiction books include The Velvet Years: Warhol's Factory 1965-1967, with photographs by Stephen Shore; Bookstore: The Life and Times of Jeannette Watson and Books & Co.; and What Would Lynne Tillman Do?, a finalist for the National Book Critics Circle Award in Criticism. She is the recipient of a Guggenheim Foundation Fellowship and The Andy Warhol Foundation Arts Writers Grant. Tillman is Professor/Writer-in-Residence in the Department of English at The University of Albany, and lives in New York with bass player David Hofstra. *** Otherppl with Brad Listi is a weekly literary podcast featuring in-depth interviews with today's leading writers. Launched in 2011. Books. Literature. Writing. Publishing. Authors. Screenwriters. Etc. Available where podcasts are available: Apple Podcasts, Google Podcasts, Spotify, Stitcher, iHeart Radio, etc. Subscribe to Brad Listi’s email newsletter. Support the show on Patreon Merch @otherppl Instagram  YouTube Email the show: letters [at] otherppl [dot] com The podcast is a proud affiliate partner of Bookshop, working to support local, independent bookstores. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Isaac Fitzgerald is the author of the memoir-in-essays Dirtbag, Massachusetts: A Confessional, available from Bloomsbury. Fitzgerald appears frequently on The Today Show and is the author of the bestselling children's book How to Be a Pirate as well as the co-author of Pen & Ink and Knives & Ink (winner of an IACP Award). His writing has appeared in the New York Times, the Guardian, the Best American Nonrequired Reading, and numerous other publications. He lives in Brooklyn. *** Otherppl with Brad Listi is a weekly literary podcast featuring in-depth interviews with today's leading writers. Launched in 2011. Books. Literature. Writing. Publishing. Authors. Screenwriters. Etc. Available where podcasts are available: Apple Podcasts, Google Podcasts, Spotify, Stitcher, iHeart Radio, etc. Subscribe to Brad Listi’s email newsletter. Support the show on Patreon Merch @otherppl Instagram  YouTube Email the show: letters [at] otherppl [dot] com The podcast is a proud affiliate partner of Bookshop, working to support local, independent bookstores. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

David Koepp is the author of the novel Aurora, available from Harper. It is the official July pick of the TNB Book Club. Koepp has written or co-written the screenplays for more than thirty films, including Carlito's Way (1993), Jurassic Park (1993), Mission: Impossible (1996), Panic Room (2002), Spider-Man (2002), War of the Worlds (2005), Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull (2008), Angels & Demons (2009), and Kimi (2022). As a director, his work includes the films The Trigger Effect (1996), Stir of Echoes (1999), Secret Window (2004), Ghost Town (2007), Premium Rush (2012), and You Should Have Left (2020). Ghost Town and Premium Rush were co-written with John Kamps. Koepp’s first novel, Cold Storage, was published in 2019. His story "Yard Work," narrated by Kevin Bacon, was released by Audible Originals in July 2020. He was born in Pewaukee, Wisconsin and graduated from UCLA’s film school in 1986. He lives in New York City with his wife and children. *** Otherppl with Brad Listi is a weekly literary podcast featuring in-depth interviews with today's leading writers. Launched in 2011. Books. Literature. Writing. Publishing. Authors. Screenwriters. Etc. Available where podcasts are available: Apple Podcasts, Google Podcasts, Spotify, Stitcher, iHeart Radio, etc. Subscribe to Brad Listi’s email newsletter. Support the show on Patreon Merch @otherppl Instagram  YouTube Email the show: letters [at] otherppl [dot] com The podcast is a proud affiliate partner of Bookshop, working to support local, independent bookstores. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Teddy Wayne is the author of the novel The Great Man Theory, available from Bloomsbury. Wayne's other novels include Apartment, Loner, The Love Song of Jonny Valentine, and Kapitoil. He is the winner of a Whiting Writers’ Award and an NEA Creative Writing Fellowship as well as a finalist for the Young Lions Fiction Award, PEN/Bingham Prize, and Dayton Literary Peace Prize. A former columnist for the New York Times and McSweeney’s and a frequent contributor to The New Yorker, he has taught at Columbia University and Washington University in St. Louis. He has developed films and series from his novels with HBO, MGM Television, and Mad Dog Films. He lives in Brooklyn with his wife, the writer Kate Greathead, and their children. *** Otherppl with Brad Listi is a weekly literary podcast featuring in-depth interviews with today's leading writers. Launched in 2011. Books. Literature. Writing. Publishing. Authors. Screenwriters. Etc. Available where podcasts are available: Apple Podcasts, Google Podcasts, Spotify, Stitcher, iHeart Radio, etc. Subscribe to Brad Listi’s email newsletter. Support the show on Patreon Merch @otherppl Instagram  YouTube Email the show: letters [at] otherppl [dot] com The podcast is a proud affiliate partner of Bookshop, working to support local, independent bookstores. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Chantal V. Johnson is the author of the debut novel Post-Traumatic, available from Little, Brown. Post-Traumatic was named a Best Debut Novel of 2022 by Debutiful and hailed as a "sharp psychological novel" by The New Yorker. Chantal graduated from Stanford Law School and worked as a tenant lawyer for over seven years. A 2018 Center for Fiction Emerging Writers Fellow, she lives in New York. *** Otherppl with Brad Listi is a weekly literary podcast featuring in-depth interviews with today's leading writers. Launched in 2011. Books. Literature. Writing. Publishing. Authors. Screenwriters. Etc. Available where podcasts are available: Apple Podcasts, Google Podcasts, Spotify, Stitcher, iHeart Radio, etc. Subscribe to Brad Listi’s email newsletter. Support the show on Patreon Merch @otherppl Instagram  YouTube Email the show: letters [at] otherppl [dot] com The podcast is a proud affiliate partner of Bookshop, working to support local, independent bookstores. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Austin Kleon is the New York Times bestselling author of a trilogy of books on creativity in the digital age, including Steal Like an Artist—now celebrating its 10th year in print—Show Your Work!, and Keep Going. Kleon is also the author of Newspaper Blackout, a collection of poems made by redacting the newspaper with a permanent marker. His books have been translated into dozens of languages and have sold over a million copies worldwide. He’s been featured on NPR’s Morning Edition, PBS Newshour, and in The New York Times and The Wall Street Journal. New York Magazine called his work “brilliant,” The Atlantic called him “positively one of the most interesting people on the Internet,” and The New Yorker said his poems “resurrect the newspaper when everybody else is declaring it dead.” He speaks for organizations such as Pixar, Google, SXSW, TEDx, and The Economist. In previous lives, he worked as a librarian, a web designer, and an advertising copywriter. He lives in Austin, Texas, with his wife and sons. Visit him online at www.austinkleon.com. *** Otherppl with Brad Listi is a weekly literary podcast featuring in-depth interviews with today's leading writers. Launched in 2011. Books. Literature. Writing. Publishing. Authors. Screenwriters. Etc. Available where podcasts are available: Apple Podcasts, Google Podcasts, Spotify, Stitcher, iHeart Radio, etc. Subscribe to Brad Listi’s email newsletter. Support the show on Patreon Merch @otherppl Instagram  YouTube Email the show: letters [at] otherppl [dot] com The podcast is a proud affiliate partner of Bookshop, working to support local, independent bookstores. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Marcy Dermansky is the author of the novel Hurricane Girl, available from Knopf. Dermansky is the author of the critically acclaimed novels Very Nice, The Red Car, Bad Marie, and Twins. She has received fellowships from The MacDowell Colony and The Edward F. Albee Foundation. She lives with her daughter in Montclair, New Jersey. *** Otherppl with Brad Listi is a weekly literary podcast featuring in-depth interviews with today's leading writers. Launched in 2011. Books. Literature. Writing. Publishing. Authors. Screenwriters. Etc. Available where podcasts are available: Apple Podcasts, Google Podcasts, Spotify, Stitcher, iHeart Radio, etc. Subscribe to Brad Listi’s email newsletter. Support the show on Patreon Merch @otherppl Instagram  YouTube Email the show: letters [at] otherppl [dot] com The podcast is a proud affiliate partner of Bookshop, working to support local, independent bookstores. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Sloane Crosley is the author of the novel Cult Classic, available from MCD/FSG. Crosley is the author of The New York Times bestselling essay collections, I Was Told There’d Be Cake (a 2009 finalist for The Thurber Prize for American Humor) and How Did You Get This Number, as well as Look Alive Out There (a 2019 finalist for The Thurber Prize for American Humor) and the bestselling novel, The Clasp. She served as editor of The Best American Travel Writing series and is featured in The Library of America's 50 Funniest American Writers, The Best American Nonrequired Reading, Phillip Lopate’s The Contemporary American Essay and others. She was the inaugural columnist for The New York Times Op-Ed "Townies" series, a contributing editor at Interview Magazine, and a columnist for The Village Voice, Vanity Fair, The Independent, Black Book, Departures and The New York Observer. She is a contributing editor at Vanity Fair. Her next nonfiction book, Grief Is for People, will be published in 2023. She lives in New York City. *** Otherppl with Brad Listi is a weekly literary podcast featuring in-depth interviews with today's leading writers. Launched in 2011. Books. Literature. Writing. Publishing. Authors. Screenwriters. Etc. Available where podcasts are available: Apple Podcasts, Google Podcasts, Spotify, Stitcher, iHeart Radio, etc. Subscribe to Brad Listi’s email newsletter. Support the show on Patreon Merch @otherppl Instagram  YouTube Email the show: letters [at] otherppl [dot] com The podcast is a proud affiliate partner of Bookshop, working to support local, independent bookstores. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Abbigail Nguyen Rosewood is the author of the novel Constellations of Eve, available from DVAN/UTTP. It is the official June pick of The Nervous Breakdown Book Club. Rosewood was born in Vietnam, where she lived until the age of twelve. Her debut novel, If I Had Two Lives, has been hailed as "a tale of staggering artistry" by the Los Angeles Review of Books and "a lyrical, exquisitely written novel" by the New York Journal of Books. The New Yorker called it "a dangerous fantasy world" that "double haunts the novel." Her short fiction and essays can be found at Electric Lit, LitHub, Catapult, The Southampton Review, The Brooklyn Review, Columbia Journal, and The Adroit Journal, among others. In 2019, her hybrid writing was featured in a multimedia art and poetry exhibit at Eccles Gallery. Her fiction has been nominated for the Pushcart Prize, Best of the Net, and Best American Short Story 2020. She is the founder of Neon Door, a forthcoming immersive literary exhibit. *** Otherppl with Brad Listi is a weekly literary podcast featuring in-depth interviews with today's leading writers. Launched in 2011. Books. Literature. Writing. Publishing. Authors. Screenwriters. Etc. Available where podcasts are available: Apple Podcasts, Google Podcasts, Spotify, Stitcher, iHeart Radio, etc. Subscribe to Brad Listi’s email newsletter. Support the show on Patreon Merch @otherppl Instagram  YouTube Email the show: letters [at] otherppl [dot] com The podcast is a proud affiliate partner of Bookshop, working to support local, independent bookstores. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Hernan Diaz is the author of the novel Trust, available from Riverhead.  A finalist for the Pulitzer Prize for fiction and the PEN/Faulkner Award, Diaz's work has been translated into more than twenty languages. He has published stories and essays in The Paris Review, Granta, Playboy, The Yale Review, McSweeney’s, and elsewhere. His first novel, In the Distance, was the winner of the Saroyan International Prize, the Cabell Award, the Prix Page America, and the New American Voices Award, among other distinctions. It was also a Publishers Weekly Top 10 Book of the Year and one of Lit Hub’s 20 Best Novels of the Decade. He is the recipient of a Guggenheim Fellowship, a Whiting Award, and fellowships from the New York Public Library’s Cullman Center for Scholars and Writers, the The Rockefeller Foundation Bellagio Center, MacDowell, Yaddo, and the Ingmar Bergman Estate. He holds a PhD from NYU, edits an academic journal at Columbia University, and is also the author of Borges, between History and Eternity. * * *  Otherppl with Brad Listi is a weekly literary podcast featuring in-depth interviews with today's leading writers. Launched in 2011. Books. Literature. Writing. Publishing. Authors. Screenwriters. Etc. Available where podcasts are available: Apple Podcasts, Google Podcasts, Spotify, Stitcher, iHeart Radio, etc. Subscribe to Brad Listi’s email newsletter. Support the show on Patreon Merch @otherppl Instagram  YouTube Email the show: letters [at] otherppl [dot] com The podcast is a proud affiliate partner of Bookshop, working to support local, independent bookstores. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Kathryn Miles is the author of Trailed: One Woman's Quest to Solve the Shenandoah Murders (Algonquin Books). Miles is the author of five books. Her essays and articles have appeared in publications such as Audubon, Best American Essays, Best American Sports Writing, the Boston Globe, the New York Times, Outside, Politico, and Time. A contributing editor at Down East magazine, Miles also serves as a scholar-in-residence for the Maine Humanities Council and as a faculty member in several MFA programs. Her website is www.kathrynmiles.net. *** Otherppl with Brad Listi is a weekly literary podcast featuring in-depth interviews with today's leading writers. Launched in 2011. Books. Literature. Writing. Publishing. Authors. Screenwriters. Etc. Available where podcasts are available: Apple Podcasts, Google Podcasts, Spotify, Stitcher, iHeart Radio, etc. Subscribe to Brad Listi’s email newsletter. Support the show on Patreon Merch @otherppl Instagram  YouTube Email the show: letters [at] otherppl [dot] com The podcast is a proud affiliate partner of Bookshop, working to support local, independent bookstores. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Mary Laura Philpott is the author of the memoir-in-essays Bomb Shelter: Love, Time, and Other Explosives (Atria Books). It was the official April pick of the TNB Book Club. Philpott, nationally bestselling author of I Miss You When I Blink, writes about the overlap of the absurd and the profound in everyday life. Her writing has been featured by The New York Times, The Washington Post, and The Atlantic, among many other publications. A former bookseller, she also hosted an interview program on Nashville Public Television for several years. Mary Laura lives in Nashville, Tennessee, with her family. *** Otherppl with Brad Listi is a weekly literary podcast featuring in-depth interviews with today's leading writers. Launched in 2011. Books. Literature. Writing. Publishing. Authors. Screenwriters. Etc. Available where podcasts are available: Apple Podcasts, Spotify, Stitcher, iHeart Radio, etc. Subscribe to Brad Listi’s email newsletter. Support the show on Patreon Merch @otherppl Instagram  YouTube Email the show: letters [at] otherppl [dot] com The podcast is a proud affiliate partner of Bookshop, working to support local, independent bookstores. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Brad Listi is the author of the novel Be Brief and Tell Them Everything, available from Ig. Listi was born in Milwaukee. His other books include the novel Attention. Deficit. Disorder., an LA Times bestseller, and Board, a work of nonfiction collage, co-authored with Justin Benton. He is the founding editor of The Nervous Breakdown, an online literary magazine, and in 2011 he launched the Otherppl podcast, which features in-depth interviews with today's leading writers. He lives in Los Angeles.  Today's interview is conducted by guest host Steve Almond. *** Otherppl with Brad Listi is a weekly literary podcast featuring in-depth interviews with today's leading writers. Launched in 2011. Books. Literature. Writing. Publishing. Authors. Screenwriters. Etc. Available where podcasts are available: Apple Podcasts, Spotify, Stitcher, iHeart Radio, etc. Subscribe to Brad Listi’s email newsletter. Support the show on Patreon Merch @otherppl Instagram  YouTube Email the show: letters [at] otherppl [dot] com The podcast is a proud affiliate partner of Bookshop, working to support local, independent bookstores. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Darrel Alejandro Holnes is the author of the poetry collection Stepmotherland (University of Notre Dame Press). It is the winner of the Andres Montoya Poetry Prize. Holnes is an Afro-Panamanian American writer and is the recipient of a National Endowment for the Arts Literature Fellowship in Creative Writing (Poetry). His poems have previously appeared in the American Poetry Review, Poetry, Callaloo, Best American Experimental Writing, and elsewhere. Holnes is a Cave Canem and CantoMundo fellow who has earned scholarships to the Bread Loaf Writers' Conference, Fine Arts Work Center in Provincetown, Postgraduate Writers Conference at Vermont College of Fine Arts, and residencies nationwide, including a residency at MacDowell. His poem "Praise Song for My Mutilated World" won the C. P. Cavafy Poetry Prize from Poetry International. He is an assistant professor of English at Medgar Evers College, a senior college of the City University of New York (CUNY), where he teaches creative writing and playwriting, and a faculty member of the Gallatin School of Individualized Study at New York University. *** Otherppl with Brad Listi is a weekly literary podcast featuring in-depth interviews with today's leading writers. Launched in 2011. Books. Literature. Writing. Publishing. Authors. Screenwriters. Etc. Available where podcasts are available: Apple Podcasts, Spotify, Stitcher, iHeart Radio, etc. Subscribe to Brad Listi’s email newsletter. Support the show on Patreon Merch @otherppl Instagram  YouTube Email the show: letters [at] otherppl [dot] com The podcast is a proud affiliate partner of Bookshop, working to support local, independent bookstores. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Steve Almond is the author of the debut novel All the Secrets of the World, available from Zando. Almond is the author of ten books of fiction and nonfiction, including the New York Times bestsellers Candyfreak and Against Football. He teaches Creative Writing at the Neiman Fellowship at Harvard and Wesleyan, as well as Hugo House, Grub Street, and numerous literary conferences. His essays and reviews have been widely published in The New York Times Magazine, The New York Times, The Boston Globe, The Los Angeles Times, GQ, The Wall Street Journal, Poets & Writers, Tin House, and Ploughshares. His journalism has received numerous awards including the top national prize for feature writing from the Society of Professional Journalists. His short stories have been anthologized in The Best American Short Stories, Best American Mysteries, Best American Erotica, and The Pushcart Prize. He serves as a literary correspondent for WBUR and appears on numerous podcasts. He lives in Arlington, Massachusetts. *** Otherppl with Brad Listi is a weekly literary podcast featuring in-depth interviews with today's leading writers. Launched in 2011. Books. Literature. Writing. Publishing. Authors. Screenwriters. Etc. Available where podcasts are available: Apple Podcasts, Spotify, Stitcher, iHeart Radio, etc. Subscribe to Brad Listi’s email newsletter. Support the show on Patreon Merch @otherppl Instagram  YouTube Email the show: letters [at] otherppl [dot] com The podcast is a proud affiliate partner of Bookshop, working to support local, independent bookstores. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Caren Beilin is the author of the novel Revenge of the Scapegoat, available from Dorothy. Beilin's other books are Blackfishing the IUD (Wolfman Books, 2019), Spain (Rescue Press, 2018), The University of Pennsylvania (Noemi Press, 2014), and the chapbook Americans, Guests, or Us (Diagram/New Michigan Press, 2012). Shorter prose appears in Fence, Territory, Dreginald, and The Offing. She is an assistant professor of creative writing at the Massachusetts College of Liberal Arts and lives close by, in Vermont.  *** Otherppl with Brad Listi is a weekly literary podcast featuring in-depth interviews with today's leading writers. Launched in 2011. Books. Literature. Writing. Publishing. Authors. Screenwriters. Etc. Available where podcasts are available: Apple Podcasts, Spotify, Stitcher, iHeart Radio, etc. Subscribe to Brad Listi’s email newsletter. Support the show on Patreon Merch @otherppl Instagram  YouTube Email the show: letters [at] otherppl [dot] com The podcast is a proud affiliate partner of Bookshop, working to support local, independent bookstores. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Today on the program, a special sneak preview of my new novel, Be Brief and Tell Them Everything, available now for preorder and wherever books are sold on May 10, 2022 in trade paperback and audiobook formats. This is an excerpt from the audiobook edition, read by yours truly. It is the first time any part of the novel has been made available to the public. An exclusive offering for listeners of the Otherppl podcast. Thanks for tuning in. *** Otherppl with Brad Listi is a weekly literary podcast featuring in-depth interviews with today's leading writers. Launched in 2011. Books. Literature. Writing. Publishing. Authors. Screenwriters. Etc. Available where podcasts are available: Apple Podcasts, Spotify, Stitcher, iHeart Radio, etc. Subscribe to Brad Listi’s email newsletter. Support the show on Patreon Merch @otherppl Instagram  YouTube Email the show: letters [at] otherppl [dot] com The podcast is a proud affiliate partner of Bookshop, working to support local, independent bookstores. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Zac Smith is the author of the debut story collection Everything is Totally Fine, available from Muumuu House. Smith's other books includeTwo Million Shirts (2021), of which he is co-author, and a poetry collection entitled 50 Barn Poems (2019). He lives in Massachusetts. *** Otherppl with Brad Listi is a weekly literary podcast featuring in-depth interviews with today's leading writers. Launched in 2011. Books. Literature. Writing. Publishing. Authors. Screenwriters. Etc. Available where podcasts are available: Apple Podcasts, Spotify, Stitcher, iHeart Radio, etc. Subscribe to Brad Listi’s email newsletter. Support the show on Patreon Merch @otherppl Instagram  YouTube Email the show: letters [at] otherppl [dot] com The podcast is a proud affiliate partner of Bookshop, working to support local, independent bookstores. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Julia May Jonas is the author of the debut novel Vladimir, available from Avid Reader Press. Jonas is a playwright and teaches theater at Skidmore College. She holds an MFA in playwriting from Columbia University and lives in Brooklyn with her family. Vladimir is her debut novel. *** Otherppl with Brad Listi is a weekly literary podcast featuring in-depth interviews with today's leading writers. Launched in 2011. Books. Literature. Writing. Publishing. Authors. Screenwriters. Etc. Available where podcasts are available: Apple Podcasts, Spotify, Stitcher, iHeart Radio, etc. Subscribe to Brad Listi’s email newsletter. Support the show on Patreon Merch @otherppl Instagram YouTube Email the show: letters [at] otherppl [dot] com The podcast is a proud affiliate partner of Bookshop, working to support local, independent bookstores. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Anakana Schofield is the author of Bina: A Novel in Warnings, a New York Review Book. Schofield is an award-winning Irish-Canadian writer of fiction, essays, and literary criticism. Her previous novels are Malarky (2012) and Martin John (2015). The UK edition of Bina was shortlisted for the Goldsmiths Prize 2020. She lives in Vancouver, British Columbia. *** Otherppl with Brad Listi is a weekly literary podcast featuring in-depth interviews with today's leading writers. Launched in 2011. Books. Literature. Writing. Publishing. Authors. Screenwriters. Etc. Available where podcasts are available: Apple Podcasts, Spotify, Stitcher, iHeart Radio, etc. Subscribe to Brad Listi’s email newsletter. Support the show on Patreon Merch @otherppl Instagram  YouTube Email the show: letters [at] otherppl [dot] com The podcast is a proud affiliate partner of Bookshop, working to support local, independent bookstores. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Kate Folk is the author of the debut story collection Out There, available from Random House. Folk has written for publications including The New Yorker, The New York Times Magazine, Granta, McSweeney's Quarterly Concern, and Zyzzyva. She's received support from the Headlands Center for the Arts, MacDowell, the Vermont Studio Center, and the Virginia Center for the Creative Arts. Recently, she was a Wallace Stegner Fellow in fiction at Stanford University. She lives in San Francisco.  *** Otherppl with Brad Listi is a weekly literary podcast featuring in-depth interviews with today's leading writers. Launched in 2011. Books. Literature. Writing. Publishing. Authors. Screenwriters. Etc. Available where podcasts are available: Apple Podcasts, Spotify, Stitcher, iHeart Radio, etc. Subscribe to Brad Listi’s email newsletter. Support the show on Patreon Merch @otherppl Instagram  YouTube Email the show: letters [at] otherppl [dot] com The podcast is a proud affiliate partner of Bookshop, working to support local, independent bookstores. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Mike Meginnis is the author of the novel Drowning Practice (Ecco Books). It is the official March pick of The Nervous Breakdown Book Club. Meginnis is also the author of the novel Fat Man and Little Boy. His fiction has appeared in The Best American Short Stories 2012, Unstuck, The Collagist, PANK, Hayden's Ferry Review, and many other outlets. He lives and works in Iowa City. *** Otherppl with Brad Listi is a weekly literary podcast featuring in-depth interviews with today's leading writers. Launched in 2011. Books. Literature. Writing. Publishing. Authors. Screenwriters. Etc. Available where podcasts are available: Apple Podcasts, Spotify, Stitcher, iHeart Radio, etc. Subscribe to Brad Listi’s email newsletter. Support the show on Patreon Merch @otherppl Instagram  YouTube Email the show: letters [at] otherppl [dot] com The podcast is a proud affiliate partner of Bookshop, working to support local, independent bookstores. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Lili Anolik is the author of Hollywood's Eve: Eve Babitz and the Secret History of L.A., available from Scribner. Anolik is a contributing editor at Vanity Fair and a writer at large for Air Mail. Her work has also appeared in Harper's, Esquire, and The Paris Review, among other publications. Her latest podcast, Once Upon a Time… at Bennington College, dropped September 29th, 2021. *** Otherppl with Brad Listi is a weekly literary podcast featuring in-depth interviews with today's leading writers. Launched in 2011. Books. Literature. Writing. Publishing. Authors. Screenwriters. Etc. Available where podcasts are available: Apple Podcasts, Spotify, Stitcher, iHeart Radio, etc. Subscribe to Brad Listi’s email newsletter. Support the show on Patreon Merch @otherppl Instagram  YouTube Email the show: letters [at] otherppl [dot] com The podcast is a proud affiliate partner of Bookshop, working to support local, independent bookstores. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

John Keene is the author of Punks: New & Selected Poems, available from The Song Cave. Keene is a writer, translator, professor, and artist who was named a MacArthur Fellow in 2018. In 1989, Keene joined the Dark Room Writers Collective, and is a Graduate Fellow of the Cave Canem Writers Workshops. He is the author of Annotations, and Counternarratives, both published by New Directions, as well as several other works, including the poetry collection Seismosis, with artist Christopher Stackhouse, and a translation of Brazilian author Hilda Hilst's novel Letters from a Seducer.  Keene is the recipient of many awards and fellowships--including the Windham-Campbell Prize, the Whiting Foundation Prize, the Republic of Consciousness Prize, and the American Book Award. He teaches at Rutgers University-Newark. *** Otherppl with Brad Listi is a weekly literary podcast featuring in-depth interviews with today's leading writers. Launched in 2011. Books. Literature. Writing. Publishing. Authors. Screenwriters. Etc. Available where podcasts are available: Apple Podcasts, Spotify, Stitcher, iHeart Radio, etc. Subscribe to Brad Listi’s email newsletter. Support the show on Patreon Merch @otherppl Instagram  YouTube Email the show: letters [at] otherppl [dot] com The podcast is a proud affiliate partner of Bookshop, working to support local, independent bookstores. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Cara Blue Adams is the author of the debut story collection You Never Get It Back, winner of the John Simmons Short Fiction Award, available from the University of Iowa Press. Adams has published over twenty stories in leading magazines, including Granta, The Kenyon Review, American Short Fiction, Alaska Quarterly Review, Epoch, The Sun, The Missouri Review, The Mississippi Review, Story, and Narrative, which named her one of their “15 Below 30.” Stories in You Never Get It Back have been awarded the Kenyon Review Short Fiction Prize, judged by Alice Hoffman, the Missouri Review Peden Prize, judged by Jessica Francis Kane, and the Meringoff Prize in Fiction, awarded by the Association of Literary Scholars, Critics, and Writers. A 2018 Center for Fiction Emerging Writers Fellow, Cara has been awarded support by the Bread Loaf Writers’ Conference, the Sewanee Writers’ Conference, the Virginia Center for the Creative Arts, the Lighthouse Works, the Kimmel Harding Nelson Center for the Arts, and the New York State Foundation on the Arts. Cara earned a B.A. in English Language and Literature from Smith College and an MFA from the University of Arizona. Originally from Vermont, she has lived in Boston, Tucson, Montreal, Maine, South Carolina, and Baton Rouge, where she co-edited The Southern Review. She is an associate professor at Seton Hall University and lives in Brooklyn and the Hudson Valley. *** Otherppl with Brad Listi is a weekly literary podcast featuring in-depth interviews with today's leading writers. Launched in 2011. Books. Literature. Writing. Publishing. Authors. Screenwriters. Etc. Available where podcasts are available: Apple Podcasts, Spotify, Stitcher, iHeart Radio, etc. Subscribe to Brad Listi’s email newsletter. Support the show on Patreon Merch @otherppl Instagram  YouTube Email the show: letters [at] otherppl [dot] com The podcast is a proud affiliate partner of Bookshop, working to support local, independent bookstores. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Lan Samantha Chang is the author of the novel The Family Chao, available from W.W. Norton & Co. It is the official February pick of The Nervous Breakdown Book Club. Chang's other books include the story collection Hunger and the novels Inheritance and All Is Forgotten, Nothing Is Lost. A recent Berlin Prize Fellow, she also has received grants from the National Endowment for the Arts and the John Simon Guggenheim Foundation. Chang is the first Asian American and the first female director of the Iowa Writers' Workshop. She lives in Iowa City. *** Otherppl with Brad Listi is a weekly literary podcast featuring in-depth interviews with today's leading writers. Launched in 2011. Books. Literature. Writing. Publishing. Authors. Screenwriters. Etc. Available where podcasts are available: Apple Podcasts, Spotify, Stitcher, iHeart Radio, etc. Subscribe to Brad Listi’s email newsletter. Support the show on Patreon Merch @otherppl Instagram  YouTube Email the show: letters [at] otherppl [dot] com The podcast is a proud affiliate partner of Bookshop, working to support local, independent bookstores. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Sheila Heti is the author of the novel Pure Colour, available from Farrar, Straus, & Giroux. Heti is the author of several books of fiction and nonfiction, including Motherhood and How Should a Person Be?, which New York magazine deemed one of the "New Classics of the 21st century." She was named one of "the New Vanguard" by the New York Times book critics, who, along with a dozen other magazines and newspapers, chose Motherhood as a Best Book of 2018. Her novels have been translated into twenty-four languages. She is the former Interviews Editor of The Believer magazine and lives in Toronto. *** Otherppl with Brad Listi is a weekly literary podcast featuring in-depth interviews with today's leading writers. Launched in 2011. Books. Literature. Writing. Publishing. Authors. Screenwriters. Etc. Available where podcasts are available: Apple Podcasts, Spotify, Stitcher, iHeart Radio, etc. Subscribe to Brad Listi’s email newsletter. Support the show on Patreon Merch @otherppl Instagram  YouTube Email the show: letters [at] otherppl [dot] com The podcast is a proud affiliate partner of Bookshop, working to support local, independent bookstores. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Antoine Wilson is the author of the novel Mouth to Mouth, available from Avid Reader. Wilson is also the author of the novels The Interloper and Panorama City. His writing has appeared in The Paris Review, Quarterly West, and Best New American Voices, among other publications. He is a contributing editor at A Public Space. He has received the Carol Houck Smith Fiction Fellowship at the Wisconsin Institute for Creative Writing and the San Fernando Valley Award for Fiction, and has been a finalist for The National Magazine Award, the Southern California Independent Booksellers Association Book of the Year Award, and the Foreword Magazine Book of the Year Award. He has taught writing at the University of Iowa, the University of California San Diego, the University of California Los Angeles Extension Writers’ Program, Stanford Continuing Studies, and the Otis School of Art and Design. Born in Montreal and raised in California and Saudi Arabia, he now lives with his family in Los Angeles. He can be found on twitter at @antoinewilson and Instagram at @theantoinewilson. *** Otherppl with Brad Listi is a weekly literary podcast featuring in-depth interviews with today's leading writers. Launched in 2011. Books. Literature. Writing. Publishing. Authors. Screenwriters. Etc. Available where podcasts are available: Apple Podcasts, Spotify, Stitcher, iHeart Radio, etc. Subscribe to Brad Listi’s email newsletter. Support the show on Patreon Merch @otherppl Instagram  YouTube Email the show: letters [at] otherppl [dot] com The podcast is a proud affiliate partner of Bookshop, working to support local, independent bookstores. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

I'm sharing a special preview of the new podcast, Well-Read Black Girl from Pushkin Industries. Well-Read Black Girl is the literary kickback you never knew you needed. Glory Edim, author and founder of the Well-Read Black Girl community, sits in deep, honest and close conversation with authors like Tarana Burke, Gabrielle Union, Elizabeth Acevedo and more. You’ll also meet book club members, literacy advocates, and Black booksellers to hear what they’re reading and what it means to be well-read. In this preview, Glory talks with lawyer and educator Anita Hill about her work to help gender-based violence victims and the process behind writing her new book. You can listen to Well-Read Black Girl at https://link.chtbl.com/otherpplwrbg. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Debbie Millman is the author of Why Design Matters: Conversations with the World's Most Creative People, available from Harper Design. Debbie’s podcast, Design Matters is one of the first and longest running podcasts, and as host and founder, Millman has interviewed nearly 500 of the most creative people in the world over the past 17 years. Design Matters won a 2011 Cooper Hewitt National Design Award, in 2015 Apple designated it one of the best overall podcasts on iTunes, and in 2021 designated it one of their “All Time Favorite Podcasts.” In addition, the show has been nominated for six Webby Awards, and has been listed on over 100 “Best Podcasts” lists, including one of the best podcasts in the world by Business Insider and Vanity Fair.  Debbie is the author of seven books, including two collections of interviews that have extended the ethos and editorial vision of Design Matters to the printed page: How to Think Like a Great Graphic Designer and Brand Thinking and Other Noble Pursuits. Both books have been published in over 10 languages. She is also the co-owner and Editorial Director of PrintMag.com.  Debbie co-founded the world’s first graduate program in branding at the School of Visual Arts in New York City in 2010. For 20 years, Debbie was the President of Sterling Brands, one of the world’s leading branding consultancies. She arrived in 1995 when the company was two years old and had 15 employees in one office. Under her leadership, Sterling grew to 150 employees in five offices and she was instrumental in the firm’s acquisition by Omnicom in 2008. Omnicom is one of the world’s largest holding companies. While there she worked on the logo and brand identity for Burger King, Hershey’s, Haagen Dazs, Tropicana, Star Wars, Gillette, and the No More movement. Debbie’s writing and illustrations have appeared in publications such as The New York Times, The Washington Post, New York Magazine, Print Magazine, Baffler and Fast Company. She lives in New York and Los Angeles. *** Otherppl with Brad Listi is a weekly literary podcast featuring in-depth interviews with today's leading writers. Launched in 2011. Books. Literature. Writing. Publishing. Authors. Screenwriters. Etc. Available where podcasts are available: Apple Podcasts, Spotify, Stitcher, iHeart Radio, etc. Subscribe to Brad Listi’s email newsletter. Support the show on Patreon Merch @otherppl Instagram YouTube Email the show: letters [at] otherppl [dot] com The podcast is a proud affiliate partner of Bookshop, working to support local, independent bookstores. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Rachel Krantz is the author of Open: An Uncensored Memoir of Love, Liberation, and Non-Monogamy, available from Harmony Books. Krantz is one of the three founding editors of Bustle, where she served as Senior Features Editor for three years, and Senior News Editor before that. She also worked at The Daily Beast as Homepage Editor, and at the nonprofit Mercy For Animals as Lead Writer. She’s the recipient of the Peabody Award, the Robert F. Kennedy Center for Justice and Human Rights International Radio Award, the Investigative Reporters and Editors Radio Award, and the Edward R. Murrow Award for her work as an investigative reporter with YR Media. She was the host of the Bustle podcast Honestly Though, a show about taboo topics recommended by The Guardian. Her work has been featured on Vox, The Guardian, The Huffington Post, NPR, The Daily Beast, Newsweek, High Times, AFAR, Vice, USA Today, Buzzfeed Books, Publishers Weekly, Salon, Marie Claire, VegNews Magazine, and many other outlets. She is on the advisory board for Sentient Media and the board of directors of Our Hen House. *** Otherppl with Brad Listi is a weekly literary podcast featuring in-depth interviews with today's leading writers. Launched in 2011. Books. Literature. Writing. Publishing. Authors. Screenwriters. Etc. Available where podcasts are available: Apple Podcasts, Spotify, Stitcher, iHeart Radio, etc. Subscribe to Brad Listi’s email newsletter. Support the show on Patreon Merch @otherppl Instagram  YouTube Email the show: letters [at] otherppl [dot] com The podcast is a proud affiliate partner of Bookshop, working to support local, independent bookstores. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Emmelie Prophete is the author of the novel Blue, available from Amazon Crossing. Translated by Tina Kover. It is the official January pick of The Nervous Breakdown Book Club. Born in Port-au-Prince, where she still resides, Prophète is a poet, novelist, journalist, and director of the National Library of Haiti. Blue (Le testament des solitudes), earned her the Grand Prix littéraire de l'Association des écrivains de langue française (ADELF) in 2009. Her other publications include Le reste du temps (2010), which tells the story of her special relationship with journalist Jean Dominique, who was murdered in 2000; Impasse Dignité (2012); and Le bout du monde est une fenêtre (2015). Tina Kover translations include Antoine Compagnon's A Summer with Montaigne and Négar Djavadi's Disoriental, which won both the Albertine Prize and the Lambda Literary Award, and was a finalist for the National Book Award for Translated Literature and the PEN Translation Prize. *** Otherppl with Brad Listi is a weekly literary podcast featuring in-depth interviews with today's leading writers. Launched in 2011. Books. Literature. Writing. Publishing. Authors. Screenwriters. Etc. Available where podcasts are available: Apple Podcasts, Spotify, Stitcher, iHeart Radio, etc. Subscribe to Brad Listi’s email newsletter. Support the show on Patreon Merch @otherppl Instagram  YouTube Email the show: letters [at] otherppl [dot] com The podcast is a proud affiliate partner of Bookshop, working to support local, independent bookstores. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Jami Attenberg is the author of the memoir I Came All This Way to Meet You: Writing Myself Home, available from Ecco. Attenberg is the New York Times bestselling author of seven books of fiction, including The Middlesteins and All This Could Be Yours. She has contributed essays to the New York Times Magazine, the Wall Street Journal, the Sunday Times, and the Guardian, among other publications. She lives in New Orleans. *** Otherppl with Brad Listi is a weekly literary podcast featuring in-depth interviews with today's leading writers. Launched in 2011. Books. Literature. Writing. Publishing. Authors. Screenwriters. Etc. Available where podcasts are available: Apple Podcasts, Spotify, Stitcher, iHeart Radio, etc. Subscribe to Brad Listi’s email newsletter. Support the show on Patreon Merch @otherppl Instagram  YouTube Email the show: letters [at] otherppl [dot] com The podcast is a proud affiliate partner of Bookshop, working to support local, independent bookstores. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Claire Messud is the author of A Dream Life, available from Tablo Tales. Messud is the author of seven works of fiction, including the New York Times bestsellers The Emperor’s Children and The Burning Girl, and a new book of essays, Kant’s Little Prussian Head and Other Reasons Why I Write. She is a recipient of Guggenheim and Radcliffe Fellowships and the Strauss Living Award from the American Academy of Arts and Letters. *** Otherppl with Brad Listi is a weekly literary podcast featuring in-depth interviews with today's leading writers. Launched in 2011. Books. Literature. Writing. Publishing. Authors. Screenwriters. Etc. Available where podcasts are available: Apple Podcasts, Spotify, Stitcher, iHeart Radio, etc. Subscribe to Brad Listi’s email newsletter. Support the show on Patreon Merch @otherppl Instagram  YouTube Email the show: letters [at] otherppl [dot] com The podcast is a proud affiliate partner of Bookshop, working to support local, independent bookstores. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Lejla Kalamujic is the author of the novel-in-stories Call Me Esteban, available from Sandorf Passage. Translated by Jennifer Zoble. Kalamujic is an award-winning queer writer from Bosnia and Herzegovina. Call Me Esteban received the Edo Budisa literary award in 2016 and it was the Bosnian-Herzegovinian nominee for the European Union Prize for Literature in the same year.  Jennifer Zoble translates Bosnian/Croatian/Serbian- and Spanish-language literature. Her translation of Mars by Asja Bakic (Feminist Press, 2019) was selected by Publishers Weekly for the fiction list in its "Best Books 2019" issue. She contributed to the Belgrade Noir anthology (Akashic Books, 2020), and her work has been published in McSweeney's, Lit Hub, Words Without Borders, Washington Square, The Iowa Review, and The Baffler, among others. She's a clinical associate professor in the interdisciplinary Liberal Studies program at NYU. *** Otherppl with Brad Listi is a weekly literary podcast featuring in-depth interviews with today's leading writers. Launched in 2011. Books. Literature. Writing. Publishing. Authors. Screenwriters. Etc. Available where podcasts are available: Apple Podcasts, Spotify, Stitcher, iHeart Radio, etc. Subscribe to Brad Listi’s email newsletter. Support the show on Patreon Merch @otherppl Instagram  YouTube Email the show: letters [at] otherppl [dot] com The podcast is a proud affiliate partner of Bookshop, working to support local, independent bookstores. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Lou Mathews is the author of the novel Shaky Town, available from Tiger Van Books. Mathews has written seven books and published two of them, Just Like James and L.A. Breakdown, an LA Times Best Book. He has taught in UCLA Extension’s acclaimed creative writing program since 1989. His stories have been published in ZYZZYVA, New England Review, Short Story, Black Clock , Paperback L.A. , and many fiction anthologies. Mathews is also a journalist, playwright, and passionate cook, as well as a former mechanic, street racer, and restaurant critic. He has received a Pushcart Prize and a Katherine Anne Porter Prize, as well as California Arts Commission and NEA Fiction fellowships, and is a recipient of the UCLA Extension Teacher of the Year and Outstanding Instructor awards. *** Otherppl with Brad Listi is a weekly literary podcast featuring in-depth interviews with today's leading writers. Launched in 2011. Books. Literature. Writing. Publishing. Authors. Screenwriters. Etc. Available where podcasts are available: Apple Podcasts, Spotify, Stitcher, iHeart Radio, etc. Subscribe to Brad Listi’s email newsletter. Support the show on Patreon Merch @otherppl Instagram  YouTube Email the show: letters [at] otherppl [dot] com The podcast is a proud affiliate partner of Bookshop, working to support local, independent bookstores. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

As another year comes to a close, Brad is joined by authors Megan Boyle and Joseph Grantham to celebrate the season and reflect on what's ahead. Happy holidays and happy new year to Otherppl listeners all over the world! Thanks so much for tuning in and supporting the show. Back in 2022.... *** Otherppl with Brad Listi is a weekly literary podcast featuring in-depth interviews with today's leading writers. Launched in 2011. Books. Literature. Writing. Publishing. Authors. Screenwriters. Etc. Available where podcasts are available: Apple Podcasts, Spotify, Stitcher, iHeart Radio, etc. Subscribe to Brad Listi’s email newsletter. Support the show on Patreon Merch @otherppl Instagram  YouTube Email the show: letters [at] otherppl [dot] com The podcast is a proud affiliate partner of Bookshop, working to support local, independent bookstores. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Stacy D. Flood is the author of the novella The Salt Fields, available from Lanternfish Press. Originally from Buffalo, and currently living in Seattle, Stacy’s work has been published and performed nationally as well as in the Puget Sound Area. Having received his MFA in Creative Writing from San Francisco State University, he has also been an artist-in-residence at DISQUIET in Lisbon, as well as The Millay Colony of the Arts. In addition, he is the recipient of the Gregory Capasso Award in Fiction from the University at Buffalo, along with a Getty Fellowship to the Squaw Valley Community of Writers. *** Otherppl with Brad Listi is a weekly literary podcast featuring in-depth interviews with today's leading writers. Launched in 2011. Books. Literature. Writing. Publishing. Authors. Screenwriters. Etc. Available where podcasts are available: Apple Podcasts, Spotify, Stitcher, iHeart Radio, etc. Subscribe to Brad Listi’s email newsletter. Support the show on Patreon Merch @otherppl Instagram  YouTube Email the show: letters [at] otherppl [dot] com The podcast is a proud affiliate partner of Bookshop, working to support local, independent bookstores. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Megan Milks is the author of the novel Margaret and the Mystery of the Missing Body (The Feminist Press). Milks is the author of Kill Marguerite and Other Stories (2014), available from Feminist Press in revised and expanded form as Slug and Other Stories, and Remember the Internet: Tori Amos Bootleg Webring. With Marisa Crawford, they are coeditor of We Are the Baby-Sitters Club: Essays and Artwork from Grown-Up Readers; with KJ Cerankowski, they are coeditor of Asexualities: Feminist and Queer Perspectives. Born in Virginia, they currently live in Brooklyn. *** Otherppl with Brad Listi is a weekly literary podcast featuring in-depth interviews with today's leading writers. Launched in 2011. Books. Literature. Writing. Publishing. Authors. Screenwriters. Etc. Available where podcasts are available: Apple Podcasts, Spotify, Stitcher, iHeart Radio, etc. Subscribe to Brad Listi’s email newsletter. Support the show on Patreon Merch @otherppl Instagram  YouTube Email the show: letters [at] otherppl [dot] com The podcast is a proud affiliate partner of Bookshop, working to support local, independent bookstores. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Robin McLean is the author of the debut novel Pity the Beast, available from And Other Stories. McLean worked as lawyer and then a potter in the woods of Alaska before turning to writing. Her story collection Reptile House won the 2013 BOA Editions Fiction Prize and was twice a finalist for the Flannery O'Connor Short Story Prize. She now lives and teaches in the high plains desert of central Nevada at Ike's Canyon Ranch Writer's Retreat which she co-founded. *** Otherppl with Brad Listi is a weekly literary podcast featuring in-depth interviews with today's leading writers. Launched in 2011. Books. Literature. Writing. Publishing. Authors. Screenwriters. Etc. Available where podcasts are available: Apple Podcasts, Spotify, Stitcher, iHeart Radio, etc. Subscribe to Brad Listi’s email newsletter. Support the show on Patreon Merch @otherppl Instagram  YouTube Email the show: letters [at] otherppl [dot] com The podcast is a proud affiliate partner of Bookshop, working to support local, independent bookstores. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Duncan Birmingham is the author of the debut story collection The Cult in My Garage, available from Maudlin House. Birmingham is a writer and filmmaker in Los Angeles. His fiction has appeared in Mystery Tribune, Brooklyn vol 1, Juked, 7x7, Joyland, nerve, Word Riot, Opium, Story Chord, Oxford Review and Mr. Beller's Neighborhood, among other places. He was a writer/executive producer on IFC's Maron (with Marc Maron) as well as a writer/producer on Starz's Blunt Talk (with Jonathan Ames) and David Fincher's never-aired HBO show, Videosyncrazy. Short films he has written and directed have premiered at Sundance, AFI, GenArt and Miami Film Festival. *** Otherppl with Brad Listi is a weekly literary podcast featuring in-depth interviews with today's leading writers. Launched in 2011. Books. Literature. Writing. Publishing. Authors. Screenwriters. Etc. Available where podcasts are available: Apple Podcasts, Spotify, Stitcher, iHeart Radio, etc. Support the show on Patreon Merch @otherppl Instagram  YouTube Email the show: letters [at] otherppl [dot] com The podcast is a proud affiliate partner of Bookshop, working to support local, independent bookstores. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Roisin Kiberd is the author of The Disconnect: A Personal Journey Through the Internet, available from Serpent's Tail. Kiberd's essays have been published in the Dublin Review, the White Review, the Stinging Fly and Winter Papers. She has written features on technology and culture for publications including the Guardian, Vice and Motherboard, where she wrote a column about internet subcultures. Having spent some time in London as the online voice of a cheese brand, she now lives in Dublin. *** Otherppl with Brad Listi is a weekly literary podcast featuring in-depth interviews with today's leading writers. Launched in 2011. Books. Literature. Writing. Publishing. Authors. Screenwriters. Etc. Support the show on Patreon Merch @otherppl Instagram  YouTube Email the show: letters [at] otherppl [dot] com The podcast is a proud affiliate partner of Bookshop, working to support local, independent bookstores. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Janice Lee is the author of the novel Imagine a Death, available from Texas Review Press.  Lee is a Korean-American writer, editor, publisher, and shamanic healer. Author of seven books of fiction, creative nonfiction and poetry, she is the founder & executive editor of Entropy, Co-Publisher at Civil Coping Mechanisms, Contributing Editor at Fanzine, and Co-Founder of The Accomplices LLC. She currently lives in Portland, OR where she is an Assistant Professor of Creative Writing at Portland State University. *** Otherppl with Brad Listi is a weekly literary podcast featuring in-depth interviews with today's leading writers. Launched in 2011. Books. Literature. Writing. Publishing. Authors. Screenwriters. Etc. Support the show on Patreon Merch www.otherppl.com @otherppl Instagram  YouTube Email the show: letters [at] otherppl [dot] com The podcast is a proud affiliate partner of Bookshop, working to support local, independent bookstores. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Jocelyn Nicole Johnson is the author of the debut story collection My Monticello, available from Henry Holt & Co. Johnson's writing has appeared in Guernica, The Guardian, Phoebe, Prime Number Magazine, and elsewhere. Her short story "Control Negro" was anthologized in Best American Short Stories 2018, guest edited by Roxane Gay, and read live by LeVar Burton as part of PRI's Selected Shorts series. Johnson has been a fellow at Hedgebrook, Tin House Summer Workshops, and VCCA. A veteran public school art teacher, she lives and writes in Charlottesville, Virginia. *** Otherppl with Brad Listi is a weekly literary podcast featuring in-depth interviews with today's leading writers. Launched in 2011. Books. Literature. Writing. Publishing. Authors. Screenwriters. Etc. Support the show on Patreon Merch www.otherppl.com @otherppl Instagram  YouTube Email the show: letters [at] otherppl [dot] com The podcast is a proud affiliate partner of Bookshop, working to support local, independent bookstores. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Sarah Hall is the author of the novel Burntcoat, available from Custom House. It is the official November pick of The Nervous Breakdown Book Club. Hall was born in Cumbria. She is the prizewinning author of six novels and three short story collections. She is a recipient of the American Academy of Arts and Letters E. M. Forster Award, the Edge Hill Short Story Prize, among others, and the only person ever to win the BBC National Short Story Award twice.  *** Otherppl with Brad Listi is a weekly literary podcast featuring in-depth interviews with today's leading writers. Launched in 2011. Books. Literature. Writing. Publishing. Authors. Screenwriters. Etc. Support the show on Patreon Merch www.otherppl.com @otherppl Instagram  YouTube Email the show: letters [at] otherppl [dot] com The podcast is a proud affiliate partner of Bookshop, working to support local, independent bookstores. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Dennis Cooper is the author of the novel I Wished, available from Soho Press. Cooper is the author of the George Miles Cycle, an interconnected sequence of five novels: Closer, Frisk, Try, Guide, and Period. His other works include My Loose Thread; The Sluts, winner of France's Prix Sade and the Lambda Literary Award; God Jr.; Wrong; The Dream Police; Ugly Man; and The Marbled Swarm. He divides his time between Los Angeles and Paris. He is the director (with Zac Farley) of Permanent Green Light and Like Cattle Towards Glow. *** Otherppl with Brad Listi is a weekly literary podcast featuring in-depth interviews with today's leading writers. Launched in 2011. Books. Literature. Writing. Publishing. Authors. Screenwriters. Etc. Support the show on Patreon Merch www.otherppl.com @otherppl Instagram  YouTube Email the show: letters [at] otherppl [dot] com The podcast is a proud affiliate partner of Bookshop, working to support local, independent bookstores. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Larissa Pham is the author of the memoir-in-essays Pop Song, available from Catapult.  Pham is an artist and writer in Brooklyn. Born in Portland, Oregon, she studied painting and art history at Yale University. She has written essays and criticism for the Paris Review Daily, The Nation, Art in America, Guernica, and elsewhere. She was an inaugural Yi Dae Up fellowship recipient from the Jack Jones Literary Arts Retreat. She is also the author of Fantasian, a novella. *** Otherppl with Brad Listi is a weekly literary podcast featuring in-depth interviews with today's leading writers. Launched in 2011. Books. Literature. Writing. Publishing. Authors. Screenwriters. Etc. Support the show on Patreon Merch www.otherppl.com @otherppl Instagram  YouTube Email the show: letters [at] otherppl [dot] com The podcast is a proud affiliate partner of Bookshop, working to support local, independent bookstores. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Mike DeCapite is the author of the novel Jacket Weather, available from Soft Skull Press. DeCapite's other books include the novel Through the Windshield, the chapbook Creamsicle Blue, and the short-prose collection Radiant Fog, published under the banner of Sparkle Street Books. Cuz Editions published his story “Sitting Pretty,” later anthologized in The Italian American Reader. DeCapite grew up in Cleveland and has lived in London and San Francisco, but has spent most of his time in New York City, where he now resides. *** Otherppl with Brad Listi is a weekly literary podcast featuring in-depth interviews with today's leading writers. Launched in 2011. Books. Literature. Writing. Publishing. Authors. Screenwriters. Etc. Support the show on Patreon Merch www.otherppl.com @otherppl Instagram  YouTube Email the show: letters [at] otherppl [dot] com The podcast is a proud affiliate partner of Bookshop, working to support local, independent bookstores. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Louise Erdrich is the author of the novel The Sentence, available from Harper. One of America's most celebrated authors, Erdrich was awarded the 2021 Pulitzer Prize for her novel The Night Watchman. In 2012, she won the National Book Award for her novel The Round House, and twice she has been awarded the National Book Critics Circle Award, first for her debut novel Love Medicine in 1984, and again for her novel LaRose in 2016. Erdrich is a member of the Turtle Mountain Band of Chippewa. She is the author of many novels as well as volumes of poetry, children's books, and a memoir of early motherhood. She lives in Minnesota with her daughters and is the owner of Birchbark Books, a small independent bookstore. A ghost lives in her creaky old house. *** Otherppl with Brad Listi is a weekly literary podcast featuring in-depth interviews with today's leading writers. Launched in 2011. Books. Literature. Writing. Publishing. Authors. Screenwriters. Etc. Support the show on Patreon Merch www.otherppl.com @otherppl Instagram  YouTube Email the show: letters [at] otherppl [dot] com The podcast is a proud affiliate partner of Bookshop, working to support local, independent bookstores. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Marlowe Granados is the author of the debut novel Happy Hour, available from Verso Books. Granados is a writer and filmmaker living in Toronto. She co-hosts The Mean Reds, a podcast dedicated to women-led films. And her advice column, "Designs for Living," appears in The Baffler.  *** Otherppl with Brad Listi is a weekly literary podcast featuring in-depth interviews with today's leading writers. Launched in 2011. Books. Literature. Writing. Publishing. Authors. Screenwriters. Etc. Support the show on Patreon Merch www.otherppl.com @otherppl Instagram  YouTube Email the show: letters [at] otherppl [dot] com The podcast is a proud affiliate partner of Bookshop, working to support local, independent bookstores. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Matthew Clark Davison is the author of the debut novel Doubting Thomas, available from Amble Press. Davison is a writer and educator living in San Francisco. He earned a BA and MFA in Creative Writing from San Francisco State University, where he now teaches full-time. His prose has been recently anthologized in Empty The Pews and 580-Split, and published in Guernica, The Atlantic Monthly, Foglifter, Lumina Magazine, Fourteen Hills, Per Contra, Educe, and others; and has been recognized with a Creative Work Grant, (Inaugural Awardee/San Francisco State University), Cultural Equities Grant (San Francisco Arts Commission), the Clark Gross Award for a Novel-in-Progress, and a Stonewall Alumni Award. *** Otherppl with Brad Listi is a weekly literary podcast featuring in-depth interviews with today's leading writers. Launched in 2011. Books. Literature. Writing. Publishing. Authors. Screenwriters. Etc. Support the show on Patreon Merch www.otherppl.com @otherppl Instagram  YouTube Email the show: letters [at] otherppl [dot] com The podcast is a proud affiliate partner of Bookshop, working to support local, independent bookstores. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Emily Ladau is the author of Demystifying Disability: What to Know, What to Say, and How to Be an Ally, available from Ten Speed Press. Ladau is an internationally known disability rights activist, writer, and speaker. She is the editor in chief of the Rooted in Rights blog, a platform dedicated to amplifying authentic narratives of the intersectional disability experience. She also co-hosts The Accessible Stall, a podcast about disability issues. Ladau's writing has been published in outlets including the New York Times, HuffPost, CNN, Self, Salon, Vice, The Daily Beast, Variety, and Marie Claire Australia. Her work is also included in the Criptiques Anthology and About Us: Essays from the Disability Series of the New York Times. She has served as an expert source on disability issues for outlets including NPR, Vox, Washington Post, and Teen Vogue, and has been featured in a range of press outlets including Newsday, BuzzFeed, CBS News, and U.S. News & World Report. A complete transcript of this interview is available at otherppl.com. *** Show notes: The Microsoft videos that Emily references during the interview can be found here. Other useful resources: Ableist words and terms to avoid. 2021 working definition of ableism. *** Otherppl with Brad Listi is a weekly literary podcast featuring in-depth interviews with today's leading writers. Launched in 2011. Books. Literature. Writing. Publishing. Authors. Screenwriters. Etc. Support the show on Patreon Merch www.otherppl.com @otherppl Instagram  YouTube Email the show: letters [at] otherppl [dot] com The podcast is a proud affiliate partner of Bookshop, working to support local, independent bookstores. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Lucy Corin is the author of The Swank Hotel, available from Graywolf Press. It is the official October pick of The Nervous Breakdown Book Club. Corin's other books include the story collections One Hundred Apocalypses and Other Apocalypses and The Entire Predicament, and the novel Everyday Psychokillers: A History for Girls. Her work has appeared in American Short Fiction, Conjunctions, Harper’s Magazine, Ploughshares, Bomb, Tin House Magazine, and the New American Stories anthology from Vintage Contemporaries. She is the recipient of an American Academy of Arts and Letters Rome Prize and a literature fellowship from the National Endowment for the Arts. She teaches at the University of California at Davis and lives in Berkeley. *** Otherppl with Brad Listi is a weekly literary podcast featuring in-depth interviews with today's leading writers. Launched in 2011. Books. Literature. Writing. Publishing. Authors. Screenwriters. Etc. Support the show on Patreon Merch www.otherppl.com @otherppl Instagram  YouTube Email the show: letters [at] otherppl [dot] com The podcast is a proud affiliate partner of Bookshop, working to support local, independent bookstores. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Kate Durbin is the author of the poetry collection Hoarders, available now from Wave Books. Durbin is a Los Angeles-based artist and author of four books of poetry. Her art and writing have been featured in The New York Times, The Atlantic, Art Forum, Art in America, The Believer, BOMB, and elsewhere. She is the winner of the international 2017 Turn on Literature Prize for Electronic Literature for her poetry app, Abra. *** Otherppl with Brad Listi is a weekly literary podcast featuring in-depth interviews with today's leading writers. Launched in 2011. Books. Literature. Writing. Publishing. Authors. Screenwriters. Etc. Support the show on Patreon Merch www.otherppl.com @otherppl Instagram  YouTube Email the show: letters [at] otherppl [dot] com The podcast is a proud affiliate partner of Bookshop, working to support local, independent bookstores.   Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Catherine Raven is the author of the memoir Fox & I: An Uncommon Friendship, available from Spiegel and Grau. Raven received her Ph.D. in biology from Montana State University and is a former National Park Ranger at Glacier, Mount Rainier, North Cascades, Voyageurs, and Yellowstone National Parks. Her natural history essays have appeared in American Scientist, Journal of American Mensa, and Montana Magazine. She is currently an Assistant Program Director and Professor at South University in Savannah, Georgia.  *** Otherppl with Brad Listi is a weekly literary podcast featuring in-depth interviews with today's leading writers. Launched in 2011. Books. Literature. Writing. Publishing. Authors. Screenwriters. Etc. Support the show on Patreon Merch www.otherppl.com @otherppl Instagram  YouTube Email the show: letters [at] otherppl [dot] com The podcast is a proud affiliate partner of Bookshop, working to support local, independent bookstores. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Alexandra Kleeman is the author of the novel Something New Under the Sun, available from Hogarth Press. Kleeman's other books include Intimations, a short story collection, and the novel You Too Can Have A Body Like Mine, which was awarded the 2016 Bard Fiction Prize and was a New York Times Editor’s Choice. In 2020, she was awarded the Rome Prize and the Berlin Prize. Her fiction has been published in The New Yorker, The Paris Review, Zoetrope, Conjunctions, and Guernica, among others, and other writing has appeared in Harper's, The New York Times Magazine, VOGUE, Tin House, n+1, and The Guardian. Her work has received fellowships and support from Bread Loaf, Djerassi, the Virginia Center for the Creative Arts, and the Headlands Center for the Arts. Born in 1986 in Berkeley, California, she was raised in Colorado and lives in Staten Island with her husband, the writer Alex Gilvarry. *** Otherppl with Brad Listi is a weekly literary podcast featuring in-depth interviews with today's leading writers. Launched in 2011. Books. Literature. Writing. Publishing. Authors. Screenwriters. Etc. Support the show on Patreon Merch www.otherppl.com @otherppl Instagram  YouTube Email the show: letters [at] otherppl [dot] com The podcast is a proud affiliate partner of Bookshop, working to support local, independent bookstores. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Julie Poole is the author of the poetry collection Bright Specimen, available now from Deep Vellum. Poole was born and raised in the Pacific Northwest. She received a BA from Columbia University and an MFA in poetry from The New Writers Project at The University of Texas at Austin. She has received fellowship support from the James A. Michener Center, the Helene Wurlitzer Foundation, The Corsicana Artist and Writer Residency, and Yaddo. In 2017, she was a finalist for the Keene Prize for Literature. Her poems and essays have appeared in Borderlands: Texas Poetry Review, CutBank, Denver Quarterly, Poet Lore, Cold Mountain Review, Porter House Review, HuffPost, and elsewhere. Her arts and culture writing has appeared in Publishers Weekly, the Ploughshares Blog, Sightlines, The Texas Observer, Texas Monthly, Scalawag, and Bon Appétit. She lives in Austin, Texas, with her growing collection of found butterflies. *** Otherppl with Brad Listi is a weekly literary podcast featuring in-depth interviews with today's leading writers. Launched in 2011. Books. Literature. Writing. Publishing. Authors. Screenwriters. Etc. Support the show on Patreon Merch www.otherppl.com @otherppl Instagram  YouTube Email the show: letters [at] otherppl [dot] com The podcast is a proud affiliate partner of Bookshop, working to support local, independent bookstores. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

José Vadi is the author of the debut essay collection Inter State: Essays from California (Soft Skull).  He received the San Francisco Foundation’s Shenson Performing Arts Award for his debut play “a eulogy for three” produced by Marc Bamuthi Joseph’s Living Word Project. He is the author of SoMa Lurk, a collection of photos and poems published by Project Kalahati / Pro Arts Oakland. His work has been featured by the Paris Review, the PBS NewsHour, the San Francisco Chronicle, Catapult, McSweeney’s, The Los Angeles Review of Books, Quartersnacks, Free Skate Magazine and Pop-Up Magazine. He lives in Sacramento. *** Otherppl with Brad Listi is a weekly literary podcast featuring in-depth interviews with today's leading writers. Launched in 2011. Books. Literature. Writing. Publishing. Authors. Screenwriters. Life. Death. Etc. Support the show on Patreon Merch www.otherppl.com @otherppl Instagram  YouTube Email the show: letters [at] otherppl [dot] com The podcast is a proud affiliate partner of Bookshop, working to support local, independent bookstores. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Louise Nealon is the author of the debut novel Snowflake (Harper Books), a #1 International Bestseller. It is the official September pick of The Nervous Breakdown Book Club. Nealon is a writer from County Kildare, Ireland. In 2017, she won the Seán Ó Faoláin International Short Story Competition and was the recipient of the Francis Ledwidge Creative Writing Award. She has been published in the Irish Times, Southword, and The Open Ear.  Nealon received a degree in English literature from Trinity College Dublin in 2014 and a master's degree in creative writing from Queen's University Belfast in 2016. She lives on the dairy farm where she was raised, and Snowflake is her first novel. *** Otherppl with Brad Listi is a weekly literary podcast featuring in-depth interviews with today's leading writers. Launched in 2011. Books. Literature. Writing. Publishing. Authors. Screenwriters. Life. Death. Etc. Support the show on Patreon Merch www.otherppl.com @otherppl Instagram  YouTube Email the show: letters [at] otherppl [dot] com The podcast is a proud affiliate partner of Bookshop, working to support local, independent bookstores. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Rachel Long is the author of the poetry collection My Darling from the Lions, available from Tin House. First published by Picador in the UK, it was shortlisted for the Rathbones Folio Prize, the Costa Poetry Award, and was named a Best Poetry Book of 2020 by The Guardian. Long is the founder of Octavia Poetry Collective for Women of Colour, which is housed at Southbank Centre in London. My Darling from the Lions is her debut collection. She was born in London, and resides there today. *** Otherppl with Brad Listi is a weekly literary podcast featuring in-depth interviews with today's leading writers. Launched in 2011. Books. Literature. Writing. Publishing. Authors. Screenwriters. Life. Death. Etc. Support the show on Patreon Merch www.otherppl.com @otherppl Instagram  YouTube Email the show: letters [at] otherppl [dot] com The podcast is a proud affiliate partner of Bookshop, working to support local, independent bookstores. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Lucie Elven is the author of the debut novel The Weak Spot, available from Soft Skull Press. Elven has written for publications including The London Review of Books, Granta, and NOON. She is the former deputy editor of The Believer magazine, and The Weak Spot is her first book. She lives in London. *** Otherppl with Brad Listi is a weekly literary podcast featuring in-depth interviews with today's leading writers. Launched in 2011. Books. Literature. Writing. Publishing. Authors. Screenwriters. Life. Death. Etc. Support the show on Patreon Merch www.otherppl.com @otherppl Instagram  YouTube Email the show: letters [at] otherppl [dot] com The podcast is a proud affiliate partner of Bookshop, working to support local, independent bookstores. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Today on the podcast, an episode devoted to the life and legacy of the late author, activist, diarist, and digital native Mark Baumer. A new book, The One on Earth: Selected Works of Mark Baumer, is available now from Fence Books. It was edited by Blake Butler and Shane Jones, with a foreword by Claire Donato. Butler, Jones, and Donato are the guests. Born and raised in Durham, Maine, Baumer was a graduate of the MFA program at Brown University, after which he became a web content specialist, a climate activist, and a labor organizer in Providence, RI. A member of the group FANG (Fighting Against Natural Gas Convergence), he walked barefoot across America to draw attention to climate change. His work is continued by the Mark Baumer Sustainability Fund. *** This Week's Sponsor: Join New York Times #1 best-selling author George Saunders in conversation with author and professor Imani Perry for Humanities New York’s third annual History and the American Imagination benefit. The live discussion will take place online on October 5th at 7 PM EASTERN. Purchase your tickets at humanitiesny.org and use code OTHERPPL for half off membership tickets. *** Otherppl with Brad Listi is a weekly literary podcast featuring in-depth interviews with today's leading writers. Launched in 2011. Books. Literature. Writing. Publishing. Authors. Screenwriters. Life. Death. Etc. Support the show on Patreon Merch www.otherppl.com @otherppl Instagram  YouTube Email the show: letters [at] otherppl [dot] com The podcast is a proud affiliate partner of Bookshop, working to support local, independent bookstores. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Anna Qu is the author of Made in China: A Memoir of Love and Labor, available from Catapult. Qu is a Chinese American writer. She writes personal essays on identity and growing up in New York as an immigrant. Her work has appeared in Poets & Writers, Lithub, Threepenny Review, Lumina, Kartika, Kweli, Vol.1 Brooklyn, and Jezebel, among others. She holds an MFA in Creative Nonfiction from Sarah Lawrence College.  She also serves as the Nonfiction Editor at Kweli Journal, and teaches at the low res MFA program at New England College, Sackett Street Writers’ Workshop, and Catapult. She lives in Brooklyn with her partner and their cat, Momo. *** Otherppl with Brad Listi is a weekly literary podcast featuring in-depth interviews with today's leading writers. Launched in 2011. Books. Literature. Writing. Publishing. Authors. Screenwriters. Life. Death. Etc. Support the show on Patreon Merch www.otherppl.com @otherppl Instagram  YouTube Email the show: letters [at] otherppl [dot] com The podcast is a proud affiliate partner of Bookshop, working to support local, independent bookstores. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Leigh Stein is the guest. Her new poetry collection, What to Miss When, is available from Soft Skull. Stein is the author of five books including the novel Self Care and the poetry collection Dispatch from the Future. She has also written for The New York Times, The Washington Post, Allure, ELLE, The Cut, Salon, and Slate. She is a recipient of an Amy Award from Poets & Writers and The Cut named her poet laureate of The Bachelor. *** Otherppl with Brad Listi is a weekly literary podcast featuring in-depth interviews with today's leading writers. Launched in 2011. Books. Literature. Writing. Publishing. Authors. Screenwriters. Life. Death. Etc. Support the show on Patreon Merch www.otherppl.com @otherppl Instagram  YouTube Email the show: letters [at] otherppl [dot] com The podcast is a proud affiliate partner of Bookshop, working to support local, independent bookstores. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Azareen Van der Vliet Oloomi is the author of the novel Savage Tongues, available from Houghton Mifflin Harcourt. Her previous novel, Call Me Zebra, won the Pen/Faulkner Award for Fiction and the John Gardner Award. She was a National Book Foundation "5 Under 35" honoree for her debut novel, Fra Keeler, and her work has appeared in a variety of publications, including the Paris Review, Guernica, Granta, and BOMB. She splits her time between South Bend, Indiana, and Chicago.  *** Otherppl with Brad Listi is a weekly literary podcast featuring in-depth interviews with today's leading writers. Launched in 2011. Books. Literature. Writing. Publishing. Authors. Screenwriters. Life. Death. Etc. Support the show on Patreon Merch www.otherppl.com @otherppl Instagram  YouTube Email the show: letters [at] otherppl [dot] com The podcast is a proud affiliate partner of Bookshop, working to support local, independent bookstores. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Katie Crouch is the author of the novel Embassy Wife, available from Farrar, Straus, and Giroux. It is the official August pick of the TNB Book Club. Crouch is the New York Times bestselling author of Girls in Trucks, Men and Dogs, and Abroad. She has also written essays for The New York Times, Glamour, The Guardian, Slate, Salon, and Tin House. A former resident of Namibia and San Francisco, Crouch now lives in Vermont with her family and teaches creative writing at Dartmouth College. *** Otherppl with Brad Listi is a weekly literary podcast featuring in-depth interviews with today's leading writers. Launched in 2011. Books. Literature. Writing. Publishing. Authors. Screenwriters. Life. Death. Etc. Support the show on Patreon Merch www.otherppl.com @otherppl Instagram  YouTube Email the show: letters [at] otherppl [dot] com The podcast is a proud affiliate partner of Bookshop, working to support local, independent bookstores. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Sam Cohen is the author of the debut story collection Sarahland, available from Grand Central Publishing. Cohen is a queer, Jewish femme born and raised in suburban Detroit. Her fiction is published in Fence, Bomb, Diagram, and Gulf Coast, among others. The recipient of a MacDowell fellowship and a PhD fellow at the University of Southern California, she lives in Los Angeles. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Kendra Allen is the author of the poetry collection The Collection Plate (Ecco). Allen was born and raised in Dallas, Texas. She is the recipient of the 2018 Iowa Prize for Literary Nonfiction for her essay collection When You Learn the Alphabet, awarded by Kiese Laymon. She has been featured on C-SPAN, interviewed in The Rumpus and Poets & Writers, and her work has been taught by New York Times bestselling author Jason Reynolds alongside that of Jamaica Kincaid and Eve Ewing, among other distinctions. She lives in San Antonio. *** Otherppl with Brad Listi is a weekly literary podcast featuring in-depth interviews with today's leading writers. Launched in 2011. Books. Literature. Writing. Publishing. Authors. Screenwriters. Life. Death. Etc. Support the show on Patreon Merch www.otherppl.com @otherppl Instagram  YouTube Email the show: letters [at] otherppl [dot] com The podcast is a proud affiliate partner of Bookshop, working to support local, independent bookstores. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Tao Lin is the author of the novel Leave Society (Vintage). This is his fourth time on the program. Lin's other books include Trip: Psychedelics, Alienation, and Change, the novels Taipei, Richard Yates and Eeeee Eee Eeee, the novella Shoplifting from American Apparel, the story collection Bed, and the poetry collections cognitive-behavioral therapy and you are a little bit happier than i am. He was born in Virginia, has taught in Sarah Lawrence College's MFA program, and is the founder and editor of Muumuu House. He lives in Hawaii. *** Otherppl with Brad Listi is a weekly literary podcast featuring in-depth interviews with today's leading writers. Launched in 2011. Books. Literature. Writing. Publishing. Authors. Screenwriters. Life. Death. Etc. Support the show on Patreon Merch www.otherppl.com @otherppl Instagram  YouTube Email the show: letters [at] otherppl [dot] com The podcast is a proud affiliate partner of Bookshop, working to support local, independent bookstores. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Matthew Specktor is the author of Always Crashing in the Same Car: On Art, Crisis, and Los Angeles, California, available from Tin House. Specktor’s other books include the novels That Summertime Sound and American Dream Machine, which was long-listed for the Folio Prize. Born in Los Angeles, he received his BA from Hampshire College in 1988, and his MFA in Creative Writing from Warren Wilson College in 2009. His writing has appeared in the New York Times, GQ, The Paris Review, Tin House, Black Clock, and numerous other periodicals and anthologies. He is a founding editor of the Los Angles Review of Books. *** Otherppl with Brad Listi is a weekly literary podcast featuring in-depth interviews with today's leading writers. Launched in 2011. Books. Literature. Writing. Publishing. Authors. Screenwriters. Life. Death. Etc. Support the show on Patreon Merch www.otherppl.com @otherppl Instagram  YouTube Email the show: letters [at] otherppl [dot] com The podcast is a proud affiliate partner of Bookshop, working to support local, independent bookstores. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Reginald Dwayne Betts is the author of the poetry collection Felon, available from W.W. Norton & Co. Betts is a poet, essayist, and national spokesperson for the Campaign for Youth Justice. He writes and lectures about the impact of mass incarceration on American society. His previous books include the poetry collections Bastards of the Reagan Era and Shahid Reads His Own Palm, and a memoir entitled A Question of Freedom. A graduate of Yale Law School, he lives in New Haven, Connecticut. *** Otherppl with Brad Listi is a weekly literary podcast featuring in-depth interviews with today's leading writers. Launched in 2011. Books. Literature. Writing. Publishing. Authors. Screenwriters. Life. Death. Etc. Support the show on Patreon Merch www.otherppl.com @otherppl Instagram  YouTube Email the show: letters [at] otherppl [dot] com The podcast is a proud affiliate partner of Bookshop, working to support local, independent bookstores. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Matt Bell is the author of the novel Appleseed, available from Custom House Books. It is the official July pick of The Nervous Breakdown Book Club. Bell is also the author of the novels Scrapper and In the House upon the Dirt between the Lake and the Woods, as well as the short story collection A Tree or a Person or a Wall, a non-fiction book about the classic video game Baldur's Gate II, and several other titles. His writing has appeared in The New York Times, Tin House, Conjunctions, Fairy Tale Review, American Short Fiction, and many other publications. A native of Michigan, he teaches creative writing at Arizona State University. *** Otherppl with Brad Listi is a weekly literary podcast featuring in-depth interviews with today's leading writers. Launched in 2011. Books. Literature. Writing. Publishing. Authors. Screenwriters. Life. Death. Etc. Support the show on Patreon Merch www.otherppl.com @otherppl Instagram  YouTube Email the show: letters [at] otherppl [dot] com The podcast is a proud affiliate partner of Bookshop, working to support local, independent bookstores. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Greg Gerke is the author of the essay collection See What I See (Zerogram Press). Gerke’s work has appeared in Tin House, Film Quarterly, The Kenyon Review, and other publications. He is also the author of a story collection entitled Especially the Bad Things, which was published by Splice in 2019. He lives in New York. *** Otherppl with Brad Listi is a weekly literary podcast featuring in-depth interviews with today's leading writers. Launched in 2011. Books. Literature. Writing. Publishing. Authors. Screenwriters. Life. Death. Etc. Support the show on Patreon Merch www.otherppl.com @otherppl Instagram  YouTube Email the show: letters [at] otherppl [dot] com The podcast is a proud affiliate partner of Bookshop, working to support local, independent bookstores. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Mark Leidner is the author of the poetry collection Returning the Sword to the Stone (Fonograf Editions). Leidner is also the author of two feature films: the sci-fi noir Empathy, Inc. (2019) and the relationship comedy Jammed (2014), as well as the story collection Under the Sea (Tyrant Books, 2018), the poetry collection Beauty Was the Case that They Gave Me (Factory Hollow, 2011), and the book of aphorisms The Angel in the Dream of Our Hangover (Sator, 2011). He lives in California. *** Otherppl with Brad Listi is a weekly literary podcast featuring in-depth interviews with today's leading writers. Launched in 2011. Books. Literature. Writing. Publishing. Authors. Screenwriters. Life. Death. Etc. Support the show on Patreon Merch www.otherppl.com @otherppl Instagram  YouTube Email the show: letters [at] otherppl [dot] com The podcast is a proud affiliate partner of Bookshop, working to support local, independent bookstores. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Pedro Mairal is the author of the novel The Woman from Uruguay (Bloomsbury), translated by Jennifer Croft. Mairal was born in Buenos Aires in 1970. He studied a degree in ‘Letras’ (‘Humanities’) at USAL (‘University of el Salvador’) where he was an assistant lecturer of English Literature. He has published three novels, a volume of short stories and two poetry books. His first novel, Una noche con Sabrina Love, was awarded the ‘Premio Clarín’ (‘Clarín Prize’) in 1998 with a panel of judges comprising Roa Bastos, Bioy Casares and Cabrera Infante, and was adapted to the screen in the year 2000. His work has been translated and published in France, Italy, Spain, Portugal, Poland and Germany. In 2007 the Bogotá39 jury selected him among the most notorious 39 young Latin-American authors. He currently lives in Montevideo. *** Otherppl with Brad Listi is a weekly literary podcast featuring in-depth interviews with today's leading writers. Launched in 2011. Books. Literature. Writing. Publishing. Authors. Screenwriters. Life. Death. Etc. Support the show on Patreon Merch www.otherppl.com @otherppl Instagram  YouTube Email the show: letters [at] otherppl [dot] com The podcast is a proud affiliate partner of Bookshop, working to support local, independent bookstores. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Forrest Gander is the author of the poetry collection Twice Alive, available now from New Directions. In 2019, he was awarded the Pulitzer Prize for Poetry for his collection Be With. Gander's other books include Core Samples from the World, which was a finalist for the Pulitzer Prize and the National Book Critics Circle Award. He has collaborated frequently with other artists including photographers Sally Mann, Graciela Iturbide, Raymond Meeks, and Lucas Foglia, glass artist Michael Rogers, ceramic artists Rick Hirsch and Ashwini Bhat, artists Ann Hamilton, Tjibbe Hooghiemstra, dancers Eiko & Koma, and musicians Vic Chesnutt and Brady Earnhart, among others.  Gander was born in the Mojave Desert and grew up in Virginia. In addition to writing poetry, he has translated works by Coral Bracho, Alfonso D'Aquino, Pura Lopez-Colome, Pablo Neruda, and Jaime Saenz. The recipient of grants from the Library of Congress, the Guggenheim, Howard, Whiting, and United States Artists Foundations, he taught for many years as the AK Seaver Professor of Literary Arts & Comparative Literature at Brown University. *** Otherppl with Brad Listi is a weekly literary podcast featuring in-depth interviews with today's leading writers. Launched in 2011. Books. Literature. Writing. Publishing. Authors. Screenwriters. Life. Death. Etc. Support the show on Patreon Merch www.otherppl.com @otherppl Instagram  YouTube Email the show: letters [at] otherppl [dot] com The podcast is a proud affiliate partner of Bookshop, working to support local, independent bookstores. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Lana Bastasic is the author of the debut novel Catch the Rabbit, winner of the 2020 European Union Prize for Literature. Available now in translation from Restless Books. The official June pick of The Nervous Breakdown Book Club. Bastasic is a Yugoslav-born writer. She majored in English and holds a master’s degree in cultural studies. She has published three collections of short stories, one book of children’s stories and one of poetry. She lives in Belgrade. Her short stories have been included in regional anthologies and magazines throughout the former Yugoslavia. She has won the Best Short Story section at the Zija Dizdarević competition in Fojnica; the Jury Award at the ‘Carver: Where I’m Calling From’ festival in Podgorica; Best Short Story at the Ulaznica festival in Zrenjanin; Best Play by a Bosnian Playwright (Kamerni teatar 55 in Sarajevo) and the Targa Unesco Prize for poetry in Trieste. In 2016 she co-founded Escola Bloom in Barcelona and she now co-edits the school’s literary magazine Carn de cap. She is one of the creators of the ‘3+3 sisters’ project, which aims to promote women writers of the Balkans. *** Otherppl with Brad Listi is a weekly literary podcast featuring in-depth interviews with today's leading writers. Launched in 2011. Books. Literature. Writing. Publishing. Authors. Screenwriters. Life. Death. Etc. Support the show on Patreon Merch www.otherppl.com @otherppl Instagram  YouTube Email the show: letters [at] otherppl [dot] com The podcast is a proud affiliate partner of Bookshop, working to support local, independent bookstores. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Barrett Swanson is the author of the essay collection Lost in Summerland (Counterpoint Press). Swanson is a contributing editor at Harper’s Magazine. He was the recipient of a 2015 Pushcart Prize, and his short fiction and essays have been distinguished as notable in Best American Short Stories (2019), Best American Nonrequired Reading (2014), Best American Essays (2014, 2015, 2017, 2019 and 2020) and Best American Sports Writing (2017). His work has appeared in many places, including Harper’s, The New Yorker, The Paris Review, The New York Times Magazine, The Believer, American Short Fiction, The New Republic, The Atavist, Guernica, The Guardian, Best American Travel Writing 2018, and Best American Travel Writing 2020. He and his wife live in the Midwest. *** Otherppl with Brad Listi is a weekly literary podcast featuring in-depth interviews with today's leading writers. Launched in 2011. Books. Literature. Writing. Publishing. Authors. Screenwriters. Life. Death. Etc. Support the show on Patreon Merch www.otherppl.com @otherppl Instagram  YouTube Email the show: letters [at] otherppl [dot] com The podcast is a proud affiliate partner of Bookshop, working to support local, independent bookstores. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Melissa Febos is the author of the essay collection Girlhood (Bloomsbury). It is a national bestseller.  Her other books include the critically acclaimed memoir, Whip Smart (St. Martin’s Press 2010), and the essay collection, Abandon Me (Bloomsbury 2017), which was a LAMBDA Literary Award finalist, a Publishing Triangle Award finalist, an Indie Next Pick, and was widely named a Best Book of 2017. A craft book, Body Work, will be published by Catapult in March 2022. The inaugural winner of the Jeanne Córdova Nonfiction Award from LAMBDA Literary, her work has appeared in publications including The Paris Review, The Sun, The Kenyon Review, Tin House, Granta, The Believer, McSweeney’s, The New York Times Magazine, The Guardian, Elle, and Vogue. Her essays have won prizes from Prairie Schooner, Story Quarterly, The Sewanee Review, and The Center for Women Writers at Salem College. She is a four-time MacDowell fellow and has also received fellowships from the Bread Loaf Writer’s Conference, Virginia Center for Creative Arts, Vermont Studio Center, The Barbara Deming Memorial Foundation, The BAU Institute at The Camargo Foundation, The Ragdale Foundation, and The Lower Manhattan Cultural Council, which named her the 2018 recipient of the Sarah Verdone Writing Award. She co-curated the Mixer Reading and Music Series in Manhattan for ten years and served on the Board of Directors for VIDA: Women in Literary Arts for five. The recipient of an MFA from Sarah Lawrence College, she is an associate professor at the University of Iowa, where she teaches in the Nonfiction Writing Program. *** Otherppl with Brad Listi is a weekly literary podcast featuring in-depth interviews with today's leading writers. Launched in 2011. Books. Literature. Writing. Publishing. Authors. Screenwriters. Life. Death. Etc. Support the show on Patreon Merch www.otherppl.com @otherppl Instagram  YouTube Email the show: letters [at] otherppl [dot] com The podcast is a proud affiliate partner of Bookshop, working to support local, independent bookstores. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Sam Tallent is the guest. His debut novel, Running the Light, is available on Too Big To Fail Press. Known for whip-quick wit and rollicking improvisations, Sam Tallent is one of the sharpest, most original rising talents in comedy today. For the last 10 years, he has performed at least 45 weekends annually across America, Canada and France. Called "the absurd voice of a surreal generation" by the Denver Post, Sam is beloved by fans of contemporary comedy. He was a New Face at the 2019 Just for Laughs Montreal Comedy Festival, he won his battle on Comedy Central's Roast Battle, hosted the Denver episode of VICELAND's Flophouse and appeared on the Chris Gerhard Show to impress a girl. His critically acclaimed debut novel Running the Light — heralded as the “definitive novel about stand up comedy” (Marc Maron, WTF) — was published in 2020 and his short fiction has been published on VICE.com and in BIRDY magazine. He lives in Colorado with his wife and his dog. *** Otherppl with Brad Listi is a weekly literary podcast featuring in-depth interviews with today's leading writers. Launched in 2011. Books. Literature. Writing. Publishing. Authors. Screenwriters. Life. Death. Etc. Support the show on Patreon Merch www.otherppl.com @otherppl Instagram  YouTube Email the show: letters [at] otherppl [dot] com The podcast is a proud affiliate partner of Bookshop, working to support local, independent bookstores. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Courtney Zoffness is the author of Spilt Milk, a collection of memoirs available now from McSweeney's. It is the official May pick of The Nervous Breakdown Book Club. Zoffness writes fiction and nonfiction. She won the 2018 Sunday Times Short Story Award, the most valuable international prize for short fiction, amid entries from 38 countries. Other honors include an Emerging Writers Fellowship from the Center for Fiction, the Arts & Letters Creative Nonfiction Prize, and two residency fellowships from MacDowell. Her writing has appeared in various outlets, including the Paris Review Daily, the New York Times, The Southern Review, Guernica, and the Los Angeles Review of Books, and she had “notable” essays in Best American Essays 2018 & 2019. Zoffness holds graduate degrees from Johns Hopkins University and the University of Arizona, and a B.A. from the University of Pennsylvania. She directs the Creative Writing Program at Drew University and is a faculty member at Writing Workshops in Greece. She lives with her family in Brooklyn, New York. *** Otherppl with Brad Listi is a weekly literary podcast featuring in-depth interviews with today's leading writers. Launched in 2011. Books. Literature. Writing. Publishing. Authors. Screenwriters. Life. Death. Etc. Support the show on Patreon Merch www.otherppl.com @otherppl Instagram  YouTube Email the show: letters [at] otherppl [dot] com The podcast is a proud affiliate partner of Bookshop, working to support local, independent bookstores. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Elissa Washuta is the author of the essay collection White Magic, now available from Tin House. Washuta is a member of the Cowlitz Indian Tribe and a nonfiction writer. Her other books are My Body Is a Book of Rules and Starvation Mode, and with Theresa Warburton, she is co-editor of the anthology Shapes of Native Nonfiction: Collected Essays by Contemporary Writers. She has received fellowships and awards from the National Endowment for the Arts, Creative Capital, Artist Trust, 4Culture, and Potlatch Fund. She is an assistant professor of creative writing at the Ohio State University. *** Otherppl with Brad Listi is a weekly literary podcast featuring in-depth interviews with today's leading writers. Launched in 2011. Books. Literature. Writing. Publishing. Authors. Screenwriters. Life. Death. Etc. Support the show on Patreon Merch www.otherppl.com @otherppl Instagram  YouTube Email the show: letters [at] otherppl [dot] com The podcast is a proud affiliate partner of Bookshop, working to support local, independent bookstores. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

This conversation first aired on June 17, 2015. It is being reposted in memory of Shanna Mahin, who died last week. She had been battling a particularly difficult case of Covid-19 this past year. The cause of death was suicide. Shanna's debut novel, Oh! You Pretty Things is available from Dutton. Heartfelt condolences to all of Shanna's family and friends. She will be missed. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Gina Nutt is the author of the essay collection Night Rooms, available now from Two Dollar Radio. Nutt's other books include the poetry collection Wilderness Champion and two chapbooks—Here Is My Adventure I Call it Alone and Ars Herzogica (dancing girl press). Her writing has appeared in online and print journals, including Cosmonauts Avenue, Joyland, Ninth Letter, and Salt Hill. Poems have appeared on Verse Daily and in the Best of the Net Anthology. She graduated from Syracuse University’s MFA program in Creative Writing and lives in New York. *** Otherppl with Brad Listi is a weekly literary podcast featuring in-depth interviews with today's leading writers. Launched in 2011. Books. Literature. Writing. Publishing. Authors. Screenwriters. Life. Death. Etc. Support the show on Patreon Merch www.otherppl.com @otherppl Instagram  YouTube Email the show: letters [at] otherppl [dot] com The podcast is a proud affiliate partner of Bookshop, working to support local, independent bookstores. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Mik Grantham is the author of the debut poetry collection Hardcore, available from Short Flight / Long Drive Books. Grantham is the founder and co-editor of Disorder Press which she runs with her brother. Her work has appeared in New World Writing, Hobart, Maudlin House, The Nervous Breakdown, and Fanzine. She currently lives in New Orleans. Hardcore is her first book. *** Otherppl with Brad Listi is a weekly literary podcast featuring in-depth interviews with today's leading writers. Launched in 2011. Books. Literature. Writing. Publishing. Authors. Screenwriters. Life. Death. Etc. Support the show on Patreon Merch www.otherppl.com @otherppl Instagram  YouTube Email the show: letters [at] otherppl [dot] com The podcast is a proud affiliate partner of Bookshop, working to support local, independent bookstores. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Patricia Engel is the author of the novel Infinite Country, available from Avid Reader Press. It is the official April pick of The Nervous Breakdown Book Club. Engel is the author of The Veins of the Ocean, winner of the Dayton Literary Peace Prize; It's Not Love, It's Just Paris, winner of the International Latino Book Award; and Vida, a finalist for the Pen/Hemingway and Young Lions Fiction Awards, New York Times Notable Book, and winner of Colombia's national book award, the Premio Biblioteca de Narrativa Colombiana. She is a recipient of fellowships from the Guggenheim Foundation and the National Endowment for the Arts. Her stories appear in The Best American Short Stories, The Best American Mystery Stories, The O. Henry Prize Stories, and elsewhere. Born to Colombian parents, Patricia teaches creative writing at the University of Miami. *** Otherppl with Brad Listi is a weekly literary podcast featuring in-depth interviews with today's leading writers. Launched in 2011. Books. Literature. Writing. Publishing. Authors. Screenwriters. Life. Death. Etc. Support the show on Patreon Merch www.otherppl.com @otherppl Instagram  YouTube Email the show: letters [at] otherppl [dot] com The podcast is a proud affiliate partner of Bookshop, working to support local, independent bookstores. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Andrea Bajani is the author of the novel If You Kept a Record of Sins, available from Archipelago Books. It was translated from the Italian by Elizabeth Harris. Bajani is one of the most respected and award-winning novelists and poets of contemporary Italian literature. He is the author of four novels and two collections of poems. If You Kept a Record of Sins has brought him a great deal of attention. In just a few months, the book won the Super Mondello Prize, the Brancati Prize, the Recanati Prize and the Lo Straniero Prize. His works have been translated into many languages, and published by some of the most prestigious European publishers, such as Gallimard, Siruela, MacLehose, Atheneum, DTV, Humanitas. He now lives in Houston and teaches at Rice University. *** Otherppl with Brad Listi is a weekly literary podcast featuring in-depth interviews with today's leading writers. Launched in 2011. Books. Literature. Writing. Publishing. Authors. Screenwriters. Life. Death. Etc. Support the show on Patreon Merch www.otherppl.com @otherppl Instagram  YouTube Email the show: letters [at] otherppl [dot] com The podcast is a proud affiliate partner of Bookshop, working to support local, independent bookstores. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Shannon McLeod is the author of the novella Whimsy, available from Long Day Press. McLeod is also the author of the essay chapbook Pathetic (University of Indianapolis Etchings Press). Her writing has appeared in Tin House Online, Wigleaf, Hobart, Joyland Magazine, Cosmonauts Avenue, and Prairie Schooner, among other publications. She teaches high school English in Virginia. *** Otherppl with Brad Listi is a weekly literary podcast featuring in-depth interviews with today's leading writers. Launched in 2011. Books. Literature. Writing. Publishing. Authors. Screenwriters. Life. Death. Etc. Support the show on Patreon Merch www.otherppl.com @otherppl Instagram  YouTube Email the show: letters [at] otherppl [dot] com The podcast is a proud affiliate partner of Bookshop, working to support local, independent bookstores. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Gina Frangello is the author of the memoir Blow Your House Down, available from Counterpoint Press. This is Gina's second time on the program. She first appeared in Episode 16 on November 9, 2011. Frangello's other books include Every Kind of Wanting, A Life in Men, Slut Lullabies, and My Sister's Continent. Her short fiction, essays, book reviews, and journalism have been published in Ploughshares, The Boston Globe, Chicago Tribune, HuffPost, Fence, Five Chapters, Prairie Schooner, Chicago Reader, and many other publications. She lives with her family in the Chicago area. *** Otherppl with Brad Listi is a weekly literary podcast featuring in-depth interviews with today's leading writers. Launched in 2011. Books. Literature. Writing. Publishing. Authors. Screenwriters. Life. Death. Etc. Support the show on Patreon Merch www.otherppl.com @otherppl Instagram  YouTube Email the show: letters [at] otherppl [dot] com The podcast is a proud affiliate partner of Bookshop, working to support local, independent bookstores. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

This episode first aired on March 27, 2013. It is being reposted in memory of Giancarlo DiTrapano (1974-2021), founder and publisher of Tyrant Books. He died unexpectedly on March 30 in New York City. No official cause of death has been reported as of yet. I didn't know Gian well, but I did know him a bit. He was always kind, always memorable. One of the few true originals out there, and certainly an original in the world of publishing. He did very good work and helped shepherd the publication of books that will far outlive him. He made a positive difference in the world. My heartfelt condolences to his friends and family. He will be greatly missed. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Hari Kunzru is the author of the novel Red Pill, available now from Knopf. This is Hari's second time on the program. He first appeared in Episode 57, on April 1, 2012. Born in London, he is the author of the novels The Impressionist, Transmission, My Revolutions, Gods Without Men, and White Tears, as well as a short story collection, Noise, and a novella, Memory Palace. He is an honorary fellow of Wadham College Oxford, and has received fellowships from the Cullman Center at the New York Public Library, the Guggenheim Foundation and the American Academy in Berlin. He is the host of the podcast Into The Zone, coming in September from Pushkin Industries, and lives in New York City. *** Otherppl with Brad Listi is a weekly literary podcast featuring in-depth interviews with today's leading writers. Launched in 2011. Books. Literature. Writing. Publishing. Authors. Screenwriters. Life. Death. Etc. Support the show on Patreon Merch www.otherppl.com @otherppl Instagram  YouTube Email the show: letters [at] otherppl [dot] com The podcast is a proud affiliate partner of Bookshop, working to support local, independent bookstores. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Tod Goldberg is the guest. His critically acclaimed new story collection, The Low Desert, is available from Counterpoint. This is Tod's third time on the program. He first appeared in Episode 320 on October 12, 2014, and again in Episode 488, on October 18, 2017. Goldberg is the author of more than a dozen books, including Gangsterland, a finalist for the Hammett Prize; Gangster Nation; The House of Secrets, which he coauthored with Brad Meltzer; and the crime-tinged novels Living Dead Girl, a finalist for the Los Angeles Times Book Prize, and Fake Liar Cheat, plus five novels in the popular Burn Notice series. He is also the author of the story collection Simplify, a 2006 finalist for the SCIBA Award for Fiction and winner of the Other Voices Short Story Collection Prize, and Other Resort Cities. His essays, journalism, and criticism have appeared in many publications, including the Los Angeles Times, The Wall Street Journal, Los Angeles Review of Books, Las Vegas Weekly, and Best American Essays, among many others, and have won five Nevada Press Association Awards. He lives in Indio, California, where he directs the Low Residency MFA in Creative Writing & Writing for the Performing Arts at the University of California, Riverside. *** Otherppl with Brad Listi is a weekly literary podcast featuring in-depth interviews with today's leading writers. Launched in 2011. Books. Literature. Writing. Publishing. Authors. Screenwriters. Life. Death. Etc. Support the show on Patreon Merch www.otherppl.com @otherppl Instagram  YouTube Email the show: letters [at] otherppl [dot] com The podcast is a proud affiliate partner of Bookshop, working to support local, independent bookstores. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Yamen Manai is the author of the novel The Ardent Swarm, available now from Amazon Crossing. Winner of the Prix Comar d'Or and the Prix des Cinq Continents, it is the official March pick of The Nervous Breakdown Book Club. Manai was born in 1980 in Tunis and currently lives in Paris. Both a writer and an engineer, Manai explores the intersections of past and present, and tradition and technology, in his prose. In The Ardent Swarm (originally published as L'Amas ardent), his first book to be translated into English, he celebrates Tunisia's rich oral culture, a tradition abounding in wry, often fatalistic humor. He has published three novels with the Tunisia-based Elyzad Editions--a deliberate choice to ensure that his books are accessible to Tunisian readers: La marche de l'incertitude (2010), awarded Tunisia's prestigious Prix Comar d'Or; La sérénade d'Ibrahim Santos (2011); and L'Amas ardent (2017), which earned both the Prix Comar d'Or and the Prix des Cinq Continents, a literary prize recognizing exceptional Francophone literature. *** Otherppl with Brad Listi is a weekly literary podcast featuring in-depth interviews with today's leading writers. Launched in 2011. Books. Literature. Writing. Publishing. Authors. Screenwriters. Life. Death. Etc. Support the show on Patreon Merch www.otherppl.com @otherppl Instagram  Email the show: letters [at] otherppl [dot] com The podcast is a proud affiliate partner of Bookshop, working to support local, independent bookstores. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Vesna Maric is the author of the debut novel The President Shop (Sandorf Passage). Maric was born in Mostar, Bosnia-Herzegovina, in 1976. She left the country at sixteen as part of a convoy of refugees bound for the Lake District in England. She attended University College London and later went on to work for the BBC World Service. She now writes Lonely Planet travel guides, translates literary fiction and non-fiction from Croatian into English, and writes a variety of journalism for publications including the Guardian. Vesna has collaborated with various artists, including Jane and Louise Wilson, and on art projects at the Tate Modern's Who Are We? project. Her memoir, Bluebird, was published by Granta in 2009, and was longlisted for The Orwell Prize. She lives in Madrid. *** Otherppl with Brad Listi is a weekly literary podcast featuring in-depth interviews with today's leading writers. Launched in 2011. Books. Literature. Writing. Publishing. Authors. Screenwriters. Life. Death. Etc. Support the show on Patreon Merch www.otherppl.com @otherppl Instagram  Email the show: letters [at] otherppl [dot] com The podcast is a proud affiliate partner of Bookshop, working to support local, independent bookstores. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Melissa Broder is the guest. Her new novel, Milk Fed, is available from Scribner. This is Melissa's fourth time on the podcast. She first appeared in Episode 58 on April 4, 2012. Her second appearance was in Episode 404 on March 13, 2016. Her third appearance came in Episode 519, on May 9, 2018. Broder's other books include the novel The Pisces, the essay collection So Sad Today, and five poetry collections, including Superdoom: Selected Poems (Summer 2021) and Last Sext. Broder has written for The New York Times, Elle.com, VICE, Vogue Italia, and New York Magazine‘s The Cut. Her poems have appeared in Poetry, The Iowa Review, Guernica, Fence,  et al. She is the winner of a Pushcart Prize for poetry. She lives in Los Angeles. *** Otherppl with Brad Listi is a weekly literary podcast featuring in-depth interviews with today's leading writers. Launched in 2011. Books. Literature. Writing. Publishing. Authors. Screenwriters. Life. Death. Etc. Support the show on Patreon Merch www.otherppl.com @otherppl Instagram  Email the show: letters [at] otherppl [dot] com The podcast is a proud affiliate partner of Bookshop, working to support local, independent bookstores. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

David Tromblay is the guest. His new memoir, As You Were, is available from Dzanc Books. It is the official February pick of The Nervous Breakdown Book Club. Tromblay served in the U.S. Armed Forces for over a decade before attending the Institute of American Indian Arts for his MFA in Creative Writing. He's since written and published a memoir and three novels. His other books include The Essentials: A Manifesto and The Ramblings of a Revenant. He currently works as an editor for Shotgun Honey Magazine and lives in Tulsa, Oklahoma, with his cat, Walter, and dogs, Bentley and Hank. *** Otherppl with Brad Listi is a weekly literary podcast featuring in-depth interviews with today's leading writers. Launched in 2011. Books. Literature. Writing. Publishing. Authors. Screenwriters. Life. Death. Etc. Support the show on Patreon Merch www.otherppl.com @otherppl Instagram  Email the show: letters [at] otherppl [dot] com The podcast is a proud affiliate partner of Bookshop, working to support local, independent bookstores. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Candace Jane Opper is the author of the debut memoir Certain and Impossible Events. It was selected by Cheryl Strayed as the winner of the Kore Press Memoir Award. Opper is a writer, a mother, and an occasional visual artist. She grew up in the woods of Southern Connecticut. Her essays have appeared or are forthcoming in Longreads, Guernica, Creative Nonfiction, LitHub, Narratively, Brevity, and Vestoj, among others. She is a Creative Nonfiction Foundation Fellowship recipient and a member on the advisory council for Write Pittsburgh, a program collective that empowers writers to amplify their voices and strengthen their communities. Certain and Impossible Events is her first book. Today's monologue: listener mail *** Otherppl with Brad Listi is a weekly literary podcast featuring in-depth interviews with today's leading writers. Launched in 2011. Books. Literature. Writing. Publishing. Authors. Screenwriters. Life. Death. Etc. Support the show on Patreon Merch www.otherppl.com @otherppl Instagram  Email the show: letters [at] otherppl [dot] com The podcast is a proud affiliate partner of Bookshop, working to support local, independent bookstores. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Ahmed Naji is the guest. He is the author of three novels, including Using Life (University of Texas Press), which led to his imprisonment in Egypt—and then led to the writing of a new memoir, Rotten Evidence: Reading and Writing in Prison, currently excerpted in The Believer magazine. In 2016, Naji was sentenced to 2 years in prison after a reader complained that an excerpt of Using Life published in a literary journal harmed public morality. His imprisonment marks the first time in modern Egypt that an author has been jailed for a work of literature. Writers and literary organizations around the world rallied to support Naji, and he was released in December 2016. His original conviction was overturned in May 2017. His other books include the novels Rogers and And Tigers to My Room. Throughout his career, he has won several prizes, including the 2016 PEN/Barbey Freedom to Write Award. He is now a fellow at the Black Mountain Institute in Las Vegas, where he lives with his small family. *** Otherppl with Brad Listi is a weekly literary podcast featuring in-depth interviews with today's leading writers. Launched in 2011. Books. Literature. Writing. Publishing. Authors. Screenwriters. Life. Death. Etc. Support the show on Patreon / get merch.  www.otherppl.com @otherppl Instagram  Email the show: letters [at] otherppl [dot] com Get Otherppl t-shirts, sweatshirts, etc. The podcast is a proud affiliate partner of Bookshop, working to support local, independent bookstores. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Michael Bible is the guest. His new novel, The Ancient Hours, is available from Melville House. Support independent booksellers! Get your copy here. Bible's other books include Empire of Light and Sophia, also from Melville House. He is originally from North Carolina. His work has appeared in the Oxford American, The Paris Review Daily, Al-Jazeera America, ESPN The Magazine, and New York Tyrant Magazine. He is a former bookseller at Square Books in Oxford, Mississippi, and lives in New York. The Otherppl podcast is a proud affiliate partner of Bookshop. Support independent bookstores and buy your books here. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Te-Ping Chen is the guest. Her debut story collection, Land of Big Numbers, is available from Houghton Mifflin Harcourt. It is the official January pick of The Nervous Breakdown Book Club. Chen's fiction has been published in The New Yorker, Granta and Tin House. She is a Wall Street Journal correspondent in Philadelphia who was previously based in Beijing and Hong Kong. She has reported on rice cookers and wrongful convictions, gotten hung up on by Edward Snowden and eaten more robot-cooked noodles than she can count.  *** Otherppl with Brad Listi is a weekly literary podcast featuring in-depth interviews with today's leading writers. Launched in 2011. Books. Literature. Writing. Publishing. Authors. Screenwriters. Life. Death. Etc. Support the show on Patreon Merch www.otherppl.com @otherppl Instagram  Email the show: letters [at] otherppl [dot] com The podcast is a proud affiliate partner of Bookshop, working to support local, independent bookstores. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Rob Doyle is the guest. His new book, Threshold, is available from Bloomsbury. Doyle's debut novel, Here Are the Young Men, was published in 2014 by Bloomsbury and the Lilliput Press. It was selected as one of Hot Press magazine’s ‘20 Greatest Irish Novels 1916-2016’, and has been made into a film starring Dean Charles Chapman and Anya Taylor Joy. This is the Ritual, a collection of short stories, was published in 2016 to widespread acclaim. Doyle is the editor of the anthology The Other Irish Tradition (Dalkey Archive Press), and In This Skull Hotel Where I Never Sleep (Broken Dimanche Press). He has written for the Guardian, TLS, Vice, Sunday Times, Dublin Review, Observer and many other publications, and throughout 2019 he wrote a weekly column on cult books for the Irish Times. He lives between Ireland and Berlin. *** Otherppl with Brad Listi is a weekly literary podcast featuring in-depth interviews with today's leading writers. Launched in 2011. Books. Literature. Writing. Publishing. Authors. Screenwriters. Life. Death. Etc. Support the show on Patreon Merch www.otherppl.com @otherppl Instagram  Email the show: letters [at] otherppl [dot] com The podcast is a proud affiliate partner of Bookshop, working to support local, independent bookstores. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Gil Adamson is the guest. Her new novel, The Ridgerunner, will be published in the United States by House of Anansi Press on February 2, 2021. Adamson is the critically acclaimed author of The Outlander, which won the Dashiell Hammett Prize for Literary Excellence in Crime Writing, the Amazon.ca First Novel Award, the ReLit Award, and the Drummer General’s Award. It was a finalist for the Commonwealth Writers’ Prize, CBC Canada Reads, and the Prix Femina in France; longlisted for the International IMPAC Dublin Literary Award; and chosen as a Globe and Mail and Washington Post Top 100 Book. She is also the author of a collection of linked stories, Help Me, Jacques Cousteau, and two poetry collections, Primitive and Ashland. She lives in Toronto. *** Otherppl with Brad Listi is a weekly literary podcast featuring in-depth interviews with today's leading writers. Launched in 2011. Books. Literature. Writing. Publishing. Authors. Screenwriters. Life. Death. Etc. Support the show on Patreon Merch www.otherppl.com @otherppl Instagram  Email the show: letters [at] otherppl [dot] com The podcast is a proud affiliate partner of Bookshop, working to support local, independent bookstores. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

George Saunders is the guest. His new book, A Swim in a Pond in the Rain, is available from Random House. This is George's second time on the program. He first appeared in Episode 100, on August 29, 2012. Saunders is the author of eleven books, including Lincoln in the Bardo, which won the 2017 Man Booker Prize for best work of fiction in English, and was a finalist for the Golden Man Booker, in which one Booker winner was selected to represent each decade, from the fifty years since the Prize’s inception. The audiobook for Lincoln in the Bardo, which featured a cast of 166 actors, won the 2018 Audie Award for best audiobook.   His stories have appeared regularly in The New Yorker since 1992. The short story collection Tenth of December was a finalist for the National Book Award, and won the inaugural Folio Prize in 2013 (for the best work of fiction in English) and the Story Prize (best short story collection).  He has received MacArthur and Guggenheim Fellowships, the PEN/Malamud Prize for excellence in the short story, and is a member of the American Academy of Arts and Letters, and the American Academy of Arts and Sciences. In 2013, he was named one of the world’s 100 most influential people in the world by Time magazine. In support of his work, he has appeared on The Colbert Report, Late Night with David Letterman, All Things Considered, and The Diane Rehm Show.  Saunders was born in Amarillo, Texas and raised in Oak Forest, Illinois. He has a degree in Geophysics from the Colorado School of Mines and has worked as a geophysical prospector in Indonesia, a roofer in Chicago, a doorman in Beverly Hills, and a technical writer in Rochester, New York. He has taught, since 1997, in the Creative Writing Program at Syracuse University. *** Otherppl with Brad Listi is a weekly literary podcast featuring in-depth interviews with today's leading writers. Launched in 2011. Books. Literature. Writing. Publishing. Authors. Screenwriters. Life. Death. Etc. Support the show on Patreon Merch www.otherppl.com @otherppl Instagram  Email the show: letters [at] otherppl [dot] com The podcast is a proud affiliate partner of Bookshop, working to support local, independent bookstores. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

In keeping with the tenets of 2020, this year's holiday episode unfolded online, not in a Zoom room but in a "Skype amphitheater." With guest appearances by Megan Boyle, Leland Cheuk, Richard Chiem, Rachel Bell de Navailles, Juliet Escoria, Joseph Grantham, Mik Grantham, Ben Loory, Gene Morgan, Timothy Willis Sanders, and Bud Smith. Special guest: Rich Ferguson. *** Otherppl with Brad Listi is a weekly literary podcast featuring in-depth interviews with today's leading writers. Launched in 2011. Books. Literature. Writing. Publishing. Authors. Screenwriters. Life. Death. Etc. Support the show on Patreon Merch www.otherppl.com @otherppl Instagram  Email the show: letters [at] otherppl [dot] com The podcast is a proud affiliate partner of Bookshop, working to support local, independent bookstores. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Alex Branson is the guest. His new novel, Water, Wasted, is available from Rare Bird Books. It is the official December pick of The Nervous Breakdown Book Club. Branson works for a non-profit in South Jersey. Before that, he worked at group homes in rural Missouri and Chicago for eight years. He is one of the hosts of E1 Podcast. *** Otherppl with Brad Listi is a weekly literary podcast featuring in-depth interviews with today's leading writers. Launched in 2011. Books. Literature. Writing. Publishing. Authors. Screenwriters. Life. Death. Etc. Support the show on Patreon Merch www.otherppl.com @otherppl Instagram  Email the show: letters [at] otherppl [dot] com The podcast is a proud affiliate partner of Bookshop, working to support local, independent bookstores. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Michael Schumacher is the guest. He is the editor of The Fall of America Journals, 1965-1971, by the late Allen Ginsberg, available now from the University of Minnesota Press. Schumacher is also the author of the acclaimed Ginsberg biography Dharma Lion (Minnesota, 2016). Along with Ginsberg’s Iron Curtain Journals and South American Journals and Conversations with Allen Ginsberg (all from Minnesota), he has edited Family Business, selected correspondence between Allen and Louis Ginsberg, and The Essential Ginsberg, a reader of Ginsberg’s best work. He lives in Wisconsin. *** Otherppl with Brad Listi is a weekly literary podcast featuring in-depth interviews with today's leading writers. Launched in 2011. Books. Literature. Writing. Publishing. Authors. Screenwriters. Life. Death. Etc. Support the show on Patreon Merch www.otherppl.com @otherppl Instagram  Email the show: letters [at] otherppl [dot] com The podcast is a proud affiliate partner of Bookshop, working to support local, independent bookstores. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Travis Hoewischer is the guest. He is the author of the Two Dollar Radio Guide to Naming Your Baby, available now from Two Dollar Radio. Hoewischer has spent twenty years as a journalist, standup comedian, and non-profit leader. This is his first book. He was almost called Andrew. *** Otherppl with Brad Listi is a weekly literary podcast featuring in-depth interviews with today's leading writers. Launched in 2011. Books. Literature. Writing. Publishing. Authors. Screenwriters. Life. Death. Etc. Support the show on Patreon Merch www.otherppl.com @otherppl Instagram  Email the show: letters [at] otherppl [dot] com The podcast is a proud affiliate partner of Bookshop, working to support local, independent bookstores. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Darien Gee is the guest. She has two books out this year. The first is called Other Small Histories, a poetry collection available from Poetry Society of America. And the second is a collection of micro-essays called Allegiance, available from Legacy Isle Publishing. Gee is the author of five novels published by Penguin Random House that have been translated into eleven languages, including An Avalon Christmas and The Friendship Bread. She won the 2019 Poetry Society of America’s Chapbook Fellowship award for Other Small Histories. She lives with her family on the Big Island of Hawai‘i. *** Otherppl with Brad Listi is a weekly literary podcast featuring in-depth interviews with today's leading writers. Launched in 2011. Books. Literature. Writing. Publishing. Authors. Screenwriters. Life. Death. Etc. Support the show on Merch www.otherppl.com @otherppl Instagram  Email the show: letters [at] otherppl [dot] com The podcast is a proud affiliate partner of Bookshop, working to support local, independent bookstores. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Kasey Thornton is the guest. Her debut novel-in-stories, Lord the One You Love is Sick, is available now from Ig Publishing. It is the official November pick of The Nervous Breakdown Book Club. Thornton attended both the University of North Carolina at Wilmington and North Carolina State University for her MFA in Fiction. She lives with fellow author Kevin Kauffmann in Durham County, North Carolina, where members of her family have resided for over two hundred years. Her creative work has been featured in the Masters Review, TJ Eckleberg Review, tinyjournal, Colonnades Literary & Art Journal, and Apeiron Review. *** Otherppl with Brad Listi is a weekly literary podcast featuring in-depth interviews with today's leading writers. Launched in 2011. Books. Literature. Writing. Publishing. Authors. Screenwriters. Life. Death. Etc. Support the show on Patreon Merch www.otherppl.com @otherppl Instagram  Email the show: letters [at] otherppl [dot] com The podcast is a proud affiliate partner of Bookshop, working to support local, independent bookstores. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Andrew Weatherhead is the guest. His latest book, $50,000, is available from Publishing Genius. Weatherhead is a writer and artist from Chicago, Illinois. His other books include the poetry collections TODD and Cats and Dogs -- and a chapbook, The Kids I Teach, with Mallory Whitten. He currently lives in Brooklyn, New York. *** Otherppl with Brad Listi is a weekly literary podcast featuring in-depth interviews with today's leading writers. Launched in 2011. Books. Literature. Writing. Publishing. Authors. Screenwriters. Life. Death. Etc. Support the show on Patreon Merch www.otherppl.com @otherppl Instagram  Email the show: letters [at] otherppl [dot] com The podcast is a proud affiliate partner of Bookshop, working to support local, independent bookstores. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Sebastian Castillo is the guest. His new book, Not I, is available from Word West Press. Castillo is the author of 49 Venezuelan Novels (Bottlecap Press). You can find his writing in Hobart, Peach Mag, X-R-A-Y, and elsewhere. He lives in New York, where he teaches writing.  *** Otherppl with Brad Listi is a weekly literary podcast featuring in-depth interviews with today's leading writers. Launched in 2011. Books. Literature. Writing. Publishing. Authors. Screenwriters. Life. Death. Etc. Support the show on Patreon Merch www.otherppl.com @otherppl Instagram  Email the show: letters [at] otherppl [dot] com The podcast is a proud affiliate partner of Bookshop, working to support local, independent bookstores. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Jared Yates Sexton is the guest. His new book, American Rule, is available from Dutton. This is Jared's second time on the program. He first appeared in Episode 478 on August 23, 2017. Sexton is the author of The Man They Wanted Me to Be and The People Are Going to Rise Like the Waters Upon Your Shore. His political writing has appeared in publications including The New York Times, The New Republic, Politico, and Salon.com. Sexton is also the author of three collections of fiction and is an associate professor of creative writing at Georgia Southern University. *** Otherppl with Brad Listi is a weekly literary podcast featuring in-depth interviews with today's leading writers. Launched in 2011. Books. Literature. Writing. Publishing. Authors. Screenwriters. Life. Death. Etc. Support the show on Patreon Merch www.otherppl.com @otherppl Instagram  Email the show: letters [at] otherppl [dot] com The podcast is a proud affiliate partner of Bookshop, working to support local, independent bookstores. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Anne Helen Petersen is the guest. Her new book, Can't Even: How Millennials Became the Burnout Generation, is available from Houghton Mifflin Harcourt. It is the official October pick of The Nervous Breakdown Book Club. A former senior culture writer for BuzzFeed, Petersen now writes her newsletter, Culture Study, as a full-time venture on Substack. She received her PhD at the University of Texas at Austin, where she focused on the history of celebrity gossip. Her previous books, Too Fat, Too Slutty, Too Loud and Scandals of Classic Hollywood, were featured in NPR, Elle, and the Atlantic. She lives in Missoula, Montana.  *** Otherppl with Brad Listi is a weekly literary podcast featuring in-depth interviews with today's leading writers. Launched in 2011. Books. Literature. Writing. Publishing. Authors. Screenwriters. Life. Death. Etc. Support the show on Patreon Merch www.otherppl.com @otherppl Instagram  Email the show: letters [at] otherppl [dot] com The podcast is a proud affiliate partner of Bookshop, working to support local, independent bookstores. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Laura Bogart is the guest. Her debut novel, Don't You Know I Love You, is available from Dzanc Books. Bogart is also a non-fiction writer who focuses on personal essays, pop culture, film and TV, feminism, body image and sizeism, and politics (among other topics). She is a featured contributor to The Week and DAME magazine; her work has also appeared in The Atlantic, The Guardian, SPIN, The AV Club, Vulture, and Indiewire (among other publications). She lives in Baltimore. *** Otherppl with Brad Listi is a weekly literary podcast featuring in-depth interviews with today's leading writers. Launched in 2011. Books. Literature. Writing. Publishing. Authors. Screenwriters. Life. Death. Etc. Support the show on Patreon Merch www.otherppl.com @otherppl Instagram  Email the show: letters [at] otherppl [dot] com The podcast is a proud affiliate partner of Bookshop, working to support local, independent bookstores. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Dean Koontz is the guest. His new novel, Elsewhere, is available from Thomas & Mercer. Koontz is the author of fourteen number one New York Times bestsellers, including One Door Away from Heaven, From the Corner of His Eye, Midnight, Cold Fire, The Bad Place, Hideaway, Dragon Tears, Intensity, Sole Survivor, The Husband, Odd Hours, Relentless, What the Night Knows, and 77 Shadow Street. He’s been hailed by Rolling Stone as “America’s most popular suspense novelist,” and his books have been published in thirty-eight languages and have sold over five hundred million copies worldwide. Born and raised in Pennsylvania, he now lives in Southern California with his wife, Gerda, their golden retriever, Elsa, and the enduring spirits of their goldens Trixie and Anna. *** Otherppl with Brad Listi is a weekly literary podcast featuring in-depth interviews with today's leading writers. Launched in 2011. Books. Literature. Writing. Publishing. Authors. Screenwriters. Life. Death. Etc. Support the show on Patreon Merch www.otherppl.com @otherppl Instagram  Email the show: letters [at] otherppl [dot] com The podcast is a proud affiliate partner of Bookshop, working to support local, independent bookstores. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Lynn Steger Strong is the guest. Her new novel, Want, is available from Henry Holt. Strong was born and raised in South Florida. Her first novel, Hold Still, was released by Liveright/WW Norton in 2016. Her nonfiction has been published by Guernica, Los Angeles Review of Books, Elle.com, Catapult, Lit Hub, and others. She teaches both fiction and non-fiction writing at Columbia University, Fairfield University, and the Pratt Institute. *** Otherppl with Brad Listi is a weekly literary podcast featuring in-depth interviews with today's leading writers. Launched in 2011. Books. Literature. Writing. Publishing. Authors. Screenwriters. Life. Death. Etc. Support the show on Patreon Merch www.otherppl.com @otherppl Instagram  Email the show: letters [at] otherppl [dot] com The podcast is a proud affiliate partner of Bookshop, working to support local, independent bookstores. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Steven Dunn is the guest. His latest novel, water & power, is available from Tarpaulin Sky. Dunn's other novel, Potted Meat, is also available from Tarpaulin Sky. He was born and raised in West Virginia, and after 10 years in the Navy, he earned a B.A. in Creative Writing from the University of Denver. Some of his work can be found in Columbia Journal, Granta Magazine, and Best Small Fictions 2018. He lives in Denver. *** Otherppl with Brad Listi is a weekly literary podcast featuring in-depth interviews with today's leading writers. Launched in 2011. Books. Literature. Writing. Publishing. Authors. Screenwriters. Life. Death. Etc. Support the show on Patreon Merch www.otherppl.com @otherppl Instagram  Email the show: letters [at] otherppl [dot] com The podcast is a proud affiliate partner of Bookshop, working to support local, independent bookstores. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Amy Shearn is the guest. Her new novel, Unseen City, is available from Red Hen Press. It is the official September pick of The Nervous Breakdown Book Club. Shearn is the author of the novels The Mermaid of Brooklyn and How Far Is the Ocean From Here. She has an MFA from the University of Minnesota, and currently lives in Brooklyn.  *** Otherppl with Brad Listi is a weekly literary podcast featuring in-depth interviews with today's leading writers. Launched in 2011. Books. Literature. Writing. Publishing. Authors. Screenwriters. Life. Death. Etc. Support the show on Patreon Merch www.otherppl.com @otherppl Instagram  Email the show: letters [at] otherppl [dot] com The podcast is a proud affiliate partner of Bookshop, working to support local, independent bookstores. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Kathleen Rooney is the guest. Her new novel, Cher Ami and Major Whittlesey, is available from Penguin Books. This is her second time on the program. She first appeared in Episode 274 on May 4, 2014. Rooney is a founding editor of Rose Metal Press, a nonprofit publisher of literary work in hybrid genres, as well as a founding member of Poems While You Wait, a team of poets and their typewriters who compose commissioned poetry on demand. She teaches in the English Department at DePaul University, and her most recent books include the national best-seller, Lillian Boxfish Takes a Walk (St. Martin’s Press 2017 / Picador 2018) and The Listening Room: A Novel of Georgette and Loulou Magritte (Spork Press, 2018). A winner of the Ruth Lilly Fellowship from Poetry magazine, she is the author of nine books of poetry, fiction, and nonfiction, including the novel O, Democracy! (Fifth Star Press, 2014); the novel in poems Robinson Alone (Gold Wake Press, 2012), based on the life and work of Weldon Kees; the essay collection For You, For You I Am Trilling These Songs (Counterpoint, 2010); and the art modeling memoir Live Nude Girl: My Life as an Object (University of Arkansas Press, 2009). Her first book is Reading with Oprah: The Book Club That Changed America (University of Arkansas Press, 2005), and her first poetry collection, Oneiromance (an epithalamion) won the 2007 Gatewood Prize from the feminist publisher Switchback Books. With Elisa Gabbert, she is the co-author of the poetry collection That Tiny Insane Voluptuousness (Otoliths, 2008) and the chapbook The Kind of Beauty That Has Nowhere to Go (Hyacinth Girl Press, 2013).. And with fellow DePaul professor Eric Plattner, she is the co-editor of Rene Magritte: Selected Writings (University of Minnesota Press, 2016). Her reviews and criticism have appeared in The New York Times Magazine, The Poetry Foundation website, The New York Times Book Review, BITCH, Allure, The Chicago Review of Books, The Chicago Tribune, The Paris Review, The Los Angeles Review of Books, The Nation and elsewhere. She lives in Chicago with her spouse, the writer Martin Seay.  *** Otherppl with Brad Listi is a weekly literary podcast featuring in-depth interviews with today's leading writers. Launched in 2011. Books. Literature. Writing. Publishing. Authors. Screenwriters. Life. Death. Etc. Support the show on Patreon Merch www.otherppl.com @otherppl Instagram  Email the show: letters [at] otherppl [dot] com The podcast is a proud affiliate partner of Bookshop, working to support local, independent bookstores. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Matthew Salesses is the guest. His new novel, Disappear Doppelgänger Disappear, is available from Little A Publishing. This is Matthew's second time on the program. He first appeared in Episode 145 on February 3, 2013. Salesses is the bestselling author of The Hundred-Year Flood, an Amazon Best Book of September and Kindle First pick, an Adoptive Families Best Book of 2015, and a Best Book of the season at Buzzfeed, Refinery29, and Gawker, among others. Forthcoming in 2021 are a craft book, Craft in the Real World, and a collection of essays, Own Story. His previous books include I’m Not Saying, I’m Just Saying; Different Racisms: On Stereotypes, the Individual, and Asian American Masculinity; and The Last Repatriate. Salesses was adopted from Korea. In 2015 Buzzfeed named him one of 32 Essential Asian American Writers. His essays have been published in Best American Essays 2020, NPR Code Switch, The New York Times Motherlode, VICE.com, Gay Magazine, and many other venues. His short fiction has appeared in Glimmer Train, American Short Fiction, PEN/Guernica, and Witness, among others. He has received awards and fellowships from the Bread Loaf Writers’ Conference, Glimmer Train, Mid-American Review, [PANK], HTMLGIANT, IMPAC, Inprint, and elsewhere.  He is currently an Assistant Professor of English at Coe College, where he teaches fiction writing and Asian American literature. He earned a Ph.D. in Literature and Creative Writing from the University of Houston and an M.F.A. in Fiction from Emerson College. He serves on the editorial boards of Green Mountains Review and Machete (an imprint of The Ohio State University Press), and has held editorial positions at Pleiades, The Good Men Project, Gulf Coast, and Redivider. He has read and lectured widely at conferences and universities and on TV and radio, including PBS, NPR, Al Jazeera America, various MFA programs, and the Tin House, Kundiman, Writers @ Work, and Boldface writing conferences. *** Otherppl with Brad Listi is a weekly literary podcast featuring in-depth interviews with today's leading writers. Launched in 2011. Books. Literature. Writing. Publishing. Authors. Screenwriters. Life. Death. Etc. Support the show on Patreon Merch www.otherppl.com @otherppl Instagram  Email the show: letters [at] otherppl [dot] com The podcast is a proud affiliate partner of Bookshop, working to support local, independent bookstores. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

David Goodwillie is the guest. His new novel, Kings County, is available from Avid Reader Press / Simon & Schuster. Goodwillie's other books include the novel American Subversive, a New York Times Notable Book of the Year, and the memoir Seemed Like a Good Idea at the Time. Goodwillie has written for the New York Times, New York magazine, Newsweek, and Popular Science, among other publications. He has also been drafted to play professional baseball, worked as a private investigator, and was an expert at Sotheby’s auction house. A graduate of Kenyon College, he lives in Brooklyn. *** Otherppl with Brad Listi is a weekly literary podcast featuring in-depth interviews with today's leading writers. Launched in 2011. Books. Literature. Writing. Publishing. Authors. Screenwriters. Life. Death. Etc. Support the show on Patreon Merch www.otherppl.com @otherppl Instagram  Email the show: letters [at] otherppl [dot] com The podcast is a proud affiliate partner of Bookshop, working to support local, independent bookstores. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Emerson Whitney is the guest. He is the author of a memoir called Heaven, available from McSweeney's. Whitney is also the author of Ghost Box. He teaches in the BFA creative writing program at Goddard College and is a postdoctoral fellow in gender studies at the University of Southern California. *** Otherppl with Brad Listi is a weekly literary podcast featuring in-depth interviews with today's leading writers. Launched in 2011. Books. Literature. Writing. Publishing. Authors. Screenwriters. Life. Death. Etc. Support the show on Patreon Merch www.otherppl.com @otherppl Instagram  Email the show: letters [at] otherppl [dot] com The podcast is a proud affiliate partner of Bookshop, working to support local, independent bookstores. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Nick Flynn is the guest. His new memoir, This is the Night Our House Will Catch Fire, is available now from W.W. Norton & Co. It is the official August pick of The Nervous Breakdown Book Club. Flynn is the author of three previous memoirs, including the PEN/Joyce Osterweil Award–winning Another Bullshit Night in Suck City, and four volumes of poetry. A professor on the creative writing faculty at the University of Houston, he lives in Brooklyn, New York. *** Otherppl with Brad Listi is a weekly literary podcast featuring in-depth interviews with today's leading writers. Launched in 2011. Books. Literature. Writing. Publishing. Authors. Screenwriters. Life. Death. Etc. Support the show on Patreon Merch www.otherppl.com @otherppl Instagram  Email the show: letters [at] otherppl [dot] com The podcast is a proud affiliate partner of Bookshop, working to support local, independent bookstores. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Stephen Graham Jones is the guest. His latest novel, The Only Good Indians, is available from Gallery Books. Jones is the author of twenty-five or so novels and collections, and there’s some novellas and comic books in there as well. Stephen’s been an NEA recipient, has won the Texas Institute of Letters Award for Fiction, the Independent Publishers Award for Multicultural Fiction, a Bram Stoker Award, four This is Horror Awards, and he’s been a finalist for the Shirley Jackson Award and the World Fantasy Award. He’s also made Bloody Disgusting’s Top Ten Horror Novels. He lives in Boulder, Colorado. *** Otherppl with Brad Listi is a weekly literary podcast featuring in-depth interviews with today's leading writers. Launched in 2011. Books. Literature. Writing. Publishing. Authors. Screenwriters. Life. Death. Etc. Support the show on Patreon Merch www.otherppl.com @otherppl Instagram  Email the show: letters [at] otherppl [dot] com The podcast is a proud affiliate partner of Bookshop, working to support local, independent bookstores. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Mesha Maren is the guest. Her debut novel, Sugar Run, is available from Algonquin Books. Maren's short stories and essays can be read in Tin House, The Oxford American, The Guardian, Crazyhorse, Triquarterly, The Southern Review, Ecotone, Sou’wester, Hobart, Forty Stories: New Writing from Harper Perennial, and elsewhere. She was the recipient of the 2015 Thomas Wolfe Fiction Prize, a 2014 Elizabeth George Foundation grant, an Appalachian Writing Fellowship from Lincoln Memorial University, and fellowships from the MacDowell Colony and the Ucross Foundation. She was the 2018-2019 Kenan Visiting Writer at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. She is an Assistant Professor of the Practice of Creative Writing at Duke University and also serves as a National Endowment of the Arts Writing Fellow at the federal prison camp in Alderson, West Virginia. *** Otherppl with Brad Listi is a weekly literary podcast featuring in-depth interviews with today's leading writers. Launched in 2011. Books. Literature. Writing. Publishing. Authors. Screenwriters. Life. Death. Etc. Support the show on Patreon Merch www.otherppl.com @otherppl Instagram  Email the show: letters [at] otherppl [dot] com The podcast is a proud affiliate partner of Bookshop, working to support local, independent bookstores. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Sabrina Orah Mark is the guest. Her story collection, Wild Milk, is available from The Dorothy Project. Sabrina grew up in Brooklyn, New York. She earned a BA from Barnard College, Columbia University, an MFA from the Iowa Writers’ Workshop, and a PhD in English from the University of Georgia. She is the author of the book-length poetry collections The Babies (2004), winner of the Saturnalia Book Prize chosen by Jane Miller, and Tsim Tsum (2009), as well as the chapbook Walter B.’s Extraordinary Cousin Arrives for a Visit & Other Tales from Woodland Editions.  Her poetry and stories most recently appear in American Short Fiction, The Bennington Review,  Tin House (Open Bar), The Collagist, jubilat, The Believer, and have been anthologized widely. She lives in Athens Georgia with her husband, Reginald McKnight, and their two sons. For The Paris Review she writes a monthly column on fairytales and motherhood entitled HAPPILY.  *** Otherppl with Brad Listi is a weekly literary podcast featuring in-depth interviews with today's leading writers. Launched in 2011. Books. Literature. Writing. Publishing. Authors. Screenwriters. Life. Death. Etc. Support the show on Patreon Merch www.otherppl.com @otherppl Instagram  Email the show: letters [at] otherppl [dot] com The podcast is a proud affiliate partner of Bookshop, working to support local, independent bookstores. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Hilary Leichter is the guest. Her debut novel, Temporary, is available from Coffee House Press. Hilary teaches at Columbia University, where she earned her MFA in Fiction. She has received fellowships from The Edward F. Albee Foundation, the Table 4 Writers Foundation, the Folger Shakespeare Library, and the New York Foundation for the Arts. She lives in New York. *** Otherppl with Brad Listi is a weekly literary podcast featuring in-depth interviews with today's leading writers. Launched in 2011. Books. Literature. Writing. Publishing. Authors. Screenwriters. Life. Death. Etc. Support the show on Patreon Merch www.otherppl.com @otherppl Instagram  Email the show: letters [at] otherppl [dot] com The podcast is a proud affiliate partner of Bookshop, working to support local, independent bookstores. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Leigh Stein is the guest. Her new novel, Self Care, is available from Penguin. This is Leigh's third time on the program. She first appeared in Episode 105, on September 16, 2012, and again in Episode 407, with Lux Alptraum, on March 30, 2016. Stein is a writer interested in what the internet is doing to our identities, relationships, and politics. She is also the author of the memoir Land of Enchantment, the poetry collection Dispatch from the Future, and the novel The Fallback Plan. Her non-fiction writing has appeared in the New York Times, the Washington Post, the New Yorker online, Allure, ELLE, Poets & Writers, BuzzFeed, The Cut, Salon, and Slate.  From 2014 – 2017, she was cofounder and executive director of Out of the Binders/BinderCon, a feminist literary nonprofit organization dedicated to advancing the careers of women and gender variant writers. Nearly 2,000 writers attended BinderCon events in NYC and LA, to hear speakers including Lisa Kudrow, Anna Quindlen, Claudia Rankine, Jill Abramson, Elif Batuman, Effie Brown, Leslie Jamison, Suki Kim, and Adrian Nicole LeBlanc. Leigh also moderated the private Facebook community of 40,000 writers. Leigh is no longer on Facebook. *** Otherppl with Brad Listi is a weekly literary podcast featuring in-depth interviews with today's leading writers. Launched in 2011. Books. Literature. Writing. Publishing. Authors. Screenwriters. Life. Death. Etc. Support the show on Patreon Merch www.otherppl.com @otherppl Instagram  Email the show: letters [at] otherppl [dot] com The podcast is a proud affiliate partner of Bookshop, working to support local, independent bookstores. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Raphael Bob-Waksberg is the guest. He is the creator of the animated television series BoJack Horseman and the author of a new story collection called Someone Who Will Love You in All Your Damaged Glory (Knopf). Bob-Waksberg was raised in Palo Alto, California. He attended Bard College and lives in Los Angeles. This is his first book. *** Otherppl with Brad Listi is a weekly literary podcast featuring in-depth interviews with today's leading writers. Launched in 2011. Books. Literature. Writing. Publishing. Authors. Screenwriters. Life. Death. Etc. Support the show on Patreon Merch www.otherppl.com @otherppl Instagram  Email the show: letters [at] otherppl [dot] com The podcast is a proud affiliate partner of Bookshop, working to support local, independent bookstores. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Maggie Downs is the guest. Her new memoir, Braver Than You Think: Around the World on the Trip of My (Mother's) Lifetime, is available from Counterpoint Press. Downs is an award-winning writer based in Palm Springs, California. Her work has appeared in The New York Times, The Washington Post, Los Angeles Times, Palm Springs Life, and McSweeney's and has been anthologized in The Lonely Planet Travel Anthology: True Stories from the World's Best Writers and Best Women's Travel Writing. This is her first book. *** Otherppl with Brad Listi is a weekly literary podcast featuring in-depth interviews with today's leading writers. Launched in 2011. Books. Literature. Writing. Publishing. Authors. Screenwriters. Life. Death. Etc. Support the show on Patreon Merch www.otherppl.com @otherppl Instagram  Email the show: letters [at] otherppl [dot] com The podcast is a proud affiliate partner of Bookshop, working to support local, independent bookstores. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Jean Kyoung Frazier is the guest. Her new novel, Pizza Girl, is available from Doubleday. It is the official July pick of The Nervous Breakdown Book Club. Jean lives in Los Angeles. This is her debut. *** Otherppl with Brad Listi is a weekly literary podcast featuring in-depth interviews with today's leading writers. Launched in 2011. Books. Literature. Writing. Publishing. Authors. Screenwriters. Life. Death. Etc. Support the show on Patreon Merch www.otherppl.com @otherppl Instagram  Email the show: letters [at] otherppl [dot] com The podcast is a proud affiliate partner of Bookshop, working to support local, independent bookstores. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Nikki Dolson is the guest. Her new story collection, Love and Other Criminal Behavior, is available from Bronzeville Books. Dolson is a writer primarily of short fiction, which has been published in places like Shotgun Honey, Tough, Thuglit, and Bartleby Snopes. Her other book, All Things Violent, is available from Fahrenheit Press. She lives in Las Vegas. *** Otherppl with Brad Listi is a weekly literary podcast featuring in-depth interviews with today's leading writers. Launched in 2011. Books. Literature. Writing. Publishing. Authors. Screenwriters. Life. Death. Etc. Support the show on Patreon Merch www.otherppl.com @otherppl Instagram  Email the show: letters [at] otherppl [dot] com The podcast is a proud affiliate partner of Bookshop, working to support local, independent bookstores. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Genevieve Hudson is the guest. Their new novel, Boys of Alabama, is available from Liveright Publishing. This is their second time on the program. They first appeared in Episode 544 on September 26, 2018. Hudson's other books include the critical memoir A Little in Love with Everyone (2018), and Pretend We Live Here: Stories (2018), which was a LAMBDA Literary Award finalist. They hold an MFA in fiction from Portland State University, and their work has appeared or is forthcoming in ELLE Magazine, OprahMag.com, McSweeney’s, Catapult, Bookforum, Bitch, and other places. They have received fellowships from the Fulbright Program, MacDowell, Caldera Arts, and The Vermont Studio Center. They are a Visiting Fiction Faculty member at Antioch University-Los Angeles’s MFA Program, a freelance writer, and also work in advertising. They live in Portland, Oregon. *** Otherppl with Brad Listi is a weekly literary podcast featuring in-depth interviews with today's leading writers. Launched in 2011. Books. Literature. Writing. Publishing. Authors. Screenwriters. Life. Death. Etc. Support the show on Patreon Merch www.otherppl.com @otherppl Instagram  Email the show: letters [at] otherppl [dot] com The podcast is a proud affiliate partner of Bookshop, working to support local, independent bookstores. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Wayne Koestenbaum is the guest. His new essay collection, Figure It Out, is available from Soft Skull Press. Koestenbaum has published nineteen books, including Camp Marmalade, Notes on Glaze, The Pink Trance Notebooks, My 1980s & Other Essays, Hotel Theory, Best-Selling Jewish Porn Films, Andy Warhol, Humiliation, and Jackie Under My Skin. His essays and poems have been widely published in periodicals and anthologies, including The Best American Poetry, The Best American Essays, The New Yorker, The New York Times, The Paris Review, London Review of Books, The Believer, The Iowa Review, Cabinet, and Artforum. Formerly an Associate Professor of English at Yale and a Visiting Professor in the Yale School of Art’s painting department, he is a Distinguished Professor of English, French, and Comparative Literature at the CUNY Graduate Center in New York City. *** Otherppl with Brad Listi is a weekly literary podcast featuring in-depth interviews with today's leading writers. Launched in 2011. Books. Literature. Writing. Publishing. Authors. Screenwriters. Life. Death. Etc. Support the show on Patreon Merch www.otherppl.com @otherppl Instagram  Email the show: letters [at] otherppl [dot] com The podcast is a proud affiliate partner of Bookshop, working to support local, independent bookstores. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Joseph Di Prisco is the guest. His new novel, The Good Family Fitzgerald, is available from Rare Bird Books. It was the official May pick of The Nervous Breakdown Book Club. Di Prisco has published four other novels (Confessions of Brother Eli, Sun City, All for Now, and The Alzhammer), three books of poetry (Wit’s End, Poems in Which, and Sightlines from the Cheap Seats), two books on childhood and adolescence co-written with psychologist and educator Michael Riera (Field Guide to the American Teenager and Right from Wrong), and two memoirs (Subway to California and The Pope of Brooklyn). His book reviews, essays, and poems have appeared in numerous journals and newspapers, and his poetry has been awarded prizes from Poetry Northwest, Bear Star Press, and Bread Loaf. He is the graduate of a Catholic boys’ high school, Syracuse University summa cum laude, and the University of California, Berkeley, where he completed his dissertation on Mark Twain. He taught English for some twenty years, middle school, high school, and college. In other lives he has lived, he was a novice in a Catholic monastery, managed restaurants, been a wine consultant, and (when he was a young man who was broke in the ‘80s) played high-stakes blackjack professionally around the world for several years, bankrolled by big-money backers with multiple vowels in their names. He has sat on, and consulted with, non-profit boards dedicated to children’s mental health, the arts, theater, and education. He is Board Chair Emeritus of Redwood Day School and Founding Chair of the Simpson Family Literary Project, a collaborative enterprise of the UC Berkeley English Department and the Lafayette Library and Learning Center Foundation. He lives with his wife, photographer Patti James, and their two whippets (Raylan and Ava—yes, their names straight out of Elmore Leonard) in Lafayette, California. *** Otherppl with Brad Listi is a weekly literary podcast featuring in-depth interviews with today's leading writers. Launched in 2011. Books. Literature. Writing. Publishing. Authors. Screenwriters. Life. Death. Etc. Support the show on Patreon Merch www.otherppl.com @otherppl Instagram  Email the show: letters [at] otherppl [dot] com The podcast is a proud affiliate partner of Bookshop, working to support local, independent bookstores. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Meredith Talusan is the guest. Her new memoir, Fairest, is available from Viking. Talusan is an award-winning journalist and author. She has written features, essays, and opinion pieces for many publications, including The New York Times, The Guardian, The Atlantic, VICE, Matter, Backchannel, The Nation, and the American Prospect. She has contributed to several books including the New York Times Bestselling Not That Bad: Dispatches from Rape Culture edited by Roxane Gay. She lives in New York. *** Otherppl with Brad Listi is a weekly literary podcast featuring in-depth interviews with today's leading writers. Launched in 2011. Books. Literature. Writing. Publishing. Authors. Screenwriters. Life. Death. Etc. Support the show on Patreon Merch www.otherppl.com @otherppl Instagram  Email the show: letters [at] otherppl [dot] com The podcast is a proud affiliate partner of Bookshop, working to support local, independent bookstores. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Brian Allen Carr is the guest. His new novel, Opioid, Indiana, is available from Soho Press. This is Carr's second time on the program. He first appeared in Episode 135 on December 30, 2012. Carr is the author of Sip (Soho Press) and other novellas and story collections, and he has been published in McSweeney’s, Hobart, and The Rumpus. He was the inaugural winner of the Texas Observer short story prize as judged by Larry McMurtry, and the recipient of a Wonderland Book Award. He splits his time between Texas and Indiana, where he writes about engineers and inventors at Rose-Hulman Institute of Technology.  *** Otherppl with Brad Listi is a weekly literary podcast featuring in-depth interviews with today's leading writers. Launched in 2011. Books. Literature. Writing. Publishing. Authors. Screenwriters. Life. Death. Etc. Support the show on Patreon Merch www.otherppl.com @otherppl Instagram  Email the show: letters [at] otherppl [dot] com The podcast is a proud affiliate partner of Bookshop, working to support local, independent bookstores. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Natalie Diaz is the guest. Her new poetry collection, Postcolonial Love Poem, is available from Graywolf Press. It is the official June pick of The Nervous Breakdown Book Club. Diaz was born and raised in the Fort Mojave Indian Village in Needles, California, on the banks of the Colorado River. She is Mojave and an enrolled member of the Gila River Indian Tribe. Her first poetry collection, When My Brother Was an Aztec, was published by Copper Canyon Press in 2012. She is 2018 MacArthur Foundation Fellow, a Lannan Literary Fellow and a Native Arts Council Foundation Artist Fellow. She was awarded a Bread Loaf Fellowship, the Holmes National Poetry Prize, a Hodder Fellowship, and a PEN/Civitella Ranieri Foundation Residency, as well as being awarded a US Artists Ford Fellowship. Diaz teaches at the Arizona State University Creative Writing MFA program. *** Otherppl with Brad Listi is a weekly literary podcast featuring in-depth interviews with today's leading writers. Launched in 2011. Books. Literature. Writing. Publishing. Authors. Screenwriters. Life. Death. Etc. Support the show on Patreon Merch www.otherppl.com @otherppl Instagram  Email the show: letters [at] otherppl [dot] com The podcast is a proud affiliate partner of Bookshop, working to support local, independent bookstores. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Brady Hammes is the guest. His debut novel, The Resolutions, is available from Ballantine Books. Hammes lives in Los Angeles by way of Colorado and Iowa. His short stories have appeared in Michigan Quarterly Review, Guernica, The Rattling Wall, and Harper Perennial’s Forty Stories Anthology.  He’s also an Emmy-Award winning documentary film editor whose most recent project, Tom vs. Time—about NFL quarterback Tom Brady—won a 2018 Sports Emmy. Before that, he edited the feature film Social Animals, which had its world premiere at the 2018 SXSW film festival. For more of Brady's documentary work, please visit range-la.com. *** Otherppl with Brad Listi is a weekly literary podcast featuring in-depth interviews with today's leading writers. Launched in 2011. Books. Literature. Writing. Publishing. Authors. Screenwriters. Life. Death. Etc. Support the show on Patreon Merch www.otherppl.com @otherppl Instagram  Email the show: letters [at] otherppl [dot] com The podcast is a proud affiliate partner of Bookshop, working to support local, independent bookstores. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Spring Washam is the guest. She is the author of A Fierce Heart: Finding Strength, Courage, and Wisdom in Any Moment (Hay House). Washam is a well-known meditation teacher based in California and Peru. She is considered a pioneer in bringing mindfulness-based healing practices to diverse communities. She is one of the founders and core teachers at the East Bay Meditation Center, located in downtown Oakland, CA.  She received extensive training by Jack Kornfield, is a member of the teacher’s council at Spirit Rock Meditation Center in northern California, and has practiced and studied Buddhist philosophy in both the Theravada and Tibetan schools of Buddhism for the last 20 years.  In addition to being a teacher, she is also a shamanic practitioner and has studied indigenous healing practices for over a decade. She is the founder of Lotus Vine Journeys, an organization that blends indigenous healing practices with Buddhist wisdom. Her writing and teachings have appeared in many online journals and publications such as Lions Roar, Tricycle, and Belief.net. She has been a guest on many popular podcasts and radio shows. She currently travels and teaches meditation retreats, workshops and classes worldwide. She lives in the Bay Area. *** Otherppl with Brad Listi is a weekly literary podcast featuring in-depth interviews with today's leading writers. Launched in 2011. Books. Literature. Writing. Publishing. Authors. Screenwriters. Life. Death. Etc. Support the show on Patreon Merch www.otherppl.com @otherppl Instagram  Email the show: letters [at] otherppl [dot] com The podcast is a proud affiliate partner of Bookshop, working to support local, independent bookstores. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Ashleigh Bryant Phillips is the guest. Her debut story collection, Sleepovers, is available from Hub City Press. It is the winner of the 2019 C. Michael Curtis Short Story Book Prize. Phillips was raised in rural Woodland, North Carolina. She's a graduate of Meredith College and earned an MFA from the University of North Carolina, Wilmington. Her stories have appeared in The Oxford American, The Paris Review and others. Sleepovers is her first book. She lives in Baltimore. *** Otherppl with Brad Listi is a weekly literary podcast featuring in-depth interviews with today's leading writers. Launched in 2011. Books. Literature. Writing. Publishing. Authors. Screenwriters. Life. Death. Etc. Support the show on Patreon Merch www.otherppl.com @otherppl Instagram  Email the show: letters [at] otherppl [dot] com The podcast is a proud affiliate partner of Bookshop, working to support local, independent bookstores. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Roxane Gay is the guest. A contributing opinion writer for the New York Times, she is the author of several bestselling books, including Bad Feminist, Difficult Women, and Hunger. Gay’s writing appears in Best American Mystery Stories 2014, Best American Short Stories 2012, Best Sex Writing 2012, A Public Space, McSweeney’s, Tin House, Oxford American, American Short Fiction, Virginia Quarterly Review, and many others. Her other books include Ayiti, An Untamed State, and the World of Wakanda for Marvel. She has several books forthcoming and is also at work on television and film projects. She lives in Los Angeles. *** Otherppl with Brad Listi is a weekly literary podcast featuring in-depth interviews with today's leading writers. Launched in 2011. Books. Literature. Writing. Publishing. Authors. Screenwriters. Life. Death. Etc. Support the show on Patreon Merch www.otherppl.com @otherppl Instagram Email the show: letters [at] otherppl [dot] com The podcast is a proud affiliate partner of Bookshop, working to support local, independent bookstores. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Susan Choi is the guest. Her novel, Trust Exercise, is available in trade paperback from Henry Holt. It is the winner of the 2019 National Book Award for Fiction. Choi’s first novel, The Foreign Student, won the Asian-American Literary Award for fiction. Her second novel, American Woman, was a finalist for the 2004 Pulitzer Prize. Her third novel, A Person of Interest, was a finalist for the 2009 PEN/Faulkner Award. In 2010 she was named the inaugural recipient of the PEN/W.G. Sebald Award. Her fourth novel, My Education, received a 2014 Lammy Award. Her first book for children, Camp Tiger, was published in 2019. A recipient of fellowships from the National Endowment for the Arts and the Guggenheim Foundation, she teaches fiction writing at Yale and lives in Brooklyn. *** Otherppl with Brad Listi is a weekly literary podcast featuring in-depth interviews with today's leading writers. Launched in 2011. Books. Literature. Writing. Publishing. Authors. Screenwriters. Life. Death. Etc. Support the show on Patreon Merch www.otherppl.com @otherppl Instagram  Email the show: letters [at] otherppl [dot] com The podcast is a proud affiliate partner of Bookshop, working to support local, independent bookstores. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

The podcast is dark this week, in light of the events of the past few days. A few brief words on the current state of things, recorded in Los Angeles on June 2, 2020. Back next week in some capacity. Hang in there, everybody. Peace. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Kristen Millares Young is the guest. Her debut novel, Subduction, is available from Red Hen Press. Young is a prize-winning journalist and essayist whose work has appeared in the Washington Post, the Guardian and the New York Times, along with the anthologies Pie & Whiskey, a 2017 New York Times New & Notable Book, and Latina Outsiders: Remaking Latina Identity. The current Prose Writer-in-Residence at Hugo House, Kristen was the researcher for the New York Times team that produced “Snow Fall,” which won a Pulitzer Prize. She graduated from Harvard with a degree in history and literature, later earning her MFA from the University of Washington. She serves as board chair of InvestigateWest, a nonprofit news studio she co-founded in Seattle, where she lives with her family. *** Otherppl with Brad Listi is a weekly literary podcast featuring in-depth interviews with today's leading writers. Launched in 2011. Books. Literature. Writing. Publishing. Authors. Screenwriters. Life. Death. Etc. Support the show on Patreon Merch www.otherppl.com @otherppl Instagram  Email the show: letters [at] otherppl [dot] com The podcast is a proud affiliate partner of Bookshop, working to support local, independent bookstores. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Chelsea Bieker is the guest. Her debut novel, Godshot, is available from Catapult Press. Bieker's forthcoming story collection, Cowboys and Angels, is due out in 2022. Her writing has been published by The Paris Review, Granta, McSweeney’s, Lit Hub, and Electric Literature. She is the recipient of a Rona Jaffe Writers’ Award and a MacDowell Colony fellowship. Originally from California’s Central Valley, she now lives in Portland, Oregon with her husband and two children, where she teaches writing. *** Otherppl with Brad Listi is a weekly literary podcast featuring in-depth interviews with today's leading writers. Launched in 2011. Books. Literature. Writing. Publishing. Authors. Screenwriters. Life. Death. Etc. Support the show on Patreon Merch www.otherppl.com @otherppl Instagram  Email the show: letters [at] otherppl [dot] com The podcast is a proud affiliate partner of Bookshop, working to support local, independent bookstores. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Chris Dennis is the guest. His new story collection, Here is What You Do, is available from Soho Press. Dennis' work has appeared in The Paris Review, McSweeney's, Granta, Lit Hub, and Guernica. He holds a master's degree from Washington University in St. Louis, where he also received a postgraduate fellowship. He lives in Southern Illinois.  *** Otherppl with Brad Listi is a weekly literary podcast featuring in-depth interviews with today's leading writers. Launched in 2011. Books. Literature. Writing. Publishing. Authors. Screenwriters. Life. Death. Etc. Support the show on Patreon Merch www.otherppl.com @otherppl Instagram  Email the show: letters [at] otherppl [dot] com The podcast is a proud affiliate partner of Bookshop, working to support local, independent bookstores. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Mary South is the guest. Her debut story collection, You Will Never Be Forgotten, is available from FSG Originals. South is a graduate of Northwestern University and the MFA program in fiction at Columbia University. For many years, she has worked with Diane Williams as an editor at the literary journal NOON. She is also the recipient of a Bread Loaf work-study fellowship and residences at VCCA and Jentel. Her writing has appeared in American Short Fiction, The Baffler, The Believer, BOMB, The Collagist, Conjunctions, Electric Literature, Guernica, LARB Quarterly, The New Yorker, NOON, The Offing, The White Review, and Words Without Borders. She lives in New York. *** Otherppl with Brad Listi is a weekly literary podcast featuring in-depth interviews with today's leading writers. Launched in 2011. Books. Literature. Writing. Publishing. Authors. Screenwriters. Life. Death. Etc. Support the show on Patreon Merch www.otherppl.com @otherppl Instagram  Email the show: letters [at] otherppl [dot] com The podcast is a proud affiliate partner of Bookshop, working to support local, independent bookstores. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Danielle Trussoni is the guest. Her new novel, The Ancestor, is available from William Morrow. Trussoni is the New York Times, USA Today, and Sunday Times Top Ten bestselling author of the supernatural thrillers Angelology and Angelopolis. She currently writes the Horror column for the New York Times Book Review and has recently served as a jurist for the Pulitzer Prize in Fiction. Trussoni holds an MFA in Fiction from the Iowa Writers' Workshop, where she won the Michener-Copernicus Society of America award. Her books have been translated into over thirty languages. She lives in the Hudson River Valley with her family and her pug Fly. *** Otherppl with Brad Listi is a weekly literary podcast featuring in-depth interviews with today's leading writers. Launched in 2011. Books. Literature. Writing. Publishing. Authors. Screenwriters. Life. Death. Etc. Support the show on Patreon Merch www.otherppl.com @otherppl Instagram  Email the show: letters [at] otherppl [dot] com The podcast is a proud affiliate partner of Bookshop, working to support local, independent bookstores. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Rowan Hisayo Buchanan is the guest. Her new novel, Starling Days, is available from The Overlook Press. It is the official April pick of The Nervous Breakdown Book Club. Buchanan is also the author of Harmless Like You, winner of The Authors’ Club First Novel Award and a Betty Trask Award. It was a New York Times Editors’ Choice and an NPR 2017 Great Read. Her short work has appeared in several places including Granta, Guernica, The Guardian, The Harvard Review, and NPR’s Selected Shorts.  She lives in London. *** Otherppl with Brad Listi is a weekly literary podcast featuring in-depth interviews with today's leading writers. Launched in 2011. Books. Literature. Writing. Publishing. Authors. Screenwriters. Life. Death. Etc. Support the show on Patreon Merch www.otherppl.com @otherppl Instagram  Email the show: letters [at] otherppl [dot] com The podcast is a proud affiliate partner of Bookshop, working to support local, independent bookstores. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Kevin Bigley is the guest. His new novel, Comaville, is available from Clash Books. Bigley is an actor/author. He can be seen on such television as Amazon’s Undone, USA’s Sirens, as well as heard on Netflix’s Bojack Horseman. Currently, he’s starring in the new Greg Daniels show Upload, coming to Amazon on May 1st. He lives in Los Angeles. *** Otherppl with Brad Listi is a weekly literary podcast featuring in-depth interviews with today's leading writers. Launched in 2011. Books. Literature. Writing. Publishing. Authors. Screenwriters. Life. Death. Etc. Support the show on Patreon Merch www.otherppl.com @otherppl Instagram  Email the show: letters [at] otherppl [dot] com The podcast is a proud affiliate partner of Bookshop, working to support local, independent bookstores. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Juliana Delgado Lopera is the guest. Their new novel, Fiebre Tropical, is available from The Feminist Press. It was the official February pick of The Nervous Breakdown Book Club. Lopera's other books include Quiéreme (Nomadic Press 2017) and ¡Cuéntamelo!, an illustrated bilingual collection of oral histories by LGBT Latinx immigrants which won a 2018 Lambda Literary Award and a 2018 Independent Publisher Book Award.  Their work has been nominated for a Pushcart Prize and has appeared in Teen Vogue, The Rumpus, The White Review, LALT, Four Way Review, Broadly,TimeOut Mag, and more.  They live in San Francisco. *** Otherppl with Brad Listi is a weekly literary podcast featuring in-depth interviews with today's leading writers. Launched in 2011. Books. Literature. Writing. Publishing. Authors. Screenwriters. Life. Death. Etc. Support the show on Patreon Merch www.otherppl.com @otherppl Instagram  Email the show: letters [at] otherppl [dot] com The podcast is a proud affiliate partner of Bookshop, working to support local, independent bookstores. ​ Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Amanda Goldblatt is the guest. Her debut novel, Hard Mouth, is available from Counterpoint Press. Goldblatt's work can lately be found at NOON, Fence, and Diagram. She was a 2018 National Endowment for the Arts Creative Writing Fellow, and teaches creative writing at Northeastern Illinois University.  She lives in Chicago, with her architect partner, and no dog. *** Otherppl with Brad Listi is a weekly literary podcast featuring in-depth interviews with today's leading writers. Launched in 2011. Books. Literature. Writing. Publishing. Authors. Screenwriters. Life. Death. Etc. Support the show on Patreon Merch www.otherppl.com @otherppl Instagram  Email the show: letters [at] otherppl [dot] com The podcast is a proud affiliate partner of Bookshop, working to support local, independent bookstores. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Megan Boyle is the guest. Her novel LIVEBLOG is available from Tyrant Books. This is Megan's second time on the program. She first appeared in Episode 13 on October 30, 2011. She is also the author of selected unpublished blog posts of a mexican panda express employee (Muumuu House, 2011). Her writing has appeared in Vice, the Believer, Thought Catalog, and other places online and in print. She has been liveblogging her life since March 17, 2020 on her Tumblr. She lives in Baltimore, Maryland. *** Otherppl with Brad Listi is a weekly literary podcast featuring in-depth interviews with today's leading writers. Launched in 2011. Books. Literature. Writing. Publishing. Authors. Screenwriters. Life. Death. Etc. Support the show on Patreon Merch www.otherppl.com @otherppl Instagram  Email the show: letters [at] otherppl [dot] com The podcast is a proud affiliate partner of Bookshop, working to support local, independent bookstores. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Crissy Van Meter is the guest. Her debut novel, Creatures, is available from Algonquin Books. She teaches creative writing at The Writing Institute at Sarah Lawrence College and is the founder of the literary project Five Quarterly. She's also the managing editor for Nouvella Books and serves on the board of directors for the literary non-profit Novelly. She lives in Los Angeles. *** Otherppl with Brad Listi is a weekly literary podcast featuring in-depth interviews with today's leading writers. Launched in 2011. Books. Literature. Writing. Publishing. Authors. Screenwriters. Life. Death. Etc. Support the show on Patreon Merch www.otherppl.com @otherppl Instagram  Email the show: letters [at] otherppl [dot] com The podcast is a proud affiliate partner of Bookshop, working to support local, independent bookstores. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Sarah Kendzior is the guest. Her new book, Hiding in Plain Sight: The Invention of Donald Trump and the Erosion of America, is available from Flatiron Books. This is Sarah's second time on the podcast. She first appeared in Episode 516 on April 25, 2018. She is best known for her reporting on St. Louis and the 2016 election, her academic research on authoritarian states, and her New York Times bestselling debut The View from Flyover Country. She is a co-host of the podcast Gaslit Nation and was named one of Foreign Policy's “100 people you should be following on Twitter to make sense of global events.” Her reporting has been featured in Politico, The Atlantic, Fast Company, The New York Times, Globe and Mail, and more. She lives in St. Louis. *** Otherppl with Brad Listi is a weekly literary podcast featuring in-depth interviews with today's leading writers. Launched in 2011. Books. Literature. Writing. Publishing. Authors. Screenwriters. Life. Death. Etc. Support the show on Patreon Merch www.otherppl.com @otherppl Instagram  Email the show: letters [at] otherppl [dot] com The podcast is a proud affiliate partner of Bookshop, working to support local, independent bookstores. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Jenn Shapland is the guest. Her debut, My Autobiography of Carson McCullers, is a genre-bending work of nonfiction. It is available from Tin House Books. Shapland's nonfiction has been published in O, the Oprah Magazine, The Paris Review daily, Tin House, Outside ​online, Lit Hub, and elsewhere. Her essay "Finders, Keepers" won a 2017 Pushcart Prize, and she was awarded the 2019 Rabkin Foundation Award for art journalism. She has a PhD in English from the University of Texas at Austin and lives in New Mexico. *** Otherppl with Brad Listi is a weekly literary podcast featuring in-depth interviews with today's leading writers. Launched in 2011. Books. Literature. Writing. Publishing. Authors. Screenwriters. Life. Death. Etc. Support the show on Patreon Merch www.otherppl.com @otherppl Instagram  Email the show: letters [at] otherppl [dot] com The podcast is a proud affiliate partner of Bookshop, working to support local, independent bookstores. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Deb Olin Unferth is the guest. Her new novel Barn 8 is now available from Graywolf Press. It is the official March pick of the TNB Book Club. This is Deb's second time on the program. She first appeared in Episode 178 on May 29, 2013. Unferth is the author of six books, including Wait Till You See Me Dance and Revolution. She has received a Guggenheim Fellowship and three Pushcart Prizes, and was a National Book Critics Circle Award finalist. Her work has appeared in Granta, Harper’s, McSweeney’s, and The Paris Review. She lives in Austin, Texas. *** Otherppl with Brad Listi is a weekly literary podcast featuring in-depth interviews with today's leading writers. Launched in 2011. Books. Literature. Writing. Publishing. Authors. Screenwriters. Life. Death. Etc. Support the show on Patreon Merch www.otherppl.com @otherppl Instagram  Email the show: letters [at] otherppl [dot] com The podcast is a proud affiliate partner of Bookshop, working to support local, independent bookstores. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Monika Woods is the guest. She is a literary agent and founder of Triangle House Literary in New York. Woods' clients have won the PEN Bingham Award, been listed for the National Book Award, The Kirkus Prize, The Edgar Awards, LAMBDA Awards, and the Believer Book Award, appeared on the New York Times bestseller list, and been named books of the year by The New York Times and NPR, among other honors. She is a graduate of SUNY Buffalo and the Columbia Publishing Course and has worked closely with leading voices in contemporary literature over her decade-long publishing career. Her interests include literary fiction and compelling non-fiction in cultural criticism, food, popular culture, journalism, science, and current affairs. She is particularly excited about plot-driven literary novels, non-fiction that is creatively critical, unique perspectives, a great cookbook, and above all, original prose. (Photo credit: Sylvie Rosokoff) *** Otherppl with Brad Listi is a weekly literary podcast featuring in-depth interviews with today's leading writers. Launched in 2011. Books. Literature. Writing. Publishing. Authors. Screenwriters. Life. Death. Etc. Support the show on Patreon Merch www.otherppl.com @otherppl Instagram  Email the show: letters [at] otherppl [dot] com The podcast is a proud affiliate partner of Bookshop, working to support local, independent bookstores. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Sam Farahmand is the guest. His debut novel, Chimero, is available from dr.Doctor Press. Farahmand is originally from Los Angeles. His writing has appeared in Electric Literature, Hobart, and PANK Magazine. He lives in Nashville. *** Otherppl with Brad Listi is a weekly literary podcast featuring in-depth interviews with today's leading writers. Launched in 2011. Books. Literature. Writing. Publishing. Authors. Screenwriters. Life. Death. Etc. Support the show on Patreon Merch www.otherppl.com @otherppl Instagram  Email the show: letters [at] otherppl [dot] com The podcast is a proud affiliate partner of Bookshop, working to support local, independent bookstores. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Erin Eileen Almond is the guest. Her debut novel, Witches' Dance, is available from Lanternfish Press. Almond is a novelist, short story writer, essayist and reviewer. Her work has been published in The Boston Globe, Colorado Review, Normal School, Small Spiral Notebook, and on Cognoscenti.com, and The Rumpus.net. *** Otherppl with Brad Listi is a weekly literary podcast featuring in-depth interviews with today's leading writers. Launched in 2011. Books. Literature. Writing. Publishing. Authors. Screenwriters. Life. Death. Etc. Support the show on Patreon Merch www.otherppl.com @otherppl Instagram  Email the show: letters [at] otherppl [dot] com The podcast is a proud affiliate partner of Bookshop, working to support local, independent bookstores. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

April Dávila is the guest. Her debut novel, 142 Ostriches, is available from Kensington Books. Dávila received her undergraduate degree from Scripps College before going on to study writing at USC. She was a resident of the Dorland Mountain Arts Colony in 2017 and attended the Squaw Valley Community of Writers in 2018. In 2019 her short story “Ultra” was nominated for a Pushcart Prize. A fourth-generation Californian, she lives in La Cañada Flintridge with her husband and two children. She is a practicing Buddhist, half-hearted gardener, and occasional runner. 142 Ostriches is her first novel.  *** Otherppl with Brad Listi is a weekly literary podcast featuring in-depth interviews with today's leading writers. Launched in 2011. Books. Literature. Writing. Publishing. Authors. Screenwriters. Life. Death. Etc. Support the show on Patreon Merch www.otherppl.com @otherppl Instagram  Email the show: letters [at] otherppl [dot] com The podcast is a proud affiliate partner of Bookshop, working to support local, independent bookstores. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Emily Nemens is the guest. Her debut novel, The Cactus League, is available from Farrar, Straus, & Giroux. In 2018, Nemens became the seventh editor of The Paris Review, the nation’s preeminent literary quarterly. Since her arrival, the magazine has seen record-high circulation, published two anthologies, produced a second season of its acclaimed podcast, and won the 2020 National Magazine Award for Fiction. Previously, she coedited The Southern Review, a storied literary quarterly published at Louisiana State University. Stories published during her tenure at The Southern Review were selected for the Pushcart Prize anthology, Best American Short Stories, the O. Henry Prize anthology, and the inaugural edition of PEN America Best Debut Fiction. Nemens grew up in Seattle and received her bachelor’s degree from Brown University, where she studied art history and studio art. She completed an MFA degree in fiction at Louisiana State University. As an illustrator, she’s collaborated with Harvey Pekar, published her work in The New Yorker, and her watercolor portraits of every woman in congress were featured across the web and on national TV. Her short stories have appeared in Blackbird (Tarumoto Prize winner), Esquire, n+1, The Iowa Review, Hobart, and The Gettysburg Review. She lives in New York and remains a Mariners fan. *** Otherppl with Brad Listi is a weekly literary podcast featuring in-depth interviews with today's leading writers. Launched in 2011. Books. Literature. Writing. Publishing. Authors. Screenwriters. Life. Death. Etc. Support the show on Patreon Merch www.otherppl.com @otherppl Instagram  Email the show: letters [at] otherppl [dot] com The podcast is a proud affiliate partner of Bookshop, working to support local, independent bookstores. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Megan Fernandes is the guest. Her new poetry collection, Good Boys, is available from Tin House Books. It was a finalist for the Kundiman Book Prize and the Saturnalia Book Prize. Fernandes is a writer living in New York City. Her work has been published or is forthcoming in The New Yorker, Tin House, Ploughshares, Denver Quarterly, Chicago Review, Boston Review, Rattle, Pank, The Common, Guernica, the Academy of American Poets, McSweeney’s Internet Tendency, among others. She is also the author of The Kingdom and After (Tightrope Books 2015).  An Assistant Professor of English at Lafayette College, Fernandes teaches courses on poetry, creative nonfiction, and critical theory. She holds a PhD in English from the University of California, Santa Barbara and an MFA in poetry from Boston University. *** Otherppl with Brad Listi is a weekly literary podcast featuring in-depth interviews with today's leading writers. Launched in 2011. Books. Literature. Writing. Publishing. Authors. Screenwriters. Life. Death. Etc. Support the show on Patreon Merch www.otherppl.com @otherppl Instagram  Email the show: letters [at] otherppl [dot] com The podcast is a proud affiliate partner of Bookshop, working to support local, independent bookstores. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Garth Greenwell is the guest. His new book Cleanness is available from Farrar, Straus, & Giroux. Greenwell is the author of What Belongs to You, which won the British Book Award for Debut of the Year, was longlisted for the National Book Award, and was a finalist for six other awards, including the PEN/Faulkner Award, the James Tait Black Memorial Prize, and the Los Angeles Times Book Prize. A New York Times Book Review Editors' Choice, it was named a Best Book of 2016 by over fifty publications in nine countries, and is being translated into a dozen languages. His fiction has appeared in The New Yorker, The Paris Review, A Public Space, and VICE, and he has written criticism for The New Yorker, the London Review of Books, and the New York Times Book Review, among others. He lives in Iowa City.  *** Otherppl with Brad Listi is a weekly literary podcast featuring in-depth interviews with today's leading writers. Launched in 2011. Books. Literature. Writing. Publishing. Authors. Screenwriters. Life. Death. Etc. Support the show on Patreon Merch www.otherppl.com @otherppl Instagram  Email the show: letters [at] otherppl [dot] com The podcast is a proud affiliate partner of Bookshop, working to support local, independent bookstores. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Katharine Coldiron is the guest. Her debut novella, Ceremonials, is available from Kernpunkt Press. Coldiron's work has appeared in Ms., the Washington Post, LARB, the Times Literary Supplement, the Guardian, BUST, the Kenyon Review, the Rumpus, VIDA, Brevity, and elsewhere. She earned a B.A. in film studies & philosophy from Mount Holyoke College and an M.A. in creative writing from California State University, Northridge. She has read many, many books. Born in the American South to a professor of poetry and translation and a U.S. Navy captain, and raised along the East Coast, she now lives in Los Angeles.  Today's episode is brought to you by Blinkist. With Blinkist, you get unlimited access to read or listen to a massive library of condensed non-fiction books -- all the books you want and all for one low price. Right now, for a limited time, Blinkist has a special offer for Otherppl listeners. Go to Blinkist.com/Otherppl try it free for 7 days and save 25% off your new subscription. *** Otherppl with Brad Listi is a weekly literary podcast featuring in-depth interviews with today's leading writers. Launched in 2011. Books. Literature. Writing. Publishing. Authors. Screenwriters. Life. Death. Etc. Support the show on Patreon Merch www.otherppl.com @otherppl Instagram  Email the show: letters [at] otherppl [dot] com The podcast is a proud affiliate partner of Bookshop, working to support local, independent bookstores. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Nicolette Polek is the guest. Her new story collection, Imaginary Museums, is available from Soft Skull Press. Polek is a writer from Cleveland, Ohio and is a recipient of the 2019 Rona Jaffe Foundation Writers’ Award. *** Otherppl with Brad Listi is a weekly literary podcast featuring in-depth interviews with today's leading writers. Launched in 2011. Books. Literature. Writing. Publishing. Authors. Screenwriters. Life. Death. Etc. Support the show on Patreon Merch www.otherppl.com @otherppl Instagram  Email the show: letters [at] otherppl [dot] com The podcast is a proud affiliate partner of Bookshop, working to support local, independent bookstores. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Amina Cain is the guest. Her new novel, Indelicacy, is available from Farrar, Straus, & Giroux. This is Amina's second time on the program. She first appeared in Episode 390 on November 25, 2015. She is also the author of the short story collection Creature, out with Dorothy, a publishing project, and her writing has appeared in Granta, n+1, The Paris Review Daily, BOMB, Full Stop, Vice, the Believer Logger, and elsewhere. She lives in Los Angeles and is a literature contributing editor at BOMB.  Today’s episode is sponsored by BetterHelp. Go to Betterhelp.com/Otherppl to get 10% off your first month with discount code OTHERPPL. *** Otherppl with Brad Listi is a weekly literary podcast featuring in-depth interviews with today's leading writers. Launched in 2011. Books. Literature. Writing. Publishing. Authors. Screenwriters. Life. Death. Etc. Support the show on Patreon Merch www.otherppl.com @otherppl Instagram  Email the show: letters [at] otherppl [dot] com The podcast is a proud affiliate partner of Bookshop, working to support local, independent bookstores. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Elaine Kahn is the guest. She is a writer and artist currently based in Los Angeles. Her new poetry collection, Romance or The End, is available from Soft Skull. Kahn's other book is called Women in Public (City Lights). She holds an MFA from the Iowa Writers’ Workshop and a BFA from California College of the Arts. And she teaches at the Poetry Field School. Today’s episode is sponsored by BetterHelp. Go to Betterhelp.com/Otherppl to get 10% off your first month with discount code OTHERPPL. *** Otherppl with Brad Listi is a weekly literary podcast featuring in-depth interviews with today's leading writers. Launched in 2011. Books. Literature. Writing. Publishing. Authors. Screenwriters. Life. Death. Etc. Support the show on Patreon Merch www.otherppl.com @otherppl Instagram  Email the show: letters [at] otherppl [dot] com The podcast is a proud affiliate partner of Bookshop, working to support local, independent bookstores. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Matthew Zapruder is the guest. His latest poetry collection, Father's Day, is available from Copper Canyon Press. This is his second time on the program. He first appeared in Episode 477 on August 9, 2017. He is a poet, translator, professor and editor. He earned a BA in Russian literature at Amherst College, an MA in Slavic languages and literature at the University of California, Berkeley, and an MFA in poetry at the University of Massachusetts, Amherst, where he studied with Dara Wier, James Tate, and Agha Shahid Ali. He is the author most recently of Sun Bear, Copper Canyon, 2014, and Why Poetry, a book of prose about poetry, Ecco/Harper Collins, 2017. An Associate Professor in the MFA at Saint Mary’s College of California, he is also editor at large at Wave Books, and from 2016-7 held the annually rotating position of Editor of the Poetry Column for the New York Times Magazine. He lives in Oakland, California. He also plays lead guitar in the rock band The Figments, a Western Massachusetts based band led by songwriter Thane Thomsen. Zapruder’s other collections of poetry include Come On All You Ghosts (2010), The Pajamaist (2006), and American Linden (2002). He collaborated with painter Chris Uphues on For You in Full Bloom (2009) and co-translated, with historian Radu Ioanid, Romanian poet Eugen Jebeleanu’s last collection, Secret Weapon: Selected Late Poems (Coffee House, 2008). Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Amanda Yates Garcia is the guest. Her new memoir, Initiated: Memoir of a Witch, is available from Grand Central Publishing. This is Amanda's second time on the podcast. She first appeared in Episode 444 on December 21, 2016. Garcia is a writer, artist, professional witch, and the Oracle of Los Angeles. Her work has been featured in The Millions, The LA Times, Time Out, LA Weekly, GOOP, Glamour, The London Times, CNN, Salon, as well as a viral appearance on Tucker Carlson Tonight. She has led classes and workshops on magic and witchcraft at UCLA, UC Irvine, MOCA Los Angeles, The Hammer Museum, LACMA, The Getty and many other venues. Co-host of the popular Between the Worlds podcast, Initiated is her first book. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Steffie Nelson, Heather John Fogarty, and Sarah Tomlinson are the guests. All are contributors to a new essay anthology called Slouching Towards Los Angeles: Living and Writing by Joan Didion's Light. The collection is edited by Steffie Nelson and is available from Rare Bird Books. It is the official January pick of The Nervous Breakdown Book Club. In The White Album, Joan Didion famously wrote that “a place belongs forever to whoever claims it hardest, remembers it most obsessively…loves it so radically that he remakes it in his image.” Cruising in her Daytona yellow Corvette Stingray, taking it all in behind dark glasses, Joan Didion claimed California for all time. Slouching Towards Los Angeles is a multi-faceted portrait of the literary icon who, in turn, belongs to us. This collection of original essays covers the turf that made Didion a sensation—Hollywood and Patty Hearst; Malibu, Manson and the Mojave; the Summer of Love and the Central Park Five—while bringing together some of the finest voices of today’s Los Angeles and beyond. Slouching Towards Los Angeles is a love letter and thank you note; personal memoir and social commentary; cultural history and literary critique. Fans of Didion, lovers of California, and fellow writers alike will all find something to dig into, in this rich exploration of the inner and outer landscapes Joan Didion traveled, shaping our own journeys in the process. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Milo Martin is the guest. He is the author of the poetry collections Poems for the Utopian Nihilist (Echo Park Press) and the forthcoming sublemon/sublime. He is also collaborating on an upcoming art book with Gigi Spratley and Jack Waltrip. A poet by trade, Martin has toured extensively throughout the United States and Europe. He has been invited to perform at international literature and poetry festivals in France, Italy, Germany and Croatia as well as numerous venues in Estonia, Switzerland, Holland, Liechtenstein and Serbia. His works have been translated into four languages. Educated at San Francisco State University and the University of Southern California, he currently resides in Los Angeles. He contends that birds and insects are manifest angels. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Mark Guerin is the guest. His debut novel, You Can See More From Up Here, is available from Golden Antelope Press. It is the official December pick of The Nervous Breakdown Book Club. Guerin is a 2014 graduate of Grub Street’s Novel Incubator program in Boston. He also has an MFA from Brandeis University and is a winner of an Illinois Arts Council Grant, the Mimi Steinberg Award for Playwriting and Sigma Tau Delta's Eleanor B. North Poetry Award. A contributor to the novelist’s blog, Dead Darlings, he is also a playwright, copywriter and journalist. He currently resides in Harpswell, Maine, with his wife, Carol, and two Brittany Spaniels. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Tim O'Brien is the guest. He is the author of The Things They Carried, which was a finalist for the Pulitzer Prize and National Book Critics Circle Award. And he is the recipient of the 1979 National Book Award for Fiction for his novel Going After Cacciato. His latest book, a memoir, is called Dad's Maybe Book, available now from Houghton Mifflin Harcourt. O'Brien was born in 1946 in Austin, Minnesota, and spent most of his youth in the small town of Worthington, Minnesota. He graduated summa cum laude from Macalester College in 1968. From February 1969 to March 1970 he served as infantryman with the U.S. Army in Vietnam, after which he pursued graduate studies in government at Harvard University. He worked as a national affairs reporter for The Washington Post from 1973 to 1974.  His short fiction has appeared in The New Yorker, Esquire, Harper's, The Atlantic, Playboy, and Ploughshares, and in several editions of The Best American Short Stories and The O. Henry Prize Stories. In 1987, O'Brien received the National Magazine Award for the short story, “The Things They Carried,” and in 1999 it was selected for inclusion in The Best American Short Stories of the Century, edited by John Updike. O'Brien is the recipient of literary awards from the American Academy of Arts and Letters, the Guggenheim Foundation, and the National Endowment for the Arts. He has been elected to both the Society of American Historians and the American Academy of Arts and Sciences. O'Brien currently holds the University Endowed Chair in Creative Writing at Texas State University. He lives with his wife and children in Austin, Texas. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Abigail Tarttelin is the guest. Her new novel, Dead Girls, is available from Rare Bird Books. It was the official November pick of The Nervous Breakdown Book Club. This is Abigail's second time on the program. She first appeared in Episode 194 on July 28, 2013. Tarttelin is also the author of Golden Boy, “a grippingly innovative” coming-of-age novel with a “radical non-binary, pro-intersex message” (Autostraddle). Golden Boy is the winner of an Alex Award from the American Library Association, a LAMBDA Literary Award Finalist for Best LGBT Debut, a Booklist Top Ten First Novel of 2013, a School Library Journal Best Book of 2013, and is published in eight languages. Her journalism has appeared in The Guardian, The Independent, Glamour, Phoenix, Oh Comely, and The Huffington Post. Also a screenwriter, in 2016 Abigail served as a juror for the British Independent Film Awards. She is the recipient of awards from The Authors Foundation and The K Blundell Trust in Great Britain. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Fiona Alison Duncan is the guest. Her debut novel, Exquisite Mariposa, is available from Soft Skull Press. Duncan is a Canadian-American artist, writer and organizer. She is the founding host of Hard to Read, a lit series, and Pillow Talk, community organising on sex, love and communication. She lives in New York City and Los Angeles. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Leland Cheuk is the guest. His new novel, No Good Very Bad Asian, is available from C&R Press. A MacDowell Colony and Hawthornden Castle Fellow, Cheuk is also the author of the story collection Letters from Dinosaurs (2016) and the novel The Misadventures of Sulliver Pong (2015), which was also published in translation in China (2018). His work has been covered in Buzzfeed, The Paris Review, VICE, San Francisco Chronicle, and elsewhere, and has appeared in publications such as Salon, Catapult, Joyland Magazine, Literary Hub, among other outlets. He is the founder of the indie press 7.13 Books. Cheuk lives in Brooklyn and teaches at the Sarah Lawrence College Writing Institute. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Adrienne Brodeur is the guest. Her memoir, Wild Game: My Mother, Her Lover, and Me, is available from Houghton Mifflin Harcourt. It was the official October pick of The Nervous Breakdown Book Club. Brodeur has spent the past two decades of her professional life in the literary world, discovering voices, cultivating talent, and working to amplify underrepresented writers. Her publishing career began with founding the fiction magazine, Zoetrope: All-Story, with filmmaker Francis Ford Coppola, where she served as editor in chief from 1996-2002. The magazine has won the prestigious National Magazine Award for best fiction four times. In 2005, she became an editor at Harcourt (later, HMH Books), where she acquired and edited literary fiction and memoir. Adrienne left publishing in 2013 to become Creative Director — and later Executive Director — of Aspen Words, a literary arts nonprofit and program of the Aspen Institute. In 2017, she launched the Aspen Words Literary Prize, a $35,000 annual award for an influential work of fiction that illuminates a vital contemporary issue and demonstrates the transformative power of literature on thought and culture. She splits her time between Cambridge and Cape Cod, where she lives with her husband and children.  Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Mimi Lok is the guest. Her debut story collection, Last of Her Name, is available from Kaya Press. Lok is the recipient of a Smithsonian Ingenuity Award and an Ylvisaker Award for Fiction, and was a finalist for the Susan Atefat Arts and Letters Prize for nonfiction. Her work can be found in McSweeney’s, Electric Literature, LitHub, Nimrod, Lucky Peach, Hyphen, the South China Morning Post, and elsewhere. She is currently working on a novel. Lok is also the executive director and editor of Voice of Witness, an award-winning human rights/oral history nonprofit she cofounded that amplifies marginalized voices through a book series and a national education program. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Adam Mansbach is the guest. He is the author of the #1 New York Times bestseller Go the Fuck to Sleep, and has just published a new book called Fuck, Now There are Two of You. Go the F*ck to Sleep has been translated into forty languages, named Time Magazine's 2011 "Thing of the Year," and sold over three million copies worldwide. The 2014 sequel, You Have to Fucking Eat, is also a New York Times bestseller. Mansbach was recently nominated for an Independent Spirit Award and an NAACP Image Award for his screenplay Barry. The film premiered to rave reviews at the Toronto International Film Festival, where it was acquired by Netflix and released as a Netflix Original on December 16, 2016. Mansbach's 2013 novel, Rage is Back, was named a Best Book of the Year by National Public Radio and the San Francisco Chronicle. Adapted for television by Mansbach and Danny Hoch, it is currently in development at USA as an hour-long drama. Mansbach's previous novels include The End of the Jews (2008) which won the California Book Award, and the cult classic Angry Black White Boy, or the Miscegenation of Macon Detornay (2005), which is taught at more than eighty schools and was adapted into a prize-winning stage play in 2008. His work has appeared in The New Yorker, New York Times Book Review, Esquire, The Believer, The Guardian, The Los Angeles Times, The Boston Globe, and on National Public Radio's All Things Considered, The Moth Storytelling Hour, and This American Life. He lives in Berkeley, California, and is a frequent lecturer on college campuses. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Ashley Wurzbacher is the guest. A 5 Under 35 honoree, her debut story collection, Happy Like This, won the 2019 John Simmons Short Fiction Award. It is available from the University of Iowa Press. Wurzbacher's writing has appeared in The Iowa Review, The Kenyon Review, Prairie Schooner, The Cincinnati Review, Colorado Review, Michigan Quarterly Review, Gettysburg Review, Alaska Quarterly Review, and elsewhere. She earned her BA from Allegheny College, her MFA from Eastern Washington University, and her PhD in Literature and Creative Writing from the University of Houston. Originally from Titusville, Pennsylvania, she currently lives in Birmingham, Alabama and teaches creative writing at the University of Montevallo. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Steph Cha is the guest. Her new novel, Your House Will Pay, is available from Ecco. This is Steph's second time on the program. She first appeared in Episode 319 on October 8, 2014. Cha is also the author of the Juniper Song crime trilogy. She’s an editor and critic whose work has appeared in the Los Angeles Times, USA Today, and the Los Angeles Review of Books. A native of the San Fernando Valley, she lives in Los Angeles with her husband and two basset hounds. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Jarett Kobek is the guest. His new novel, Only Americans Burn in Hell, is available from We Heard You Like Books. This is Kobek's third time on the program. He first appeared in Episode 399 on February 3, 2016, and in Episode 476 on August 2, 2017. Kobek is an internationally bestselling Turkish-American writer who lives in California. His work has been translated into nine languages and published in twelve countries. His previous books include ATTA, I Hate the Internet, and Do Every Thing Wrong!: XXXTentacion Against the World. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Madeline Stevens is the guest. Her debut novel, Devotion, is available from Ecco. Stevens is from Boring, Oregon and is currently based in Los Angeles. She holds an MFA from Columbia University and her work has been published in a variety of literary magazines. She teaches creative writing to adults and children through Catapult and Writopia Lab. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Zulema Renee Summerfield is the guest. Her debut novel, Every Other Weekend, is available in trade paperback from Back Bay Books. Summerfield holds an MFA in Creative Writing from San Francisco State University, and her work has appeared in a number of literary journals. She is also the author of a book of flash fiction, Everything Faces All Ways At Once (Fourteen Hills Press). In addition to her writing, Summerfield is an educator and creative coach and is one half of Thoughts & Feelings. She lives in Portland, Oregon, where she is at work on a collection of short stories and a new novel.  Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Elizabeth Cantwell is the guest. Her new poetry collection, All the Emergency-Type Structures, is available from Inlandia Institute. Cantwell lives in Claremont, CA, where she teaches Humanities at The Webb Schools. She has a B.A. from Yale University and a Ph.D. in Literature & Creative Writing from the University of Southern California. Her poetry has appeared in a variety of journals, including DIAGRAM, The Cincinnati Review, The Los Angeles Review, Hobart, and The Missouri Review. Her first book of poems, Nights I Let The Tiger Get You (Black Lawrence Press, 2014), was a finalist for the 2012 Hudson Prize; she is also the author of a chapbook, Premonitions (Grey Book Press, 2014). ​ Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Adam Popescu is the guest. His debut novel, Nima, is available from Unnamed Press. Popescu is a writer and journalist whose work has appeared in The New York Times, Washington Post, Bloomberg Businessweek, Vanity Fair, National Geographic, Conde Nast Traveler, Marketplace, Playboy, Fast Company, Scientific American, Outside,The Guardian, New Scientist, Los Angeles Magazine, and others. His journalism has focused on a wide range, from business, the internet and the arts, to vanishing cultures and wildlife, reporting from places threatened by climate change, globalism, and the march of technology. In 2013, he climbed 18,000 feet up Mount Everest, covering the impact of tourism on the land and local Nepali people for the BBC. That experience would inspire his debut novel, NIMA, published in late May, 2019, from Unnamed Press. He's tracked mountain lions in urban LA, polar bears in Northern Canada, covered Arctic tsunamis, glacial melt and erosion in Greenland and Alaska, and spent time in drought-plagued East Africa and Indonesia, places and people at the vanguard of this world shift. Heads of state in Mexico, politicos tasked with governing alongside narcos, Tibet's exiled leader, the Dalai Lama, founders of Instagram, Twitter, Tinder, real cyborgs, convicts, dissidents, billionaires, all have been interview subjects. He recently profiled Steven Spielberg for The New York Times. In 2018, Popescu spent weeks in Ladakh, in search of snow leopards in India's Himalayas, sailed to the edge of the globe in the Russian High Arctic and into the deceptively placid Pacific waters of the Galapagos, on assignment for Bloomberg, the Washington Post and New York Times. A year later, he returned to Ladakh and saw a leopard with the naked eye.  Popescu holds a master’s degree in journalism from the S.I. Newhouse School of Public Communications at Syracuse University, and a BA in creative writing from Pitzer College.  Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Robin Page is the guest. Her debut novel, Small Silent Things, is available from Harper Perennial. Page was raised in Cincinnati and has degrees from UCLA and UC Irvine’s MFA program. She is married, has two daughters, and lives in Los Angeles.  Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Belén Fernández is the guest. Her new book, Exile: Rejecting America and Finding the World, is available from OR Books. It is the official September pick of The Nervous Breakdown Book Club. After growing up in Washington, D.C. and Texas, and then attending Columbia University in New York, Belén Fernández ended up in a state of self-imposed exile from the United States. From trekking—through Europe, the Middle East, Morocco, and Latin America—to packing avocados in southern Spain, to close encounters with a variety of unpredictable men, to witnessing the violent aftermath of the 2009 coup in Honduras, the international travel allowed her by an American passport has, ironically, given her a direct view of the devastating consequences of U.S. machinations worldwide. For some years Fernández survived thanks to the generosity of strangers who picked her up hitchhiking, fed her, and offered accommodations; then she discovered people would pay her for her powerful, unfiltered journalism, enabling—as of the present moment—continued survival. In just a few short years of publishing her observations on world politics and writing from places as varied as Lebanon, Italy, Uzbekistan, Syria, Mexico, Turkey, Honduras, and Iran, Belén Fernández has established herself as a one of the most trenchant observers of America’s interventions around the world, following in the footsteps of great foreign correspondents such as Martha Gellhorn and Susan Sontag. She is a contributing editor at Jacobin and graduated from Columbia with a BA in political science. She frequently writes for Al Jazeera, Middle East Eye, and Jacobin, and is also the author of The Imperial Messenger: Thomas Friedman at Work. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Sarah M. Broom is the guest. Her debut memoir, The Yellow House, is available now from Grove Press. Broom began her writing career as a newspaper journalist working in Rhode Island, Dallas, New Orleans and Hong Kong (for TIME Asia). She also worked as an editor at O, The Oprah Magazine for several years. Her work has appeared in The New Yorker, the New York Times Magazine, O, The Oprah Magazine and elsewhere. In 2016, she received the prestigious Whiting Award for Creative Nonfiction. Broom has an undergraduate degree in anthropology and mass communications from the University of North Texas and a Master’s degree in Journalism from the University of California, Berkeley.  A native New Orleanian, she is the youngest of twelve children, and now makes her home in New York City. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Dora Malech is the guest. Her most recent poetry collection, Stet, is available from Princeton University Press. Malech's other collections include Say So (Cleveland State University Poetry Center, 2011), and Shore Ordered Ocean (Waywiser Press, 2009). Her fourth collection, Flourish, will be published by Carnegie Mellon University Press in 2020.  Malech has been the recipient of an Amy Clampitt Residency Award from the Amy Clampitt Fund, a Mary Sawyers Baker Prize from the Baker Artist Awards, a Ruth Lilly Poetry Fellowship from the Poetry Foundation, and a Writing Residency Fellowship from the Civitella Ranieri Foundation, and she has served as Distinguished Poet-in-Residence at Saint Mary's College of California. She is a co-founder and former director of the arts engagement organization the Iowa Youth Writing Projects, and she is currently an assistant professor in The Writing Seminars at Johns Hopkins University.  Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Kimberly King Parsons is the guest. Her debut story collection, Black Light, is available now from Vintage. Born in Lubbock, Texas, Parsons earned a BA in English and an MA in Literary Studies (emphasis on the works of William Faulkner) from the University of Texas at Dallas. She later moved to New York City, where she earned an MFA in fiction from Columbia University and served as the editor-in-chief of Columbia: A Journal of Literature and Art. A recipient of fellowships from Columbia University and the Sustainable Arts Foundation, her fiction has been published in The Paris Review, Best Small Fictions 2017, Black Warrior Review, No Tokens, Kenyon Review, and elsewhere.  She lives with her partner and sons in Portland, OR, where she is completing a novel about Texas, motherhood, and LSD.  Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Josh Gondelman is the guest. His new book, Nice Try: Stories of Best Intentions and Mixed Results, is available from Harper Perennial (Sept. 17).  Gondelman is a writer and comedian who incubated in Boston before moving to New York City, where he currently lives and works as a writer and producer for Desus and Mero on Showtime. Previously, he spent five years at Last Week Tonight with John Oliver, first as a web producer and then as a staff writer. In 2016, he made his late night standup debut on Conan (TBS), and he recently made his network tv debut on Late Night With Seth Meyers (NBC). He is the winner of two Peabody Awards, three Emmy awards, and two WGA Awards for his work on Last Week Tonight. He is also the co-author (along with Joe Berkowitz) of the book You Blew It, published October 2015 by Plume. His writing has also appeared in prestigious publications such as McSweeney’s Internet Tendency, New York Magazine, and The New Yorker. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

R.O. Kwon is the guest. Her bestselling debut novel, The Incendiaries, is available in trade paperback from Riverhead Books. Named a best book of the year by over forty publications, The Incendiaries was a finalist for the National Book Critics Circle John Leonard Award for Best First Book, Los Angeles Times First Book Prize, and Northern California Independent Booksellers Association Fiction Prize. The book was also nominated for the Aspen Prize, Carnegie Medal, and the Northern California Book Award. Kwon’s next novel, as well as an essay collection, are forthcoming. Kwon’s writing has appeared in The New York Times, The Guardian, The Paris Review, Buzzfeed, NPR, and elsewhere. She has received fellowships and awards from the National Endowment for the Arts, Yaddo, MacDowell, the Bread Loaf Writers’ Conference, and the Sewanee Writers’ Conference. Born in Seoul, Kwon has lived most of her life in the United States. In today's monologue, I respond to more mail.  Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Chris L. Terryis the guest. His new novel, Black Card, is available from Catapult Press. This is Terry's second time on the podcast. He first appeared in Episode 217 on October 16, 2013. Terry was born in 1979 to an African American father and an Irish American mother. He has an BA in English from Virginia Commonwealth University and a creative writing MFA from Columbia College Chicago. His debut novel, Zero Fade, was named a Best Book of the Year by Slate and Kirkus Reviews. He lives in Los Angeles with his family.  Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Shane Jones is the guest. His latest novel, Vincent and Alice and Alice, is available from Tyrant Books. It is the official August pick of The Nervous Breakdown Book Club. This is Shane's second time on the program. He first appeared in Episode 301 on August 6, 2014. Jones' other books include the novels Light Boxes, Daniel Fights a Hurricane, and Crystal Eaters. He lives in Albany, New York. In today's monologue, I talk briefly about the guy at the cafe who had a problem with my dog.  Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Juliet Escoria is the guest. Her debut novel, Juliet the Maniac, is available from Melville House. It was the official May pick of The Nervous Breakdown Book Club. This is Juliet's second time on the program. She first appeared in Episode 273 on April 30, 2014. She also wrote the short story collection Black Cloud, which was originally published in 2014 by Civil Coping Mechanisms. In 2015, Emily Books published the ebook, Maro Verlag published a German translation, and Los Libros de la Mujer Rota published a Spanish translation. Witch Hunt, a collection of poems, was published by Lazy Fascist Press in 2016.  She was born in Australia, raised in San Diego, and currently lives in West Virginia. In today's monologue, I respond to more listener mail.  Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Sarah Rose Etter is the guest. Her debut novel, The Book of X, is available from Two Dollar Radio. She is also the author of the chapbook Tongue Party, selected by Deb Olin Unferth as the winner of the Caketrain Press award. Her work has appeared or is forthcoming in The Cut, Electric Literature, Guernica, VICE, New York Tyrant, Juked, Night Block, The Black Warrior Review, Salt Hill Journal, The Collagist, and more. She is the co-founder of the TireFire Reading Series, and a contributing editor at The Fanzine. She has also served as an arts columnist at Philadelphia Weekly. She has been awarded residences at Disquiet International program in Portugal and the Gullkistan Writing Residency in Iceland. In 2017, she was the keynote speaker at the Society for the Study of American Women Writers conference in Bordeaux, France, where she presented on surrealist writing as a mode of feminism. She earned her B.A. in English from Pennsylvania State University and her M.F.A. in Fiction from Rosemont College. In today's monologue, I respond to listener mail. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

J. Ryan Stradal is the guest. His new novel, The Lager Queen of Minnesota, is available from Viking / Pamela Dorman Books. This is Stradal's second time on the podcast. He first appeared in Episode 376on August 19, 2015. His first novel, Kitchens of the Great Midwest, reached the New York Times Hardcover Best Seller list at #19 on its third week of release. His shorter writing has appeared in Hobart, The Rumpus, The Wall Street Journal, Granta, The Guardian, Electric Literature, The Nervous Breakdown, and more.  He lives in Los Angeles. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Chip Cheek is the guest. His debut novel, Cape May, is available from Celadon Books. Cheek's stories have appeared in The Southern Review, Harvard Review, Washington Square, and other journals and anthologies. He has been awarded scholarships to the Bread Loaf Writers' Conference, the Tin House Summer Writer's Workshop, and the Vermont Studio Center, as well as an Emerging Artist Award from the St. Botolph Club Foundation in Boston. For many years, Chip taught fiction at GrubStreet in Boston. He now lives in El Segundo, California, with his wife and daughter.  Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Steve Almondis the guest. His new book, William Stoner and the Battle for the Inner Life, is available from Ig Publishing. This is Steve's fourth time on the program. He first appeared in Episode 9, on October 16, 2011, and again in Episode 302, on August 10, 2014, and Episode 513, on April 8, 2018. Almond is the author of ten books of fiction and nonfiction, including the New York Times bestsellers Candyfreak and Against Football. You can check those out here.Last year, he published Bad Stories, a literary investigation of what the hell just happened to our country, which he wrote to keep from going crazy. (You can find his latest rants here or here.) For four years, Steve hosted the New York Times Dear Sugars podcast with his pal Cheryl Strayed. His short stories have been anthologized widely, in the Best American Short Stories, The Pushcart Prize, Best American Erotica, and Best American Mysteries series. He also publishes crazy, DIY books. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Erin Hosieris the guest. Her new memoir, Don't Let Me Down, is available from Atria Books. Hosier is also the coauthor of Hit So Hard by Patty Schemel (Da Capo, 2017). She has been a literary agent since 2001 (currently with Dunow Carlson & Lerner), and was an original co-host of the Literary Death Match. As an agent, she primarily works with authors of nonfiction and has a special interest in popular culture, music biography, humor, women's history (and untold stories of all kinds). She lives in Brooklyn. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Bret Easton Ellis is the guest. His new essay collection, White, is available from Knopf. Ellis is the author of six novels, including Less Than Zero, The Rules of Attraction, and American Psycho, and a collection of stories, which have been translated into thirty-two languages. He lives in Los Angeles and is the host of The Bret Easton Ellis Podcast, available on Patreon. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Karen Stefano is the guest. Her new book, What a Body Remembers: A Memoir of Sexual Assault and Its Aftermath, is available from Rare Bird Books. It is the official June pick of The Nervous Breakdown Book Club. Stefano's other books include the short story collection The Secret Games of Words (1GlimpsePress 2015) and the how-to business writing guide, Before Hitting Send (Dearborn 2011). Her work has appeared in Ms. Magazine, The Rumpus, Psychology Today, California Lawyer, The South Carolina Review, Tampa Review, Epiphany, Volume 1 Brooklyn, and many other journals and magazines. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Elvia Wilk is the guest. Her debut novel, Oval, is available from Soft Skull Press. Wilk is a writer and editor living in New York and Berlin. She contributes to publications like Frieze, Mousse, Metropolis, Artforum, and Zeit Online. From 2012 to 2016 she was a founding editor at uncube magazine and from 2016 to 2018 she was the publications editor for transmediale. She is currently a contributing editor at e-flux journal and is finishing a masters at the New School for Social Research. She has taught at the University of the Arts Berlin, Eugene Lang College, and City College of New York.  Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Kathryn Scanlan is the guest. Her new book, Aug 9 — Fog, is available from MCD Books. Scanlan lives in Los Angeles. Her stories have appeared in NOON, Fence, American Short Fiction, Tin House, Caketrain, and The Iowa Review, among other publications. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Jennifer Pastiloff is the guest. Her new book, On Being Human: A Memoir of Waking Up, Living Real, and Listening Hard, is available from Dutton. Pastiloff travels the world with her unique workshop On Being Human, a hybrid of yoga-related movement, writing, sharing aloud, letting the snot fly, and the occasional dance party. She has been featured on Good Morning America, New York Magazine, Health Magazine, CBS News, and others for her unique style of teaching, which she has taught to thousands of women in sold-out workshops all over the world. Jen is also the guest speaker at Canyon Ranch and Miraval Resorts, and she leads Writing and The Body workshops with author Lidia Yuknavitch, as well as retreats with Emily Rapp Black. Founder of the online magazine The Manifest Station, when Jen is not traveling she is based in Los Angeles with her husband and son. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Elisa Gabbert is the guest. Her new essay collection, The Word Pretty, is available from Black Ocean Press. This is Elisa's second time on the podcast. She first appeared in Episode 241 on January 8, 2014. Gabbert is a poet and essayist whose other books include L’Heure Bleue, or the Judy Poems (Black Ocean, 2016), The Self Unstable (Black Ocean, 2013), and The French Exit (Birds LLC, 2010). The Word Pretty was a New York Times Editors’ Pick, and The Self Unstable was chosen by the New Yorker as one of the best books of 2013. Elisa’s work has appeared in the New Yorker, the New York Times Magazine, the New York Review of Books, the Guardian Long Read, Boston Review, the Paris Review Daily, Pacific Standard, Guernica, The Awl, Electric Literature, the Harvard Review, Threepenny Review, Real Life, Catapult, Jubilat, Diagram, and many other venues. Elisa is currently writing a book about disaster culture and human failure, The Unreality of Memory, forthcoming from FSG Originals. She lives in Denver. Other adventures: Elisa writes an advice column for writers, The Blunt Instrument, at Electric Literature. Send her a question at blunt@electricliterature.com. She occasionally writes about perfume for Bois de Jasmin. She occasionally teaches at Lighthouse Writers Workshop. She has co-written several collaborative collections with Kathleen Rooney, including That Tiny Insane Voluptuousness. She holds degrees from Rice University and Emerson College. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Saskia Vogel is the guest. Her debut novel, Permission, is available from Coach House Books. Vogel was born and raised in Los Angeles and now lives in its sister city, Berlin, where she works as a writer and Swedish-to-English literary translator. Previously she worked as Granta magazine’s global publicist and as an editor at the AVN Media Network, where she reported on pornography and adult pleasure products. She volunteers her time as the honorary secretary of SELTA and as part of the team that organizes Viva Erotica, an annual film festival in Helsinki that explores the art, history, and culture of sex on film. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Lydia Fitzpatrick is the guest. Her debut novel, Lights All Night Long, is available from Penguin Press. Fitzpatrick’s work has appeared in the The O. Henry Prize Stories, The Best American Mystery Stories, One Story, Glimmer Train,and elsewhere. She was a Wallace Stegner Fellow at Stanford University, a fiction fellow at the Wisconsin Institute for Creative Writing, and a recipient of an Elizabeth George Foundation grant. She graduated from Princeton University and received an MFA from the University of Michigan. She lives in Los Angeles with her husband and daughters.    Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Lilliam Rivera is the guest. Her new YA novel, Dealing in Dreams, is available from Simon & Schuster. Rivera's previous novel, The Education of Margot Sanchez (February 2017) was nominated for a 2019 Rhode Island Teen Book Award, a 2017 Best Fiction for Young Adult Fiction by the Young Adult Library Services Association (YALSA), and has been featured on NPR, New York Times Book Review, New York magazine, MTV.com, and Teen Vogue, among others. She is a 2016 Pushcart Prize winner and a 2015 Clarion alumni with a Leonard Pung Memorial Scholarship. Lilliam has also been awarded fellowships from PEN Center USA, A Room Of Her Own Foundation, and received a grant from the Elizabeth George Foundation and the Speculative Literature Foundation. Her short story "Death Defiant Bomba" received honorable mention in Bellevue Literary Review's 2014 Goldenberg Prize for Fiction, selected by author Nathan Englander. She recently received honorable mention in the 2018 James Tiptree, Jr. Literary Award. Lilliam's work has appeared in The New York Times, Elle, Lenny Letter, Tin House, Los Angeles Times, USA Today, and more. She has been a featured speaker in countless schools and book festivals throughout the United States and teaches creative writing workshops. She lives in Los Angeles Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Balli Kaur Jaswal is the guest. Her new novel, The Unlikely Adventures of the Shergill Sisters, is available from William Morrow. It is the official April 2019 pick of The Nervous Breakdown Book Club. Jaswal is the author of Inheritance, which won the Sydney Morning Herald’s Best Young Australian Novelist Award in 2014 and was adapted into a film at the Singapore International Festival of the Arts in 2017. Her second novel Sugarbreadwas a finalist for the 2015 inaugural Epigram Books Fiction Prize and the 2018 Singapore Literature Prize. Her third novel Erotic Stories for Punjabi Widows (Harper Collins/William Morrow) was released internationally to critical acclaim in March 2017. Translation rights to this novel have been sold in France, Spain, Italy, Israel, Poland, Germany, Sweden, Greece, China, Brazil and Estonia. Film rights to Erotic Stories for Punjabi Widows have been acquired by Ridley Scott’s production company, Scott Free Productions and Film Four in the UK. Erotic Stories for Punjabi Widows was also picked by Reese Witherspoon’s book club and The Girly Book Club in 2018. Jaswal’s short fiction and non-fiction writing have appeared in the UK Sunday Express, Cosmopolitan Magazine, The New York Times, Harpers Bazaar, Conde Nast Traveller and Best Australian Short Stories, among other publications and periodicals. She has travelled widely to appear in international writers festivals to conduct workshops and lectures on creative writing, pursuing an artistic career, the power of storytelling, global citizenship and social justice advocacy through literature. A former writing fellow at the University of East Anglia, Jaswal has taught creative writing at Yale-NUS College and Nanyang Technological University where she is currently pursuing a PhD.  Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

David Shields is the guest. His two most recent books are The Trouble with Men: Reflections on Sex, Love, Marriage, Porn, and Power (Mad Creek Books) and Nobody Hates Trump More than Trump: An Intervention (Thought Catalog Books). Shields is the internationally bestselling author of twenty-two books, including Reality Hunger (named one of the best books of 2010 by more than thirty publications), The Thing About Life Is That One Day You’ll Be Dead (New York Times bestseller), Black Planet (finalist for the National Book Critics Circle Award), and Other People: Takes & Mistakes (NYTBR Editors’ Choice). The film adaptation of I Think You’re Totally Wrong: A Quarrel was released by First Pond Entertainment in 2017. A recipient of Guggenheim and NEA fellowships and a senior contributing editor of Conjunctions, Shields has published essays and stories in the New York Times Magazine, Harper’s, Esquire, Yale Review, Salon, Slate, A Public Space, McSweeney’s, and Believer. His work has been translated into two dozen languages. He lives in Seattle. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

T Kira Madden is the guest. Her new memoir, Long Live the Tribe of Fatherless Girls, is available from Bloomsbury. It was the official March pick of The Nervous Breakdown Book Club. T Kira Madden is a lesbian APIA writer, photographer, and amateur magician living in New York City. She holds an MFA in creative writing from Sarah Lawrence College and an BA in design and literature from Parsons School of Design and Eugene Lang College. She is the founding Editor-in-chief of No Tokens, a magazine of literature and art, and is a 2017 NYSCA/NYFA Artist Fellow in nonfiction literature from the New York Foundation for the Arts. She has received fellowships from The MacDowell Colony, Hedgebrook, Tin House, DISQUIET, Summer Literary Seminars, and Yaddo, where she was selected for the 2017 Linda Collins Endowed Residency Award. She facilitates writing workshops for homeless and formerly incarcerated individuals and currently teaches at Sarah Lawrence College. There is no period in her name. In today's monologue, I talk about buying a birthday gift for my wife. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Lori Gottlieb is the guest. Her new memoir, Maybe You Should Talk to Someone: A Therapist, Her Therapist, and Our Lives Revealed, is available from Houghton Mifflin Harcourt. Gottlieb is a psychotherapist and New York Times bestselling author who writes the weekly “Dear Therapist” advice column for The Atlantic. She has written hundreds of articles related to psychology and culture, many of which have become viral sensations all over the world. A contributing editor for the Atlantic, she also writes for The New York Times Magazine, and appears as a frequent expert on relationships, parenting, and hot-button mental health topics in media such as The Today Show, Good Morning America, CBS This Morning, Dr. Phil, CNN, and NPR.  Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Richard Chiem is the guest. His new novel, King of Joy, is available from Soft Skull Press. This is Richard's second time on the podcast. He first appeared in Episode 142on January 23, 2013. Chiem is also the author of You Private Person (Sorry House Classics). It was named one of Publishers Weekly's 10 Essential Books of the American West. His work has appeared in City Arts Magazine, NY Tyrant, and Gramma Poetry, among other places. He lives in Seattle, WA.  Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Chloe Aridjis is the guest. Her new novel, Sea Monsters, is available from Catapult Press. Aridjis is a Mexican-American writer who was born in New York and grew up in the Netherlands and Mexico. After completing her Ph.D. at the University of Oxford in nineteenth-century French poetry and magic shows, she lived for nearly six years in Berlin. Her debut novel, Book of Clouds, has been published in eight languages and won the Prix du Premier Roman Étranger in France. Aridjis sometimes writes about art and insomnia and was a guest curator at Tate Liverpool. In 2014, she was awarded a Guggenheim Fellowship. She lives in London. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Eva Hagberg Fisher is the guest. Her new book, How to Be Loved: A Memoir of Life-Saving Friendship, is available from Houghton Mifflin Harcourt. Eva's writing has appeared in the New York Times, Tin House, Wallpaper*, Wired, and Dwell, among other places. She holds degrees in architecture from UC Berkeley and Princeton as well as a PhD in Visual and Narrative Culture from UC Berkeley.  Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Roger McNamee is the guest. His new book Zucked: Waking Up to the Facebook Catastrophe, is a New York Times bestseller, available from Penguin Press. McNamee has been a Silicon Valley investor for 35 years. He co-founded successful funds in venture, crossover and private equity. His most recent fund, Elevation, included U2’s Bono as a co-founder. He holds a B.A. from Yale University and an M.B.A. from the Tuck School of Business at Dartmouth College. Roger plays bass and guitar in the bands Moonalice and Doobie Decibel System and is the author of The New Normal and The Moonalice Legend: Posters and Words, Volumes 1-9. He has served as a technical advisor for seasons two through five of HBO’s “Silicon Valley” series and was also responsible for raising the money that created the Wikimedia Foundation. In today's monologue, I talk about Disorder Salon, a new reading series starting up in New Orleans. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Steve Anwyll is the guest. His debut novel, Welfare, is available from Tyrant Books. Anwyll's work has appeared in Hobart and Tyrant Magazine, among other places. He lives in Montreal.  Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Pam Houston is the guest. Her new essay collection, Deep Creek: Finding Hope in the High Country, is available now from W.W. Norton & Co. Houston's other books include two novels, Contents May Have Shifted and Sight Hound, two collections of short stories, Cowboys Are My Weakness and Waltzing the Cat, and a collection of essays, A Little More About Me, all published by W.W. Norton. Her stories have been selected for volumes of The O. Henry Awards, The Pushcart Prize, Best American Travel Writing, and Best American Short Stories of the Century, among other anthologies. She is the winner of the Western States Book Award, the WILLA Award for contemporary fiction, the Evil Companions Literary Award and several teaching awards.  She teaches in the Low Rez MFA program at the Institute of American Indian Arts, is Professor of English at UC Davis, and co-founder and creative director of the literary nonprofit Writing By Writers. She lives at 9,000 feet above sea level near the headwaters of the Rio Grande.  Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Sam Lipsyte is the guest. His new novel, Hark, is available now from Simon & Schuster. This is Sam's second time on the podcast. He first appeared in Episode 154, on March 6, 2013. Lipsyte is the author of the story collections Venus Drive (named one of the top twenty-five books of its year by the Voice Literary Supplement) and The Fun Parts, and three other novels: The Ask, The Subject Steve, and Home Land, which was a New York Times Notable Book and received the first annual Believer Book Award. He is also the recipient of a Guggenheim fellowship. He lives in New York City and teaches at Columbia University. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Sarah McColl is the guest. Her debut memoir, Joy Enough, is available now from Liveright Publishing. McColl's essays have appeared in Paris Review, McSweeney's, StoryQuarterly, and elsewhere. She has been the recipient of fellowships from the MacDowell Colony, where she was named the 2017 Mary Carswell Fellow, the Millay Colony for the Arts, Ucross Foundation, Vermont Studio Center, Virginia Center for the Creative Arts, and Wrangell Mountains Center. Before receiving her MFA at Sarah Lawrence College, she was the founding editor in chief of Yahoo Food. Her food writing has been featured in print and online for Bon Appétit, House Beautiful, The Guardian, Modern Farmer, Extra Crispy and others. She teaches creative writing and is based in Los Angeles, California. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Madhuri Vijay is the guest. Her debut novel, The Far Field, is available now from Grove Press. A graduate of the Iowa Writers Workshop, Vijay was born in Bangalore. She is the recipient of a Pushcart Prize, and her writing has appeared in Best American Non-Required Reading, Narrative Magazine and Salon, among other publications. The Far Field is her first book.  Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Peter Stenson is the guest. His new novel Thirty Seven is available from Dzanc Books. It is the official February pick of The Nervous Breakdown Book Club. Stenson received his MFA from Colorado State University in 2012. His first novel, Fiend, was an Amazon Best Book of the Month for July 2013. His stories and essays have been published in The Bellevue Literary Review, The Greensboro Review, Confrontation, Blue Mesa Review, and elsewhere. He lives with his wife and family in Denver, Colorado. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Brad Phillips is the guest. His new story collection, Essays and Fictions, is available from Tyrant Books. The late Anthony Bourdain calls it: "Searingly honest, brilliant and disturbing. Brad Phillips peels back the skin and bone and stares right into the human soul."  Born in 1974, Phillips is also an accomplished visual artist known for dark work that engages with themes of eroticism, depression, and mortality. His paintings display stylistic breadth, from text-based to photorealist, referring in many cases directly to his daily life. He lives in Toronto. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Duke Haney is the guest. His new essay collection, Death Valley Superstars, is available now from Delancey Street Press. Haney has spent most of his adult life working in the movie business, with twenty feature-film credits as an actor and twenty-two as a screenwriter. He used pseudonyms for some of the screenplays and went by “D. R. Haney” as the author of a novel, Banned for Life, and an essay collection, Subversia. After he was struck by a car in a crosswalk on Sunset Boulevard, a friend claimed he walked like John “Duke” Wayne and gave him the nickname by which most people know him and he has adopted belatedly as his pen name. He plans to follow Death Valley Superstars with a novel tentatively titled XXX. He lives in Los Angeles. This is Duke's second time on the podcast. He first appeared in Episode 36on January 18, 2012. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Ingrid Rojas Contreras is the guest. Her debut novel, FRUIT OF THE DRUNKEN TREE (Doubleday), is a national bestseller, an Indie Next selection, a Barnes & Noble Discover Great New Writers selection, and a New York Times editor's choice. Born and raised in Bogotá, Colombia, Contreras' essays and short stories have appeared in the New York Times Magazine, Buzzfeed, Nylon, and Guernica, among others. She is the book columnist for KQED, the Bay Area's NPR affiliate, teaches writing at the University of San Francisco, and works with immigrant high school students as part of a San Francisco Arts Commission initiative bringing writers into public schools. She is working on a family memoir about her grandfather, a curandero from Colombia who it was said had the power to move clouds. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Thomas Kohnstamm is the guest. His debut novel, Lake City, is available from Counterpoint Press. It is the official January pick of The Nervous Breakdown Book Club. Kohnstamm is also the author of Do Travel Writers Go to Hell? (Crown). He was born in Seattle and lives there with his wife and two children. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Mattilda Bernstein Sycamore is the guest. Her new novel SKETCHTASY is available from Arsenal Pulp Press. Described as "startlingly bold and provocative" by Howard Zinn, "a cross between Tinkerbell and a honky Malcolm X with a queer agenda” by the Austin Chronicle, and “a gender-fucking tower of pure pulsing purple fabulous” by The Stranger, Mattilda Bernstein Sycamore is the author of a memoir and three novels, and the editor of five nonfiction anthologies. Sycamore's memoir, The End of San Francisco(City Lights 2013), won a Lambda Literary Award, and her most recent anthology, Why Are Faggots So Afraid of Faggots?: Flaming Challenges to Masculinity, Objectification, and the Desire to Conform (AK Press 2012), was an American Library Association Stonewall Honor Book and a finalist for a Lambda Literary Award. Mattilda's novels include So Many Ways to Sleep Badly (City Lights 2008) and Pulling Taffy (Suspect Thoughts 2003). She is the editor of four additional nonfiction anthologies, Nobody Passes: Rejecting the Rules of Gender and Conformity (Seal 2007), That’s Revolting! Queer Strategies for Resisting Assimilation (Soft Skull 2004; 2008), Dangerous Families: Queer Writing on Surviving (Haworth 2004), and Tricks and Treats: Sex Workers Write about Their Clients (Haworth 2000), which now also appears in Italian (Effepi Libri 2007). Mattilda has written for a variety of publications, including the San Francisco Chronicle, BOMB, Bookforum, The Baffler, the New York Times, New Inquiry, Los Angeles Review of Books, Truthout, Time Out New York, Utne Reader, AlterNet, Bitch, Bookslut, and The Stranger, and for ten years, Mattilda was the reviews editor and a columnist for the feminist magazine Make/shift. Mattilda made a short 16mm film, All That Sheltering Emptiness, in collaboration with Joey Carducci. The film premiered in 2010, and has screened around the world. Mattilda created Lostmissing, a public art project about the friend who will always be there, and what happens when you lose that relationship. Mattilda’s activism has included ACT UP in the early ‘90s, Fed Up Queers in the late ‘90s, Gay Shame, and numerous lesser-known (or even unnamed) groups. Mattilda's papers are archived at the San Francisco Public Library, and are accessible to the public. Mattilda lives in Seattle, Washington, but will be on tour for Sketchtasy from fall 2018 through spring 2019. In the past, she has appeared in independent bookstores, community centers, performance venues and universities across the US (and Canada), from Yale to Evergreen, UCLA to Harvard to Mills to McGill. Mattilda loves feedback, so contact her, okay? Mattilda is now on Twitter. Don't tell anyone, but she kind of loves it. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Tommy Pico is the guest. A poet, performer, and screenwriter, he is the author of the poetry collections IRL (Birds, LLC), NATURE POEM, JUNK, and the forthcoming FEED (Tin House Books). A Whiting Award winner, Pico is originally from the Viejas Indian reservation of the Kumeyaay nation. He now divides his time between Los Angeles and Brooklyn, where he co-curates the reading series Poets With Attitude (PWA) with Morgan Parker at the Ace Hotel, co-hosts the podcast Food 4 Thot, and is a contributing editor at Literary Hub.  Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Morris Collinsis the guest. He is the author of the debut novel Horse Latitudes (Dzanc Books). It was the official December 2018 pick of The Nervous Breakdown Book Club. Collins' other fiction and poetry has recently appeared in Pleiades, Gulf Coast, The Chattahoochee Review, Michigan Quarterly Review, Iron Horse Review, Nimrod, among others. He attended the University of Rochester where he studied English and Medieval Studies and received his MFA from Penn State University in 2008.  He is a Visiting Assistant Professor of English at the College of the Holy Cross. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Brittany Ackerman is the author of the debut memoir The Perpetual Motion Machine (Red Hen Press). Ackerman is a graduate of Florida Atlantic University's Master of Fine Arts program in Creative Writing. Since graduation, she has completed a residency at the Wellstone Center in the Redwoods, and has attended the Mont Blanc Workshop in Chamonix, France under the instruction of Alan Heathcock.  She recently attended the Writers by Writers Methow Valley Workshop in May of 2017 under the leadership of Ross Gay. She lives in Los Angeles. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Katya Apekina is the guest. She is the author of the debut novel THE DEEPER THE WATER THE UGLIER THE FISH (Two Dollar Radio). Apekina's short stories have appeared in various literary magazines. She is the recipient of an Elizabeth George grant, an Olin Fellowship, the Alena Wilson prize and a 3rd Year Fiction Fellowship from Washington University in St. Louis where she did her MFA. She has done residencies at VCCA, Playa and Ucross. Her prose and poetry translations from Russian appeared in Night Wraps the Sky: Writings by and About Mayakovsky(FSG 2008), which was short-listed for the Best Translated Book Award. She co-wrote the script for the independent film New Orleans, Mon Amour (2008), directed by Michael Almereyda and starring Elisabeth Moss and Christopher Eccleston. She lives in Los Angeles with her husband and daughter.  Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Anita Felicelli is the author of the debut story collection LOVE SONGS FOR A LOST CONTINENT (Stillhouse Press), winner of the 2016 Mary Roberts Rinehart Award. Felicelli's stories have appeared in The Normal School, Joyland, The Rumpus, Kweli Journal, Eckleburg, and elsewhere. Her essays, reviews, and criticism have appeared or are forthcoming in the New York Times (Modern Love), Slate, Salon, SF Chronicle, the Los Angeles Review of Books, Babble, Romper, and Electric Literature. She is a graduate of UC Berkeley and UC Berkeley School of Law, a member of the National Book Critics Circle, and a Voices of Our Nations alum. Her work has placed as a finalist in multiple Glimmer Train contests and received a Puffin Foundation grant, two Greater Bay Area Journalism awards, and Pushcart Prize nominations. She lives in the Bay Area with her family. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

John Wray is the guest. He is the author of the novel GODSEND (Farrar, Straus, & Giroux). His other novels include The Lost Time Accidents, Lowboy, Canaan's Tongue, and The Right Hand of Sleep. The recipient of a Guggenheim Fellowship, a Whiting Award, a Cullman Fellowship from the New York Public Library, and a Mary Ellen von der Heyden Fellowship from the American Academy in Berlin, he was named one of Granta's Best Young American Novelists in 2007. A citizen of the United States and Austria, he currently lives in Mexico City. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Christopher Zeischegg is the author of the memoir BODY TO JOB (Rare Bird Books). A writer, musician, and filmmaker, he spent eight years working in the adult industry as performer Danny Wylde. His other two books are Come to my Brother and The Wolves that Live in Skin and Space. He has also contributed to The Feminist Porn Book, Best Sex Writing, Coming Out Like a Porn Star, Split Lips, and a variety of digital publications, such as Somesuch and Nerve. His industrial metal band, Chiildren, released their second EP, The Circle Narrows, through Records Ad Nauseam in 2015. He became the face of Wyldefire Hot Sauce in 2016. Zeischegg lives in Los Angeles with his two cats, Victoria and Isis. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Daniel Gumbiner is the author of the debut novel THE BOATBUILDER, available from McSweeney's. It was nominated for the National Book Award. Gumbiner is the managing editor of THE BELIEVER magazine. He was born and raised in Northern California, graduated from UC Berkeley in 2011, and now lives in Southern Nevada. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Lydia Kiesling is the author of the debut novel THE GOLDEN STATE, available from MCD Books. Kiesling is a 2018 National Book Foundation “5 under 35” honoree, and her writing has appeared at outlets including The New York Times Magazine, The New Yorker online, The Guardian, and Slate. She lives in San Francisco with her family. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Brad Listi talks with Leah Dieterich, author of the debut memoir VANISHING TWINS: A MARRIAGE (Soft Skull Press). Dietrich's essays and short fiction have been published by Lenny Letter, Buzzfeed, LitHub, and Bomb Magazine among others. She is also the author of a book of thank-you notes, entitled "thxthxthx: thank goodness for everything" (Andrews McMeel, 2011). She lives in Portland, Oregon and Los Angeles with her husband and daughter. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Andre Dubus III is the bestselling author of the novel GONE SO LONG (W.W. Norton). His other book include "House of Sand and Fog," "The Garden of Last Days," and a memoir called "Townie." A recipient of a Guggenheim Fellowship and a National Magazine Award for Fiction, his books are published in over twenty-five languages, and he teaches full-time at the University of Massachusetts Lowell. He lives in Massachusetts with his wife, Fontaine, a modern dancer, and their three children. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Meghan O'Gieblyn is the author of the essay collection INTERIOR STATES (Anchor Books). It is the official October pick of The Nervous Breakdown Book Club. O'Gieblyn's essays have appeared in Harper's Magazine, n+1, the New York Times, The Guardian, Oxford American, Ploughshares, newyorker.com, The Point and Tin House, and have been included in the Pushcart Prize anthologies and in The Best American Essays 2017. She lives in Wisconsin. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Kristi Coulter is the author of the essay collection NOTHING GOOD CAN COME FROM THIS (MCD/FSG Originals). Coulter holds an MFA in creative writing from the University of Michigan. She is a former Ragdale Foundation resident and the recipient of a grant from the National Foundation for Advancement in the Arts. Her work has appeared in The Paris Review, The Awl, Glamour, Vox, The Mississippi Review, Longreads, and elsewhere. She lives in Seattle, where she is working on her next book. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Laura van den Berg is the author of the novel THE THIRD HOTEL (Farrar, Straus, & Giroux). Her other books include two collections of stories, The Isle of Youth (FSG, 2013) and What the World Will Look Like When All the Water Leaves Us (Dzanc Books, 2009), and the novel Find Me (FSG, 2015). Laura van den Berg is a Briggs-Copeland Lecturer in Fiction at Harvard University and also teaches in the MFA Program for Writers at Warren Wilson College. She lives in Cambridge, MA. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Mark Leidner is the author of the story collection UNDER THE SEA (Tyrant Books). Leidner's other books include Beauty Was the Case They Gave Me, (Factory Hollow, 2011), and a collection of aphorisms called The Angel in the Dream of Our Hangover (Sator, 2011). He has taught at Elms College and the University of Massachusetts-Amherst, and his poems have appeared in Action Yes, The Iowa Review, Sixth Finch, and Supermachine. He lives in Georgia. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Genevieve Hudson is the author of A LITTLE IN LOVE WITH EVERYONE (Fiction Advocate), a work of queer commentary, and a story collection called PRETEND WE LIVE HERE (Future Tense Books). Her writing has been published in Catapult, Hobart, Tin House online, Joyland, The Millions, Bitch, The Rumpus, and other places. She received an MFA in creative writing from Portland State University, where she occasionally teaches fiction writing and gender studies courses. She lives in Amsterdam. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Lisa Locascio is the author of the debut novel OPEN ME (Grove Atlantic). Her work has appeared in The Believer, Tin House, n+1, Bookforum, and many other magazines. She is the editor of the anthology "Golden State 2017: Best New Writing from California," co-publisher of Joyland and editor of its West section, as well as of the ekphrastic collaboration magazine 7x7LA. She is Executive Director of the Mendocino Coast Writers Conference. She lives in California. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Joseph Grantham is a poet and the author of the debut collection TOM SAWYER, available now from Civil Coping Mechanisms. Grantham was born in Kansas City, Missouri. He grew up in California. He read books for awhile and wrote bad stories and poems and went to school. Not much happened. He lost his virginity when he was 18. He got his BA from Bennington College. He still reads books and writes. He runs Disorder Press with his sister, Mik. He currently lives in Woodland, North Carolina. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

T. Greenwood is the author of the novel RUST & STARDUST (St. Martin's Press). Greenwood has published twelve novels and has received grants from the Sherwood Anderson Foundation, the Christopher Isherwood Foundation, the National Endowment for the Arts, and the Maryland State Arts Council. She has won three San Diego Book Awards. Five of her novels have been BookSense76/IndieBound picks. BODIES OF WATER was finalist for a Lambda Foundation award. She lives in San Diego and Vermont. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Brad Listi talks with Maggie Nelson, author of the poetry collection SOMETHING BRIGHT, THEN HOLES (Soft Skull Press). Nelson is the author of nine books of poetry and prose, including the National Book Critics Circle Award winner The Argonauts, The Art of Cruelty: A Reckoning, Bluets, The Red Parts, and Jane: A Murder. She has been the recipient of a Guggenheim Fellowship in Nonfiction, an NEA Fellowship in Poetry, and in 2016 was awarded a MacArthur “Genius” Fellowship. She lives in Los Angeles. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Victoria Patterson is the author of the story collection THE SECRET HABIT OF SORROW (Counterpoint Press). Patterson is the author of the novels THE PEERLESS FOUR and THIS VACANT PARADISE, a 2011 NY Times Book Review Editors’ Choice. Her story collection, DRIFT, was a finalist for the California Book Award, the 2009 Story Prize, and was selected as one of the best books of 2009 by The San Francisco Chronicle. She lives with her family in Southern California and teaches at Antioch University Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Amber Tamblyn is the author of the novel ANY MAN (Harper Perennial) and three books of poetry, including the critically acclaimed best seller, "Dark Sparkler." A book of essays is forthcoming from Crown in 2019. Most recently Tamblyn wrote and directed the feature film, “Paint it Black”, based on the novel by Janet Fitch, currently on Netflix. She's a contributing writer for The New York Times and is a founding member of Time’s Up. She lives in New Yor Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Adam Greenfield is the author of the debut novel CIRCA (Pelekinesis Press), the official August pick of The Nervous Breakdown Book Club. Greenfield's short fiction has appeared in many literary magazines, including MungBeing, Outsider Ink, and Prole. He lives in Los Angeles with his wife and children.  Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Amanda Stern is the author of the memoir LITTLE PANIC: DISPATCHES FROM AN ANXIOUS LIFE (Grand Central Publishing). Stern's first novel "The Long Haul" (Soft Skull Press) was published in 2003. That same year, she launched The Happy Ending Music and Reading Series, producing over 250 shows and welcoming over 700 creative artists, ranging from Lena Dunham to Laurie Anderson, before ending the series in 2016. She has also published nine children's books. She lives in Brooklyn. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Allie Rowbottom is the author of JELL-O GIRLS: A FAMILY HISTORY (Little, Brown). Her essays can be found in Vanity Fair, Salon, The Rumpus, and elsewhere. She has taught fiction and non-fiction at the University of Houston and CalArts and holds a PhD in literature and creative writing from the University of Houston. She is lives in Los Angeles with her husband Jon, French bulldogs Butter and Jammy, and Ham the Morgan horse. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Robert Goolrick is the author of the novel THE DYING OF THE LIGHT (Harper). It is the official July pick of The Nervous Breakdown Book Club. Goolrick is the author of the bestselling novels "A Reliable Wife," "Heading Out to Wonderful," and "The Fall of Princes," and the acclaimed memoir "The End of the World as We Know It." He lives and works in Baltimore.  Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Adrienne Celt is the author of the novel INVITATION TO A BONFIRE (Bloomsbury). Celt's debut novel "The Daughters"(Norton/Liveright) won the 2015 PEN Southwest Book Award for Fiction and was named a Best Book of the Year by NPR. She has also authored a collection of comics called "Apocalypse How? An Existential Bestiary" (DIAGRAM/New Michigan Press 2016). A recipient of an O. Henry Prize, the Glenna Luschei Award, and multiple residencies, she lives in Tucson, Arizona. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Ottessa Moshfegh is the author of the novel My Year of Rest and Relaxation (Penguin Press). Moshfegh's first book, McGlue, a novella, won the Fence Modern Prize in Prose and the Believer Book Award. She is also the author of the short story collection Homesick for Another World. Eileen, her first novel, was shortlisted for the National Book Critics Circle Award and the Man Booker Prize, and won the PEN/Hemingway Award for debut fiction. She lives in Los Angeles.  *** Otherppl with Brad Listi is a weekly literary podcast featuring in-depth interviews with today's leading writers. Available where podcasts are available: Apple Podcasts, Google Podcasts, Spotify, Stitcher, iHeart Radio, etc. Subscribe to Brad Listi’s email newsletter Support the show on Patreon Merch @otherppl Instagram  YouTube TikTok Email the show: letters [at] otherppl [dot] com The podcast is a proud affiliate partner of Bookshop, working to support local, independent bookstores. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Bethany C. Morrow is the author of the debut novel MEM (Unnamed Press). A California native, Morrow graduated from the University of California, Santa Cruz with a BA in Sociology. Following undergrad, she studied Clinical Psychological Research at the University of Wales, Bangor, in Great Britain before returning to North America to focus on her literary work.  *** Otherppl with Brad Listi is a weekly literary podcast featuring in-depth interviews with today's leading writers. Available where podcasts are available: Apple Podcasts, Google Podcasts, Spotify, Stitcher, iHeart Radio, etc. Subscribe to Brad Listi’s email newsletter Support the show on Patreon Merch @otherppl Instagram  YouTube TikTok Email the show: letters [at] otherppl [dot] com The podcast is a proud affiliate partner of Bookshop, working to support local, independent bookstores. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Ruth Ozeki is the author of the novel, A TALE FOR THE TIME BEING (2013), won the LA Times Book Prize and was shortlisted for the Man Booker Prize and the National Book Critics Circle Award. Her other novels include "My Year of Meats" and "All Over Creation." In 2016, she published a work of personal nonfiction called "The Face: A Time Code." Her film "Halving the Bones" appeared on PBS. She lives in British Columbia and teaches at Smith College. *** Otherppl with Brad Listi is a weekly literary podcast featuring in-depth interviews with today's leading writers. Available where podcasts are available: Apple Podcasts, Google Podcasts, Spotify, Stitcher, iHeart Radio, etc. Subscribe to Brad Listi’s email newsletter Support the show on Patreon Merch @otherppl Instagram  YouTube TikTok Email the show: letters [at] otherppl [dot] com The podcast is a proud affiliate partner of Bookshop, working to support local, independent bookstores. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Poe Ballantine is the author of the novel WHIRLAWAY (Hawthorne Books). He currently lives in Chadron, Nebraska. His work has appeared in The Atlantic Monthly, The Sun, Kenyon Review, and The Coal City Review. In addition to garnering numerous Pushcart and O. Henry nominations, Mr. Ballantine’s work has been included in the anthologies The Best American Short Stories 1998 and The Best American Essays 2006. *** Otherppl with Brad Listi is a weekly literary podcast featuring in-depth interviews with today's leading writers. Available where podcasts are available: Apple Podcasts, Google Podcasts, Spotify, Stitcher, iHeart Radio, etc. Subscribe to Brad Listi’s email newsletter Support the show on Patreon Merch @otherppl Instagram  YouTube TikTok Email the show: letters [at] otherppl [dot] com The podcast is a proud affiliate partner of Bookshop, working to support local, independent bookstores. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Jamel Brinkley is the author of the story collection A LUCKY MAN (Graywolf Press). Brinkley's fiction has appeared, or is forthcoming, in The Best American Short Stories 2018, A Public Space, Ploughshares, Gulf Coast, The Threepenny Review, Glimmer Train, American Short Fiction, Epiphany, and LitMag. A graduate of the Iowa Writers’ Workshop, he will be a 2018-2020 Wallace Stegner Fellow in Fiction at Stanford University beginning this fall.  *** Otherppl with Brad Listi is a weekly literary podcast featuring in-depth interviews with today's leading writers. Available where podcasts are available: Apple Podcasts, Google Podcasts, Spotify, Stitcher, iHeart Radio, etc. Subscribe to Brad Listi’s email newsletter Support the show on Patreon Merch @otherppl Instagram  YouTube TikTok Email the show: letters [at] otherppl [dot] com The podcast is a proud affiliate partner of Bookshop, working to support local, independent bookstores. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Chelsea Hodson is the author of the essay collection TONIGHT I'M SOMEONE ELSE (Henry Holt) and a chapbook called "Pity the Animal." She is a graduate of the MFA program at Bennington College and has been awarded fellowships from MacDowell Colony and PEN Center USA Emerging Voices. Her writing has appeared in The New York Times Magazine, Frieze Magazine, Black Warrior Review, The Lifted Brow, Fanzine, Hobart, and elsewhere. She teaches at Catapult in New York and at Mors Tua Vita Mea in Rome. *** Otherppl with Brad Listi is a weekly literary podcast featuring in-depth interviews with today's leading writers. Available where podcasts are available: Apple Podcasts, Google Podcasts, Spotify, Stitcher, iHeart Radio, etc. Subscribe to Brad Listi’s email newsletter Support the show on Patreon Merch @otherppl Instagram  YouTube TikTok Email the show: letters [at] otherppl [dot] com The podcast is a proud affiliate partner of Bookshop, working to support local, independent bookstores. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

A re-posting of this December 29, 2013 conversation between Brad Listi and Jennifer Michael Hecht, author STAY: A HISTORY OF SUICIDE AND THE ARGUMENTS AGAINST IT. Hecht is a poet, historian, and commentator. Her other books include the bestseller "Doubt: A History," "The Happiness Myth," and "The End of the Soul: Scientific Modernity, Atheism, and Anthropology." Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Aja Gabel is the author of the debut novel THE ENSEMBLE (Riverhead Books). Gabel's short fiction can be found in New England Review, New Ohio Review, Glimmer Train, BOMB, and elsewhere. She has taught fiction, non-fiction, and literature at the University of Virginia, the University of Houston, Sweet Briar College, and Pacific University, as well as at undergraduate creative writing conferences and community workshop organizations. She lives in Los Angeles with her dog, Bear.  *** Otherppl with Brad Listi is a weekly literary podcast featuring in-depth interviews with today's leading writers. Available where podcasts are available: Apple Podcasts, Google Podcasts, Spotify, Stitcher, iHeart Radio, etc. Subscribe to Brad Listi’s email newsletter Support the show on Patreon Merch @otherppl Instagram  YouTube TikTok Email the show: letters [at] otherppl [dot] com The podcast is a proud affiliate partner of Bookshop, working to support local, independent bookstores. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Jonathan Evison is the bestselling author of the novel LAWN BOY (Algonquin Books). Evison is the author of four previous novels, including All About Lulu, West of Here, The Revised Fundamentals of Caregiving, and This Is Your Life, Harriet Chance! He lives with his wife and family in Washington state.  *** Otherppl with Brad Listi is a weekly literary podcast featuring in-depth interviews with today's leading writers. Available where podcasts are available: Apple Podcasts, Google Podcasts, Spotify, Stitcher, iHeart Radio, etc. Subscribe to Brad Listi’s email newsletter Support the show on Patreon Merch @otherppl Instagram  YouTube TikTok Email the show: letters [at] otherppl [dot] com The podcast is a proud affiliate partner of Bookshop, working to support local, independent bookstores. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Michelle Dean is the author of SHARP: THE WOMEN WHO MADE AN ART OF HAVING AN OPINION (Grove Press). Dean is a journalist, critic, and the recipient of the National Book Critics Circle’s 2016 Nona Balakian Citation for Excellence in Reviewing. A contributing editor at the New Republic, she has written for the New Yorker, Nation, New York Times Magazine, Slate, New York Magazine, Elle, Harper’s, and BuzzFeed. She lives in Los Angeles. *** Otherppl with Brad Listi is a weekly literary podcast featuring in-depth interviews with today's leading writers. Available where podcasts are available: Apple Podcasts, Google Podcasts, Spotify, Stitcher, iHeart Radio, etc. Subscribe to Brad Listi’s email newsletter Support the show on Patreon Merch @otherppl Instagram  YouTube TikTok Email the show: letters [at] otherppl [dot] com The podcast is a proud affiliate partner of Bookshop, working to support local, independent bookstores. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Adrian Todd Zuniga is the author of the debut novel COLLISION THEORY (Rare Bird Books). Zuniga the host/creator/CCO of Literary Death Match (now featured in over 60 cities worldwide) and host of LDM Book Report on YouTube. A WGA Award-nominated screenwriter, he co-wrote Madden NFL 18’s interactive movie Longshot (EA Sports). His short fiction has been featured in Gopher Illustrated and Stymie, and online at Lost Magazine and McSweeney’s. He lives between London and Los Angeles.  *** Otherppl with Brad Listi is a weekly literary podcast featuring in-depth interviews with today's leading writers. Available where podcasts are available: Apple Podcasts, Google Podcasts, Spotify, Stitcher, iHeart Radio, etc. Subscribe to Brad Listi’s email newsletter Support the show on Patreon Merch @otherppl Instagram  YouTube TikTok Email the show: letters [at] otherppl [dot] com The podcast is a proud affiliate partner of Bookshop, working to support local, independent bookstores. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Sloane Crosley is the author of the essay collection LOOK ALIVE OUT THERE (MCD Books). Crosley's other books include the bestselling essay collections "I Was Told There’d Be Cake," a finalist for The Thurber Prize, "How Did You Get This Number," and the novel "The Clasp." Her work has appeared in Esquire, Elle, GQ, Vogue, The New York Times Book Review, The Guardian, NY Magazine, McSweeney's, The Believer, Vice and on NPR. She lives in Manhattan. *** Otherppl with Brad Listi is a weekly literary podcast featuring in-depth interviews with today's leading writers. Available where podcasts are available: Apple Podcasts, Google Podcasts, Spotify, Stitcher, iHeart Radio, etc. Subscribe to Brad Listi’s email newsletter Support the show on Patreon Merch @otherppl Instagram  YouTube TikTok Email the show: letters [at] otherppl [dot] com The podcast is a proud affiliate partner of Bookshop, working to support local, independent bookstores. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Brad Listi talks with Tao Lin, author of TRIP: PSYCHEDELICS, ALIENATION, AND CHANGE (Vintage). Lin's other books include Taipei (2013), Richard Yates (2010), Shoplifting from American Apparel (2009), cognitive-behavioral therapy (2008), Eeeee Eee Eeee (2007), Bed (2007), & you are a little bit happier than i am (2006). He is also the author of Selected Tweets (2015) with Mira Gonzalez. He is the founder and editor of Muumuu House and lives in New York City (but is probably moving to Hawaii).  Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Jonathan Ames is the author of the novel YOU WERE NEVER REALLY HERE (Pushkin Press), now a major motion picture starring Joaquin Phoenix. Ames' other books include the novels I Pass Like Night, The Extra Man, Wake Up, Sir!, and the essay collections My Less Than Secret Life, I Love You More Than You Know, and The Double Life is Twice As Good. Ames is also the creator of two television shows: Bored to Death (HBO, 2009-2011) and Blunt Talk (STARZ, 2015-2016). He lives in Los Angeles. *** Otherppl with Brad Listi is a weekly literary podcast featuring in-depth interviews with today's leading writers. Available where podcasts are available: Apple Podcasts, Google Podcasts, Spotify, Stitcher, iHeart Radio, etc. Subscribe to Brad Listi’s email newsletter Support the show on Patreon Merch @otherppl Instagram  YouTube TikTok Email the show: letters [at] otherppl [dot] com The podcast is a proud affiliate partner of Bookshop, working to support local, independent bookstores. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Melissa Broder is the author of the debut novel THE PISCES, available now from Hogarth Press. Broder is the author of four poetry collections, including LAST SEXT (Tin House, 2016), and the essay collection SO SAD TODAY (Grand Central, 2016). She writes the @sosadtoday Twitter feed, the So Sad Today column for VICE, the horoscopes for Lenny Letter, and the Beauty and Death column at Elle.com. She lives with her husband and her dog Pickle in Los Angeles. *** Otherppl with Brad Listi is a weekly literary podcast featuring in-depth interviews with today's leading writers. Available where podcasts are available: Apple Podcasts, Google Podcasts, Spotify, Stitcher, iHeart Radio, etc. Subscribe to Brad Listi’s email newsletter Support the show on Patreon Merch @otherppl Instagram  YouTube TikTok Email the show: letters [at] otherppl [dot] com The podcast is a proud affiliate partner of Bookshop, working to support local, independent bookstores. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Susan Henderson is the author of the novel THE FLICKER OF OLD DREAMS (Harper Perennial). Henderson is a five-time Pushcart Prize nominee and the recipient of an Academy of American Poets award. Her debut novel, UP FROM THE BLUE, was published in 2010, and shorter work has been published in a number of anthologies, magazines, and newspapers. She lives in New York and blogs at the writer support group, LitPark.com. *** Otherppl with Brad Listi is a weekly literary podcast featuring in-depth interviews with today's leading writers. Available where podcasts are available: Apple Podcasts, Google Podcasts, Spotify, Stitcher, iHeart Radio, etc. Subscribe to Brad Listi’s email newsletter Support the show on Patreon Merch @otherppl Instagram  YouTube TikTok Email the show: letters [at] otherppl [dot] com The podcast is a proud affiliate partner of Bookshop, working to support local, independent bookstores. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Lauren Grodstein is the author of the novel OUR SHORT HISTORY, available from Algonquin Books. Grodstein is the author of four other novels, including the New York Times bestseller "A Friend of the Family" and the Washington Post Book of the Year "The Explanation for Everything." She directs the MFA Program at Rutgers University-Camden and lives in New Jersey with her husband, children, and dog.  *** Otherppl with Brad Listi is a weekly literary podcast featuring in-depth interviews with today's leading writers. Available where podcasts are available: Apple Podcasts, Google Podcasts, Spotify, Stitcher, iHeart Radio, etc. Subscribe to Brad Listi’s email newsletter Support the show on Patreon Merch @otherppl Instagram  YouTube TikTok Email the show: letters [at] otherppl [dot] com The podcast is a proud affiliate partner of Bookshop, working to support local, independent bookstores. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Sarah Kendzior is the author of the essay collection THE VIEW FROM FLYOVER COUNTRY: DISPATCHES FROM THE FORGOTTEN AMERICA (Flatiron Books). A frequent contributor to Fast Company, NBC News, and other national outlets, she has been covering the transformation of the US under the Trump administration, writing on authoritarian tactics, kleptocracy, racism and xenophobia, media, voting rights, and the Russian interference case, among other topics. She lives in St. Louis. *** Otherppl with Brad Listi is a weekly literary podcast featuring in-depth interviews with today's leading writers. Available where podcasts are available: Apple Podcasts, Google Podcasts, Spotify, Stitcher, iHeart Radio, etc. Subscribe to Brad Listi’s email newsletter Support the show on Patreon Merch @otherppl Instagram  YouTube TikTok Email the show: letters [at] otherppl [dot] com The podcast is a proud affiliate partner of Bookshop, working to support local, independent bookstores. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Natalia Sylvester is the author of the novel EVERYONE KNOWS YOU GO HOME (Little A Books). Sylvester was born in Lima, Peru and came to the U.S. at age four. She was raised in Florida and Texas. Her debut novel CHASING THE SUN was named the Best Debut Book of 2014 by Latinidad and was chosen as a Book of the Month by the National Latino Book Club. A former magazine editor, she now works as a freelance writer in Texas and is a faculty member of the low-res MFA program at Regis University.  *** Otherppl with Brad Listi is a weekly literary podcast featuring in-depth interviews with today's leading writers. Available where podcasts are available: Apple Podcasts, Google Podcasts, Spotify, Stitcher, iHeart Radio, etc. Subscribe to Brad Listi’s email newsletter Support the show on Patreon Merch @otherppl Instagram  YouTube TikTok Email the show: letters [at] otherppl [dot] com The podcast is a proud affiliate partner of Bookshop, working to support local, independent bookstores. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Elle Nash is the author of the novel ANIMALS EAT EACH OTHER (Dzanc Books). It is the official April pick of The Nervous Breakdown Book Club. Nash's other works include the chapbooks AVOKA (Ghost City Press, 2017) and i can remember the meaning of every tarot card but i can’t remember what i texted you last night (Nostrovia Press, 2016). She is a founding editor at Witch Craft Magazine, a fiction editor at Hobart Pulp, and lives in the Ozarks with her husband and their dog.  *** Otherppl with Brad Listi is a weekly literary podcast featuring in-depth interviews with today's leading writers. Available where podcasts are available: Apple Podcasts, Google Podcasts, Spotify, Stitcher, iHeart Radio, etc. Subscribe to Brad Listi’s email newsletter Support the show on Patreon Merch @otherppl Instagram  YouTube TikTok Email the show: letters [at] otherppl [dot] com The podcast is a proud affiliate partner of Bookshop, working to support local, independent bookstores. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Brad Listi talks with Steve Almond, author of BAD STORIES: WHAT THE HELL JUST HAPPENED TO OUR COUNTRY? (Red Hen Press). Almond is the author of nine books of fiction and nonfiction, including the New York Times bestsellers CANDYFREAK and AGAINST FOOTBALL. He also hosts the New York Times Dear Sugars podcast with his pal Cheryl Strayed. His short stories have been anthologized widely, and he has been known to publish crazy DIY books. He lives in Massachusetts.  *** Otherppl with Brad Listi is a weekly literary podcast featuring in-depth interviews with today's leading writers. Available where podcasts are available: Apple Podcasts, Google Podcasts, Spotify, Stitcher, iHeart Radio, etc. Subscribe to Brad Listi’s email newsletter Support the show on Patreon Merch @otherppl Instagram  YouTube TikTok Email the show: letters [at] otherppl [dot] com The podcast is a proud affiliate partner of Bookshop, working to support local, independent bookstores. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Shauna Barbosa is the author of the poetry collection CAPE VERDEAN BLUES (University of Pittsburgh Press). Barbosa's poems have appeared or are forthcoming in Boulevard, Lit Hub, Lenny Letter, Awl, Colorado Review, Virginia Quarterly Review, Foundry, Wildness, The Atlas Review, PANK, and others. She is a Disquiet International Luso-American fellow and received her MFA from Bennington College in Vermont. She currently resides in Los Angeles, California. *** Otherppl with Brad Listi is a weekly literary podcast featuring in-depth interviews with today's leading writers. Available where podcasts are available: Apple Podcasts, Google Podcasts, Spotify, Stitcher, iHeart Radio, etc. Subscribe to Brad Listi’s email newsletter Support the show on Patreon Merch @otherppl Instagram  YouTube TikTok Email the show: letters [at] otherppl [dot] com The podcast is a proud affiliate partner of Bookshop, working to support local, independent bookstores. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Jami Attenberg is the bestselling author of the novel ALL GROWN UP, available in trade paperback from Mariner Books. Attenberg has written about sex, technology, design, books, television, and urban life for The New York Times Magazine, The Wall Street Journal, The Guardian, Lenny Letter and others. Her other books include INSTANT LOVE, THE KEPT MAN, THE MELTING SEASON, THE MIDDLESTEINS, and SAINT MAZIE. She lives in New Orleans. *** Otherppl with Brad Listi is a weekly literary podcast featuring in-depth interviews with today's leading writers. Available where podcasts are available: Apple Podcasts, Google Podcasts, Spotify, Stitcher, iHeart Radio, etc. Subscribe to Brad Listi’s email newsletter Support the show on Patreon Merch @otherppl Instagram  YouTube TikTok Email the show: letters [at] otherppl [dot] com The podcast is a proud affiliate partner of Bookshop, working to support local, independent bookstores. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Will Mackin is the author of the story collection BRING OUT THE DOG, available from Random House. Mackin is a veteran of the U.S. Navy His work has appeared in The New Yorker, GQ, and The New York Times Magazine. His story “Kattekoppen” was selected by Jennifer Egan for inclusion in The Best American Short Stories 2014, and his essay about being an extra on Breaking Bad, published in GQ, was nominated for an American Society of Magazine Editors “Ellie” award. *** Otherppl with Brad Listi is a weekly literary podcast featuring in-depth interviews with today's leading writers. Available where podcasts are available: Apple Podcasts, Google Podcasts, Spotify, Stitcher, iHeart Radio, etc. Subscribe to Brad Listi’s email newsletter Support the show on Patreon Merch @otherppl Instagram  YouTube TikTok Email the show: letters [at] otherppl [dot] com The podcast is a proud affiliate partner of Bookshop, working to support local, independent bookstores. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Brad Listi talks with Lynne Tillman, author of the novel MEN AND APPARITIONS, available from Soft Skull Press. Her novels include Haunted Houses; Motion Sickness; Cast in Doubt; No Lease on Life, a finalist for the National Book Critics Circle Award; and American Genius, A Comedy. Her nonfiction books include The Velvet Years: Warhol’s Factory 1965–1967; and What Would Lynne Tillman Do?, a finalist for the National Book Critics Circle Award in Criticism. She lives in New York. *** Otherppl with Brad Listi is a weekly literary podcast featuring in-depth interviews with today's leading writers. Available where podcasts are available: Apple Podcasts, Google Podcasts, Spotify, Stitcher, iHeart Radio, etc. Subscribe to Brad Listi’s email newsletter Support the show on Patreon Merch @otherppl Instagram  YouTube TikTok Email the show: letters [at] otherppl [dot] com The podcast is a proud affiliate partner of Bookshop, working to support local, independent bookstores. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Troy James Weaver is the author of the novel TEMPORAL, available from Disorder Press. Weaver is the author of three other books—WITCHITA STORIES, MARIGOLD, and VISIONS. He lives in Kansas, where he works as a florist.  *** Otherppl with Brad Listi is a weekly literary podcast featuring in-depth interviews with today's leading writers. Available where podcasts are available: Apple Podcasts, Google Podcasts, Spotify, Stitcher, iHeart Radio, etc. Subscribe to Brad Listi’s email newsletter Support the show on Patreon Merch @otherppl Instagram  YouTube TikTok Email the show: letters [at] otherppl [dot] com The podcast is a proud affiliate partner of Bookshop, working to support local, independent bookstores. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Azareen Van der Vliet Oloomi is the author of the novel CALL ME ZEBRA (Houghton Mifflin Harcourt). Oloomi is the winner of a 2015 Whiting Writers' Award, a National Book Foundation "5 Under 35" honoree, the recipient of a MacDowell Fellowship, and a Fulbright Fellowship in Fiction to Catalonia, Spain. She currently teaches in the M.F.A. Program in Creative Writing at the University of Notre Dame and splits her time between South Bend, Indiana and Florence, Italy.  *** Otherppl with Brad Listi is a weekly literary podcast featuring in-depth interviews with today's leading writers. Available where podcasts are available: Apple Podcasts, Google Podcasts, Spotify, Stitcher, iHeart Radio, etc. Subscribe to Brad Listi’s email newsletter Support the show on Patreon Merch @otherppl Instagram  YouTube TikTok Email the show: letters [at] otherppl [dot] com The podcast is a proud affiliate partner of Bookshop, working to support local, independent bookstores. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Elif Batuman is the author of the bestselling debut novel THE IDIOT, available in trade paperback from Penguin. Batuman's first book, THE POSSESSED (2010), a collection of comic interconnected essays about the pursuit of Russian literature, was a finalist for a National Book Critics Circle Award. She has been a staff writer for The New Yorker magazine since 2010 and holds a PhD in comparative (mostly Russian) literature from Stanford University. *** Otherppl with Brad Listi is a weekly literary podcast featuring in-depth interviews with today's leading writers. Available where podcasts are available: Apple Podcasts, Google Podcasts, Spotify, Stitcher, iHeart Radio, etc. Subscribe to Brad Listi’s email newsletter Support the show on Patreon Merch @otherppl Instagram  YouTube TikTok Email the show: letters [at] otherppl [dot] com The podcast is a proud affiliate partner of Bookshop, working to support local, independent bookstores. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Willy Vlautin is the author of the novel DON'T SKIP OUT ON ME (Harper Perennial). It is the official February pick of The Nervous Breakdown Book Club. Born and raised in Reno, Nevada, Vlautin Vlautin has published four other novels: THE MOTEL LIFE (2007), NORTHLINE (2008), LEAN ON PETE (2010), and THE FREE (2014). Otherppl with Brad Listi is a free weekly podcast featuring in-depth conversations with today's leading writers. *** Otherppl with Brad Listi is a weekly literary podcast featuring in-depth interviews with today's leading writers. Available where podcasts are available: Apple Podcasts, Google Podcasts, Spotify, Stitcher, iHeart Radio, etc. Subscribe to Brad Listi’s email newsletter Support the show on Patreon Merch @otherppl Instagram  YouTube TikTok Email the show: letters [at] otherppl [dot] com The podcast is a proud affiliate partner of Bookshop, working to support local, independent bookstores. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Rachel Lyon is the author of the debut novel SELF-PORTRAIT WITH BOY (Scribner). Lyon teaches for the Sackett Street Writers Workshop, Catapult, Slice, and elsewhere, and offers private writing coaching. Most weeks she sends out a free writing/thinking prompts newsletter. She is a cofounder of the monthly reading series Ditmas Lit. Otherppl with Brad Listi is a free weekly podcast featuring in-depth interviews with today's leading writers. *** Otherppl with Brad Listi is a weekly literary podcast featuring in-depth interviews with today's leading writers. Available where podcasts are available: Apple Podcasts, Google Podcasts, Spotify, Stitcher, iHeart Radio, etc. Subscribe to Brad Listi’s email newsletter Support the show on Patreon Merch @otherppl Instagram  YouTube TikTok Email the show: letters [at] otherppl [dot] com The podcast is a proud affiliate partner of Bookshop, working to support local, independent bookstores. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Liska Jacobs is the author of the debut novel CATALINA, available from MCD/FSG. Jacobs holds an MFA from the University of California, Riverside. Her essays and short fiction have appeared in The Rumpus, Los Angeles Review of Books, Literary Hub, The Millions, and The Hairpin, among other publications. Otherppl with Brad Listi is a free weekly podcast featuring in-depth interviews with today's leading authors.  *** Otherppl with Brad Listi is a weekly literary podcast featuring in-depth interviews with today's leading writers. Available where podcasts are available: Apple Podcasts, Google Podcasts, Spotify, Stitcher, iHeart Radio, etc. Subscribe to Brad Listi’s email newsletter Support the show on Patreon Merch @otherppl Instagram  YouTube TikTok Email the show: letters [at] otherppl [dot] com The podcast is a proud affiliate partner of Bookshop, working to support local, independent bookstores. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Debbie Graber is the author of KEVIN KRAMER STARTS ON MONDAY, available now from Unnamed Press. Graber's fiction has appeared in Harpers, Zyzzyva, Hobart, The Nervous Breakdown and Word Riot, among other journals. She received an MFA from the University of California, Riverside. Otherppl with Brad Listi is a free weekly podcast featuring in-depth interviews with today's leading writers.  *** Otherppl with Brad Listi is a weekly literary podcast featuring in-depth interviews with today's leading writers. Available where podcasts are available: Apple Podcasts, Google Podcasts, Spotify, Stitcher, iHeart Radio, etc. Subscribe to Brad Listi’s email newsletter Support the show on Patreon Merch @otherppl Instagram  YouTube TikTok Email the show: letters [at] otherppl [dot] com The podcast is a proud affiliate partner of Bookshop, working to support local, independent bookstores. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Tim Wirkus is the author of the novel THE INFINITE FUTURE (Penguin Press). Wirkus is the author of one previous novel, CITY OF BRICK AND SHADOW (Tyrus Books, 2014), which was a finalist for the Shamus Award and the winner of the Association for Mormon Letters Best Novel Award. He’s currently a doctoral candidate in the University of Southern California’s Creative Writing and Literature Program. *** Otherppl with Brad Listi is a weekly literary podcast featuring in-depth interviews with today's leading writers. Available where podcasts are available: Apple Podcasts, Google Podcasts, Spotify, Stitcher, iHeart Radio, etc. Subscribe to Brad Listi’s email newsletter Support the show on Patreon Merch @otherppl Instagram  YouTube TikTok Email the show: letters [at] otherppl [dot] com The podcast is a proud affiliate partner of Bookshop, working to support local, independent bookstores. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Clay Byars is the author of the memoir WILL & I, available from FSG Originals. Byars attended The School of Letters at Sewanee, Tennessee. His work has appeared in the Paris Review, the Oxford American, and Narrative Magazine, where he serves as a consulting editor. He lives on a farm in Alabama.  *** Otherppl with Brad Listi is a weekly literary podcast featuring in-depth interviews with today's leading writers. Available where podcasts are available: Apple Podcasts, Google Podcasts, Spotify, Stitcher, iHeart Radio, etc. Subscribe to Brad Listi’s email newsletter Support the show on Patreon Merch @otherppl Instagram  YouTube TikTok Email the show: letters [at] otherppl [dot] com The podcast is a proud affiliate partner of Bookshop, working to support local, independent bookstores. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Brad Listi talks with Lauren Haldeman, author of the poetry collection INSTEAD OF DYING (Center for Literary Publishing at Colorado State University). It is the winner of the Colorado Prize for Poetry. Haldeman is a graduate of the Iowa Writers Workshop. Her other books include CALENDAY (Rescue Press, 2014) and THE ECCENTRICITY IS ZERO (Digraph Press, 2014). A finalist for the Walt Whitman Award and National Poetry Series, her work has appeared in Tin House, Fence, the Iowa Review, and the Rumpus. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Brad Listi, Adam Greenfield, and Gene Morgan gather in the studio to reflect on 2017 and eat some homemade bread, trying hard to end the year on a high note. Adam is the author of the novel CIRCA, due out in August 2018, and Gene is the founder and CEO of the literary site HTMLGiant. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Brad Listi talks with Daniel A. Hoyt, author of the novel THIS BOOK IS NOT FOR YOU, available from Dzanc Books. It is the recipient of the Dzanc Fiction Prize and the official December pick of The Nervous Breakdown Book Club. Hoyt's first short story collection, THEN WE SAW THE FLAMES, won the 2008 Juniper Prize for Fiction. He teaches creative writing, mainly fiction, and lit classes, at Kansas State University. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Brad Listi talks with Patty Schemel and Erin Hosier. Schemel was the drummer for the rock band Hole from 1992-98 and has just published a memoir called HIT SO HARD, available now from Da Capo Press. Hosier is a literary agent at Dunow, Carlson, and Lerner; she helped shepherd the book to publication. (Full disclosure: She is also Brad Listi's literary agent.) Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Brad Listi talks with author Bud Smith about his new memoir WORK, available from Civil Coping Mechanisms. Smith is a writer from New Jersey who also works heavy construction. His other books include DUST BUNNY CITY (Disorder Press), F250 (Piscataway House), TOLLBOOTH (Piscataway House), EVERYTHING NEON (Marginalia), OR SOMETHING LIKE THAT (Unknown Press), and CALM FACE (House of Vlad). This is Bud's second time on the program. He first appeared in Episode 373, on July 29, 2015. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Brad Listi talks with Ivy Pochoda, author of the novel WONDER VALLEY (Ecco Press). Her previous books include THE ART OF DISAPPEARING and the critically acclaimed VISITATION STREET (Ecco / Dennis Lehane Books), which was chosen as an Amazon Best Book of the Month, Amazon Best Book of 2013, and a Barnes & Noble Discover Great New Writers selection. A former world ranked squash player, Pochoda is originally from Brooklyn and now lives in Los Angeles with her daughter Loretta and husband Justin Nowell.  Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Brad Listi talks with Panio Gianopoulos, author of the story collection HOW TO GET INTO OUR HOUSE AND WHERE WE KEEP THE MONEY, available now from Four Way Books. Gianopoulos is the author of the novella A FAMILIAR BEAST. His stories, essays, and poetry have appeared in Tin House, Northwest Review, Salon, The Rattling Wall, Chicago Quarterly Review, Big Fiction, The Brooklyn Rail, Catamaran Literary Reader, and the Los Angeles Review of Books. He lives in New York with his wife and three children.  Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Brad Listi talks with Emily Geminder, author of DEAD GIRLS AND OTHER STORIES, winner of the Dzanc Books Short Story Prize. Geminder's work has appeared or is forthcoming in American Short Fiction, Conjunctions, Kenyon Review, New England Review, Prairie Schooner, Tin House, and elsewhere. The recipient of an AWP Intro Journals Award, a Glenna Luschei Prairie Schooner Award, and a Pushcart Special Mention, she previously worked as a journalist in New York and Cambodia. She lives in Los Angeles.  Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Brad Listi talks with Elizabeth Ellen, author of the story collection SAUL STORIES (Short Flight / Long Drive Books). Earlier this year, she published a novel called PERSONA, and her poetry collection, ELIZABETH ELLEN, is coming soon. Ellen's other books include "Before You She Was a Pit Bull" (Future Tense), "Sixteen Miles Outside of Phoenix" (Rose Metal Press) and "Fast Machine" (Short Flight/Long Drive Books). She lives in Michigan. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Brad Listi talks with Carmen Maria Machado, author of the story collection HER BODY AND OTHER PARTIES, available now from Graywolf Press. It is a finalist for the 2017 National Book Award and the Kirkus Prize, and the winner of the Bard Fiction Prize. Her memoir "House in Indiana" is forthcoming in 2019 from Graywolf Press. Machado holds an MFA from the Iowa Writers’ Workshop and lives in Philadelphia with her wife. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Brad Listi talks with Jarret Middleton, author of the debut novel DARKANSAS, available now from Dzanc Books. It is the official November selection of The Nervous Breakdown Book Club. Middleton's other book is a novella entitled "An Dantomine Eerly." He was the founding editor of Dark Coast Press and the classics library Pharos Editions, an imprint of Counterpoint/Soft Skull Press. His fiction, essays, and reviews have appeared in a number of online and print publications. He lives in Seattle, WA. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Brad Listi talks with Will Dowd, author of the essay collection AREAS OF FOG, due out from Etruscan Press on November 14, 2017. Dowd is a writer and artist from the Boston area. His work has appeared in Post Road Magazine, The Rialto, NPR.org, and elsewhere. Otherppl with Brad Listi is a weekly podcast featuring in-depth interviews with today's leading writers. All episodes free. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Brad Listi talks with Tod Goldberg, New York Times bestselling novelist and author of GANGSTER NATION, available now from Counterpoint Press. Goldberg's other books include Gangsterland (Counterpoint), a finalist for the Hammett Prize, and Living Dead Girl (Soho Press), a finalist for the Los Angeles Times Book Prize. He is the director of the Low Residency MFA Program in Creative Writing and Writing for the Performing Arts at the University of California, Riverside.  Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Brad Listi talks with Vanessa Grigoriadis, author of BLURRED LINES: RETHINKING SEX, POWER, & CONSENT ON CAMPUS, available now from Houghton Mifflin Harcourt. It is the official October pick of The Nervous Breakdown Book Club. Grigoriadis is a contributing editor at the New York Times Magazine and Vanity Fair, specializing in pop culture, youth movements, and crime reporting. She is a National Magazine Award winner and has been featured on MSNBC, CNN, Dateline, and Investigation/Discovery shows. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Brad Listi talks with Chelsea Martin, author of the essay collection CACA DOLCE: ESSAYS FROM A LOWBROW LIFE, available now from Soft Skull Press. Martin's other books include 'Even Though I Don’t Miss You', which was named one of the Best Indie Books of 2013 by Dazed magazine, and the novel 'Mickey.' Her work has appeared in Buzzfeed, Hobart, Lenny Letter, and Vice, and chosen as a Notable Essay in Best American Essays 2016. She is a comic artist and illustrator and currently lives in Washington State. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Brad Listi talks with Ayobami Adebayo, author of the debut novel STAY WITH ME, available now from Knopf. Her stories have appeared in a number of magazines and anthologies, and she has worked as an editor for Saraba magazine since 2009. She has received fellowships and residencies from Ledig House, Sinthian Cultural Centre, Hedgebrook, Ox-bow School of Arts, Ebedi Hills and Siena Art Institute. She was born in Lagos, Nigeria.  Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Brad Listi talks with Karl Geary, author of the debut novel MONTPELIER PARADE, available from Catapult. Geary was born in Dublin, and moved to New York City at age sixteen. He cofounded two East Village institutions: the music venue Sin-é, and later the Scratcher. He has worked as a scriptwriter (Coney Island Baby) and an actor (Michael Almereyda’s Hamlet; Ken Loach’s Jimmy’s Hall), and has adapted and directed Dorothy Parker’s story “You Were Perfectly Fine” for the screen. He lives in Glasgow Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Brad Listi talks with Lisa Lucas, Executive Director of the National Book Foundation. Prior to joining the Foundation, she served as the Publisher of Guernica, a non-profit online magazine focusing on writing that explores the intersection of art and politics with an international and diverse focus. She has also served as Director of Education at the Tribeca Film Institute, and on the development team at Steppenwolf Theatre Company. This year's National Book Awards will be held on November 15th in New York. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Brad Listi talks with Chiara Barzini, author of the debut novel THINGS THAT HAPPENED BEFORE THE EARTHQUAKE, available from Doubleday. Barzini is a screen, fiction, and journalism writer who was born in Rome and raised as a teenager in Los Angeles, where she became obsessed with canyons, quartz, and the Grateful Dead. She now lives in Rome with her partner Luca, their children Sebastiano and Anita, two cats, and one dog.  Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Brad Listi talks with Margaret Wilkerson Sexton, author of the debut novel A KIND OF FREEDOM, available from Counterpoint Press. It was recently long-listed for the 2017 National Book Award for Fiction. Wilkerson studied creative writing at Dartmouth and law at UC Berkeley. She was a recipient of the Lombard fellowship and spent a year in the Dominican Republic working for a civil rights organization. She lives in the Bay Area, California.  Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Brad Listi talks with Alex Gilvarry, author of the novel EASTMAN WAS HERE, available from Viking. It is the official September pick of The Nervous Breakdown Book Club. Gilvarry is a National Book Foundation 5 Under 35 nominee and he has received fellowships from the Harry Ransom Center and the Normal Mailer Center. Otherppl with Brad Listi is a weekly podcast featuring in-depth interviews with today's leading writers. All episodes are free. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Brad Listi talks with Ben Loory, author of the new story collection TALES OF FALLING AND FLYING, available from Penguin. Loory has appeared 'This American Life' and other radio programs, and first guested on this podcast in Episode 29 on December 25, 2011. Otherppl with Brad Listi is a weekly podcast featuring in-depth interviews with today's leading writers. All episodes are free. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Brad Listi talks with Jared Yates Sexton, author of the new book THE PEOPLE ARE GOING TO RISE LIKE THE WATERS UPON YOUR SHORE, available from Counterpoint Press. Sexton is a writer, academic, and political correspondent whose work has appeared in The New York Times, The New Republic, Salon, and literary journals around the world. Otherppl with Brad Listi is a weekly podcast featuring in-depth interviews with today's leading writers. All episodes are free. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Brad Listi talks with Matthew Zapruder, author of the new book WHY POETRY, available from Ecco. Zapruder is an award-winning poet, editor, translator, and professor who from 2016-17 held the annually rotating position of Editor of the Poetry Column for New York Times Magazine. Otherppl with Brad Listi is a weekly podcast featuring in-depth interviews with today's leading writers. All episodes are free. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Brad Listi talks with Jarett Kobek, author of the novels THE FUTURE WON'T BE LONG (Viking Press) and I HATE THE INTERNET (We Heard You Like Books). The Otherppl with Brad Listi podcast is a weekly podcast featuring in-depth interviews with today's leading writers. All episodes are free. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Fiona Helmsley is the guest. Her new essay collection, Girls Gone Old, is available from We Heard You Like Books. In today's monologue, I talk about skywriting.  Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Siel Ju is the guest. Her new novel-in-stories, Cake Time, is available from Red Hen Press. In today's monologue, I talk about some recent celebrity interactions.   Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Scott McClanahan is the guest. His new novel The Sarah Book is now available from Tyrant Books. It is the official July pick of The Nervous Breakdown Book Club. This is Scott's second appearance on the program. He was my guest in Episode 87 on July 15, 2012. In today's monologue, I talk about six years of Otherppl and I also talk about not talking about what I tend to talk about. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Julia Fierro is the guest. Her new novel, The Gypsy Moth Summer, is available now from St. Martin's Press. This is Julia's second time on the program. She first appeared in Episode 292 on July 6, 2014. In today's monologue, I discuss eating during interviews, politics, and health care. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Nathan Hill is the guest. His debut novel The Nix is now available in trade paperback from Vintage.  In today's monologue, I read some listener mail and talk about getting a massage.     Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Jonathan Safran Foer is the guest. His latest novel, Here I Am, is available now in trade paperback from Picador. It is the official June selection of The Nervous Breakdown Book Club. In today's monologue, I read more listener mail and discuss the role of political dialogue on the show.   Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Paula Priamos is the guest. Her new novel, Inside V, is now available from Rare Bird Books. In today's monologue, I talk about Trump and answer some mail.   Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Charmaine Craig is the guest. Her new novel, Miss Burma, is available now from Grove Press. In today's monologue, I talk about the apparent death of my novel.        Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Amelia Gray is the guest. Her new novel Isadora is available now from Farrar, Straus, & Giroux.  In today's monologue, I eulogize my dog Walter.   Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Elizabeth L. Silver is the guest. Her new memoir, The Tincture of Time, is available now from Penguin. In today's monologue—which is long—I talk about the Trump presidency. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Erika Carter is the guest. Her debut novel Lucky You is available now from Counterpoint. In today's monologue, I talk about the Republican health care bill. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Brian McGreevy is the guest. His new novel, The Lights, is available from Rare Bird Books. Brian is also a co-creator of the AMC series The Son, based on the bestselling novel by Philipp Meyer. In today's monologue, I read listener mail and talk about peak performance culture.   Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Annabelle Gurwitch is the guest. Her new book, Wherever You Go, There They Are: Stories About My Family You Might Relate To, is available now from Blue Rider Press. In today's monologue, I tell a tragic, over-long story involving spinning class, code names, spelling, and grim humiliation. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Lidia Yuknavitch is the guest. Her new novel, The Book of Joan, is available now from Harper. It is the official April selection of The Nervous Breakdown Book Club. This is Lidia's third appearance on the podcast. She first appeared on August 5, 2012, in Episode 93, and again on July 15, 2015, in Episode 370. All episodes can be streamed free of charge.  In today's monologue, I read more listener mail.     Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Michael Finkel is the guest. He is the author of True Story: Murder, Memoir, Mea Culpa, which was made into a film starring Jonah Hill and James Franco. His latest book is called The Stranger in the Woods: The Extraordinary Story of the Last True Hermit, available now from Knopf.  In today's monologue, I talk briefly about becoming a hermit, and then I respond to some listener mail.   Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Melissa Febos is the guest. Her new memoir is called Abandon Me, available now from Bloomsbury.   This is Melissa's second appearance on the program. She was my guest in Episode 2, which first aired on September 22, 2011. In today's monologue, I read listener mail. The topic is drinking and writing. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Ron Currie is the guest. His new novel, The One-Eyed Man, is available now from Viking. It is the official March selection of The Nervous Breakdown Book Club. In today's monologue, I respond to listener mail.  Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Abigail Ulman is the guest. Her debut story collection, Hot Little Hands, is now available from Spiegel & Grau.  In today's monologue, I talk about writing to and calling Republicans, and pouring my heart out to Lachlan Murdoch of Fox News.     Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Kristin Dombek is the guest. Her new book, The Selfishness of Others: An Essay on the Fear of Narcissism, is available now from FSG Originals.  In today's monologue, I talk about my decision to open up the archive and make the Otherppl podcast completely free of charge.     Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

David Berenbaum is the guest. He is an accomplished screenwriter whose credits include the Christmas classic Elf, directed by Jon Favreau and starring Will Ferrell.  In today's monologue, I read some listener mail.  Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Min Jin Lee is the guest. Her new novel, Pachinko, is available now from Grand Central Publishing. It is the official February pick of The Nervous Breakdown Book Club. In today's monologue, I basically just get right to the interview. But I talk a little bit about the Academy Awards at the end of the show.   Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

David Shields is the guest. His new book, Other People: Takes and Mistakes, is available now from Knopf.  David last appeared on this program on Episode 26, in December 2011. In today's monologue, I talk about possibly starting a blog.     Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Natashia Deón is the guest. Her debut novel is called Grace. It is available now from Counterpoint Press. In today's monologue, I offer outtakes from a failed attempt at a monologue.  � Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

�Sarah Manguso is the guest. Her new book, 300 Arguments, is available now from Graywolf Press. In today's monologue, I basically just get right to the interview. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Jonathan Herman is the guest. He is an Oscar-nominated screenwriter of the film Straight Outta Compton. In today's monologue, I talk about my new email newsletter and read some reactions from subscribers��.   Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Tom McAllister�� is the guest. His debut novel The Young Widower's Handbook is available now from Algonquin Books. It is the official January pick of The Nervous Breakdown Book Club.  In today's monologue, I pay tribute to Mark Baumer.   Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Lindsey Lee Johnson is the guest. Her debut novel, The Most Dangerous Place on Earth, is available now from Random House. In today's monologue, I read some listener mail in response to last week's conversation with Roxane Gay. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Roxane Gay is the guest. Her new story collection, Difficult Women, is available now from Grove Press. This is Roxane's second appearance on the podcast. She was my guest on Episode 34, which you can listen to via Otherppl Premium. In today's monologue, I read listener mail.   Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Vanessa Hua is the guest. Her debut story collection, Deceit and Other Possibilities, is available now from Willow Press.  In today's monologue, I talk about the holidays, Christmas presents, and New Year's resolutions.       Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Masande Ntshanga is the guest. His debut novel The Reactive is now available in the United States from Two Dollar Radio. It is the official December pick of The Nervous Breakdown Book Club. In today's monologue, I get right to the interview. Happy New Year, everybody! Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

This is the second annual Holiday Spectacular. The guests are Melissa Broder, Gene and Jenny Schlief Morgan, Amelia Gray, Lee Shipman, Ben Loory, Rich Ferguson, and Adam Greenfield. Recorded on December 10, 2016.  Get the free Otherppl app. Listen via iTunes. Support the show at Patreon. Happy holidays, everyone. I should be back next week with the final episode of the year. Stay tuned...    Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

The Oracle of Los Angeles is the guest. Her name is Amanda Yates Garcia. She is an artist, writer, witch, healer, and oracle. Recent performance rituals include Capitalism Exorcism at Human Resources and Devouring Patriarchy at the Women’s Center for Creative Work. Other venues to feature her work include Side Street Projects, REDCAT, Public Fiction, Highways Performance Space, and the Laband and Ben Maltz galleries among others. Her writing has been featured in publications such as CARLA, Black Clock, the Rough Magickanthology, Entropy, Synema Publikationen (Cinema Magazine), and WITCH. Amanda hosts her bi-monthly show The Oracle Hour on KCHUNG radio; teaches the Magical Praxis monthly mystery school; and performs private rites of healing and empowerment at her magical studio in West Adams. Please support this podcast at http://patreon.com/otherpplpod In today's monologue, I basically just get right to the main event.   Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Jason Diamond is the guest. His new memoir Searching for John Hughes is available now from William Morrow.  In today's monologue, I talk about the current shit show.  Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Adam Soldofsky is the guest. His new poetry collection, Memory Foam, is available now from Disorder Press. In today's monologue, I talk about cold meds and gas lines and no heat and our plumber's fear of heights.    Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Kool A.D. is the guest. His new novel OK is available now from Sorry House.  In today's monologue, I talk about Kool A.D. and how he describes his own book. And I talk some more at the end of the show too.    Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Sonya Chung is the guest. Her new novel The Loved Ones is available now from Relegation Books. It was the official October pick of The Nervous Breakdown Book Club. In today's monologue, I talk about dystopia and Thanksgiving.    Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Jade Chang is the guest. Her debut novel The Wangs vs. the World is available now from Houghton Mifflin Harcourt. In today's monologue, I talk about going pro. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

I'm not doing a regular show this week. It's the day after the election and I'm not feeling all that great. It seems wrong to do a show. The only thing on my mind is the election. I don't want a guest of mine to appear this week. It's not fair to the guest. I'll be back with a regular episode next week. For now, and maybe against my better judgment, I'm gonna share my thoughts on what just happened to our country and the world. A little while ago I sat down and thought out loud and talked into the microphone. I tried to think as deeply as I could about what just happened and how best to respond. And I'm sharing it with you here. I hope that's okay.    Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Michelle Tea is the guest. Her new novel, Black Wave, is available now from Feminist Press. In today's monologue, I talk about Halloween.   Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Meredith Alling is the guest. Her debut story collection Sing the Song is available now from Future Tense Books.  In today's monologue, I talk briefly about wine.   Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Wendy C. Ortiz is the guest. Her new book Bruja—a "dreamoir"—is available now from Civil Coping Mechanisms.  In today's monologue, I basically just get right to the interview.   Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Mike Roberts is the guest. His debut novel, Cannibals in Love, is available now from FSG Originals. He also wrote the screenplay for the movie Goat, out in theaters now. In today's monologue, I talk about finishing my novel. And the election.  Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Melissa Yancy is the guest. Her debut story collection, Dog Years, is available now from the University of Pittsburgh Press.  In today's monologue, I talk about the good lives and legacies of my Uncle Elmore and my friend Barb.   Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Rich Ferguson is the guest. His debut novel, New Jersey Me, is available now from Rare Bird Books / A Barnacle Book. In today's monologue, I talk about the debate between Hillary Clinton and Donald Trump.   Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Today's episode is a bit unorthodox. It's just me talking for an hour. Sorry about that. As most of you know, the podcast has been homeless since June. I've managed to have a guest each week since that time, but this week I finally hit the wall. Couldn't get my shit together. Logistically too difficult.  The good news is, I should have a recording space within the next few days. The new home studio is almost done, almost operational. I even got myself some new gear to celebrate the show's 5-year anniversary. So once I get everything set up and moved into the new space, it'll be all systems go. Thanks for bearing with me.  And thanks for supporting the show for the past 5 years.   Here's to whatever's next. -BL Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Nicole Dennis-Benn is the guest. Her debut novel Here Comes the Sun is available now from Liveright. It is the official September pick of The Nervous Breakdown Book Club. In today's monologue, I talk about my novel. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Garth Risk Hallberg is the guest. His debut novel, City on Fire, is available now in trade paperback from Vintage. In today's monologue, I talk briefly about my weekend trip to Wisconsin. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Margaret Wappler is the guest. Her debut novel Neon Green is available now from The Unnamed Press. This is the final conversation recorded in the old garage.   In today's monologue, I catch up on listener mail.   Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

S.J. Watson is the guest. His novel Second Life is available now in paperback from Harper. It was the official July pick of The Nervous Breakdown Book Club. In today's monologue, I talk about recording in a crowded house. And I talk with my daughter, who is about to celebrate her sixth birthday. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Lesley M. M. Blume is the guest. Her new book is called Everybody Behaves Badly: The True Story Behind Hemingway's Masterpiece The Sun Also Rises, available now from Houghton Mifflin Harcourt. In today's monologue, I talk about Lesley's book and Ernest Hemingway.    Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Jonathan Franzen is the guest. His latest novel, Purity, is available now in trade paperback from Picador. It is the official August selection of The Nervous Breakdown Book Club. In today's monologue, I discuss being in flux. And my dog Walter. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Dorthe Nors is the guest. Her new book, So Much For That Winter, is available now in the United States from Graywolf Press. I had a great time talking with Dorthe. She is, I believe, the first Danish author to guest on the program.  Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Sloane Crosley is the guest. Her debut novel, The Clasp, is available now in trade paperback from Picador.  A great pleasure to have Sloane on the program.   Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Chuck Klosterman is the guest. His new book, But What If We're Wrong?: Thinking About the Present As If It Were the Past, is available now from Blue Rider Press. So great to have Chuck on the program.  Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Frances Stroh is the guest. Her new memoir, Beer Money, is available now from Harper. In today's monologue, I talk about the logistics of vacationing with my family. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Mike Edison is the guest. He is the former publisher of High Times magazine and was the editor-in-chief of Screw magazine. He is also a musician and a professional wrestler. His new memoir, You Are a Complete Disappointment, is available now from Sterling Books. Great fun talking with Mike. Also heartbreaking. The title of his memoir also happens to be the last thing his father ever said to him. Brutal. But he has found a kind of peace with it, and he has written this fine memoir. Aside from that, Mike is a person who has really lived some lives. He's authored 28 pornographic novels. Has been a correspondent for Penthouse and Hustler. The professional wrestling. He's in a band. High Times. We talk about all of it. Fasten your seat belts. In today's monologue, I talk about my sense of urgency and the heat of summer.   Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Max Porter is the guest. His debut novel, Grief is the Thing with Feathers, is the official June pick of The Nervous Breakdown Book Club.  Winner of the Dylan Thomas Prize, it is available now from Graywolf Press. Max and I spoke by telephone. He was at home in London. It was nighttime for him. I was here in Los Angeles, mid-morning. His publication story is a good one. He wrote a book that isn't easily classifiable. Usually such books have a hard road to publication. But Grief found a way, and thank goodness. It's short, poetic, and wonderfully surprising novel. There's a talking bird in it. It takes chances. Packs a punch. The fact that it has gone on to do so well is a testament to Max's vision and skill. Wise, witty, and very deeply felt. A real gift to the reader. In today's monologue, I talk about compression in literature, compression of schedule, the podcast's logistical crossroads, Kickstarter, and my need to podcast in a cloistered environment. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Viet Thanh Nguyen is the guest. His debut novel, The Sympathizer, was awarded the Pulitzer Prize for Fiction in 2016. It is available now from Grove Press. I want to say that Viet is the first Pulitzer winner ever to appear on the program. I could be wrong. (Am I forgetting someone?) I read The Sympathizer earlier this year when I was a judge for the Tournament of Books at The Morning News. (You can read my judgment here.) This was before the Pulitzer. Fortunately I had the good sense to pick it as the winner and advance it to the next round; otherwise this conversation might never have happened. Kidding aside, Viet was great. He showed up ready to talk and was everything one might expect after reading the novel: sharp, funny, opinionated, and full of stories.   In today's monologue, I talk about moving. Again. I promise this will end soon.�� Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Stephen Elliott is the guest. He is the founding editor of The Rumpus, the author of seven books, and the director of three films. His latest film, After Adderall, will be premiering at the Rumpus Lo-Fi Los Angeles Film Festival on July 30th. I can't believe it's taken me this long to meet Stephen Elliott. He just moved out to Los Angeles for the summer and he came over and we sat down and talked. I admire Stephen. He does things. He gets things done. He's able to mobilize people. Build communities. He takes risks. He makes stuff. He's a writer. He's the editor of an online literary magazine. And now he's making films. He just keeps going. Great to have had the chance to meet him in person and talk to him for an hour. In today's monologue, I discuss my brief (very brief) history with adderall.     Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Claire Hoffman is the guest. Her new memoir, Greetings from Utopia Park, is available now from Harper Books.  Claire is a friend of mine here in Los Angeles. She grew up in Fairfield, Iowa in an intentional community founded by the late Maharishi Mahesh Yogi. Maharishi, for the uninitiated, was a spiritual guru and the progenitor of transcendental meditation, or TM. Claire's memoir deals in family history, her experiences growing up in Fairfield, and her struggle to come to terms with what it means to lead a spiritual life.   In today's monologue, I talk about my friendship with Claire, and about interruptions, and (again) about my impending move. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Cynthia D'Aprix Sweeney is the guest. Her debut novel, The Nest, is available now from Ecco Books.  Cynthia is living the dream. Or at least one kind of dream. It's a common dream: write novel, sell novel for big advance, watch as novel becomes New York Times bestseller, do media tour for novel, feel somewhat weird and even at times guilty that novel is doing so well. And so on. Really good time talking with Cynthia. Very candid conversation. And one of the best conversations I've ever had about what it really takes to make a book a bestseller. In today's monologue, I talk about moving, and customer service representatives, and spiritual depletion at the hands of customer service representatives. And also my dog's bleeding anus.      Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Jung Yun is the guest. Her debut novel, Shelter, is now available from Picador.  Jung's novel has gotten an incredibly warm critical reception. Not surprisingly, it took years to write, the gestation was arduous, the psycho-spiritual agony along the way was often intense. This, I'm finding, is what's called "the creative process." This is what I'm learning as I do this show and have these conversations. This particular conversation I remember fondly for a variety of reasons, not least of which being that Jung is a first-generation Korean American from Fargo, North Dakota whose father is a world-renowned martial arts instructor. We had fun. In today's monologue, I read some tweets from my @BradListi twitter account. Lucky you.     Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Nayomi Munaweera is the guest. Her new novel, What Lies Between Us, is available now from St. Martin's Press.  And here it should be mentioned that Nayomi's debut novel, Island of a Thousand Mirrors, was long-listed for the Man Asia Prize. The story of that book—its arduous, unconventional road to publication and eventual glory—should be heartening to anyone out there slaving away in obscurity. Nayomi was a lot of fun. She's originally from Sri Lanka but immigrated to the States as a child by way of Nigeria. Pretty sure she's the first Sri Lankan-American author to appear on this program. Happy to share this episode with you guys. In today's monologue, I field questions from Twitter followers.  Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Dana Spiotta is the guest. Her new novel, Innocents and Others, is available now from Scribner. It is the official May selection of The Nervous Breakdown Book Club. This is Dana's second appearance on the podcast. (Her first appearance, Episode 31, can be heard via Otherppl Premium.) I spoke with her by phone. She was at home in Syracuse, New York. We talked a lot about movies, which feature prominently in her fiction and especially in Innocents. And towards the end of our conversation, we discussed her writing process—how it tends to take her five years to write a novel, how she drafts, how she edits, and so on. It's illuminating. And that's really a good word for Dana Spiotta, as both a person and a writer. She's illuminating.   There isn't much of a monologue today—I just get right to the main event—but for those of you who can't live without my rambling, I talk a bit at the end of the show. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Kirstin Valdez Quade is the guest. Her debut story collection, Night at the Fiestas, is now available in paperback from W.W. Norton & Company. I first met Kirstin on April 1, 2016, at the Ace Hotel Theater in downtown Los Angeles. We were standing side-by-side in the wings, just as she was being introduced at Literary Death Match. She went to walk out onstage, and as she did I turned to her and said, in a deadpan/jokey way, "Don't fuck this up." She smiled, but only kind of (to be fair, it was dark, and things were happening fast), and then almost immediately I began to question my judgment, wondering if the joke had been ill-advised. The good news is, Kirstin didn't hold it against me. In fact, she barely remembered it. In today's monologue, I talk about mediocrity and Hollywood and delusions of grandeur. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Kathy Fish and Robert Vaughan are the guests. They are the co-authors of a flash fiction collection called Rift, available now from Unknown Press. Rift was the official December 2015 selection of the TNB Book Club.   Kathy and Robert were in town for AWP about a month ago. Normally I interview book club authors in the month that their book is featured. In this case, we waited a bit so that we could record in-person. It was worth the wait. Fun meeting these guys. We got into all sorts of stuff. And I think they're the first flash fiction authors I've ever interviewed. I could be wrong. But to the best of my recollection they're the first.  In today's monologue, I answer some mail from a listener. He wants to know how I feel about the work of authors younger than I am.  Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Elizabeth Crane is the guest. Her new novel, The History of Great Things, is available now from Harper Perennial.  Great to see Elizabeth again. She came over not too long ago and sat down across from me and we caught up. Her new novel is all about her late mother. It's about other things, too, but mostly it's about her mom. We get into that. We also talk about writing and fiction vs nonfiction and childhood and fears. We talk about preconception of structure vs intuitive making-it-up-as-you-go. We talk. In today's monologue, I answer questions as smooth jazz plays in the background. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Tony Tulathimutte is the guest. His debut novel, Private Citizens, is available now from William Morrow.  Had a good time talking with Tony. He's a smart guy. I feel like he has a lot of intensity to him. There's a coiled intensity thing happening. He doesn't miss much. He had a hard childhood. We talk about that. His novel has gotten the kinds of reviews that debut authors dream about. It's a promising beginning to a career. We talk about that, too. We talk about a lot of stuff.   In today's monologue, I experiment with a groundbreaking new broadcasting technique and share a short conversation I had with Bud Smith, whose novella, I'm From Electric Peak, is the official April pick of The Nervous Breakdown Book Club. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Jim Krusoe is the guest. His new novel, The Sleep Garden, is available now from Tin House. Can't believe it's taken me this long to meet Jim Krusoe. I've been hearing about him forever. He's a pillar of the LA lit community and was even my colleague for a time at Santa Monica College, where he has taught for years and where I taught for a spell. (How did we not meet then?) Anyway. He came over and sat down and we talked for an hour and could've talked for another hour. He's been in Los Angeles for a long time, transplanted, just like me, from the Midwest, and has seen the city through a few evolutions. Fun to ask him about his early years here, and how the city has changed and so on.   In today's monologue, I read some mail from listeners.   Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Leigh Stein and Lux Alptraum are the guests. They are co-directors, with Jenny Lumet, of a non-profit organization called Out of the Binders. It is devoted to advancing the careers of women and gender non-conforming writers. Had a great time with Leigh and Lux. It's very impressive what they've built. We sat down in the wake of BinderCon LA and talked about gender politics and community-building and how much work it takes to run a grassroots organization. It's one thing to know about social injustices; it's another thing to do something about them. These guys are doers. And they're helping an awful lot of people.   In today's monologue, I talk about AWP and the LA Times Festival of Books. And I plug my upcoming appearances at Literary Death Match and the Lit/Comedy Roundtable.    Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Juan F. Thompson is the guest. His new memoir, Stories I Tell Myself: Growing Up with Hunter S. Thompson, is now available from Knopf.  I tore through Juan's book. Read it in like 24 hours. I'm a huge fan of Hunter. He's in my top 5 all-time. I think he's among the funniest writers America has ever produced.  I've read most everything he wrote, and I've read about him at length, but up until a few days ago, I knew little about his son, whom I've always wondered about. What was it like to be him?  It can be easy to think that the child of Hunter Thompson would automatically be some kind of savage hell-raiser, but in fact Juan comes off as the opposite. In reading about him lately, the word "monkish" keeps coming up. I wouldn't go that far, but I will say we didn't snort any cocaine during the interview. Nor did we detonate any homemade explosives, which kind of bums me out.  In the monologue, I talk about Hunter. And I read an excerpt of a review of one of his books.   Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Michelle Adelman is the guest. Her debut novel, Piece of Mind, is available now from W.W. Norton & Company.  Michelle and I have the same birthday (August 1), which we discovered before we started recording. That put us on a good footing right away. I feel predisposed to liking someone who shares my birthday, which probably makes little sense, and yet I suspect it's a common impulse. I should also admit that I may have mispronounced Michelle's last name in this episode. I pronounced it Add-uhl-man. But then at the tail end of the show, in my closing remarks, I pronounced it Aid-uhl-man and spiraled into a rambling crisis of confidence. You have to understand how much I fear this kind of mistake. Fucking something up that is so elemental, mispronouncing a guest's name...it feels egregious to me. Inexcusable. And yet here I am, racing against the clock to get this episode posted, unable to spend the time to verify and, if need be, fix it. I'm out of time. So all I can do is stand before you and admit my failing, assuming that I've failed, which I'm not sure if I have, but if I did: I feel awful about it. Michelle, please forgive me. Assuming that I need to be forgiven. And if don't need to be forgiven, then please don't forgive me. We share a birthday, for godsake. Doesn't that mean anything? In today's monologue, I read some mail from listeners. And then respond to it.   Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Melissa Broder is the guest. Her debut essay collection, So Sad Today, is available now from Grand Central Publishing. She has also written a new poetry collection called Last Sext, due out from Tin House in June.  So much to say about my friend Melissa. I've known her for years. We met back when she was still in New York. Then she and her husband moved to LA, and not long after that she "came out" to me as her Twitter alter-ego, @sosadtoday. You'll hear all about this in the podcast. And you'll hear about how, for the past two years, Melissa and I have been working together as writing partners for film and TV stuff. It's been an experience. It's been fun.  It has involved many meetings. Endless meetings. Many studio lots. Many bottles of water. Many coffee shop writing sessions. Many pieces of Nicorette. (Melissa loves Nicorette and has tried to get me addicted. We chew it together after meetings.) And...what else can I say? She's a dear friend and collaborator, and I'm thrilled to see her having such great success.   In today's monologue, a special guest! I talk with Heidi Pitlor, whose novel The Daylight Marriage is now out in trade paperback from Algonquin. The Daylight Marriage is the official March selection of The TNB Book Club.   Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Adrian Todd Zuniga is the guest. He's the creator and host of Literary Death Match, an international reading series, comedy show, and all-around entertainment. Note: I will be appearing with Melissa Broder at the April 1st edition at Ace Hotel Theater in Los Angeles during AWP. For tickets, click here. Nice to finally have Adrian on the show. When I first met him, he was Todd. I've always called him Todd, which he still allows on the basis of a grandfather clause. I've known him for a number of years but didn't know a ton about his life until he came over the other day and sat down across from me. We discussed "Adrian."  We discussed "Todd."  We discussed "Adrian Todd." He had a hell of a childhood, which I'm not sure he fully realizes. Or maybe it seems less dramatic to him because it's his childhood and he lived it. For me, in hearing about it, I thought: Jesus, that's a lot. It's also interesting. And it makes Literary Death Match make more sense somehow. It makes it seem more unlikely, which then makes it seem more impressive. I have a soft spot for people who conduct cultural experiments and have weird ideas and try to actualize them—and then do. Having pursued a few weird ideas in my day, I have a feel for how much work it is to put on a Death Match. (Hint: it's a fuck-ton.) Todd—sorry, Adrian Todd—has been doing this thing for a decade, largely on his own. Yes, he's had help. But he's the prime mover. It's takes a Herculean amount of effort, and he deserves some credit for that. A tip of the cap as LDM turns 10. In today's monologue, I talk about LDM Los Angeles on April 1st, and how I'm going to interview someone in public (Melissa Broder) for the second time in my life.    Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Mark de Silva is the guest. His debut novel, Square Wave, is available now from Two Dollar Radio.  If I recall correctly, Mark's parents dropped him off at my house, which, if true, would make him the first guest in the history of the program to be dropped off by his parents, which is hopefully the start of a trend. (Maybe I should do a series of interviews called "Writers and Their Parents" wherein writers come over with their parents, and we all sit down and talk.) Mark went to Cambridge and got a Ph.D. in Philosophy. I feel like I should tell you that. He grew up in the Inland Empire here in Southern California, the child of psychotherapists. I think I'm remembering that correctly. This conversation took place two or three weeks ago. My life has been crazy since then. My brain is completely shot. I can't remember much. But I do remember laughing a lot during this interview, and feeling like it went really well. So there's that. I hope you guys enjoy it.  In today's monologue, I think I talk about caffeine. And I talk about my barista, a gentle man with a ponytail.   Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Hanya Yanagihara is the guest. Her novel A Little Life was a finalist for the Man Booker Prize and the National Book Award, and it is now available in trade paperback from Anchor Books. I feel like A Little Life is having the kind of existence that pretty much all writers hope their books will have. It seems to provoke passionate responses. The people who love it really fucking love it and the people who hate it are incensed by it and there are way more people who love it than hate it. You can't ask for much more than that. Hanya was only in town for a day and pretty solidly booked but she found an hour to come over and talk with me, and for that I'm grateful. I learned a lot from her. She knows her shit, and she really fought hard for her novel. She fought hard to see her vision of this book realized, and she's protective of it in a way that seems both smart and endearing. Also: it paid off huge. Few works of literary fiction strike a nerve the way this book has struck a nerve. Also: it's 700 pages long and she wrote it in 18 months. Also: she doesn't own a cell phone. In today's monologue, I give a quick update on the health of my son and share news about some appearances I'll be making during AWP here in Los Angeles in April.  Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Alexander Chee is the guest. His new novel, The Queen of the Night, is available now from Houghton Mifflin Harcourt. It is the official February pick of The Nervous Breakdown Book Club. Years ago Alex was out in LA and we had a drink and he told me he was working on this novel. It's amazing to see it all come to fruition, to see him on Late Night with Seth Meyers, to see the book reviewed all over the place, to see everybody chattering about it online. Just happy for him. It was a long road from start to finish, but he got there, and we talk about that. We also talk about his late, beloved father, and what an incredible polymath he was, and what it was like to be a mixed race kid growing up in Portland, Maine. We talk about the Iowa Writers Workshop and AIDS activism and what it was like to be in the green room getting ready to appear before a national television audience. And of course we talk opera and historical fiction and The Queen of the Night.  In today's monologue I talk about 400 episodes and what, if anything, that means. I also give an update on the health of my son.   Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Jarett Kobek is the guest. His new novel is called I Hate the Internet, available now from We Heard You Like Books.  This one was fun. I didn't know what to expect. Or I guess I sort of knew what to expect: Jarett and I would talk about the internet and what it feels like to hate it. But I didn't know quite what to expect from Jarett himself. Jonathan Lethem called him "the American Houellebecq," so I guess I was imagining that he would be drunk and smoking cigarettes and difficult to talk to, and so on. I imagined him as preemptively hating me, thinking of me as "the media," annoyed that he had agreed to do the podcast. Then he showed up and it was easy. More than that, it was interesting. This is a guy who really thinks about the world that we live in and the information we consume and the products we buy and how the powers that be make these things come to pass. He thinks about a lot more than that, but those are some of his main preoccupations. He's a good conversationalist, a curious person, a skeptic, and, I think it's safe to say, a man who has a very well-developed problem with authority.  The interview runs longer than normal. Hope that's okay. On this one, I just let the tape run. In today's monologue, I talk about some scary health stuff that we're going through with our son, and how that has been all-consuming lately, and how unhealthy (but unavoidable) it is to start Googling when confronted with medical troubles.     Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Elizabeth Bruenig is the guest. She is a staff writer for The New Republic. Her work focuses on politics and religion.   Really excited to have Elizabeth on the program. I've been a big fan for a while now and feel like she is already, at the ripe old age of 25, an indispensable voice in our political discourse, and on the topic of religion.  She first came to my attention (and you'll hear me mention this in the monologue) when she submitted an essay to The Nervous Breakdown several years ago. She must have been twenty or twenty-one at the time. Something like that. The quality of the writing blew me away. To see her have the success that she's having now is really wonderful, and not at all surprising. In our conversation we discuss her personal history, growing up in Texas, her religious upbringing and her conversion, in college, to Catholicism. We talk about God, Augustine, the nature of belief. And of course we talk about politics. Hillary Clinton vs. Bernie Sanders. Donald Trump and Ted Cruz and the GOP shit-show. All of it.   In the monologue, I talk, as I said, about the history of my Elizabeth Bruenig fandom and then I get into Election 2016 and start rambling and don't stop rambling for roughly fifteen minutes.  You're welcome, America. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Ruth Wariner is the guest. Her new memoir, The Sound of Gravel, is available now from Flatiron Books. It is the official January selection of The Nervous Breakdown Book Club.  This is one of the most devastating reading experiences I've had in recent memory.  Ruth Wariner's childhood in LeBaron, a fundamentalist Mormon colony in Mexico, is almost beyond belief. That she was able to survive seems miraculous, and the fact that she has now transmuted the horrors of her youth into a book is, I feel, an act of real heroism. When she showed up at my door, I was a little rattled. I had just finished the book and was still processing it. Ruth and her husband pulled up in front of the house and got out of their rental car and...the word that comes to mind is "sunny." They are sunny people. I feel like Ruth has the right to be ultra-goth and cynical—after what she's been through, it seems like she should be allowed to chain-smoke everywhere she goes, including in hospitals and on airplanes—but that wasn't the sense that I got when I met her—not at all. She sat down in the garage and we talked for an hour about all of it—Mormonism, polygamy, child abuse, the prison of belief, the deep pain of loss, the love of family, time, healing, catharsis, you name it. It was a good hour. I hope you guys enjoy it as much as I did.  In today's monologue, I recall how I raced to read Ruth's memoir and wound up listening to the audiobook version at double-speed, and what it did to my head. I also pay a little homage to Glenn Frey of The Eagles, yet another Baby Boomer rock icon, gone, it seems, too soon. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Margaret Malone is the guest. Her debut story collection, People Like You, is available now from Atelier 26 Books.  Really enjoyed meeting Margaret. She showed up at my door and I almost felt like I knew her already. There was something familiar about her. We have a friend in common. Maybe that was it. She used to live in LA. Maybe that was it. We're roughly the same age. Maybe that was it. Or maybe it was a combination of all of these things. Anyway, she seemed familiar and it was easy talking with her. We've been through some similar stuff as parents, too. Trying to have kids. How harrowing that can be. And then she and I talked about some difficult health issues that her husband faced, and what that was like. We talked about Portland, too. She lives in Oregon now, and is involved in the literary community, and so on. We talked about other stuff, too. Margaret is a gem.   In today's monologue I talk about the Powerball lottery and the death of David Bowie. And social media grief.   Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Chiwan Choi is the guest. His latest poetry collection is called Abductions, available now from Writ Large Press. First episode of 2016. Here we go. Though technically Chiwan and I spoke in late 2015. He came over. It was cold. He was in a t-shirt. I offered him a coat. He said he was fine. I couldn't believe it. I felt like a sissy. He sat for the hour and seemed unaffected. Maybe something's wrong with me. Anyway it was really fun talking with him. We've met on a handful of occasions at literary events around Los Angeles. He grew up in LA, is very active in the literary community here. He was born in Korea. He lived in South America on his way to living in Los Angeles. He's an immigrant. His family immigrated. A sense of dislocation has been with him to a degree for all of his life. Or for most of his life. I think that's true. I hope I said that right. He can obviously say it better than I can. We talk about those parts of his life, among other things. I found his stories about being a child and moving around really touching. Listen to it. You'll see.   In today's monologue I talk about the holidays. And Star Wars. I talk about Christmas trees. And the shame I feel over how few books I read last year compared to some people.    Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

For this, the 2015 Holiday Spectacular episode, I was happy to be joined in-studio by my friends Mira Gonzalez, Tyler Madsen, and Gene Morgan. They arrived at my house to help me execute a simple plan: we would drink alcohol together and call people and record it. And that's what we did.  Happy holidays, everybody. This is the final show of 2015. Thanks for all of your continued support. I appreciate it very much and will talk to you in the new year.   Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Brandi Wells is the guest. Her latest novel, This Boring Apocalypse, is available now from Civil Coping Mechanisms.  Brandi moved to LA recently to get her PhD. She's going to be a doctor of literature. She's a shy Southern girl originally from Georgia and spent time in Tuscaloosa, Alabama, which she loved, and which she misses, and we talk about that. She is also very much into body dismemberment—I don't mean to say that she wants to dismember anyone, or be dismembered herself. She's just fascinated with the body and with the alteration and desecration of the body, and with the body generally. We talk about that, too. What else? She used to hula hoop a lot. Not in a hippie way. In a circus way. And she grew up going to a Pentecostal church where people spoke in tongues and writhed on the ground, electrified by the power of The Lord. All of this and more in today's episode. In the monologue, I talk about the shutting down of LAUSD schools due to an unspecific terrorism threat, and about the fear in the air, and my outrage over all of the recent violence and America's stupid gun laws, and the chaos and horrors of the Middle East, and so on, and so on. All of it.  I attempt to get it off my chest.  Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Alexandra Kleeman is the guest. Her debut novel, You Too Can Have a Body Like Mine, is available now from Harper. Alexandra is from Boulder, so we have that in common. Not that I'm "from" Boulder, but I did live there for eight years, went to college there, and so on. The feeling I came away with after talking to her is that she's an unusually kind person. She's one of those people who emanates goodness. Just sweet as could be. And behind that sweetness is a really fierce intelligence. Her book has been getting all kinds of raves, and Ben Marcus called it "the fiction of the future" or something along those lines, and he tends to be right about those kinds of things, so...a very promising start to a literary career. And I'm happy I got to talk with Alexandra just as things are getting under way.  In today's monologue I talk about the holidays. And jury duty. And then at the tail end of the show I talk about some movies I've seen recently.   Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Nic Kelman is the guest. His new novel, How to Pass As Human, is now available from Dark Horse Comics. Nic is also an accomplished screenwriter—he sold a script to Stephen Spielberg a few years back and has since made other sales for other projects.  Funny story: Nic and I are neighbors and didn't know it. He walked over, sat down, we talked. Very pleased to have a guest on the show who works in film and television in addition to writing books. It's a no-brainer for a podcast based in LA and something I need to do more often. It's on my list for 2016. Nic is a smart guy with a deep interest in artificial intelligence. He studied brain and cognitive science at MIT, with a minor in film and media studies. How's that for a combination? I did my best to keep up.   In today's monologue, I discuss Thanksgiving and the perils of holiday travel and the fact that I haven't gone anywhere in way too long. I also discuss a text message that my wife sent me in the middle of the monologue which underscored this very point and made me feel like a negligent parent.    Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Amina Cain is the guest. Her latest story collection, Creature, is available now from Dorothy Books. I was unusually tired on the day that Amina came over to do the show. I'm almost always tired these days because of the newborn, but on this particular day it was especially so. The comparison I often make is drunk driving. It can feel like you're driving drunk, talking into a microphone on three hours of sleep. That's probably not the best comparison but you know what I mean. Anyway, my point is that, as tired as I was, talking to Amina was easy and it gave me energy and made me feel better. She has that kind of effect. I imagine I'm not the only person who feels this way. Just a very thoughtful, kind, sincere person, and a very good writer. Hers is a point of view that feels valuable to me, and I'm glad she's writing books and making art.  In today's monologue, I read some mail and then talk about money and class anxiety and having low-level panic attacks at parties and try to make sense of what seems to be a growing caste system in America. And so on. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Andrea Kleine is the guest. Her debut novel, Calf, is available now from Counterpoint Press. This is a novel rooted in history, both personal and cultural. I lived through the cultural part of it. Anyone alive and aware in 1981 can say that.  Andrea, however, lived through both parts of it, and now has a book to show for it, a book that grapples with these darknesses head on. She was in town on book tour and stopped by and sat down and gave very thoughtful responses to my questions, sometimes pausing to think things over before speaking. This is not the easiest subject matter to talk about, but she was game, and I appreciate that.   Speaking of subject matter that's not easy to talk about, in today's monologue I talk about Paris and Beirut and the Russian airliner that got bombed, and terrorism, and the sorry state of the world, and so on. I try to stay coherent. I think I was mostly coherent.   Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Myriam Gurba is the guest. Her new story collection is called Painting Their Portraits in Winter, available now from Manic D Press.  Myriam showed up in a pair of new shoes. She went shopping before the podcast. Bought some shoes. Wore them out of the store. I found that charming. It reminded me of being a kid and getting new shoes and insisting on wearing them out of the store because I felt like they would make me run faster or something. Another thing about Myriam: she's an easy talker. I love it when I get a guest like this. Makes it easy on me. Good sense of humor. Opinions. Plenty to say. Also very direct about not wanting to talk about certain things, which is always fine. She's a California girl, born and raised. Grew up in Santa Maria, not far from Santa Barbara. Land of the saints. Wine country, farmland, ocean air, strawberries. We talk about it all.   In today's monologue, I discuss my recent crisis of confidence regarding monologues and read from a Twitter exchange I had with listeners regarding the continued existence of the monologue at the top of the show.   Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Eileen Myles is the guest. She has two books out from Ecco, the first of which is a collection of poetry called I Must Be Living Twice: New and Selected Poems 1975-2014, and the second of which is a reissue of her novel Chelsea Girls.  Such a pleasure to have Eileen on the show. I've been wanting to talk with her for a long time and finally it all worked out. I should add that the interview almost didn't happen, because my computer died.  But I managed to get that rectified just in the nick of time. You'll hear me talk about this in the monologue. And if you follow me on Twitter, then you know that in the aftermath of my computer's death I had what can only be described as an epic customer service experience with Apple. So anyway. Eileen Myles was here at my house. She sat down across from me, and we talked. She's having a moment, as they say. And it's the kind of moment that feels rare and very well-deserved. I feel lucky to have had the chance to talk with her as all of this is happening, and grateful that she gave me an hour of her time.  In the monologue, as I just mentioned, you'll hear me talk about the death of my computer. And you'll also hear Eileen read a poem.  Which is way better than hearing me talk about the death of my computer.   Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Alex Mar is the guest. Her new memoir, Witches of America, is available now from Farrar, Straus, & Giroux. Alex showed up in the car of a journalist. She was, I think, fresh from the airport, and a journalist had picked her up and interviewed her on the way to my house. Busy author.  She got out of the journalist's car and walked back to my garage and sat down and talked to me for an hour about witches and Paganism and magic and religion and the occult. I often worry, when an author is on an extended tour, doing a ton of media, that I'll catch her in a state of fatigue, that she'll be "all talked out" by the time she gets to me. (This can happen.) Fortunately, this wasn't the case with Alex, who was totally game and has a truly incredible story to tell. I hold journalists, and particularly those who work deep in the field, in the very highest regard. It's a noble line of work. Alex has spent much of the past five years doing just that, and Witches in America is the very fine result. Today's monologue is (spoiler alert) pretty long. The podcast got a mention in the New York Times this past Sunday, and it meant something to me. I talk about that, and about the origins of this show and the people who inspired me to create it, and so on. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Matt Bell is the guest. His new novel, Scrapper, is now available from Soho Press. It is the official October selection of The Nervous Breakdown Book Club. This is Matt's second time on the show. Last we spoke, he was living up in northern Michigan, in Marquette. Since then he's moved to Tempe, Arizona. A big change in all sorts of ways. We start off talking about that, and then we get into Detroit, the setting of Scrapper, and try to wrap our heads around what's happened there and why and what might happen in the future. Detroit, like post-Katrina New Orleans, is something that from a distance can be hard to believe. Not until you're on the ground and looking at it with your own eyes does the scale of it even begin to come into focus. So Matt, with his good brain, has done us all a service by writing this book and imagining this world in such richness and depth. Seems hard to believe, as I've known (or "internet known") him for a long time, but this was the first time Matt and I have ever met in person (our previous interview was conducted over the phone). He was passing through Los Angeles on book tour and was kind enough to stop by to do the show. In today's monologue I talk about going out to dinner and my failure to do the kinds of cultural things that I should probably be doing. And I talk about Starbucks.  Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Chris Tarry is the guest. His debut story collection, How to Carry Bigfoot Home, is available now from Red Hen Press. This one was fun. Chris had flown in the day before from New York and then was up late working—he's a professional bass guitarist—and this, he told me, led to a few drinks, and well, you get the picture. It was nothing too dramatic, but he was dragging a little when he showed up, hadn't slept much, and it's how we got started with the conversation. And from there things just sort of rolled. Easy guy to talk to. And it was nice to meet a writer who is also an honest-to-God professional musician who makes his living playing music. They do exist. But just a few. Almost as rare as Bigfoot. And another thing: Chris is Canadian. Nice to have another Canadian on the program. In the monologue, I talk about the difficulties inherent in talking about music, and my disdain for the words "jam" and "gig."  I've probably talked about this before.  Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Catie Disabato is the guest. Her debut novel, The Ghost Network, is available now from Melville House. Catie came over here and sat down in the middle of her workday and talked to me. I always appreciate it when someone with a serious day job makes time to do the show. As you'll hear, she's a Midwestern girl. We have that in common. The Midwest.  I feel like I have a certain shorthand with people who were raised in the Midwest. And I feel something similar with people who were raised in the South, as my extended family is from the South and I grew up going down South and so there's a certain comfort level there, a Southern comfort level. What else?  Catie went to Oberlin at the same time as Lena Dunham. We talk about that a little. And we talk about bisexuality and bullying, and so on. We had a good conversation. Catie was game. She was delightful. I think you guys are gonna really like hearing from her.  In the monologue today I talk about manic happiness and this woman in my neighborhood who is always, without fail, insanely happy, and how this morning when she saw me she did a karate kick.     Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Jonathan Evison is the guest. His new novel, This is Your Life, Harriet Chance!, is now available from Algonquin Books. It was the official August pick of The Nervous Breakdown Book Club. A little late getting to this one, considering that Harriet was the August pick for the book club, but as most of you know, my new policy is to only do in-person interviews, so I waited for Johnny to get down here on  tour, and then he came over and sat down and we talked. Always great to see Mr. Evison. Known him for a long time. We met on Myspace years ago. True story. And we've been buddies ever since. Johnny is one of those writers who can really do the work. He's prolific and yet the quality is so high. Every time I look up, I feel like he's got another novel coming out. (And here I should mention that his last one, Revised Fundamentals of Caregiving, has been adapted for the silver screen, starring Paul Rudd and Selena Gomez, and should be out in theaters before too long.  Stay tuned.)  And what else? I think you're gonna like this one.  I know I always say that, but with this one I really mean it.  I had a good time talking with Johnny Evison. We haven't seen each other in a while and this was our chance to catch up and there's just an essential goodness to him that always comes through, both in art and in life. In today's monologue I somehow start talking about Janis Joplin and how a certain Janis Joplin moment encapsulates my inner world when I'm deep in the throes of sleep deprivation. I also talk briefly about the recent blood moon.    Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Bill Clegg is the guest. His debut novel, Did You Ever Have a Family?, is available now from Scout Press. It has been long-listed for both the Man Booker Award and National Book Award. Bill and I talked on the hottest day of the year in LA, or one of the hottest days of the year. It was sweltering in the garage and it had rained the night before (odd), which made it humid, which made the heat worse. Plus, we did the interview at four in the afternoon, the hottest time of the day. So it was hot. And Bill, bless him, arrived at my door after a day of media and travel and was, despite the heat and fatigue, completely game and willing to sit there and field my questions for an hour. We had a great conversation in spite of it all. Not much of a monologue today.  I just get to the main event.  I do, however, get more expansive than usual at the tail end of the show.  Stay tuned. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Carmiel Banasky is the guest. Her debut novel, The Suicide of Claire Bishop, is now available from Dzanc Books. It is the official September selection of The Nervous Breakdown Book Club. Carmiel and I talked about Los Angeles and New York and Judaism and her dad. We also talked about Portland; she grew up in Portland (Oregon). Of particular interest to me was the fact that she lived on the road, housesitting and working odd jobs for (if I recall correctly) four years. She wrote much of Claire Bishop during this time. A very admirable resourcefulness. And quiet tenacity. I think writers have to be tenacious. And disciplined. Carmiel is also a meditator. She does TM. We talked about that, too. A regular writing practice and a regular meditation practice: they seem of a piece. You have to be willing to sit down and sit still and be quiet and watch your thoughts. You have to be disciplined. You have to be quietly tenacious.  Quietly tenacious. In the monologue, I talk about being up all night with my eight-week-old son, and how recently, after a 2 a.m. feeding, rather than fall back asleep, he stayed awake and stared at me for two solid hours. My point, if there is one, is that it's weird to have someone, anyone, even your own infant child, stare at you for that long in the middle of the night. Especially when conversation isn't possible.      Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Jennifer Pashley is the guest. Her debut novel The Scamp is available now from Tin House Books. Jennifer and I had a mix-up on time. She thought we were scheduled for a different day. She also had a migraine headache. She got into an Uber with a migraine and raced across Los Angeles to be here. Shanna Mahin (my guest in Episode 365) was with her.  I had to be somewhere in an hour. We were up against the clock but we got it done. Jennifer is from New York state and is one of the rare people I've met who has lived in the same place for her entire life. Maybe it's not that rare. It seems rare to me. I live in Los Angeles and most people in Los Angeles seem to have come here from somewhere else, or else they left at some point and then came back. I do know a few Los Angelenos who never left. I'm not denigrating that choice, by the way. I envy it. I envy people who have a real sense of place. But I'm sure there are downsides to it, too. The grass is always greener, and so on. Anyway, it was great fun talking with Jennifer, migraine headache and all. My monologue is about time and sleep-deprivation, the two main themes of my life right now, and maybe always. I feel like I have a lot to do and lack the time and/or brain power to do it. But of course this is temporary, I think it's temporary. Everything is temporary.  It had better be temporary. It's temporary. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Joshua Mohr is the guest. His new novel, All This Life, is available now from Soft Skull Press. This is, I think, the third time I've talked to Josh on the program. The first time we did a full hour and the second time we did a few minutes at the top of a show and now we've done another hour. Always great talking with him. Some writers are good writers and bad talkers and some writers are bad writers and good talkers and other writers are good writers and good talkers. Joshua Mohr is a good writer and a good talker. Actually, I think a lot of writers are good talkers. I think communication is communication, and if a person has a facility for the written word they're often good to talk with as well. But not always. Which is fine. I'm just saying. Anyway. Great talking with Joshua Mohr and great to see his new novel get the kind of glowing reviews that it's been getting. Well-deserved and then some. Mr. Mohr fights the good fight. In the monologue, I read some more mail. One letter comes from an angry listener stepping up to defend me, and another comes from a listener who just saw the new movie The End of the Tour about the late-great David Foster Wallace. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Karolina Waclawiak is the guest. Her new novel is called The Invaders, available now from Regan Arts. This is my second time talking with Karolina. The first time, it was over the phone. She was living in Brooklyn. Things were different for her then. Then she moved to Los Angeles and is now a neighbor of mine, more or less. She took a long lunch break from her day job and drove over and sat down across from me, and we had a great conversation. When I do repeat interviews I'm always worried that it's going to be a retread, but I don't think that's the case here. Karolina and I covered a lot of new ground.  We even talked about crystals. I was really tired but didn't feel it during the conversation. The conversation brought me to life. Hopefully it does the same for you.  (Note: You can hear my first interview with Karolina Waclawiak via Otherppl Premium.) In the monologue today, I read some more mail. A listener wrote in accusing me of glorifying recreational drug use and denigrating antidepressant use and also accused me of behaving selfishly by trying to "crowdsource" positive thoughts for myself via the podcast. I respond.  Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

J. Ryan Stradal is the guest. His bestselling debut novel, Kitchens of the Great Midwest, is available now from Viking.  Really happy for J. Ryan. He lives here in Los Angeles and I've known him for a while and he's one of those guys who really deserves the success he's having. Not only has he worked hard and written well, he's been showing up at literary events all over town for years, he hosts his own reading series, he volunteers at 826LA, and is generally just an all-around mensch in the LA writing community and beyond. I know I'm not alone in being thrilled for him.  In the monologue today, I bitterly assess the state of my novel while in a state of epic sleep-deprivation. Hopefully some humor shines through. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Meg Howrey is the guest. Her two novels, Blind Sight and The Cranes Dance, are both available from Vintage Contemporaries. This is the first interview I conducted after the birth of my son, which is to say "in the throes of acute sleep deprivation."  I was pretty caffeinated, and Meg was great to talk with, which helped a lot.  I hope I did an okay job. Meg seems like one of those people whom you might call an old soul. It's hard for me to imagine her as a child. An accomplished dancer, she went off to study ballet in New York City at age 15.  And now she's the author of two critically acclaimed novels.  A gifted person who has lived an interesting life, or lives, in a short amount of time. Also: she wants to go to Mars.  In the monologue, I catch up on more mail.  Thanks again for all the letters.  If you want to email me, you can do so at letters [at] otherppl [dot] com.  Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Matt Sumell is the guest. His novel-in-stories, Making Nice, is available now from Henry Holt.  Note: Our conversation was recorded earlier in July, days before my son was born, so you'll hear us talking about the impending birth a little bit. I logged a bunch of interviews in the weeks leading up to delivery, anticipating a busy late summer, so if you hear things that seem chronologically lagging, baby-wise, that's why.  And so. Matt Sumell. There are people in the world who are naturally funny, I feel, and by that I mean this: they're the ones who don't even have to tell a joke, and they're still funny. They barely have to say a word. It's like their essence is funny. They walk into the room, and things get funnier automatically. It's just who they are, it's the charge they give off. Matt Sumell is like this. He's a character. You'll get it almost right away when you listen to him talk. And he's a hell of a writer. In the monologue, I read and respond to some mail from listeners.  I've been getting a lot of great email lately.  So much.  Many of you have taken the time to send good wishes re: the arrival of my son, and I want you to know how much I appreciate that. Thank you.  (I'm not gonna overdo it reading such emails, as I feel like that would be overkill.)  That said, the mail runs the gamut, subject-matter-wise, and I'll be reading more of it in episodes to come; I want to try to get to as much of it as possible on-air.  Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Bud Smith is the guest. His new novel, F 250, is available now from Piscataway House. I did a reading with Bud here in Los Angeles earlier this summer. He was kind enough to invite me. Ben Loory, Mira Gonzalez, and xTx also read. The next day Bud came over and we sat down and talked. What strikes me about him is that his path to writing is different from most everyone I know in literature. Different and the same, I guess. The word "refreshing" comes to mind. By day he works as a boilermaker. He writes his novels on his iPhone, typing with his thumbs, during his lunchbreaks and whanot. He doesn't get too neurotic about it. We discuss all of this in the interview, and more. Bud is a good one. He has the right attitude.  In today's monologue, I talk about the birth of my son, River, who arrived on July 21st, a few hours after I recorded my last episode. Hard to put it into words, especially since I'm so sleep-deprived, but I give it a shot. Let's just say it's been a great week for my family, and I want to thank those of you who wrote/tweeted/Facebooked your good wishes. Really appreciate it, you guys. Means a lot to me. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Jim Gavin is the guest. His story collection, Middle Men, is available now from Simon & Schuster. Jim is another in a long line of Catholic (and recovering Catholic) authors who have appeared on this program, a completely accidental trend that was pointed out to me by listener Nick Ripatrazone, who wrote about it in an essay over at The Millions. Jim and I talk Catholicism—as a child he wanted to be a priest—and we get into other stuff as well, including how he managed to get one of his stories published in The New Yorker. The monologue today is short and sweet.  It looks like my wife is beginning to go into labor.  I talk about it.  That doesn't mean the baby is hours from being born—though this could be the case. It's up in the air.  I might have over-shared. I'm not sure. It's debatable. Let me know. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Tao Lin and Mira Gonzalez are the guests. Their new book, Selected Tweets, is available now from Short Flight / Long Drive. Selected Tweets, as its title suggests, is a collection of Tao and Mira's tweets. It's not all of their tweets; it's an edited selection, published in a little black bible-like volume. For those of you who might be doubting the literary value of the book, I would suggest considering it as a work of poetry, though it feels like more than a work of poetry. In the aggregate, I suppose it reads like a kind of memoir-poetry hybrid or something. Maybe it's its own thing. It's kind of a jokebook, too. Both Mira and Tao are funny writers. In the monologue, I talk about Tao and Mira's arrival at my house and the shopping bag that Tao brought, and a conversation that he and I had about a tree in my backyard. I also talk about Twitter. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Lidia Yuknavitch is the guest. Her new novel, The Small Backs of Children, is available now from Harper. It's the official July selection of The Nervous Breakdown Book Club. Had such a fun time talking with Lidia. It was one of those conversations that could've easily gone longer. She's just a great person to have a conversation with, especially when you're talking about things like books and art and life and death and writing, and so on. She's been through some stuff. She's written her way through some stuff. She's very generous in sharing what's on her mind and in her heart. I think you guys will really enjoy hearing from her. I always do.   In the monologue I talk about my daughter, a recent hike we took, and a question that she asked me out of the blue. It involves incarceration. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Chet Weise is the guest. He is the editor and co-founder of Third Man Books, based in Nashville, TN. Third Man is a young indie press, and if you've listened to this podcast for any amount of time, you probably know that I'm a fan of the indies and feel like a lot of our best and most interesting literature is produced on the periphery. Third Man is unique, an offshoot of what started as a record label founded by a major rock star. What are these guys doing out in Nashville? I wanted to know. Chet was kind enough to talk with me. The monologue involves listener mail and is, to a degree, an extension of the monologue from Episode 366. I read a letter from a listener named Keegan, who has a question involving David Foster Wallace, and then I read a letter from a listener named Clay, who survived a terrible car accident, was severely injured, almost died, and then had what he describes as "a flash of liberating brilliance." Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

David L. Ulin is the guest. He is the book critic for the Los Angeles Times, a Guggenheim fellow, and the author of Sidewalking: Coming to Terms with Los Angeles, due out from the University of California Press in October. You can pre-order it now. I've been reading David for years in the LA Times and had the pleasure of meeting him this past winter during a residency in Palm Desert. His new book deals with a subject we have in common: the city of Los Angeles, a city notoriously difficult to wrap one's head around. David, though, does it masterfully, shining a light on LA's strange beauty, little idiosyncrasies, and big contradictions. In the monologue, I talk about my complete lack of imagination and tendency toward very thinly veiled autobiographical work, and I ponder my decision to read a sex scene in front of people at a local bookstore. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Maggie Shipstead is the guest. She is the author of the novels Astonish Me and Seating Arrangements, both of which are available from Vintage Contemporaries. Maggie is one of those people who seems to be doing everything right. Harvard. Iowa Writers Workshop. Stegner Fellow. Her first novel was a critically acclaimed national bestseller. Her second novel, many say, is even better. We talk about all of this. I try to get answers out of her. How did she do it? How was she raised? Is it nature? Is it nurture? How does a person turn out to be so accomplished, and at such a young age?  In the monologue, I talk about an episode from last night at around 2 a.m. I woke up and my wife was doing some Lamaze breathing. She had some sort of abdominal contraction, some sort of cramping, and the pain was so bad it woke her up from a dead sleep. And so then there I am, in the dark, trying to process this, trying to decide whether or not I should call the gynecologist (or 911). Fun stuff. Late stage pregnancy. We're getting down to the wire over here.  (All is well, by the way. The cramping went away. No home births...yet...)     Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Ryan O'Connell is the guest. His new memoir, I'm Special, is available now from Simon & Schuster. This one was easy. It's always great when a guest is funny and forthcoming, and Ryan is both of these things in spades. His new book deals with, among other things, his experiences with cerebral palsy, homosexuality, addiction, and more—all or most of it delivered with dark humor.  In addition to book stuff, Ryan has written for Awkward and is also working on getting I'm Special adapted for television with executive producer Jim Parsons. He's got a lot going on and has achieved an unusual amount of success for someone so young. Fun to catch him now, as his star is on the rise.  In the monologue I talk about existential stuff related to the impending birth of my second child.  I also talk about death, which came up recently in an impromptu question-and-answer session with my 4-year-old daughter. She's starting to wrap her head around some stuff, namely the reality of having a baby brother and what it means to get older and, well, eventually die. I fielded her questions, or tried to.  Hope you enjoy.     Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices