Otherppl with Brad Listi
Otherppl with Brad Listi is a weekly books and culture podcast featuring in-depth conversations with today's leading authors. Literature, screenwriting, the creative process, pop culture, and more. Available wherever you get your podcasts. Follow the show on Bluesky and Instagram.
1045. Hal Ebbott
Hal Ebbott is the author of the debut novel Among Friends, now available in trade paperback from Riverhead Books.
Ebbott is a writer living in New York.
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Otherppl with Brad Listi is a weekly podcast featuring in-depth interviews with today's leading writers.
Available where podcasts are available: Apple Podcasts, Spotify, YouTube, etc.
Get How to Write a Novel, the debut audio course from DeepDive. 50+ hours of never-before-heard insight, inspiration, and instruction from dozens of today's most celebrated contemporary authors.
Subscribe to Brad's email newsletter.
Support the show on Patreon
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Email the show: letters [at] otherppl [dot] com
The podcast is a proud affiliate partner of Bookshop
Carmen Maria Machado on Early Success, Haunted Residencies, and the Joy of Video Games
Today on the program, a trip into the archive and a return to Episode 491, my conversation with Carmen Maria Machado, author of the award-winning debut story collection Her Body and Other Parties.
Air date: November 8, 2017.
Carmen is also the author of the bestselling memoir In the Dream House and the graphic novel The Low, Low Woods. 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...
Explosive Diarrhea in Trump's America
Volume 96 of Brad & Mira For the Culture...Mira sleeps through her alarm by 2 hours...Mira wants Brad to be a drag queen...Mira gets botox....Brad gets the shingles vaccine...insane evangelicals on airplanes...the explosive diarrhea outbreak of 2026...Lindsey Graham dies...no more NDAs...Mitch McConnell relaxes in blue jeans in the ICU...Hunter Biden's invincible podcast era...almost comes to blows with Nick Fuentes...Mira confesses that she would join Hunter Biden Premium OnlyFans...Clavicular in Israel...another looksmaxxer bites the dust...farewell to the great Kiwi übermensch Sam Neill...& more...
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Otherppl with Brad Listi is a weekly podcast featuring in-depth int...
1044. Scott McClanahan
Scott McClanahan is the author of the novel Fights!, available from Rose Books.
His other books include Crapalachia, Hill William, and The Sarah Book. He lives in West Virginia.
***
Otherppl with Brad Listi is a weekly podcast featuring in-depth interviews with today's leading writers.
Available where podcasts are available: Apple Podcasts, Spotify, YouTube, etc.
Get How to Write a Novel, the debut audio course from DeepDive. 50+ hours of never-before-heard insight, inspiration, and instruction from dozens of today's most celebrated contemporary authors.
Subscribe to Brad's email newsletter.
Support the show on Patreon
Merch
Instagram
TikTok
Bluesky
Email the show: letters [at] otherppl [dot] com
The podcast is a
REPLAY: Candace Jane Opper on Suicide, Obsession, and Radical Unforgetting
Today on the program, a trip into the archive and a return to Episode 693, my conversation with Candace Jane Opper, author of the debut memoir Certain and Impossible Events (Kore Press).
Air date: February 17, 2021.
Candace Jane Opper is a writer, a mother, and an occasional visual artist. She grew up in the woods of Southern Connecticut, in a house that alarmingly resembles the one from The Amityville Horror, where she learned to embrace the value of unconventionality. She holds an MFA in Nonfiction Writing from Portland State University and spent her undergraduate years in Providence st...
Excerpt from 'The Radiant Dark,' by Alexandra Oliva
Vol. 13 of Story Time, featuring an author reading aloud from her work. In this episode, Alexandra Oliva reads from her new novel, The Radiant Dark (SJP Lit). It is the official July pick of the Otherppl Book Club.
Oliva's other novels include Forget Me Not and The Last One, which was selected as a Best Book of 2016 by The Seattle Times and translated into twenty-five languages. She received her BA from Yale University and her MFA from The New School, and she now lives in the Pacific Northwest with her family.
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Today's episode is brou...
More Mira Mayhem
Volume 95 of Brad & Mira For the Culture...Mira returns...two weeks of pure chaos...an airborne toxic event...a week of tending to a friend...convalescing in Vegas...getting her first (!!) massage...Brad's chipped tooth...annoyed on the 4th of July...Taylor Swift gets married to Travis Kelce...Graham Platner is very probably a sex pest...Olivia Nuzzi's new boyfriend...Mitch McConnell is brain dead, apparently...& more...
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Today's episode is brought to you by Rula. Thousands of people are already using Rula to get affordable, high-quality therapy that’s actually covered by insurance. Visit www.rula.com/other...
1043. Alexandra Oliva
Alexandra Oliva is the author of the novel The Radiant Dark, available from SJP Lit. It is the official July pick of the Otherppl Book Club.
Oliva's other books include Forget Me Not and The Last One, which was selected as a Best Book of 2016 by The Seattle Times and translated into twenty-five languages. She grew up in a tiny town in New York's Adirondack Mountains and received her BA from Yale University and her MFA from The New School. She now lives in the Pacific Northwest with her family.
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Otherppl with Brad Listi is a weekly podcast featuring in-depth interview...
REPLAY: Elizabeth Ellen on the Midwest, Indie Lit, and Being an Outsider
Today on the program, a trip into the archive and a return to Episode 99, my conversation with Elizabeth Ellen, author of American Thighs, editor of Hobart, and publisher of SF/LD Books.
Air date: 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 the cult classics Fast Machine and Person/a.
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Otherppl with Brad Listi is a weekly podcast featuring in-depth interviews with today's leading writers.
Available where podcasts are available: Apple Podcasts...
1042. Zinzi Clemmons
Zinzi Clemmons is the author of the essay collection Freedom, available from Viking.
Clemmons is the author of What We Lose, which was a finalist for the NBCC John Leonard First Book Prize and the Aspen Words Literary Prize. A National Book Foundation “5 Under 35” honoree, she was raised in Philadelphia by a South African mother and an American father. A cofounder of the literary journal Apogee, she lives in Northern California, where she serves as director of the creative writing program at the University of California, Davis.
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Otherppl with Brad Listi is a weekly podcast featuring in-depth interviews with today's leading writers.
Available where podcasts are available: Apple Podcasts...
REPLAY: Mike DeCapite on Midlife Romance in New York City
Today on the program, a trip into the archive and a return to Episode 740, my conversation with Mike DeCapite, author of the novel Jacket Weather (Soft Skull).
Air date: November 14, 2021.
DeCapite has published the novel Through the Windshield, the chapbook Creamsicle Blue, and the short-prose collection Radiant Fog 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...
1041. Erin Van Der Meer
Erin Van Der Meer is the author of the debut novel The Scoop, available from Grand Central Publishing.
Van Der Meer is a writer and former journalist whose work has appeared in publications including The New York Times, The Daily Beast, and Elle. She was a Spruceton Inn Artist Resident in 2024. Born in Sydney, Australia, she now lives in Brooklyn.
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Today's episode is brought to you by Rula. Thousands of people are already using Rula to get affordable, high-quality therapy that’s actually covered by insurance. Visit www.rula.com/otherppl to get started.
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<...REPLAY: Chantal V. Johnson on Trauma, Adulthood, and Contemporary Survival
Today on the program, a trip into the archive and a return to Episode 780, my conversation with Chantal V. Johnson, author of the debut novel Post-Traumatic (Little, Brown).
Air date: July 6, 2022.
Chantal V. Johnson is an attorney and writer whose fiction explores gender, personality, friendship, and all forms of art, but particularly music. Her debut novel, Post-Traumatic, was long-listed for the Center for Fiction First Novel Prize and selected as a New York Public Library book club pick. She has received fellowships and support from The Center for Fiction, the Djerassi Resident Artists Program, the...
Excerpt from 'The Scoop,' by Erin Van Der Meer
Vol. 12 of Story Time, featuring an author reading aloud from her work. In this episode, Erin Van Der Meer reads aloud from her debut novel, The Scoop.
Erin Van Der Meer is a writer and former journalist whose work has appeared in publications including The New York Times, The Daily Beast, and Elle. She was a Spruceton Inn Artist Resident in 2024. Born in Sydney, Australia, she now lives in Brooklyn. The Scoop is her debut.
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Today's episode is brought to you by Rula. Thousands of people are already using Rula to get affordable, hi...
The Golden Sacrifice
Volume 94 of Brad & Mira For the Culture...Mira experiences multiple traumas in a single week...Disclosure Day nightmare...a rat in her kitchen...witnesses attempted human trafficking...talks to live human cops...buys Brad a Jerry Garcia tie-dye....Brad attends the World Cup...gets kinda drunk...Geoff from Tennessee weighs in...Angry Adam at his most authentically hostile and aggrieved...Spencer Pratt "graciously concedes"...acts like an insane drama queen on adderall...deranged tirade...calls Nithya and Karen "commie animals"....Elon Musk, low-key trillionaire man of the people...Knicks win the title...the bandwagon is packed...Timmy-Tim in the l...
1040. Ben Fountain
Ben Fountain is the author of the novel Rasputin Swims the Potomac, available from Flatiron Books. It is the official June pick of the Otherppl Book Club.
Fountain’s work has received the National Book Critics Circle Award for Fiction, the PEN/Hemingway Award, the Los Angeles Book Prize for Fiction, and a Whiting Writers Award, and has been a finalist for the National Book Award and runner-up for the Dayton Literary Peace Prize. He lives in North Carolina.
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Today's episode is brought to you by Rula. Thousands of people are already using Ru...
REPLAY: Lili Anolik on Eve Babitz and the Secret History of LA
Today on the program, a trip into the archive and a return to Episode 763, my conversation with Lili Anolik, Vanity Fair contributing editor and the author of Hollywood's Eve: Eve Babitz and the Secret History of LA (Scribner).
Air date: March 16, 2022.
Lili Anolik is a contributing editor at Vanity Fair and a writer at large for Air Mail. She is the author of the Los Angeles Times bestseller Hollywood’s Eve and Didion and Babitz. Her last podcast, Once Upon a Time…at Bennington College, was produced by Cadence13. In 2024, she was a finalist for the Nat...
Brad vs. The Volcano
Volume 93 of Brad & Mira For the Culture...the podcast is huge in Vietnam...Mira's male antagonists go low, Mira goes lower...evaluating the Twitter fallout of her Twitter clash with musician Ariel Pink...Mira lobbies Brad to help her get into the Toy Story 5 premiere....Brad triumphs on Acatenango in Guatemala....completes a round-trip ascent and descent in less than 6 hours...serves as the guide, translator, and consigliere for his 80-year-old parents...Nithya Raman heads to the run-off...Spencer Pratt dies slowly, like a rat in a sewer...Trump gets booed at MSG...Gwyneth comes out as a 'centrist'...B...
1039. Anne Enright
Anne Enright is the author of Attention: Writing on Life, Art, and the World, available from W. W. Norton & Co.
Enright is the author of eight novels, most recently The Wren, the Wren. She has been awarded the Man Booker Prize and the Andrew Carnegie Medal for Excellence in Fiction, and was named the inaugural Laureate for Irish Fiction. In 2022, Enright was awarded a Lifetime Achievement Award from the Irish Book Awards. She lives and works in Dublin.
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Today's episode is brought to you by Rula. Thousands of people are already using Rula to...
REPLAY: Rex Pickett on 'Sideways,' Hollywood, and Adventures in Wine Country
Today on the program, a trip into the archive and a return to Episode 33, my conversation with Rex Pickett, author of the novel Sideways, which was adapted for the screen to great acclaim by Alexander Payne and Jim Taylor. (Payne and Taylor won the Academy Award for Best Adapted Screenplay.)
Air date: January 7, 2012.
Pickett is the critically acclaimed author of the novel Sideways, which was adapted into the iconic film of the same title. Sideways was nominated for five Academy Awards, winning for Best Adapted Screenplay, among 350 other plaudits. Pickett is the author of three Sidew...
1038. Tracy Lynne Oliver
Tracy Lynne Oliver is the author of the debut novel Magician, available from Roxane Gay Books.
Oliver is a writer based in Los Angeles. She has been published online at a variety of places such as Medium, Fanzine, and Occulum. She co-authored the graphic novel, The Sacrifice of Darkness, with Roxane Gay. Her story, "This Weekend" included in Best Microfiction 2019.
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Today's episode is brought to you by Rula. Thousands of people are already using Rula to get affordable, high-quality therapy that’s actually covered by insurance. Visit www.rula.com/otherppl to get started.
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<...Nobody Puts Mira in a Corner
Volume 92 of Brad & Mira For the Culture...Mira is on muscle relaxers again...and 150mg of THC...watched Dirty Dancing for the first time...experiences a sexual awakening...Brad contemplates Guatemala on the eve of his departure...has learned that you can't flush toilet paper there...Mira wins the Travis and Taylor bet...a discussion of the Travis and Taylor wedding invite drama...Dua Lipa marries Callum Turner...Trump passes his physical with flying colors...a picture of robust good health...the America 250 Concert fiasco...does Erika Kirk have a new boyfriend?...Sydney Sweeney announces a new career move...& m...
1037. Luke Goebel
Luke Goebel is the author of the novel Kill Dick, available from Red Hen Press.
Goebel is also the author of the debut novel, Fourteen Stories, None of Them Are Yours. And he co-wrote the screenplays for the films Eileen and Causeway. He is known as well for his role as co-editor at The New York Tyrant and work with Tyrant Books. He lives in Los Angeles.
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Today's episode is brought to you by Rula. Thousands of people are already using Rula to get affordable, high-quality therapy that’s actually covered by insurance. Visit ...
REPLAY: Timothy Willis Sanders on Anxiety, Stalin, and Male Vulnerability
Today on the program, a trip into the archive and a return to Episode 788, my conversation with Timothy Willis Sanders, author of the story collection Modern Massacres (Publishing Genius).
Air date: August 31, 2022.
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...
Excerpt from 'Kill Dick,' by Luke Goebel
Vol. 11 of Story Time, a new series on the program featuring an author reading aloud from his work. In this episode, Luke Goebel reads from his new novel, Kill Dick (Red Hen Press).
Goebel is also the author of the debut novel Fourteen Stories, None of Them Are Yours. And he co-wrote the screenplays for the movies Eileen and Causeway. He is known as well for his role as co-editor at The New York Tyrant and work with Tyrant Books. He lives in Los Angeles.
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Today's episode is brought to you by Rula. Thousand...
Who's Got the Crack?
Volume 91 of Brad & Mira For the Culture...Mira sees Obsession...theorizes that lots of film directors are dumb...Mira goes to see Bright Eyes in concert...relives her tortured youth...openly loathes The Moldy Peaches...Happy birthday Mira...Brad meets an Otherppl superfan in-person...gets a disgusting iced matcha latte...preparations for Guatemala continue...Should Brad hike a volcano?...Blake Shelton finally goes to the Sphere to see No Doubt...Chris Brown gets an honorary doctorate...Bam Margera and giving your children THC...leave Britney alone (again)...& more...
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Today's episode is brought to you by R...
1036. Kyle McCarthy
Kyle McCarthy is the author of the novel Immersions, available from Tin House. It is the official May pick of the Otherppl Book Club.
McCarthy's debut novel is called Everyone Knows How Much I Love You, and her fiction and essays have appeared in Best American Short Stories, American Short Fiction, n+1, and elsewhere. A graduate of the Iowa Writers’ Workshop, she lives in Brooklyn, New York.
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Today's episode is brought to you by Rula. Thousands of people are already using Rula to get affordable, high-quality therapy that’s actually covered by insurance. Visit ...
REPLAY: Nick Flynn on Hard Writing, Compassion, and Confronting the Ghosts of the Past
Today on the program, a trip into the archive and a return to Episode 667, my conversation with Nick Flynn, author of the acclaimed memoir This is the Night Our House Will Catch Fire (W. W. Norton & Co).
Air date: August 19, 2020.
Flynn is the author of four memoirs and six volumes of poetry. A professor on the creative writing faculty at the University of Houston, he lives in Brooklyn, New York.
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Otherppl with Brad Listi is a weekly podcast featuring in-depth interviews with today's leading writers.
Available where podcasts are available: Apple Podcasts, Spotify...
Excerpt from 'Immersions,' by Kyle McCarthy
Vol. 10 of Story Time, a new series on the program featuring an author reading aloud from his work. In this episode, Kyle McCarthy reads from her new novel, Immersions, the official May pick of the Otherppl Book Club.
McCarthy is also the author of the novel Everyone Knows How Much I Love You, and her fiction and essays have appeared in Best American Short Stories, American Short Fiction, n+1, and elsewhere. A graduate of the Iowa Writers’ Workshop, she lives in Brooklyn, New York.
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Otherppl with Brad Listi is a weekly podcast featuring in-depth interviews with today's leading writers.
Available where podcasts are available: Apple Podcast...
Vive la Travolta
Volume 90 of Brad & Mira For the Culture...Mira triumphs at her grandmother's funeral...gives a stirring keynote...her health problems seem to be abating...stressing about Spencer Pratt...Mira's uncle went to high school with Pratt...egged his house "at least 15 times"...the constant operatic morality play of Brad's Starbucks experiences...getting ready for Guatemala...worried about diarrhea...Travolta goes way too French on the red carpet at Cannes...Adam Driver responds to questions about Famesick...Amy Schumer's botched colonoscopy...Apple Martin beats the odds and gets a plum job in Hollywood...& more...
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Otherppl with Brad Listi is a weekly podcast featuring in-de...
1035. Sonya Walger
Sonya Walger is the author of the novel Wifehouse, available from Union Square Press.
Walger is an award-winning actress, best known for her role as Penny Widmore on Lost and Molly Cobb in the first three seasons of Apple TV+'s For All Mankind. She studied English Literature at Christ Church, Oxford and was the host of the literary podcast, Bookish. Her first book, Lion, a semiautobiographical novel was published by New York Review Books in February 2025.
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Today's episode is brought to you by Rula. Thousands of people are already using Rula to get a...
REPLAY: Clancy Martin on How Not to Kill Yourself
Today on the program, a trip into the archive and a return to Episode 825, my conversation with Clancy Martin, author of How Not to Kill Yourself: A Portrait of the Suicidal Mind (Pantheon).
Air date: March 29, 2023.
Martin is the acclaimed author of the novel How to Sell (FSG) as well as numerous books on philosophy. 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 Kan...
1034. Daniel Kraus
Daniel Kraus is the author of the novel Angel Down, available from Atria Books. It was awarded the 2026 Pulitzer Prize for Fiction.
Daniel Kraus is a New York Times bestselling writer of novels, TV, and film. His novel Whalefall received a front-cover review in The New York Times Book Review, won the Alex Award, was an LA Times Book Prize Finalist, and was a Best Book of 2023 from NPR, The New York Times, Chicago Tribune, and more. With Guillermo del Toro, he coauthored The Shape of Water, based on the same idea the two created for the Oscar–winning...
Mira Didn't Die
Volume 89 of Brad & Mira For the Culture...the return of Mira...still alive...describes her health ordeal...Brad's colonoscopy journey...his true crime spiral continues...gets reprimanded for helping the homeless...revisiting the hyper-capitalist hell of the Met Gala...making sense of the Baldoni-Lively saga...Channing Tatum's mournful Instagram poetry for Zöe Kravitz...the hantavirus cruise ship nightmare...& more...
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Otherppl with Brad Listi is a weekly podcast featuring in-depth interviews with today's leading writers.
Available where podcasts are available: Apple Podcasts, Spotify, YouTube, etc.
Get How to Write a Novel, the debut audio course from DeepDive. 50+ hours of never-before-heard insight, inspiration, and instruction from dozens of today's most celebrated contemporary authors.
Subscribe to Brad's email newsletter.
Support the show on Patreon
Merch
Instagram
TikTok
Bluesky
Email the show: letters [
1033. Patrick Radden Keefe
Patrick Radden Keefe is a staff writer for The New Yorker and the New York Times bestselling author of London Falling: A Mysterious Death in a Gilded City and a Family's Search for Truth (Doubleday).
Patrick's other books include the New York Times bestsellers Rogues, Empire of Pain (winner of the Baillie Gifford Prize for Non-Fiction), and Say Nothing, which received a National Book Critics Circle Award and was named one of the Twenty Best Books of the Twenty-First Century by The New York Times Book Review. He is a recipient of a Guggenheim Fellowship, the National Magazine...
REPLAY: Susan Choi on the Pandemic, Winning the National Book Award, and the Lasting Effects of Childhood
Today on the program, a trip into the archive and a return to Episode 647, my first conversation with author Susan Choi. We were discussing her National Book Award-winning novel, Trust Excerise.
Air date: June 10, 2020.
Choi is the author of Trust Exercise, which received the National Book Award for fiction, as well as the novels The Foreign Student, American Woman, A Person of Interest, and My Education. She is a recipient of the Asian-American Literary Award for fiction, the PEN/W. G. Sebald Award, a Lambda Literary award, the Sunday Times Audible Short Story Award, and fellow...
Excerpt from 'I Am the Ghost Here,' by Kim Samek
Vol. 9 of Story Time, a new series on the program featuring an author reading aloud from his work. In this episode, Kim Samek reads the title story from her acclaimed debut collection, I Am the Ghost Here (The Dial Press).
Samek's fiction has won the O.Henry Prize, the Pushcart Prize, and has been cited as a distinguished story in Best American Short Stories. Her stories appear in Zyzzyva, The Threepenny Review, Story, Guernica, and elsewhere. She works as a TV writer and producer, with credits including WordGirl and Catfish, and her writing has been nominated for an Emmy Awa...
What Does It Really Mean to ‘Make It’ As a Writer? On Leaving Corporate Publishing, Becoming a Hack, and Deciding to Self-Publish
Mira is out sick again this week, so instead of a new episode of Brad & Mira for the Culture, I am instead joined by Chris Stuck, who came to my attention recently when he published a very provocative and unusually candid essay on the online literary magazine Zona Motel. The essay is called ‘Chasing Wild Geese Through the Corporate Book World, or How I Became a Hack and Stated Self-Publishing My Fiction.'
Stuck is the author of Give My Love to the Savages, a debut story collection published in July 2021 by Amistad/HarperCollins. He was a fi...
1032. Kim Samek
Kim Samek is the author of the debut story collection I Am the Ghost Here, available from The Dial Press.
Samek's fiction has won the O. Henry Prize, the Pushcart Prize and has been cited as a distinguished story in Best American Short Stories. Her stories appear in Zyzzyva, The Threepenny Review, Story, Guernica, and elsewhere. She works as a TV writer and producer, with credits including WordGirl and Catfish, and her writing has been nominated for an Emmy Award. She lives in Los Angeles.
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Otherppl with Brad Listi is a weekly podcast featuring in-depth interviews with today's leading writers.
Available where podcasts are available: Apple Podcasts...
REPLAY: Kimberly King Parsons on Texas, Despicable People, and Finding Complexity in the Darkness
Today on the program, a trip into the archive and a return to Episode 598, my first conversation with author Kimberly King Parsons. We were discussing her debut story collection, Black Light, which went on to be nominated for the National Book Award.
Air date: September 18, 2019.
Kimberly King Parsons is a National Book Award-nominee and the bestselling author of We Were the Universe, a New York Times Editors’ Choice, winner of the Oregon Book Award, a finalist for the LAMBDA Literary Award and the Texas Book Award, a Dakota Johnson Book Club pick ranked #2 on TIME Ma...
