Today, we have something new. This past spring, Annmarie gathered with eight local writers to try a podcasting project. Over the course of six weeks together, they wrote side-by-side, saying YES to whatever stories arose. About friendship and loss, dreams and possibility, parents and belief. These sessions were sometimes tearful and painful, but they were always beautiful. And powerful. Because something important happens when we create in community. In this episode, we share eight short...

Crystal Wilkinson is the award-winning author of several books including Praisesong for the Kitchen Ghosts: Stories and Recipes from Five Generations of Black Country Cooks. She was Poet Laureate of Kentucky from 2021 to 2023, and currently teaches creative writing at the University of Kentucky where she is a Bush-Holbrook Endowed Professor. In today’s episode, Crystal and Annmarie discuss kitchen ghosts, family recipes – including how biscuits need to “kiss,” and the blessings and...

Christina Cooke was born in Jamaica and is now a Canadian citizen who lives and writes in New York City. BROUGHTUPSY is her debut novel. In today’s episode, Annmarie and Christina discuss cultural upbringings, the cruelty of children, the joys of weightlifting, and how all humans are complex and contradictory and deserving of love.  Episode Sponsor: Zora’s Den – Dedicated to empowering the lives of Black women writers. At Zora’s Den, we host a monthly reading series, conduct workshops, and...

Sarah Kain Gutowski is the author of Fabulous Beast and along with interdisciplinary artist Meredith Starr, she’s co-creator of Every Second Feels Like Theft, a conversation in cyanotypes and poems, and It's All Too Much, a limited edition podcast and art project. She’s out now with a new book of narrative poetry, The Familiar. In today’s episode, Sarah and Annmarie discuss the ache of literary ambition, how parenthood divides us from ourselves, and how Moonstruck is one of the best movies of...

Originally from Argentina, Cecilia Gentili came to the U.S. pursuing a safer life as a transgender woman. She lived undocumented for 10 years. After surviving arrests and an immigration detention, she accessed recovery services and won asylum. Cecilia founded Transgender Equity Consulting, which works to ensure all people living on the margins receive dignity and respect. In today’s episode, Annmarie and Cecilia talk about growing up on the margins, emigrating to the United States, and how to...

Leslie Jamison has written two essay collections, The Empathy Exams and Make It Scream, Make It Burn. She also gained prominence for her critical memoir, The Recovering: Intoxication and Its Aftermath. She’s out now with a new book, Splinters, about raising a child during the end of a relationship and the beginning of the pandemic. In today’s episode, Annmarie and Leslie talk about motherhood and how it’s both a mad transformative mystery and a boring daily slog. It’s both the Cheerios ground...

Angeline Boulley, an enrolled member of the Sault Ste. Marie Tribe of Chippewa Indians, is a storyteller who writes about her Ojibwe community in Michigan's Upper Peninsula. She is a former Director of the Office of Indian Education at the U.S. Department of Education and is the author of two bestselling novels, Firekeeper’s Daughter and Warrior Girl Unearthed. In today’s episode, Angeline and Annmarie talk about the need to protect and celebrate indigenous artifacts, cultures, and...

Born and raised in Northeast Ohio, Athena Dixon is a poet, essayist, and editor. She is the author of The Loneliness Files, The Incredible Shrinking Woman, and No God In This Room, winner of the Intersectional Midwest Chapbook Contest. In this episode, Annmarie and Athena talk about mental health, women who die alone, and how having loneliness in common might just be the connection we need to take better care of one another. Episode Sponsors: A Novel Idea – A community-minded bookstore and...

Olga Mecking is a writer, journalist, and translator based in the Netherlands, and she’s the reporter who made Niksen (“doing nothing”) go viral. Her New York Times article on the subject was shared over 100,000 times. In this episode, Annmarie and Olga talk about the health and creativity benefits of doing nothing and why it is that pauses, rests, and breaks too often feel out of reach for our overworked selves. Episode Sponsors: The American Book Center – Booksellers with a personal...

Prince Shakur’s debut memoir, When They Tell You to Be Good, is a political and personal exploration of his coming of age as a writer and activist. In this episode, Laura Maylene Walter talks to Prince Shakur about how race and identity shaped his formative years, how journaling providing him with a creative outlet, his experience with activism and protest, the challenges he faced in the publishing industry, and working with Hanif Abdurraqib as his editor at Tin House Books, and more. Follow...

Alejandro Varela is the author of THE TOWN OF BABYLON, a finalist for the National Book Award, and THE PEOPLE WHO REPORT MORE STRESS, which The New York Times called “a master class in analyzing the unspoken” and praised Varela for shedding light on complex societal problems with “seemingly effortless wit and empathy." Varela has a Master’s Degree in Public Health, and believes strongly in reparations, land back, a national health service, and a $36 minimum wage pegged to inflation. In this...

Lou-Andrea Callewaert was a chronically ill child who learned to write through her pain. She’s the author of I FELL IN LOVE WITH HOPE, the story of young hospital patients who support one another throughout their terminal diagnoses and promise to live fully for as long as they are able. Lou writes under the pen name Lancali, and in this episode, she and Annmarie talk about grief, horseback riding, and the necessity of clinging to hope even when it seems like there is no reason to do...

Vauhini Vara’s debut novel, THE IMMORTAL KING RAO, has been published around the world, is being adapted for television, and was a finalist for the Pulitzer Prize. She’s out now with a new story collection, THIS IS SALVAGED, which Lit Hub and Electric Literature named one of the most anticipated books of the year. In this episode, Annmarie and Vauhini talk about the opportunities and costs of technology, writing through grief, and how to use Battlestar Galactica to solve craft...

Karen Walrond is the author of THE LIGHTMAKER’S MANIFESTO and THE BEAUTY OF DIFFERENT, and she’s out now with a new book, RADIANT REBELLION, in which she urges all of us to reexamine the myths and celebrate more of the opportunities of growing older. In this episode, Karen and Annmarie talk about reclaiming aging, practicing joy, and how to take charge of our own stories as we walk, dance, and even hula hoop into the second half of our lives.  Episode Sponsors: Blue Willow Bookshop – A...

Christian Kiefer is the director of the low-residency MFA at Ashland University. He’s the author of The Infinite Tides, The Animals, and Phantoms which was one of Kirkus Reviews and the BBC’s Best Books of 2019. And he’s out with a new novel, THE HEART OF IT ALL. Christian is the recipient of a Pushcart Prize for his short fiction and has enjoyed a second career in music, releasing a number of albums primarily in the folk-rock and avant-garde traditions. In this episode, Annmarie and...

On Sept. 16, 2023, one of our beloved guests, Echo Brown, passed away. We were incredibly saddened by the news, this is for her. Echo Brown’s recent memoir, THE CHOSEN ONE, examines the opportunities and costs of an Ivy League education, and the obligation universities have to support and safeguard first-generation college students. Annmarie and Echo discuss inequity, community, and the need to be a promised land for one another. Additionally, Echo talks about her current health crisis and...

Jean Kwok immigrated from Hong Kong to Brooklyn when she was five, where she lived with her family in an unheated, roach-infested apartment.  Her 2010 book, GIRL IN TRANSLATION, is a fictionalized account of how Jean worked in a clothing factory for much of her childhood. She followed that with MAMBO IN CHINATOWN which echoed the three years that Jean worked as a professional ballroom dancer, and SEARCHING FOR SYLVIE LEE, which was an instant NYTimes bestseller and a Read with Jenna Book Club...

Saeed Jones is a Pushcart Prize-winning writer whose first collection of poetry, PRELUDE TO BRUISE, was a 2014 finalist for the National Book Critics Circle Award. His 2019 memoir, HOW WE FIGHT FOR OUR LIVES, won the Kirkus Prize for Nonfiction. And his second poetry collection, ALIVE AT THE END OF THE WORLD, is a 2023 winner of an Anisfield-Wolf Book Award, the only national juried prize for literature that confronts racism and explores diversity. In this episode, Annmarie and Saeed talk...

Heather Drago is the Founder and Chief Strategist of Clever Girl Marketing and the host of the That’s a Hard No podcast. A recent cancer survivor, Heather has been on a journey lately of turning down situations, experiences, and people who do not serve her. On today’s bonus episode, Annmarie and Heather discuss how to set healthy boundaries, saying NO, and what might be possible when we make a little more room for ourselves in these busy and hectic days. Learn more about your ad choices....

In both fiction and memoir, William Dameron writes about coming out as a gay man, and what it might look like to start again with a great love affair in the second half of life. Dameron is the award-winning author of THE LIE, A MEMOIR OF TWO MARRIAGES, CATFISHING & COMING OUT. His most recent project, THE WAY LIFE SHOULD BE, is a novel, and it’s out now. In this episode, Bill and Annmarie talk about second-chance love, the various delights of both fiction and nonfiction, and why Annmarie...

At the end of the Vietnam War, when Beth Nguyen was eight months old, she and her family fled Saigon for America, but Beth’s mother stayed behind. In this episode, Annmarie and Beth discuss OWNER OF A LONELY HEART, Beth’s recent memoir. They talk about the uncertainty of growing up without a strong tie to your biological mother, and the way other people can step in to fill that void. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Edan Lepucki is the author of three novels, including CALIFORNIA, WOMAN NO. 17, and her newest book, TIME’S MOUTH. In this week’s episode, Annmarie and Edan grapple with fleetingness and nostalgia. What if we could go back in time? What might be better? What might be worse? They also discuss parenting and how much raising children is itself a form of time-travel. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

justin a. reynolds always knew he wanted to be a writer, he even created his own book jacket when he was a kid. Fast forward and justin is an accomplished author whose debut novel, Opposite of Always, was a 2019 best seller. His most recent novel, House Party, is a novel in stories, written by ten different authors. In this episode, justin and Annamarie talk about wrangling authors, making the move with Marvel, and the best cereals of our childhood. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit...

As a journalist, Ruchira Gupta stumbled upon a disturbing story: girls were disappearing from villages and being sold into prostitution in the city. Determined, Ruchira set about dismantling sex trafficking across her home country of India and around the world. She testified before Indian Parliament and lobbied the United Nations. She kept asking questions, kept sitting down with families, and kept fighting. Ruchira started with a single story and now leads a global movement. In this episode,...